finslippy

Freedom--at least for a few hours.

Wonderland column, here! Hey!

Tonight, I am going BY MYSELF into the city for cocktails and dinner with my friend Irene, my lovely friend from Eng-uh-land who graces me with her presence once a year. I wish she were here more frequently, but since the last time I was in London was, uh, fifteen years ago, I should probably shut up about that. Cocktails! I think I need to wear, you know, a skirt! Which means I need to shave my legs, right? That's what I think that means. Since that should take me a few hours, I better get cracking.

Have a great Labor Day weekend, you.

Pondering the imponderable.

You want to talk about death, again, but your mother's not into it.

Lately death is staring you in the face at every turn. You look down, and there's a deceased earthworm baking on the sidewalk. Look up, and WHAPPO, your cat just murdered a fly. You go for a drive with your mom, and there's another cemetery, on your left. That's where all the people go to die.

"Not to die," your mother says. "Those people were dead when they got there."

"What got them dead?" you want to know.

"They were very old and very sick," she says.

"How old? Grandma old?" You bite your lip.

"Nonononono. Older. Much, much older. Hey, look at that funny guy doing that, uh, thing!"

What funny guy? What thing? You can't see from the car seat. What were we talking about, again?

Die, death, dying, dead, you hear it all the time, it pops out of conversations, like your name. "You're killing me," your mom says to your dad. That's an expression. She won't die yet. On the television they're killing each other but then they bounce right back up. Your grandma's friend dies. You tell her, "I'm sorry your friend is dead. I hope she gets better." After a little rest, you think, she'll stand back up. So why do they bury people?

You keep asking your mom, but something happens and you don't get the answer, or at least not the right answer. You say "even when I die" a lot, testing it out. "I will always love you," you say to your best friend, "even when I die." Your friend gives you a funny look, or maybe that's just his face. After a day at the beach, you tell your mom that you will always love the ocean. "Even when I die," you add. Your mom mutters something.

"I want my grave to be in the ocean," you say. "I want to be buried on a surfboard."
"Wow," your mom says, "you really DO love the ocean."
"And maybe your grave can be in the ocean, too, and we can be buried facing each other so we're kissing, because I will always love you—"
"Oh boy," your mom says.
"—even when I die," you get out.
"Can we not talk about death right now?" your mom asks. "No one's dead, no one's dying, we're all here, let's talk about something else. Okay?"
"But someday," you say.
"Someday, but not now. Not for a long, long time."

So: not now. But someday. And what then?

I'm in my car, and I'm coming for you!

Oh, my lovely lovely readers, thank you for your advice and your sympathy. It's heartwarming and yet at the same time chilling to learn that so many people are also terrified of being on the open road. I may still do the hypnosis, I may not, I don't know. Finding a driving instructor is an interesting idea, but I honestly don't think my panic has anything to do with not knowing what I'm doing, because although I emphasized my initial incompetence as a driver, I really think I'm pretty competent on the road. Even when I'm in the grips of an unnameable terror.

But hey, you handful of people who were all DON'T BE OFFENDED BUT YOU SHOULDN'T DRIVE and YOU SCARE ME, why do you write things like that? Do you really think that's helpful? (It's not, by the way. FYI. It just makes me give the computer the finger. While imagining that the computer is you.) And do you really think you need to be scared of me, the person in the right lane going exactly 55, her hands gripping the wheel tightly at 9 and 3, scanning her rear-view and side mirrors obsessively? I mean, okay, maybe there's a little hyperventilating, maybe there's a LOT, but sheesh, do you think I'm caroming against car after car as I hurtle down the shoulder, shrieking all the way? Give me a break. Be more scared of the people talking on their cell phones. They're out to kill us all.

Hey, also! There's a new post here at Alpha Mom.

I'm closing comments on this and the previous post, because what the hell. I can. Whee! I'm drunk with power. Also there has been some wine.

Hi, I'm panicky.

What's with me? With the not-posting? I have no excuses. Actually I have an entire rucksack full of them, but I will spare you.

First of all, I have been terribly remiss regarding informing you of my Wonderland posts. New posts here and here. Also, there's also an interview with me in the videos, under "Keyboard Confidential" (which I would link to if I could figure out how), in which I murmur and look an awful lot like my late Irish grandmother. All I need is a Manhattan and wispy blue hair, and I could scare the shit out of my father.

Now marvel as I abruptly change the subject. Aaaaand… go!

I've always lacked confidence regarding my ability to move through space. There was the Bike-Learning Failure of '73-'78, the Roller Skating Catastrophe of '79, the Uneven Bars Horror of '83. And then there was driving. I never had the slightest interest in driving, except inasmuch as it could get you places, and I liked places. I had never even sat in a driver's seat, when I found myself in just such a seat, my foot on the pedal, in a driver's ed car, careening down Main Street. I don't remember much from driver's ed, but I do recall a lot of screaming, most of it not coming out of my own mouth. I may have hit a few things. Not surprisingly, I failed. I took Driver's Ed all over again. I passed, but barely. I failed the driver's test. I figured that this was a sign that I should be chaffeured everywhere, but my parents made me take it again. I passed, but just slightly.

