Winnie and Shirley are our vehicles. Winnie is a Saturn sedan, and Shirley is a Nissan Pickup, before they started giving them names besides “pickup.” We love them unto the ends of the earth, and it will be hard to say goodbye to them when the time comes. However, I don’t think that time will come soon. My best friend is a mechanic, and since I’m a member of his pack, he does all my labor for free. The reason for this is twofold:

1. Every time Volfe works on my truck, I am right behind him. I’ve learned how to reconnect batteries, how to change brake pads, and how to hold things, including coffee, cigarettes, wrenches, and anything else that will fit as he raises the hood to look underneath. Part of the reason my labor is free is that he’s slowly teaching me to do all of this stuff myself, so I won’t have to come to him forever. I am getting an education worth thousands, and just like Dana did for me when I started cooking, Volfe has taken me under his wing.
2. My relationship with my truck feels different now that I’m actually learning to work on it. I advocate that all people, at least once in their lives, learn to work on their own car. It’s not because it’s a useful skill, although it is. It’s that your perspective changes when you’re doing your own maintenance. It stops being “your vehicle,” and starts being your child or your puppy when you realize how much of your blood, sweat, and tears (great band, am I right?) have actually gone into taking care of him/her. My vehicles are normally boys, because I like boys’ names a tiny bit better, but Shirley just took me by surprise. She was a gift from my father, so I called her Shirley after the Biblical passage “Shirley goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life.” She has never let me down until today, but it wasn’t her fault. She has a bad battery and desperately needs a new one.

However, when Volfe and I get together, sometimes we work on Winnie, too. She’s the first car I ever did the brake pads all by myself, and the parts were only $22… which leads me to my next point. No labor is worth the exorbitant amount that you pay at a dealership for service. You know why? Because the labor rate is set by the body shop, and very little of it goes to the people who ACTUALLY work on your car. For instance, because my dad drives one, I know for sure that the labor rate at Lexus is about $90/hr.

IF YOU ARE POOR, IT’S WORTH IT.

I promise. Go to O’Reilly’s or AutoZone and pick up a Chilton manual for your car. If you are out of money and don’t have the funds for a new one, you might be able to pick up a used manual at Powell’s.

Believe me, if you don’t have money, this sort of thing will change your life. For instance, like I said, the brake pads were only $22 for the set. Things like speaker contacts are like, $6/box. It’s not the parts that are expensive, it’s the labor. And women, you have got to get interested in this stuff, because this is what will save you when you go to the dealership to buy a car. Of course, with new cars, this is not going to be much help. But do yourself a favor and buy a used car. There are many, many used cars in all different price points. The good part comes in when you, as a woman, can look at something and see whether it’s totally f’ed up or not. The sales guy is not expecting you to know that. I promise. So wait until he shows you the vanity mirrors and cupholders and then look at the engine. Then say something like, “how many miles on this truck before the starter usually craps out?” or something equally noxious and watch the car dealers swallow their teeth. God, it is so much fun.

In short, love the hell out of y0ur cars, because I do, and it has been one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done in my life. Especially as a computer geek, it means the world to me to be able to work with my hands and get out of my head for a while. How many hobbies can you take up like that which will REALLY save you money? I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter.

Do it anyway. Fall in love with your car. Learn his/her personality frontwards and backwards. It’s worth it.

Because you can replace brake pads for $22.

 

 

In November, when I moved to Portland, I wanted and needed everything to be different. I would lose myself in learning to navigate the culture, enthralled that there were so many life lessons to be learned.

Now that I’ve had some time to be immersed in such an unfamiliar environment, I’m ready for something to feel like “home.” Hell, I would settle for a day of being able to eat and drink what I wanted without being lectured by someone on the evils of whatever I was putting into my mouth… because in Portland, it’s not about fat grams and calories. It’s about making sure people know that what they’re eating is probably genetically modified or hormone enhanced and ragging them until they break down in paranoia and switch to organic.

I know all Portlanders are not like this, and it would be silly for me to assume that even a large margin of them are. However, the people I live with *are* “nutrinazis” and therefore give me a skewed view of the population at large. In short, I know the world is not out to get me everytime I pop open a Coke. It just feels that way to me because I’m not brave enough to retaliate by grinding beef into their TVP crumbles.

Sounds cruel, yes? Well, let me tell you more about what would lead me to such shenanigans. Tori and I were sitting at the kitchen table one day, having a conversation about this proposition in Oregon to require companies to label their food as genetically modified. I told her that I thought most all food was genetically modified, and that I preferred it to taking my chances with organic. I cited several news articles that I had read over the past few years on organic food which stated that organic food was actually worse for you than non-organic because if they don’t spray pesticides on the crops, then you’re taking the chance of getting whatever disease the local insects might be carrying. Tori quietly agrees with me, then when all her friends are over a few evenings later, she says, “Leslie, why don’t you tell us why you don’t eat organic food?” and just starts laughing like a fucking hyena. Yep, you could see it coming. She made me look like a total idiot in front of the only people I had met in Portland thus far. Not only that, then the entire room was trying to tell me that what I had heard was incorrect, that bugs don’t carry disease, you can wash off dirt, etc.

We’ve also run into issues over the compost jar. This is because I refuse to use it. I am extremely sensitive to strong smells, particularly bad ones. Logically, it makes sense to me that I should purposefully avoid situations that clearly reduce me to projectile vomiting… and we’ll leave it at that. To do a lengthy description of what a compost jar *is* and how one uses it would reduce me to- you guessed it- projectile vomiting. This is because, much like the sin structure in Catholocism, the memory of said smell is enough to make me ralph. The actual smell does not have to be present.

And on that note, I think I would like to open this forum to my readers. Have there been times where you’ve been the “stranger in a strange land?” What did you do to combat it?

I wrote you a note every day in seventh grade. I kept some of them, but I threw most of them away because I didn’t think you’d be interested in hearing about how Mr. Reeve had made fun of my t-shirt with Jesus on the front and Mr. Witkov said I was one of the best creative writers in the class and Mr. Schwerak said that I was doing a lot better in Life Science. I saved the best ones for Monday or Tuesday, because there was no one at the church and I could drop them in your choir folder before practice on Wednesday.

