The rink owner told me I could bring in my own music for Roller DJ to play during my party, and you better believe I did just that. I slaved over this mix for weeks, trying to get it as close to three hours as possible. It started out as a list on paper, just a casual scribbling of possibilities that soon morphed into The Most Important List in the World and had me getting out of bed in the middle of the night to add to it. (So this is why, when Janna said she was going to request the Hokey Pokey, I almost chewed her face off. THERE WAS NO TIME FOR SHENANIGANS! I had it down to the second.)

When I gave Roller DJ the music, I said to him, “I only have one request. Before “Heart & Soul” by T’Pau comes on, can you give me a birthday shout out?” Roller DJ is pretty experienced with me by now, so he just sighed and said sure.

AND HE DID JUST THAT TOO. It was like 1988 all over again, except I was wearing a side pony with an over-sized bow in my hair.

(Why wasn’t I wearing a side pony with an over-sized bow in my hair?)

I really wanted to have some comfort songs from my childhood, back when roller skating was the popular thing to do and didn’t inspire the “Whoa, people still roller skate in 2011?” reaction that I normally get. So I threw on some New Order, Depeche Mode, Pet Shop Boys, Naked Eyes, the Cure of course, Duran Duran, Mummy Calls, Siouxsie and the Banshees…at one point, the rink owner snagged me during my party (people kept doing this when I was clearly trying to be a dream on wheels!) and said laughingly, “Hey Erin, do you work at a discotheque?”

YES, HOW DID YOU KNOW.

I also wanted to have the other side of the 80’s spectrum: Some Phil Collins/Genesis such as “Tonight Tonight Tonight” and “Easy Lover,” which I was very vocal about missing while I was unwrapping presents.  Billy Ocean and Madonna when she was still cool (“Borderline” FTW). Whitesnake and Foreigner to fulfill the monster ballad quota. Some 90s throwbacks in the form of Sophie B. Hawkins and Boyz II Men (Henry wouldn’t skate with me during “End of the Road” even though he knew it was dying wish).

“Return of the Mack” of course. There is no way I will ever not skate to “Return of the Mack.” Quintessential skate jam.

The day before my party, I jokingly tweeted that I even included “Jackie Blue” because I wanted to have something from Barb’s generation to make her happy. Coincidentally, that happened to be the song that was playing when she arrived at the rink. We were both like, “Whaaaaat is happening right now.” (I seriously do love the shit out of that song, though. It backfired though because I think it made Henry feel more at home on the rink. And giving him an enjoyable time is the opposite of my life’s mission.)

And then when Kaitlin arrived with my Robert Smith cake (which stopped me in my tracks, it was so perfect), “The Baby Screams” was playing.

Creepy but awesome.

Of course I wanted to appease everyone with the music selection, especially after Henry lectured me about alienating people. I had some current r&b and pop hits, some Fall Out Boy for Henry’s nieces, Britney Spears and Rihanna, but you know there was that part of me that was itching for my favorites, those songs that make my heart bleed. So I loaded up some Dance Gavin Dance, Emarosa and Chiodos as well. I was dying to hear some post-hardcore at the roller rink.

Roller DJ kicked off my party by playing an Emarosa track.

“Not gonna lie, this is pretty cool,” Blake said when I skated past him and pointed up at the speakers.

Near the end of the night, when Jonny Craig’s voice permeated the Roller Drome with the words “Tailored sheets,”  Chooch and I screamed in unison from opposite sides of the rink. His voice sounded even more beautiful to me, reverberating off that smooth wooden floor, making my knees all weak. It was the only time of the night I almost fell.

Roller skating to Emarosa and Dance Gavin Dance was the best birthday present EVER.

VI. Balloon Sweatshop

Henry wanted to hire some form of entertainment for the party, forgetting that 5-year-olds are pretty much good with some grass to run on and slides to slide down. Unfortunately, the only party entertainment I could find that catered to poor-folk like us was a clown whose sole review said: CON ARTIST!

Part of me thought it would be pretty awesome to hire her and watch as she picked the pockets of the preschool moms, but my luck she’d pick that day to graduate to armed robbery.

But then Bill mentioned to me that he used to be pretty savvy with balloon twisting. Hired!

I caught him pacing around the pavilion, watching tutorials on his phone. He was really taking his role seriously, which I appreciated because I wasn’t going to let him eat until he entertained some fucking kids.

It’s amazing how excited kids get over balloon swords.

Everything was going great until one little brat decided that swords were yesterday’s news and began requesting other things. Like puppies.

Thank god for Bill’s secret weapon: Jessi. She began twisting the fuck out of green and yellow balloons until they were these perfect, precious daisies. I gave one to Momesis’s daughter and I was sure she was going to faint like Perez Hilton meeting Lady Gaga for the first time. Momesis and I laughed together until I realized that we were having a moment so I walked away.

Stripper’s daughter must have requested a sword in every color, thrice, only to take five steps away from the pavilion and stomp it to death. Pretty sure Bill and Jessi wanted to cut her off.

Or just cut her.

At one point, I caught Bill trying to eat while a line of balloon-addled children formed to his right. What, you want a break? You’re tired and hungry from driving all the way to Pittsburgh that morning from Michigan? Boo-hoo! You’re not here to enjoy yourself! You’re not a guest, you’re the HELP. And if you want to know what that entails, go ask Janna.

Then I felt bad and decided to intervene. I’m not really good with talking to children*. My first inclination was to flick the kids on the forehead and tell them to beat it, but their moms were near by so instead I just said, “Bill’s taking a break. Come back later.”

(*Like when I told Kara’s baby Harland that the grill was there for cooking babies, which caused Henry to give me a disgusted look. What? Harland’s young enough still for me to get away with that. But if he grows up into a serial baby-griller, then it was really Henry who said it.)

I DON’T SEE ANY BALLOONS IN YOUR HANDS!

VII. Douche Cup

Toward the end of the party, I was sitting at a table with my friend Lindsay. “We learned a new word over at the playground,” she said to me in such a way that I:

• knew my kid definitely was going to be a character in this story
• knew that it definitely wasn’t going to be church-appropriate

“Douche cup,” she said, snickering.

When Bill and Jessi were here last year for Chooch’s party, Bill and Chooch were putting together a Spongebob Lego set. But Bill had the audacity to eschew the directions and build his own things. Chooch didn’t like that at all and that is how Bill became known as Douche Cup.

