While My Boyfriend Was Sleeping

What I write after Joe and Henry go to bed

I always knew manatees were the pugs of the sea. Now I have proof.

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Today is Cubbie’s birthday. He would have turned nine. He would have gobbled up a celebratory gourmet dog cookie with a candle in the middle. He would have walked bowlegged through the neighborhood, greeting passing dogs and people with the kind of amiable superstar charm that is reserved for celebrity darlings like George Clooney and Tom Hanks. He would have nestled in bed beside me, keeping me company as I type this. He would have fallen asleep quickly, his barreled body warm and soft and all the things Cub was and isn’t anymore.

I wish I’d given him five celebratory gourmet cookies last year.

Joe told me I need to stop writing sad posts about the dog. He told me enough already, Heidi. You wrote your closure piece, now move on.

So today I moved on. I did what I thought was the best possible thing to do on Cub’s birthday. I loaded Henry into the kayak, tucked Cubbie’s ashes into a waterproof bag and pushed off into the bay at sunset.

The weather was perfect. The water was glass. The air was still and the park was quiet, save for my homeless friend Charlie, who wished us well as we paddled into the calm, orange distance.  My son was well-rested and contemplative as I explained to him the significance of today’s paddle.

“We’re going to scatter some of Cub’s ashes in the water.”

“Cubbie has ashes,” he repeated.

“Yes,” I replied.

“We see Cubbie again?” He asked confused, or so I thought.

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LANCE CHAT :: Q&A with singer Mifflin Lowe

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**LOOK FOR A GIVEAWAY AT THE END OF THIS Q&A.

The back story: Mifflin Lowe, the singer/songwriter I blogged about here, just released a kid’s Christmas album – Wilton Wilberry and the Magical Christmas Wishing Well. This 15-track collection of original songs and narration tells the story of a greedy kid, Wilton Wilberry, who every Christmas feels snubbed in the gift department.

Fed up with being under-gifted, he runs away from home and stumbles upon a magical wishing well that’s home to a rock ‘n roll Santa who makes all his wildest wishes come true. Soon he’s showered with more toys and candy than an overindulged celebrity child, which naturally leaves him feeling lousy and selfish. With the help of a Christmas princess, gluttonous Wilton comes to terms with his “gimmes” and finally sees value in the most overlooked gift of all: the love of family and friends.

Inspired by the sounds of Elvis, Roy Orbison, The Beatles and early hip-hop, Wilton Wilberry is a modern-day Dickens tale with a rock ‘n roll twist.

Please note: I’d never promote something on the Lance that I didn’t think was awesome. I have a huge soft spot for artists, especially artists whose visions and sensibilities align with mine. If I’m going to push products in this space, they’re going to have to be clever, meaningful and inherently funny. Miff hits all three with Wilton and his two previous albums, The King Who Forgot His Underpants and Beasts By The Bunches.

I love listening to music with Henry. It’s the feel-good, no-fuss, old-fashioned alternative to watching television. One of my favorite material possessions is the radio in my kitchen. It was a Christmas gift from Joe. I listen to more music in the kitchen than anywhere else, including the car. The kitchen is where I spend most of my rare indoor time with Hank. We dance. We sing. Sometimes I even line his stuffed animals on the bench seat at the table so we have an “audience” to entertain. Sometimes in the middle of these dance-offs I wonder who’s really the kid in our house.

Speaking of big kids, here’s Miff … looking more serious than usual …

christmas backdrops photography uk

HK: What kind of kid is Wilton Wilberry?

ML: Wilton is the archetypal little brother who always feels slighted, neglected, picked on and not so much under-appreciated as utterly unnoticed. This simmering resentment is brought to a quick boil during the holidays when Wilton ABSOLUTELY KNOWS his brother and sister will get the all good stuff like video games, skateboards and electric guitars and he will get nothing but the crummy stuff like socks, undershirts and cuff links. Cufflinks? What kid wants cufflinks? It’s even worse than cologne! When Wilton discovers the magical wishing well and the Rock ‘n Roll Santa, he’s able to turn the tables and get everything he wants. Sometimes he goes to the wishing well with catalogs and wishes for every single thing on every single page – and gets it all. Eventually his gifts fill the house, the front lawn, the street and the whole neighborhood while no one else gets a thing.

HK: It sounds like you have Santa issues.

ML: I suppose Wilton springs from the fact that my sisters were the princesses in our family. They were driven to grade school even though it was only three blocks away, while I was forced to rake leaves, shovel the walk, and refinish furniture.

HK: Why the name Wilton Wilberry?

ML: It arises from its alliteration with wishing well. I’m a sucker for word play and a particular fan of alliteration. Plus I thought the name implied a certain weeny-ness, which is part and parcel of Wilton’s character.

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Pure imagination: Is technology killing or cultivating creative thinking?

