My Weekly Writing Assignment

I'm doing my homework this week, too.

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Tag! Post and write about the 6th picture from (the 6th folder of?) your Flickr account and then do the same for the 6th picture of the 6th folder on your computer.



This was taken in June of this year. That orange sugarsicle you see my daughter eating is the first one she ever had and she loved it. It was about 100 degree at 10 a.m. that day and shortly thereafter, we decided to go to the beach. That resulted in a trip to Terror Beach but an otherwise lovely day.



Okay, so the 6th picture in the 6th folder on my computer was another picture of Beth. That didn't seem fair. So I went to the 7th folder. But there were only four pictures in there. I checked the 8th - this is picture #6. It was taken in January of this year at Valeta's place with her daughter. A playdate, if you will!

I'm Going For Extra Credit This Week

I'm doing two prompts. Today's homework:

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1. The last time I laughed really hard...

About a week and a half ago, Rob and I were sitting on the couch watching Ghost Adventures. I'm not a huge fan of the show but it is about ghosts 'n such, so I'm willing to give it a whirl now and again.

Anyway, we're watching it and during a commercial, we were talking about how these types of shows could be completely staged. You know, actors instead of real ghost hunters on a sound stage instead of a real haunted place, sound crew in the background making noises, props falling over, laser pointers, etc. Then my husband pipes up with possibly the funniest statement he's ever made:

"When I took a ninja training class..."

That's all I heard. He lost me there. I fell into fits of tear-filled laughter that went on for about five minutes. How many times in your life do you get to hear someone say that, let alone your husband? Besides, can you picture this guy learning how to be a ninja???





It was just too damn funny. When I finally got all my giggles out, he went on to tell me that when he and his brother were living in Pennsylvania with their mom, they came out one summer to spend a few months with their dad. The day they flew in, he picked them up at the airport and took them directly to this class which was being held and taught by his wife's brothers, both black belts in karate. So it was a legitimate class. I had just one question for him when he was done talking:

"So, did you get a little certificate or something when you were done? Like, you're a certified ninja now?"

He wasn't amused.

My Weekly Writing Assignment

Time for my homework!

This week's prompts:

1.) Write a haiku about what you see out the window. (if you don't know what a haiku is click here.)

2.) Begin with "I thought I saw..."

3.) If I could live in any era of history, what would it be -- list 10 reasons why.

4.) Write a light hearted piece on how to get along with an enemy.

5.) The first time you...

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IF I COULD LIVE IN ANY ERA OF HISTORY...

I'd give my left pinky toe to have been born circa 1940, slightly pre-baby boom. How amazing it would have been to realize all the optimism of the post-war era versus the stagnancy of the new millenium.

Here are my 10 reasons (wow, I'm kind of a Top Ten whore these days, aren't I?):

10. The Music I know it's not for everybody, but I simply adore the music from the 1950s and 1960s. I also love music from the late '60s up through today, but the music from my mom's heyday (she graduated in the class of '56) is innocent, pure and had a really good beat. That's my seque into #9...



9. The Dancing People actually danced in the '50s. I mean, a boy and girl stood facing each other, assumed the dancers position and danced as a pair, and no groin areas ever really touched, and if they did it wasn't intentional or sexual. Dancing wasn't equivalent to dry-humping. I, to quote Denise, "super puffy heart" dancing and wish I could convince my husband to take dance lessons with me. I want to learn the jitterbug, swing, waltz, two-step, cha-cha, and even line dancing. I dance daily around our place. I don't need music, I just dance. My husband, unfortunately for me, thinks dancing is for girls and refuses. *sigh*



8. The Clothes They were pretty uniform and back then, girls didn't strive to wear as small a size as possible. Curvy was considered attractive. I'll grant you, I'm a bit more than just curvy, but still. Clothes were forgiving and brand names weren't really an issue then. Hell, it was still fashionable to sew your own clothes. And if anyone's interested, I found a really good site for Marilyn Monroe pictures. It's in Russian, but the pictures are awesome.



