When I Dip, You Dip, We Dip

I love my roots.  I love where I came from and how that past contributed to the person I've becom.  I even love my hometown.  My favorite view of it comes from my rear view mirror. 

I knew from a very early age that I needed to get out of there.  This knowledge probably stems from my mom regularly telling me that I needed to get good grades so that I could get a scholarship because we were poor.

8-year-old me pulling an all-nighter before a spelling quiz.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to take everyone I love with me.  That means I have to drive back to Centralia, IL on an almost monthly basis.  While my father and I have a strained relationship, he has made this list and, through association, so has his girlfriend and her children.  I attended grade school and high school with them.  We’ve always been a part of one another’s lives.

These people are a mess, so I clearly get them.  Last Thanksgiving, they decided not to invite many people and were able to host in my dad’s single-wide trailer.  There were two types of turkey (smoked for Rhonda (the girlfriend who is now my stepmother) and roasted for pretty much everyone else) and all of the usual suspects of sides.  My stepmom even made bacon-wrapped asparagus.  It was awesome!

Having grown up in Southern Illinois, though, I always expect one appetizer at holiday dinners: pickle wraps.  They’re basically slices of ham smeared with cream cheese and then wrapped around dill pickles ham-side out.  Once sliced into bite-size pieces, they look like pupil-less green eyes.  They’re both repulsive and delicious.  I blame my sodium deficiency.

White trash caviar

I looked all around for them, but didn't ask because I didn't want to accidentally spark a conversation. I’m the only extrovert in my biological family, but Rhonda’s kiddos know how to small talk, especially about things that matter in their own microcosm of the world.  They’re not entirely self-centered, though.  Each and every one of them asked where my partner at the time was.  He had never attended a Garland Thanksgiving.  He always went home for that holiday and came with me on Christmas.  Still, they never failed to ask.  I've yet to decide whether I appreciate or hate that fact.

Despite my carefully toeing the landmines of actual conversation, I, nevertheless, was pressed to try a new dip.  It was in a bowl the size of which I would associate with holding an entire bag of microwave popcorn or vomit (avoid popcorn bowls in my house).  For dip and the number of people in attendance, the serving seemed superfluous.  The medium was white and suspended in it were pink and green chunks of indiscernible flora and fauna.

As I spread the mystery dip onto a cracker and had it nearly to my mouth, I asked, “What is it?”  I didn't consider this a bold or adventurous move.  Most of the food my family makes is fairly bland.  Eating strange animals hasn't been an issue for me outside of the one time my dad mentioned “bullet cat stew.” (I’m still hoping he was kidding, but he swears a recipe is floating around his house (trailer) somewhere.) Saltiness was the only flavor profile they hit hard, and that wasn't a problem for me.

The cracker was already in my mouth when my “sister” said, “It’s pickle wrap dip!”

NOT TODAY, SATAN.  NOT TODAY!

This is as good a time as any to explain my stepsister, Sam.  She is almost the exact same age as I.  We were in the same grade, but we didn't really take the same classes or like one another.  Then, our parents started dating and suddenly I was “brother.”  Growing up in Centralia, I knew when to take my lumps.  I returned the favor and we've gotten along ever since.  She’s especially easy to like considering the way my father treats her.  I’ll take his indifference to the constant barrage of insults he tosses her way any day.

Sam stayed at my dad’s house (trailer) for about a year after she developed some disease I never cared to remember.  The symptom was fainting?  Insomnia? Celiac disease?  Regardless, she was there.  When my brother and his family made one of his biennial visits, my father and stepmother insisted they spend at least one night with them.  They were staying at my mom’s with me while she stayed at my “stepdad’s” place around the block.

Sam's doctor, I'm assuming

The only way Shawn, his wife and his daughter could stay at the lake, though, was for Sam to hit the bricks.  In an effort not to make Shawn and co. feel like they were kicking her out and bail out of guilt, though, my father did the honors himself.  Everything Sam owned, including her toiletries, were moved to the unfinished house my dad stopped working on when I was four years old.  Since my father also hosted a barbecue that evening, we all got to hear this first-hand from Sam herself.

Thankfully, her boyfriend at the time brought a tent and sleeping bags (along with his four children from a previous relationship) since it was going to be thirty-three degrees outside that night.  In the end, my father’s stratagem proved successful. Shawn and his wife felt so much responsibility that they HAD to stay in the trailer.

I felt bad for Sam after that…until I ate the dip she invented.  Now, I totally get it.  That fainting, not-sleeping, gluten-fearing jerk had it coming.

She turned pickle wraps into a dip!   And it was…awful.  She used a combination of dill and bread and butter pickles (Note: In no way am I claiming that using only dill would have made this dip edible).  I shame-swallowed this monstrosity in my mouth and quickly fled the table devoted solely to one of the worst things I've ever allowed past my teeth.  When asked, I politely effused over how happy I was that something so good was made into a dip.

My niece and I spent the rest of the night in a horrified silence normally reserved for people who dress up in pirate costumes for a pirate-themed wedding only to find that they are, in fact, the only ones who assumed costumes were part of the theme.

