One Soul for Sale

This is my soul.
We may or may not have been under the influence during the composition of this document.

Actually, that's entirely misleading; my soul isn't for sale. I sold my soul for 5 dollars and a cigarette to my best friend in 2002. We drew up a contract and everything on the back of an East Windsor Diner menu, after losing the original at Denny's in Enfield. She gave it back to me for my 25th birthday and I used to carry it in my wallet. (It was nothing like that episode of The Simpsons, if you're wondering.) So, technically, I don't think I can resell it. I'm far too attached to it by now; it has so much more meaning.

One of the most frustrating aspects of my job search is trying to weigh my crippling idealism with even a modicum of pragmatism. As you may be aware, I don't do that very well. If I did, I would probably still be fully employed at my last job (which was, incidentally, at a non-profit), ignoring the blatant bigotry in favor of the practicality of having a job, and maybe even one day, a career. The practical aspects of employment have never really been enough, heretofore, to keep me employed. Of course, I could have tried harder to change things at my last place (which shall be called That Place from now on), but there is no telling some people. (It's really difficult to look a grown 40-something-year-old woman, who is also your boss, in the eye and explain that "I have [insert marginalized group here] friends," does not negate the racism she just vomited out.)

So when a friend of mine, miserable in his corporate job, elbows me and only half-jokingly asks if I'm willing to sell my soul yet, it gives me pause. At some point, I do need to marry pragmatism and idealism, but where does that point lie? I often think that corporations actually have better protections against the kind of bullshit that went on at That Place, but does not mean that what one may do while at a corporation is meaningful in any significant way. 

My whole life, I've been told that I can change the world, help others, become some fantastical force for positive change. Well, I'm not changing a whole hell of a lot from the couch. And it is misery-inducing. Volunteering at Meals on Wheels was such a great experience, but now I'm even afraid to spend the gas that it would take to make once-a-week deliveries. When my grad school called, desperate for funds, I cringed. I have always given, even a measly amount, whenever I could because I love that place and believe in it as one of the best chances some students have to actually spread true and permanent good in the world. I apologized profusely to the student on the phone, and hung up feeling miserly.

But the truth is, I don't have the luxury of idealism, most people don't. All the insistence on my exceptionalism, and I know I'm not alone in in this, warped me in a bizarre way. I am self-aware enough to know I really hit the high notes on occasion. Moral superiority? Check. Intellectual snobbery? Yeah, I do that too. In my defense, I've been getting progressively better at identifying it and reigning it in before I come off like a complete tit (at best).

So right now, I'm procrastinating filling out the applications for a few jobs my sister-in-law sent me from her company. I know I don't have the option of not applying, but my soul, as it lies in the bottom drawer of my jewelry box next to my passport, is probably wriggling in discomfort. 

Ten, fifteen, eighteen year old Courtney was told to change the world. Twenty-eight-year-old Courtney is trying to change her outlook... and maybe make change with her soul, which, interestingly enough, could probably be leased for around $40,000 a year.

Housekeeping

I decided to update the look of my self-indulgent blog here because it was about time. I was tired of the old drab brown map. But more importantly, I completely procrastinated cleaning today so I thought I should do something to make myself feel marginally productive. However much I love the smell of Murphy Oil Soap, it doesn't improve the actual task of cleaning the floor. (And apparently, it's no good for wood floors according to the site I grabbed that pic from, but whatever. I'd bathe in it if it were acceptable.)

Beyond that, things just need to be cleaned. I feel tidying up my small corner of the known world is a desperate attempt to keep order; the world lately is getting more and more surreal every day, and not in a good way.

The Loaded Cupcake Conundrum and the Politics of Food

Key lime and blackberry cupcakes with blackberry filling and buttercream. (My decorating could use a bit of help.)

Okay, so, I like to bake. It's my obsession of the moment, and next week I'll probably start practicing calligraphy or something, thinking that I'm going to make a mint painstakingly writing out the wedding invitations of spoiled Millenials or some shit. But this is not my point. 

I've liked to bake since I was about 13 and my mother brought home my grandmother's extensive baking supply cache. Way back when, my grandmother ran a small wedding cake baking business out of her kitchen. She was really good at it, and would spend hours making sugared flowers and custard fillings. Like me, she tended to have fleeting obsessions with crafty things; she taught herself to knit, dabbled in watercolors, quilted, baked, and even gardened. My suspicion is that she was bi-polar, but that's a discussion for another day. By the time I was old enough to be left to my own devices in the kitchen, my grandmother was already deep in the abyss of Alzheimer's. The brutal disease had robbed her of herself, took away my grandfather's partner, and robbed us of our matriarch. My brother and I, as the eldest grandchildren, were fortunate to have a small piece of her as she once was, but even we mostly remember her as the more-child-than-mother that she became. When I started to bake, leafed through her Wilton baking books, I felt like I knew her, even a little.