I guess being around Bill again jogged Chooch’s memory, and the day became a douche cup free-for-all. Barb mentioned that he ran past the table she was sitting at and everyone was like, “Did he just say—-yeah, pretty sure he said douche cup.”

Later, Jessi told me that she overheard one of the preschool moms saying, “I think he wants a juice cup?”

Yes, that’s exactly right! My kid REALLY likes his juice cups.

Douche cups.

VIII. The Guests

We had a small Labor Day cookout at my mom’s last year. I only invited three of my friends, and two of them couldn’t make it. So it wound up being Blake, Henry’s mom, my two brothers, and Jessy* and Tommy.

(*Not to be confused with Jessi from Michigan, who is a much better example of a friend.)

Nothing major, just a small cookout, during which I expressed interest in having a Halloween party.

“Um, have you SEEN how your parties turn out?” Jessy sneered, waving an arm around the table of limited guests.

It hurt my feelings real bad. Too bad she’s a dumb bitch and wasn’t invited to this party, which ended up having a total of 62 people show up.

There were old friends, new friends, faraway friends, high school friends, my favorites from the Law Firm, family I haven’t seen in forever (like my cousin Danielle and Aunt Susie, who brought embarrassing pictures from when Christy and I were junior bridesmaids in her wedding), my dad, Henry’s family. And of course all the preschool kids. There were so many kids, surprisingly none of which were crying kids. Not even Jacob, who unfailingly cries before school each morning.

That was my favorite part of the day, knowing all these people cared.

And the moms didn’t even bother me too much!

Kaitlin, Kristen and Danny. This was Kaitlin’s first time meeting Henry and she said watching us together was like reading my blog in real time. This made Henry frown, because he knows it’s true.

IX. Fuck a Pinata

Hey, did you know that you don’t pulverize pinatas with a baseball bat anymore? Apparently, the Mothers Against Dangerous Party Games banded together to eradicate these festive abominations and now pinatas come with a bunch of ribbons dangling from its anus, and each kid gets to pull one.

Chooch went first, and naturally pulled the one string that was rigged to break open the bottom. Total party foul. Except it was stuffed tighter than 4 bodies in Bundy’s trunk so only three pieces of candy flittered to the ground. Then we had to go through the motions of every kid yanking a ribbon, which clearly wasn’t going to do anything, but Henry insisted that every kid have a turn. He really took this seriously. Probably because it was his only responsibility of the day.

I honestly thought Henry was going to backhand J.T. for trying to pull a ribbon before Chooch. J.T.’s mom was right next to me, so that wasn’t awkward at all. It’s probably why she snubbed me on Wednesday when we were picking up our kids at school.

Random gun. I’m sure one of the moms had a problem with that. SO GO WRITE A LETTER.

There’s the Baby Grill in the background. I hope you brought some buns.

X. Cake, Part 2

Stapler makes a cameo.

I feel like I missed the full glory of Chooch’s embarrassment at being serenaded because I was too busy tripping over myself trying to take pictures. This was also right about the time the fucking camera battery died. I hate taking pictures at parties because I just want to enjoy myself but I can’t trust Henry to take pictures (I asked him 87 times to take pictures of the kids at the playground but he refused because it was “creepy.” NOT WHEN IT’S OUR SON’S BIRTHDAY PARTY.)

And then everyone (myself included) stood around after the candle was blown out, anxiously awaiting the cake to be cut. But Henry just up and left, fucking walked away like leaving a cake to fester beneath hungry eyes was no big thing. I literally had to chase him down, chanting, “When are you going to cut the cake, when are you going to cut the cake, when are you going to cut the cake, I’m going to slit your throat tonight, when are you going to cut the cake.”

“You told me to find the other camera battery!” he yelled. “What do you want me to do first?!”

“Um, cut the cake.” Obviously.

So he cut the cake, but then never gave me a piece, which of course is a silent, yet LOUD, way to say, “The last thing you need is a piece of cake, Chubs.”

In addition to the cake, Kaitlin made French macaron lollipops. Suck on that, preschool moms. How many 5-year-old have such culinary riches at their parties? Suri Cruise probably does, but she also probably has mimes handing out Scientology pamphlets.

XI. Presents. Or: The Best Part of the Day, as declared by Chooch.

I had every intention of writing down what everyone got him, but guess what? He started opening the presents right when I FINALLY got a piece of cake. (I made Henry’s mom cut it for me. I don’t do cake-cutting.) So it was either set the cake down for later or stand there worthlessly, shoveling it into my maw while all the moms watched me only half-care about my kid. Every now and then, I’d mutter the obligatory, “Whoa, buddy. Cool gift!” while cake droppings cascaded from my lips.

The cake totally won.

Bria was all up on him, telling him which one to open next. I wanted to be like, “Let the guy breathe, Jesus Christ!” Until I realized it was like watching a mini Henry and Erin.

I liked when he started pulling out zombie and Jason Voorhees memorabilia in front of all the moms who played it safe with age-appropriate toys.

Bonecrusher zombified this Batman doll for him!

After the presents were opened, all the preschool kids left. On their invitations, I put 2-3:30 as the time of the party, when it was actually 2-6. (Sometimes I’m smart like that.) Henry was acting like a jazz choreographer on speed, trying to get everything out of the way in the first 2 hours.

“PINATA! (jazz hands!) CAKE! (boomkack!) PRESENTS! (step ball change!)”

With all that out of the way, I got to relax with my friends for the second half. I love my friends. And there were still plenty of kids there, which meant I didn’t have to entertain my own child.

After the party, Jessi told me that she heard one of the moms say this was going to be the party to beat. Success! Thanks to everyone who helped make it the best party Chooch has ever had!

Right as we were leaving the park, a bird shit straight down Chooch’s back. Happy birthday, Chooch! Better you than mommy!

For as shitty and stressful the preceding days and hours were, the party itself shaped up to be pretty rad. The rain never escalated past a drizzle, and even that only lasted the first twenty minutes. The rest of the day, for the entire four hours, the sun shone. It was a goddamn Christmas in May miracle. Bill and Jessi, who had driven to Pittsburgh that morning from Michigan, said this was because of some crazy Christian grandma they encountered at a rest stop who was urging her grandkids to pray to Jesus that it didn’t rain.

So thank you, religiously-bullied children. And Jesus, too, I guess.

