Vidal Sassoon: Peace Maker

It was a cold winter night back in 2000.  I was a videographer at WNDS and they just hired a full time Sports Reporter, Ted Panos.  I was trying to be the official full time Sports Videographer and was willing to do practically anything to ensure that.  The Assignment Editor sent Ted and I to CB Sullivan, a Beauty supply distributor.  They were having a party and Vidal Sassoon and (for some reason) Robbie Knievel were to appear. 

Somehow the Assignment Editor talked Ted into believing this was some kind of sports story. I wasn't convinced.  We showed up and almost immediately got "Big Timed" by Knievel's "People".  "We're not sure Robbie is gonna talk to the Media today" they told Ted.   Finally Ted manged to get the OK to interview Knievel and Sassoon after some quick announcements by one of the owners.  I still have no idea why A: I'm here and B: why this is newsworthy.  And to tell the truth, I was pretty pissed at this point. Knievel was half in the bag and hitting on all the hairdressers, such a douche bag.  At this point Ted disappears to feed his face or schmooze and I am no longer keeping my thoughts to myself.  I guess I was a little loud when I called Knievel a No-Talent Ass-Clown and he apparently heard me.  He was about 5'10", wearing tight jeans, cowboy boots and a leather Jacket with the American flag on the back with the word Knievel in it.  If you were there, you'd want to punch him, too.  He smelled like a beer-filled ash tray.  So the Son of Evel turns to me and slurs "Wha did yooujus say d'me".  So I'm thinking, well now you've done it, this is gonna be a thing, Robbie's handlers are gonna shove this camera up my ass before I can even swing at this Buffoon.

Just then Vidal Sassoon, who apparently was witnessing this whole thing, steps in and says "We're all friends here, Mate. Let's have a drink".  He puts his arm around Robbie and they all walk away.  Then Ted shows up and I'm like "Where the hell were you? I almost just fought Robbie Knievel".  It was a very weird situation.  And, I must add, Vidal smelled great.

HARD TO BELIEVE, BUT IT REALLY HAPPENED TED NEVER GOT HIS INTERVIEW BUT AT LEAST WE GOT ALL THE SCALLOPS-WRAPPED-IN-BACON WE COULD EAT.

A Soldiers's Daughter

A Quarter for a Backscratch

I grew up a soldier’s daughter.

I was a daydreamer of a child, not knowing all that much about the world around me and less about the soldier that raised me.

He was not much more than a child when his parents read him a letter one day; this seventeen year old dreamer, this blue-eyed all American boy. He was the youngest of five. Raised on the football field, Grandpa’s hand-grown vegetables and Grandma’s brownie squares.

The letter promised his future. He would leave for camp. He would not play football at a university or continue his education. There would be war.
That football would be replaced with a rifle. His team shirt would be traded for a uniform of greens and gray. His new playing field: a jungle of underground trenches and a monsoon-filled forest.

I grew up this soldier’s daughter.

He left in January of 1967, his home, his family, his sweetheart . The next eleven months he would travel on foot through a foreign country. This boy that knew nothing more of the world than a white house on a hill on Main Street, America, and a few family picnics down an old dirt road.

Instead he’d see torrential rain that never ceased. Morning, noon or night. He’d eat from an aluminum can with a tin spoon, sleep under the light of ammunition and watch boys, as young as he, fall to their fate on a ground of bloodshed dirt.

This makeshift soldier lost his very best friend in December that year. To a boy about his age, hiding behind a single tree. He took the life of the enemy that day before he succumbed to the bullet himself. He would be rescued in helicopter, having left half of his soul in the jungle.

He would not be greeted at home, not by family, not by his sweetheart, and rested in a hospital twenty-five hundred miles from Main Street.

I grew up this soldier’s daughter.

Finally he would return home. Not a boy but a broken man. His football dream a memory. His future uncertain. He married his sweetheart and a short time later, he was blessed with a daughter and three more in a row. He built us a home with his own hands and made a living of electricity and repair.