I loved Wednesdays. Even though I knew I wouldn’t see you until 6:15, when handbells started, I usually arrived around 5:00. I would walk from my house to the church and go down the outside steps to the basement so I could get a Coke before I went up to the empty sanctuary. I claimed that I was doing my homework, but sometimes I was talking to God. Sometimes I was practicing my trumpet. I was never really doing homework. I was too excited to concentrate because I knew I would see you soon.

You usually got to the church about 15 minutes before handbells was supposed to start, and that was my favorite part of my entire week, because you would sit next to me on the floor and you’d ask me about my day and I would ask you about yours. You gave the BEST hugs because you were big and I was little and you could wrap yourself around me so that I couldn’t see anything but your hair and I’d breathe in your perfume because you smelled so good. Sometimes, you’d give me the note you’d written to me while you were at your school, but since you only had to teach the classes you liked I wondered how you had time to write to me, because I always had Algebra.

I loved that you’d laugh and joke with me during rehearsal, and I thought it was so sweet when you’d put your elbow on my shoulder and lean your head onto your hand. I felt so important because you had the best voice in the choir and you were leaning on MY shoulder. When practice ended, I would walk you out to your car just so that I could hug you again, and as I walked home, I was jealous that I wasn’t old enough to drink margaritas at the Pecos Grill.

Remember when a big group of us from church came to see you in Carousel? I never told you that I slept through most of the second half because we were so high up. Luckily, I got to see it again and I was on the 4th row. I was so close that I could tell who you were even through your costume. I couldn’t believe I knew a REAL opera singer.

I sweated over what to get you for your birthday, because I wanted it to be really cool. I always thought it would be neat to get flowers in class, so I had my mom call the florist. When my mom asked me what I wanted to order, I knew exactly:

Leslie: I want one rosebud.

Mom: One rosebud? That’s it? Why don’t you give her some carnations or something to make her room look pretty?

Leslie: No, Mom. One rosebud. She’ll love it. I have this joke that I’m going to do that will make it all make sense.

Mom: What’s your joke?

Leslie: I’m going to sign the card, “for all you do, this bud’s for you.”

Mom: You watch too much television. At least get her a balloon or something.

Just to make sure that you knew I remembered your birthday, I called 104.1 KRBE because they always announced birthdays on their morning show. I’m sorry I forgot to ask if you listened to 104.1- but it’s the thought that counts, right?

I watched you sign your name once, and in seventh and eighth grade I would practice your signature in my notebooks. I had a very good reason for this. I thought that one day you were going to be famous and you would need me to help sign your CDs because you couldn’t possibly sign all twelve million by yourself. I got really, really good at it. So good at it, in fact, that one time I got back a math test that wasn’t very good and my teacher told me that I had to get it signed by a parent or guardian. It was then that I realized that being able to sign your name might come in handy for other reasons, too.

My birthday was great that year because you gave me a book of poetry that you had written. I loved its pages and pages of handwriting that bent the wrong way and I read it all, even though I didn’t really understand it. I wanted you to think I did, though. I started my own poetry journal, and I was embarrassed when I let you read it because it didn’t occur to me until after I’d handed it over that most of them were about you. My ears turned pink and I thought I was going to cry. I think you noticed because it didn’t take you long to hand it back.

When I was in eighth grade, somebody at church asked me if you were gay and I was embarrassed when I found out what it meant because I thought that if they thought you were gay, they might think I was gay, too. But it didn’t take me very long to decide that I loved you and if being near you made people think I was gay, it was all right with me. But I asked you if you were gay, just to be on the safe side. You told me that people say all sorts of things, but that didn’t mean they were all true… and in fact, someday people might say things about me, too. You made me laugh so hard when you said, “Leslie, you don’t get to be gay by hanging out with gay people any more than you can get Indian by hanging out with Indians.” I wasn’t sure that I knew any gay people, but I knew enough Indians to know that you were right.

After that, my mom told me that she didn’t think it was right for an adult to be friends with a kid. I bit my fingernails and waited in the parking lot while she talked to you after church, because I knew that she was telling you that she didn’t want you to talk to me anymore. I had to start going to and from choir practice with my mom so that there weren’t very many more of those talks before handbells. I got sneaky about when and where I would write notes for you and how you got them, and I was really happy when you got sneaky, too.

I was proud of you when you got into graduate school, but I was so sad when I learned that you were going to move. When I went to your goodbye concert, I thought I would never see you again and I cried big, alligator tears. In fact, I cried so hard that I couldn’t see and I was embarrassed and even though my mom told me I would regret it if I didn’t go, I wished I hadn’t come.

The choir helped you pack up your boxes and load them onto the truck, and I was so excited because it was the first time I got to go to your house… but my mom and dad were running late so we got there when the house was empty and you were getting ready to leave. We stood in a circle and prayed for your safety, and then you gave me one last hug before you got into the big truck. As I watched you drive away, I wondered if I’d given you my address so that you could give me yours when you got there, because maybe I could still write to you in math.

I didn’t want to start high school without you.

The summer before ninth grade was spent waiting for the mail. I had auditioned for High School for Performing and Visual Arts, so between waiting for the results and waiting for your letters so my mom wouldn’t see them, my schedule was pretty full. My boyfriend convinced me that I could leave the mail slot long enough to spend the weekend with him and his family in Galveston. That Saturday night, I lay next to him in a beach chair, and we shared our deepest secrets. I told him that I thought I was in love with you, but it didn’t really matter because you were probably too old for me and you didn’t live in Houston, anyway.

A few weeks later, my mom and dad took my sister and me on vacation close to where you lived. I didn’t know if I’d be able to see you, but we could at least talk to each other for free. I told you that I was gay. You told me that you were gay, but not in the way I expected. You told me that your “roommate” was actually your lover. My stomach dropped to the concrete. I was mad and again, embarrassed- partly because you had kept such a big secret from me, partly because IF you were going to have a girlfriend, I was the ONLY acceptable one, and partly because deep in my heart I knew that a teacher would never marry a ninth grader.

——————-

I don’t like to talk about money, but I will today. I think it’s very important that you guys know how hard I’m working to make this web site succeed. But for me to keep writing, I have to have donations to support myself. In Portland, everything is expensive… but at the same time, I don’t want to devalue my work, either. It’s important for me to have some validation that this could, eventually, turn into a career. I don’t think that my writing is necessarily good enough yet, but I use my web site as a training ground to workshop all my ideas. I see which ones stick and which ones don’t. I learn more about form, phrasing, and timing every single day. My readers are such an integral part of this blog that in some ways, I want you to own it. Putting your hard-earned dollars into my PayPal account is not only a way to clap me on the back. It’s to feel like it’s not just my web site. It’s ours.