Please note the one (1) Star Wars tablecloth. This was supposed to be the kids table, but no kids sat down. Ever. They’re probably still not sitting, wherever they are.

I. The Parents

The aspect of the party I was most freaked out about was dealing with the preschool parents. Of course Henry wasn’t there when the kids began arriving, because he had to go pick up Blake, leaving me to greet the parents on my own. Jacob was the first to arrive with his aunt, who seemed young-ish and not too much of a threat, so I broke the ice by regaling her with the trials and tribulations of the Jaguar.

Actually, I think that was my opener for at least 80% of the conversations I had that day. Clearly, the twenty-minute pavilion drama was intense enough to make a strong impact on me. If I ever go on a game show, that’s how I’ll be annoucned.

And here’s Erin from Pittsburgh! She loves uncooked tortellini and once nearly lost a rented park pavilion to a man driving a Jag.

Guess who came next? Momesis and her daughter! The husband was also in tow and I tried desperately to peg his profession. It’s something douchey, I know it. Luckily, I only had to talk to them for < 30 seconds before Momesis suggested checking out the playground. Jacob’s aunt went with them, leaving the pavilion parent-free. I exhaled real dramatically and yelled to Janna, Bill and Jessi, “THAT WASN’T SO BAD RIGHT? I DIDN’T DO SO BAD?”

It’s hard to believe I was once a socially capable, popular girl who loved to invite perfect strangers to parties.

Because I make Henry go to all the preschool birthday parties in my place, I don’t know many of the parents. Some of them I see briefly in the mornings when I drop Chooch off and pick him back up,  but some of the kids are there for a full day so I never see their parents. Like Caitlin’s mom, who asked if Robbie and I were Chooch’s parents. I guess I should be flattered that I look young enough to be linked to 20-year-old Robbie, but it was still pretty awkward.

Not awkward at all was when Blake arrived and Chooch, spotting him from the playground, shrieked, “Hey, it’s my brother! My brother’s here! Come meet my brother!” and all the parents turned around in time to see this kid traipsing down the hill toward the pavilion, decorated with tattoos, piercings and gauges in his ears large enough to transport the thickest, meatiest German schwarzwurst your obsolete Deutsche Mark can buy.

I relished that moment. You’re in my world now, bitches.

I think the only thing I really said to any of the parents was, “Have some food! Here is the food table! Hey, did you have any food? Did you know we almost didn’t HAVE any food here at ALL? PLEASE EAT SOME FUCKING FOOD BEFORE I MAKE YOU CHOKE IT DOWN.” (And seriously, thanks to Janna, Kara, Gina, Kristen, Kaitlin and Jessi for helping me out on that front. I mean, not choking food down the throats of anal-retentive preschool moms like it’s some epicurious suburban housewife porn, but for making food and placing it atop the food table.)

But hey, props to Momesis for setting the precedent: all the moms arrived with their kids, put the gift down at the gift table, and then accompanied their child to the playground.

Except for:

II. The Stripper

Mom to Chooch’s girlfriend Bria, she arrived with her long copper-tinged platinum hair in loose curls; hot pink, skin-tight tank top; borderline inappropriately short jean shorts.

And Sketcher mules.

Bria ran off to join the other kids, but Stripper (whose name I didn’t catch but I’m sure it was Kandeeeee) hung back in the pavilion with the rest of us.

“Sorry, I’m not a morning person,” she said in a definite smoker’s voice. “I work nights.” Her hands were in her back pockets and her pelvis was jutted out just enough to be suggestive. I think it was aimed at Janna.

Last week, I ran into her when dropping Chooch off for school and she was wearing Applebottoms. She probably listens to Flo-Rida and Nelly on repeat while twirling down the stripper pole her husband installed in the kitchen.

Henry, stripper authority extraordinaire, argued that she was probably just a bartender (in a strip club) and now I’m certain he’s had her dance on his jock while he shoved fistfuls of Faygo coupons between her tits. But when my friend Bonecrusher arrived, I didn’t even have to point her out before she said, “Oh, totally a stripper.” I trust the judgment of anyone wearing a naked Burt Reynolds belt buckle over Henry any day.

III. Camera Died

The camera peaced out sometime between the failed pinata experiment and singing Happy Birthday. I whined about it, made Gina check to see if she had her camera in the car, and then kicked Henry’s shins approximately 5.3 times before settling on using my iPhone, which is really all I use anymore anyway so I don’t know why I was crying about it. To bring the attention back on me, me, me I guess. OH POOR, ERIN. ALL THE BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO ERIN.

We realized the next day, after tearing apart the house, that the charger and spare battery is sitting in my estranged mom’s garage from when my brother and I failed at an Easter photoshoot. So since our card reader is also broken, I haven’t been able to get the few pictures I did take off the camera yet. And the Internet cheers. I GUESS THERE WILL JUST HAVE TO BE AN EXTRA POST FOR THE PICTURES.

The Internet groans!

IV. Star Wars Theme-fail

The only signifiers of this being a Star Wars party was the one (1) Star Wars tablecloth, plates and napkins that required the purchase of 3D glasses to properly enjoy, and a Darth Vader pinata (more on that later). My relationship with Star Wars is pretty casual at best, so aside from grilling burgers and calling it Ewok meat, I didn’t really have many ideas. I haven’t watched any of the movies since high school, which was how I would spend most Christmases after running home from my grandparent’s house in tears because I wasn’t getting enough attention/my dad was being mean to me/my brother Ryan got bigger gifts than me: sitting alone on the couch with a luke warm TV dinner, watching Star Wars. Comforting, yet pathetic.

Henry’s niece was supposed to come up with some Star Wars-themed games, but apparently that didn’t happen because I don’t remember seeing any games being played that didn’t involve 5-year-olds chasing each other with stray 2×4’s decorated with nails and crime scene tape. (This really happened.) So thank god for dangerous police evidence and the playground, am I right?

IV. Cake

Wait, we also had a cake with a Darth Vader candle. The cake itself was just an outer space theme because I was thoroughly underwhelmed at the picture of the Star Wars cake on the bakery’s website (only bakery I will buy a birthday cake from, I should add). Henry suggested just ordering a sheetcake and then cutting it into the shape of Darth Vader’s mask and then re-frosting it. Yes, because let’s spend $70 dollars on a delicious cake only to shit it up with store-bought frosting. Good thinking, Betty Crocker.

