Ramona Quimby, My First Love.

I'm linking up today with the Red Dress Club:

The prompt is:
Write a short first-person story about your first love, or write a short fiction piece about a character's first love.


I'd asked my parents to take me to Waldenbooks. My dirty Tretorns spirited me from our space in the parking lot into Lakeside Mall, which always smelled of Swenson's waffle cones.


My palms were sweating so much the crumpled bills in my hand were damp. I'd been saving my weekly allowance for ages in my purple cash box that opened with an impossibly tiny key. "Erin" was carefully carved into the metal as if those four letters would prevent someone from stealing what little I had. 
 
I walked straight to the back of the book store where the young adult section was. Too many decisions: Beverly Cleary, Judy Blume, Baby-sitters Club. But I knew what I wanted. I gently eased the orange paperback from the shelf with the tip of my index finger. The stiff book crackled when I opened it and had that wonderful new smell. I inhaled deeply.

I walked briskly to the check out and placed my purchase on the counter. I smiled at Ramona and couldn't wait to bring her home and up to my room.

  

Ramona Quimby, my first love.

Top 10 Reasons I Can't Leave the House Today. But I'm Not a Hermit, I Swear.

1.) Laundry. Mountains of it. Created predominantly by two hooligans who feel compelled to change outfits multiple times a day to keep up with the latest Target fashions. Then I can't remember what was truly dirty to begin with, and/or I can't find a spot/stain, so I just chuck it all back through the wash again. Izzy pees through her Pull-Up most nights, so I wash sheets a lot thank goodness Abby sleeps in panties and stays dry. Let's not even talk about all the track marks in their princess panties. You moms who think dealing with your kids' poop ends with potty training? I laugh at you. No, see, here's the rub: they can wipe, and they do wipe, but they do not do a good job. Ewww. So I bond with my Method detergent, my eco-friendly stain spray, and my washing machine. It's true love, people. I do so much laundry that I deserve one of these beauties for Hanukkah. And a matching dryer. Not necessarily in red, but you get the idea.

2.) I haven't showered in 3+ days. I used to shower daily, but that was prior to having children. Now showering is a luxury, one I can rarely afford. My options are: (a) shower with little people whining and pounding on the door to tattle at regular intervals; (b) wake up at the ass crack of dawn to shower before the little hags wake up; or (c) shower with them while they point at my va-jay-jay and ask me when they will grow boobies. Anylazy, (d) I'm too tired by the time I corral their little asses into bed at night to shower then. So three days without any soap or shampoo = pretty ripe. Better stay in.

3.) I am too busy cramming Cheez-its in my mouth and washing them down with Honest Tea while watching all the shows I have saved on my DVR, like Brothers & Sisters, Grey's Anatomy, Dexter, Gossip Girl, and Man vs. Food. Me and the couch? We're like in love. Actually, this is just a fantasy of mine.

4.) I had a bikini wax the day before. So there's that initial uncomfortable chafing thing that either no one talks about or only I am privy to. Also there could still be remnants of blue-green wax stubbornly stuck to my lady bits so that mere walking is like a second round of waxing.

5.) I was too busy cleaning the house because The Father Load is hosting a Journal Club tonight with many very important medical people. They come over, eat Oklahoma Joe's, use too many plastic cups and paper plates you have no idea how this irks me and laugh at me when I put our recycling bins on the patio to prompt them to do the right green thing. And then my whole house which was previously clean and smelling like Mrs. Meyers products now reeks like a barbeque joint and stale beer. Gross.

6.) I am still learning the ways of the vegetarian woman. I haven't yet determined the proper ratio of salads and fruit to beans and nuts that won't offend my delicate intestinal tract. When I overdose, my body rebels and leaving the house becomes impossible.



7.) I'm addicted to your blogs. I love reading them. Alas, so many wonderful blogs, so little time. I also love writing blogs. And did I mention reading blogs? I thrive on the connections I'm making with people. I've made so many friends and I've come out of my shell because I've read about you coming out of yours. Thank you. I'm in love with you. You've taught me how to use this noggin of mine that's been dormant for so long. You keep my heart open, my mind sharp, and my body moving. You teach me things every day. THANK YOU for being so delicious that I can't leave my computer all day. Hello, my name is Erin, and I'm addicted to BlogLand.

8.) My children are being such hellions that I am afraid to take them out in public for fear of being shunned. People will look at me and I'll be that mom. You know who I'm talking about--- that yelling, red-faced, screaming banshee who's completely out of control. My shopping cart will be full of bribes like Twinkies, Zhu Zhu pets, Halloween candy, coloring books, pop tarts, and all manner of ridiculous crap. I also might start to imagine something like this is a good solution:



9.) I have this eyebow obsession problem. See, if I don't pluck my caterpillars eyebrows, I might look something like this. And this is being kind, people:


So, I pluck and pluck and pluck (don't tell me to get 'em waxed because I'm incapable of not plucking until the next wax, can't tolerate the strays---I am slightly OCD, remember?). And then I have all these lovely red pock marks between my eyes and my eyebrows and I look scary for a day. So I can't leave the house.