The comments you’ve left have been so insightful and amazing that I want all of you to keep going. Keep with me, and let it start to feel like home. I encourage you to say whatever you want, whenever you want, even if it’s negative towards me or the writing itself. I’m a big girl. I can take it.

This blog is my blood, and I pour everything into it, because it is a teaching tool. You teach me every day, and trust me, I’m learning. So even if you just want to drop a dime in the box, know that that dime means more to me than rubies. Because I don’t need rubies to tell me that you’re reading. A dime says, “I’m thinking of you, and I appreciate you” all in one.

You are my miracle, the people that show up because you think my writing is worth reading.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for your dime.

At Diane’s concert last Friday I sat behind Alexis and Wendy, and they were having this conversation:

Wendy: Do you write poetry?
Alexis: Not well.

Wendy looked at me.

Leslie: I *think* I only have one or two good poems in me, and they’ve already been written.

And now, for your viewing pleasure, here they are.

Affinity- written for my high school girlfriend, Meag, just after reading an article on chemistry in the New Yorker.

In the right corner of the periodic table there lies,
next to einsteinium and francium,
a most unassuming little element. It does nothing
useful like oxygen or calcium, but do not let it’s
size predict it’s capabilities. It is called cesium,
and had I not stumbled upon the extremity of it’s plight,
I might never have known the depth of my own love for you.
Cesium is unpretentious in every way
except that it is the only element precisely one
electron short of equilibrium.
Much like I have spent my life looking for a soulmate,
cesium searches for the one element that will make it whole.
When the match is found, there is an explosion of heat and light,
a celebration of it’s completeness.

For cesium, there was fluorine. For me, there was you.
and the explosion of heat and light and
the joy of being complete.

untitled- I can’t remember exactly when I wrote this one, but I was embroiled in grief at the time.

Let me cry. Let the hurt
flow out of my body on the
waves of my tears. Let me
see the ablution take place
by blessing and releasing
the anger pent up inside.
Cleanse my spirit and make
pure the palate that paints
my emotions to the people who
experience them.

Let me scream, making my
angry voice heard far into the
night and long after dawn has
broken. Let the pain of my throat
replace the pain of my heart
for the physical pain is a
lesser evil. And after I have
vented my frustration, I will feel spent.
Let me sleep. Let me experience the
absolute peace that sleep may bring
and let me sense the calm rhythm
of my body releasing a thunderstorm.
Let me dream…

These poems were both written the summer after my senior year of high school, when I was young and angsty and into this sort of stuff. In fact, I wrote an entire pile of complete and utter crap anthology.

For some reason, Tori and Brianna have gotten on an extreme “let’s get a dog” kick. I remain indifferent. We had two little dogs that I loved and adored while we were living in Houston, but OH MY GOD WERE THEY A LOT OF WORK! Here is a typical morning dialog between Kathleen and I during that period:

alarm sounds in the background: Welcome to Morning Edition. I’m Bob Edwards. …and I’m Linda Wertheimer

Leslie: Kat, it’s time to get up and walk the dogs.
Kathleen: Could you take them? I walked them yesterday morning.
Leslie: I walked them yesterday afternoon. What’s your point?
Kathleen: It’s raining.
Leslie: It’s the Gulf Coast. It’s always raining.
Kathleen: Just let me sleep for five more minutes.
Leslie: The dogs are crossing their little legs as it is, sweetie.
Kathleen: Well, then. That should make you feel guilty enough to want to walk them yourself.
Leslie: hrmmmmph… All right. But you better be cooking breakfast by the time I get back.

Good times, good times. But don’t let me fool you into thinking that I was always the one to walk them. On alternate days we would have the exact same conversation in reverse. I think that there were three times where we got up and executed the original plan… which consisted of walking them together so that we could talk and plan our day at the same time. And that was in the first week that we got them.

Another problem I forsee is that all three of us have a different definition of “dog.” I’ve envisioned a little lapdog that is easy to walk and doesn’t require a whole lot of room (because honestly, the house isn’t THAT big). Brianna wants a dog that will accompany her while she’s running (which could probably be any kind, really). Tori has her heart set on a dalmatian (what the fuck is she *on*, anyway?).

If Brianna doesn’t care what kind of dog we get, I am *almost* willing to go out and get a little terrier or something just to circumvent Tori bringing home Satan’s favorite puppy a spotty dog. For those who aren’t in the know, dalmatians are poster children for hyperactivity- the antidog for three busy twentysomethings who just like the idea of having a dog in the house. And, of course, I know that all terriers are not created equally. I am not the type that would adopt a constant yapper just for spite.

In the meantime, I’ve just been playing rent-a-dog. It suits my lifestyle perfectly. Scootter and Anne have a boxer. Susan and Diane have a BBD (basic blonde dog). I go over and pet the dogs, walk them on a leash, and after about 30 minutes, take them home again.

In fact, I am the type of dog-loving friend that I hope I’ll have if I end up on the losing side of this argument. Takers?

This being the first time I’ve ever lived alone, tonight was the very first party I’ve ever hosted solo. It was a different vibe than the ones Kathleen and I used to host together, because my personality type (and my upbringing) would always preclude me from taking credit for anything. Since Kathleen was known in her family and mine as “Martha Stewart,” I tended to give her credit where I probably should have taken some. Tonight was wonderful for several reasons, but the most personal for me was realizing that I do have a knack for cooking, decorating, and being “hostess with the mostess.” (I love that this year has been about discovering myself, because I find out so much every day.)

I also need to give credit to my friends, who showed up with bottles of wine, candles, and other assorted housewarming presents. It was so thoughtful, and so in character for them, that I couldn’t help but think, “who wouldn’t want to cook for these people?” I made sure they were well taken care of with a pot of spaghetti with homemade marinara sauce and a roasted chicken. I figured whatever we didn’t eat could go in the fridge for soupmaking later. See! Isn’t that Martha of me? 🙂

Reminds me of the time my dad came to pick me up at Crossroads, a gay bookstore in Houston that is now defunct. When he walked in, he just CRACKED UP laughing, and I was sort of afraid to turn around and see what he was laughing at. I looked up, and there on display was a t-shirt that read, “I want to be Martha. The bitch can do everything.” Eventually, I went back and bought it for him. Yes, he wears it. No, he is not gay. He may, however, be slightly metrosexual.

