Crazy Crap Item #204: The part where I attempt an essay on a seemingly arbitrary topic

So, today is Thanksgiving. And I suppose I should compose some paean to the day--thanks for our many blessings, mullings over the sacrifice of the pilgrims who founded our great nation, panegyrics on founding fathers and fruited plains.

But instead, I feel like writing about a topic that just keeps popping up in my life over the last few weeks. And if it doesn't initially seem like it's a topic relevant on a day of national thanksgiving--of celebrating the plenty in our lives, the traditions we share, the communities that bring us together--then stick around. You might just be surprised.

The topic is hair. Specifically, black hair. Now, of course, I have black hair (see profile photo), but that's not what I mean. I'm instead referring to what we used to call "African American hair." Someone told me recently that "African American" is over, and now it's all about "black," but I may be confused on that point. So for the sake of this exercise, I will stick to the term "black hair" to refer specifically to hair on the heads of black people--those of African American descent. I just can't see typing "African American" over and over and over on a holiday.

But to resume my theme: I'm embarrassed to admit that it wasn't until I was well into my 20s--teetering, in fact, into my 30s--that the idea that black hair was significantly and fundamentally different than white hair entered my consciousness. It's not that I hail from some snooty, all-white suburb. San Gabriel, Ca., my home town, was integration-central, but in our neck of the woods, the idea of "race" entailed the almighty triad: white/Latino/Asian. And I think, in terms of demographics, the Latinos were winning. There was a small handful of black kids in our school; few enough that, paradoxically, the fact of their blackness was incidental. So my exposure to black America was slight, at best.

So fast forward to--gulp--graduate school. One afternoon, I stop by the apartment of my friend Nicole. We had plans later that day, and since I was killing time, she told me just to stop on by. When I arrived, she had some mysterious cream smeared along the roots of her hair. She said, "Sorry, you caught me in the middle of an African American hair ritual."

This is the embarrassing part: It had never before entered my mind that Nicole straightened her hair. That OF COURSE she straightened her hair. That her hair, which always was so carefully coiffed, didn't just grow out of her scalp that way.

Now, this realization was strange and embarrassing because, although I did not grow up in a neighborhood replete with black kids, I had somehow picked up the knowledge that black people generally have curly, kinky hair. That cropped close, it makes tight little curls. That grown long and picked out, it makes wild, wonderful Afros that I've always secretly coveted. In fact, as a child, I purchased at a local flea market a little fashion doll that was black, and I always loved her tight little 'fro. I used to pat it lovingly after dressing her up for a night on the town. So, clearly, I had lurking in my brain a basic knowledge of black hair and its characteristics.

So it was with great mortification that I realized not just how remarkably ignorant I was--but how unable to see what was right in front of me. And trust me, that's an unsettling realization.

Fast forward about six years. I'm out of graduate school. I'm part of the work force, taking the Red line downtown everyday to work. During my commute, sometimes I'd read, sometimes I'd gaze out the window. But sometimes, I'd just stare at the heads in front of me. And since Chicago--though still shockingly segregated--holds a healthy mix of black and white, often the heads I found myself staring at were black.

It was at this moment that little kernel of realization planted by Nicole and her hair-straightening ritual took root. I started to notice--really notice--the remarkable variety in black women's hair and how they had dressed it. I became aware of the many options they were choosing from--straightened, au natural, extensions, colorings. And wigs! Why had I never noticed how many black women were wearing wigs?

Next, I began to reckon with the sheer amount of effort that went into these creations. The straightening alone, I knew, must be time-consuming, annoying, and must be done with steady regularity. But then there were pasted-down curls and squiggles of hair, arrangements of braids, careful interweavings of hair, natural and synthetic.

Dear God, I thought. How much time must that take? Hair-wise, I've always been pretty darn close to au natural. There was a spiral perm in the late '80s, but that was never repeated. My entire first year of graduate school, I stopped getting my hair cut at all, just to see what would happen. Turns out, it got really long.

My main point is, besides washing, cutting, blowdrying, and a very infrequent spritz of hairspray (for special occasions), I don't really spend a heck of a lot of time on my hair. And I resent the small amount of time its maintenance does require.

As I pondered the hair of my train-mates, I began to appreciate that, given how little inclined I am to dress and attend to my hair, I'm lucky I've got white-girl hair. It's straight. It's durable. It grows ridiculously fast, and it can be easily coaxed into just about any style. Or it can be pulled back in a ponytail and ignored.

So I mused on this fact, and decided I needed to learn more. Pushing aside all apprehensions about being one of those annoying liberal white folk who want to appreciate the "black experience" as a way to show how enlightened they are, I gingerly instant-messaged Nicole. My message was something along the lines of: "So, this black hair thing, it takes a lot of work. What's up with that?" But, I hope, with more grace, tact, and clarity.

Nicole, being a patient and amiable soul, helpfully enlightened me. She opened my eyes to the world of black hair maintenance. The regular visits to the neighborhood salon that take up the entirety of one's Saturday. The painful process of cornrow braiding. The ongoing, never-ending toil to keep one's hair up to code. (Believe it or not, I still have the transcript of the conversation saved in a Word file. It was that significant to me.)

But she also gave me a glimpse into the culture of the black hair--that when she used the phrase "African American hair ritual" so many years before, she wasn't being glib. She was referring--tip-of-the-iceberg style--to a rich, complex node of community life and culture. She told me how the local salon or barbershop was a neighborhood institution. One spends so much time there, one can't help but make it a center of shared culture.