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https://www.katebackdrop.de/collections/fruhling-hintergrunde

Henry’s toy collection is all over the place, as in it’s (figuratively) diverse and (literally) scattered all over the house.

He’s got stuff that talks and moves, beeps and flashes. He’s got a workbench filled with tools that look and sound like the real deal. He’s got a train that whistles and rolls with the help of a AAA battery. He’s got a guitar that doubles as a keyboard and a set of John Deere tractors that double as throwing stars when hurled in fits of rage.

He’s got a hand-me-down tricycle, a hand-me-down kitchen set and a hand-me-down horse on a set of squeaky springs. He’s got Legos and blocks and puzzles and books. He’s got a toy rocket, a wheelbarrow, a lawnmower, a leaf blower, a trampoline and a vacuum.

Wait. He’s got two vacuums – an upright and a canister.

He’s got a dog that won’t stop talking, a bear that won’t stop singing and a baby doll from the Goodwill that wont stop threatening to stab me in my sleep.

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swim.bike.run.joy.

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Why do I love triathlons?

There are the obvious reasons.

The constant training keeps me in shape. The constant outdoor training forces me to explore my city by foot and by bike, activities that immediately appeal to my inherent sense of wanderlust.

Also appealing: the fact that I can build muscle and endurance without having to be married to a gym.

Running is free. Biking is free. And the paths available to me for these pursuits are gorgeous, well-lit, lined with palm trees and guarded by dolphins and a popular family of manatees.

And then there’s swimming.

Swimming feels SO good when you spend half the year living in stifling humidity. If you’re lucky enough to live within two miles of a 50-meter public pool as I do, you don’t have to fork over big bucks to install a backyard pool. For five bucks and no upkeep, I can bike two miles to a sprawling aquatic complex that borders the bay and swim 80 laps before Henry rises from his afternoon nap. (FYI: This is only when Joe is home to man the fort.)

Living in St. Petersburg how could I not be a triathlete? I read somewhere that Florida is the triathlon capital of the world. I’m not sure if this is an accurate claim, but whatever. I’m reaping the benefits.

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I told you Scandal was good

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Duh to you, Entertainment Weekly’s Mark Harris. So I was totally on target last year when I interviewed Kerry Washington about her new show Scandal. (Thanks Creative Loafing Tampa.) Sure I gratuitously used the word juicy during my chat with the actress, but how could I not? Her character is sleeping with the president and the relationship is hella steamy and … you guessed it – scandalous.

Now the chick is everywhere and rightfully so. When Michelle Obama debuted new BANGS at her husband’s inauguration the ‘do was touted as “The Kerry Washington.” Oh, and what’s this about Michelle banning Kerry from the White House because she flirts with Barack? I know it’s just celeb gossip, but it sort of explains the bangs doesn’t it?

Rumors Plausible political drama aside, I’m just saying the girl’s got momentum and I called it. So take that, Magazine I Wish I Wrote For.

At the time of our interview Kerry was still filming Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained in Louisiana. She was pretty mum about the movie, though it was obvious that her role as Broomhilda (a slave in the pre-Civil War South) would bare no resemblance to Scandal’s Olivia Pope (a high-powered Washington D.C. political fixer). I knew Django would catapult her status in Hollywood and draw (much deserved) attention to her work on television.

My favorite part from our brief phoner: when a dude drove past Kerry, yelled to her that she was driving with her car door open and upon recognizing the actress audibly freaked out. Apparently I’m not the only Season One fan.

(BTW: The reason Kerry was doing press last spring was because the show was pulling in mediocre ratings and ABC, which had just released Scandal’s Season One box set, was looking for a boost in positive coverage – ie: get Kerry to talk sweetly to reporters.)

NOW, onto ABC’s Nashville, also a guilty pleasure of mine that opened to pitiful viewership. Who wants to hook a girl up with a Connie Britton interview?

Friday in 15 pictures

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We dressed in warm clothes. We went on a picnic. We picked up our Hot Mama’s of St. Pete Co-op basket. We played kickball. We made a sweet organic salad using fixin’s from our basket. We tried to set up a trampoline, but ended up bouncing around the yard instead. We got excited when Joe came home. We played with a strange, creepy baby doll from the 1960s. We fell asleep happy.

The great skimp

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My name is Heidi and I’m a crazy bag lady.

I’m a crazy bag lady because I recently returned six cans of tuna fish to Save A Lot. I pulled six cans out of my enormous purse, stacked them in front of the cashier and shamelessly asked for my money back.

Henry squawked. The people in line behind me squawked. Ohnoshedidn’t. Tuna fish in a purse? Those cans better not be opened.

(They weren’t.)

I was that woman. The one who plods into a bargain basement grocery store with a baby on her hip and a purse full of tuna fish.