7. The Cars You can't beat the cars from that era. Cars built up through the early 1980s were built to last, bodies made out of steel, not plastic. The cars were roomy and designed to be aesthetically pleasing, not necessarily compact and efficient. They were showy. People took pride in their cars, washed them every weekend, serviced them regularly. They didn't cover them in bumper stickers, ignore the much-needed oil change, or allow Cheerios to be eternally lost to the backseat.



6. The Furniture Their furniture was...well...interesting. Odd colors, not that comfortable, but it belongs solely to that generation and they own it. I'd love to decorate a room with their furniture, namely my kitchen. It'd be themed a la the Prime Time Cafe at Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park. We ate there during my and my mom's 1997 trip to Florida, it was awesome.

5. The Way They Reared Children It was a no-bullshit mentality. Kids did what they were told, there was no room for negotiation, and if you didn't do it, you were punished. I'm sorry if I offend anyone here, but in my opinion there are far too many parents out there who want the kid to make all their own decisions, have their own way, and by the time the kid is 16, they're a spoiled little brat who's never been told no and who will whine, cry, and lay down on the floor kicking and screaming until someone bends to their will. It annoys the everlovin' hell out of me! Kids NEED discipline and structure! They want boundaries! They need parents who say, "NO!" Bah.

4. A Handshake Really Meant Something My mom has a waterbed (purchased circa 1983, yeah, it's that old) with the drawers underneath it. In them, she stores old things: pictures, my drawings and stories from the first grade, my baby blankets, and most importantly, my grandmother's jewelry box. I sifted through it once. Mostly costume jewelry. But among all the big necklaces and clip-on earrings, I found my grandfather's credit card for Montgomery Ward.



Credit wasn't always so complicated. "Credit" meant you could go to a store, get what you needed and they'd keep track of what you owed them. If you didn't pay, it didn't turn into a dozen phone calls a day, credit scores tanking, and thousands of dollars in debt. If you didn't pay, your creditor (Montgomery Ward, Sears, the car dealership, etc.) showed up and took back what you couldn't pay for. Your word and your handshake were all that mattered. It's just not that simple anymore.

3. The Novelty of Technology Television. Your own private phone number at home instead of party lines. Electric kitchen appliances. We take it all for granted now but I'd have loved to see it all when it was shiny and new, making life easier for us. We get some of that feeling now, but it's more improvements on current technology than something actually new. We're a lackluster generation: nothing surprises us and we're always wanting the next best thing.



2. No Convenience Foods People were expected to prepare every meal from scratch. There weren't any individually wrapped granola bars, snack-sized bags of chips, big-as-a-Buick Costco-sized containers of pretzels. There were candy shops and TV dinners, but much like the cars I mentioned above, meal preparation was something women took pride in. Of course, they also used a TON of butter and even lard (EW.)



1. The Optimism Everyone was so damn happy! Happy to be alive, happy to have won the war, happy to get married and raise their families. People had dinner parties, they dressed nicely every day, they were proud of what they had and aspired to do more. The American Dream was alive and well in our little chunk of earth and I feel like it's all gotten lost amid politics, the rising cost of living, and a lack of hope. People are too willing to sit on their backsides and wait for life to happen to them - or the government to provide them a better life, but that's a story for another blog - and in the meantime, they're wasting precious time. You only get one ride around this sphere, make the most of it!

This is at a rest stop on our journey out west. We planned this adventure in a matter of about two months.


Rob and a brand-new Bubba


Beth and Me, summer of 2007

My Weekly Writing Assignment

So I caught a little flack for being predictable last week. I always write about my past, my memories, etc. However, what the commenter doesn't know is that I'm horrible with creativity. I took a Fiction Writing course in college and never wrote a fictitious story. I took stories that actually happened, changed the names, and submitted it. I swung a B in the class. So I'm sorry if it's disappointing to some, but with my weekly writing assignment, I'm going to be predictable yet again. Here are the prompts, though, if you're interested:

1.) You awaken with amnesia in what looks to be an igloo. You have $4 and a rock in one pocket, and a toothbrush in the other. Someone is staring at you. Write this scene.

2.) Write a 16-line poem (rhyming or non-rhyming) about a moment from your childhood that changed your life for the better.