Her account put me in mind of a salon that Eamon and I used to pass when we lived in Rogers Park that advertised "Styling, Weaves, Braiding, Neighborhood Folklore." We'd always loved that sign; now I felt I actually, in some way, understood more fully its significance.

So, I decided, I wanted to learn more. Mind you, this was before the outbreak of Barbershop, Salon, and Hair Show movies. This was before Tyra compassionately explained to a white girl contestant on America's Next Top Model that, yes, extensions hurt like the bejesus, and you have to pat them so you don't scratch your scalp and cause more problems down the line. So really, I was ahead of the white-folk curve, I like to think.

Naive and presumptuous as I was, I thought maybe I'd try to write an article about this phenomenon. I did a little research to see what else was written on the topic, and ran across an exhaustive book about the history of black hair. I was so blown away by the book that, paradoxically, I have kept no notes from it, not even its title. Googling like a fiend just now, I suspect it was Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America, by Ayana Byrd and Lori Tharps.

How, you may wonder, could I have failed to keep note of the book title--especially considering I kept an entire transcript of my IM conversation with Nicole on the same topic? The truth is, as I read the book, I could not escape the dawning realization that any role I'd try to play in recording or reporting on this cultural phenomenon was pretty suspect. Who was I? The great white translator of black experience? Did I think black writers couldn't sufficiently describe, analyze and celebrate this tradition on their own? And who was my audience? Clearly, black folk already know about this stuff. So I'm just talking to a non-black audience, which once again raised this spectre of the great white translator. Ick.

So while I pored over the book, intrigued by its scrupulous tracing of the history of black hair culture, stemming back from its African roots, through centuries in America, and up to today, I realized this was a conversation I needed to enjoy as audience, and keep my big, blabby mouth out of. As a result, I took no notes. Not even the title. Dang.

But the topic has stuck in my head. And in the last few weeks, it just keeps coming up. A friend of mine who is a teacher in the public school system was recently bemoaning the fact that she only just learned about the need to "pat" new cornrows to lessen the pain till they loosen up (revealing, in her mind, her ignorance about her students' experience). I've mulled over accounts I've read of cross-racial adoption--in which white parents must educate themselves in hair maintenance for their child, and how hard it is to cross that cultural line.

And then last night, Nicole posted as her status on Facebook the following: "Nicole is looking forward to the meeting of the White House and the hot comb."

As I drowsed into consciousness this morning, all these notions stewed in my brain, and I began to ponder the paradox at the heart of black hair culture. As was explained in that wonderful book I read, black hair culture grew out of the need to try to conform blackness to whiteness--to force kinky hair into straight silky locks--as a way, if not to gain the power of the dominant race, at least to align oneself with it aesthetically. At best, it was a means to get a toehold into that power. But at the least, it was a way to avoid calling attention to one's "difference"--a difference that could, as history all too clearly attests--be deadly.

But there's more to the story. This drive to conform, of course, starts as a sort of imposition from without. But soon enough, it's internalized. Black culture forms its own rules about how one manages one's "difference" via hair. There develop standards within the culture itself for the proper upkeep of one's hair--standards the dominant culture (white America) hasn't a clue about. It becomes self-policing.

And if that sounds grim and disappointing, there's actually a flipside to consider--one that's far more encouraging and even inspiring. In creating these internal standards, black America creates its own law, its own identity.

This can lead to concrete power. As recounted in the regrettably untitled book I consulted, the development of black hair culture both drove and was fed by the rise of black-owned businesses that served a black market, a chief example being Madame C. J. Walker, a pioneering entrepreneur in the field of beauty products designed especially for black women.

So some blacks gained real power--financial, political--from the industry that arose around black hair care. But hand-in-hand with this--and probably with more impact on the lives of everyday blacks--the culture of how one cares for one's hair provided a powerful community-building force: the neighborhood barbershop and/or salon. As Nicole had recounted to me so many years ago, the trip to the salon was like a weekly hajj to Mecca, and that many women travel miles to return to their childhood salons after they've moved out of the neighborhood. And where salons weren't plentiful, an aunt's house or Grandma's kitchen could fulfill the same purpose.

Mulling over this, I think back to my own childhood. I had a close, loving family. I was briefly a Girl Scout. (Hated it.) I was a member of several choirs. My family went to church. But I can't say I had a "community." If anything, I'd say my experience was "anti-community." We belonged to one parish, but another church was closer, so we went there. We weren't "joiners." I never felt a love for my Alma Mater. I've yet to go to a football game at the two universities I've attended, and can't even imagine going to an alumni event. Hell, I didn't even attend any of my three college graduations (undergrad, masters, doctorate).

Only now, as an adult, do I grasp what it means to be in a "community." I live on a fantastic block. As I've often recorded, whenever possible, we gather at the benches in front of Ruth's house and while away the hours sharing recipes and gossip. We keep an eye out for each other, and lend cups of sugar.

It's in experiencing this sense of "community"--and how it's formed by some accident of habit or behavior or geography--that I feel like I begin to experience something like the black hair thing. Here on 1500 Norwood, "community" has formed around the ritual of the sitting on the benches in front of Ruth's house and the fact that 6-year-old boys need to spend at least 3 hours a day simply running around and shooting fake guns at each other. For black communities, it's the fact that every week, you must spend hours tending to your hair.

I have no doubt that black hair experience has caused psychic scars for many--the push to conform, the belief that one must alter one's appearance to be acceptable. But I know that it's also provided strength and cohesiveness, a sense of shared experience that has empowered millions. I have no doubt that the civil rights movement found its impetus in the barbershop chair or while a small child wept from the sting of chemical straightener on her poor, red scalp.

