Archive for July, 2008
We spent yesterday at Desert Grandma’s (more on that later), and she went with us today to the Grand Canyon. We drove seperately, so that she could return to her home and we could continue Eastward, but we parked her car in Tusayan, just outside the park, and went in together. She has the fancy Senior National Park pass, which gets her, and everyone with her, into all national parks free forever, which is reason enough to be happy about turning 65 (especially in this case, since the Canyon is $25 entry. I don’t begrudge the park service a penny, but most parks are 410, if I recall correctly). She is not a good passenger; if anyone on the road in front of us, no matter how far ahead, even thinks about touching their brakes, she stomps the floor, grabs the O.S. handle, hisses, and grabs the dashboard. This gets annoying after about 45 seconds. We managed to park, stored the computer with the bellman at one of the lodges, and went to look at the Canyon.
This is the point at which Grandma got really freaky. She’s always been nervous about heights, but she went crazy about the Little Guy. Every time he got anywhere near the edge of the rim, she’d scold him, or scold me, or grab him, or all of the above. She walked as far away from the rim as she could, and within 10 minutes was talking about going home. Eventually, I told her she could sit and wait and he and I went out on a little promontory, so he could look at the canyon, get a little vertigo, get a little excited. I didn’t want him to think of the Canyon as just a train depot (he’d been excited to see the train when we first parked). He was impressed when I showed him the trailhead for Bright Angel, and immediately wanted to go down, which made my mother hiss angrily. I told him we weren’t prepared for that kind of hike, and pulled him away. I would have liked to walk with him just a little bit, but it felt like my mother would report me to child services if I did. The whole trip was like that, so we wrapped it up earlier than I would’ve liked — I would’ve liked to walk along the rim more, to stop and look more frequently, but maternal disapproval is a powerful force in my life, and she really played up the drama of her fear of heights. The Little Guy tried to reason with her: “We’re not high up, we’re on the ground, and it’s all below us.” It didn’t work, and I had to talk him out of his efforts to console her.
It’s too bad, because I have good memories of going to the Canyon when I was a kid — yes, with this same mother — and again, on my own after grad school, and with my in-laws, some years ago, and I wanted the Little Guy to have some of that. I don’t think he got much of it, because all day his grandma told him NO, and his mom tried to work around it, but didn’t do a very good job.
Driving back to grandma’s car, she complained that we didn’t do this, didn’t do that, and I should’ve done what I wanted, it was my trip, she was just along for the ride. Yeah, right.
I’m so tired.
Filed under: the roadPosted: July / 30 / 2008
It’s funny the way memories layer onto a place, like flaking paint in an old house. Nowadays, Williams is a big tourist stop, gateway to the Grand Canyon, where you catch the fancy train.
When I was a kid, it was two motels, three gas stations, a Denny’s, a bowling alley, and a few dusty old tourist shops that hadn’t gotten new stock since folks started driving I 40 instead of Rte 66. I know a lot about it, because on one of our family vacations, one of my parents — and who hit it depends on who is telling the story ( Dad says Mom did it, and vice versa) — hit a cow on the road. Hit it hard, too, and broke the axle on our camping van. We spent 3 days in Williams, waiting for the part to be delivered from California. We walked along the railroad tracks — no beautifully restored Pullmans for tourists, but freight back then. We found the bowling alley. We got to know the waitresses at Denny’s.
We stopped through Williams today, and I also remembered how we drove through here a few years ago with my in-laws. They thought it a cute little town, and I noticed that they’d built a new Denny’s, right by the highway. This time, I found the old, googie Denny’s — it’s a liquor store now, with a walk-up window (so Williams still has its seedy side, don’t worry). The main event this time was the trains, of course, and the Little Guy’s enthusiasm. He wanted to ride them, but they only ran one today, and it was early, thank heavens. He dragged grandma in to see the model train in the souvenir shop/restaurant, and was happy with that too. After our trip to the canyon, we pulled off and said goodbye to Grandma here, too (she was going back to Kingman and we were going on to Flagstaff); she was pretty emotional about it.
So next time we go through here — and there’s no escaping Williams, Arizona — I’ll look to see if the old Denny’s is still there, and what it’s become now, and check to see if the old garage that repaired our van is still operating (it is now), and maybe next time we will save up and ride the trains.
This is actually day 2 of our cross-country trek. Day 1’s entries are still in my notebook in longhand — maybe I will get them uploaded tomorrow.