The struggle is real.  Let your guests know in no uncertain terms whether or not you want them to dress up for your wedding that has a ridiculous theme.

I'll Take You to the Candy Shop

For the son of a functioning alcoholic, it may be surprising to learn that I didn’t know the difference between a bar and a liquor store until I was well into high school.  My parents had split custody after their divorce when I was four years old.  Because of this, every other weekend, I would pack a bag and my dad would take me from the bustling metropolis of Centralia, IL to the sticks.  Before we would make that drive, however, my father would take me to the Blue Goose for anywhere from thirty minutes to four hours.

The Blue Goose was a magical shack.  Free standing, though no larger than a convenience store, the walls were covered in shelves of dusty bottles I never once saw anyone purchase.  The floor was mostly filled with boxes of beer and the centerpiece consisted of three barrels filled with beer and ice.  It was from these glorious troughs that my father and his friends would shovel out their libations.

Four-year-old me thought this was totally natural.  The only man I ever saw working there, Dennis, used to throw pieces of Double Bubble at me when I walked in or whenever I got those dead hooker eyes that said, “I guess this is my life now. I’ll sleep on that case of PBR.   There’s plenty of soda and chips.”  I never saw Dennis do that with anyone else.  It made me feel special, which is awesome because I needed that.  I was obviously too stupid to realize this unique relationship was only unique because my recently-divorced father was the only man who would bring his child into a liquor store for more than a quick stop.

A child's only hope of happiness in a liquor store

To be fair, I was basically an only child (both brothers were moved out by this time), well-versed in entertaining myself.  I was the poster child for bringing your kids to liquor stores that operate as bars without proper bar licensure.  I would just curl into fetal position and hum to myself…LIKE ANY NORMAL CHILD!

When I got involved with chorus and speaking in junior high, my dad told me he was so happy I grew out of that shy phase.  I just couldn’t tell him it was all a result of having to ignore my present situation and absorbing way too many adult conversations at an early age.  My schoolmates didn’t understand my humor.  My dad could call a lady a drunk slut and get a shack-full of laughter.  All I got were looks of fear, but not the badass Machiavellian kind.  The kind that’s mixed with pity.  The kind one might have of a concerningly-dissheveled person walking too fast toward one.

Maybe you're just scared of how much you care?

If I had been better at reading context clues, I might have avoided developing my father’s colloquialisms.  This is the same man who wore a t-shirt and swimming trunks to our family Christmas dinner. 

This is why I am never in a rush at the liquor store.  If there were ever a reason to camp out at one, I would be perfect at that!  In addition, I almost never walk out of one without candy.

This is also why my boss thinks I talk like an 80 year old.  I’m not saying, “I’ll be back in two shakes of a lamb’s tail,” because I want to look older or retro; I’m saying that because I thought that’s how you told people, “I’ve had three beers and need to piss.”

It blows my mind that some counties/states won’t sell liquor and beer at the same place.  If the Blue Goose were under those constraints, they’d either lose all of their decorations or unceremoniously go out of business.  Conversely, anyone not from Centralia gets a similarly blown mind when he or she discovers that all of our liquor stores are drive-thru liquor stores.

Fast forward to Christmas of 2012.  My brother was up from his home in Florida, so Dad and his live-in were pulling out all of the stops. 

A moment to explain my father’s live-in.  My family doesn’t marry.  I mean, at one point, they did.  But then they all got divorced and apparently decided they were over it.  My father has been dating his girlfriend for over a decade.  She is, for all intents and purposes, my stepmom.  Her children call me “brother.”  That is less clinical than it sounds.  I call my real brother “brother.”  I call my cousins “cousin.”  It’s just a thing we do. 

Another moment to explain my brother.  He moved to Florida when he was fourteen.  He even dropped our last name for a while when he was married to a woman named Noel.  Apparently, she didn’t want her name to be too Christmas-y.  He’s now back to the Garland clan.

My old sister-in-law.

Back to the main storyline: my father and “stepmother” took my brother’s wife, his child and him to every place of note in Centralia.  One destination conspicuously not on the agenda was the Blue Goose.  It seems the ownership has changed in Centralia’s version of a hostile takeover.  The entire Blue Goose Crew (BGC) fled to a bar/liquor store (because, why not?) called The Caddy Shack.  I was worried that my father had learned how to drink in an actual bar (This isn’t entirely fair.  One holiday weekend, I went out with some of my friends from home to a dive bar in town.  My dad was there.  He was so happy to see me talking to females at a bar that he bought us all a round.  It was sweet.); my fears were assuaged, however, when he took us to the liquor store side of the establishment, reached into an all too familiar barrel and cracked open a Bud.  To this day, I’ve never seen the bar section of The Caddy Shack.

My imagined idea of what the bar in The Caddy Shack looks like.  I'll probably never know.

Not to be outdone, my sister-in-law and I got a bottle of Shiraz and passed it back and forth.  I am my father’s son, after all.