It was so much fun showing my friends what my dad and I did with the place while he was here, but as I predicted earlier, it was Karen who had the most immediate reaction. She was the one who helped me move in, and she was the only one who saw it with only a dresser, a futon, and a few boxes. So the look on her face was priceless. I don’t remember the exact quote, but there was a lot of hugging and a lot of “OH MY GOD!”

This is not to say that Scootter, Ann, and Mary were not impressed. They just didn’t get to see the dramatic improvement that the new furniture brought. But again, there was a lot of hugging and a lot of “WOW! THIS IS SO COOL!”

As we sat down to dinner, I silently thanked my dad. We did such a good job in such a short amount of time while he was here, and I can’t imagine what my house would have looked like had he not stepped in and said, “why don’t I fly up there and we can get it all done at once?” There is another entity that deserves much praise, and that is Goodwill. I was able to make a functional apartment into home for just a few dollars. I got paintings and brass plates and flower boxes and a menorah. I mean, who COULDN’T live without a menorah? 🙂

As we sat down to dinner, the conversation was warm and a lot of fun. I love learning new things about the people around me- and this conversation did not disappoint. In our little group, three people had been to China, two to Viet Nam, all five to Europe, and one was a Fulbright Scholar for a summer.

After dinner, we retired to the living room, where we watched last night’s Christmas episode of The West Wing. Since four of us have been and are residents of the state of Oregon, it was particularly interesting to us since a good bit of it centered around our state’s right to die with dignity initiative.

During the show, I discovered the second hit of the evening: Tootsie Roll Caramel Apple Pops. By the time my guests left, there weren’t any in the basket… because someone, and I’m not sure who, stuffed a bunch in their pocket for the ride home.

Tonight was so much fun, and I couldn’t be more proud.

Editor’s Note 2013- This is my favorite story to tell IN LIFE.

—————————-

For our third anniversary, Kathleen planned a road trip from our home in Alexandria, Virginia, to a lesbian-owned bed and breakfast in New Hampshire (Their phone number? 1-800-Les-B-Inn. You can’t make that up, folks…). When we arrived, our room was decked out with a romance package that included sparkling cider, M-M’s, incense, and temporary tattoos (I definitely want to know who was on *that* committee. No, wait… the embarrassing part is that I was all like, “I’m going to put them on my skin and then try to get really tan before they wash off! Oy vey.). We spent the evening lounging about the place, swimming, hot tubbing, going out to eat, etc. By midnight we had *two* problems. The first was that the town we were in was so small that we’d seen everything there was to see. Twice. The second was that this trip was kind of a last ditch effort for Kat to reignite whatever it was she felt for me, and it wasn’t working. Once all the planned activities ran out, she went from being mildly annoyed to nitpicking everything about my presence and my person.

So I did what any self-respecting lesbian would have done in that situation. I called up my ex-girlfriend and asked her how far it was to her house, because I couldn’t handle the current one all by myself. And there was an alterior motive involved- Kathleen had never been outside of the country, and Meagan lived in CANADA. I might could save our trip by showing her something new and exciting- we could tool around Ottawa for a day, see the Parliament buildings, and successfully avoid an entire DAY of talking exclusively to one another.

So we called Meagan and her partner, Deah, and asked them if we could meet up for supper. But that plan had to be scratched because our figuring was off… it was actually closer to five hours to get there. When they asked us if we wanted to sleep over, I could see the relief in Kathleen’s eyes. She didn’t even care that she was losing the money she’d already paid to the hotel. It was worth it to her to have me completely wrapped up in something else besides, well, her.

We didn’t even have to set the alarm. By seven or eight, we were on the road, barreling toward all of the salvation Canada could offer. Meagan called somewhere around 9 or 10 and asked us where we were. I told her that we were almost to Montreal, and we were going to stop at Tim Horton’s for breakfast.

Meagan: You have to order a TimBit.
Leslie: What the fuck is a TimBit?

I wasn’t even going to try and play it cool like I did on our first “date.” Around Chrismastime of my senior year of high school, Meagan came to pick me up before school so that we could go to Starbuck’s. I had never been there before, and I ordered a Frappucino. Meagan was like, “are you sure?” Like an idiot, I answer “of course, I get them all the time…” THE DRINK WAS FROZEN. IT WAS DECEMBER. I WAS A COFFEE FUDGESICLE BY THE TIME WE GOT TO SCHOOL!

Meagan: You’re just going to have to trust me on this one.
Leslie: I thought we had established early on that that was NEVER A GOOD IDEA!

Ok, so Kathleen and I drive up to Tim Horton’s and I am instantly jealous that there is nothing like it within five minutes of my house in DC. We go in.

The illusion shatters. If the trip hadn’t been bad before, this is where it got a WHOLE LOT WORSE. I’d forgotten that Quebec is the only province in Canada where they don’t have to put signs in both French and English. The entire menu is in French. Not only do I not know what a TimBit is, I don’t know how to ask for one. I am standing there in a puddle of self pity. ALL I WANT IS A DONUT AND SOME COFFEE AND NOW I’M IN A FUCKING FOREIGN COUNTRY AND I CAN’T READ!

I go up to the counter. I ask for a TimBit and a large coffee in English. The woman points to the menu overhead. You can’t get one TimBit. The quantities and prices are scattered as if put there by someone with a killer hangover. I point to the one I want. I pay. It’s like ten dollars. I don’t care.

My order comes up, and all I see is this HUGE BOX. I have ordered ENOUGH FUCKING TIMBITS TO FEED THE ENTIRE CANADIAN ARMY, AND ALL THEIR SQUIRRELS.

We’re walking out of the restaurant, and I’m going to kill Meagan. All she had to say was, “it’s kind of like a donut hole, eh.” So I call her up. And she’s laughing hysterically. “Oh man,” she says. “I never should have done that to ya in Quebec.”

So by this time we’re both laughing and my bit of annoyance has passed. I tell her we’ll be there in a couple more hours and hang up.

“I wish you’d asked me for help,” says Kat. “I took French in high school.”

I replied, “Oh, I wish I’d known that, sweetheart…”

But I thought, “Friends help you move. REAL FRIENDS help you move bodies.”

