Speed and the psycho dikes

When I sold out of my last business, I immediately threw away my cell phone. I hated that thing. It would ring all the damn time and it drove me up the wall.

Don't get me wrong, I loved to hear from my friends and family. It wasn't them that I didn't want to hear from anymore. It was the people that were associated with the business. I kid you not. One night around two in the morning, while J and I were uh...busy, the phone rang. Of course I ignored it. But the person wasn't giving up. On the third time they called, I answered with obvious anger in my voice. One of the guys I did business with was on the other end, drunk out of his mind. He said he dialed the wrong number but then proceeding to ask me if I would like to be his company for the night. WTF! Right?

So, yeah, I was more than happy to toss that damn phone as soon as I was no longer associated with the business.

Well, Mom wasn't too happy about this. She hated not being able to talk to me whenever she wanted. So when I was down there last month, she got me another one.

No problem. Except I keep forgetting that I have one and I leave it at home most of the time. Besides, there is only a special select few that I actually gave the number to. And Starr is one of them.

Last night, after I posted that bit on the weather changing, I got a phone call. It was CLC night and all the girls were hanging out together. They had me on speaker phone and each of them got on to me about that little bit I added at the end of my post. The part about moving to Alaska.

I'd be lying if I said that J and I haven't seriously considered it. I've never been there but from the pictures Mel has sent me, the place is breathtakingly beautiful. And like I said, we could spend the winters in Hawaii with my cousin. It sounds perfect but...

"Hell no!" Starr practically yelled in the phone.
"That's right, Speed. Don't you even think of it," Walker added.
"I'll fly up there and beat the shit out of you right now," Bruiser threw in.
I could hear the rest of the girls protesting in the background too.
"What are you guys talking about?" I had to ask because I was really clueless.
"I just got your update on my phone. You cannot move to Alaska." Starr sounded like my mom for a second. "Since you left, we hardly get to see you. If you move to Alaska, we will never see you."
"Guys," I tried to explain. But they didn't want to hear it.
"Speed," Candy spoke, "my sister from another mother. And father for that matter. But that's beside the point. I love you. We love you. You already left us and are now 717 miles away. If you move to Alaska, you will be like 10,000 miles away. I couldn't handle that. I'm already suffering from separation anxiety with you being in Georgia. If you moved to Alaska, I would go out of my mind."

They are the greatest friends.

Peace grabbed the phone and took me off speaker. "I wonder what the waves are like in Alaska. Wait. No I don't. Please tell me that you really aren't going to move there."

"Nah, hun. I have no intentions on moving to Alaska anytime soon. But I really am going there next summer for that wedding." There was a certain sadness in her voice and it kind of made me feel horrible and horribly loved all at the same time.
"But, Speed. What if you go there and you do fall in love with the place and then next thing we know, we get a post card from you saying that you are never coming back to the east side and, well...who will I call when Walker pisses me off and Starr won't listen and you are too busy snowboarding Mt. McKinley and won't answer your damn phone again? How will I complain to you about Candy doing those crazy ass stunts on her bike that you two used to do together and she scares the shit out of me? Or," and her voice got softer, "who will sing to me when I've had one of those days where the paint just isn't right on the canvas and the rain won't fall? It won't be you because you will be in like a different time zone and living it up in some untouched landscape and forgetting all about us. The people who love you to death."

You would really have to know us to know exactly why I was laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes.
"Aikona, baby," I said as I caught my breath. "Not gonna happen. But if it did, what makes you think that I wouldn't invite all of you to come up for an extended visit? And then when you got there, you all fell in love with the place and decided that you no longer needed anything you had in Florida and you moved into my garage and we spent everyday of the summer chasing bears on the four wheelers and everyday of the winter snowboarding and skiing and building really cool snowboarding parks all over the place. And you'd paint all those untouched landscapes and sell them for millions and Candy wouldn't ride her bike anymore because she would be having too much fun off-roading and Walker wouldn't piss you off because she would be chasing the Eskimo chicks around and Starr would be more relaxed than she had ever been in her entire life and Bruiser would become a bear wrestler and Dimes and Lani would be making very beautiful babies for us all to fall in love with. What if?"

