Funny, how a little t.p. can take the sting out of turning 40.
For a close up of the long string of pictures of Doctor Dash in his gold lamé body suit, chimp mask and afro, voila:
Nice touch, guys.
We’re just galloping towards the end of school and this most kick ass time of year is flying by. If you took a venn diagram with one circle being school and one circle being summer, we’re in the intersecting area that is defined by sunshine, staring out the window, sweatiness, rowdiness, popsicles, field day, and a general slide-on-into-home attitude. I love it. I’ve always loved it. I never went to a school with air conditioning and neither do my kids. Somehow their damp brows and flushed faces at the end of the school day are all part of the charm. You can practically hear the drum beats: Sum-mer! Sum-mer! Sum-mer!
In the midst of all of this, I got to fly off on a secret mission last week: Operation Babe-o-matic, Part II, to be specific. Sunny turned 40 and her hilarious husband, Tax Man Italiano, managed to plan a giant surprise party without her knowing. Of course, the Babe-os shimmyied and shammyied and sashayed in the door about 40 minutes after Sunny’s first heart attack of the evening, sending her into a second surprised near-swoon. It was tremendously fun and a comforting reminder that somethings never change. When Sunny’s 180 friends had cleared out, the five of us were still standing, dancing around with beers, feeling like we were 20 again. (Actually, I should say 6 of us because Meester Panqueques was an honorary Babe-o for the night, kindly fetching Dolly and me at the airport, driving us to the party in amused near-silence while Tartare, Dolly and I shrieked and chatted and dove right in in that way that friends do when there is very little time.) I’m only including a small photo because . . . how can I put this delicately? There would be no reason to subject you to our shiny happy late-night-good-time faces. No reason at all. It was a lightening quick trip – less than 24 hours, but so much fun, so very very good for my soul. My only regret is that I’m always left feeling bereft that these soul sisters of mine scattered like seeds in the wind after college, and not a one of them managed to land near me.
And speaking of seeds, yesterday time slowed down twice for me, and both times, it was in a garden. First, Doctor Dash and I had a really juicy hour with a “garden coach” from Bachmans Nursery named Suzanne. She showed up at our house and she didn’t waste any time in plunging into our perennial garden to give us the lay of the land. We found out all sorts of stuff. Now we know we have two horrid invasive buckthorn trees that need to be removed asap (actually, it’s already done – Doctor Dash could also aptly be renamed Doctor Bushwhacker). We also now know that we should be fawning over a beautiful lacy drapey Pagoda Dogwood because we are “lucky to have such a specimen.” We know where to move the hydrangea that is languishing in the shade and the bleeding heart that is getting the shit kicked out of it over in soccer terrain. We know which hostas are next for being divided and recolonized and what to do with the crazy rose bush that’s turned aggressive, hanging its thorny branches into the yard in the hopes of catching some tender child flesh. We now know what is weed and what is hearty native growth. We even know what to put in Melancholy Corner and that, my friends, is something that has eluded us since we moved into this house. Suzanne was knowledgeable, witty, and best of all, pragmatic. I feel like we can do this now. We can make our garden even more beautiful, piece by piece, plant by plant, season by season.
As soon as I was finished with Suzanne, I raced off to school to drive Supergirl and a few of her friends to Waite House, the food shelf that our school collects food for all year long. The first graders were going to deliver and plant the vegetables they had grown from seed in the Waite House garden. The garden will be tended by the Waite House volunteers and the families who utilize the services. There were enough kids to do most of the planting so I mostly got to watch and listen and I have to say, it was lovely. We didn’t need “one more thing” to go do, but I’m so glad we did this. Not only did they plant tons of tomatoes, beans, peppers and herbs, they pretty much lined the perimeter of the chain link fence with sunflowers and other ornamentals. I am so grateful to their teachers for realizing that there is no end to the good that can come of this – the planting, the waiting, the giving, the digging, the beautifying. It’s all so good for our guys and hopefully there will be many families eating delicious tomatoes later this summer; tomatoes that started out as seeds in cups on an elementary school floor.
Sometimes the ladies who lunch get a little rowdy. So rowdy that people FROM THE RESTAURANT NEXT DOOR turn around to stare. It all started when the one in the burka yelled “TITS!”
God help us when our kids are all in school full time.
Got my ass rocked off last night, which is always a good thing, but particularly so when you weren’t necessarily expecting to get your ass rocked off. An unexpected, revelatory, surprise ass rocking is the very very best kind. And when steely banjos and flying cellos are involved, well, then you just stand back on your heels and go, Shit, man. Who knew? Pipes knew, that’s who. That’s why he jumped on tickets for himself, Sassy Jewels, Ten Gallon, Gigi, and us as soon as they went for sale months ago. And, oh blessed Bertha, I am so glad he did!
Having given I and Love and You a few listen-throughs, I was expecting a soulful, bluegrassy, folksy show. I was not expecting to get my ass rocked off. I went in kind of blind, happy to ride along in the backseat of someone else’s idea for the night; Pipes is to be trusted in these matters. I got my first inkling that we might be in for something special during the opener: The Low Anthem. I left my group for a little scouting mission to see how far up we might be able to get and suddenly found myself in the hot pulsing belly of First Ave, totally enthralled but what I can only describe as thrashing hillbillies. They were very hairy (of head, not of body) and they were on fire, playing bluegrass like they were all hopped up on meth (which they weren’t. At least I don’t think they were). We only caught the end of their set, but it was frenetic and exhilarating, wild and raw. Speed bluegrass is not the kind of music I would necessarily listen to on my own, but so goes the magic of live music. When there’s that kind of energy and musicianship raging in front of your eyes, pummeling your rib cage, hell, it’s really hard not to get caught up. I was practically panting when I found my friends again.