—————————
***UPDATE***
—————————

Because this was originally written in 2005, I haven’t told you the best part of the story. A couple of years later, after Meag and Deah’s daughter was born, Deah and I schemed to get me into Canada without Meag knowing. I was supposed to come for Thanksgiving, but I bought the tickets for the wrong weekend due to not remembering it was a *revolving* Monday. As it turned out, I think it was better that way, because I got the girls all to myself. 🙂

Anywho, because Deah was a rock star, she showed up at the airport with the biggest fucking box of Timbits I have ever seen before or since. She hands it to me and I know instantly what this is about. I’m going to go and knock on the door with the same smile I had when she screwed me over at Timmy’s to begin with.

So we get there, and I knock.

Meagan comes to the door, as beautiful as I’ve always remembered her, and involuntarily, the Timbits just drop out of my hand and I run toward her. We hug so hard that it’s like a contest to see who can get the most life energy out of the other one. It is a magic moment, the one moment I am blessed to say there are no pictures. Because that look? The one of amazement and shock at seeing me for the first time in years? That was just for me, and it always will be.

“…and with a still small voice the other will tell you his/her name.
listen carefully. i watched it happen and it was good. clean, pure,
gentle, healing energy. you are more than you were 4 days ago and i am proud of you.”

– Dana Bamberger

———–

I just wanted her to look at my heart.

She’d done it to a friend of mine… looked at her heart and took away all the chords of energy that didn’t sustain her, that were just draining into a vacuum. I knew the same thing was happening to me, and in some cases, I thought I knew their names.

She came over around ten and had me lie face up on my bed. I got very nervous because in a lot of ways, it was starting to remind me of a medical procedure. She placed her hands over my abdomen, or root chakra.

I just wanted her to look at my heart, and now I knew that what she said might fundamentally change me.

She saw a memory. I was being reprimanded by a nursery school teacher. I was three. The teacher told me that I was too little, too small, too weak. I took it in, made it fit, and I have carried the belief that I was too small to handle or understand what was happening to me until that night.

That night when she reached inside me and ripped my old tapes to shreds… the old tapes that carried the message of my insignificance.

By the time she got to my heart, I knew what had been the undoing of every relationship I’d ever been in. I’d thought of myself as someone who needed protection, putting my partner in the role of parent/mentor and allowing them to occupy a position that they’d never asked for or wanted.

It was liberating to learn that I’m actually quite strong- perhaps I’d started to learn it long ago, but this energy work truly helped me to tap into the wealth of emotional resources I have at my disposal, the ones that I have generally spent on other people until now, because it was easier to give them away than to lift myself up.

I learned that I also have two angels that protect me, that sit at my shoulders. It is fitting that one is loud and obnoxious, and one is so shy that I haven’t even learned its name. It made me feel wonderful to know that I have two angels of my own, whereas before I’d called on Rafael, the angel of a friend of mine.

I am really not this woo-woo, this New Age. It’s actually a simple story. When Kathleen and I were divorcing and I was truly in the thick of it, my oldest friend called me and said, “I have a friend who has an angel named Rafael, and when she gets in big trouble, she pictures Rafael wrapping his arms around her and protecting her from all that’s hurting her. If there’s anything I want to give you during this time, it’s the image of angels wrapping their wings around you and letting you know how much you are loved.” During that time in my life, I called on Rafael quite a bit, and I knew for a fact that he did not mind.

But now that I have my own twin angels, Rafael can go back to his rightful owner. (Is that what you call someone who has a guardian angel? I’m really new at this.)

She erased my old tapes, she gave me my angels, and as a lovely parting gift, took a look at the names written on my heart. And while I am not sure how much of all this to believe, I woke up the next morning lighter than I had been in months. I felt ready to take on the world, rather than sitting there and waiting for it to come to me.

When the bowl exploded, raspberry Jell-o sprayed onto the range and started running down the front of the oven. Fear gripped me like a well-worn driving glove. “You should have known that bowl wasn’t safe to use on the stove,” said Kathleen. “Look at this mess!” I took out a dishcloth and started sopping up the boiling liquid. When she saw that I was not cleaning up the kitchen to her satisfaction, she ripped the towel out of my hands and continued her assault. “I’m not sure who it was that taught you how to cook, but that was a dumbass move on your part.” I noticed that she was now wiping the area that I had just cleaned. My humiliation was now complete.

I waited a long time for the embarrassment of the incidence to fade, for a lighthearted story to replace Kathleen’s anger at my moment of incompetence.

It’s been almost four years.

The raspberry Jell-o caper, as I now refer to it, has become important in my mind as one of the watershed moments of my marriage. The moment where I knew marriage was hard work. Kathleen’s anger was not just about the broken bowl and the messy kitchen. It was that both of those things tapped into her feeling that I was helpless when it came to running my own household and she felt like she had to parent me. My humiliation wasn’t about Jell-o, either. It tapped into my feelings of inadequacy because Kathleen was never content to let me make my own mistakes. Before I could really make them, she’d swoop in and “rescue” me. And at that point, I was not strong enough in myself to tell her to back off… that sometimes mistakes were necessary because you grew from them in order to stop making so many. I was also angry that she knew so well how to tap into my childhood emotions, pushing buttons so that in a matter of seconds I was reduced from fully-functioning adult to insolent child screaming “you’re not the boss of me.”

While that problem was infinitely more fixable than some of our others, the bottom line was that we partnered way too long before either of us knew who we were and how we would react to being in a serious relationship… which is why hearing that one of my friends is planning to move to Phoenix to be with his girlfriend and her two children is causing me more anxiety than joy.

I’m happy that he’s found someone to love, someone who brings him so much happiness. But I fear for him, too. I worry that he is in the same place I was when Kathleen and I started our partnership- deliriously happy to have found each other and naïve enough to believe that if we just loved each other enough, all our worries would work themselves out.

This is another unfinished entry… one of those where I just needed to think my way through this. I want to be supportive, but I also want to be authentic, because to me, sugar-coating the reality of marriage is what gets people into trouble in the first place. It’s a little too late to be voicing too many concerns, though. He leaves next week. I think the best thing I can do is to be there if he needs me, and not worry too much about trying to rescue him the same way Kathleen tried to rescue me. After all, it taught me some of life’s most important lessons.