That soldier rode us in a wheelbarrow through a backyard of leaves, fed us his very own hand grown vegetables, and put that first ball in our hands and showed us how to play it.

It was Saturday morning, after a week long of labor, that soldier would ask me for a back scratch. A back scratch for a quarter. He’d sit up straight, this grown up blue-eyed All American boy and I’d scratch his his back all for a quarter and a smile.

As I sat there he’d ask about my week and I filled the room with little girl stories, always wondering as I scratched his back, about the mark on his back. It was all of six inches long, longer than my little girl hand, and it scarred him clear across his shoulder blade. I never asked, for I feared it, and more so the answer.

I grew up this soldier’s daughter.

He waited as long as it took me to grow up and find my own ‘football’ dreams, and told me about the day he suffered his scar. It wasn’t from an old sport injury, a hero quarterback play, but a wound suffered in Vietnam on a day in December of 1967.

That scar, that very scar I would scratch for a quarter, had given me freedom, had given me and every other daughter , son, and family, the gift of liberty, and justice, and the pursuit of dreams. He may not have seen his own All American dream through, but he worked his entire grownup life making sure I did.

I grew up this soldier’s daughter.

And there’s no prouder way to grow up.

Let's BLOG Good Dates Gone Bad.

Plenty of fish in the sea.  For me there were 10.  All a boy had to do was throw me a line and I was in deep. Hook, line and scrunchie. 

Course I was thirteen.  The better half of the 80s spent in a convent and a plaid uniform skirt.  First day of seventh grade, I took me and my spiral perm up to the second floor of a public school building. A playground for pimply, preteen romantics and a haven for hallway hookups.  Nothing but shoe-sized Don Johnsons  and spray-teased, neon miniature Madonnas.

With three days IN and no way OUT, I was asked out on a real honest-to-goodness date.  And I agreed to that date. On account of a threat.  A threat made when two true blue buddies promised a certain boy in a certain jean jacket that I would consent.  But not until they sat on my desk.  In social studies class.  In front of a room of starey-eyed students.  Until I agreed to go on a date.  This was nothing the nuns had prepared me for.  And neither had Molly Ringwald.

What they didn’t realize was that I was already signed, sealed, and practically delivered to return to that convent.  To solemly swear to write off boys and devote myself to God and all things polyester.  

Yes, it’s true.  This was my first experience of a DATE.  With a boy that hadn’t the courage to ask me himself.  Under the condition of A. humiliation, B. getting my first ever detention and C. making it very difficult to take notes about the Civil War with two pubescent pimps on my desktop. Nevertheless, I consented, which translates to, I circled ‘yes’ instead of ‘no’ or ‘maybe.’ 

From there it was a romance like no other young adult novel.  A thousand and one folded notes you’d need MacGyver to dismantle, mini-Brach’s boxes  of chocolate, and a random PG 13 movie every Saturday night. That was until the breakup.  With love lost and nothing but time in between, I had me a series of other dates. 

Let me remind you that I was no expert in Cupid’s quest for eternal love.  All I wanted to do was be left to my own self and my Michael Jackson records.  But those fish in the sea kept biting.  Turns out that sea was more of a water hole.  And the fish left me high and dry with a broken heart and two ounces of self esteem.  I shall share these Good Dates Gone Bad, with no bad intent, other than to practice the method of rating love.  Like playing The Love Connection for points.

10. After my elusive love affair with Mister Jean Jacket, I attended an all boys’ school PROM.  On a blind date.   We actually met for the first time at the limousine.  Me in my turquoise sequin gown and  ten foot bow and he in his matching turquoise tie. You would have thought we had been a couple since preschool but we had only known each other all of ten minutes before the first Electric Slide. This was a Good Date Gone Bad not because it was a blind date, but because just a few short months later,  Blind Date Boy had dumped me for my best friend.  Who didn’t own any floor length turquoise gown, but did own a twelve inch pleated cheerleading skirt.  D-