Baking is more than that, though. It's scientific, each ingredient dependent on a type of unique exactness that I don't concern myself with when roasting a chicken or making pulled pork. Not flavorful enough? I'll throw some scotch on my slow-cooked pork shoulder. Too mild? Red pepper all the way. But baking? Miss one tablespoon and your cake might fall. Skip the butter and use margarine? Well, let's just say butter is a flavor and margarine just doesn't cut it. The precision, the timing, and the elbow grease come together to make the most amazing confections. I started baking en masse, and when I was staring at a dining room table covered in six dozen cupcakes, I began delivering them to friends and family. Who doesn't like a cupcake? It's your own damn cake and it doesn't even have to be your birthday! 

When I bake, all the frustration of my job search, our financial fears, the fact that the puppy just ate another one of my shoes, goes away with each stroke of the spatula, every whirr of the Kitchen Aid (that I have all but appropriated from my mother who never used it anyway). When people say something was baked with love, I say that my baked goods were baked with anxiety and fear and frustration and a pinch of catastrophe, and it's therapeutic to place those anxieties into something that will, almost without fail, make others happy. (Plus, cupcakes are especially easy because they're so sharable and portable and conveniently portioned. And they make really awesome breakfasts.)

But there is something inescapably girlie about cupcakes. Something so fucking Etsy-cutesy-by-way-of-Zooey-fucking-Deschannel-and-June-Cleaver about the cupcake fad. It oddly almost romanticizes the housewife, the homestead, the Martha-Stewart-without-the-business-acumen girlie-girl, ensconced in frothy pink innocence. 

My grandmother quit school in 8th grade (at 14), to take care of her sick mother and grandmother. When she met my grandfather, she was working as a very adept draftswoman at Pratt & Whitney just before WWII. She was capable, almost exclusively self-taught, and probably pretty amazing. But when she married my grandfather, she became the housewife. She gave birth to four children and stayed at home, except for a few odd jobs here and there that were probably not nearly as stimulating or demanding as her previous career (lunchlady, for example). And I wonder if it was this that created in her the searchingness that left her bouncing from one domestic or creative pursuit to another. 

And I can't help but feel I am not alone in this thinking. The best master chefs -- even patissieres -- the world over are almost exclusively male. The boys club persists even as the daily grind of cooking for the home and family is often still seen as women's work. And this is even more pointed as I have become the primary cook at home, as Adam works and it's really the least I can do (in addition to the laundry, the dishes, the pets, the floors, the windows...) It is a trade, a balancing of the financial burden with domestic one, but I can understand why Mother's Little Helpers were once so prevalent (and really, they still are). However fulfilling one batch of cupcakes may be, sometimes, even when holding my Guinness chocolate with Jameson ganache and Bailey's buttercream frosting beastly delicious creations, I feel like I'm just slathering calories over some serious cultural, familial, personal baggage. 

Or maybe I'm eating too much into it. Maybe sometimes, a cupcake is just a little cake, even if it has a lot of booze in it.

P.S. I have loads of delicious recipes for those looking to get some ganache-based therapy.

Moving On

As I have finally, FINALLY!, gotten a job (and what a job it is...) I have obviously closed up shop here at Adventures in Funemployment.

But, if you enjoy reading of my manic misadventures and bizarre realities that continue to be my life, follow me here: Finding Ford Prefect

enjoy!

and

Don't Panic.

Things You Don't Say to Dad (and Never Did)

(This is where I usually put a photo, but I searched for "crackpot" and only came up with images of Bill Kristol and Glenn Beck. The internet wins again!)

OR

This Is Why I'm Crazy, The Sequel

The Crazy Flags are waving at full-mast here at the family homestead. Allow me to elaborate.

My father, Dog bless him, is a wonderful, kind man whom I consider a confidante and friend as well as an inspiration. My mother, likewise, is a loving and nurturing individual who is truly invested in those around her. I love them and respect them both entirely.

However, as I said before, my parents are bananas. (And yes, you can love and respect crazy people.)

Last week I came home from spending the day with Adam, as I do. He had complained of a cold, so we just loafed around, watched TV, I made tea and such, and so the day went. I returned to my parents' house for dinner and spent what I thought was a fairly average evening at home. We three chatted, I watched The Daily Show and The Colbert Report with my dad as is our habit, read a little of the book I'm devouring (The Help by Kathryn Stockett), and went to sleep.

I woke up the next morning and started my usual routine. I made coffee, had some yogurt, and started looking for jobs. My mother was furiously cleaning the windows in the house, but as it is getting close to the end of her summer vacation, I was not surprised by this. When my mother is on vacation (she's an elementary school librarian), she spends 90% of her time reading. There is exactly zero wrong with this. My mom is a bibliophile, she loves her job, she loves books, and kids crack her up. Most days, she sits in the living room reading book after book, from children's stories to huge tomes written for adults. It's her comfort place - and to be honest, it's mine, too. As long as she's sitting there, I know she's not about to go all Joan Crawford on me because... one day, something in her brain starts to fizzle and she goes on a cleaning rampage because she thinks she hasn't accomplished enough over her break. It's super-fun, especially when you get unexpectedly sucked into it and have to help sort through your brother's old shit even though he moved out 12 years ago. Fun fun. 