3.) You're sitting at work one day and receive a text message from an unrecognized number. The text says, "I have the money and hid the body." You think this is a practical joke from a friend, so you play along at first. But the more texts you receive, the more you realize that it isn't a joke. Write the text conversation you have with this unknown texter.

4.) 10 of my absolute worst pet peeves...

5.) Fictionalize an event that happened to one of your parents, friends, or siblings.

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10 of My Absolute Worst Pet Peeves

10. Nonsensical arguments. Don't pick a fight with me, or try to debate me, if you have no basis for your side of the debate. You'll end up plucking total nonsense, seemingly out of thin air, and try to sling it at me like a fireball. You end up sounding incredibly stupid and I've got nothing because I can't argue with stupidity.

9. Dog-earing pages of books. My husband is totally guilty of this and it drives me up the damn wall. I don't care if it's our book, the library's or someone else's. You DON'T dog-ear pages! Preserve the damn book! Use a slip of paper, a string, or - here's a novel idea - a bookmark.

8. The fact that the California Drivers License Handbook comes in nine different languages-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
. This is AMERICA! Did you know that until 2006, we didn't have an official language? It's absolutely absurd to me that people are allowed to take their driver's license exams in one of 8 other languages - aside from English - and get their license. Of course, that brings me to Pet Peeve #7.

7. That one can become a legal citizen of the United States of America and not want to embrace our language and culture. It's infuriating that there are people out there who simply want to make money here, send it back to their home country for years at a time, and the whole time they're here, bitch about America. "America sucks, Vietnam's great!" is a tune Rob hears at work all the time. Yeah, but the money you make here, that's no so bad, eh? The guy who chants his America Sucks Mantra every day also dragged an animal trap into work one day. Rob asks him, "Hey [name here], what's the trap for?" The response: "Cats." Yeah.

6. Maintenance staff, mechanics (other than my hubby, of course), and any man I deal with in the general public assuming I'm a complete idiot and treating me like one. The maintenance guy I get up here every time something in our apartment needs fixed automatically thinks I broke whatever he's fixing and that I'm just some dumb woman. I'm not stupid, I know how/why/when it broke and how to not break it again. Jackass. My hoo-ha doesn't knock 40 points off my IQ.

5. The gap in between my two front teeth. I had it before I got braces in 1992. The braces I wore through 1994 closed it. Then I got lazy about wearing my retainer and by the time I was 19, it was back. Now I have a gap that food gets stuck in constantly. So if I'm eating, and I make a disgusting thhhhhhtttt sound, you know why.

4. Parents that refuse to restrain or even watch their kids in public places, namely stores and restaurants. There is nothing more irritating than trying to do your shopping or lunch-gnoshing while there are small children running around, screaming, knocking things off of shelves with nary a parent or guardian to be found. Who lets their kids run wild? Don't they worry about kidnapping? Or even something so simple as their kid breaking something and them being forced to buy it? Aye yi yi! WATCH YOUR KIDS! I've taken three children under three years old to a store before, it's not asking too much, I swear.

3. Holy Rollers. Bible thumpers. Soldiers of God. I don't have a problem with your Christianity. Believe what you want to believe, you won't hear a peep out of me because that's the beauty and whole premise of America: your freedom of religion. In that same vein, I enjoy the freedom of not having to believe in any deity or dogma, so please stop waving your bible in my face, stop reciting passages from it, and stop telling me that all of life's answers are in it. The bible is your cheat sheet. If you need a bunch of mostly-fictitious stories to answer life's tough questions or you need a printed and bound moral compass, then by all means. But it's not mine and you can't force-feed Christianity. Besides, what about the Golden Rule? My religious beliefs, or lack thereof, shouldn't be a factor, right?

2. The reset time on my digital camera. I get my kids all set for a second picture, or I get the perfect smile on someone, and then they have to wait for the damn thing to reset. By then, I've lost that wonderful smile, nobody's looking at the camera, and the moment's over. I need this camera in my life. Seriously.