9. Next up was a date with a friend.  Sat behind me in Algebra II.  It was an early edition of When Harry Met Sally until little Sally there lit up a Chinese chicken teriyaki like it was a blowtorch on the fourth of July.  I must have been nervous and still new at the dating scene. And there I was, presented with not a corsage, but my first pu pu platter.   When I leaned that chicken stick in, that flame met Perdue and fifteen year old Harry never called me again.  I think he even changed seats in Algebra for fear of my impending Firestarter abilities. B

8. My next date was with a younger man.  No license. No car.   That was really no matter when someone looked like a young John Travolta minus the T-bird jacket.  So like Sandy, I was hopefully devoted.  Until he showed up.  In his dad’s car: a red BMW convertible.  Would have been a dream date til I discovered that said BMW had a chaperone.  HIS DAD.  B-

 7. I gave the next boy a try and all my might not to sock him to South Dakota.  He was a friend of Mister Jean Jacket and he did, after all, have his own car.  And he drove me in that car to the most high end restaurant  in town: Dairy Queen. I was enjoying my chocolate malted milkshake until he expressed that I was pretty.  Boy probably thought I’d throw that shake right out the window and blow out all my sixteen candles right then and there.  But A. he had to go and put both feet in his mouth and B. there was no boy worth my chocolate milkshake.  By the next sip, shortly after “you are pretty” and right before “don’t get me wrong” he says, “I mean you ARE pretty, but your friends, the ones on your cheerleading team, are GORGEOUS.”  C-

6. For the next whirl-of-a-wind romance, I went all worldly.  A young girl needs some culture in her life. So I dated a boy from French class.  He was older, funny, and mysterious. But it’s not so funny when he has to play Knight Rider in his 1975 Ford pinto.  That car was like ten years old and still cranked one hundred and one.  Miles per hour that is.  Grand Prix Guy took me down back roads, highways, freeways and to and from Teenage Hell in that pinto.  I don’t even know if we ended up at a destination for our date other than the infirmary.  All I know is I wasn’t having me another ride with the Chauffeur from the Underworld and he dumped me next day.  He had a new date by 6^th period. D- as in thought I might Die a Virgin.

5. By date #5 I experimented with spirituality.  He was a born-again Christian, whatever that meant, with a conscience complex.  One minute he’d be rounding first base in the back seat and by second inning he was signing the cross.  My heart beating fast, my super strength aquanet bangs all awry, he made me feel like a regular Mary Magdelene. Last date with him was a youth group meeting.  Brings me home and announces, “we need to cool this off til we get married.”  This chic, despite her firestarter powers, didn’t need her flame blown out just yet, so we ended it.  And I went back to being less holylike.  O for How Loved Thine Aren’t. 

4. My summer fling. Point Sebago.  It was seven days of summer sun, summer fun, and Beach Blanket Bingo with the summer fling.  Poor kid never had me alone.  Even on the tennis court.  It was a family reunion every time he served.  And you’d think me annihilating him with my racket would be humiliating enough.  Imagine his mother marching down to that court snatching her son up before fifteen love.  He penpaled me for two years til Mom quit buying stamps. B

3. You know that date, that one date you wished you should have, could have, would have? That was this here one.  He was the soccer captain which meant I had hit the Big Time at Ridgemont High.  Too bad for him I wasn’t ‘fast times.’ A senior, a player, and could pass for a Tony Danza weighing in at 67 pounds.  Tony didn’t even BRING me to a DATE.  He brought me HOME.  And everyone was gone except for the Tony Jr., his little brother with his little notepad and #2.  Taking notes on how to score an assist off the field.  Turned out Tony hadn’t realized I majored in defense at the convent.  For the first and only hour of our date, which took place in his bedroom, I succeeded in twelve blocks, two penalties, and bought myself two tickets home.  He promised me a real date next time but then had his assistant captain break up with me on the phone.  Never spoke to Tony again but at Sports Award Night I believe I was named Best Defensive Player.  F

2. As if Tony’s sixty minute date wasn’t disastrous enough, the next Romeo got five minutes.  A friend of a friend’s friend approaches me at my locker.  Right between Astronomy and British Literature.  Asks me for a date.  This Good Date never had a chance to get bad because #1, the one and only, shows up at said locker and tells this kid to ‘Beat It.’  Not only was #1 playing one of my favorite songs he was prepared to retire my fishing pole.   I never saw that friend of a friend’s friend again since he ran away that day and we never did have that date. But perhaps it’s better that way having never really been friends with the friend of that friend.  No grade here.  Just an Inexcused.