ANYWAY, so she was doing something weird with the windows (it wasn't just a cleaning, there was scraping and such involved), and I started chatting with her. I'm not exactly how it came about, but at one point, she looked at me in the way she looks at a puppy (we've had several) when it pees on the rug and said, "Well, after what you said to your father last night...! I have never - in 38 years! - seen him speechless, but you made him speechless!"

At first I thought, 'Oh GOD, what did I say?' I had been out for a friend's birthday the night before and there were margaritas involved and I was mildly concerned I had dropped some awful unintentional insult at my dad for a moment. But then I paused. No, no, I had a lovely, quiet, fun evening at home. There was nothing controversial or even any mild disagreement. I had no idea what was going on.

"What?! What?" Exclaimed I. "What did I say?!"

--- Here, dear reader, is where I will tell you what I actually said. My father asked, mid-Colbert Report, what Adam and I did that day. I said, "Oh, you know, sat around all day, laid low." This is my usual sort of response. Additionally, it's truly what we did all day. ---

So my mother, cleaning rag in hand, points at me and says, "You told him you and Adam made love all day."

I don't think I've ever come so close to vomiting at something my mother has said. I was so panicked and horrified that my brain turned into TV static and I burst into tears. And despite my protestations, I could not for the life of me remember what I said, so it seemed like I was just back-pedaling. 

"I" - sob - "would" - sob gasp - "neversay" - gasp sob gasp - "ANYTHING" - sob - "like that" - sob gasp sob - "to" - snort sniffle choke - "either of you!" I blurted.

And this is where I lost my mind. I was so thoroughly mortified at the idea, that screws started shaking lose. I know there exist some really fantastic people out there who are so bohemian and free-spirited and like "with it" that they can say shit like that to their parents. Good for them, honestly, that is pretty awesome. But for all my parents' hippie and free-spirited tendencies, we're not like that. As an acquaintance said when I told her my tale, "I'm 42 and married and I still can't mention anything like sex to my mom!" Some of us are just too stuck in our Puritanical ideals or whatever, I guess. I mean, I get embarrassed if my dad finds out I had a gynecologist's appointment. I begged my mother not to tell him when I reached menarche, for the love of Bob! (I mean, even at that age, I realized he'd figure it out sooner or later, but seriously.)

So, screws coming lose, sobbing, I turned into what can only be characterized as "a six-year-old attempting to run away." I started maniacally throwing shit around my room. I moved my stuff like a whirling dervish, my bed was strewn with books and papers and clothes of various sorts. My mother stood at my doorway, vacillating between apologizing for upsetting me so much by saying she "had to make sure I really didn't say that" and reminding me that she and my father "weren't born yesterday" (i.e. they know I knock boots. FANTASTIC. Really, I'm excited about being told that in no uncertain terms). Neither of these approaches helped.

I started babbling about how I had to move out IMMEDIATELY, and started to "plan" accordingly. Here's where the runaway attempt began. Into an overnight bag, I threw: four pairs of underwear, a dog-eared copy of Lettres de Mon Moulin by Alphonse Daudet, my iPod (sans headphones), an already worn tee shirt, and a box of tampons. I was ready for anything, or at least for emergency travel to the French countryside. I don't know if I've ever felt so mortified - and I once gave a fifteen minute presentation in sixth grade with my fly down!

A few hours later, still half-crying, my face looking like something a rabid possum had chewed on from so many tears, I calmed enough to assess my packing, sort out what I really needed to pack, and headed over to Adam's.

As I drove down Pierce Road, I realized what I had said. Here I must point out that I absolutely ABHOR the use of cell phones while driving. Unless there's an axe murder in the back seat attempting to gut you, stay off your fucking telephone while driving. The use of cell phones - hands-free or otherwise! - while driving is downright dangerous and people who do so should be treated like drunk drivers. BUT, hypocrite that I am, I was in such a state that I called my house.

My mother picked up. "Hello?" She said.

"I know what I said," I growled, only half-relieved. "I said 'we sat around all day and laid low.'"

My mother laughed and laughed, and if I weren't still worked up from earlier, I probably would have seen the humor in it, too. She asked, still half-laughing and entirely worried because she knows how I feel about phones in cars, "do you feel better now?"

"No," I pouted. "Not yet."

"You'll find it funny soon, too," my mom soothed. "I love you."

"Ilumyoutu," I mumbled. "I need to go, I'm driving."

"Okay, be safe," she said, still half-chuckling to herself. "I'll sort everything out with Dad. Love you."

We hung up. I got to Adam's and told him the story. I could tell he was trying very hard not to laugh as he rubbed my back and told me everything would be okay.

"I'm never going to be able to look your father in the eye again!" He exclaimed, only half-joking.

We went about our evening as planned.

My mother later told me that my father was doubled-over with laughter when she told him what I actually said. She said she'd find him chuckling to himself the rest of the day, standing in front of the open fridge for instance, muttering "laid low" and shaking his crazy, bald head.

Now, we just don't mention the incident, my dad and I. I have, however, begun to see the very awkward, slightly schadenfreud-ish humor in it. Likewise, I've come to the conclusion that I need to enunciate better, and maybe make sure my father's not half-asleep when imparting even the most mundane information.