And that's the weird, rich paradox of America and of human nature. Don't think any phenomenon will have a single, predictable outcome. Oppression become conformity becomes solidarity becomes a dream of power.

And then, suddenly, you've got hot combs in the White House. Amen.

Crazy Crap Item #203: The part where I prove to be a girl of small ambitions

Lately, I've noticed a strange trend in my dreams. No, not the unearthly appearance of spirit visitors that lately garnered such attention.

Rather, I've discovered an uncanny ability to realize I'm dreaming while in the midst of my dreams, and to react to the situations around me armed with this knowledge. I chalk it up to the fact that I've taken to the habit of arising at a normal hour, then rolling back over for an extra hour or so of sleep. These strangely reasonable dreams tend to occur just before I arise for good.

Here's an example: I recently had a dream that I was on a business trip (clearly a sign I'm dreaming), and was taking a work-out in the hotel gym. As I step on to the exercise equipment, I notice I am wearing my very costly silver watch. So I remove it and fling it to the ground. I hop on to exercise, and almost immediately realize that this is not a smart move. One does not simply fling one's fancy watch onto a gym floor, where it could be broken or purloined!

I hop off said equipment, and begin to search for my watch. I quickly discover that nearly everybody in this gym has done the same thing, so there are watches everywhere! How, oh, how shall I ever find my watch!! How could I be so stupid as to do this?

At which point, another part of my brain chimes in and says, "You wouldn't. Nobody would. This is clearly a dream. You can look all you want for that watch, but when you wake up, you can check your jewelry box, and it'll be there." I realize that this is probably true. I regret I can't somehow go check right now, but I assure myself this makes perfectly good sense. I abandon my search and go on my merry, dreamy way.

(For anyone who's interested, my dream-self was correct. The watch was in my jewelry box.)

So this morning, a similar thing occurs. I dream that I'm on my way to some sort of rehearsal, and realize that I need to grab a meal first. I stop in at a very seedy fastfood joint. Zany hijinx ensue--too disjoined to try to recount--but I end up ordering a chicken sandwich, a donut, and a diet Coke.

As I wait for my order to come up, it suddenly strikes me that I have no idea if I have any money to pay for this meal. I pull out my purse, which--as it turns out--is a triangular, "Hello Kitty"-inspired affair, made of transparent plastic and trimmed in pink. Since it is transparent, I quickly see that my big black wallet is not inside. It is totally empty.

But before I can even worry, that same, oddly rational part of my brain says, "This is a dream. You make it go any way you want. Just put your hand in the purse and pull out a $10 bill. That should cover it."

I do, I pay for my meal, and go on my merry, dreamy way.

It's not till later this morning, as I'm recounting this dream to Eamon that I realize I could’ve told myself to reach into my purse and pull out …. A $100 bill. A credit card. The Hope diamond. A gold-plated tiara.

But, no, I pull out a $10. Because that should just about cover it.

Dream big, little lady. Dream big.

Crazy Crap Item #202: The part where I spin a Halloween yarn

It seems my attempt to exorcize all the cobwebs of the worst summer ever has worked, as I am now able to document some more appealing events, appropriate to my claim of having crazy crap happen to me nearly every day. So let me return to quasi-normalcy with a tale quite befitting the season.

Some of you may recall a past episode which made my hairs stand on end. Dear friends, I admit, I love a good ghost story. I love thinking there's something mysterious there, just out of reach--something pointing to larger spheres we can't even imagine.

But let me be the first to say it: I am not one of those invested with the gifts of a sensitive. Besides occasionally thinking of someone just as the phone rings with a call from that very same person, I am utterly non-psychic. Profoundly so. I do not feel creepy presences. I do not sense "being watched." I do not glimpse eerie movements out of the corner of my mind which cannot be dismissed.

And yet, just the other day, I had an experience of such sheer uncanniness, I've been unable to shake its sense of otherworldly ookiness. And since it's nearly Halloween, it seems more appropriate share the wealth than keep it to myself.

So here it is: Kay's Uncanny Experience

Let me preface by saying, as revealed with such endearing candor in my previous post, I'm in the recovery phase from a good-old-fashioned, Valley-of-the-Dolls style nervous breakdown. So, goodness knows, there are some funny, funny chemicals oozing around my synapses. And I'm recovering quite nicely, thank you very much. I typically awake sometime between 6 and 7:30am, pop a soothing doll, and snooze for a few hours more. I chalk it up to my body really, really needing sleep, and am simply reveling in it.

So this morning, this typical transaction occurs. Pop a doll, back to bed.

At some point, I think I'm awake, but so woozy and sleepy, I don't want to get up. I'm absolutely certain I hear someone come in the room. My brain decides it's my mom, who is concerned that I need to get up, but doesn't want to wake me. I make sure not to move, and hope she'll just leave, because I just want to sleep and don't want to be roused further--kind of the way you lay very still when you've fallen alseep in the car on the way home so your dad will carry you in.

At this point, I should add that I'm currently sleeping in one of our guest bedrooms. It's dark and quiet, and allows me to flop about without disturbing Eamon. It's a disheveled little room, with a threadbare carpet and a kind of sad-making patch of plaster on its cracked, robin's-egg blue walls. Because of its dreary condition, I've always jokingly referred to it as "the haunted bedroom."

The haunted bedroom opens out onto the second story of our disgracefully dilapidated porch. When we first viewed the house, the door was marked with a sign that said, in daunting letters, "DO NOT STAND ON PORCH." We do not.

