Vodka & Chocolate

This entry originally appeared in Powell's Books blog and is reprinted by permission.

The year my oldest son (we call him Doonie) turned three was a difficult one. The term "custody dispute" in no way describes the agony of that time, a time colored by gutting loss. I was losing my son, my home, my grip. I spent most afternoons in a lawyer's office, trying not to cry in front of anyone, and Doonie was forced into a day care program where his choice of friends was limited to, in his 3-year-old-kid words, "kids what would eat cheese for dinner" and "kids who used books as bricks."

"You mean they build things with them?" I asked hopefully.

"No, Mom," he smiled sadly. "These are bad kids."

In the lawyer's office, while I sat and listened to people I barely knew read lists of lies that had been told about me and wondered how I would ever pay the lawyer's fees, my son moved between both of these social groups, defending the cheese eaters from the book throwers. I don't believe he ever let himself cry in public, either.

Sometimes, after leaving the lawyer's office, unable to face my empty apartment, I would visit him at the day care facility. I wasn't allowed to go in, but if I timed it right, I could stand on the other side of a chain link fence during recess and talk to him through it.

"Hi, Mom."

"Hi, sweetie. How's it going?"

"It's okay. That kid on the slide got scratched by her cat."

"Oh yeah? Is that what the band aid's all about?"

"I guess. I think she might be faking it."

"Weird."

"Yeah."

Then an aid would see me and call Doonie away. He'd stand at her side and wave goodbye with a very serious look on his face and I'd wave back with a fake smile, as if I'd just been out taking a walk and was now going on my merry way.

Weekends were wonderful, though. Fridays at five to five, I would be waiting in the fluorescent light of the kids' coat room for my baby to come tearing out the door and jump into my arms. My future husband would take the train in from New York and the three of us would fill two whole days with pie baking and sand castles. Only sweetness, to shake off the bitter.

The pie baking always meant a visit from "Cooking Man," the only super hero who carries a whisk. Who wouldn't marry a man who so willingly shamed himself for our pleasure? Who wore only dark-colored long-johns, swimming goggles on his face, and a towel-cape around his neck, a handprint of flour on his chest? It was a beautiful thing and it filled my apartment with the greatest sound in the world: a toddler's giggle.

Then we'd head for the beach, no matter what the weather, and build cities out of sand until our faces stung. These cities were always places we wanted to go. Anywhere but here, I'd think. Imaginary, but even more compelling in that, because they were created by the funny little broken family we were back then.

I could even eat on the weekends, so we'd all cook dinner together and then rent psychotic old Disney movies: The Cat from Outer Space, The Shaggy D.A. -- two days of heaven every week.

Sunday afternoons, Cooking Man would take the train back to the city and Doonie and I would go home to a dinner neither of us could face. I only ever wanted vodka, he only wanted chocolate. Even then I could only manage a sip or two and he would feel sick after a few bites, so I'd gather him up and we'd sit in the red rocking chair, staring into the fish tank until we both fell asleep.

•••

Doonie is now twenty years old, six feet tall, still very articulate yet soft spoken. He calls and writes, just like a good boy should. He's no longer forced to hang with kids he doesn't like, but he graciously credits the day care crowd with having taught him valuable social skills.

Last week, my husband and I dropped him off at the airport after a quick visit with his three younger brothers. He carried a bag of chocolate onto the plane and I went home to a shot of vodka, but we didn't cry in front of anyone. In fact, I don't believe we cried at all. It wasn't sad enough. I was just so proud.

I do miss him. And I grieve the loss of the baby he was every day; I wear it like a lead apron over my heart. But I look at the person he is and I think — we're not losing anymore. We may even have won.

Korporate Konsumer Kulture

This entry originally appeared in Powell's Books blog and is reprinted by permission.

It's 2 a.m. and the rain is so loud and the moon is so bright that I'm lying on the closet floor, trying to get some sleep. It's hard. I mean, the floor is hard and it's hard to sleep on it.

You're supposed to empty your mind of all thought, in order to fall asleep, right? Or is that meditation? Either way. I believe the brain's first order of business is to lie to you, so I like to shut that organ down every chance I get.

Tonight, though, when I try to shut it up, it keeps asking this question: why do people think I'm foreign? My brain raises a good point. I've never been sure why people tend to guess I'm foreign. 'Cause they do. Often. They ask me "what part of the world" I'm from. And it bugs me. What does "foreign" even mean in a melting pot? I mean, I speak English.

"You speak it...weird, though," says my husband, Billy. "And you like to dress like a refugee."

"Weird? What do you mean, 'weird'? And good like a refugee or bad like a refugee?"

"Oh...good," he says. "Like you were the first girl to the bale."

I've seen Billy asked for directions in Milan, Boise, Barcelona, New York and Dublin. Clearly he has no trouble fitting in, wherever he is. In most of these places, he is foreign.

I'm not asked for directions anywhere, not even in my hometown where I should look like I know where I'm going.

Today, walking down NW 23rd, here in Portland, I saw no less than six different ladies wearing the exact same shoes. Shoes that were being sold in several places on that very street. I guessed that those ladies weren't foreign — they certainly looked like they belonged.

I began to wonder if besides wearing the same shoes, maybe they all listened to the same music, too. As a musician, I wonder this a lot. Marketing is very effective when it comes to shoes and music.

I looked down at my sturdy refugee shoes and thought, "Fashion. Again." In music it often seems to come down to that tiny bit of evil: style over substance, ephemeral over timeless.

Recently, a music journalist told me that he hadn't kept up with my career for the past few years, because I had "fallen off [his] radar." The last record of mine that he'd heard was the subject of a well funded major label marketing campaign; I was on the radio and in most music publications as well as some of the magazines one might read at, say, the dentist's office.

It hadn't occurred to this man, who works in the music business, that what he thinks of as his "radar" might just be the result of marketing dollars spent by a corporation whose job it is to create popular culture by creating the impression of popular culture in order to... Make Money.

I was amazed. How could this be? I thought. How can this process be invisible even to a person who plays a role in it? Well, I guess the answer is in the shoes. Belonging at the expense of individuality. No one seems to want to give it up. We like matching feet and reliable coffee and using the same perfume as rich and famous people.

Our American cities are disappearing under the weight of corporate giants who drive out competition while peddling sameness. Once the rents go up, no store other than a chain can afford to pursue the all-important Coed Consumer Monster, waving Daddy's credit card.

Over twenty years of touring the states, I've watched local accents and local music slip away from cities like Austin, Texas, Athens, Georgia and Chapel Hill, North Carolina. So sad! There used to be places to go in this country, pictures to take, people to meet. Now they look the same and sound the same. We even eat the same food! Do you remember regional cuisine? Can you really find any? It's even happening in foreign places like Europe, Asia, Australia, even my beloved New Zealand!

I'm done. I'm going back to sleep now. My sturdy shoes are right next to my face, but I don't mind. I like them now. They're on my radar. I love being an American, but I don't feel like I have to look like one. And I listen to all kinds of music, from lots of different places and eras; not because some giant sold it to me, but because it never sucked.

I think I might just keep talking funny, too.