Frank (Slept Here)

Ella and I are going down to Philadelphia this weekend for a cousin’s wedding. Travel always reminds me of a family tradition. My mom rarely went on trips on her own – we almost always hit the road as a family – but on those occasions when she was traveling more than 50 miles from home by herself, she would gather us kids in the living room and tell us what to do and who got what in the event she didn’t come back. This gave me terrible separation anxiety because I associated being away from my mother overnight with a strong possibility of her dying, but it did lead to discussions like this:

“So, any questions about what to do if I don’t come back?”

“Yes, can we get a dog?”

“No.”

“But you said we could get a dog over your dead body.”

“No, you won’t take care of it and I’ll have to walk it.”

“But you’ll be dead.”

“Don’t be a smartass.”

Sadly, we did not get a dog. On the bright side, my mom survived every trip. However, thanks to these pre-travel discussions I’ve never left the house for more than 48 hours without first making sure my estate was in order. Do you have any idea what a pain in the ass it is to have to write up my last will and testament every time I want to take a weekend trip?

Since I’ve got lots to do before we go, I’m just going to take this trip without consulting an attorney. Hopefully everything will be fine.

Today my office is surprisingly quiet. I assume that most people are home celebrating Presidents Day with those they love. Presidents Day was one of my favorite holidays as a kid. Each year my brother, sisters, and I would would vote on a bill banning bedtimes and my father would sign it into law. Then dad would make a speech emancipating the cats and we’d shoot our guns and pass the jug around. Or not…I sometimes confuse my childhood with the Red Skelton show.

For those of you keeping score at home, today marks two years that Ella and I have been together. After weeks of talking via phone and text message, I finally boarded an Amtrak train and headed out to New York to see her. Some people may have thought we were rushing into things, but I disagree. If I had waited any longer to come visit she may have changed her mind.

Since that day a lot has changed: I left Chicago, we moved in together, and my life is coming together in ways I could never have possibly imagined two years ago.

Any time I think back to the days before I boarded that train and then consider how my life has changed since, I always wonder what I did to feel as happy and as fortunate as I do today.

I once met a girl who didn’t wear panties. On our first few dates she made a point of telling me this and then proving her point by showing me that there was nothing behind the curtain. I spent a lot of time behind the curtain in inappropriate places. At restaurants she’d take my hand beneath the table and lead me home. Same went for movies, shopping, and even a public park.

After a couple of months of this and after we’d discussed getting “serious,” she bought a truckload of underwear and never went out without them again. I felt cheated – this is known as the ol’ bait and switch. We didn’t last.

Following up on yesterday’s Five Years Ago post I feel like I should point out a few things that have changed since that day:

1. The girl in that story and I are dating, but not each other.

2. My Windstar has since passed on to the great scrapyard in the sky.

3. I can now eat seafood without feeling disgusted.

4. My wardrobe now includes shirts I did not buy at a concert.

While I was out getting coffee this morning I realized that was the anniversary of a notable day in my life. On this day in 2007 I was in my Naperville apartment, doing homework and listening to music, probably Something Corporate. When the phone rang, my then-girlfriend’s number showed up and I swallowed hard before answering. I had been home the previous weekend and while we did the same things we usually did – namely go out to dinner and hang out at the mall – something hadn’t seemed right. She was quiet, fidgety, wouldn’t make eye contact for more than a brief second, and dragged her feet on making plans for my next trip to see her. It had been up and down for us since the fall of 2001, dating for between three and five months at a time, breaking up, seeing other people for brief periods of time, and then drifting back together in our own doctrine of mutual self-destruction.

When she awkwardly said “hey…so how are you?” I knew what was coming next. She had been seeing someone else for a while. Actually quite a while, only keeping occasional weekends open to entertain me when I hopped on an Amtrak train or drove my battered Ford Windstar back to Michigan to see her. There was of course shouting, lots of outbursts along the lines of “how could you?” on my end, passionate defenses along the lines of “you’re never here,” on her end. An hour later I was off the phone, sobbing uncontrollably on my bed. We had broken up before, but this was the first time it had involved cheating for either one of us (well, at least for me). It was over, for good this time, and I knew it. From my desk drawer I took a silver necklace that I had been planning to give to her for aValentine’s Day present, dropped it in my pocket, threw on my coat, and (despite it being a Sunday) went out in search of a drink.

So that’s the answer to the question of what I was doing five years ago. How about you?