When the Avett Brothers came on, First Ave exploded. They were ridiculously good. Ree. Dick. U. Lous. Now I get it. NOW I GET IT! I get why they’ve been sold out for months. They were beyond sweet and gracious with the adoring crowd – obviously jacked up to be performing. North Carolina boys happy to be in Minnesota for a night. The brothers are beautiful song writers first and foremost, but man can they sing. The eldest, Scott, has a superhero voice – it’s shot through with gold streaks, completely unique and seemingly indefatigable – like an alloy of a man’s voice and a precious metal. After two hours of some serious singing, he sounded as fresh as a daisy – like I said, a friggin’ superhero. His brother, Seth, has the dulcet, pretty voice, the perfect sound to wrap under and over and all around his brother’s. Mmm. Wrap me up in that blanket anytime. Like sexy overgrown leprechauns, they jumped around, played a bunch of different instruments, tore through song after song – their talent and musicality was staggering – as was their energy. There’s a reedy blue grassy vein through all of it, but often they teetered into punk and the next song would have a total Buddy Holly feel to it and then, just as deftly, they’d woo us into a smoky honky tonk shack – all with a cool, sharp edge. It was just an amazing, amazing show, and now, listening to their album again, I realize it’s all in there – beautiful song writing with deep roots in country, folk, blues and rock served up in a completely modern, clean, brilliant way. It was good. Really good. Lucky fucking us.
Last night as I shampooed Devil Baby’s hair, my thoughts kept straying to my weekend away with the book club ladies. Mere hours before, I had been sitting in one of the various roving sloppy circles of the weekend (in front of the windows with the view of the lake, in front of the fire place, around the wooden farm table, on two benches in the sun at the tip of Stout’s Island) surrounded by a near constant flow of words and laughter, maybe a few tears and quiet moments. Devil Baby didn’t want me to wash her hair and as she whined and resisted, I thought about the women who let me say what I needed to say, without judgment, with nods and murmurs of understanding, with stories of their own. I felt physically exhausted (more on that in a second), but mentally alert – almost limber. The way you’d feel after one of those rare classes in college where you felt like you cracked through to some greater truths, some deeper understanding of whatever topic you were discussing.
I’ve said it before, but these book club ladies are super analytical. They are processors and thinkers. They’re also highly verbal people. So you sit in enough circles with them and you’re going to hear really nuanced and insightful explanations or theories about the stuff that’s on their minds. They are also lyrical and romantic and curious. Lady Shutterbug has this completely endearing habit of saying “O.K., I’ve got a question for you guys . . .” and throwing out some juicy dilemma or a giant octopus of a topic. The word soulful came up a few times over the weekend – it’s what we look for in a yoga teacher, in a book, in a song, in a friend. But to be soulful, I think you must be honest. And to be honest, you must be brave. And the ladies are brave. (Not that you’d know it, judging by our mini frights over the course of the weekend: country folk on snowmobiles with night vision goggles, cat burglars, cracking ice, grandpa poltergeists). I think my take-away from the weekend, the reason I feel so clear in my head (despite all the wine, etcetera) is that I got to speak and hear the truth for hours and hours and hours. A mother’s truth. A wife’s truth. A woman’s truth.
I wasn’t privvy to every single conversation, but as we meandered through the thicket of our lives right now – motherhood, sex, food, balance, friendship, botox (just talking, just talking), work, non-work, house work, clothes, husbands, art, faith, bras, meditation, moods, yoga, books – I felt like there was so much disclosure, so much sharing, but equally as much listening and mental note taking. We are not old, but we are not young. As such, I think we’re aware that we’re learning a few things along the way. The tricks, tips, and shortcuts. The surefire cures, the hit recipes, the best this or that, the worse this or that. I’m a huge fan of a “hot tip” and I feel like I was scurrying around, gathering the ladies’ hot tips like falling leaves. On the topic of food alone, I can’t wait to make Lady Pretty Twigs’ green goddess dressing, Lady Doctah K’s oven ribs and mushroom barley soup, Lady Tabouli’s kugel, Lady Shutterbug’s eggbake, Lady Homeslice’s chocolate mousse cake, and Lady Peace’s salad with stir fried veggies. And Lady Doctah Poodle, her fruit was fab, but what I really can’t stop thinking about is something she said right before I left: that perhaps it’s not a question of being a good mother or a bad mother, but of being an authentic mother. This is a really beautiful way to look at this job we have now and will have for the rest of our lives. It allows for imperfections and yet the standard is lofty, one worth calling to mind again and again, like a mantra.
But the weekend wasn’t all talk. There might have been a little drinking. There might have been a little dancing. There might have been a little singing. And there might have been some shrieking and laughing. And some of that might have happened indoors. But it all might have happened out on the white expanse of the frozen lake under a full moon, too. I must say, the ladies went a little crazy. A little really crazy. They cut loose. Soooooper loose. They even indulged me and my ridiculous notions and took turns with my cushy headphones and did a little tiny dancing. OH, TINY DANCING, HOW I LOVE AND ADORE YOU! We gave those country folk in their icehouses an eyeful and an earful, I’m afraid. The image of my friends, running, spinning, swaying, singing, falling onto their backs and gaping up at the moon is something I’ll not soon forget. And I suspect the same goes for the country folk cowering in those ice houses.
It may come as a surprise to you, but I love Valentine’s Day. I don’t consider it to be a Hallmark holiday construed to torture lonely hearts, purge the sappy and guilt ridden of their hard earned pennies and replenish the candy coffers of children. Instead I take Valentine’s Day to be a simple and pure celebration of love. What’s better than love? And if you are lucky enough to be in love, why not have a day where the red carpet is unfurled for all sorts of showy and not so showy demonstrations of that love? Why not wallow in cupids, hearts and flowers for just a day, without feeling sheepish, without feeling cynical? Why not be a little flamboyant? A little racy? A little cheesy? Why not?
Valentine’s Day happens to be a quasi anniversary for Doctor Dash and me. In February of 1992, after five months of friendship and on again off again more-than-friendship, I finally stopped my senseless running and over-thinking. I stopped being cavalier about my friend’s feelings. I stopped ignoring the fact that if there were a hundred people at the keg party, Dash was the one I always wanted to talk to. I stopped. With Dash. And I thank my lucky stars he stood still long enough for me to run around like the fool girl I was and then find my way back.
♥ ♥ ♥
Last night, our sitter comes at 5:00 so we can go to the wake for Circus Lady’s dad. As I look at a beautiful board of old photos, her mom and dad so young, stylish and happy, I feel my heart contract. How can it be, that you can love someone almost your entire life only to have them ripped away from you? What is she going to do now? How will she live, with her other half, her life’s partner, gone? It’s too much, I wail to Doctor Dash in the car. What’s the point of this short wretched life? There is so much suffering, it’s over so fast, WHAT THE HELL IS THE POINT? For twenty minutes we plunge in deep as we race to our next destination. We question the logic of despair and human suffering, the need for faith, our lack of faith, how the existence of an after-life seems like such an easy palliative, how incredible it is that as humans we still don’t know, we don’t really know what happens after we die or whether there is a God. In our car, hurtling through the dark, I feel like we’re careening into the yawning, impenetrable depths of life’s greatest mysteries. And then Dash says simply: I think the point is love.
