Judith Pettersen

 I turned 61 this year and the symptoms are settling in nicely. For example. A few weeks ago I twisted my knee. It didn’t happen during Zumba, where we contort ourselves into every possible position while moving to a Salsa beat. It happened, sadly, and with a hint of cliché, while I was weeding the garden.

My inner self, the real me, has immense energy and a sunny outlook. But my body insists on remembering every dumb move it ever made. Every klutzy moment and resulting injury insists on making a fuss long after it should be over. Ahem, they say, fighting for the turn to speak. Remember me? Like two years ago when I jumped off the garden wall and told Clarence to catch me. My back was out for three weeks. His fared slightly better. And remember when sun screen wasn’t invented yet and fair skinned people got sunburned so badly our skin looked like a futuristic dystopian plague?

My body has imposed martial rule over my dietary choices. No bread. No sugar. 85% chocolate for a treat. Lots of salads and healthy fruits and vegetables and not a lot of beef. Hardly any junk food, unless you count a few rice crackers every now and then. Because I get hives if I break curfew. And anemia. What, you may be wondering, is my payment for all this good behavior? Twelve pounds. A twelve pound gain in one year. But no hives, and I feel healthy, so. Sigh.

It’s annoying how my outer self refuses to match the inner me. My dad warned me about this. “One day,” he said, “you’ll wake up, look in the mirror and wonder who that stranger is.” I’m not quite there, but when I get out of bed in the morning and walk like I have no joints in my legs, I understand a little of what he meant. On the other hand, if I was born in the early 1900’s, I’d have been dead ten years ago.

So. I will continue to count my blessings every day. I will remember that my mother lived large until the very end. She wasn’t one to dwell on aches and pains. She didn’t remember much about menopause. We didn’t worry about that, she said, and couldn’t understand all the fuss about childbirth, either. Women of her generation just got on with it. That included grieving. I should have paid better attention when she lost her parents.

I will remember the summer of 61 for many reasons. For the day I buried my last parent. For coming to terms with my own mortality. And of course, for the army worms marching through our small town. But that’s a complaint for another day.

I’m in a funk. It’s a beautiful day, but there’s a fire somewhere and the smoke is burning my throat. So I put away my garden tools and check to see if the coast is clear. Then I slink into the house, turn on the TV and let Netflix load.

Binge watching TV has replaced afternoon drinking as the way to avoid the boring things in life, like chores. I’m a serious reader with an obligation to my local library, but Don Draper keeps calling my name. His slicked back hair, immobile face and no nonsense tone compel me to drop what I’m doing and tune in. Especially when he says, “Betty, its going to be fine.” I know, Don. And thanks for the reassurance.

We have a complicated relationship, he and I. For one thing, I can’t trust him. These Mad Men and their lying ways. They spend their days making up stories about products, and their nights lying to their wives. “Just off to meet a client, honey.” Sure thing, Don. Roger. Pete. All you lusty, smoking, hard drinking men with your pressed shirts and suave ways.

Supposedly the series is a comedy. Well, I’m not laughing. Neither is Don’s wife, Betty. In fact, I think she only smiled twice during the first three seasons. The show was produced by AMC, who also made Breaking Bad and the Walking Dead. Of the three series, this one is the darkest. Sure, Jessie is chained in the basement cooking meth in the first. Zombies are trying to kill off the remaining humans in the second. But still.

Misogyny. People who smoke and drink day and night. (My chest gets tight just from watching.) Men who lie without turning a hair on their brylcreemed heads. Women named Sweetheart and Dear who choose to believe them. Characters so complicated, no therapist can ever sort through the dark closets of their psyches.

Remember this. If you’re going to binge watch Netflix shows, make sure you have a plausible story lined up. Grab a dust cloth. Take out the vacuum cleaner. And be careful. Once you fall down that rabbit hole, its very hard to find your way out again. To help kick the Netflix habit, find a supportive group. Once you’ve shared your concerns and confessed your darkest fears, there just might be time left over for to turn on Netflix and find a new series.