Peace took a second, I guess she was contemplating. "That actually sounds really cool. Except for the part about Bruiser and the bears."

Dimes somehow got the phone from Peace. "These chicks are crazy if they actually think that you would move that far away from us."

I laughed. "Right."

"Besides, don't they know that there is way too many men up there and definitely not enough women. I think its like 7 men to every woman. What lesbian would ever want to live there?"

I had to laugh even harder. Leave it to Dimes to think of it that way.

So, to ease all of you crazy dikes minds, I'll be in Georgia. At least until next summer. And then we can talk about it. Love you girls!

Helen, Georgia

My wake up call today...
"Hello?"
"Hey girl! How you doing?"
I cringed. My ex. "Great. How are you?"


"Doin' good," he tells me. "We are heading up to Helen and wanted to know if you and J wanna meet up with us for lunch."


I took the phone away from my ear and shook my head, trying to clear the sleep. Then I scanned the room looking for J. "Uh..."


"Our treat," he added.


Still couldn't find J and he was waiting on an answer. "Yeah, I think it would be cool."


"You're only like ten minutes from there, right?"


"Yep. Where are you?" I was praying he wasn't going to say he was in the driveway.


"We are about an hour away."


Whew! So, yeah, we hung out with my ex and his wife and son all day up in Helen. At first J was a little hesitant but she shrugged and said, "What the hell, why not."



Since our divorce many many years ago, he has been like the annoying older brother. He used to call me daily but since I've ridded myself of a cell phone, he rarely calls anymore. (thank God...lol) Sometimes, I don't understand why he is still in my life. He treated me like shit and cheated on me constantly. And though I hate no one, he was definitely worthy of hating. I did try to distance myself from him (getting rid of my cell and moving to Georgia) but he still knew where I was. Whatever...



We ate lunch at a place called Margaritas. It was all right. Our choices were limited. Then ex, his son, and J took a ride to Anna Ruby Falls leaving me and ex's wife to do "shopping." Me <--not a shopper. But she is pregnant and couldn't walk the trail up to the falls. It was cool. We did go in a few of the tourist trap shops and then we found a spot on the river to sit and put our feet in the water.

The water felt great. We watched the people tubing and laughed with them when they got stuck.

My sides still hurt from laughing so hard. It wasn't long before J, ex, and his son got back to us. The little guy loved playing in the water and him and I mined for really cool looking rocks. (Okay, I picked up handfuls of the rocks and he told my that none of the were 'gorgeous' and dumped them back in the water.) And then he tried to catch a minnow with the water bottle.



Done with the water, we walked to the ice cream shop. On the way we met Sweet Tater Salad.

Really...that was what the lady said his name was. His little hat was cute. He had a couple friends too.

It was a fun day. Even if it was with the ex...

*I can't tell you more about the ex, it will give away the Back Then story.

A kidnapping in creation

My lovely cousin, Jane, graced my ears with her soothing voice last night. Lately, I have been feeling kind of awkward and out of place, so to speak. Kind of stagnant and such. And North Georgia just hasn't quite felt like home to me yet.
I still can't seem to find my groove. Adjusting isn't as easy as I expected. I have no idea how I lived up here for two years before.

Back to Jane.
I had left her a message on myspace to call me. Like the loyal cousin she is, she called late last night. My day was shit and just the sound of her voice lifted that dark cloud in an instant. She had me laughing in no time. Well, I had left her specific instructions on what her call was to be about. I think I'm in desperate need of one of those "I'm laughing so hard my ribs are hurting" phone calls. It was just that...hell, my jaw still hurts.

Jane: What's the matter, baby?
me: Lots of things. And I can't really talk right now. (I was in the kitchen and it seemed everyone followed me.)
Jane: Okay, lets play 21 questions.
me: Okay. Go. Yes or no only please.
Jane: Hmmm....is it J?
me: Nope.
Jane: Is it Rock?
me: Maybe.
Jane: I see. Umm, is it the fact that you are stuck up in the sticks and bored out of your mind?
me: Yes.
Jane: Uh (there was about thirty seconds of her humming uh)
me: You suck at 20 questions.
Jane: (Laughing) 21 questions and just wait...Is it that there is nothing to do?
me: You just asked me that and you really suck at 21 questions. You can't even make it to five.
Jane: I guess you are right. I do suck at 21 questions.