With all of this churning in my chest, we grab our mats and walk into the yoga studio for Crackerjack’s special Valentine’s class and there she is in her red shirt, with her arms open for a hug. She’s got wine chilling and a table set up for appetizers for after class. She’s greeting people, making sure everything is just so, fluttering around with that anticipatory energy that is so uniquely her. Renaissance Man is helping her, quietly lighting votives all around the studio, being the man behind the woman (and if I’m not mistaken, having a pre-yoga glass of wine, but I can’t be sure). All of this I take in as a sensation, through tear blurred eyes. Mindfully, excitedly, and with open hearts they are preparing something special, for others. And boy does that class lift my spirits and settle my angst. By the time Doctor Dash is able to peel me away from my friends and the wine, I’m feeling positively bouyant, peaceful. And a little drunk.
It’s ten o’clock so we rush over to Barbette, one of our fave haunts. I watch Doctor Dash get out of the car and check the meter. He’s the details guy, the responsible one. When I’m with him I’m free to not pay attention to where we’re going, not carry money or keys, chatter aimlessly, make silly observations, daydream. I stand on the chilly sidewalk, dusted white with salt and frost, and wait for my friend, my love, of eighteen years.
Love is the point.
OK, that’s possibly a little misleading. Possibly a little very misleading. I’m no Kenny Rodgers, if you know what I mean. There haven’t been that many who have travelled in and out my door, if you know what I mean. I’ve loved many boys (and still do), but I haven’t luuuuved many boys, if you know what I mean. Cough. Cough. Good Catholic girl, etcetera, etcetera. And yet, and yet . . .
A couple weeks ago, I went out and kicked up a little dust with my girls on a Thursday night and long story short, I ended up calling some old buddies at three o’clock in the morning. You know, just to shoot the shit. First I called The Fox, then I called Devious Knickers and then I called Tartare. By some miracle, none of them picked up, and I left them each long and ludicrous voicemails. I talked and talked and talked until each of their respective phones cut me off. What can I say? Doctor Dash was working an overnight shift and I was bouncing around the house, snarfing Dutch Crunch Mesquite BBQ Chips and feeling chatty. I was in a state of mind that called to mind my old good time friends. I could have kept dialing, but after Tartare a seed of good sense took root and I switched gears and listened to some loud music with my cushy head phones. Like I said, I was bouncin’.
The next morning, over a woozy and funny breakfast with some of the aforementioned crazy girls, I happened to mention that I had called my buds in the wee hours and Nanook’s eyes bugged out at me just a little: You went home and drunk dialed two GUYS? There was no judgment in her voice – just surprise. It hadn’t even occurred to me that my calls might be deemed inappropriate by oh, I don’t know, like, the whole world.
I started pondering, because that’s what I do. Was it inappropriate for me, a married lady, to call two married guys at three a.m? (By the way, Doctor Dash is also friends with them – he has a separate and distinct but equally as important friendship as mine – but I knew them first – they are mine). What’s the litmus test for inappropriateness? What my mother would think? What their wives would think? The purity of my intentions? What The Fox and Devious Knickers think? What Doctor Dash thinks? What is the test?
And more importantly, WHY DOES THERE HAVE TO BE A TEST? They are my friends. Some of the most hilarious, trippy adventures of my life have happened to me with one or both of them at my side. London, Chicago, Southbend, Detroit, New York, Seattle, Key West and God knows where else. We’ve wandered and imbibed and woven miles of floating tapestries with our serpentine conversations, our peculiar observations and our extravagant laughter.
They are two of my favorite people in the world. They just happen to be men.
By mid morning, I had heard back from both of them. The Fox and I chatted on the phone and Devious Knickers and I exchanged a flurry of emails. They were amused by my ramblings, sounded happy to hear from me, if a little surprised at the late hour. It was great to catch up.
Since he is ever willing to indulge me in my musings, to delve into the shadowy crevices of human nature, to poke holes in the smooth fabric of convention and peek his curious little eyeball through, I wrote to Devious Knickers about the issue I’d been noodling since breakfast – why did I feel like, suddenly, the friendship that I had with them was no longer legitimate? No longer sanctioned. Devious Knickers responded: “And to get back to the issue of calling boys that aren’t your husband at 3:30 a.m, yes, you are right that there aren’t too many people who would understand what was at play there.” But isn’t it enough that we all knew what was at play there? I knew I wasn’t being shady and he knew I wasn’t being shady, so isn’t it ipso facto NOT shady?
And to take it one step further, aren’t we allowed to do what we used to do ever again? Eat, drink and smoke everything in sight and go on a crazy adventure in some strange place? There are socially acceptable reasons to see my college girls, but them? It seems like it just can’t happen anymore – not without chaperones. They are lost to me and I to them. We joked of going to Cairo. Exotic cafes with hookahs and belly dancers, delicious lemony mezze, dusty labyrinthian streets, bustling markets with shady characters beckoning and yelling over tables of gold, silk, and fruit. Oh, to go to Cairo!
And to be fair, I got to marry one of my adventure boys. We do go on adventures – I have that in my life, but I still miss those boys, those adventures, that freedom, that youth.
Doctor Dash, is an eminently fair guy, who understands my friendships and loyalties, the things that make me happy. He knows how I am about my guy friends because he was (and is) one of my guy friends. And he agrees that there is a double standard for old friendships based on gender. He agrees that it’s unfair. He agrees that it doesn’t make sense. But the standard is there nevertheless. We talked about the fact that he could jet off to meet up with them at any time, no questions asked. On the one hand I’d be happy that the boys I love are together, reenforcing and tending to old and valuable friendships. On the other hand, I would be bereft. I would feel so left out. So sad to be missing the fun.
To my surprise, he said: You could go to Cairo, but only if both of them went. Aha! Oho! I’ll take that! He is nothing if not fair, my Doctor Dash. Fox? Devious Knickers? What do you say? Cairo? Hulloooo? Hulloooloooloooo???
Just mulling anyway.
Just mulling – missing a vanished piece – wondering if it’s vanished forever.