I was seventeen the first time I drove uptown in my mother’s car. It was old. A nineteen sixty-four mint green Rambler with standard steering and brakes. At five foot two and a hundred pounds, I had to throw my whole body against the wheel just to turn the corner. When I got uptown, I remember wondering, “What the hell were they thinking, letting me take the car?” Driving that thing was the equivalent of a chipmunk trying to steer a Tyrannosaurus Rex. “Go that way, dammit,’ I’d squeak. Sometimes the car would obey.

My friends and I spent hours in it listening to the radio. When you share the house with six other kids and two parents, you have to be creative in finding your space. My dad would holler through the garage window, “You’re running down the battery!” Sometimes I listened. Sometimes I ran down the battery.

Like all cars built then, it was extremely spacious. On family vacations, Linda would sit up front with mom and dad. Joni would lie in the back window. Bill would sit on the floor on some kind of board system, while the rest of us shared the back seat. Any fighting that took place was purely recreational.

My first incident with the Rambler happened on the way to Denare Beach. I was stopped by the RCMP for a reason I can’t remember. Probably because I look about ten years old. My friends in the back, each holding a case of beer, wore expressions of such innocence, they might have been preparing for their First Communion.

Meanwhile, I had to follow the cop back to his car for questioning. In the next minute, like a slowed down insurance advertisement on what not to do, the Rambler rolled backward and hit the patrol car. It was a gentle roll. I didn’t get charged with anything, just told to fix my parking brake. “My mother’s parking brake, you mean.” I was quick to grant her ownership of the car when it was convenient for me.

For the next incident, my grade twelve biology class was on a field trip on the North Star road. After wading through weeds looking for God knows what, we were driving back to class when the Rambler left the road, almost of its own accord. The roll downhill seemed to happen in slow motion.

There were no seatbelts, so there was a lot of head bumping before we finally stopped. After a brief moment of hysteria, we found a ride into town. With whom, I can’t recall. All I remember is arriving home and seeing my mother’s face. Hearing the sound of her voice. “My beautiful car! Oh My God! My Rambler! I mean, I’m glad you’re all right but…My Car!”

 Mud along the shoulder of the road was blamed. But if I hadn’t slammed on the brake, it wouldn’t have happened. We were all fine, except for the Rambler. In spite of its tank like qualities, it was no match for a rocky hillside. Mom, I’m still sorry. The upside is, I became a cautious driver. 

I always swore that if I struck it rich, I’d buy my mother a brand new car to make up for the loss. It never happened. So, God, its up to you. Give her something for racing around heaven. She was an excellent driver and a very good person. And when we meet again, I’ll probably want to borrow her new car. I think she’ll say yes.

Once, there was a man in a chair beside a fake fireplace in the Saskatoon airport. He was reading a book. Not a magazine. A big book, and not a Dan Brown novel either, because I checked. His feet were up on an Ottoman, and he was completely immersed in the story.  I watched him for a while, in a non creepy way, and longed to congratulate him for being the sexiest man in the airport.

I have certain requirements that must be filled before a man enters the sexy category. Someone with a big truck, super size tires and no muffler? Not sexy.  A guy with a big truck, a muffler and regular tires who also helps his friends move their stuff? Very sexy. People underrate helpfulness. I find it extremely compelling.

Guys who do stuff for their families and friends definitely up their hotness quotient. Clarence was just home working in our yard and I had to use the garden hose just to cool down. Seriously. So. Reading publicly. Being helpful and kind. And funny. Funny works for me. These are sexy behaviors. But this next one tops them all. Men who Sing.

Now, its become obvious to me that Clarence is not in this category. However, in my defense, he had me convinced that he could. He dazzled me with his funny, charming, sneakily helpful ways. So every single time he opened his mouth, I could hear the back up music to a great song. It wasn’t until we’d been married a few years and I heard him howling in the shower that I realized I’d been duped. However, he is saved by the helpful thing, the reading thing and the funny thing. Whew!