So back to our scene. I'm still drowsing, eyes shut, head under pillow, my usual sleep mode, and I sense that my mom is moving toward the door to the porch. It crosses my mind I should tell her not to go out there, as it's dangerous.

But I'm drowsy, and if I stop her, the jig is up, she'll know I'm awake, and I'll have to get up. At the very least, the sheer effort of exertion will rouse me past returning to sleep, and I really want to sleep. I let myself off the hook, thinking the odds of the porch suddenly collapsing as my mom puts her tiny frame on it are infinitesimally small, and she'll so enjoy the view. I swear I hear her going out there. She steps out for a minute, then comes back in. And I think, see, she was just curious, and everything's fine.

I remain as still as possible, as I just want her to leave so I can go back to sleep.

Then, at some point, something weird happens. It almost feels like the quilt by my face is jerked up slightly, or maybe it was that I had one of those weird sleep shudders one sometimes has--where you're drifting off to sleep and you suddenly jerk to action. I'm not sure if this happened right away or later ... but I do recall looking down toward my chest as I lay on my back, and seeing that my quilt was tented up so I could see under it. And what I see/sense is a kind of dull yellow glow. And I remember thinking, "That is just not right." And thinking I should really investigate further, but just being too sleepy to do so.

I also recall, and have no idea of the chronology in terms of when I was sensing all these things, realizing that there is no way my mother could not possibly be in the room. My mother lives in California. And I get this strange flash -- not really a vision, not really a thought -- a sort of weird sense of just "old lady" -- a stooped, white figure. Maybe white hair. Dolores, my recently passed neighbor, I muse. Or maybe Babe O'Malley. But those are really the most deliberate logical thoughts I had in the whole experience. Like that's the label I'm putting on the generic "old lady" essence that was the original impulse.

Later after this, not sure if it was few minutes or longer, I became aware of really loud irritating sounds that I couldn't make out. Eventually, I decided it was my brain trying to process the noise of workmen working on my neighbor's house ... only I realized later that those guys finished the job weeks ago. So I don't know what the hell that was.

And then, at some point, I am dead certain that someone hear someone else coming in to "check on me." I am sure it is Eamon, and again, I stay quite deliberately immobile because I don't want to get up. I want to go back to sleep.

But I give up. At this point, I think, what with the loud, irritating noises earlier, and the weird sensations, I might as well get the hell up. Besides, I can just catch Eamon to say goodbye before he leaves for work.

Only his car is gone. And when I look at my computer, I see he's online, which means he's been gone for at least a half hour.

So that's my creepy story. Serotonin run amok? Grandmotherly figure from the Other Side worried that I'm oversleeping. Who's to say?

Crazy Crap Item #201: The part where I open myself up to the accusation of TMI

Dearest reader:

No doubt you have noted a serious decline in both the quantity and quality of my installments of insanity in the Daly household. Some have even asked: "Why no entries? Has nothing crazy happened in your life?"

In actuality, much crazy has happened. Unfortunately, the "bad" crazy has far outweighed the "good crazy," leaving me little energy or inclination to document even those blessed beneficial moments of insanity that have occasionally wafted down upon me like unto manna from heaven.

I had originally planned to weather the storm, await the return of a larger proportion of good crazy, and proceed with my labors as if the summer of 2008 had never happened.

I'm finding, though, as summer turns to fall, that celebrating the joyful crazy crap without first giving due place to the difficulties of the past few months seems somehow... dishonest...? Levity, I like to think, is my habitual frame of mind, but until I discharge this past summer's flat-out badness, any show of fun feels forced and false. And you, dear reader, deserve better than that.

So here's the deal: What follows in this post is a description of my worst summer ever. Many of you have heard part or all of this saga -- say, if you are a denizen of 1500 Norwood or have ever been to my house to watch the season premiere of Ugly Betty and eat empenadas. Those of you who have not heard the tale may simply not want to veer off the path of crazy crap comedy. If you number yourself among them, please feel free to wait for my next, hopefully more cheerful posting.

The point is, I'm sharing too much here. I know it, and I own it. So here goes: my account of "Crazy Crap Gone Bad: The Summer of 2008":

June: A fine afternoon, I prepare a meal of hummus and veggies. As a precursor, I pop a handful of Beano in my mouth. I chomp down. I feel brief pain. I chew. One tablet will not dissolve. I ponder the matter, and realize that I've actually broken a tooth.

Thankfully, my dentist can see me immediately, fits me for a crown, and glues in a temp. Two weeks later, I have a permanent crown. It doesn't feel quite right. I start to notice discomfort in my cheek. I return to the dentist and have her adjust the bite. No relief. I ask her to do it again. She tells me the bite is fine; I need to see someone about TMJ syndrome.

In the meantime: Eamon and I consult a friendly neighborhood fertility specialist vis-a-vis the baby-having (you may recall, he looks like Bob Balaban). He works up all sorts of tests, sonograms, probings and so forth. It is discovered I have not one but two uterine fibroids which require yanking. (I have recorded this bit before).

My surgery is scheduled for July 11, so I decide that I will delay doing anything about the TMJ. I know it will require weeks of physical therapy, which I won't be able to do, so we'll just wait till afters.

July 4: Eamon and I take a delightful walk on the beach, and return home to find a block party on the dreaded 1400 Norwood block. As we chat with local denizens, I'm approached by a neighbor who informs me that Dolores McDermott -- she of song and story -- has passed away suddenly. We are all stunned and saddened.

