Delivering Newspapers

I've been asked to write a short story about when I was a teen and delivered newspapers on horseback. I actually lived next door to some guy in Flint who had a couple of horses I would take care of and exercise. There was one horse who wouldn't spook if you lobbed newspapers from its back. I'd even ride him into underground condo parking lots and leave him unattended as I dropped off my papers.

Kids can't get a paper route anymore. Not to say kids can't still deliver papers, it's just that now their mom or dad usually owns the route. And they all have to deliver newspapers via car, not bike with a newspaper bag strung across the handle bars or, in my case, a couple of bags overfilled with folded papers and stuffed into sacks that hang from a horse saddle.

Tell me the last time you saw some kid mowing lawns or delivering papers. I don't mean to disparage a hard-working contractor — I'm just saying, I really miss the opportunity to see a new generation of neighborhood kids who get an opportunity to own something. Kids have fewer opportunities to get a decent paying job before they're 15.

And where do these kids learn how to throw items in the air sideways and still hit the mark? When I was a delivery girl, I had about 70 opportunities to feel good about something as simple as that. Conversely, kids don't know how it feels to smack the window of someone's door and wince as you hope it doesn't shatter.

Nowadays, if you're up early enough, you'll hear somebody's car pull up, the brakes will be squeaking and a soft thump follows if the newspaper hits your porch, which it rarely does. And that's my point! Paper routes are delivered by people who get a stipend for gas and don't even live in the neighborhood half the time. Even the yearly service form from my carrier is mailed to me. I yearn to see some earnest, sweaty little kid knock on the door instead, asking me to pay my monthly subscription. I'd give that kid a tip. I still tip, but it's not the same.

And lastly, where are kids going to get those first jobs that show them how to manage in a diverse world where people think differently and expect different levels of attention? For instance,
"Mr. Jones likes his paper in the door jam so it won't get wet if it rains."
"Ms. Garza wants her paper in a rubber band, but her neighbor, Mrs. Smith, just wants the paper to hit the porch."

The fact is, some people are really cool and a pleasure to work for. They get the best from you regardless if they tip well. And some people are dicks and they want everything perfect, but they tip really well so you learn to just pick battles. A paper route was a safe place to learn these simple concepts, without working at some fast food joint.

Leeches

My son is scared of leeches. He's also pretty nervous about ebola. That whole bleeding-out-of-your-eye thing, kind of freaks him out. I can understand this. It is abnormal to bleed out of your eye. It would also mess up a person's makeup. For this reason alone I told him I would no longer wear makeup. Making fun of my son's fears to lighten his concerns usually works if it's done with good intent. This is called distraction in the world of children. And sometimes distraction works with adults, too.

The members of our church recently found out that our rector is retiring (the main priest in laymen's terms). During our first visit to St. Stephen's 10 years ago, Patricia was giving her inaugural sermon. I loved her immediately and Michael was impressed. He would have the most reservations as he grew up in a fairly conservative background including stints as an alterboy and regular church attendance. We both decided after visiting that day that we had found out church.

As a child, I didn't belong to a church. My parents said I could decide if I wanted to go to church when I was older. However, I would attend church whenever my grandparents had me for the weekend. It seemed so mysterious to me then and I now recognize this was just ignorance around the traditions of the catholic church. But I learned to appreciate these traditions whenever my grandpa and grandma brought us along. They would guide us when to stand and kneel. "And also with you" was a phrase I learned to confidently roll of my tongue. My sister and I knew THAT phrase. Another tradition my grandma had, upon entering and exiting the church, was to dunk both my sister and me until we were soggy with holy water. My grandma was saving us. It was a little church in Swartz Creek Michigan. She was worried we wouldn't go to heaven.

When I was 11, our uncle Dick asked for a divorce from our favorite aunt. He had fallen in love with someone else. What could she do? Her heart was broken but she allowed the divorce and at that time, it had to be someone's fault in the courts. In the courts, uncle Dick was to blame. But at the church, my aunt was excommunicated. She was to blame. Now it seemed, no one was safe. Luckily, my grandma had died the year before so at the most she could have been my aunt's angel. You could not distract my aunt from her hurt.