But back to men who sing. I don’t know why they don’t take advantage of their talent. I sat beside a guy on the plane last week who pulled out a Velcro wallet to pay for his drink. I had to turn my face away. However, if he’d started serenading the stewardess, it would have cancelled the dorkiness of being a grown man with a Velcro wallet. This talent opens many doors and possibly more than that, if used correctly. Justin Timberlake figured this out as a child. And look where he is.  He brought sexy back. And, with the right props and attitude, so can you.

I was driving down the street a number of years ago when Meatloaf’s song, ‘I would do Anything for Love, (but I won’t do that),’ came on the radio. I’d never heard it before. I pulled the car over, growing increasingly irritated that I couldn’t figure out exactly what ‘that’ was. Sex? Lying? Cross dressing? I’m still not sure. It troubles me.

At times, I feel like a foreigner in my own country. The most familiar city becomes strange once I’m trying to drive through it. I need a guide. Possibly, an interpreter. Someone kind, who thinks its all right to misunderstand situations or words. For example. When I was a little kid, I thought being fired from a job meant being tied to a gasoline soaked chair while a hooded man hovered nearby with a lit match. I begged my parents to always be on time for work. Just in case.

 Next, I wondered why the local theater kept repeating the movie, “DOUBLE BILL. “It’s in town at least once a month,” I said, shaking my head at the craziness of it all. My dad’s name was Bill. So was my brother’s. Hmmm. It took a friend’s kind explanation for me to understand they meant ‘Double Feature.’ Well, why not say that?

When hearing about a local spin class. (sadly, I was already an adult) I wondered how there could possibly be room for everyone. And what music does one choose for spinning? Does the class glide through the room, their arms spread in a whirling dervish bliss out? Is it ballet style dancing, or does it have more of a Woodstock feel?

Wrong again. There is no spinning. Just stationary bikes ridden like…stationary bikes. Well, then why don’t they just say that. Why don’t they call a spade a spade, instead of asking us foreigners to learn the language. We can’t. We’ve tried. It just doesn’t take.

Go ahead, world. Be like Meatloaf, enigmatic and opaque. Have your inside jokes that more literal people like me never get. Sure, I’ll be puzzled. Occasionally, I’ll become lost. But I won’t feel sad. Like Meatloaf says, two outta three ain’t bad.

Passion. Faith. Greed. Love. I sit in the Channing auditorium with my alto sisters, mentally echoing Jean Val Jean’s shout out to the universe. Who Am I? And why is my memory so dismal? I ignore the larger questions, of course. The ones the characters ponder during this three hour musical extravaganza.

Though, like them, I wonder where it all went wrong. Not with the musical, or our amazing cast who has the choir weeping every night. (At the end of the day, we are out of Kleenex and unable to breath from our noses.) No, the question for me is, why can’t I remember words better?

For example, instead of ‘chaperone,’ I’ve been singing ‘Chapter One.’ My alto sister to my right finally convinced me of the truth, but it is hard to change mid stream. Not for our cast members, of course, who remember all their words plus an incredible number of notes about their acting, (turn your head to the right, not the left, and drop your chin as you exit the stage.) Seriously, they should all receive a Tony and an honorary membership in Mensa.

It eats me up, the contrast between our on stage cast and myself. At one point, (Crystal will fire me for sure) I shouted out, “Send the slut away!” instead of ‘Sack the girl today!” Fortunately, it was during the dress rehearsal. The choir has received notes on diction, and I must shoulder a lot of the blame.

That’s the lovely thing about three performances. There are more chances to get things right. While Javert or Cosette stress about whether they’ve raised their hands at the right time, I’m praying I don’t sing out at the wrong moment. Which happens in choir. We call it ‘pulling a Timmy.’

Now that I’ve thrown another choir member under the bus, I feel a lot better.  I’ll prepare for tonight’s show with a lighter heart. Don my peasant garb, fill my water bottle and hold on to that last tiny cheat sheet. After all, I’m still in the dark about certain things. The answers to life’s big questions. The right words to this musical. I need all the help I can get.