1. Opportunists. I'm not talking about my husband, although he is an excellent example of an opportunists. I'm talking about people who know you're relying on them for something and take every opportunity to use you. Rob and I have this happen to us time and again and it's really very frustrating. We never want to slight people and we're both helpers: we help even when we really can't or shouldn't. It's a compulsion, really. Anyway, we're often taken advantage of and it starts to suck. You want to believe in people, you know?

My Weekly Writing Assignment

This week's assignment is as follows:

The Prompts:

1.) Write from the point of view of a glass at the edge of the table.

2.) Describe a typical day during your Jr. High years.

3.) Why do you write?

4.) When I'm around too much negativity I...

5.) You've been hired as a writer for "Late Show with David Letterman." Your first assignment is to come up with a witty, nonpolitical Top Ten list for him to read on air.

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A Typical Day in April of 1993, Spring of my 7th Grade Year

I wake up at 7:00 a.m. because I had to be on the bus at 7:45 a.m. Yes, I only gave myself 45 minutes. For some reason, it took me a lot less time to get ready back then. Maybe it's because I didn't have kids OR a giant purse. Hm. Anyway, I got my shower and headed back upstairs, turned on the 1"-barrel curling iron and got dressed. I was probably wearing a pair of straight-leg jeans that were docked, a dark green turtleneck bodysuit (you remember them - just like a baby's onesie but a lot bigger and more chic, ha ha) and an oversized white cardigan sweater. Then I did my hair: I pulled it back into a slick ponytail and doused my bangs with hairspray. I wrapped the top half of them around the curling iron, rolled it back, and held it for a few seconds and released. Curled the other half of them down. Then I properly feathered the top half and re-sprayed, just for insurance purposes. Don't need flat bangs by lunch!

I grabbed my backpack, skipped breakfast completely because I wasn't hungry and I didn't have time anyways because I'd redone my bangs four times just to achieve the proper height and proportion. Ran out to the corner and hopped on the bus just as it came up the sidestreet to pick up me and Kim, my neighbor and good friend who was two years my senior.

My school day, though littered with eight classes and a lunch period (this was in the days before block scheduling and different classes in different semesters; we had eight periods a day, same classes all school year long), was spent SOCIALIZING. Seriously folks, for every ounce of nerd in me existed an ounce of wanting to be liked. I was a joiner. That year, I'd participated in junior high basketball, junior high intramural volleyball, marching band, concert band and concert choir. Okay, I only lasted about six weeks into basketball. Evidently, you need to be in the know as far as rules of the game and how the game is played in order to not be last-ditch, gotta-be-fair-and-let-them-have-court-time third string. Hm.

I wrote notes. I now half-heartedly and somewhat sheepishly refer to myself as a writer when in close company - in other words, in front of people who won't laugh at that idea - and I earned a degree in it, so my note-writing obsession was probably just a little hint of what was to come. I used to save my notes. Up through the end of college, I kept an old Utz Pretzel jar in my closet with a batch of notes from grades 7-12. I finally trashed them when I met my husband. Fire hazard, anyone?

I chased boys, although I went about it in completely the wrong way. I thought my best way in was to be a friend first. This failed in multiple ways, but none that I was aware of until I was much older. To begin with, once you're a friend, it very rarely transpires to anything more, especially with teenage boys. And then you end up being the girl the guy goes to when he's have problems with the girl he actually likes, and that girl isn't you. Then you feel like crap for weeks. Finally, I realized that the whole "friend" thing was an easy way out for the guy: he didn't have to tell me what he really thought about me. I'm thinking those things varied: you're not interesting, you have a bad attitude (actually heard this once), you're fat, blah blah blah. Stupid boys.

Boy-chasing was actually a full-time extracurricular among my friends and I. Isn't it that way for most 13-year-olds? Now I can look back and laugh about it, but I was an overly open book about my crushes and all it brought me was humiliation. Ugh. When people ask if I could go back to high school and do it all over...HELL NO! It was awful enough the first time, I'm not that much of a masochist to want to relive it.

Finally, at the end of a day full of note-taking, note-writing, and crush-obsessing, I'd go home, crank out the homework uber-fast and then get on the phone to talk to all my friends about the day's events. There are two things I do well now: write and talk. It was no different at 13.