July 11: I go in for surgery. We were told to expect it to be about 2 to 3 hours long. In truth, it takes 6 hours. One of the fibroids measures 8 centimeters. I've been under anesthesia so long, they can't release me the same day, as we had expected. I spend an utterly sleepless night in the women's hospital (seriously, it's called that), counting how many seconds it takes for my decompression boots (which ensure no blood clots form) to inflate and deflate. Over and over.

Eamon gallantly offers to sleep in a recliner beside my bedside, but I send him home. He picks me up the next morning, and we arrive to the welcome of our summer block party, which I cannot attend, as I find I can barely sit upright due to the four incisions in my gut.

Recovery is much worse than I had anticipated. Pain pills seem to do nothing, my jaw pain continues, and I must lie almost exclusively on my back. And I develop some pretty severe insomnia.

My jaw pain is still troublesome, so I drag myself to the dentist a few days after surgery. She's amazed I'm standing. She suggests soft food and ibuprofin. I tell her, due to surgery, that's pretty much what I've been doing. She says after I'm recovered I should go to an oral surgeon.

Five days after surgery, I learn a project I've been working on needs a revision NOW. I manage somehow to put in something like 10 hours of work over the next couple of days, and decide to knock off when STABBING PAINS develop in my gut. Fun.

Two weeks after surgery, we receive very sad news. Our dear friend Jonathan, who has been fighting leukemia for more than three years, has received his final treatment, and it has failed. We organize with friends of Jonathan and his partner Chris to come out for support. We arrange a schedule to ensure that someone is always there to help. Eamon and I will be leaving in 2 days time, and will stay for 8 days. When we leave, we will be replaced by another friend.

July 29: We arrive in New York, and in the cab on the way to Mt. Sinai, we learn via cell phone that Jonathan's condition has suddenly declined. All friends have been summoned to New York. As such, many friends will be staying at Jonathan and Chris' apartment. We call our dear friend Michael, who lives up in Washington Heights, who selflessly offers us his bed.

I won't recount much about our time in New York. It was very, very difficult. We ended up staying 12 days, as Jonathan's condition continued to decline. We had some blessings during that time, too. A testament to Jonathan's and Chris' character is the remarkable group of friends they surrounded themselves with. Many of them I knew from my time at Northwestern University (where I met Chris), but I also met friends from other parts of their life as well as Jonathan's family. If I ever find myself spending 10 hours a day in a hospital lounge for nearly two weeks, looking on as one friend suffers and another grieves, these are the people I'd want to do it with.

August 10: We returned home. That night, at about 3am, we received the news that Jonathan had passed away.

Once the dust settled, I decided to return my attention to various of my physical ailments. As many know, I am the physical therapy queen. In the past couple of years, I've experienced chronic pain in my hip and shoulder, and done something like a year's worth of physcial therapy treatment to try to get them under control. This past summer, I got add a new ailment -- stabbing pains in my forearms and elbows that particularly hit just as I would lay down to sleep. So another trip to the orthopedist. Who sends me to physical therapy.

At PT, I learn that my PT insurance coverage for the year has been all used up, and in fact, was used up a few months ago, so I'm already paying for several visits out of pocket. I learn some nice stretches and techniques for my forearms from my therapist, and tell her, I don't think i can prioritize this now. She understands, and tells me to continue with the exercises, and come back for a check in some time if I wish.

So I cue up my next ailment: TMJ. It's now quite severe. My dentist sends me to an oral surgeon. He questions me for 3 minutes, and refers me to a physical therapist, "a miracle worker," her calls her. I see her twice a week for a month. And yes, I'm going to be paying out of pocket. She reduces my visits to once ever other week. Then she says, "Well, we have one more visit, and we're done!"

To which I say, "But I still have symptoms." And she explains that I seem to have plateaued, so in her experience, there's no point in continuing. We do my exercises. She joggles things about. I go home. And I brood. So I decide to call her an clarify.

"So," I ask her on the phone, "Am I going to be in pain for the rest of my life?" And she explains that people thing therapy is a cure, but it's not always, and though we want therapy to help, sometimes it doesn't. I ask her if there's anything else I can do. She says if I continue with my exercises, I can keep further damage from being done.

I am upset. What I'm hearing is, "yes, you will be in pain for the rest of your life." It is now September. I've been tolerating this basically never-ending pain since June.

And it is at this point that the entire deck of cards which was once my mental and physical state comes crashing down. I have been exercising about 2 hours a day for my various pained parts. I have done my TJM exercises every 2 hours for 6 weeks. And now I am to understand that none of it matters, as I will be in pain for the rest of my life.

Oh, and on Monday, I'm supposed to start fertility treatments, which entails self-injecting hormones every day and driving out to suburbs every few days to have my blood tested.

And all the while I'm thinking .... How the fuck am I going to do this.

So this is the when the uncontrollable sobbing starts. And the intense anxiety. I spend the weekend sleeping little and eating less. I somehow manage to sing at a wedding .... not sure how I pulled that off.

The weekend ends, and Monday morning, I've had something like 2 hours sleep. So Eamon and I talk. We decide to defer fertility treatments for a month. I'm supposed to see a periodontist later in the week about a gum tissue transplant I need (oh, did I forget to mention that?), and he says, "Let's see if he'll see you today." He also urges me to see my GP, who I had an appointment with later that week anyway.

The periodontist tells me to postpone the tissue transplant. He offers to do some research for specialists I could see about the TMJ.