Let’s not mince words. I’m in funk. A thoroughly funkified funkmaster funkty dumpty funkalicious funkafreaky funk. I feel like I’m looking at the world through the musty living room curtain of a nonagenarian smoker, my thoughts veering wildly from: mother fucking mother fucker it’s colder than a mother fucker in this mother fucking god forsaken ice hole of a bung hole of a place, to the decidedly more upbeat and pithy: What’s the point of anything? To make matters worse, it also seems I can’t write my way out of a paper bag. In a classic chicken and the egg quandry, I don’t know if I can’t write because of the funk, or if I’m in the funk because I’m not writing. As frivolous and silly as this blog may be, I must admit that it does bring me some pleasure and even a measure of peace from time to time, so the yawning silence of my keyboard has got me down. In the dumps. In the dumptastic, dumpgusting, dumptopia, dumptragic, dumpster diddy dumps. Speaking of dumps, that last post, the one about winter, I felt like a constipated old woman (yes, the one with the dirty sheer curtains) hell bent on taking a huge dump only to squeeze out one unsatisfying, measly, rock hard pellet. I know that’s gross. Sooooo gross. So so so gross.
But look, can’t you tell I’m feeling better already?
Actually, the reason I’m feeling better is that yesterday I got to take in a double feature of girl love. First there was a tasty riotous lunch at Blackbird Cafe with Nanook, Birdie and Pretty Young Thing for a belated celebration of Crackerjack’s birthday. Two bottles of wine would barely begin to wet the whistles of this crew after sundown, but tucked into a cozy table in the middle of the day with no kids, it felt deliciously decadent and before long we were shrieking and chattering like a tree full of crazed baboons. It was lovely. A total breath of fresh air. Happy Birthday CJ!
And then last night as a few of us were lingering at Lady Biker Babe’s house after book club, my funk was detected. They are nothing if not astute, this bunch. They are nothing if not fixers, this bunch. They can sniff out and snuff out a funk a mile away. I mentioned my writer’s block and the fact that I can’t seem write my way out of a paper bag. Actually, I don’t think I used the words “paper bag” at all, but bear with me, I’m trying my hardest to stay away from the dump metaphor. Instead of poopooing the paper bag, they saw the paper bag. They nodded, quietly acknowledging the paper bag and then without a lot of fanfare, Lady Shutterbug handed me some pinking shears. Then Lady Homeslice used her socked foot to slide a nail file in my direction over the couch cushions. On her way out the door, Lady Doctah Poodle wrapped my fingers around some knitting needles. Lady Tabouli (whom I’m temped to rechristen Lady Rollergirl after a story I heard last night – she gets to pick) palmed me a tiny switchblade and Lady Biker Babe tossed a lighter in my lap. I don’t remember anything specific that anyone said, I just know that in their own way they were helping me fight the funk. They were helping me fight my way out of the paper bag.
So, what else can I do but just try, right? What else can any of us do? But. Just. Try.
Lady Doctah K and Doctor Mister Lady Doctah K throw a lovely holiday party every year. It is elegant and pretty, warm and inviting. There are beautiful flower arrangements, delicious food, lovely wines and a well stocked bar. And. And there is always a gaggle of loud rowdy women from book club who storm in lookin’ all fancy with bemused partners in tow, get their hands on a cocktail within seconds and start to surf the waves of shrieks and cackles that crash through the house for the duration of the fest. I describe this as if I am nothing more than a detached observer to the phenomenon, a curious sociologist scribbling notes, when truth be told I may actually, kind of, sort of be in the midst of the ruckus. This year Doctor Dash was on-call and Lady Shutterbug was also stag, which I think upped the ante a little bit. Without the calming influences of our well behaved hubbies, we went in fast and hard on the gin and tonics and ended up staying until two a.m. Although this hardly explains Lady Homeslice’s behavior, as Mister Lady Homeslice was in da house and she still managed to titillate a group of innocent fireside sitters with her silver panted gyrations. Twice! Oh, it was beautiful. By the end of the night my bookish sisters were screaming and dancing to Tom Petty, getting their sequins all tangled up and laughing. Laughing and laughing.
I can’t even figure out why we laugh so much. Half the time no one has even said anything and there we are, eyes locked on one another, horse faces in full neigh (OK, maybe that’s just me), the hysterics bubbling forth like a shaken bottle of champagne. There’s a piece of it that’s purely and joyfully auditory. Every one in the book club has an uh, umm, uhhh, robust laugh. So if one person starts, it’s hard not to follow. This month we’re reading Foxfire by Joyce Carol Oates who describes Goldie, one of the members of the girl gang, as follows: “(she was) famous for her hyena laugh which had the unnerving power to draw your laughter with it whether it was your wish to laugh or not or whether there was logic to such laughter or not . . . ” So there’s a bit of that, except everyone’s a Goddamn Goldie, so you can imagine. Also, I think that because month after month we delve into all sorts of difficult issues through our books, the emotional barriers between us are gauzy, stretched almost to the point of transparency. When you talk about books, you’re really talking about yourself a lot of the time. I feel like I’m always right there at the surface with these guys, hence the hair trigger tipping into laughter. And finally, but most simply, there’s the obvious fact that being as smart as they are, these ladies are funny – plain and simple. They just say and do funny things. They crack my ass up. Alas, Lady Doctah Poodle and Lady Peace had left by the time Lady Shutterbug unearthed her camera and some of the other ladies were MIA, but, hey, there’s always next year (or next month).
In the post mortem flurry of emails, Lady Tabouli wrote something to the effect of: Did you ever think you’d meet women who would make you laugh like this in your late thirties and forties? The answer for me is a resounding no. I never thought I would. But I have. And I thank my lucky stars for the giggly gift of them.
There have been some recent events, which I’m not at liberty to discuss, that have gotten me thinking long and hard about females, friendships and feelings. For better or worse, I’m not sure if I’ve ever given more than a glancing thought to these issues. I pride myself on my relatively drama free life. I love the ease of all my guy friendships and my low-maintenance girl friendships. The last fight I was in was in seventh grade when my best friend Sweet Sue and I broke up for a whole summer. I can’t even remember why. I do, however, remember seeing her on the first day of eighth grade in Mrs. Strong’s classroom and just adoring her violently Sun-Inned hair and realizing, in a rush, how much I had missed her. We made up. Just like that. Then once in college I got really mad when my friend La Peruanita took my big red boxy sweatshirt, which if I recall correctly, wasn’t even my sweatshirt and might actually have been her sweatshirt, but I had kind of adopted it and it was a crucial piece of my wardrobe. She heard about my ire through the grapevine and the wretched thing reappeared in my milk crate in due course. Crisis averted, I suppose.