When I was a kid, I thought about candy every day. If I found a dime in the street or collected a few empty pop bottles, I’d head to Johnny’s and peruse the merchandise. I knew what I liked. A crispy crunch bar. A small paper bag of mixed up penny candy. An orange crush soda, or a bag of chips. When you’re a kid, candy is your soul mate. Which is why I’m puzzled by some of those childhood choices.

Like, wax lips.  Made from actual wax with some kind of gross liquid inside. Probably the kind of dye that steals your fertility or gives you cancer. But anyway. Once you’d punctured the lips and drank the miniscule amount of mystery juice, all that was left was to chew the lips. Or put them on top of your own. Which I always did. And then chewed the wax and spit it out, because you couldn’t actually eat it.

Lickimade. I’m not sure if this is the right spelling, but it was basically kool aid in a small envelope that you slit open and ate. Dry powder with fake flavor and sugar. I hope it was cheap, and only cost a penny. I hate to think I spent a dime on it.

Macintosh Toffee, uncut, in the box. I’m fairly sure it was meant for baking, but every now and then I’d buy some. With the first bite, my jaw would lock and it would take me about four hours to finish.

Pink elephant popcorn. Not the real name, but I remember a white box with pink popcorn that tasted a thousand years old. It belonged in an Egyptian tomb, scattered around the remains of a pharaoh.

Candy necklaces. Small, hard rings of candy, fake tasting and strung together on a piece of elastic. You could wear it, or you could eat it. But you couldn’t do both. Because it got sticky and then it felt terrible on your neck.

Why the bad candy choices? I don’t know. I like to think that somebody else bought them and I just partook. There’s more strange candy on the list…things I’ve forgotten about. So please. Add your own. Take a walk down candy lane and ask yourself the following question. “What the hell was I thinking?”

This is not an homage to the movie, which I refer to as the poor man’s Breaking Bad. I know about the great reviews and still don’t care. Since I’ve grown up, it just makes me recoil. I’m not sure if its the misogyny or the bad acting. But the soundtrack? One of the best ever made.

There is a time and a place for everything. The time for the song, Born to be Wild, is during a car dance. What is that, you might be wondering. Please, let me tell you. When you live in the far north, as I do, road trips take forever. Hours of long, barren highway leave one with nothing to do but listen and dream. So. Select the music of your choice, and begin moving the muscles in your bum as well as your actual shoulders. Its a matter of multi tasking, really. You still have two hands on the wheel and a foot ready for the brake, but everything else is keeping time with the beat.

Do this alone. For some reason, its off putting to passengers. Ever since I dropped a pistachio while driving, I have to sit like the sphinx when I’m with Clarence and behind the wheel. Also, its just too embarrassing. Because what’s the point if you don’t get into it? Singing along is optional, but after a few minutes of movement, you won’t be able to resist.

Besides helping pass the time and avoiding numb bum, something really wonderful happens during a good car dance. All the forces of the universe come together and make me feel as if I’ve just:
a: won the lottery
b: found a cure for cancer
c. am discovered by Simon Cowell, who can’t stop raving about my wonderful voice.

It can be anything really. And the benefits are many. A good car dance has the same effect on me as meditation, yoga, or running. (Not that I over indulge in any of those.) I get a mind/body high that tells me anything is possible. There is one perfect, synchronized moment when I am born to be wild. I am free. I’m an easy rider. I can do anything I set my mind to. Anything! Which is a wonderful way to feel on an eight hour road trip.

To recap, here are the other benefits.

1. Pass the time. (it flies by!)
2. Save your butt (avoid sciatic nerve damage!)
3. Rev your creative engine. (write that novel! compose that song! knit! (but not in the car))
4. Find happiness. (yes, its this easy.)

Please enjoy your next long distance car ride by employing my suggested technique. And you’re very welcome.