This cake was my idea. It turned out fine without Henry’s input. 

And it had almond batter with raspberry cream filling. Better than a wedding cake.

Or at least comparable.

I take cake-ordering extremely seriously.

My friend Ron asked me if Henry and I made the cake and I impregnated the atmosphere with my laughter. If Henry and I made the cake, it would be lopsided, splattered with blood, and one of us would be buried beneath the floorboards. (99.9% sure it wouldn’t be me.)

Oh, and it would taste like saw dust baked with dried-out vomit and mutual hatred.

V. Work Friends!

This is still something that’s kind of new to me: I invite people from work to my parties, and they come. This makes me think that in the past, it was less of me being uncool and more of my ex co-workers being squares.

“You invited Barb?” Chooch said to me in a tone drenched in annoyance. She said it was the most welcomed she has ever felt at a party! And Bill and Jessi brought her up later when we were hanging out after the party. I think the word they used to describe her was “nice,” perhaps even “friendly.” Yeah. They should see the signs she makes and the emails she sends out to the entire department at work, in her patented fits of rage. My favorite was the one addressed to the person who not only dropped a pretzel on the floor in the kitchen, but then stepped on it and left it there. It made me feel scared, but also glad I wasn’t the pretzel-stepper.

That night, I said to Henry, “I really need to stop referring to these people as my work friends, when they’re clearly just my friends.”

I’m going to end this party installment on that note, since it’s all gross and sappy and completely unlike me. Plus, I’m tired of typing and I need my other pictures.  There’s still balloons, presents and douche cups to look forward to. Try to sleep tonight knowing that.

The fact that Henry was in charge of purchasing the decorations for Chooch’s party made me nervous. I mean, he’s Henry of the Non-Descript T-Shirt Tribe, after all. I hear his people like to transcend their non-descript persuasions upon parties, too.

So I wasn’t surprised when my friend Janna and I arrived at the pavilion an hour before the party started and I found in a bag one (1) Star Wars table cloth and five plain black ones.

What did surprise me was the Jaguar parked next to the pavilion, owned by a family of yuppies frolicking around the nearby playground under the overcast sky.

Let me rewind to 7AM when I woke up and panic immediately staked out a home in my chest. In my mind, this was the most sloppily-planned party to date and I was running around swearing, barking orders, threatening cancellation and stinking up the house with Yankee Candle’s brand new BITCH scent. Plus, it was raining. I was anticipating this, as the weather had been calling for 24:7 rain for Saturday all week long. Henry, who had been in the kitchen cooking army-sized batches of rigatoni and potato salad, came out and said, “I got this. Just sit down.”

So I put on Bring Me the Horizon super loud and changed my clothes eighteen times.

I was still shaking beneath my skin by the time we got to the pavilion, even though Henry promised me the food situation was under control. So when I saw Mr. Jaguar and his douche-brood, I pretty much snapped.

“They better fucking leave before the party starts,” I growled, and Janna assured me they probably would once they realized the pavilion was spoken for. (I gave it a promise ring the night before, after all.)

There was one bag of white balloons. Who buys one bag of just white balloons unless they’re celebrating virginity? I called Henry and yelled about this.

“Well, they didn’t have any black!” was his excuse. After hanging up, I noticed that the streamers were black and white. What the fuck, were we having a fucking Over the Hill party?

I was in the middle of holding Janna at the mercy of my rant about the lack of decorative color when Mr. Jaguar himself approached us.

“Did you guys rent this pavilion or something?” he asked with one of those sharky smiles you’d expect from a small-statured Jaguar owner. He kind of looked like Billy Joel.

“Yes,” I said figuring he would then leave.

“Hmm,” he murmured, sharky smile losing even more of its friendliness. “I’m pretty sure I rented this one, too.”

My fingers involuntarily dropped the bag of balloons. Adrenaline began pumping through me and the morning’s panic was back and better than ever.

“Woodland Crest?” I probed.

“Pretty sure that’s the one,” he said, and we both moved over until the pavilion marker was in our sight. It clearly said Woodland Crest.

There was a moment where the atmosphere birthed babies of awkwardness right on our faces. I started wringing my hands. What if I had the wrong pavilion? I wasn’t with Henry when he rented it, but I was sure I triple-checked the paper work before sending out the information to all the guests. I had a vision of Jaguar banishing us from the premises like the poor raggedy folk we are, and all of Chooch’s friends showing up and being taken under the wings of the mini-Jaguars while Daddy Jag spoon-fed them all caviar on the swing set. They were going to steal my party.

I wanted to stay for that party.

“How many people you got coming?” he asked me.

“I don’t know,” I muttered. “Like, at least 30.”

His eyes widened and he said, “Wow, that’s a lot. Well, I certainly don’t want to be the bad guy here.” And I thought, before he walked back to the playground, that he said he’d back out. But they all stayed and continued to run around in their riches and scream delightfully.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I squealed to Janna. “He rented this entire pavilion for his family of five?”

“Maybe he thinks that just because he was here first, that means it’s his,” Janna offered, trying to keep me from hanging from the rafters.

I called Henry in a panic and he flipped out. Of course, he didn’t have the permit in the car anymore, and even though he was nearly to the pavilion, he turned around to get it from home.

“If that motherfucker is still there by the time I get back, I’m punching him in the fucking mouth and calling the police!” Henry shouted, which made me laugh because Henry has never been in a fight before, unless you count the time as a kid when he fought a five-year-old girl over a Barbie sundress. I couldn’t even imagine him kicking gravel at the guy’s car. Meanwhile, Janna had gotten hold of someone at the park office who confirmed that the pavilion was indeed in Henry’s name and that we could always stop by and have a copy printed off.

“She also said to call the police if he doesn’t leave,” Janna, looking all important for being privy to this information. I’m all for confrontation, but not when my child’s birthday party was expected to start in thirty minutes. I’m already such an outcast among the school moms, imagine if they showed up with their children just in time to see the South Park police prying me off this rich dick, and I mean that in the least sexual sense possible. (For once.)

However, once I had confirmation that we were legally in our rights to be there, I instructed Janna to finish decorating. Let us not forget that she is the help.

While I blew up white balloons and Janna stapled them in trios around the corners of the pavilion, a guy on a bike skidded to a halt next to us.