Then I moved away, away from the Land Where Everyone Drove, and that was that for twenty years. For twenty years I haven't had to drive. I think I drove a few times in college, when my a cappella group (don't laugh) went on tour. There was a familiar screaming sound, when I did that. My fellow a cappella mates stopped asking me to drive. I moved to the city, where no one had cars. I was all set.

But then I moved here. Figuring I would get used to driving, I moved to this place. And I did, mostly. I was a little sweaty-palmed for the first couple of months, but now I can get around town without a problem. Then I tried to drive on the highway.

And I completely freaked out.

Without going into too much detail about it because reliving it makes me want to die, here was how much I was freaking out: my vision tunneled. I was fairly certain that I was going to throw up on myself. I lost all feeling in my arms. My hands were sweating so badly that they were slipping off the steering wheel. My hearing went all funny. Then I started crying, which, in addition to the tunnel vision, made it awfully hard to see. I got off at the nearest exit.

I was probably on the highway for ten or fifteen minutes. That was one year ago.

I know what you're going to say. I can hear you saying it. Highway driving is scary, you're saying. You have to keep on trying! It's a skill! You'll get better! Do you always use all those exclamation points, when you're talking?

What we have here is not a lack of confidence—well, okay, it IS a lack of confidence, but also it is a fear that grips so tightly to me that I can no longer reason. I've tried driving on the highway a couple of times since then. I've tried to work through it. I did some cognitive behavioral therapy, I learned about dealing with panic and breathing the right way and I tried talking myself through the panic, blar de blar, and I am here to tell you that I cannot. I don't want to sound defeatist, here, but all the talking to myself and breathing just makes me calm enough that I don't run off the road and run screaming from the car. I can manage it, but I still get the numbness and the tunnel vision and the nausea—and the sweating, don't forget the sweating!—and I feel absolutely dreadful.

I tried going on the Garden State Parkway last week. My panic was so intense that I was nauseated for days afterward. It was like I had been poisoned. Why would I put myself through that again? Except, you know, for all the really smart reasons, like I need to get around and do things and be independent and GOD SHUT UP WITH YOUR REASONABLE ATTITUDE.

I'm sorry, baby, I didn't mean it. It's the fear, is all. It's got ahold of me.

All of this is leading up to one question, which is: what do you think of hypnosis? Anyone? Anyone?

Things I thought I would do as a grown-up, when I was seven.

Wear pantyhose.

Okay, I have worn panytyhose in my life, but not with the regularity I assumed I would. I do not even own a pair, currently. If my mother found this out she would be scandalized.

Get brainwashed.

I didn't know if it would be by an underground militia or a cult, but I was pretty sure that at some point in my life, I would be wearing white robes and my new name would be Snowfall. I wasn't looking forward to deprogramming, but I knew that when I did, my brooding deprogrammer would fall in love with me even as he brutalized my warped mind back into reality. It's for your own good, he would whisper over my inert body. Still hasn't happened.

Quit smoking.

I have never smoked, so I have never been able to quit. I have been robbed of that triumphant feeling of removing the nicotine monkey from my back.

Play bridge.

I barely know what bridge is, but the adults I knew, they all played it. As I came of age, I suspected that I would be indoctrinated into the ways of bridge. So far no one's come at me with a pack of cards.

Play tennis.

I hated tennis, I could never play, in school I was always assigned to hit balls against the side of the building because I disrupted everyone else's game—but when I reached some milestone of adulthood, I knew that I would simply begin sporting tennis whites and calling my gal pals up for doubles. I thank God every day that this has not happened.

Attend corporate black-tie events.

This would be for my husband, who would be some sort of corporate stooge. See above re: thanking God. Then again, paid vacations would be nice.

Enjoy cocktails at 5.

You know in Annie Hall, when Woody Allen has dinner with Diane Keaton's family? That's how Scott describes meeting my family, a lot. And it's all because of the cocktails. (Also some other things.) Mother likes her Manhattans. But here I am, almost 40, and if I have a drink at 5 p.m. I'm asleep by 8.

Have a nervous breakdown.

Having read "The Yellow Wallpaper," I figured that at some point in a woman's life she succumbs. And everyone knows I'm the nervous type, prone to hysteria, given to fits. I assumed that at some point I would take to my bed for a period of weeks, perhaps in the country. There would be hushed voices outside my door, the occasional cool compress. And yet! Although I have suffered the melancholia throughout my life, I have not yet felt my mind completely fracture. There's still time, though.

Henry wants you all to know...

My head is made of poop. I smell worse than garbage. Although my head is made of poop, my son wishes to poop on my head, which is poopy. Or else he will poop on my butt. Which, incidentally, is smelly. I should also mention that my son hates me. It's perfectly reasonable that he hates me, as in only the past few days I have reminded him to wash his hands, told him I had no money for an ice cream sandwich, and asked him which movie we should watch. All of these actions are unforgiveable. I know that now. And thanks to his lengthy, and at times deafening, explanation, I see that the reason is my giant feces-head, which is awkwardly propped up here on my neck. It's amazing that I can even type or think or have any opinions about ice cream sandwiches, but nevertheless I do, and this renders me loathsome. I am a bad mommy, and he doesn't like me anymore, well, he does, but more importantly he hates me. Let's just say that his feelings for me grow increasingly more complex. But he consistently feels that my head is, as I have mentioned, poopy.

Let's all hope that my behavior improves in the near future.