Tom Petty and My Dad

     My dad listened to country music. The twang-ier the better. As a kid, I didn't care much. I sang along to a lot of the songs and didn't think too much about it until a certain teenage boy introduced his baby sister to the wonder and joy of Metallica and AC/DC. I had several older siblings with an eclectic array of music playing in their cars, and my musical horizons expanded and at some point, I could barely stand to be in the same car as my dad's music, let alone listen to him croon along with the words. I turned sixteen in the winter, and when I got my driver's license, I didn't do a lot of driving 'for pleasure'. To school and back. Maybe to the grocery store if it wasn't icy. But the following spring, freedom was waiting behind the wheel of my dad's red Chevy S-10 with a topper on the back.

     My dad and I struggled for common ground quite a bit. We loved each other, but we didn't really understand each other. He was practical and went to work and came home and mowed the yard and expected his youngest to follow the rules and be home on time and do the dishes. I was sixteen and a girl. I was about discovering who I was and the world outside 538 West 10th and I could not give a rip about dishes. (But you better believe I did them!) He was a good guy. We just didn't always speak the same language.  If I asked for $5 for gas, most often he handed me a ten. Five dollars was enough to 'cruise the square' all night.  Ten was enough to  'cruise the square' all night, and get yourself a pop and (if my brother's friends were around or the right guy was working at the gas station) a pack of cigarettes.

     Once I asked my dad to borrow the truck to go out, and he told me that I could use it if I gave him a ride to work and put gas in. Then he handed me a twenty and told me that he needed to leave early to make a stop at the Warehouse before work. On our way to the truck, he tossed the keys and said, you can drive. This was an unusual situation, and I was nervous but I hopped in and carefully buckled my seatbelt, assuming it was some kind of test. I mean, I had passed the driver's test, but had I passed the Dad test? When I started the truck, I automatically changed the radio station, which visibly irritated him, but Tom Petty was coming out of the speakers, "You Don't Know How It Feels" was a bit of an anthem for me, as I was in a misunderstood, angst-y frame of mind. So I asked him to listen to the song, hoping to send him a message. I think I lost him at "Let's get to the point, let's roll another joint..." But he didn't change the station. When it was over, I said something like, "Isn't that a great song!?" and He responded with a shrug and said, "I didn't hate it as much as some of the shit you usually listen to. And change my radio back to my station when you get home."

     It wasn't exactly a rave review, but I felt like I had made my point. He didn't know what it was like to be a sixteen year old girl, but in all fairness, I didn't know what it was like to be a 48 year old father, husband, and grandfather.

     Later that evening, I pulled into the gas station and grabbed that crisp twenty and bought myself a fountain pop, which, upon leaving, I set on the roof the truck so I could dig my lighter and cigarettes out of their hiding place. Then I promptly drove away, and the pop when sliding down and cascaded over the windshield, and into the open window. Not the best start to an evening out. Some time later, I smelled something strange, and the truck wasn't running the best but I remembered that I was supposed to have put gas in, so I pulled up to the pumps at a different gas station (I'm no glutton for embarrassment!) and pumped five dollars worth of gas. Surely that would fix the problem. I picked up my dad at eleven that night. When he came out of the jail (where he worked! Not where he was incarcerated!) , he found his truck overheating, covered in Dr. Pepper, and Tom Petty's American Girl blaring from the stereo. He, believe it or not, was even less impressed with this situation than he had been with the earlier song review. I distinctly remember a vein appearing down the side of this forehead. "DON'T YOU BOTHER TO LOOK AT THE GAGES!?"

"I promise to start looking at them right now, Dad!"

"JESUS HOLY CHRIST, JENNIFER!"

*Oh, yeah, alright. Take it easy, baby, make it last all night! She was, an AMERICAN GIRL!*

"MAYBE IF YOU TURNED DOWN THE RADIO, YOU COULD HEAR MY TRUCK BLOWING UP???"

"Good tip. Will do!"

He had to have my brother in law help him replace the head gasket. And the door remained a little bit sticky for as long as he owned that truck. Plus, he found my secret cigarette stash and I never found out what he did with them, but I would be willing to bet that he smoked them, one after the other, while he watched his engine smoke in the driveway.

    Twenty-five-ish years later, I sat by his stone at the cemetery where he is buried. I don't often feel connected to him there. When I was young, I visited the grave of my mother and felt comforted because that is the only place I remember her being. With my dad, it was different. I remember him being at home. I remember him being outside in the swing, I remember him almost everywhere except a cemetery down a gravel road on the outskirts of a town I don't really know. So, often, when I sit with his stone, I try to connect by talking.  "Well, dad, as I'm sure you know, things are ok. I'm kind of struggling with some things and I'm wondering we ever get to figure this 'life' thing out, or if we just have to keep guessing?"

 I didn't get an answer from the trees, or the granite. But when I got in my car, Tom Petty was singing, "The waiting is the hardest part, every day you see one more card, you take it on faith, you take it to the heart. The waiting is the hardest part."

     I'm taking it on faith that when I asked dad a question, he answered me in a way he knew I would hear.