“Hi!” he said cheerfully, wiping his brow. “I’m having a party here—-”

Detonating nerves shot stomach acid up to my esophagus like a geyser. If the inside of my stomach right then was a comic book cell, it would have KABLOOEY stamped across it.

“—in two weeks, and my wife sent me here to count the picnic tables.”

Janna and I looked at each other and started to laugh. The biker was too busy counting to question it and instead said, “Have a great party!” We thanked him and laughed harder as he biked away.

We had a few bags of animal twisting balloons for Bill, and Janna suggested adding one to each cluster of white in order to give it a shot of color.

It was a nice phallic touch, and we agreed it was a good thing there were three balloons in each cluster, and not just two.

“Should I stick with red and green?” she asked. We were basing the color choices off the colors in the lone Star Wars table cloth.

“I’d use other colors too, otherwise it goes from an Over the Hill party to some Italian guy’s Over the Hill Party.”

At 1:40, the Jaguar-brood loaded up in their car. (Not before discarding a drink tray onto the ground; the environment thanks you, litterer-fucks. Don’t worry, I threw it away.)

“Thanks for letting us intrude on your party,” Daddy Jag joked, and I couldn’t help but wipe his sleaze off my face.

“No problem,” I said with a tight-lipped smile.

And then Henry’s son Robbie arrived with his girlfriend Karen, who dutifully twisted and hung the black and white streamers. Karen was really concerned with getting the streamers to look prom-ready, practically fashioning a yardstick out of tree roots to measure the proper length, but I was like, “Please. Look around. This party is already halfway down the path to Cousin Jim-Bob’s Prison Release hoe-down, BYO-Moonshine.” 

Ain’t no one dancing to Forever Young beneath the streamers on this day, friend.

Anyway, I like Robbie and Karen because they laugh uproariously at everything I say. Good audience. And because I basically whaled the streamers at them and they asked no questions.

Right before 2:00, a cop car crunched down the dirt path to the pavilion.

In my head, I was screaming, “FUCK I DON’T HAVE THE PERMIT. WHERE IS HENRY WITH THE PERMIT. HE’S GOING TO THROW ME IN THE POKEY WITH ALL THE OTHER PARTY DEVIANTS. CAN ANYTHING ELSE GO WRONG RIGHT NOW. ANYTIME YOU WANT TO MAKE IMPACT, METEOR. I’M READY.”

But really, he was just there to smugly tell Janna she couldn’t keep her car parked in the dirt. Seriously? That may have been the most eventful hour of the whole day, and the party hadn’t even kicked off yet. It was like there was a beacon above our pavilion, alerting everyone to go fuck with the short-fused party host.

And don’t even get me started on the staple gun.

On my tombstone, please have engraved: “No, the universe was not fucking kidding you.”

I was already on the fact track to Pacemaker and hadn’t even been faced yet with the torturous chore of making nice with the preschool moms. And then it started to rain.

Happy Jason Voorhees Day!

Happy Mother’s Day. My only plans are to watch D.R.U.G.S. videos all day and reminisce with Henry about how awesome Friday night was, at which point he’ll say, “It was alright.” But I know what that really means is, “I have a man-crush on Craig Owens and don’t want you to ruin it for me so I will continue to act emotionally disinterested every time we talk about the show.

”

Here’s hoping your kids don’t act like assholes today. Can’t make any promises for my own.

EDIT:

Me: All I want for Mother’s Day is for you to not be a jackass.
Chooch: No, never. I’ll never stop.
Me: :(
Chooch: Can’t I just buy you something instead?

Yay! We’ve managed to make it an entire half decade without killing our son/having him taken away from us! And contrary to popular concern, he actually does know that his real name is Riley and not Chooch. You can put down the fiery spires now.

Thrilled

This morning, after he had been up for about an hour, he looked at me and very seriously asked, “Wait—-so am I five now?”

When I confirmed, he quietly whispered, “Yessssss.”

I told him this means he can finally live alone in that abandoned shed we saw a few streets over.

I think he knew I was joking.

Or was I?

Happy birthday, Chooch! You are one goddamn celebrated kid.

Easter isn’t a holiday we celebrate with much zeal in my family. I think it’s probably because it was the first holiday we had to face post-death of my Pappap. Occasionally, depending on her social state, my mom will suggest having dinner at her house, but it’s usually pretty low-key.

Which is fine. Since we’re still not speaking, this is one of those half-assed Easters. Which is also fine. Chooch got his basket though, and that’s all he really cares about so my job is done for the day.

Earlier, I sent Henry to the basement to look for an old cake pedestal for the lamb cake. While he was down there, he found this old photo album of family pets that I put together when I was a kid. Inside, there was a picture of my brother Ryan and our husky Blitz from Easter ’87 and how apropos, right?

What a weak Easter basket. Mine were always lofty vessels of quality candy and My Little Ponys.

But that was back when my mom still liked me.

Yesterday, I found one of me with the Easter Bunny from 1997. (I’m disappointed that no one coughed any of theirs up as an entry for the eye shadow giveaway.)

I’m on the far right, in case you were wondering.

Easter is pretty lame now. We don’t even hide Chooch’s basket. I’d like to say that I plan on changing that for next year, but I have pretty severe holiday apathy.

But have a great one, anyway!

I’ve already bombarded Facebook with these photos, so now it’s your turn, Blog.

We stopped at Goodwill beforehand to snag a plain white buttondown and some dress slacks (which turned out to be a womens pair) for Blake. I found some paisley piece of shit thing that we attempted to use as an ascot. Too bad none of us knew how to tie an ascot.

Immediately after walking into Goodwill, Henry was accosted by some older man (older even than Henry, if you can fathom). Apparently, they knew each other. Their discourse was not interesting enough to massage my eavesdropping gene, so I very huffily scoured the racks on my own.

“Who is that man Daddy’s talking to?” I asked Chooch, who was bouncing back and forth between me and the conversating rejects.

“I don’t know, Outrageous, I think.”

Turns out it was Regis, whoever the fuck that is.

I decided we should take some “safe” pictures at the cemetery before introducing the blood and bones into the mix, just so I’d have something to show one of the boss-types at work, who has no idea what actually goes on around here.

We then went to my grandma’s for the action shots, because, well, it’s gloomy as shit back there now. I had major anxiety being there, though, since my Aunt Sharon is crazy-weird about people stopping by. We parked the car in the upper driveway and prayed for the best, trying to stay as far away from the actual house as possible.