It’s 11:46 AM. I’m already running late. I usually start writing early in the morning so that I’m free for the rest of the day. This morning, I had the worst kind of hangover in the entire world- the Benadryl grog. If I hadn’t needed such a good night’s sleep last night, I wouldn’t have bothered with it. But as you can imagine, I’ve got so much going on in my brain that it usually takes a sleeping pill to get it to stop. The negative part is that when I woke up, it was like swimming in hospital Jell-o.

I just realized I haven’t had any caffeine today. Let me start the coffee pot, and I’ll be right back. Hold please.

————————-

Ok, so the coffee is brewing, so I know I will feel much better in about 15 minutes. This morning, I’m drinking a blend I made to save money, and it’s working out really well. I bought a pound of Three Regions blend at Starbucks, then I emptied it into a half-full bucket of Folger’s Black Pearl (incidentally, this is, in my opinion, the greatest cheap coffee ever made. OF COURSE if I pay $15/lb I’m going to get great coffee. But it is seriously amazing when you can get good coffee at 2lbs for about $12. And, as you can see, it fits in with other coffees just fine.

That’s one of my big cooking things- buy cheap, serve expensive. See, if it can’t be expensive coffee, at least make sure it’s the best brand you like for the price you’re going to pay. Think of how cheap dishes like coq au vin can be if you buy cheap wine, cheap chicken pieces, and just let them simmer for HOURS. If you can tell that I didn’t pay top dollar for every ingredient, I would be shocked. The most amazing thing about cooking is not filet mignon. It is taking something someone would write off and making it beautiful.

God, I still don’t want to write today.

Shirley and I should be hauling ass toward the Columbia River Gorge with a journal and a pencil. Today is certainly the day for it. I might be tempted to want to write, then. But today, I’m tapped out. I got nothin’. You’re just going to have to fumble the ball with me until I manage to throw a Hail Mary pass into the end zone and win one for the Gipper.

I went to the Dollar Store recently, and usually at the checkout they offer to give a toy to a kid in need if you’ll donate one. So, I’m standing in the checkout line, and the checker says, “woriboiewep?” I’m paraphrasing. She didn’t say that, it’s just what I heard. I automatically said yes, because I thought it was the toy thing. Turned out, she wanted to know if I wanted to buy a dancing sunflower. Dana put it on the coffee table in front of the sliding glass door, and the cats are watching it as if it were Breaking Bad. Apparently, it is appointment television with them. I don’t get cats. But whatever.

Technically, the cats have two TVs. The sunflower, and my goldfish tank. I love my goldfish tank. It is one of my prized possessions. The reason I keep goldfish is that they’re completely fucking nasty fish. They create a lot of waste and you have to clean the tank constantly. But at the same time, they don’t require a water heater, they eat next to nothing, and they’re happy pretty much all the time as long as the bubble pad is plugged in. The fish have the classic “Finding Nemo” personalities. They like to swim toward the bottom of the pad and just ride up, like it’s a Bubblevator.

Yesterday, Dana was in a funk so we decided to get outside and get some air. We’d taken Shirley’s battery out so that we could charge it, so first order of business was to get Shirley squared away and purring. When that was accomplished, we decided to go for a drive to make sure everything was humming smoothly.

We passed a graveyard, and looked at each other. We love graveyards due to the funny things that have happened to us in them, like the time we went to find Dana’s ancestors at Beth Israel so we could take pictures and the sky opened up and dumped snow on us up to our knees. I’ll take credit for that one. It was slightly snowing at our house, so I thought it would be cool if we went to the cemetery because we’d get pictures of the head stones “lightly dusted with snow.” Apparently, I haven’t lived in Portland long enough to realize what a stupid idea it was to begin with. We live on the SE side of Portland. Beth Israel is on the west side. If you live here, you’re starting to get the picture. If you don’t live here, SW Portland is at a much, much, much higher elevation.

#dumbassattack

So, anyway, yesterday it was nice and sunny while we were driving, and we passed an old cemetery. Dana said, “OH! That one is pretty old.” I asked her if we should turn around, and she debated in her head. When she gave me the okay, we turned around and drove into the cemetery itself, parking in the sunshine so that the car would stay warm inside while we looked around. The reason we did this is that in Portland, there’s really no warning that it’s about to get cold. Basically, as soon as the sun goes down, it will either stay nice, or it will drop 30 degrees in the same day. It was late afternoon, and we didn’t know how the weather was going to go. We’ve never seen Sybill.

We actually went to the cemetery on purpose, because our friends Greg & Alexis lost their twin girls about two weeks after they were born, due to a rare genetic disease. Since the cemetery itself was pretty close to their house, we thought it was plausible that the girls were buried there and we could go pay our respects. We looked for about two hours before coming to the conclusion that we were in the wrong place. We decided that we would message Greg when we got home so that next time, we’d be in the right place along with our hearts.

That being said, this cemetery was awful. The old headstones from the 1800s were cool, and we sat in front of them for a long time. But something strange is afoot at the Circle K when it comes to modern headstones. We actually saw a child’s grave with a photo of him airbrushed on the front. It even said “Old Navy” on his hoodie. We also saw airbrushes that were really fucking creepy because the airbrush was in color and the art wasn’t very good. Seriously, folks, if you find yourself in need of an airbrushed headstone, HOLD IN THE URGE. Again, it’s creepy and the airbrush doesn’t look so much like a portrait, it kind of looks like a portrait tattoo, with about that much talent.

I told Dana that when I die, I want to be cremated and put into the earth, which is about as legal a “green funeral” as you’re going to get. However, I still want a headstone so that people have a place to come and see me if they so desire. I think it would be cool if after I’m dead, you’d drop by to say hello. By then I’m sure there will be some kind of electronic device inside so that I can say hello, I can wave my arms at you, and yell, “I’m TRAPPED! LET ME OUT!” I am just that kind of evil/awesome. Or how ’bout a digital photo frame? That’d be really cool. You can sit at my headstone and cry, even though I won’t be there, because there I am, larger than life, letting you remember what an angel/douchebag I was.

I know I’m a douchebag, and I’m not offended by that. I call myself that a lot, because getting caught in deep snow isn’t the first dumbass attack I’ve ever had. In fact, I think it comes in at about four million.

Like today.

God, I didn’t want to write today.

 

At various times in my life, I have been:

• a preacher’s kid
• a teen who actually went to youth group
• a youth pastor
• a children’s choir assistant
• lay preacher
• other duties as assigned

Those are my qualifications for helping you pick a church. I don’t have any letters behind my name, I’m not ordained, and I have no forward motion on either at this time. So if you pick a church based on what I say and it’s the wrong one? Sorry. No refunds.

