Morning Poo

I got this email from my friend Sean, who is teaching English in Japan. Sean is a tall kid with shaggy hair and a deep baritone voice and is not typically prone to bouts of goofiness like this, which makes the following story all the better:
"I arrive at one of my two elementary schools and I'm told that there will be an assembly on "healthy living". I thought oh real fun. Although my attention span for listening to Japanese has increased over the year, listening to two hours of it kills me. So I get to the assembly, sit next to some of my students and begin to zone out. Half an hour passes, I catch the occasional phrase, drink milk, go to bed early and eat your vegetables...So you can have your morning poo....My ears pick up....What did the school nurse just say? Now my attention has returned. Did I hear wrong? Did she just say that you need to have a healthy morning poo? oh yes. She did.
Now my Japanese is not great, but I know enough to know she said morning poo. In fact, literally translated, it was good morning poo. I wait and sure enough, comes the talk on the ohayoo unchi (good morning poo). Three children bring out a big flipbook, illustrating the life and path of jiro, the morning poo. It is jiro`s job to explain how poos are formed, what to eat to have a good, healthy poo, what color your poo should be (brown it turns out). I am not joking when I say that someone had drawn pictures of a boy taking a poop. The story was narrated by some 4th, 5th and 6th grade students, Jiro being voiced by a 6th grade boy who delivered his lines without cracking a smile. In fact, no one laughed at the fact that there were illustrated bowel movements on stage. I was sitting next to third graders who looked at me like I was a child when I was laughing. Strange. My favorite quote from the story was,
boy: jiro, why is it good to take a good morning poop?
Jiro: because, wouldn't it be embarrassing to have to say to your teacher in the middle of class, "sensei, I have to take a poop. may I go to the toilet?"
now you may or may not believe me, but it gets better (or worse from your perspective). So they took the lovely illustrations away, jiro taught all the children why it is good to eat vegetables (they help you take a morning poop) why it is good to get up early (so you have time to take a morning poop) and why it is important to take a morning poop (you wont be a social outcast for having to take a poop in class). I didn't think it was possible to top that, until the finale...three 6th grade boys walk on stage with some strange headbands on. In Japan, there is a very distinctive way of drawing poop, every kid draws it the same way, it looks like brown whip cream basically. You know how when you put whip cream on, pumpkin pie, or a ice cream sundae, that kind of swirly motion (I'm sure there is a better way to describe it, but the longer I live here, the worse my English gets). Either way, there is no confusing it. Its poop. Now, what's funny is that these boys wore headbands with this poop drawing on their forehead. I'm not joking. It gives new credence to the term shit head haha. These three boys, without acting embarrassed or laughing walked on stage in front of the school, with pictures of poop on their forehead. At this point, I'm almost crying from laughter and having third graders ask me to be quiet. They come out and introduce themselves as the "poop brothers" and then proceed to give a quiz on poop (a lot of which I regretfully didn't understand). I shit you not. Get it. I made a funny."
And thus ended one of the more random emails in recent memory. I hope it made you laugh as hard as I laughed.

Pioneer Spirit

Rick is my father's best friend, and is, at the very least, far more expressive than my father. He may be one of the most passionate and insightful people I have encountered, and I think he helps my father express his emotions. I was at my dad's house last night and he pulled out a box of papers and asked if I had ever seen the poem Rick wrote about me. I hadn't. He handed me a small piece of yellow legal paper dated 12/29/95.

Sarah

Phil beams
Excited relays...
Sarah's running
Sarah's doing
She's being so
So much
A participant in life
Engaged and engaging
A special sense of right
And humor
And delight

Pioneer spirit
Clear as northern sky

My first thought was one of embarrassment and flattery. It is truly thrilling to be thought of that highly, but I was 14; how much of it really was me? Have I lost some of the better parts of me? I can't say I've ever had someone write anything for me; my exes have usually been short on words and long on action. The part that hit me hardest was the "Doing and being so much" portion; since graduation I have done little but lag under the weight of endless possibilities, and so that was a sort of sting. An "Oh yeah, I remember when I had a clear idea of just wanted I wanted and how I wanted it..." I guess it reminds me of when I was simpler. I dunno. I didn't post it to glorify myself; maybe just to remember.