When I wrote about the Babe-o-matics recently, it occurred to me that it was remarkable that six girl/women had made it four years with zero drama. But in retrospect I wonder if that was really the case. One of the original Babe-o-matics chose to cut ties with us a few years after we graduated. The rest of us have tried to work through the why’s of it, with little success. There is never a time that we get together that she doesn’t come up. It might be something that has to do with her more than us. Or maybe, something did happen and we missed it.
I have another more recent friend who would say time and time again – she doesn’t like me, or that one’s hot and cold with me, or she has it in for me, or I never know where I stand with that one. And I would listen with a mixture of fascination (because what’s more fascinating than someone else’s drama?) and scepticism. I find her loveable and thus constantly felt like Jerry Seinfeld’s mother shrieking in my best Jewish old lady voice How could anyone not like you? And every once in a while I’d feel a little frightened by it – like is this ever going to trickle over to me? Because I have a horror of this kind of thing. I don’t think I could go through even one day suspecting that someone I deal with on a frequent basis has a beef with me. It would drive me absolutely bananas. And so I avoid the whole kit and kaboodle.
No drama for this mama.
But I wonder if my drama free life is really as drama free as I think it is. The recent episode that got me thinking about this made me realize that I sort of stomp through life in big boots and maybe I need to be more careful. The whole thing took me by surprise and I realized that I’m just not tuned into this kind of thing, at all. And because these people are special to me, I felt bad about it, even though I wasn’t directly involved in it. As a rule I don’t feel a lot of angst or insecurity or competitiveness with other women and I choose to assume everyone else is the same. Maybe in my fervor to steer clear of sticky situations, I have let myself become impervious to other people’s fragilities and feelings. Maybe my mellow, low-maintenance, confident schtick is really a cop out – because I don’t want to tangle, or tango, or whatever.
Assume socks are drama. It’s possible I’m the guy who truly doesn’t see them on the ground when he walks by. Or maybe I’m the guy who doesn’t want to pick them up, so he pretends he doesn’t see them. I really don’t know. I hate that second guy. On the other hand, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life picking up socks. Isn’t it better to turn a blind eye, sail on above it all, and if you miss a couple hurt feelings here and again, so be it? Or is it better to be open, to be perceptive, to be sensitive to the drama like my Jerry Seinfeld friend?
I don’t know. I don’t know which is better. And maybe it’s not even a choice so much as a reaction you can no sooner control than fear or surprise. In any event, I think I’m keeping my big boots. And I’m not saying I’m going to pick up any socks, but maybe, just maybe, I’ll try to see one every once in a while.
I haven’t had time to write because I’m in the balls out planning stages for a Chilean Argentine Feast that we’re hosting with La Chilenita and her hubby, Sporty Scrivener, this Friday night. This whole week has been a flurry of emails, menu tweaking, ingredients sourcing, linen ironing, tomato fondling and taste testing. I test drove the skirt steak from Clancey’s, prepared it a couple different ways, Dash scribbled notes on graph paper, we looked at each other while we chewed. Yes. Good. I have literally purchased tomatoes from three different places and tried them all in search of something that approaches tasty. Alas, this is not the time of year for delicious tomatoes, so I picked the most flavorful, albeit unripe variety from the Linden Hills Coop and stashed them on my windowsill. Every day I examine them to determine their ripening progress: I gingerly probe them, take their temperature, listen to them with a stethoscope, eyeball them, sniff them and probe them some more. I have an elaborate plan should they lag behind. They need to be perfect by Friday and it is a delicate dance to coax them to perfection. Don’t make me do it, I whisper, knowing no one will be happy if I have to stuff them into a paper bag with an apple. I’m not even sure this works with tomatoes like it does with avocados and bananas, but desperate times call for desperate measures. La Chilenita is running around town doing much the same because this feast needs to be GOOD.
This dinner was part of our parish’s live auction and proof positive that chivalry is not dead. Last spring found me at the annual gala, on crutches and stag (Dash was on-call). I wasn’t going to go, but I got a few calls, and you know me, I HATE to miss a party. My Little Springroll and her hubby Runner Laddie kindly gave me a ride, carried my clutch, signed me up for stuff, got me wine and generally clucked over me and made sure I was fine, which I was, if a little pathetic. I was, however, fretting that our dinner would be allowed to blow through the room like a giant tumbleweed. When the auctioneer started to talk about it, La Chilenita was no where to be found, I had no way to escape and so I went into full cringe-hide-under-the-tablecloth-mode. And this is when my two heros of the night swaggered into town. Yes, maybe they wanted the dinner for 8 that much, maybe they did it for a good cause, or maybe they did it for the gimp in the feather headband nervously pretending not to pay attention to the proceedings. Maybe, just maybe, they did it for friendship. Ten Gallon and Runner Laddie had a blazin’ showdown and all of the sudden the dinner was sky high, higher than anything else and I went from full cringe to full swoon because NOW WHAT THE HELL WERE WE GONNA DO? La Chilenita and I are just little ol’ us! We’re home cooks, not fancy cooks! And that last slew of bids had firmly pushed us into fancy terrain! Holy shit! La Chilenita and I looked at each other agog when we found each other. No worries, we’ll make it great, it’s gonna be great, it’ll be fun, it’ll be great, great, it’ll be great! we assured ourselves, knowing we had months to plan. Nothing like the balm of time. Until you run out of time. We pictured ourselves leisurely perusing cookbooks in her backyard with glasses of wine on warm summer evenings. Instead we met at Sebastian Joe’s, leaves on the ground and our hair on end.
In the end, my two gunslingers realized they were bidding against friend, not foe, split the dinner and each invited one couple, all of whom are dear friends. So all our fretting and planning and cooking and tasting is a total and complete joy. We’ve got a sexy, candlelit room planned, a festive and sultry playlist, beautiful wines and a menu that we’re proud of. La Chilenita and I decided we would cook for our friends as if they were in a South American home. We’ll cook with time, we’ll cook with care and most importantly, we’ll cook with love. And if if turns out a little bit fancy? Well, tanto mejor!
Last week Chief Big Voice swept into town on the heels of a wretched weather pattern that is stubbornly still plaguing us. As far as he’s concerned, Minneapolis and Seattle could pretty much be interchangeable based on the furrowed brow of rain clouds our city has sported on his last two visits. Alas, I can’t control the weather no matter how much I suck up to Mama Nature on this blog. What I can do, is control what we eat and I can think of no better way to welcome an old friend, to love him up, than to cook. And so I did.