Flagstaff is actually a pretty nice town, considering it is in Arizona. It’s at altitude, so it’s nice and cool (again, for Arizona), and mostly piney woods. We checked into the Motel 6, and went to the old downtown, where Grandma promised us we would see trains. The old downtown is quite nice, what I, in my Californian way, think of as Gold-rush era, and has gentrified in a pleasantly eclectic (not snobby) way. We went right past the depot, and then took the driving tour because it’s all one way streets, and crossed the railroad tracks to park. I had the Little Guy stand in front of the railroad crossing signal to take his picture — a chance for a picture with his true love — and he said, “What if it goes off?” “Oh, I doubt that will happen,” I said, “but if it does we will just move away.” Well, he stood, grinned, I snapped the photo, and darned if the thing didn’t go off, dinging and flashing and everything. He jumped away and then jumped up and down for the entire time the train was going past, and it was a long train. We went to to old town Flag, and he picked a pizza restaurant — Alpine Pizza — which turned out to be the local version of Doria’s Haus of Pizza, which we loved in CM. A total college hangout, with much graffiti on the funky corner booth he chose. They were out of milk, so he had water, which he sipped through a straw, stirring the ice, saying, “I feel like a grownup, drinking this water.” He also went to the bathroom by himself, since I could see it from the booth, and it was a single. The bathrooms were labeled “Queen” and “King,” and he said, “I like the idea of being a king,” as he went in. .When we came out, a train was passing, so he ran down to the corner to see it (along with a middle aged man behind us, who didn’t jump up and down), and by the time we got to our car (we stopped to go into a shop), there was another train for us to see. Three trains in one evening! So he was OK with not swimming.
We gave our leftover pizza to the front desk guy, who accepted it enthusiastically. A college student, I’d guess — who else accepts food unquestioningly from strangers? At any rate, now I won’t feel so bad about filling my cooler with ice in the morning. I was going to do it, but now I won’t feel guilty about doing it.
Well, today was a mess. We were supposed to have a yard sale, but when we woke up, both of us were wiped out, and Miss Baby had herself a fever. She only wanted her Daddy, so I went back to sleep for an hour or so, then I got up and he went back to bed for a while. She cheered up a little bit, but it didn’t last. The Little Guy was OK, but became frustrated when, while playing outside, I asked him to quiet down so as not to wake his Daddy. My DH took Miss Baby to the urgent care, and the Little Guy and I took in the recycling and took our books back to the library. I did some packing for the trip. This, that, and the other.
I don’t know if I’ll be able to post tomorrow — it should be even crazier than today: church, packing for the trip, packing the car, packing up the bedroom, plus the basic daily laundry, dish-washing, chasing little people. Right now I’m the only person in the family who isn’t sick, so there’s a lot to do.
In Costa Mesa, we have a sort of a communal art project. It’s a collection of locks, hanging on a fence on a freeway overpass. They’ve always been there; every now and then, someone, presumably the police, takes them off, but then someone, or several someones, replaces them, so the number, type, and arrangement of locks varies. Usually, it’s jsut a long line of combination and key locks. They’ve been there for years, and we’ve always said that we wanted to hang a lock, but never found the right occasion. We decided that leaving town was the right event.
We finally did tonight; when we got off the freeway and turned into the neighborhood to park, there was a CHP there with someone he’d pulled off the freeway. We drove around a little, found another spot, and got out. We were in and out, quickly. My husband was nervous, but when I was a kid, I used to walk over this overpass to get to school. so it was strangely nostalgic.
It’s blurry, but here’s proof:
Filed under: ramblingPosted: July / 26 / 2008
Another last…
The last Dodger game. In the future, if we want to see major league baseball, we have to drive to Atlanta or DC. We had a last-minute babysitter scramble, but we made it. We had lovely seats, that came with their own parking permit and everything. We got there early, and stayed through the whole game, which we can’t do when we have the little people with us. The Dodgers won and everything.
After the game, as I waited for the Ladies’ room, I witnessed a brawl. The brawlers were also in line for the Ladies’; it started with an exchange of words, then the body language became more hostile, then the women started shoving each other, then they started whacking each other over the head with the bobbleheads we’d received as we entered the park. None of the women in line interfered, beyond hollering, “security!” and, “G-d, there are kids here!” The brawlers’ boyfriends pulled them off each other, and a security guard took them all outside. Afterwards, the women in the bathroom discussed the whole event vigorously, calling from stall to stall: “Those B**! Those F-ing Dodgers B***! Those ghetto B***! Those F-ing ghetto Dodgers B***! They have no class! And there were kids around!”
