If you come to a fork in the road, take it. -Yogi Berra

What you see here is my new, current work in progress.

It's going to be a cardigan. Supposed to look something like this:

The yarn is from my Ebay Massacre Collection,'03.

It's called Scandia. It sounds like an STD. It looks like cinnamon-toast-and-raw-bluegill mélange .

What happened to Peaches?
A kegger happened to Peaches.
Thanksgiving weekend, 1975.

Disclaimer: Underage drinking is wrong. Not only is it against the law, but teenage alcohol consumption is the gateway activity to adult alcoholism. Yes, I drank while in high school. And it was wrong. Okay. Maybe I faked it a few times. Teenage-faking-drunk is wrong. It is also the gateway behavior to adult-faking-normal. The material contained within the remainder of this post, should not be taken as an endorsement of any illegal behavior or otherwise poor acting on the part of the youth of our nation.

In November of 1975, about one week after my 17th birthday and about three days before Thanksgiving, my boyfriend of 2 years dumped me.

On the Friday after that Thanksgiving, I attended a kegger. ::side note: In 1975, in my urban community, it was not uncommon for a group of high school students to pool money and rent a local Polish or Latvian hall, for an illicit aggregation of the barrel-o-beer variety. Which, of course, was wrong.::

When my recently detached boyfriend showed up at the party with a whore girl named Squeaker, I was devastated. So, I did what any self-respecting, drunk-faking, painter-panted (real ones, from the paint store), high school drama-queen would do. I crawled under a table, with an unlit Virginia Slim menthol, and had myself a cry.

Next thing I know, there's the face of a handsome stranger, peeking down at me.
Gotta light? I say.

Says the handsome stranger: Hey! There's a girl down here. She needs a light.

In three shakes of a jock strap, there were three more cutie pies peering under the table. One of them with a lighter.

Next thing I know, I’m out from under the table and being introduced to flock of jocks from the suburbs. One of whom was This Guy. The Guy who found me. We talked awhile, and I gave him my number.

He called me the next night, while I was in the emergency room, getting a thin wooden dowel (about a size 3 bamboo needle) carved out of my heel (hurt like a mofo). My grandmother, visiting for the holiday weekend, had answered the phone and taken a message, in our absence. He never called back. I later learned he thought my grandma was my mother, which scared him mightily.*

Fast forward to the spring of 1976. I’m in Washington D.C. on a Close-up trip. On the bus, I meet this really cute guy who attends high school with the guy who never called back. Of course,I ask if he knows him. And the cute guy says, Yeah, I know him. I was at that party. I had the lighter.

It was a match made in purgatory. His name was Al, and I dated him roughly four years, through college. (Emphasis on the roughly.) Al and that guy remained good friends and we all used to hang out on weekends. Al and I attended his wedding.

Big fuck-dee-doo. So what happened to Peaches?

I’ve never been a Surv*vor fan. But I had to watch this one. And it was so fun and so weird and so unsettling (‘cuz, dang, he looks the same, but old too. And I had a hard time wrapping my brain around how old we are. And it's not so much the looking old, as the years we spent getting there.), that I messed up big on my Peaches sleeve cap shaping. But I didn’t catch it until I was ready to cast-off, just before bed.

Because we were leaving for the cottage immediately after work, the next day, I had to come up with something quick and easy for the car ride. So I went bin diving, grabbed a 2004 Fall Vogue and voila, more Crap-on-a-needle.

Okay, so I’m easily impressed with stardom. But it’s not every day someone I used to know, is on one of the most popular TV shows of our time. Prior to this event, this guy was my only claim to fame, by association.

I went to grade school with him. And before the scrotum hit the fan**, my husband and I happened to catch the the late night peep show. Truthfully, I thought it was kind of funny. Totally in good face. I mean good taste. Of course, I didn't recognize the puppet as a member of my 6th grade graduating class, on account of the curtain, and all.

Speaking of curtains, I'm drawing 'em on this post. And this evening.

*My grandmother was a 4 foot 8 of all tough mutha. She was sharp-tongued and mean and scared of nothing. Except the telephone. When the phone rang, she would gasp in fear and clutch her breast, as though it was Barnacle Bill himself, knocking at the door. And then she would cry. If the phone kept ringing, she would eventually answer, say a few rude words, and hang up.

**It’s kind of an interesting case. The ACLU appealed it to the State Supreme Court. He’s become a local celebrity. For obvious reasons, I’m not saying his name, here. Read more here

It ain't the heat, it's the humility-Yogi Berra

Labels: Yore