1.  The one and only.  It was 1987. And I was single as a dollar bill. Kid had his own car.  Kid had A JOB. Kid had a five o’clock shadow and an Adidas sweatshirt in MANsize Double X.  Met me by a chain-linked fence after the state championship game.  The very game I had to cheer on Captain Ten-Handed Tony and bad dates 1-6 were all in attendance.  Approached me after the game and asked me not just for a date but for the rest of my life. 

I was done sea fishing that day.   I had survived 10 Good Dates Gone Bad and #1 would pick up all the pieces. That kid had me hooked, lined, and forever his.  A+

half-a-mom 

Let's BLOG for Mother's Day.

This is for moms everywhere.

The kinds of moms that break their BACKS and their BANKS just to make their kids happy and the same moms that break their little hearts when they tell them it's time for bed so mommy can enjoy the last of the mint chocolate chip ice cream.

The kinds of moms that match socks.  And somehow end up with one hundred and twelve leftover.

This is for the moms that listen to KidsBop and RadioDisney all the way to the beach.  And for the same moms that tell them the radio is broken on the way back. 

The kind of moms that dig made-for-tv Disney movies and find themselves replaying them when no one is around because you secretly fantasize about being that lead girl that finally gets over her stagefright, rocks out on center stage and wins over her BFF's crush.

For moms that clean up lunchboxes day after day and enjoy eating the leftover goldfish not because you don't want to waste food but because they are just so cheesy delicious.  And it's way more convenient than walking all the way over to the trashcan.

For the moms that let them sleep with Daddy now and then.  And then end up spending the night on the bottom bunk with three dogs and a pillow pet. 

This is for the moms that love bike rides and nature walks and climbing 600 foot steps to a waterslide.  Only to find out you've actually GAINED seven pounds and a cramp in your spleen.

This is for moms of athletes.  You ride them to so many games and practices, tournaments and clinics, that you could actually be ON the team if it not for your spleen and all those damn leftover goldfish.

For moms of whiners, tattlers, and complainers and all the patience they have for not jumping out a window or just dropping them off with Nana for the day.

This is for moms that sit through homework, projects, and chapter reviews.  And the same moms on a Friday that can't wait for that school folder to come home to see how YOU did. 

This is for moms that are woken up with the sun, not  because you live on a farm but because you live with several little thieves that announce things like "Mommy, it's time to get up!" and "Mommy, I'm going to go downstairs and consume myself with all things chocolate and a bag of chips if you don't come with me."

This is for moms that have no privacy.  No dignity.  No sense of pride anymore.  She pees with the door open, changes clothes on the way to the front door, and she hasn't really enjoyed a good poop in at least a decade. 

This is for moms that taught their children to read and yet cannot seem to find a MOMENT to read anything more sophisticated than Dr. Suess and a llama with a mama in pin-striped pajamas.

For moms that cook dinners from scratch.  And the same moms that when the cabinets are bare she can whip up a meal with a block of cheese, a grape and a can of olives. 

For moms that host dance parties in the kitchen, sculpt playdough zoos in the living room, and build tents of pillows and sheets.  And the same moms that lock themselves in their car.  Out in the driveway. Listening to Phil Colllin's Greatest Hits just to find a moment of peace.

And let's not forgot those moms whose children make mistakes.  Humiliate them in public when they announce their REAL age at the ticket booth when four and under are free and burp in public just because they can.  Because no matter how big the mistake or how terrible it might just be, it is absolutely, positively Daddy's fault.  

This one is for moms everywhere.  On Mother's Day.  On ANY day. And know that you make special EVERY day for the life of a child.  Even it takes all your energy, your sanity, and an extra-large bag of miniature hershey chocolates.

half-a-mom

Let's BLOG 'You See, I See'

 You see a man.