Upon pulling the cans out of my purse, I explained to the cashier (and to anyone behind me muttering bag lady under their breath) that I had mistakenly purchased albacore instead of chunk light.

Ten dollars is a lot of money for tuna fish your husband won’t eat.

I never felt more like my grandmothers, although I’m pretty sure even they’d suck up $10 and move on. Not me. I was the penny-pinching old bat; the one who wears her hair in a babushka and carries change in a margarine container.

“There’s paperwork,” the cashier said flatly, handing me a form on which I had to write my name, phone number and address.

Seriously? I thought. Paperwork? Fine. Bring it on. If I’m not too proud to return the fancy kind of tuna to the poor kind of grocery store, then I’m not too proud to create a paper trail.

This should come as no surprise to you: I don’t live large. Never have.

I come from blue collar stock; the kind of people my husband describes as “salt of the earth,” which is ironic given the metaphor comes from Jesus, whom I was raised without.

New money. Old money. It’s all someone else’s money to me. Writing, though I hoped it would one day catapult me into a new socioeconomic stratosphere, has yet to buy me a Stephen King-sized house or a J.K. Rowling-sized movie deal.

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Newly minted!

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What have I done with my life since we last spoke …

seven weeks ago?

Well, let’s see.

I left my job, reevaluated my life, my work as a journalist and my work as a mother. I pitched a few stories to magazines. I booked a few freelance photography gigs. I helped my clever neighbor edit her book on grieving. I fretted (briefly) over leaving my job. I got over it. I made a list of all the posts I want to write because I feel lazy in the blogging department. I got a speeding ticket royally screwed for driving 28 mph in a 20 mph zone speed trap on Siesta Key Beach. I bought Henry a retro spring horse for $20 off craigslist. I got bit by an Australian shepherd on my final assignment for the paper. I took Henry swimming at the luxurious public pool near our house. In an attempt to fully appreciate the cool-down and to get the most for our $5 entry fee, we turned all the outings into bike excursions. (PS. Biking with my kid has become my new workout regime.)

What else?

Oh yeah, I stood up in my sister’s gorgeous wedding gown on the Erie Canal, at which Henry served as ring bearer and handsome flirt. The weekend before Heelya’s nuptials, I camped with my entire family in Middle of Nowhere, Upstate New York, where I exposed my one-year-old to the joys of four-wheeling through the woods, bathing in frigid spring water and sleeping in a cabin. When we returned to Florida, I gave him his first hair mullet cut. He had spent so much time in the New York hinterlands he’d grown a baby Billy Ray.

And then I gutted my office, which had turned into a black hole for all the crap in our house Henry has broken or has yet to break. I painted it mint green, redecorated/refurnished it with an uncharacteristically girly touch and managed to stay under my $200 budget.

Last year, when I posted pictures of Henry’s baby cave I pulled in my highest number of comments EVER. This still floors me. I write and write and write my heart out and it’s pictures of baby decor that generate chatter. A crib and an Ikea dresser-turned-changing-table, that’s what gets your juices flowing.

In the spirit of pretty pictures, I decided to return to the Lance after a long hiatus with a post dedicated to my office makeover. I was especially resourceful when it came to this overhaul. Now that we’re minus an income and living on tuna fish, I can hardly justify a new Aeron chair. This is why I got a wooden one for $30 at an estate sale.

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Who am I kidding?

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Yes, I devote an entire drawer in my fridge to chocolate. It’s the same drawer some people stick vegetables in. I call it my shnooka drawer – shnooka being a derivative of the German slang word for chocolate. My Oma has a shnooka drawer, and thus I have one too.

It’s so full I can hardly close it.

Anyone want to come over and help me empty it?

The bane of my existence

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I love that I generated fortune cookie comments in my last post.

So in the spirit of WISHFUL THINKING, I give you the fortune I pulled from a cookie when I was 15 years old. As you can see by the dirt, dust and fuzz, I’ve taped this trifling thing EVERYWHERE over the years: furniture. journals, car dashboards, refrigerator doors, useless math textbooks…

And wouldn’t you know, the goddamn thing has yet to come true.

It taunts me.

—

PS. Holy moly. It just occurred to me NOW that these lucky numbers might mean something. In all the years I’ve obsessed over this piece of paper, I’ve never given the numbers much thought.

So let’s break ’em down now: Joe’s birthday is Dec. 8. The first time I wrote a book that I was proud of was when I was 11 years old. It was for a school project and it spawned a short series of children’s books about a town in which expressions and idioms come true (ie: “It’s raining cats and dogs”). When I was 24, I quit my newspaper job, moved into a bungalow in downtown Sarasota and attempted, but of course never finished, my first novel. I was 25 when I met Joe. He was 34 when we got married.

And then there’s 38. I have no idea what 38 means.