I don’t normally post recipes because, frankly, there are so many stellar food blogs out there that it would seem like pure hubris, which, ironically is what ruined my grilled pork chops. Hubris in that I bragged about how delicious they are, coming from such happy pigs as they do. The final coup de grâce: a few too many glasses of wine causing a break in the chain of custody. In criminal law, in order for evidence to be admissible, you have to document every transfer from person to person and prove that no one else could have accessed the evidence. In cooking law, in order for the pork to be delicious, you have to make sure that the last person to handle it before Doctor Dash takes it out to the grill is me, because I, apparently, am the only person who knows you have to salt the meat. YOU HAVE TO SALT THE MEAT. Something distracted me and Dash pulled the pork out of the fridge where it had been luxuriating in nothing more than a little garlic, rosemary and olive oil and threw it on the grill, assuming I had salted except that you never put salt in the marinade because that will dry out the meat. You salt right before you throw it on the grill, but since I didn’t touch the meat, I totally forgot and suffice it to say I was less than happy with our happy pig that night. Frustratingly, I couldn’t put my finger on it. Were the chops over cooked? Under cooked? Too rubbery? Not enough char? What what what???? It wasn’t until I was doing the dishes that it hit me! No salt! Of course! That’s why they tasted insipid AND were missing that fabulous little salty char crust. Salt is essential, for taste and texture. Never forget the salt. And always use way more salt than you think when it comes to meat. Luckily, Chief Big Voice had slathered his chop with my roasted cherry tomatoes with chorizo, kindly claiming he hadn’t noticed. Argh.
I did, however, manage to make up for it the next night with some seriously delicious short ribs. Seriously. I cook a lot of meat in a lot of different ways and I might have to go out on a limb and say that this was the best thing I have ever ever ever made. I used this recipe from Smitten Kitchen as a starting point because I seem to be constitutionally incapable of actually following a recipe to the letter. Much like Nanook, who sometimes refuses to read her book club selections, feeling it to be one of the last acts of rebellion left her, I refuse to follow recipes. I start out with every intention and then suddenly I realize I can’t find the port (infuriating because I know we have it and never drink it, so what better way to use it?) and all hell breaks loose and I’m digging around throwing whatever I want into the pot like some sort of enfant terrible chef who refuses to be boxed in.
There is something so satisfying about braising. I love the frenzy of chopping and searing and seasoning followed by the glugs of your concocted braising liquid and finally, slipping the lid on for hours of slow cooking that fills the house with the most heavenly aromas known to carnivores. It seems almost ridiculous that you can go about your day, knowing that what is in your pot is just getting better and better, richer, more tender fall-off-the-bone, more concentrated and savory. It’s the most delicious and magical form of multitasking I can think of.
These short ribs are a two day process because you absolutely have to cool them in the fridge overnight to scrape off the inch of lard that forms on top. I’m sure if you follow the recipe, you’ll be over the moon. If you happen to be interested in my perverse culinary aberrations, then here they are: There is no need to finely chop the aromatics because they all get seived out anyway - inch-sized chunks work fine. I think I threw half a fennel bulb in instead of the celery. I also reconstituted some dried porcini mushrooms and added them with the nasty, funky juices. Incidentally, do you know how awesome dried porcini mushrooms are? Any sauce or braise gets instant heft and depth and dark mysterious strangerness about it from their addition – just drown three or four or five or six of them in a bowl of hot water, let them hang out for a while and add the whole steamy deal to your pot, avoiding the bits of grit at the bottom of the bowl. Smells like bunk, but tastes like heaven – like fish sauce, dried shrimp, parmesan – all that soulful umami business. Ooof. Love. I know I polished off our bottle of Cholula hot sauce into the braising liquid. Why not, right? I toss a spoonful of dijon mustard into just about everything. I didn’t do the pearl onions because they bug me. I love the idea of serving the short ribs on a bed of swiss chard like Smitten Kitchen and next time I’ll try that. Instead I made mashed potatoes, spicy sauteed broccolini, and maple roasted squash. DO NOT forget the horseradish creme fraiche. I thought it seemed like gilding the lily, considering the richness of the short ribs, but the sauce brings a tang that plays beautifully with the ribs. I didn’t do the step where you quick roast the ribs because, honestly, I just wanted to serve them in their gravy – strong, dark, velvety and completely irresistible.
What came out of that pot after two days tasted like all that is good in life: long rainy afternoons of cooking, funny, woozy, gregarious meals with old friends and the knowledge that after every cooking mistake, awaits a cooking triumph.
My college girls and I used to call ourselves the Babe-O-Matics, and lest you think we took ourselves seriously, please know that it was all in jest. Mostly. Back in the day, I had inherited a tape player called the Invert-O-Matic (my dad has always been a gadget guy and this was pure seventies cutting edge stuff) which, no joke, would eject the tape, flip it over, suck it back in and play the other side. Someone covered the “Invert” with “Babe” and that’s all she wrote. I don’t remember exactly when we became the Babe-O-Matics – it feels like we just always were. And as it turns out, I think we always will be. We may no longer be running around Southbend, Indiana dressed like grungy man-girls in big Levis, flannel shirts, Birkenstocks and boots, but Babe-os we remain.
I’ve been sitting on this post for a few days – it doesn’t seem to be writing itself, as usually happens when the emotions are bigger than the words. Earlier this summer, I had intended to write about the bookend stop in Chicago on our way back from Michigan and I never did. The words sort of eluded me to describe how much fun we had overnight at Sunny’s* house in Wilamette with her hubby, Tax Man Italiano, and their four kids. Our other roommate, Shady** came in from the city for the night and we slipped right back into our old mischief, feasting, drinking, and gabbing to excess – only now we were surrounded by a gaggle of kids and a couple of indulgent husbands who seem to understand implicitly that if there was ever a night to step up and get the kids to bed and let us talk, it was then. Late night, sitting on Sunny’s porch, drinking those last beers we would regret in the morning, it struck me that after college, I was far too cavalier about the Babe-os spreading out around the country. Nothing seemed permanent back then. Nothing seemed of consequence. We all had things we needed to do, and I figured they would always be as close to me as they were on that sad day we all drove away from our little blue house on St. Peter’s Street for the last time – weeping, desolate, inconsolable in the knowledge that we would never have that kind of fun again.
