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.

There's a Reason The Empire Theme Plays When You Call

My mother has finally figured out how to send text messages.  Despite the fact that she still has unlimited text messaging from when I was on her plan, she tries her hardest to economize her messages.  This seems like a natural inclination while texting, but she manages to do so in a way that actually defies one of the tacit rules therein.

Most texts you receive have one topic.  For instance, “Where are we eating tonight? What time do you want me there?  Are we doing anything afterward?” This message asks three questions, but they’re all related to a central topic.

My mother, on the other hand, learned to text on Htrae.  Here is an actual text I’ve received from her:  “Hello son. I hope your week is going well. Grandma is in the hospital again.  Let me know when I can send in your car payment.” Nothing can prepare you for such a text.   It's almost as if she's worried about running up the bill by breaking up her thoughts in an organic way.  Not counting the greeting, there are three separate topics in this message. I’ll break down each one so that you can better understand the punch such a message packs.

Hello son.

My family has a quirk shared with many others in that we refer to one another by our relationship to one another.  It isn’t odd for a child to refer to his/her parents as “Mom” and “Dad,” and most nieces and nephews refer their aunts/uncles as “Aunt/Uncle So-and-So.”  My family, however, takes it a step further. My parents call me “Son.” I call my brother “Brother.” My uncle Jeff is simply “Uncle.” The only relationship where this isn’t the case is the uncle/aunt-to-niece/nephew title.  My aunts and uncles all refer to me as Stephen (or Stevie).

Upon witnessing this for the first time, most people just assume my parents are reacting sarcastically to getting called outside of their given names or something. Or they think my brother and I are just quoting Arrested Development. That one is actually kind of true. I've certainly adopted Buster's affect whenever I greet my brother. Still, just know that names are only important in my family if the relationship alone isn't specific enough to convey information.

I hope your week is going well.

I try to talk to my mom at least once a week.  I rarely initiate the conversation, but if I miss a call, I’ll generally return it unless it’s the fourth or fifth I’ve received that day.  A week is an arbitrary amount of time that I’ve decided is long enough to not feel smothered, and short enough to show affection and respect.  This was my mom’s way of reminding me that I hadn’t called her yet this week.

In my defense, it isn’t always easy to call her. Parents of my generation who live in small tows have a tendency to respond to Empty Nest Syndrome by becoming hometown newscasters.  This can be entertaining on occasion, especially when someone with whom I attended high school ends up in the newspaper for illicit activities. Unfortunately, more often than not, I’ll find out about the deaths of relatives of people I hardly knew.  Today, for instance, I learned of a doctor’s son who died of an overdose. This was only relevant to me because he had another son who committed suicide six years ago. I did not know either son, which means my mom has decided all suicides are relevant to my life due to my oldest brother’s suicide eleven years ago.  Hopefully, you can see why I don’t jump at the chance to call my mother more often to play Six Degrees of Lachrymosity.

This also changed with time.  Eventually, we started bonding over mutual interests like cooking and gardening.  Recently, we met at a BBQ restaurant and had some of the best potato salad I’ve ever eaten.  We agreed on that fact and then spent about 15 minutes trying to figure out what went into it. By the next morning, she had sent me two different links to recipes confirming what we had guessed.  It’s kind of like a game except it normally just makes whoever is eating with us very nervous and quiet.

Grandma is in the hospital again.

My grandma has been having back problems for several years.  Two years ago, she fell and hurt her back and spent several months in the hospital and the nursing home.  She was eventually able to come back, but whenever she feels neglected, she’ll pull out the paperwork and threaten to sign herself in.  She’s the only person I know who on occasion wants to live in a facility that smells so strongly of urine. This message was a request for me to call my grandma and then come home and visit her over the weekend.

Let me know when I can send in your car payment.

At this point, my mom had one of my checkbooks and was sending in the payment for me at the beginning of every month.  I was only subbing during this time, so sometimes the payment would need to wait a few days until the next paycheck. This message, however, was actually how she sealed the deal in terms of me calling her.  It was always easier to just tell her which day to send the payment and explain my reasoning over the phone rather than receive a barrage of questions (and most likely more upsetting information). The woman knows what she’s doing.

Hopefully my mom will learn to break up these meaning-laden texts, but until then, I'm happy to share them with all willing listeners.

Where We're Going, We Don't Need Roads.

I didn't know what a side console in a car was called until I was in Driver's Ed.  In my world, that beautiful storage unit where people stash their cd's, spare change and sunglasses always had a second function.

A much nicer mobile home than ours

My parents had lake-front property outside of city limits.  Lake-front now applies to the house my father is still in the process of building (he started shortly after I was born).  He still lives in the yellow trailer my childhood friends called "The Twinkie."  The pseudo-house now mostly just blocks the trailer's view of the lake. He claims the reason he won't finish the house now is because his taxes will change drastically.

This prime real estate had its advantages, though.  I developed the skill of hearing a car coming when it was still miles away.  I also learned how to swim and fish at a very young age.  The advantage I never really considered during my childhood, however, was the fact that police were only present if/when someone called them.

I got driving lessons by everyone in my family before my age reached the double digits.  I ramped my ATV off a mound of dirt my dad kept after excavation for the big house, the mound I so lovingly referred to as Muddy Mountain.  A friend's little brother learned how to make bombs online the summer after my senior year in high school; I knew exactly where he could set them off.