10.) I have absolutely no idea what goes here. But I got nine, so that's good, right?

To Vlog or Not to Vlog--That is the Question. Or, Why I Embarrass my Husband.

Many of you may have watched my vlog from Thursday about Why Jazzercise is Evil. If you haven't already done so, please check it out here. Then come back and read this.

Are you done? Okay, good.

My husband said my vlog really sucked suggested I quit vlogging and revert entirely to the written word. He told me that I look like an old corpse unearthed from its tomb half eaten by maggots "depressed" in the video and that my real self comes through so much better in plain writing. Last night at dinner my friend, Anne, quipped that perhaps Hubs simply missed the boat with my deadpan sense of humor about those damned Girl Scout cookies (which I bought myself, shame on me---it's all my fault, but that is neither here nor there). She was spot on. I was trying to be funny, but perhaps I shouldn't quit my day job. I will obviously never be Chelsea Lately. Regardless, I patiently explained to Hubs that vlogging is a nice break from the standard stuff, it's fun, and it gives people a chance to see "the real me" in all of my unshowered glory. I mean seriously...you guys don't even have to pay for this shit!

So, dear readers, here is where YOU come in. I want to hear from you---ALL of you. Even if you aren't a follower (sobbing), even if you only read sporadically (boo hoo hoo!), even if this is your first time reading my blog (please come back again!). Leave me a love note in these comments. I've set things up so that anyone & everyone can comment---you don't have to sign in, you don't have to create a username/password, you don't have to be registered, pay anything, sign over your life....all you have to do is click on "Post a Comment" and then write whatever you want in the pretty little white box below. It really is that easy peasy, I promise. I'm begging you to be brutally honest. Tell me the vlog sucks. Tell me you love it. Tell me you're indifferent. Just tell me something. Either prove my husband wrong and stroke my bruised ego or tell me straight up that the vlog is not my forte and to throw in the towel.

And as long as we're on the subject: If you don't ever comment, I have no idea you're reading.

Have you read The Help by Kathryn Stockett?

Bloggy friends, if you haven't yet read this book, please please please hop on over to http://www.amazon.com/ right now and buy it! The Help, written by Kathryn Stockett, was so good I started reading it Saturday night (yes, I realize this means I have no life) and blew through it. I finished it yesterday morning. It was that good. Better than sex.

The Help focuses on the lives of three narrators: Minny and Aibileen, black maids and best friends, and Eugenia, a.k.a. Skeeter, a young white woman who has recently graduated from Ole Miss. The book is set in 1962 in Jackson, Mississippi and it deftly exposes the tensions rising during the civil rights movement. Once I started this book, I quite literally couldn't put it down. Dan's stepmother gave it to me for my birthday, and it's been one of those books gathering dust on my nightstand (I know many of you have similar piles!). Well, a friend of mine mentioned having read it, so I figured it was high time I started. Then I couldn't stop. It was so, so good. I gobbled up every page, hungry for more. I didn't want it to end!

I immediately related to Skeeter and loved her character. After all, she's a GRITS member (Girls Raised In The South) like moi, she's a sorority girl, and she loves to write. She's tall, she feels awkward in her own skin, and the people she considers her best friends don't think twice about ditching her. Throughout the novel she comes to terms with her true self--the difference between who she is and who she wants/doesn't want to be---and learns to stand alone. I was so proud of her and what she did that I caught myself laughing and cheering out loud...and catching tiny glimpses of myself.

Here's an excerpt that I loved, a scene between Eugenia/Skeeter and her family's maid, Constantine:

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The first time I was ever called ugly, I was thirteen. It was a rich friend of my brother Carlton's, over to shoot guns in the field.

"Why you crying, girl?" Constantine asked me in the kitchen.

I told her what the boy had called me, tears streaming down my face.

"Well? Is you?"

I blinked, paused my crying. "Is I what?"

"Now you look a here, Eugenia" --because Constantine was the only one who'd occasionally follow Mama's rule. "Ugly live up on the inside. Ugly be a hurtful, mean person. Is you one a them peoples?"

"I don't know. I don't think so," I sobbed.

Constantine sat down next to me at the kitchen table. I heard the cracking of her swollen joints. She pressed her thumb hard in the palm of my hand, something we both knew meant Listen. Listen to me.

"Ever morning, until you dead in the ground, you gone have to make this decision." Constantine was so close, I could see the blackness of her gums. "You gone have to ask yourself, Am I gone believe what them fools say about me today?"

She kept her thumb pressed hard in my hand. I nodded that I understood. I was just smart enough to realize she meant white people. And even though I still felt miserable, and knew that I was, most likely, ugly, it was the first time she ever talked to me like I was something besides my mother's white child. All my life I'd been told what to believe about politics, coloreds, being a girl. But with Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.

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Read this book. I promise you won't be disappointed!