A Game of Scrabble

As always, I'm doing my homework. I've always been kind of a nerd in that respect. I do my homework. Unless it's Joe McCarren's Traditional Grammar class, in which case I'll never do it, skip five classes (it was a night class, once a week, you'd think I could have been bothered, but it was a total snoozefest), and pull an A. *shrug*

Other than that, I do my homework when it's assigned. Here were this week's prompts:

1. Complete the sentence "I'd walk a mile for a ________." and continue writing about it.

2. Describe in detail a person who leaves no stone unturned.

3. When out to lunch with co-workers, you bump into a close friend who refers to you by a nickname. Because of its unusualness, the nickname catches the interest of one of your co-workers who asks for the story behind it. Start your story with, "This may come as a surprise, but ... " and end it with, "And that's how I got the nickname (fill in the blank)."

4. Write about an intense game of Scrabble that takes an ugly turn for the worse.

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So, for the not-too-swift of you who didn't read the title of today's post, I'm writing about Scrabble. Unfortunately, I can't say it takes an ugly turn. It was intense, in that it was intensely funny, at least to a bunch of 15- and 16-year-olds.

It's 1995. Possibly early 1996. It was my sophomore year of high school, I can be sure of that. I'm sitting in my Spanish II class with, among others, Amanda, Eric, Lisa, Jeff, and Jeremy. We had a student teacher at that point, I don't remember her last name but I think her first name was Kristen. One day, as an activity to engage us in Spanish speaking, she set us up to play Scrabble but we had to use Spanish words only. As you can imagine, that got old really fast, especially since she wasn't really paying attention. I think she just wanted an easy day.

So we take a notion to start spelling out dirty words. In English. We're hysterical, practically falling out of our seats with laughter (one might say we were LOLing), and arguing over which words are acceptable. I think that's a trend in any Scrabble game. My mother-in-law actually has the Scrabble Dictionary to end such disputes.

Anyway, Kristen notices the ruckus and comes over to see what's so funny. (As an aside, this girl was one of those timid, mousy types who feigned naiveté but you knew was a much more fun girl when the school day was over.) She took one look at our board, gasped, and we delightedly watched her face turn all kinds of red. "No no no no NO!" she squeaked out, and although she was trying to insist that we start the game over and get those obscene words off the board, you could see her stifling laughter. Who wouldn't laugh at the sight of "BOOBS" and "HUMP" on a Scrabble board?

Admittedly, again, no ugly turn for the worse. But it did take a turn and it was intense. I hope Mama Kat accepts this for my assignment!

My Weekly Writing Assignment

Time for my weekly writing assignment.

I chose Prompt #2: "I wish someone told me..."

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I wish someone told me..."

...that childhood is fleeting. Enjoy it. Savor it. Remember it and all its inherent joys. Like Kenny Chesney sang, "...you're six years old and you take a nap; wake up and you're twenty-five..." It goes like that. [snap your fingers, please]

...that when placed in the hands of a shopaholic college student with a penchant for American Eagle clothing, buying shit she doesn't need at Walmart, and Marlboros, a credit card is a bad, bad, bad idea. Don't sign up for credit cards just because you get a free t-shirt!!!

...to give college more of an effort. You're smart and you could do really well if you'd just try.

...to demand healthier food as a teenager. Don't assume that you have to eat what your mom makes just because she does the shopping. And learn how to say no to sweets!

...to start exercising at a young age. Start a running program! You started one right before your senior year of high school. It lasted all of one day because your first route was out Thatcher Road. Hills Galore. Not a good route for your first day out! Talk about discouraging.

...that when your college opens the new rec center, USE IT. Go work out! Join an intramural volleyball team. Try the rock-climbing wall. Don't be afraid to use the free weights just because there's a gaggle of football lineman using them too.

...to ask more questions about your family history. Talk to grandma, grandpap, your great aunts, start a family tree. Now you know next to nothing and it's extremely disappointing!