And now our rector is leaving and we have called another woman to become our interim rector. We voted to have her come on board in our vestry meeting this last week. Time after time we heard from people on the search committee and the people who were lucky enough to meet her in person. They all raved about her. She's dynamic and smart, loving and kind. She delivers an amazing sermon. And she is in a committed relationship with another woman.

There was one dissenting voice. One person voted against her. In this day and age one man could not move beyond the strict gates of tradition. He has since notified us that he is leaving the vestry. And I don't know if anyone has reached out to him to talk. I find it hard to reach out to him myself with his red, angry face. But I think he could use a little distraction. Maybe, we could show him where and how history has moved forward if only he weren't still living back there.

There are always more than two sides to each story.

My sister sent me a jpeg of a painting recently completed for her client with a story I promptly forgot. Most of our conversations are spent outdoing each other — silliness and weird voices, funster stuff and imitations. Then you can't really remember details because it all blends together like jambalaya, and that it was pretty filling even though you can't recall one thing in particular.

All I remembered was that there was an older woman who cried when she saw the portrait. And that an older photograph served as a model for this piece. And that my sister tried to hurry the air drying with a hair dryer. Which you cannot do with oils, but she still tried. And something about the paint developing a yellow cast — or maybe it was the addition of a quick-dry coating that made the paint yellow, which is bad. And that my sister spent hours the day before retouching the yellowed painting to prep it for the presentation, the next day. And maybe that's what I heard, that the woman would cry if the painting wasn't done.

But here's what my sister sent to me when I asked her to retell the story:

"Here's the painting of the family I told you about. The girl in the center just turned 16 and her parents took her out on the town to teach her how to smoke and drink. They weren't aware she was pregnant and she didn't know they were filing for bankruptcy!

Just kidding, they were a happy family for a long time.

My friend will present her mother (girl in the center) with the portrait for Christmas."

Then she signs it "love, oil on canvas 11x14'"

Clock

It's a later night for me. I was just going over the day's events:

1) rode the bike to work and missed my daily team meeting. Again.
2) involved in new project that the designer and I don't really understand. It's due tomorrow.
3) and involved in new messaging project that involves charts that I don't really understand. It's due tomorrow.
4) got voice mail from Mikey. Our 11-year-old son was mugged walking home from school. He's OK. My son that is. Mikey, on the other hand, is quite upset.
5) left work early to get home. Ran to bus feeling all passive aggressive about inconvenience of f----ing mass transit. Left bike at work.
6) while I walked, made phone calls for volunteer projects I cannot say no to. Upon completing calls, walked 5 blocks muttering, "no ... no ... no ... no ... no ..."
7) met Ranger Rick in our dining room as he filled out police report for our son.
8) checked in with daughter as she worked on a project she doesn't really understand. It's due tomorrow.
9) sent Mikey and kids to district jazz concert as I went to rehearsal.
10) Mikey relayed story of how our daughter's good friend, and vocalist of band, displayed symptoms of narcolepsy on stage. Word is, she had had an accident in gym class earlier this week and suffered a concussion. During concert, she stopped singing mid-song and just stood there with her head down. Director simply walked her to the piano bench to sit down, finished the song, then announced concert was over and called 911.
11) it was quiet, and then Mikey asked our daughter if she knew the songs.

Life is stranger than fiction.

I'm in

Here's my question: Can you be a writer and an editor, or do you have to choose one and just pretend to be the other? Props to anyone who can juggle the two. I find I have to physically get up and out of my seat, walk around and come back to the desk before I switch gears.
So here's a writing challenge for King County folks: It's the last day of February and I'm psyched about submitting a poem to the Poetry on the Bus competition. Here's the link. http://transit.metrokc.gov/prog/poetry/poetry.html

Write and share your work with me.