The disclaimer is now in place. Let us sally forth.

1. Get to Know the Major Denominations
   1. Don’t even think about church shopping unless you’ve done some Internet research, because you don’t want this to happen to you. The setup for the story is that my church, Bridgeport United Church of Christ, is extraordinarily liberal. Across the street is a UCC church that’s mega-conservative. I think they might handle snakes in there, but I’ve never been, so I can’t say for sure (That’s another thing you need to know about church denominations- in some denominations, everyone believes the same thing. In others, each individual church can believe whatever it wants). We thought it was a little odd that a black family dressed to the nines came to our church one morning, and it wasn’t because they were black. It’s that we were all in shorts and t-shirts and their little girl is in the laciest, frilliest frock you can imagine, complete with big damn hat. They sit down without incident, but I noticed that they looked a little green by the middle. We’d just had a rash of gay marriages because back then, the state was issuing licenses to gay people. We celebrated gay weddings in church, and the black family in all their Easter regalia (in July) stood up and walked out. They had walked into the wrong church! It has always been my hope that the family would find their way back to us, because it would have been so fun to have more children. But at the same time, you just can’t go to a church that doesn’t line up with what you believe.
2. Decide Whether It’s Long Term
   1. Once you get to a church, take a few weeks and really think about whether this is a relationship you could see continuing until you’re dead, because a) that’s a long-ass time b) you’re not going to be in the same place in your life for your whole life. If the church you’re in is Definitely. Not. It., do not waste another minute. What you’re looking for is a church that will allow you to grow. If you’re single, you want a place where eventually you can take your partner and kids, where you all have a relationship to a community. Life is long. Choose wisely.
      1. But don’t misunderstand me. If things get rough, even at a church you like, there’s no shame in leaving. People come and go to church for different reasons, and pastors get upset sometimes, but who’s the most important person in this equation? YOU! You’re the one giving your prayers, presents, gifts, and service (Methodist shout-out alert!) and a lot of the time, your hard-earned dollars. Don’t forget- the church never has you over a barrel, but it will sometimes feel that way if you decide to join any committees.
      2. Don’t join any committees.
3. Do You Have Children?
   1. One thing that a lot of pastors struggle with is how to grow a church, because out of all the pastors I’ve talked to, not one of them had ever had a class in seminary on how to do just that. My dad’s experience, passed on to me, is that the easiest way to get adults to come to church is to get kids to come to church first. Families don’t come back to churches that don’t have good kids’ programs, because the whole point of the exercise was to raise their kid in a church, anyway.
   2. If you already have children, but do not have a church, the easiest way to find one is to find out where your kid’s classmates go. It will be less intimidating for them because they will already know people when they get there. Just make sure that you’re going there because you can also support the church- you’re not sending them to snake handlers just because it’s all the rage at Gymboree.
4. Join Committees! Have MEETINGS!
   1. If, however, you have been at a church long enough to know how it works, then get involved. I would say don’t do ANYTHING for the first six months to a year. You know why? Because the biggest mistake that people make when joining a church is getting involved in everything because they want to plug in SO BAD! You know why that’s a bad idea? Because that will last about six months before you’re completely burned out and you’ll leave, anyway. It’s sad, but it’s true.
5. Accept the Responsibility of Going to Church
   1. You don’t go to church to “learn about God and stuff,” although that’s part of it. I would say that church is 20% about learning your own theology and 80% about learning to work with people that you don’t like. Going to church is HARD when you don’t like someone, and it’s so tempting to just stay home. But it’s true. Most of the time, when people don’t come back to church, it’s because they’re avoiding someone. I won’t lie. I’ve done it. And I’m betting you have, too. Rise above it and put your big girl panties on. Your church is your community of faith, whether you’re on top of the world or have a Chevrolet’s weight in anxiety on your chest.
6. That Sounds Really Crappy, Thanks, Leslie
   1. Here’s the thing. Church is as wonderful as you make it. I’m just telling you the truth about what happens inside them. Do not forget that even though you are in the house of God, it’s still filled with humans. But it’s our humanness and our messy lives and our outrageous fights and all of those things that MAKE US DIVINE, like the Velveteen Rabbit at the end of the book. Love makes us real.

Amen.

Dear Straight Women,

I love you so much. You’re the ones that are the most fun to gaze upon because we both know it’s not going anywhere and you’re just eye candy. Dana appreciates this, too, as you can imagine. To have a little bit of flirty fun is just confidence-building, and you, ladies, are REALLY GOOD AT IT. When you turn on the same charms for me that you do for the men you’re trying to impress, you make me blush from my hair to my toenails, but that doesn’t mean it’s not fun. Plus, you get the added comedic bonus of me standing there like a jackass, mouth open because I can’t believe what you just said. Some of you are relentless, because you know it’s not going anywhere, either.

In short, straight women, I love you because if I didn’t have you, my self-esteem would be so much lower.

There are a few things, though, that you need to know about lesbians.

Do not go to Phase II.

Don’t lie to me. You do it. You want to see if you can get a “rise” out of me, and you can. Tread carefully. You wouldn’t throw yourself at a man, so don’t throw yourself at me, even if it’s a “joke.” As you can see from my blog, I have no qualms about disguising your name and calling you out on the carpet about it. There are too many women who have had their hearts broken over “jokes” and experimentation that for you, wasn’t really real. For us, it most certainly is.

When I was in college, I fell hard for someone that took me on a roller coaster. Straight, but wanted to date me anyway just for the experience of having dated a woman. The problem was that she left out that part of it when she was coming on strong.

So we dated for a while, until this happened. We’d been together long enough that we both wanted to have sex. So we did.

And the next day, she dumped me and said that what WE did wasn’t real sex.

Do you hear me, straight women? Don’t fuck with lesbians. Our emotions run deep and you can fracture us easily.

Now do you know what I mean by Phase II? Tell me that I’m hot, but don’t take it so far that my body responds whether you’re straight or not. BECAUSE IT WILL. I am only human, and you are gorgeous. Not that I would even entertain the idea of an affair, mind you, because Dana is so much woman that I can’t handle any more.

But the point has been made. Lesbians are weird creatures in that (from what I’ve noticed) they walk around with their hearts on their sleeves, or worse, are just one big walking nerve, especially when they’ve just broken up with someone.