...to be okay with who you are as a whole, not just certain aspects. And don't bury other aspects because you fear scrutiny, abandonment, or rejection. Those that do any of those three things weren't meant to be there in the first place.

...be nicer to your dad when he gets sick. Yes, you're a teenager being forced to grow up faster than you think you should, and yes, it sucks to watch your dad slowly wither away. But he's suffering too, in ways you can't even begin to imagine. Not just physically, between chemo and radiation and all their side effects, but emotionally. He knows that someday - sooner than he'd ever planned - he's going to be leaving you and your mom alone. He struggles with the knowledge that you and your mom are having to take care of him. He prays for God to take him as soon as possible so he can "stop being a burden" on you. A burden?????? He's your dad. He'd never be a burden. Remember all of that when you heave a big sigh of indignation when he asks you to make him a cup of tea or to help him up the stairs. When he asks you to drive him to outpatient chemo, don't pitch a fit because you wanted to go to your friend's house. Help him. And hug him more often. Please make sure you have no regrets when it comes to your parents.

Writing Prompt #2: A memory attached to a holiday

If there's one thing I am, without question, it's indecisive. I can't decide where I want to live (although as of late, it's less and less California), what to make for dinner, which pair of jeans to wear, or which memory I'd like to talk about. So with that in mind, I'll be telling you about a memory related to all the major holidays in my world.

New Year's Eve & Day: It's 2000. My friends and I braved a winter storm coming off of Lake Erie to drive up to Erie for a party our friend was hosting at his college apartment. Needless to say, we were there for the evening, which worked out well because by 11 p.m., the majority of us had drank our weight in alcohol. Some time after midnight, and after watching a guy I knew hit relentlessly on a girl I didn't know but felt sorry for because he was kind of a tool, I found myself to be ten feet tall and bulletproof, so to speak. I stood up, stumbled a little, marched up to him and punched him directly in the eye. I don't remember if he swung back or whatever, I was too drunk and after that, people pryed me off of him and shortly thereafter, he was told to leave. Sucker. I was told the next morning that everyone was happy I did that, they were looking for an excuse to kick him out all night.

Memorial Day: I honestly don't have any big memories tied to this day. I know my daughter was conceived sometime around Memorial Day, but that's all I've got! I can tell you that it's a holiday I strongly revere due to its significance.

Fourth of July: It's 2002. I'd been at work all day and was really excited about going to the fireworks that night. I had a new pair of jeans, a new shirt, my hair had survived eight hours in a hat and Rob was waiting outside with a Diet Coke, a fresh pack of smokes and the car running. We drove to the east side of Conneaut Lake and parked right where Route 18 splits off into 618. We saw all of about seven minutes of fireworks and about 10,000 mosquitoes. I spent my fifteen minutes there swatting at mosquitoes and not enjoying the seven minutes of crappy fireworks.

Halloween: Oh, the places we could go with this holiday! But we'll just go one place - Halloween of 2001. It was to be my last "I'm still a kid and I'll milk this trick-or-treating thing for all it's worth" Halloween since I was graduating from college that coming spring and was going to have to grow up. My plan was to go as a Goth Chick. The end result was a Goth Hooker. Only one of my roommates has documentation of this. I've emailed her asking for a copy. If I get one, I'll surely post it. It's hysterical.

Thanksgiving: To stay with my theme of indecisiveness, I can't pick one for Thanksgiving. It'd be any Thanksgiving my mom hosted, which were all when I was really young, probably 12 and younger. I remember dusting off the two leaves for the dining room table, getting out the good plates and silverware, all the old-school serving dishes, and the ceramic gravy boat. I remember all the smells wafting through the house: turkey, sweet potatoes, Waldorf Salad (instead of celery, mom used green seedless grapes), pumpkin & pecan & cherry & apple pies, deviled eggs, stuffing, and the list goes on.

Christmas: Hmmm. Our first Christmas together, 2001, Rob was still unemployed. No money. My mother-in-law's husband loaned Rob $20 and he bought me a MagLite because my car didn't have one. He's thoughtful like that.

I love memories. Thanks for the trip down Memory Lane, Mama Kat!