I talk to my shrink, who insist I demand anti-anxiety meds from my GP.

I see my GP, who gives me all sorts of delicious drugs, all of which help, with the sleeping, with the eating, with the thinking, with the not sobbing constantly, which is nice.

I cancel my final appointment with my TMJ physical therapist, as it was to be a follow-up to the gum tissue surgery which I'm now not having. I receive a very effusive phone call in which she insists that she thought I had improved and that she never would've closed the door on me, and all sorts of other things that completely contradict the tone and content of our earlier conversation. I conceded I perhaps did not communicate my discomfort clearly enough, but inwardly wondered why, in our previous phone call, the questions "Will I be in pain for the rest of my life?" didn't ring any chimes for her. I let her know I will "think about" her offer to continue treatment with her.

In the interim, I call the oral surgeon who treated my mother-in-law for TMJ years ago. His assistant says he can't see me till December. He only sees patients every other Saturday. I say, fine, I'll take it. I tell her I'm hoping to become pregnant, so should I do xrays now, in case the blessed event occurs. She says I can come in for xrays any time!

So I do the next day, and a miracle occurs. By the time I get home, I have a message from the receptionist saying she explained my situation to the doctor, and that he said if I'd like to come in that night at 8:30pm, he'd see me then!!!! Calloo, Callay!!!! I happily agree.

I meet said doctor, and he is everything the last oral surgeon was not. He is kindly. He is leisurely. He wants to hear my whole story. He pats my arm reassuredly when I speak of my trip to New York. He examines my bite, moves my jaw around, pokes and probes.

His conclusion: the right side of my jaw, which has been hurting, and upon which I have lavished treatments and exercises is not the problem. It's actually the left side which is immobilized. The right side hurts because it's being over-extended.

Which simultaneously makes me want to shout for joy and scream in anger.

He recommends a treatment -- an injection of saline into the immobilized joint to wash things out. The rub: it can't be done if I'm pregnant. So... logistical headache....

Finally, I muster some clarity. I get an MRI so the doctor can confirm his suspicion. I consult my calendar and do some reproductive-related calcluations. I call doctor's office, explain situation again. Thankfully, it's the same receptionist, so she gets it. I explain that I want to go ahead and schedule the procedure, if I'm "blessed," I'll cancel it. So we schedule it.

And that brings me to now. Delicious drugs have tamped down the jaw pain and evened the mood. Decorating for Halloween has had the effect of basket-weaving on inmates in the asylum. I still sob occasionally, and have wrestled with the guilt that Eamon had to miss Roller Derby Regionals in Madison, Wisconsin, to stay home with his crazy, enfeebled wife.

But it's getting better. And now that I've enforced this catharsis on you all, mayhap we can all look forward to a finer brand of crazy crap in the future.

Crazy Crap Item #200: The part where James learns to spell

This latest item from my neighbor Ann, regarding a dialogue with her son James, age 4:

This morning James said upon waking up ,"I know how to spell teeth, t-o-n-e." I told him that that doesn't spell "teeth."

James --"What does it spell?"
Me -- "It spells tone"
short pause....
James -- "Oh, then I know how to spell tone"

Crazy Crap Item #199: The part where James offers a definition

Young James asked if I know what an Indian. I reply that I do, but what does he think an Indian is?

The answer: A guy who wears only pants.

Crazy Crap Item #198: The part where everything I need I find in my basement

Yes, it's been a long time since I've added to this account of my daily doings. Suffice it to say, for now, anyway, that this was a bad summer. A very bad summer.

But summer is done, and as the leaves begin to turn, we, in turn, turn our attentions to the 1500 Norwood Fall Block Party.

The Theme: Renaissance Faire

A splendid theme. Grandiose. Inspiring. And, I have found, strangely do-able.

Yes, I did my doctorate in Renaissance English literature, so perhaps this period of history and culture is just a bit more intuitive for me than for some. But really, my ease with planning and executing my Renaissance theme is mainly due to my large and strangely abundant basement.

To wit:

- I desire a costume. I begin to poke in some storage boxes. Within a half-hour, I have a full costume, which brings together an old elf costume, yesteryear's English style riding boots, and a Victorian blouse I wore in a wedding when I was 14 years old.
- My neighbor Ann and I are planning a maze of knightly obstacles in my backyard. My basement yields a multitude of large, capacious cardboard boxes, perfect for towers and hallways.
- We muse that it sure would be swell to have a full-length skeleton to hang, dungeon-style, on a trellis. While poking around for a completely different item, voila!, I find a plastic skeleton I forgot I had.
- Eamon asks me to look for an old beard from block partys past to use for his costume. It fails to materialize, but as I search, I find a full-length black hooded robe, never used.
- I decide I wish to append a drawbridge to the front of my house. Rooting around, I find not just a board but an actual, fully constructed, very sturdy ramp, which runs exactly to the height of my first step. A little paint, some rope, and I have a faux drawbridge.
- I make a mental note to by tidbits to disperse as prizes for the kids. Searching for more bits of costume for Eamon, I run across a box full of goody bags filled with toys, again, from a block party past.

This is just getting weird.

Crazy Crap Item #197: The part where Jack demonstrates his knowledge

So, since surgery for me is looming, and since it so perfectly coincides with our upcoming block party, I felt it was prudent to prepare my young friends for my lack of participation in said festivities. I'm hoping to muster, post-fibroid-removal, at most a hearty lawnchair sitting. And since James, who cannot see me in the vicinity of grass without demanding that I spin him around or hoist him upon my shoulder, I decided a few weeks of knowing such frolics were not forthcoming would be advisable.