Needless to say, traffic safety laws weren't at the forefront of my parents' minds.  I never remember being in a car seat, but to their credit, I've always been monstrously tall for my age.  Whenever I would get fussy and start squirming in the half seat belts that were outlawed from the front of vehicles in the 60's, my parents would bring me to the front of the car.

The Buddy Seat

My ridiculous size as a toddler made sitting on my parents' laps uncomfortable at best.  That's when I would get to sit on "The Buddy Seat."  With TicTacs and pennies jingling and mingling beneath me, I would sit as my father sped down sinuous country roads.  I would even ask to sit there when the front passenger seat was a viable option.  Hitting my head on the roof of a vehicle, after my vision returns, will give me a sense of nostalgia for the days when I was King of the Road with the best seat in the house.

One of my first boyfriends and I made a connection after just such a bump. 

He was a grade below me and I was home for a Halloween party.  It was at the local community college.  My best friend was working there and hosting the party, so we knew it would be a blast.  I went just for her, but then I saw other friends from high school. 

One group of former classmates included Zack.  We had one class together and the only thing I remember about him from that class was that he was tiny and full of frenetic energy.  I thought of him as a chihuahua.  However, Zack was certainly more interesting now because he was wearing a shirt announcing that he was gay.

I was intrigued, but still, not there for him.  His group, though, included some friends I had known since early childhood.  We caught up and when Ashley had to stay back to finish up some details after the party, I left with them.

We were in the back seat of a their Jeep with my friend, Travis, between us.  The driver decided she wanted to "Chase Bambi" which involves driving through harvested fields, literally driving toward the animals most known for killing people with their proclivity for jumping in front of moving vehicles.  The goal wasn't to hit them.  Looking back, it seems like it was a way of getting back at the deer for all of the times they almost killed us.

While in the field, I had one arm gripping the handle above the door and one gripping the seat behind Travis.  As we sped toward what was surely a terrified animal, we hit a huge dip and we were all lifted out of our seats.  Despite the seatbelt I'm pretty sure I was wearing, my head hit the roof.  When we came back down, my hand was in Zach's hand.  It stayed there until we got back to my house.  The relationship lasted a few months and we had some fun, but by the end I was willing to blame the whole thing on the brain damage sustained from that bump.  But perhaps the loving reminder of sitting on the Buddy Seat helped a bit.

Esty, Get Your Gun

My father’s house has always had a gun case in it.  I was never allowed to touch it, but it was prominently displayed in the master bedroom. The Freudian implications of this decorating choice are not lost on me.

I probably would’ve been allowed to use each and every one of his guns had I finished all of the training he had in mind for me.  I, unfortunately, never made it past the hunting bow. The initial phase of practice involved pulling the string back and then easing it to its natural position over and over again. I was more of a reader anyway.

My mom, however, gave herself an honorary degree (along with a license to kill) shortly before I was born. The target was my father which isn't very surprising considering the likelihood of gun-related homicides are 2.7 times more likely for people with guns in their homes.

My father was very attractive to barflies.  That isn’t to say that he’s a beast only fit for the dim lights of a dive bar, but he is very...average.  His rock hard beer belly gives the impression that he is in the cauldron smuggling business.  The inside of his pick-up truck smells like the oil derricks he has to drive by every day on his way to work.  For those of you unfamiliar with the smell, it’s very similar to beer farts.

Not my father

Nevertheless, my hometown’s standards aren’t those of Carrie Bradshaw.  My father owned his house (trailer), was in the process of building a much nicer one (made of wood!), had a steady job, and looked like someone you wouldn’t like to piss off.  He was a Centralia catch, at least in the eyes of his future live-in girlfriend.

During her pregnancy with me, my mother had multiple complications.  I literally almost killed my mother multiple times before I even made it into this world.  Because of this, she was on and off of bed rest for the majority of her third trimester.

Not my mom

Most Centralians will claim to believe in God, though few will regularly attend church.  They do borrow some of the premises, however.  Instead of prayer circles, they had that-deadbeat-husband-of-yours-is-getting-awful-friendly-with-so-and-so-at-such-and-such circles.  During one of the “off” periods of her third trimester, my mom received a call from just such a circle.  She did what any pregnant woman would do: she grabbed the first rifle she could find in the gun cabinet, set it in the passenger seat of her car, and drove into town to bring my father home from whichever seedy bar he had chosen that night.

This may seem like a kidnapping, but considering my mother’s height (5’4”) and the fact that she left the gun in the car, the altercation took a much more domestic route.  It must have been an embarrassing spectacle for all parties involved. As someone who has been in a yelling match with both of them, I can say that my mother can cause a much more effective scene than my father.  Eventually, he bowed to the inevitable and got into the car.

I’d like to think that if time travel were possible, I would go back and tell my dad to nod and apologize, but I know myself too well.  Remembering how the story ends, I’d grab whatever passed for popcorn back then and watch the magic unfold.  The car ride was silent until they reached their street.  Then the void was filled with baritone and alto screams.  They finally reached the trailer where my mom grabbed the gun and waved it as they made their cacophonous way into their home. Who won this specific argument is still dependent upon who you ask.  What is known is what happened next.

My father drunkenly told my mom that she didn’t even know how to load a gun.  And that’s how my mom, in a successful effort to prove him wrong, shot a hole in the roof.