I got my hair cut the other day. I’ve chronicled my visits to the barbershop before, and how pretty much everyone who has cut my hair has mentioned the black patch I have on the back of my head. After two plus decades of explaining that no, I did not try to dye my hair, the black patch is natural, thank you very much, you’d think I would dread going to the barber shop or at least not look forward to it. But you’d be wrong – I’ve found a way that makes getting my hair cut an amusing experience, at least for me.

You see, once you’re in the chair and you’ve got that black cape around your neck, the barber always tries to make small talk with you while they’re clipping and snipping away. This almost always consists of “so do you go to school around here?” or “what do you do for a living?”

I figure these people are strangers, they don’t really care what I do, and I’ll probably never see them again. So I just make stuff up.

“I design roller coasters,” I say. Or:

“I’m an Olympic cyclist.”

“I’m a professional skydiver.”

“I build robots. You remember that show Robot Wars? Like that. Except I build mine for the government.”

I give myself points based on how wide the barber’s eyes get when I explain my life’s work.

“No way!” they say. “How do you get a job like that!?” I try to make up as much detail as I can while still seeming believable. Bonus points are awarded if the barber calls over one of the other barbers to hear how I am working on a cure for AIDS, or how I’m looking to climb Mount Everest for the third time.

As of yet no one has asked why a best-selling Canadian author/bass player for an indie band/running shoe designer would frequent a strip mall barber shop that charges $12 for a cut, and because the turnover in these places is so high I have yet to encounter the same barber twice (provided that he/she would even recognize me three months and thousands of customers after my last cut).

After my hair has been hacked away I go up to the front counter to settle my bill.

“Thanks,” I say as the girl at the counter hands me my receipt.

“Have a nice day,” she says, “good luck in the Amazon rainforest. Let us know if you ever find that rare radioactive toad you’re looking for.”

After the transmission deteriorated to the point where I could not accelerate or brake without feeling like I was being repeatedly rear-ended, the Frank (Slept Here) Volkswagen was finally put out to pasture. I removed my dashboard robot collection, CDs, and stuff that has been sitting in the trunk since I moved out here. On Monday I drove it to a car dealership, signed some papers, wrote a big check, and drove away with a new Hyundai, quietly leaving Hans the VW behind.

Ever since I made the switch to a Hyundai I’ve walked out to the street every day expecting to see the old VW there and I get a momentary feeling of panic when it’s not. I assume this will take some getting used to. Is there such a thing as “phantom car syndrome”?

February is one of my favorite months of the year. Know why? Presidents Day, that’s why. I’ve always been big on celebrating the lesser holidays and after Bastille Day, Presidents Day was always one of my favorite holidays as a kid. It started in kind of a weird way, the year that my brother made a big deal about Presidents Day because he thought it was both George Washington and Abraham Lincoln’s birthday. Since Washington and Lincoln themselves were too dead to celebrate, my brother felt that we should eat cake in their honor. That’s not the weird part, that’s just a good way to get our mom to make us cake. In retrospect that was a genius move for a six year-old kid. I think we should all designate a historical figure’s birthday as a special kind of holiday…in addition to Jesus, I guess. Think about it – we can all get more cake and maybe a present each year and you can pick anyone you want so Ella can say to me, “Relax honey, it’s your special day…it’s Eugene V. Debs’s birthday.”

Anyway, the strange part about my brother’s idea was that he also thought that having the same birthday made Washington and Lincoln brothers; he never explained this theory and I’ve been confused by it ever since because he and I are brothers and our birthdays are not on the same day.

If I ever start a file called “Things I’ve Said That I’ll Someday Regret,” that file is sure to include the following:

1/26/12 – said to Ella:

“Last night I had a dream where Izzo died. It was way sadder than that dream I had where you died.”

That’s a dumb thing to say, even if I had a good explanation for saying it.

It’s things like that statement that make me wonder if I’m living in a sitcom. Every time something funny or improbable happens I get the feeling that I’m being watched by millions, Truman Show style. Sounds crazy, right? Well, consider these facts:

1. I’m living with a woman far more attractive than me.

2. I say and do dumb things (albeit less than I used to) and she still loves me.

3. I have wacky neighbors.

4. People sometimes laugh at me.

Of course my life isn’t a TV show but if it ever becomes one I hope that you’ll watch it. I assume a show like that would be more or less like this blog, only with talking and occasional partial nudity from one of us.