Looking at my girls over the flickering candles on that porch, my heart caught in my throat. We could be doing all of this together. Instead, we live parallel lives in different cities, only catching up for a few golden hours every year. Shady goes to a lot of the same concerts we go to when they hit Chicago – she was at Beck and at De La Soul. What a partner in crime she would be if we lived in the same place! And Sunny’s kids and my kids paired off and scampered away like they see each other every day. Sunny and I could be sitting at the pool together, at the beach together, cobbling dinners together out of cheese and crackers and wine. I married someone who knew me way back when – back when I was young and fun and didn’t have a care in the world. I know how much humor and patience and leeway and pleasure you draw out of that pot of memories, that book of characters and references. It’s huge. Embarrassingly, I think I might have blubbered something about missing out on my Ya Ya sisterhood, but Sunny and Shady understood. When six girls spend a whole Halloween night tied together disguised as a drain hair shark, on mushrooms, well, it adds a whole other dimension to your relationship.
We could be doing all of this together.
But we’re not. And as bittersweet as seeing each other may be, it’s also completely restorative, satisfying and necessary. To laugh like that, to be understood and accepted like that, fills us up and lets us glide on through until the next time. We all have other wonderful friends where we live, sisters, the ladies you count on. But what we Babe-os had remains utterly apart – maybe because we’ve always lived apart – it’s locked away in time, but breathtakingly accessible. All we have to do to tap into that, is put ourselves into the same room. So we do.
On Saturday three of us flew to Saint Louis to surprise Dolly*** for her 40th birthday party. She had no idea we were coming. Her lovely sisters and hubby, Soul Daddy, masterfully kept it under wraps. Tartare had flown from Seattle to meet up with Shady and Sunny in Chicago and they flew in together. When I looked up from my phone to see the three of them striding toward me in the St. Louis airport, looking all foxy and smiley, my heart did a little jump. All together! For a party! For Dolly! It was just too good.
The surprise was perfect. We didn’t jump out of a cake. We simply walked down the street and as we approached we could hear Dolly’s daughter, Mimi, yelling Moooom, come outside! So of course, there was shrieking. Of course there were hugs and laughter. Dolly was grinning ear to ear, as was the adorable Soul Daddy. Operation Babe-O-Matic was a success.
The Babe-os were in da haaayouse and Dolly’s relaxing afternoon had just morphed into something else entirely. We chatted, drank in their three adorable kids, oohed and aahed around the house, soaking up the wall colors, the pictures, the stuff of our dear friend’s day-to-day life. We felt lucky to be sitting in her kitchen, even for a couple hours, to have our hands on the counter top where her kids color, where they spill cereal, where Dolly rolls out pies, where Soul Daddy chops and puts out cheese and olives. We Babe-os take nothing for granted, least of all time in each other’s homes. It’s just too rare. And even back in college, back when all we really cared about was the next great party, we were all about nesting, making our dorm rooms and then the house on St. Peter’s Street sweet little homes to relish, share, and make memories in. Some things never change.
A lot of things never change.
After a little adventure to Dolly’s favorite nail salon for manis and pedis, a quick beer, and that festive, oh so fun, getting ready time when we chatted and cackled and checked out eachothers’ lotions and potions, outfits and jewelry, we were off like the wind to Dolly’s bash. We knew it was going to be great because it was at the house Dolly grew up in, now owned by her sister, the lovely Maisie and her family. We had already celebrated Dolly and Soul Daddy’s wedding at that house, not to mention various stops to and fro Mardi Gras throughout the years. This family knows how to fling open their doors, hug you close and throw down for a really good time. There were pretty lights strung up in the yard, cocktail tables with candles, delicious food and bevvies, jello shots in every flavor, and tons of party people who all love Dolly.
We knew it was going to be fun. What we didn’t know, is that we were going to spend the next nine hours in a magical musical pleasure fest! Soul Daddy’s old band set up in the garage due to some threatening sprinkles, which, luckily, never ended up getting much footing and began a night of amazing music. Lordy, did we dance! Soul Daddy sang and we all swooned. Dolly sang and we swooned some more. Our girl! As the night tore on in a mad blur fueled by beer and restorative stops to the food table, all of Dolly’s sibs took a turn, and then her uncle and then her cousins and before we knew it, the night had devolved into a beautiful crazy hootenanny. It was great. And if you went inside, you had their exquisitely woven playlist to contend with. I have fuzzy memories of lurching around, dancing to So Lonely, screaming the words while gnawing on a chicken wing. It was a buh uh uh uh laaasst!!!
Just like the old days, the Babe-os would fan out at a party, flitting around, talking to everyone, only to find each other again in a riotous explosion of cheers and hugs and laughter, feeling like you were home again after a crazy odyssey. This would happen, and did happen on Saturday, multiple times a night, all night long. We may have lived together, but we were always happiest to see each other.
A lot of things never change.
Tartare, Sunny, Shady and Dolly, you are my heart. Happy birthday Dolly. I love you rockin’ Babe-o-matics.
*Because of love of, disposition, outlook, and Coppertone always at the ready.
**Because why mess with a good nickname?
***Because she has a love for Dolly Parton, not because she looks like Dolly Parton.
One minute I’m navigating back to school night, standing in line in the school gym, clutching myriad forms and checks, and sweating about getting my kid the band instrument choice he wants. The next minute I’m in the middle of a thumping sweaty rumpus at First Ave, right up close to the stage, crackin’ out my best, getting my hip hop on courtesy of these fine fellows. Dash and I went with Nanook, Gear Daddy, Crackerjack and Renaissance Man (happy birthday RM, fellow Virgo and lover of eighties new wave, good birthday, wouldn’tchasay?).
On this evening of all things back-to-school, the smell of hallways, chalk, and gymnasiums still fresh in my nose, we got SCHOOLED. We got old schooled, we got new schooled, we got knick knock paddywacked give the dog a bone, this old girl came rollin home. These professors of hip hop put on a great show. It’s the 20 Years High and Rising Tour, marking 20 years since their first and biggest album, 3 Feet High and Rising, dropped (see how I did that? I got the lingo, bitches) and they put on a show that emphatically said: we are still here, mother fuckers and thank YOU for still being here, mother fuckers! They went easy on the goof, heavy on the heavy, and scratched all the right spots with their genius rapping, sampling, scratching, and happy mahem inducing antics. It was really cool to watch a hip hop show backed by a smokin’ ten piece band (the Rhythm Roots Allstars) who really stood on their own but, combined with De La Soul, just amped it up to a whole other level. There were crazy bongo explosions (seriously, like three or four guys on bongos – awesome) and a full horn section affectionately introduced as Ghetto Brass (which made me chuckle given my afternoon of instrument wrangling with Saint James) and who floored us with a little Stevie Wonder: a bright, shiny, clear your sinuses, Sir Duke. Beautiful. Truly.