I would be going to the hospital the day before, I explained. There were some nasty sores they needed to take out of my belly. Then I would come home, but I would have to rest a lot, what with all the doctors having been in my belly and all.

James looked concerned. "How will they go in your belly without hurting you," he queried.

"They have special medicine," I explained, "that keeps it from hurting."

"Oh, yes, medicine." Jack intoned, with a blase-ness one never quite expects from a six-year-old. "Morphine."

Oh, how fast they grow up.

Crazy Crap Item #196: The part where Sailor Jack cracks wise

My dad, for an old duffer, is an unstoppable email machine. Early and often, I receive missives from him, updating me as to daily doings and offering observations as they strike him.

To wit, today's email, which comments upon an old WWII film:

DBK [his nickname for me. It's short for "Doctor Baby Kay"],

Watching "They Were Expendable" I noticed all the officers had nicknames. There is Rusty, Shorty, Lucky, etc. I can see a poor ensign showing up later in the war and asking "Why do I have the nickname Poo Poo Head? And they would say "You waited until all the good ones were gone". Happy Gay Pride Day parade.

Love to both.

Dad

Crazy Crap Item #195: The part where James clarifies

This past Sunday, I had the pleasure of passing some time with the Casey boys, all three of them. It was a blessedly lovely evening--the air newly pummeled from earlier hail storms--and the Casey ensemble was attending to their remarkable tomato patch.

As Jim (big daddy) focused his attention on the binding of chicken wire, James (age 3) entertained me with his ever-popular "Woofy Dance," while Jack (age 6) undertook to transform every item within reach into a form of firearm.

As we chatted of this and that, Jim announced that James had learned the song "Puff the Magic Dragon." I indicated that nothing would please me more than to hear his rendition.

With gusto, he started in:

"Puff the Magic Dragon lived by the sea."

Then concluded his performance with a loud, conspiratorial stage whisper:

"It's about dragons."

Crazy Crap Item #194: The part where I am brimming with useful suggestions

Once again, Eamon is marching in the Gay Pride Parade. Faithful readers will recall that this is not his first such experience. I speak, of course, of last year's entry, with the Windy City Rollers, as a robot.

Today, he tells me that he is again set to march. This time, their team theme is "Sailors." What should he wear?, he asks.

I suggest he clad himself in one of those enormous mock-derrieres one sees so often at Halloween parties, and go as a rear admiral.

I am ostracized.

Crazy Crap Item #193: The part where Kristen cites a reliable source

As many know, the last few years can be thought of as "Adventures in Baby Delaying" for Eamon and myself. And me, well, I'm not getting any younger.

So it was that Eamon and went in for a battery of tests to determine what's what and get an expert to help us nudge things along. The news was largely good; all our nibbles and bits seem to be in good working order. Upon closer examination, however, it was determined that I am harboring some not very felicitous uterine fibroids. Not to go into grisly detail, it seems these little benign nub-ules are pushing into my baby sleigh, and making things just a bit too crowded for all concerned (or at least, that is the suspicion). So yank 'em out, the experts say!

And, it seems, the experts need a helping hand to make things happen. A robot to be precise. Seems that wee, tiny robots are all the rage in fibroid-removal circles, and me, I'm never one to miss out on a fad. So robots it is.

I conveyed as much to my good friend, Ms. Kristen Freilich. Good friend that she is, Kristen did some scrupulous research, and sent me this encouraging email of support:

Subject: Good News!

Hi kay. after i found this in USA Today I started to feel better about your surgery. i think you are going to be just fine!



And below her message, she included the following:

Which led to this exchange:

kaydaly88: USA today?
krispe22: i made that part up
kaydaly88: yeah.
krispe22: but otherwise i was afraid you woudln't take it seriously

That's what friends are for.

Crazy Crap Item #192: The part where I overhear a notable conversation

Our block party was this past Saturday. I will comment more later upon that matter. In the meantime, I'd like to share a snippet of conversation I overheard involving a group of three girls, ages 6 through 8.

It was a steamy day, our block party saturday, so I offered to hook up my fabulous Pirates of the Caribbean sprinkler. Three small girls agreed this would be a good idea.

They were dazzled by my sprinkler, with its menacing, spinning skull, crossed swords and genuine fake doubloons. They asked where on earth I could've purchased such a treasure.

Target, I revealed, was the place where I had achieved such an item (for the low, low, not-to-be-missed price of $3.00).

Girl 1: I love target!

Kay: I love it, too.

Girl 2: I like the toy department at Target. They have the best toys there.

Kay: That's true. They do have great toys.

Girl 1: Why don't parents let kids have all the toys they want. They never give them everything they ask for.

Girl 2: I always want everything at Target, and my mom says, "No, no, no, you can't have that."

Kay: Well, your parents don't want to give you everything you want so you'll learn to appreciate the stuff you have.

Girl 1: Yes. People just always want everything. They can be so greedy.

Girl 3: Yes, that's true. Even I can, and I'm a princess!

And.... scene.

Crazy Crap Item #191: The part where Eamon and I toast the long-delayed arrival of summer

The scene: Memorial Day morning

The mood: Lackadaiscal, at best.

Our guest bedroom (where I am sleeping due to ongoing hip/shoulder/elbow aches) is graciously outfitted with a television, so as I drift into consciousness, I turn on the TV, and remain supine. Eamon joins me. I discover that there is a "Law and Order" marathon running. We comment that the day is thus well and truly shot for us.