I grabbed my sketch pad from my room and brought it out to the kitchen table. For some reason, I feel I have to chain smoke when I talk to her and I never smoke in the bedroom. (If this was my house, I wouldn't even smoke inside.)

Jane: What are you doing?
me: Finishing a drawing of Bob Seger for my mom. Oh! I put up a new drawing on myspace, too. Its Jesus.
Jane: Whoa! Jesus?
me: Well, Ted Neely as Jesus.
Jane: That guy has spent his whole life pretending to be Jesus. I guess we can be sure that he is going to hell.


She went to myspace and looked at my new art.

Jane: Oooh. Baby...
me: What? Can you tell I wasn't into it or what?
Jane: Yes. I can tell. You need to take it down.
me: Why? People need to see that I do half ass work too. (I laughed. So, I'm not perfect.)
Jane: Its great work, B, but it doesn't live up to the rest of your work. You need to keep this between you and your mom and take it down.
me: Alright. I'll take it down...for your sake.

One thing I can always expect from her is the truth. I knew it wasn't one of my best pieces but, really, I don't care. Its just what I do to fill in the spaces of time where I'm about to go out of my mind.
By this point in the conversation, she has talked with Bob (aka Mary Jane in drag) and she has to tell me about it.

Jane: Can you believe I'm still smoking birthday weed?
me: (Calculating in my head...its been a month since she turned 28) Damn! No. How'd you manage that?
Jane: This stuff is that good.
me: (Laughing) Really?
Jane: Yeah. It only takes two hits and you are good. Three hits of this and you will be stuck on stupid.
me: (Laughing my ass off) Stuck on stupid?
Jane: Hell yeah! Shit, if you tried to smoke an entire joint of this, you would be stuck on stupid for a month.

Stuck on stupid. A few more minutes into the conversation and it sounded like she was borderline stupid. But she kept me laughing. She threatened to come and kidnap me for a week or two. She said she was going to get Freak and Dad D to drive down here, blindfold me, toss me in the trunk, and take me to Asheville. I told her that it didn't sound like my idea of escape. Besides, I'd get claustrophobic, go nuts, and kill the first person I saw when that trunk opened. She said, "Then we better put you in the back seat."

Jesus?

I just got off the phone with my mom. So when she asked what I had been up to, I told her I'd been drawing again. So she asked me to send them to her.

me: Even the one of the girl that's in the bikini?
mom: Yeah, of course.
me: Okay.

I sent her the pictures I posted in here. All of them. She was at work, so she printed them out. As her friends passed her desk, they stopped and commented on my work...which my mom is now plastering to the walls of her office. She says she wanted to make me a gallery. Hmmm...

She asked me what my process was when I draw. Long story short...I just have to have a picture and, well...its that easy for me. Some area's are tougher than others (hands) but usually I can make my drawing look pretty close to what I see. Although, sometimes its a challenge with color photo's.

mom: So you can draw anything from a picture?
me: Yeah, pretty much.
mom: Will you draw something for me?
me: Uh, sure. Who or what would you like?
mom: Jesus.
me: Jesus? (Not what I was expecting from her, so I was in a bit of shock.)
mom: Jesus. What? You don't draw Jesus?
me: Uh, no. Not that. I just figured you would say something like Brad Pitt.
mom: Nope. Jesus. And Bob Seger...back when he was young with his long brown hair and thick mustache.

I see the pattern here.

Last year sometime, I took her to see Jesus Christ Superstar at the Broward Center for Performing Arts. It was a great show. She loves Ted Neeley, so I think I will find a pic of him as Jesus.

I better find my muse fast.

Talking with Bob

I posted a list of all the people I miss yesterday on my myspace blog. A list of friends and of course my family. My cousin (the other family member that is "out" gay) called me as soon as she read the blog. I told her about this blog and she asked to be called Jane.