I see a boy.  A boy of seventeen.  In a baseball cap standing by a chain-linked fence after the championship game asking me for a date.  

I see a boy of poems.  Passed in the hallways between classes.  A former artist like Prince and a matchmaker of words.  

I see a boy who put himself through college.  Three years of every weekend working and between classes coaching.  Work study.  More money owed in loans than credits.  And  yet that boy  picked up that telephone each and every night, long distance just to hear my voice.  The same boy that rode that old blue Ford pickup through the valley of Franconia, wind and snow, ice and rain, to share with me what minutes he had and everything in between.

You see a groom.

I see a husband.  Who once he had to leave college with no money left to spare to work full-time, overtime, anytime, just to find me an engagement ring.  Walked right in that jeweler with a down payment and every week since giving all his tips just to put that diamond on my hand.

I see a husband that met me in front of the altar.  In front of all our family and friends, too numerous to count and promised his love to me.   But what they didn’t know was that kind of love had already been promised at that chain-linked fence just a short time ago.  

I see a husband in a one room apartment.   Posing that nine to five job just to make rent.  All along his bride knew he was meant to be an artist not a man of sales and marketing. But a maker of films, a creator of scripts.  Still he wore that suit and tie one hour there and one hour back so he could make me a husband.

You see a guy.

I see a friend.  A best friend.   A friend that sees when I hurt and wants to make me laugh.  A friend that recognizes when I'm empty and fills me with courage.

I see a friend that never held me back but pushed me forward.  As hard as it ever was and could be, reminded me of my strength, not just as a girl but as a person.  I see a friend that supported my talents.  Sometimes the only friend in the crowd, sitting in a gym, sitting by a stage.  A friend that knew when I needed applause and knew when I needed a listening as long as it took to listen and everything in between.

You see a dad.

I see a father.  Not just any father though.  More than a father.  One that changed shifts from day to night so those baby girls never had to spend one moment in someone else’s care but our own.  He’d work the night, I’d teach the day, and he cared for those babies all day with no sleep til I got home. Fed them, changed them, nurtured them.  He grew weary, especially with two and yet he was the same father that wrote them poems.  Sang to them, shared stories with them, made a life for them.  And he waited. Waited the day long for me to arrive home so he could find himself some sleep.  Only to wake up once more and work the night, raise those babies by day.

I see a father that drove a toddler to preschool, then kindergarten, finally first grade and on.  Did the same for the second daughter.  And met them each day for pickup or at a bus stop.  Not once ever calling in sick.  No personal leave.  No vacation.  Just work by night and daddy daycare by day for years on end.

You see a man.   

I see a savior.  A savior of a mother and a father.  Finding us a home between the two, close enough and in between so he could care for them in their old age.  A savior that opened his home to his ailing father so he could rest easy knowing his son and family were right there inside. A savior that uses what little time off he has to bring his mother to appointments and listen like a friend when it comes time for the need.

I see a savior that granted me everything a girl wished for.  A home, a family, a career.    A savior of little girl moments.  Spent always at home with a mommy or a daddy, not in the hands of strangers or time spent in shuttles back and forth in the early mornings, in the snow, in the wind, or rain.  A savior that with all his efforts, has sacrificed his own health, his own dreams, his own life to care for not just one girl by a chain-linked fence but two beautiful daughters.  

You see a man.   A groom.  A guy. A dad.  A man.

I see my history.  My future.  And everything in between.

Let's BLOG Not Playing with a Full Deck

Remember the "sometimes it pays to be playing without a full deck?"  Well, here's where playing without a full deck will get you. 

The cheer gym announces two shows for your daughter: May 4th and May 11th.  You write them in THE calendar.  The one on the actual wall and not part of the collage of sticky notes all over your countertop. 

You tell YOUR whole family not to worry about attending the cheer show on May 4th.  You figure there's one on May 11th, and by then the team will look a least a week better,  so you attend SOLO. 