“Try not to get any on my undershirt,” Blake said as we stood near a large tree stump, opening packets of Ketchup procured from McDonald’s. “It’s a vintage Penguins shirt.”

I expressed my approval at his hockey-geared fashion sense.

“It’s from 1991,” he stressed.

BITCH THAT’S NOT VINTAGE. Shit, I can’t remember the last time I felt so old. Perhaps when I was called MA’AM at a Chiodos show. That’ll do it.

“It’s vintage to him,” Henry argued. “It’s from the year before he was born.”

DOUBLY OLD FEELING.

Just another normal day at Grandma’s house.

Blake in any type of animal mask scares the shit out of me. I need to buy more animal masks.

Chooch was getting sincerely irritated by this point. He’s good for the first few minutes, but then the novelty of being bossed around and forcibly positioned in ridiculous and absurd stances kind of starts to piss him off a bit. These are probably the moments he wishes he had a normal mom who just take him to the fucking mall and pay $20 for a regular Easter portrait with a blood-free Easter bunny like all the kids in his class get to do.

I was on the phone today, and mistakenly let it slip  to Chooch that it was Sharon on the other end.

Raising his voice approximately eighty-seven octaves and acquiring an obnoxious lilt, he yelled, “TELL HER WHAT WE DID YESTERDAY AT HER HOUSE! TELL HER!” and I’m trying, one-handed, to use on him the things I learned last night at Zombie Defense Class, but his little-big mouth just kept flapping.

Fucking turncoat. Like he didn’t know what he was doing.

Since the middle of March, I had been going through life incorrectly informed on the date of Easter. This is, of course, Henry’s fault, who told me, “Oh, it’s April 4th” when I asked him.

You’ll note that April 4th is not even a Sunday. That slight in information apparently didn’t raise any suspicions in me. Not even when I sent out Facebook invitations for an Easter egg dyeing party and scheduled it for Saturday, April 2nd, i.e. “the day before Easter.”

Meanwhile, I was looking at the calendar for Chooch’s school and noted that Sarris Easter candy pick-up is April 7th. I freaked out. How was I going to tell the people who ordered candy from Chooch that it wasn’t going to be here in time for Easter basket grass-strangulation? This was appalling to me and made me hate Chooch’s school even more.

And when one of my old friends from school suggested getting our kids together “two Sundays from now,” I was like, “I guess this dum-dum doesn’t know that’s Easter.”

It was sometime last week when I found out Easter is actually the 24th. And none of my friends even questioned why I wanted to dye eggs so early. They’re so sweet. (And also probably know not to question my motives.)

I appreciated that Kara put so much effort into it. She was the only one who used the piece of shit egg-stamping kit I threw in the cart when Henry said, “Don’t get that, it looks stupid.” Well guess what, Henry, for the third time in 10 years you were right. It’s still all your fault, though. And then he had to prepare all the dye, of course, and was beyond irritated that Chooch and I had previously opened some of the kits and mixed things all up. For the third time in my life, I thought Henry was going to walk out on us, send his mom over later to pick up his belongings.

No one could remember who did the pretty blue and pink spotted egg so I quickly took credit. Meanwhile, I’m pretty sure I only dyed two eggs before growing bored: the first one I lost, and the second one of course had a weener drawn on it, which didn’t turn out well but Gina promised she knew what it was.

Henry’s son Robbie stopped by with his girlfriend Karen. They wouldn’t dye any eggs, preferring instead to spectate. Then they put their pretenses aside and retreated to the other room to watch the hockey game and talk to Henry. (Who chooses talking to Henry over dyeing eggs? Over anything?)

The good thing about my friends is that when Henry leaves the room, I don’t have to seamlessly sink into parenting mode, because my friends are there to do that for me. I do not have the time to make sure my kid isn’t swigging from dye cups. I’m not even sure Janna dyed any of her own eggs because she was too busy helping Chooch with glitter and sequins and making sure he didn’t die of negligence.

And I appreciated that when Chooch mistakenly plopped an egg in Gina’s cup of wine, on which I painstakingly went through the motions of Sharpie’ing her name and the words NOT EGG DYE which might not be very beneficial to four-year-old non-readers, she was like, “No, it’s cool” and just drank around it.

She must have really enjoyed this new way to quaff wine because she spent the rest of the evening watching Chooch play some stupid Pokemon game on Wii, so that means they’re BFFs now. In Chooch’s book, anyway.

This might have been one of my most poorly-planned parties ever. I’ll start planning next year’s tomorrow.

I woke up feeling like complete shit the next morning. I mean, a hangover is the natural end result of a night of Easter egg-dyeing, right?

I try not to get too hung up on that whole Valentine’s Day bullshit, but when Chooch came home from school on Monday with a Valentine for his DAD, I kind of lost my shit a little.

Chooch gave a blase shrug and a mumbled, “I don’t know” when I asked him why he made one for his dad and not me.

“IT’S BECAUSE YOU LIKE DADDY BETTER! YOU HATE ME!” I wailed, because this is how really extraordinary,  properly emotional and not-at-all competitive moms choose their words.

Quickly realizing his entire childhood was on the verge of going up in flames, he very desperately pleaded, “No! I LOVE YOU!” and then threw his arms around me in a hug fraught with fear and regret.

I made sure I reminded him every chance I got how this MISTAKE of a Valentine had decimated my already fragile feelings.

“You’re overreacting,” Henry laughed after receiving my hysteric phone call in which I tossed out promises to hedgeclip his ballsack when he came home from work. “He was probably sitting with the girls and they probably wanted to make one for their dads, so he just followed along.”

WHATEVER.

That child must have reminded me 100x yesterday that he loves me.  And when I came home from work last night, he was so excited to give me my Valentine’s Day present, which he had picked out all on his own. I guess he felt this was his penance, I don’t know.

An iCarly messenger bag! I was elated. I can’t wait to use it at Warped Tour this summer. He did such a good job that I decided to let him off the hook. But I was still hating on Henry, because everything is his fault.

EVERYONE LIKES HENRY BETTER. God, I can’t stand it. I am super competitive when it comes to Henry, and I will elaborate on soon, in another post.

Chooch drew a heart on the envelope to my card and I was really kind of smitten with the fact that he emulates his heart after my own.

(Except I usually have a little tail on mine, but that’s probably too sophisticated for him to handle.)