Of Eyebrows and Deep Thoughts

     I've got a lot on my mind, and bedtime is looming.
     I grew up in a family with a lot of 'steps' and 'halves' and such. There weren't many of us that did things in the order that we were taught was correct. A lot of babies before marriage and divorce, and remarriage and his kids and her kids and their kids. When I was a kid, it didn't occur to me to care, or notice. It was what it was. These were the people I loved. When I started to get older, I started to recognize a gap. A difference, of some kind. It took a long time to put my finger on it. And a lot of heartache, and in truth, a lot of therapy, to learn that people don't necessarily love you the same way you love them. If you're reading this, and you already know that, count yourself lucky. If you didn't know that....first, I am sorry to break the news, and second, it's ok. You'll learn to live with it. You'll find the people who love you beyond measure, and you'll find yourself outside the bounds of what I will refer to as 'obligation' and you'll be ok. But it isn't easy. For a very long time, I enacted my right to remain silent. I wordlessly hoped against hope that these people who formed me would confirm for me that I was worthy of their love. Then, my dad died. and what I THOUGHT were slight gaps turned into great, dark, deep canyons. So I found myself grieving the loss of my father, and the loss of the relationships with others who also loved him. It was a complicated time.
     At some point, after the revelation that not everyone I had spent a lifetime loving, loved me the same way, there was an accident. It was very scary, because it happened to someone that I love deeply and have a damaged but manageable relationship with. We were called to a hospital, and I spent a long drive wondering if the relationship had reached a point that we could both be satisfied and at peace with one another.
     I was surrounded by people who love this person, who have very different relationships with each other, and with me. All of them, I have known for as long as I can remember, but age had given me a different pair of glasses with which to view them. I sat in the waiting room, surrounded by these people who were present because of love, but not necessarily love for each other. Or, maybe we all had love in common, but there wasn't a lot of "like" to go around? It was a bizarre setting. Uncomfortable and caffeine fueled silences lingered. Some of us on one side of the room, some of us deliberately on the other, almost all women.
     At approximately 3am, a woman from the other side called to me as I stirred sugar and creamer into my coffee. "Jennifer? Is that your natural hair color?"
     And, after a long sip of my too hot coffee, I responded, "No. Are those your natural eyebrows?" (Spoiler Alert: They were definitely, definitively,  NOT her natural eyebrows.)
     The lone man in the room immediately got up and headed for the elevators.
     I don't know where it came from. It was a word burp that, had I been rested and not on the verge of experiencing a caffeine overdose, I would have chocked back down. But there it was. So, I sat back down and grabbed my phone, thinking that it would be smart to start recording, because I was about to be killed and my children would someday want evidence, that YES, their mother was stupid enough to pick a fight with a pride of lionesses.
     I wish I could tell you that I remember what happened after that. I don't. It's not because somebody knocked me out with their purse. I just....don't know. Sooner or later, a doctor came in to tell us that the accident had been severe, and recovery would be long, but would happen. Sooner or later, I left that waiting room. Sooner or later, I left that hospital.
     This morning, while I was getting ready for work, for some reason, the whole scene replayed in my mind. I have no idea why. I've been thinking, on and off, all day about it. Am I sorry? Possibly. Am I as sorry as I should be? Probably not.
     What had really and truly happened that very early morning, was that I stopped being silent. I stopped considering the feelings of people who hadn't, probably ever, stopped to consider MY feelings. It was equal parts liberating, and terrifying. So, tonight, I am thinking that perhaps it is time that I, once again, revisit my silence?
     I write a lot of things that I don't share. I don't share out of consideration for folks who may read my words and recognize themselves in the pages. Maybe it's good. Maybe it's bad. But maybe it's also time to honor what truly makes my heart happy. So. If, in the coming weeks, you find yourself among words I have written on this blog....I promise to change the names to protect the guilty. Unless it's me. Then, I promise to own it.

Teaching Under Fire

     Well! Things have certainly gotten.....interesting, haven't they? 

     It's Monday. There are currently 18 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Nebraska. Zoe's school has closed for what we hope is two weeks. Supplies are flying off shelves. We're smack dab in the middle of the strangest time, my brain has never been this happy to play it's favorite game of Worst Case Scenario. I spent my weekend furiously updating websites. I went to bed last night and I couldn't sleep.

     I went into work early today at the request of the director. We've implemented new procedures at drop off that require staff and I was torn between wanting to stay safely ensconced in my house under my blankie, Googling, or if I wanted to get out into the world and see if everyone else seemed as shell-shocked as I feel. I couldn't make up my mind, even as I pulled into the parking lot. 

    As it turns out, it was pretty much business as usual. Do you want to know why? Three year old's don't much care about COVID-19. Three year old's care about toys, snacks, and who is the morning helper. We washed our hands more than typical. We talked about germs and where they like to hide at Circle Time. We created an obstacle course out of packages of extra toilet paper. We made shamrocks and rainbows and read a book about a Leprechaun. We carried on. Preschoolers help keep your feet on the ground. When you ask a preschooler where germs like to hide, they might say something like, "Down your pants." and it will drag you back to reality and make you giggle and try your hardest to find a way to say, "Yes, that's true. Please keep your hands out of your pants" while also trying to figure out what choices you made in your life that led you to a moment where you have to say things like that on a pretty regular basis. 

     I don't know what tomorrow is going to bring. I don't know anyone who does. But I know this, tomorrow, I will go to work, and I will be happy to see all of my daycare babies, and I will worry about who isn't there, and I will worry about the ones that are there who have a little cough. And I will carry on, business as usual, because there is no crying in baseball, and no social distancing in daycare. I will wash my hands and I will wipe their noses and I will remind them to cough into their elbows and that we should be keeping our hands to ourselves. (Not just because of a virus.) 

      If you're stressing, I encourage you to remember what your friendly neighborhood childcare provider is telling your children. 

1. Wash Your Hands.

2. Don't touch that. Or that. Or that, either.

3. Kleenex, not fingers.

4. Pick that up off the floor and put it in the trash, please.

5. We need to use nice words to our friends. 

6. Sharing is caring.

Have a good one. Stay safe out there.