And that’s the whole point. When you laugh and joke with us, we love it. But if your flirting becomes serious, emotions will start to get involved, and I don’t know about you, but when emotions get involved, I am no longer Leslie, confident woman. I am Leslie, a big puddle of goo on the floor.

In short, don’t take it too far. Let me revel in the splendor of eye candy, and then let me let you walk away slowly.

Because I love you.

Sincerely, Leslie

During the summer of 1994, my family moved from the city of Houston to one of its most tony suburbs, Sugar Land. Though the move was entirely because my father had been appointed as senior pastor at Christ United Methodist Church, it seemed as if this move had been granted by God just for me.

Right up until we got there.

It wasn’t so much that I was unhappy, because I wasn’t. I just knew that I wasn’t going to fit in. For starters, I had just finished two years in a performing arts high school with musicians, dancers, artists, and actors that were among the best in the country. My mentor was an opera singer. It was a culture that few, if any, of the teens at Christ Church had been exposed to.

It was also a different type of church. I don’t really know how to describe it other than to say that it was one of those “yay God!” types… where people are just so happy to be in the service of the Lord and even happier to tell you about the good work that they’re doing at top volume while ignoring all issues of personal space.

In spite of this, though, I really did make the best of it… and I have Mikal Bowman to thank.

One year younger and three inches taller, Mikal was a force to be reckoned with. She had gone to the church long enough to know the ropes, and even had her own personal nickname for it: “Christ United Methodist Country Club.” Within the first couple of weeks, she had lovingly given me a nickname as well: “Ugly.” I wasn’t offended. She only called people that if she really liked them.

Throughout the summer, Mike and I were inseparable… except when she would go and hang out with her friend Meagan Atkinson. I couldn’t help it. I was jealous. I didn’t even know Meagan, but I thought, “Hey! I just moved here. Surely Meagan has more friends than me. Why does she have to do things with MY friend?” Looking back on it, I realize that I was far too trusting. It didn’t occur to me to think it was weird that Mikal never invited me to meet her other friends and include me in the group.

But that is another posting entirely. The highlight of the summer was when Mikal, another friend of ours named Sara, and I all went to Reynosa, Mexico. We were going to teach Bible School.

Yeah. Right.

My Spanish vocabulary was equal to that of your average Mexican first grader. The only thing that got me through the week was knowing that everyone *attending* the Bible School knew it, too, and didn’t harass me about it. In fact, I have now come to believe that however little Spanish I knew was still more than most of the others on the trip… which is how *I* got elected to “give my testimony” at one of the Mexican worship services.

To know how utterly ridiculous this was, you have to realize that although the church I attended was a “Yay, God” sort of place, I am not a “Yay, God” sort of person. For me to get up in front of a group and talk about how God was changing my life was the antithesis, to me, of what Christ taught. You’re not supposed to get up in front of people- you’re just supposed to live by example and leave it at that. However, I reasoned that trying to get out of it would involve more Spanish than getting the damn thing over with, so with fear and trepidation, I walked to the front of the church.

“Dios es llame me… trabajar… con los ninos.”
(God is calls me to work with the children.)

“Yo tengo amor para la iglesia y los ninos.”
(I have love for the church and the children.)

At this point, I knew that I had pretty much run out of things to say… but that had never stopped me before. So I started over.

“Dios es llame me… trabajar… con los ninos.”
(God is calls me to work with the children.)

I looked out over the crowd. Mikal caught my eye. Her look clearly said, “wrap this thing up before you embarrass the crap out of yourself.”

“Dios te bendiga.”
(God bless you.)

I sat down next to my friend. She leaned in close. “That was the worst piece of crap I’ve ever heard in my life.”

I met Janie Spahr for the first time in 1997, while attending a More Light conference being held in Portland. Trying to describe that first meeting is difficult, because when you meet Janie Spahr, you are not just meeting a person. You are meeting an event.

When she is with you, it is likely that you will forget anyone else is in the room. When Janie speaks in front of a group, it is as if the air in the room changes… electrifies somehow… so that you walk away changed from the experience, wondering how so much grace, power, and gravitas can live in one woman.

Five years later, I was in Lambda Rising bookstore when I came across a picture of Janie, standing in a church, holding her arms up in benediction. My eyes reveled at the caption: “Dr. Jane A. Spahr at Westminster Presbyterian Church, Washington, DC.” I couldn’t contain my excitement. I turned a few pages, and there was Susan Leo in the same church. I called out to my partner, “LEENIE! We *have* to go to this church!!!”

Kathleen and I had been looking for a place to attend church for a while, and were starting to become tired with the process. We had so little alone time as it was that the call of being spiritual was starting to weaken in light of staying in bed, holding each other close, and the joyful alleluias inherent within. So we would go to Westminster, but it would have to be something pretty special to get us to stay.

The first thing that tipped us off to the fact that it was kind of different was the use of coffee and muffins for communion. Ruth, one of the pastors, came up to us after the service was over and said, “I hope you don’t mind that we didn’t use grape juice.” “Oh, no,” I said. “Coffee is often a life-giving substance for me.” She laughed and said, “boy… are you going to fit right in….”

And we did. Kathleen joined a class to learn how to make stained glass, I joined the choir, we both helped to grout the labyrinth being tiled into the floor, and most of all- we made friends in the process.

Somewhere along the line (I think it was Good Friday), I was asked to sing a hymn from behind the partition that separated the choir from the congregation so that no one would know where the voice was coming from. It would have been a beautiful effect, except that when I slipped up into the choir loft, I didn’t realize that I had forgotten my hymnal.

Panicking, I called out to Kathleen. She managed to get me a book without being seen. I said a quiet prayer to God for sending me this wonderful woman. “Where would I be without her?” I thought to myself. Relieved, I sat back in the dark sanctuary to enjoy the service.

A few seconds before the appointed time, I started flipping through the book, looking for the hymn I was supposed to sing. My beautiful, wonderful, angelic wife had slipped up to the choir loft and given me a bible.

I would have been completely screwed if I hadn’t remembered that this hymn was only sung once a year, anyway, so I could probably make something up and get away with it.

I stood up to sing…

What wondrous love is this

O my soul, O my soul

What wondrous love is this

O my soul

What wondrous love is this

What wondrous love is this

What wondrous love is this

O my soullllllll……