This new strange, loving behavior carried over to today when he gave me a spontaneous kiss in the middle of purposely letting me die in a very irritating game of Super Mario Bros. on Wii. I probably scared the shit out of that kid. He’s never going to want to do anything nice for Henry ever again, for fear of me shipping him off to an orphanage. On Father’s Day, he’s going to frisbee Henry a card and scream, “HERE’S YOUR CARD BUT I STILL LOVE MOMMY BETTER!” while flinching in fear of my reaction.

Fuck, I’m such a fantastic mom.

Jessy just put this picture on Facebook and I couldn’t stop laughing. It was one of the myriad of times one of us four adults had managed to piss Chooch right the fuck off.

Actually, I think Jessy is the only
one who stayed on his good side. She needs to share her secret. Apparently, I did something really terrible. I probably ate a chip that Chooch was looking at for himself, took one too many breaths
in a minute, adjusted my bra strap. Who the hell knows what sets that kid off anymore. But I am waiting for the day he starts incinerating shit with his mind.

I also love how all the boys are wearing navy blue, like they planned it, and how Henry is standing back there laughing and silently willing Chooch to plant a hatchet between my eyes.

It’s scary being yelled at by Chooch.

I try and act like it’s no biggie, like my heart is swoll with courage, but really I’m just trying not to poop my pants.

This was Chooch, shortly after the ball dropped and he was encouraged for once to make noise.

We rang in the New Year at Jessy’s house with an array of high-caloric party food, wine slushies and a Mario Kart marathon on Wii which made me laugh to the point of tears so you know I had to have been drunk because typically watching other people play video games is not amusing for me. It was last night!

I’m not going to do some big lofty recap of 2010, but it was a pretty decent year.

Sure, it had its trying moments but what’s life without challenges and petty drama, right?

From April on, everything slowly started to fall into place.

I got a reprieve from the heavens in the form of a temporary position at a downtown law firm, which is now a permanent position, and have really come to appreciate it there. It’s nice not anticipating those eviction notices anymore.

Sometimes I even order more than water with my porridge now BECAUSE I CAN.

But best of all, I reconnected with some old friends and made a couple new ones too. If 2011 features even half of a continuation to that theme, I think I’ll be OK.

Hope everyone had a safe and happy new year’s eve and is planning on watching the Winter Classic tonight (HINT HINT)! Go Pens!

Leaving the cemetery, I began to feel anxious, which is not an emotion that should be prevalent on Christmas day.

Jessy invited us to spend Christmas at her house, with her family, and that seemed like a fine idea to me, especially considering the fact that my mom had barely even spoken to me since Thanksgiving. But then Corey mentioned that our mom had put up the tree and seemed to be sort of trying to put together some semblance of a decent Christmas for us. I had sworn after this last Thanksgiving that I was tired of watching everyone go through the motions, sitting in my mom’s dining room and barely even conversing on holidays. It’s strained, with my brother Corey and I typically being the only ones talking.

Whatever. Driven by guilt as always,  I adjusted plans because God forbid we should  have the audacity to make plans that don’t involve that stomach-churning cruise down Gillcrest Drive. In my mind, I said that I was doing this for Corey, not my mom.

The plan was to stop at  my dad’s house first. It was around 5:00, and I called him to make sure it was OK, since he was on call for his  job with the gas company  all day.

That was not a very pleasant phone call. He had apparently just gotten called out, in the middle of starting dinner. He sounded harried and put-off by the idea of us stopping over. I promised him that I didn’t want to get in the way, just wanted to give him his gift. That was all. We were only a few minutes away, so he (unconvincingly) acquiesced and I hung up. I had planned on spending about an hour there and then shooting straight to my mom’s, who lives quite honestly about two minutes away. But this threw a wrench in my plans, because my mom wasn’t having dinner until 6. We would either have to drive around, killing time, or pray that she let us come early.

In normal families, this would be a non-issue.

As I dialed her number in the car, my hands shook a little and my stomach clenched. I never know what I’m going to get with her. Especially on holidays.

I tried to sound as pleasant as possible when I asked if we could come over earlier than 6. I heard somewhere that most daughters can just show up at their mothers’ house whenever they want. I wonder what that’s like.

Over the phone, my mom huffed a little. “Like, how early?”

“I don’t know…a half hour?” I cautiously broached.

Lots of irritated sound effects exploded from the other end. Her voice took on that high-pitched, teetering-on-the-edge tone that I grew up with and still makes me want to punch myself in the throat. She started screaming about having to leave the dog outside for even longer in the case of having the nerve to crash her house any earlier than the set time. (She always uses “the dog” as an excuse for everything, like the time I found a painting I made for her one Christmas shoved in the back of a kitchen cabinet, and it was all, “Oh, that’s because THE DOG was trying to eat it.” OH OK.)

“You know what?” I shouted into the phone, cutting off her unwarranted histrionics. “Just fucking forget it. It’s clear we’re not wanted there!”

“YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT GOES ON ON MY END!” she screamed like a crazy lady.

A sure sign that she could take her goddamn forced holiday obligations and fuck herself with it. I disconnected the call, refusing to entertain one second more of her guilt-pinning. I sat for a few seconds, holding my breath while tears  stung my eyes, and then gasped to Henry, “NO ONE WANTS US.” That’s one fucking awful feeling, like we’re pestilence-coated vagrants roaming the streets, looking for discarded soup cans to scrape out with our tongues.

Meanwhile, we had just pulled into my dad’s driveway. “You knew what to expect,” Henry said calmly. “You go through this every year. We’ll find something to do.”

“We’re not supposed to go to Jessy’s until 8 now!” I whined. “And it’s only 5!” It would be senseless to go back home, since my dad lived halfway to Jessy’s. I yanked my dad’s growler of vanilla honey apple cider–which, twenty-four hours ago, I was so excited to give him–from the trunk, told Henry and Chooch to stay in the car, and then walked dejectedly inside my dad’s house.

I could tell he was in a shitty mood as he stomped around the house, getting ready to leave for work. “I didn’t even get to start the goddamn turkey!” he spat, shaking his head in disgust. I tentatively handed him his present and said that I’d get out of his hair.