Yeah, no class. no class at all.
Thanks to everyone who came and helped, we got tons of packing done today. The kids’ room is totally boxed up, the kitchen and the living room are mostly boxed up, my desk is pretty much done. My DH stacked empty boxes out front, and we strewed them across the lawn. Well, I mostly did. There were boxes within boxes, so I had to unpack in order to pack.
My DH took the little people to the Santa Ana zoo while we were packing. Miss Baby fell asleep in the car on the way home, eariler than her naptime, so she was delivered to me, and we put her in bed. She slept for a while, then woke up happy. He took the Little Guy with him to the doctor; my DH hasn’t been feeling well, so he though he had caught the Little Guy’s strep. Turns out it’s a sinus infection.
So pretty much all of the toys have been packed up, but the little people have been playing with things like the empty closet. This afternoon, Miss Baby went into the closet and started banging on the wire shelves we have in there. She closed herself in; my DH went to check on her, and found her, locked in, happily whacking away. Her brother joined her, and my DH laid on the floor, resting. Miss Baby came out of the closet, lunged at her Daddy, and whacked him with her stick. Then she laughed. my DH took the stick away from her, and she kung-fu’d him instead, laughing all the while. She’s trouble, this one
No, I’m not going to write about Charlotte Perkins Gilman.
Today’s LAT included an interesting Op-Ed column by Tim Rutten; in it he discusses how, for the first time since the 1960’s, the number of women working outside the home is actually declining. He doesn’t really pursue this the way I would; I wonder why that is. Is it because women are having trouble getting work? Is it because women find that they aren’t getting paid well enough to compensate them for all those second shift issues? Is it because women are accepting their conventional roles — is this the result of too much Republicanism/fundamentalism? (My guess is somewhere with the first two; I’ll read the article he references and get back to you). He goes on to discuss Candy Spelling’s new zillion-dollar home as evidence that we are, in his words, “entering a new gilded age.” He’s right, of course. I’d thought we were revisiting the 1970’s, but the 1890’s suit us horribly well.
As we were walking Miss Baby to her caregiver’s this morning, the Little Guy asked me, “What kind of bird is that?” I looked up at the roof of the house we were passing, and saw a heron. Big old thing. It looked down its beak at us and stalked away over the roof.
We had a long conversation about what on earth it was doing in our neighborhood; it’s not particularly marshy hereabouts. the Little Guy opined that it was visiting friends. Sweetly typical.
We were at the pig races, and didn’t see you there!
The Little Guy and I went to the OC Fair today. My DH was supposed to join us when Miss Baby woke up from her nap, but she slept late, and my DH felt ill, so it was just me and the Little Guy. We rode rides, and even played a midway game — one of those games where you race against each other. We were the only two playing, so one of us won (it was me, but he seems fuzzy on that detail), which impressed the Little Guy. He hugged his prize lion all afternoon, and was nervous about its well-being on the the rollercoaster. He then wanted to play all of the midway games — we had enough points for him to play one more, and he popped the balloon with the dart and got a prize for Miss Baby. When we bought our ride wristbands, they gave us little cards with 10 points each for the midway games, otherwise we wouldn’t have been doing this. I tend to be skeptical about these things.
The Little Guy enjoyed taking my hand and leading me from place to place, mysteriously. “Where are we going?” “It’s a surprise!” he would tell me, pleased with himself. He led me from ride to ride, then, when he started to get tired, he led me to the animals. The roosters impressed him. I could see he was tired, so I suggested the pig races as an opportunity to relax, and he liked that. As we entered the pig racing arena, we were given Ralphs coupons for … BACON! A little memento mori to go with the entertainment.
The Little Guy was pleased to see that the rides were all lit up when we left the pig races; we rode the giant ferris wheel, ate funnel cake, and went to the bus stop. The walk home from the bus was amusing — there were a few other people out walking, or doing things in the yard, or riding a bike with a dog trotting alongside. We discussed how surprised we were that we weren’t the only people out at night. The Little Guy said, “I only expected to see you.” I told him, “I only expected to see you… and your lion…” I’m not lying!,” he said, indignant. I explained what I had actually said, and he was amused by his confusion. I referred to these people as “night owls,” and he replied, “There aren’t any owls!”