My Weekly Writing Assignment

Here are Mama Kat's prompts for the week.

The Prompts:

1. Put Shaggy (Scooby Doo's partner) and Batgirl in an elevator and write a 200 word scene.

2. Write about a time you hid from someone, or a time you disguised who you really were.

3. List 10 things worth saving then choose one of those things and write about it.

4. What did you do before we had the internet?

So let's see...

1. I'm no good at writing scenes. Or clumsy pornography.

2. I've never done that. I'm no good at lying!

3. We have very little of value. I'd save the computer; it has all our pictures on it.

4. We have a winner!

Without further ado...

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Ah, life before the internet. It showed up in my house in 1997. I was in the midst of my junior year in high school and at first we were AMAZED. My friend, Diana and I would stay up till ungodly hours chatting. I distinctly remember the screen names "Imagoat" and "LilDoscha." Ha ha. We all made webpages on Angelfire and Geocities and actually had to learn some HTML. Layouts were insanely basic and didn't offer columns or anything fancy-pants. ICQ was the only way to chat. And you emailed everyone you knew just because you could.

But before that? God, let me dig into the crevices of my http://mind. I remember spending our summers riding bikes. We lived in a very small town and the majority of my friends all lived out in the country on dirt roads - or paved roads with no lines on them - so to get to anybody's house, you either had to hope you had someone's parent to drive you or you were on the Two-Wheeled Express. One day, my friend and I rode our bikes a total of 30 miles, all in the name of killing time and, you can quote me on this: "You're only 13 once, Lisa!"

I know we spent time at our one friend's place...a LOT of time. They had a big yard, a basketball hoop, and an in-ground pool. Plop yourself in western Pennsylvania in the dead heat of July and try to find a pool. Nobody has a pool in Pennsylvania because you can only use it maybe four months out of the year. This family was POPULAR. Plus, they were triplets, so it was three times the normal number of invitees.

I remember day-long trips to the mall. See, there was this joke of a "mall" in the next town over but it was very old and stores were consistently going out of business there. By the time I moved in 2003, Montgomery Wards had closed, Fashion Bug had moved, the arcade was long gone, NRM had left...all that was left was KMart, Pearle Vision Center, a pizza joint, Dollar General, the Hallmart Store, and a wannabe hair salon that butchered my hair every time I went in there.

One would think I'd stop going...but I'm stubborn like that. I had a strange optimism that someday, they'd get it right. They never did.

Anyway, we had to drive 40 minutes to the Millcreek Mall up in Erie. You leave around 10:00 a.m., get up there and go out for lunch, shop all afternoon, and grab dinner on the way home.

Let's see, what else did we do? Sports! There was summer-league softball, cheerleading, and helping the boy's volleyball team. Then there was band. Yeah, I said it. I was a band geek. I was also a choir chick. I sang, I danced, I marched, and I played a wild array of instruments. I was indispensable. (I can toot my own horn if I want to.)

And as for communication...if memory serves, we hand-wrote letters. For you younger kids, that means we broke out the stationary or lined notebook paper and a pen and scribbled out a letter - not in LOLspeak - and stuffed it in a stamped envelope, put it in the big blue box outside the post office and waited for mail to come to us. We also had land lines. That's the phone that, either by it's base or by it's receiver, is tethered to the wall by a cord. I'm sure you've seen it, hanging out in the kitchen or the office.

Hell, my mom didn't give up the phone-company-provided rotary phone until 1994. Mom has issues with technology change. It was the late 1980s before we saw a VCR, 1992 before we got a cable box, and 1997 before we got the computer.

I almost miss life before the internet came along. It was simple. You had to move your ass away from the glow of a screen to communicate with people. Of course, I also miss life as a child, when responsibility didn't dog you at every step, reminding you that even as you watch 30 get closer, day by day, you're still trying to figure out how to navigate through life.

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As an aside, although I think it's a pretty important aside: thank you to everyone who expressed concern this morning. I spoke to who I needed to speak to, they were cool (almost too cool, which worries me, but that's a post for another time) and things are going to be fine. No woman, no cry...at least not for now. Thanks, guys.