“No, that’s stupid,” he said, losing some of the angst after I told him what my mom had said. “You guys are more than welcome to hang out here, even though I have to work.” My brothers were sitting in silence, watching one of the Bourne movies (Corey said our dad is currently obsessed with the trilogy, but hopefully it’s not as intense as the Great Reinhold Caramel Carabou Ice Cream Infatuation of  1999), so I waved in Henry and Chooch from the car. My dad made Chooch a mug of hot chocolate and then left for work.  We stayed there for about an hour, for most of which Ryan was asleep on the couch, and I at least got to give Corey his presents and fill him on the latest wave of drama.

Sharon called while I was there and I nearly snapped back my thumb with all the aggression I aimed on the decline button. Leave it to my mom to sic her psycho sister on me.

Piggy-backing that call was one from my mom herself. She left a curt voicemail in a wavering, staccato Sally Struthers cadence, saying that I can grab the turkey from Sharon’s on the way down to her house. Just like that, as though the previous phone call hadn’t happened. No apologies, no warmth in her tone. Just a very mechanical, sterile demand left on my voice mail. I relayed the message to Corey and Henry, and, with my heart rate quickening a little, I said, “No. No, I’m not going over there! I’m not going to let her rule me like this!” She thinks she can just flip out of me whenever her stilted reality calls for it, and that I’ll still come back and bow to her, to continue walking on eggshells around on her. And then I thought to myself, “When was the last time she asked me how I was doing? When was the last time she didn’t call to ask  to borrow money or my car or to make the audacious requests that I ask my co-workers for LEGAL ADVICE on her behalf, when she hasn’t even bothered to ask me what I do at my job?” Then I looked at my kid, acting like a complete hellion yet somehow not arousing Ryan from his nap, and I made the firm decision that my mother was not going to have the privilege of seeing my kid on Christmas.

I walked into my dad’s kitchen and called Jessy, who said we were more than welcome to come over early.  Just like that – no groaning and grunting to aurally convey how put-out I was making her; no adopting terse tones to relay how inconvenienced I was making her. Just a short and sweet, “No problem, babes. See you when you get here!”

On the drive there, I asked Henry, “Do you think it’s wrong of me to not go over my mom’s?”

He shook his head without even considering it. Because Henry has been around for nearly a decade of holidays at my family, and a lot of those holidays were quite literally “canceled” by my mother. It was only two years ago that we had Thanksgiving at our own house because my mom wasn’t speaking to me because I had the nerve to tell her to stop texting me racial jokes. And then poor Corey got caught in the crossfire because he was ballsy enough to eat dinner with the blacklisted. I thought back to all the Christmases growing up where I would storm out of my grandparent’s house because someone in my family (back then, usually my dad) was treating me like shit; for the longest time, I associated Christmas with TV dinners and Star Wars marathons, roiling jealousy and slamming doors, a dining room table decorated with snide comments and a cloud of blubbery tension.

“I’m done,” I said to no one in particular.

***

At Jessy’s, the house was full of warmth and loud laughter. Tommy wore the Elmer Fudd-inspired hat we bought him all night long and Jessy practically had Christmas spirit oozing from her pores. It was the most relaxed and happy I had seen her in awhile, and that was enough to alleviate all the stress I had compacted in the last hour. Jessy’s mom and her husband were also there, along with her brother and Pap. They welcomed us with bigger arms than anyone in my own family ever has. And every couple of minutes, Jessy’s mom would turn to me and say, about Chooch, “He is just so damn cute.” I was glad that someone appreciated him.

“Did you guys eat yet?” Jessy asked after everyone exchanged presents (those two spoiled the shit out of ALL of us), and I was already near-attacking her with my hungry “No!” before she even finished asking. She took us into the kitchen and brought out the leftovers for us to make a plate. I didn’t even heat mine up; I just stood there shoveling various types of potatoes into my rumbling belly, pausing only to rip into a biscuit with my gnashing incisors.

“You can sit down, you know,” Tommy said, watching me stand there, feeding from a paper plate like it was my first brain as a zombie.

Corey sent me a text saying that while Ryan obediently showed his face at our mom’s, Corey opted out and stayed at our dad’s, prompting our mom to call him and hysterically accuse of him and him alone of ruining Christmas and that she threw all the food in the trash.

“I’m done,” Corey texted me, having no way of knowing that I verbalized the same sentiment an hour earlier.

She never called me though, not after spewing her detached ambivalence all over my voicemail.

I know, I should cherish these years with my mom. Who knows how much longer either of us will be around, right? I know this. I consider this always. But she makes it so hard to care sometimes, when I am consistently the only one making an effort. I have my own family now, and that’s the one I won’t be taking for granted. The others had their shot. They (mainly my mom and Sharon) have proven time and time again that I am nothing to them unless I have something that they need. Maybe it’s selfish, but I wanted to have a good Christmas, and I know it was the right choice because not once did I get that nagging feeling that we were overstaying our welcome or that Chooch was giving someone a headache or that Henry was in pure taste bud hell having to eat a turkey cooked by Sharon.

Besides, at my mom’s house, no one plays Pass the Buck, but it’s tradition in Jessy’s family and it just so happens that not only was it my first time playing, but I walked away with the pot, motherfuckers! I ran into the living room to tell Jessy, who retreated in there to watch “Despicable Me” with Chooch once she was out.

“I know, babe,” she laughed when I told her I won. “I heard.”

Maybe I was a little overzealous about it, but I beat her BROTHER and he’s basically a professional, with a string of fingers around his neck taken from all the fuckers who’ve tried to swindle him out of his money in the past. He’s pretty hardcore about it. Don’t play him unless you have regenerating digits.

The night wound down as we lounged around the couch, talking and laughing, watching Chooch get near-mauled by a dog 1/4 of his size. I looked around and thought, “This is where I wanted to be from the get-go.”

I actually almost left my FIVE DOLLARS AND TWENTY FIVE CENT winnings there that night, but Jessy was kind enough to remind me to take it.

“I’m putting it in my savings account,” I said, and everyone laughed. Little did they know I wasn’t kidding! I’m really that much of a hoarder.

It was after midnight by the time we got home, and I was still smiling. I will always remember this as the Christmas where someone else’s family loved me more than my own, and where I learned I like black olives penetrated by a sliver of sharp white cheddar, like a stinky, aged penis.

***

The next day, my dad called to apologize once more for being so abrupt when I stopped by, and to thank me again for the cider. I’m certain I won’t hear from my mom for at least half a year, and it will be me breaking the ice.

It’s whatever.