Out of all the nick names in the world, she picked Jane? Even funnier is that no one calls her by her real name anyway, so I could have just used that nick.

The first words out of her mouth were, "I miss you too."

Talking with Jane is like being stuck in the middle of a comedy festival. I never know what to expect when talking with her and she never fails to get me in a really good mood. Last night was no exception.

Even though she was pretty upset about her snake being sick, she was still great to talk to. (I told her to think that her snake was okay and it would be. Because, thoughts are things after all and if you think it, so be it. The positive thinker in me never fails.)

In our 93 minute conversation, we learned that she is only 161.23 miles from me. A three hour drive. Not bad considering that I used to be 15 hours from her. Then I learned she had been talking to Bob.
I was thinking, who the hell is Bob?
She goes on to tell me that Bob is really Mary Jane. (For the slow ones...its not a person, its a herb.)

me: So Bob is Mary Jane in drag?
Jane: (laughing) Exactly. Only you could think of something like that.
me: Well...why Bob?
Jane: Because its easier to say Bob than it is to say Mary Jane when you've been talking with Bob. And besides, Bob spells Bob backwards.
me: Now, only you would use reasons like that.
Jane: Do you know how hard it is to spell or say Mary Jane backwards?
me: (thinking about it) Its definitely not easy.
Jane: And it sounds fucked up.
me: Yeah it does.

The conversation went into extreme laughter as we butchered Mary Jane and picked on Bob.

Jane: You should try these.
me: What?
Jane: Strawberry milkshake Whoppers. They're like these whoppers that are covered in this yummy strawberry stuff.
me: Yeah, but you've been talking with Bob so anything tastes great right now. I can't eat them anyway. (celiac disease)
Jane: They do taste great. Mmmm, and I'm so sorry you can't have these. They are mmm...
me: Rub it in. You are probably going to eat so many that they are going to make you sick.
Jane: Mmmm...

About twenty minutes later, she told me she had to put them away because they were making her sick. Hey, I warned her. Another person on my list was Freak. She's a young girl that I met about 11 years ago. She plays guitar like you wouldn't believe. Jane informed me that Freak was going to be at her house that night.

Freak and I have very interesting conversations. We talk about the most off the wall things that make sense to no one except us. About 60 minutes into the conversation with Jane, Freak finally showed up.

Freak: Hello?
me: Freak!
Freak: I miss you.
me: I miss you too. I even wrote about how much I missed you at myspace.
Freak: You did? Aww. Thank you. I have to read it.
me: Yeah you do.
Freak: Its such a nice night out.
me: It is. (I'm standing out on the front steps.) Did you see the moon?
Freak: Yes. Isn't it beautiful. I want to fly up there and chase it around.
me: Do you think it will actually run?
Freak: Hmm...I think so.
me: Well, when you catch it, hold it so I can take a bite out of it.
Freak: Ooh yeah. I want to take a bite too. Do you think it would mind?
me: Umm...it might. But if you caught it that means you run faster than it does, so we should have no problem getting away.
Freak: Yeah. Lets do it.

We all talked until Jane's phone died. But then at 2am, the phone rang again.

Jane: I was so worried about calling you back.
me: Why?
Jane: I didn't know who would answer.
me: Luckily I still had the phone in my room. (J's dad was sleeping.)
Jane: I just wanted to call you and tell you that I am cuddled up with Big Bunny.
me: OMG! You still have that thing? (Big Bunny was a gift from an ex that I didn't want to throw away but I didn't want to keep. Its about a three foot stuffed rabbit.)
Jane: Yes. You wanna say hi?
me: Sure! Hi Big Bunny! (I swear we are grown adults.)

She kept threatening to fall asleep on the phone so I made her say goodnight and hang up. But not before...

me: Say goodnight to Bug Bunny for me and give it a hug.
Jane: (she actually said goodnight to the bunny and made noises like she was squeezing its head off.) Done. Goodnight. I love you.
me: Love you too. G'night.

I felt like I needed a talk with Bob after all this.