Truck driver: Long stretches of highway, yellow dashes stitching one snow-capped town to another; McDonald’s breakfasts, cashew and Dorito lunches, Subway dinners; balled wrappers sprinkling the cab floor; AM Radio programs covering alien encounters, government conspiracy theories, nasal-voiced biographers; deep, meaningful soliloquies about the nature of all things, delivered in a hoarse whisper to the hum of the engine, circa 3 a.m.; naps spanning the front seat, dreams of backstroking and butterflying through a fog that rolls endlessly across cornfields; coffee sipped standing in a field of dew-covered trucks, sunrise on the east; a horizon line that never ends.
Archive for August, 2008
I am a single mother of eight. Three naturally, three by c-section, and two adoptions: Chevy, Charlotte, Chet, Chad, Chip, Chuan-Yo, Chen-Li, and Dave. Chuan-Yo and Chen-Li are quiet and studious; they go on to win a Pulitzer in Literature and an Oscar for his lead in Yo Yo Ma’s biopic, respectively. Chevy plays guitar in a jazz band, Chet is a spiritual advisor for Manhattanites; and Charlotte, Chad, and Chip start an online business, the details of which I never fully understood. Dave has an unexplainable limp and lives next door. All of them are inconsolable when I die.
How to become a professional wrestler: First, pick whether you are going to be a fake wrestler or a real wrestler. Fake wrestlers are generally more famous. They wear glamorous costumes and never get injured. I’m not saying that’s what you should choose, but make sure you think this over carefully. Once you decide to become a fake wrestler, you have to learn how to fake fight. If it was me, I’d get a book from the library about fake fighting and read it over a heaping pile of cheese fries at that diner on the corner by your house.
My friend Scarlett insists it’s totally possible to live off the income of online sweepstakes, and my friend Scarlett knows everything. So on a cloudy Tuesday I quit my day job and put my pajamas back on. It’s tedious; between googling contests and filling out surveys, I always put in eight hours. Really it’s not so different from the job I abandoned, except there’s nobody around to talk to me about last night’s episode of Lost. Also, the mailman glares at me as he wheels in boxes of my loot: deodorant samples, free coffee filters, gift certificates, glittery key chains.
They say teen years suck, twenties are the worst, thirties are fairly miserable, forties are wretched, fifties are boring, and then a flash of clarity arrives at sixty, settling over your shoulders like a satin shawl. Knowing this, I will erase my teens, drink my twenties, nap through my thirties, gamble in my forties, rest during my fifties, and mix a glass of iced tea on my sixtieth birthday. That’s the day to simply sit back, watch the sun rise, and reflect upon a life I didn’t ask for but managed decently. Also: scrape spoonfuls of tapioca on my tongue.
barista cocktail server hostess line cook busboy chinese food delivery person bartender chef broiler person dishwasher carryout staff hooters girl pizza maker sandwich artist pastry chef banquet chef restaurant manager shift supervisor driver early morning baker house staff concession cashier donut maker sous chef gelato production artist turkey carver espresso expert greeter prep cook burger flipper fry daddy shake junkie kitchen manager burrito folder cake icer ice cream scooper fudge drizzler sushi wrapper soup stirrer tea brewer latte specialist onion ring attendant chicken scholar fugu surgeon salad tosser deli meat stacker lobster cracker sundae topper steak seasoner kabob griller waitress
Every day is the same. Waking up in the morning and brewing coffee, drinking this coffee outside or by a window, checking the weather online. Watching OPRAH. Feeling connected to society simply because I am watching OPRAH. Going to work in the afternoon. The job involves a simple task during which my mind is free to wander, plan, hypothesize, dream about everything but the task I am performing. Then: go home. Eat baked chicken. Feel relaxed completely, like it’s still morning, like I’m still watching OPRAH. Stay up late being grateful. Think about tomorrow morning’s walk, the coffee that awaits.
College: 18.
Job: 22.
Purchase turquoise car: 26.
Cruise the streets feeling alive with wonder: 26.
Meet other half: 26.
Marry other half: 27.
Divorce: 31.
Lose turquoise car in settlement: 31.
Long naps: 32.
I Love Lucy marathons: 33.
TV dinners, cheese-wheel lunches: 34.
See similar turquoise car in Wendy’s drive-through: 35.
Switch jobs: 40.
Cut hair: 42.
Buy youthful-looking jackets: 43.
Dream turquoise car is singing I Love Lucy theme, wake up sweaty: 50.
Retirement: 64.
Longer naps: 70.
Dentures: 75.
One sleepless night: 77.
Purchase turquoise car: 77.
Cruise the streets feeling alive with wonder: 77.
And to think I laughed when my friends urged me to pay two hundred dollars for Air Evacuation Insurance before my hiking expedition. Not so funny in hindsight. I am lying on my back at the bottom of K2’s steepest gorge, my leg executing an impressive Olympian twist. The weather is scorching. A Pakistani mountain porter with three teeth will find me tomorrow. The leg must go, to be followed by two gangrened fingers and, in a dash of irony, all but three of my teeth. I outlive all my friends anyway. Some things you plan, some things just happen.
You know that machine they sell in stores and online? That doohickey you attach to the bottom of your laptop via a secure (yet user-friendly) system of plastic clips and buckles, and after you activate the side-mounted on switch a humming noise begins to softly emanate from deep within as the machine roars to life, and after a brief shudder, the whole contraption defies the forces of gravity by hovering two inches above your lap, lifting the computer so your thighs don’t get scalded while you’re checking gmail and reading Wikipedia articles about the Poltergeist curse? I invented that machine.