Life can be a little crazy. Sometimes a person needs to let off a little steam. Since drinking hurts my pancreas and chocolate keeps me up all night, I need to find other solutions. Like laughing. Being overcome with hysterical giggles makes me feel like a little kid. Maybe its the way it takes over my breathing. Laughter takes firm charge, lightening my load and leaving some perspective in its wake.

Crying works, too. There are times when all I want to do is cry. Like the other night. I’d gone to the car to look for my purse and, Oh! Northern lights of ethereal greens and pinks danced across the sky, jumping up and down like they’d just heard the best news ever. I didn’t lose it right away. I was too busy watching. But it was so damn beautiful.

It was an otherworldly sight, a glimpse of heaven through a window in the universe.  I wept like I always do when confronted with that kind of beauty.  I tend to apologize when I cry around other people. So that night was lovely, standing alone under the star studded sky and sobbing as the lights swept over them like so much fairy dust. 

Tears are big multi-taskers. They allow us to vent so we don’t blow ourselves up. Because life, in all its splendor and misery, can chip away at us. It leaves us wondering where the best version of us went. Self pity sidles in, wringing its hands. But we wait, and wisdom edges it right out the door. Especially if we put our inner critic away. Then, we have room to breath. To be kinder to others and ourselves. There you are! we say, and welcome our real selves home.

There is a time for everything. A time to buck up, and a time to break down. To acknowledge that you’re having a hard time. Don’t try to shop your feelings away, or drown them with behavior that leaves you feeling worse. Acknowledge your sadness and bewilderment over life’s crazy moments. Because sometimes you have to break before you feel better. As Leonard Cohen sings, “There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.”

 I’ve learned a lot since I started this blog, some of it related to writing. This entry is dedicated to my work station. For the last two years, I’ve been walking on a treadmill while performing a multitude of writing related tasks. Using a table leaf that rests on the handles, I set the track speed for two miles per hour. This allows me to work two keyboards and drink a cup of tea while listening to the radio. The latter is only utilized when I’m not engaged in creative writing. Like now. This is a mere recounting of the facts.

I bought a treadmill for one simple, unfitness related reason. I can’t sit still. It’s  physically uncomfortable and kind of boring. The A.D.D. part of my brain adores my new routine. All that leaping onto and off the moving treadmill throughout the day. It’s beeping callback when I take a bathroom break or prepare to leave the house. It’s a stern task master, my treadmill.  It’s constantly teaching me things. Like today.

Today, I took multitasking to a whole new level. I was writing to literary agents, my laptop front and center on the table board, a guidebook to the right, cup of tea to the left. I was also practicing my part for our choir’s musical, ‘Les Miserables.’ I say ‘my part,’ grandly, though for me it means dressing in peasant garb, sitting offside, and trying not get so caught up in the action that I forget to sing. It’s harder than you think. My jaw slackens and the tears fall every time Johnny Bettger sings Jean Val Jean’s lines.

Anyway, adding one more piece to the mix, I rested my choir book on the window ledge to my immediate right. It worked fine until the  moment I closed my eyes, clasped my hands to my chest and started singing Johnny’s part. I was, in fact, praying for someone in my family, and setting my plea to music, just like Jean val Jean. Alas. Praying in that manner does not work on a treadmill. Maybe if I hadn’t closed my eyes. Or was able to hold on to the handles.

In a half second, the track threw me backward and held me fast against the wall. I didn’t have enough room to completely fall off, so my feet continued skidding against the tread while my whole body vibrated in protest. I stopped singing immediately, my ‘God on High’ song ending in a screech. Somehow I managed to climb off, still uttering the words, ‘Dear Jesus,’ but in a more emphatic, self serving way. The good news is, I raised my heart rate, which is always a bonus.

I will continue writing on my treadmill. I will still sing, or listen to the radio. I will pray, from time to time. But I will not do all three simultaneously. And I will never close my eyes again while walking. See? A life lesson safely tucked under the belt, and me still on top, going strong.