Notes from the Red Bird House

Me: For the zillionth year in a row, I work every other day the week of Christmas. Two days off together is apparently impossible. Friend: You are not old enough to have worked a zillion years. Me: Retail years are like dog years...only quadrupled.  ~~ I'm not a writer. Well, I write and if that was the minimum standard, I'd be a writer. To me, a writer is someone who gets paid to write. In my writing "career", I've been paid a sum total of $150. That's it. An entire decade and that's all I have to show. Thus far. I mean maybe one day I'll sell a book for more than I'll pay to produce it and actually - wait for it - make a profit. In the meantime, I work retail. I got the job in 2003 and intended to stay six months, maybe less. It was better than selling gym memberships on commission, but just barely. I took one promotion, then another. Before I could blink twice I was a manager. Then I dared to blink again and I wasn't a manager anym...

 My very first first day of school, I went alone. No mom, no dad, just me. At the time, I guess, I didn’t think myself weird or even independent. It’s just what I wanted to do. And my mom let me. With a full forty-three years of perspective since that day, I realize that it couldn’t have been easy for her. I can’t recall if I took the bus or she dropped me off. For the record, I was the only lone wolf that day. Everyone else had a mom fawning over them (maybe a few dads were fawning but we are talking the early 70s so I’m skeptical) and drying tears. It wasn’t a seamless plan on my part. Teachers don’t pay attention to kids sans parents on the first day of kindergarten. Lost in the shuffle, I sat down on my lunch box (I think it was the Partridge Family – early 70s, remember?), elbow on knee, chin on fist, and waited. Before too long, someone noticed me. Mom probably got judged pretty harshly for placating such independence in a five year old, but, man, that day was seminal ...