I’m not a professional, I don’t take notes, I don’t have the vocabulary or the knowledge base to really talk about music in a meaningful way but most importantly, I don’t want to miss anything. More and more, I’m finding that if I think about how I’m going to blog about something, it really takes me out of the moment, so I try not to do that. Ever. Consequently, I’m left with little more than ringing ears, a huge grin on my mug, sore muscles, and the vague notion that in addition to hopping us up on some good hard hip hop, these sampling geniuses tantalized us with a little Gorillaz, a little Steely Dan, a little Beastie Boys (Hey Ladies!!!), a little MJ, for sure some Run DMC. I know there was more, but I have a mind of swiss cheese.
And not for nothing, the last twenty years have been kind to De La Soul. They look great and they sound great. It was nice to be at a show watching guys our age working it out, and working it out really really well. It was an 18+ show, so there were plenty of babies in the audience to be sure. We even ran into Matt who works at the pool snack bar and knows to give us a heavy pour on the vino blancos, and bless his heart he was totally cool, casual and refreshingly not surprised to be running into a couple of pool mommies at the show. Every now and again they’d pan a big bright spotlight over the crowd going nuts and I amused myself imagining what Posdnuos would think of our little group dancing all dirty and freaky with our yoga arms up in the air and silly smiles plastered on our, ahem, super duper dewey and youthful looking faces. Every time I go to see live music I have a little age dysmorphia conversation in my head for a few seconds: Jeez, these people look like toddlers, ooh, hey, that one looks like a grown up St. James, cute! I should feel really old, but I don’t feel really old, what is wrong with me that I don’t feel really old? Fuck it, step aside slightly stinky, disaffected little one and watch a mama strut her stuff, WOOOHOOOO!
Sigh. It’s true. It’s really really true. So my take away from last night?
Mirror mirror on the wall.
Tell me mirror what is wrong?
Nothing child, keep keeping on.
And on and on and on and on.*
*OK, so I took some liberties with the last two lines. Sue me.
Doctor Dash can be a very wise man. There have been times in our marriage when he noticed things about the kids or put things into words in a way that made me stop, blink, and sheepishly acknowledge the lightbulb suddenly swinging above my head. I am drowning in the kids. I can’t see the forest for the trees, but he, with his hours away, sometimes brings a new perspective that is, frankly, right on.
Example: when Supergirl was about a year and a half old, she was a total wild child. She was a climber and a runner and her mission in life seemed to be to find the highest and most precarious perch from which to exhibit herself to the world. She always had a naughty smile on her face as she watched me staggering around below, trying to talk her down, ready to catch her if she ever slipped (she never did). She was (and is) a coordinated and strong little monkey with no fear of heights or speed. She was (and is) a girl in constant motion. We found ourselves gasping and clutching our chests, shaking our heads in exasperation, telling everyone who would listen what a “handful” she was. Until Dash wisely noted that if she was a boy, we would think nothing of her level of activity and risk taking, and that maybe we just needed to stop talking about it. Simply put, just because she’s a girl, doesn’t mean she doesn’t have the right to careen through life at top speeds. Of course. Of COURSE! We didn’t want to change her, wouldn’t be able to even if we tried, so what was the point of belaboring the point? No point. Right. So we stopped making such a big deal about her hair raising antics, learned to trust her as much as she trusted herself, and have come to quite enjoy having that kind of kid in our brood.
As I’ve mentioned before, we have been trying to give Saint James and Supergirl some freedom to roam our neighborhood. We want them off the couch and into the brush. We hope that by giving them a little space, they’ll gain a sense of confidence in themselves, a healthy sense of safety in their surroundings, and maybe some smarts along the way. Earlier this summer, we let them walk two blocks to Sweet Jessamine and Ivory Tickler’s house to turn on their sprinklers while they were on vacation: a chore adventure hybrid – genius. Doctor Dash made the observation that the two of them seem to get along the best when they get to go out alone on their little excursions. Normally, Saint James and Supergirl are notorious, insufferable bickerers, making the Costanzas look like swooning love birds. They have turned quarreling into an art form, refusing to agree on anything, dividing the universe of ideas in half and planting themselves firmly on either side of the line. They argue, they parse, they quote and misquote, they poke holes in reasoning, they unveil inconsistencies, they split hairs, they tit for tat, they begrudge, they demean, they scoff, they tease, they bully, they quibble, they scrap, they wrangle, they aha, they I told you so. In short, they fight. Constantly. Except, it seems, when they go off on an adventure. Yes indeed Doctor Dash, I do believe you are right! What an interesting bi-product of our little freedom experiment!
They don’t exactly walk off hand in hand, but they do go side by side and it’s as if the expanse of the world unfolding in front of their feet makes them feel less chafed by each other. Simply turning the focus away from the other to a point over the hill or down the creek allows them to coexist in peace, at least for a short time. Or maybe, when they are walking alone, they feel a bit of us against the world. They always come back happy, having seen one dead animal or another, having caught some insect or another, or, most recently, having had a relaxing little visit with neighbors. Yesterday Supergirl asked if she could walk to Red Vogue’s and Salt and Pepper Polymath’s house with Saint James, under the pretense of showing them the tie dye shirts they had made at camp. They came back about an hour later, their smiles ringed with the telltale mark of blue Gatorade. I find it amusing that they walked over to our dear neighbors’ house, accepted a little refreshment, chatted them up, (hopefully) didn’t fight with each other, (hopefully) said thank you and good bye. How civilized of them. And all NOT under my watch. It’s actually a small miracle. And another interesting bi-product of our freedom experiment.
Thank you Red Vogue and SPP, for being part of a little world that allows them to feel big. And thank you Dash for discovering one small way to curb the bickering. Their mucky water shoes are parked at the front door and if you see them touching dead things in the creek, just know that . . . I’m kind of, totally OK with that . . . as long as they’re not fighting.