On May 4th, after a marathon of softball games, you fly four towns over to attend cheer show only to be notified that the May 11th cheer show does not exist.  THIS MAY 4th CHEER SHOW WILL BE THE ONLY CHEER SHOW.  The ONLY cheer show your daughter has been preparing for since like November.  Apparently somewhere between her  broken arm, a Holy communion,  and a few missed practices, the coaches decided on CANCELING the May 11th show. 

This after showing up in the Raspberry Lightning team softball jersey, sunburn, and ballfield hair.  The kind of hair you can't make pretty with even a bow the size of blue bedazzled boomerang. 

Once you locate the cheer team, you see an array of blue, sparkly, eyeshadowed,  glowstick lip glossed, curly-q hairlocked little drop dead diva girls.   It is SHOWTIME.  And your daughter looks like a cheerleader gone through the carwash.

Nevertheless, you realize she's at least ALIVE, though she only ate one chicken nugget and a banana en route.  You spritz her up and send her out to the mat so you can detour through the back EXIT door and hunt down some last minute spectators.  You don't even care at that point if it's the parking lot attendee or some random grandmother you take hostage from another family. You figure she won't even notice the difference.  The little girls are all in blue and you are sure you can convince her that Avery IS in fact her great-granddaughter.

You call Nana and Papa. No answer.  

You can't call Vavoe or Grampa because being the kind of senior class citizens they are, it would take them til next November to find the gym anyhow.  Luckily, you remember this kid DOES have a father and a sister and they should be leaving the softball field right around half past whatever. 

Dad picks up on first ring and he's promises to abandon his submarine sandwich AND a 'night' sleep to support his little girl. This after working GRAVEYARD.  I give him just enough notice to provide him 35 minutes to make it to the cheer gym that is a good 50 minutes away.

Next, I make a mad dash to the nearest mall plaza to find some semblance of a congratulatory gift to the cheerleading star, this being her last day and all.  Once I pull in the lot, I realize the only choices I have within two miles of the gym are a superette grocery and deli, a floor tile distributor, and a Hannaford. 

I must note here that this Hannaford grocery store, 30 miles from my hometown is foreign to me.  A foreign grocery store might as well be a foreign COUNTRY to me.  It's as much fun as participating in the Amazing Race part 465.  And I don't even have a partner.

But alas, I partake in the scavenger hunt for a bouquet of flowers, a stuffed cheer bear, or at least a package of junior mints.  Those being for me. 

I end up at the register with a sad display of purple lilacs leftover from Easter is my guess, a congratulations on your Bar Mitzvah card, or something close to it, and two thank you cards to the cheer coaches and skip out on the junior mints altogether.

As I leave the plaza, I have all of 8 minutes to make it back to the gym for cheer show, all the while sweating it out, hoping that Dad and Sister have already found some seats or at least kicked some other spectators out of theirs for the sake of our viewing.

No lie that I arrive right before the beginning credits, moments before the National Anthem, and the rest of the family files in as they are announcing the MINI CHEER TEAM event.  I had even planned on making some big scene to cause a delay in the show, knowing that the MINI CHEER TEAM was first up.  I'd either have to start convulsing in aisle 11 or notify all toddlers under the age of three that if they ran to centerstage they could meet the DoodleBops firsthand!
 
Your daughter shoots you a big smile, softball hair and all, and the routine begins.  We even caught a video in which you will witness deep heavy breathing, not by any cheerleading performer, of course, but from the two idiot parents in the back row that can't keep a single date straight to save their own idiot lives.

All in all, the cheer show lasts about THREE whole minutes but had taken off a good THREE years of your life.

We are now home and recuperating from the Cheer Show disaster.  And if you know me at all, you know I have already checked each and every email and notification to find out where the cancellation was, because I have already struck out 425 times this year alone, and I just can't stomach yet another failure. 

Furthermore, I have committed myself to organizing the calendar a bit more, purchase myself some junior mints, but most importantly, to the nearest mental facility.  GOOOOO Prozac!

half-a-mom