Eamon asks how I wish to break my fast. I answer noncommittally. He suggests pancakes, waffles and the like. I wonder how such a feat will be achieved during a "Law and Order" marathon.

We realize that the episode we've just been sucked into is an expansive, gripping three-parter. Which means it will not be resolved until noon. Which opens, once again, the breakfast dilemma.

"We could move operations downstairs," Eamon suggests.

"What benefits would accrue to us?" I ask.

"To be closer to the kitchen, and be able to pause the show while I run in to flip pancakes."

This seems reasonable to me, and I am never one to turn down cakes of any kind, least of all cakes of the pan variety.

We marshall ourselves, only to have Eamon discover/realize that, through a long-neglected glitch, the channel feature "Law and Order" is not under the jurisdiction of our DVR device, and thus cannot be paused.

We moan. We wail.

I suggest that we move our electric griddle into the living room, and construct breakfast while watching the "Law and Order" triathlon. I am assured that if any such thing occured, the world would well and truly end, for we are not such trashy, low-end folk as to make breakfast in the living room just so we wouldn't miss any minute of a "Law and Order" marathon.

Personally, I find this stricture overly rigid, but after some contemplation of Lenny's witty zingers and his hot Latino partner's hot body (which they took every opportunity to display), I suggest that if we switched gears and considered the construction of French toast, this might be more manageable. French toast, you see, doesn't entail comlicated batter construction or the 1-hour resting time required for pancakes. I envisioned beating eggs, milk, sugar and vanilla at the commercial break, soaking bread during the show, adding to grill during the next commercial break, flipping them at the next commercial break, and so forth. Lengthy, cumbersome, but doable.

Eamon responded to my suggestion by noting that we had leftover French bread from a dinner party earlier in the weekend. I acknowledged that this point had occurred to me, and had figured significantly in my thought process.

With this silent assent, I retire to the kitchen to amass the fixings. During such doings, Eamon slinks into the question with a strange look on his face. Evil is too strong to describe it. Mischievous, perhaps. Impish.

I inquire what he's about. He answers not a word, but silently -- and impishly -- unplugs the griddler and begins to transport it. Wordlessly, I pack my fixings and move them to the coffee table.

Eamon sets up the griddler on the radiator, and the rest follows as one would expect, all done to the Eamon's sung refrain, "WE'RE WHITE TRASH! WE'RE WHITE TRASH."

The resulting breakfast, dubbed "Law and Order Toast," is delicious, satisfying, and media saturated. I'm instructed to never speak of it again.

Crazy Crap Item #190: The part where I am not alone

Yet another county heard from re. chapter 1 and and chapter 2 of Ambien madness. Apparently, sleep-texting is not uncommon, according to this article thoughtfully provided by Roxi.

Crazy Crap Item #189: The part where Charlie Gibson cracks wise

Tonight, on the news, there was a story about a violinist left his Stradivarius in a cab. In recounting its recovery, anchorman Charlie Gibson was heard to quip, "And voila! Or should I say, 'violin'?"

No, Charlie. You should not.

Crazy Crap Item #188: The part where Sailor Jack weighs in

Today, my dad and I were watching the news, which reported on the ongoing battle between Obama and Clinton.

My dad, a lifelong Republican, said, "I hope Obama wins. I'd like to see a president with a name like Obama. Not some Anglo Saxon 'Ward' or 'Howe.' 'Obama.' I'd like to see that."

And then I glanced out the windows, and the pigs, they were soaring by.

Crazy Crap Item #187: The part where I prudently proofread before hitting "send"

As I may have mentioned before, this is a bit of a stressful time. I'm in Banning, caring for a recuperating father, and negotiating the many needs of a household in low-key, senior citizen crisis.

As may be expected, there have been some lapses in my usually razor-sharp mental acuity. Many of you have already learned of the great Ambien fiasco of 2008.

This morning, I experienced a similar lapse. I was responding to an email from a client, who was apologizing that a project we had started had been repeatedly delayed.

I thought I'd answer with a bit of literary flair, opening my email with

"Hey, Tony -- The best laid plans of mice and men... etc."

Which would be very zippy. However, what I actually typed was:

"Hey, Tony -- The best laid men... etc."

That's me. Crafting porn-inspired emails to send to important clients.

Crazy Crap Item #186: The part where I share another story of Ambien-induced hijinks

So, it seems my story of what happens when Kay takes Ambien in lieu of Synthroid has rung some chimes with readers. My dear friend Lindsay shared this second-hand tale of Ambien-induced hijinks:

"a super sarcastic 29 year old, married mommy from sun prairie, who just took a leave of absence, secondary to her extreme and unhealthy weight loss following baby number 4, said she woke up one morning with part of a melted ice cream cone stuck to her face. "

And don't ask Linday what she did on Ambien. Just don't.

Crazy Crap Item #185: The part where I attract male attention

Still in Banning, and making many a trip to the grocery store. Ice cream and wine, they must be purchased on a regular basis.

On the way home from a recent trip to the hip doctor, we stopped at the store to pick up some baby back ribs, strawberries and dishwashing liquid. As we left the cashier, my mother and I caught sight of a very small redheaded fellow. Like Ron Howard in The Music Man, he was.

My mother pronounced him quite adorable, and as we passed him, he locked eyes with me.

"You're pretty!" he shouted.

I thanked him, and replied that he was quite handsome.

"Feel my muscle," he offered, holding out his arm in a strong-man pose.

I felt it, and commented on its massiveness.

You know how redheads blush? To the very scalp? He did. And then some.