Despots and 2x4s

My room in the townhouse is fairly small with cathedral ceilings, so I, in a fit of hysterical ambitiousness, decided I needed a full-sized loft for a bed.
And that I am the one to build it.
Just call me Bob Vila.
I'm not building this off the top of my head; I have the plans for one. It's 22 pages long.
Today I went to Home Depot (or "Home Despot" as I like to call it) in Hank, my 1987 Ford F-150 pickup truck to get the necessary lumber for said loft.
8 2x6x8
4 2x4x12
6 2x4x10
1 2x4x8
2 2x3x8
1 4'x8' 3/4" particle board (which, I learned, is approximately 90lbs)
120 #8 2 1/2" Phillips wood screws
50 #8 1 1/2" Phillips wood screws
35 5/16 x4" lag bolts and washers
Pushing my big orange cart around the Despot this morning you'd of thought that I was the first woman to dare to play at Augusta, or enter the Citadel, or accuse Bill Reilly. I mean the conversations stopped and they just stared. Like I would have been more conspicuous dressed as the mascot for the Orioles. I felt as if I was walking around with three boobs, like I should have been selling carnival tickets, or had brought my own pole to dance with. I believe some serious cases of whiplash may have later been reported. They wouldn't help me, would walk right past me but continue to stare unless I stared back, then they'd duck and walk briskly away. There actually was some snickering overheard. The only time anyone helped or spoke to me was when it was the all-out war between the particle board and myself. I had one end up on the cart and every time I went to push it farther onto the cart, the cart rolled farther down the aisle. The kind gentleman in the orange apron was nice enough to put his foot in front of the cart's wheels, thereby saving me from chasing it all the way to the far wall.
$105 later I was out in the parking lot in the 95+ weather and humidity, trying to figure out how to get all the lumber in to the bed of ol' Hank. I counted 18 men who walked right past me without so much as a grunt of encouragement or an offering of help (and it was obvious that I needed it). Finally, after about 10 minutes, a woman offered to hold my cart so I could get the bastard particle board into the bed of my truck. That's it.
I don't expect doors held for me, or a man to stand up whenever I leave the table, or him to give me his coat when it's cold (though all of these are always appreciated and major bonus points). I do, however, expect a neighborly offering of help when it is evident that it is needed. Only women spoke to me while I was struggling to wrangle my lumber into bungees and tie-downs, and it was to offer some sort of encouragement.
I got the a few of my boards measured and cut tonight; I have a lot more building, cutting, sanding, staining, drilling, screwing and filing in my future. It was just a day of realizing that I my being a girl can be a shock or even an insult in the wrong situation (Was that too dramatic? Sorry I got a phone call toward the end of this post and coming back I had lost all my steam).

Ghosts

Caroline posted a rather insightful and well-written comment to a previous post (The Crying of Frogs, a post that started as an ode to my deck and turned into a rhetorical belch about friendships) that of course got me onto the fast track of mental pacing.
A few weeks ago my youth group had a reunion. Some of those in attendance I had known since I was 4; the rest was my closest group of friends through much of high school. It was with some trepidation that I accepted the invitation and with good reason: some of them I hadn't seen in over 6 years. But I went (thanks to Carey and Liz for tagging along) and was one of only two people in the group who did not have children. Seriously. And there were 15 of us there (not including the spouses and babies). It was a relief when my sister showed up; I could steal a niece or nephew just to fit in. It only took about five minutes before I realized that I really didn't have much to talk to them about and that it was ok. It was then that I remembered something an old friend said about one of her former best friends. She said, "It's not that I love her less...I just love her differently." We stood around with love in our hearts and not a word on our tongues. It wasn't anything that was done or not done; it wasn't bitterness or distrust or disdain; it was unfamiliarity where familiarity had once been. Time shifts the mountains and the earth, why would it not shift relationships? I'm still trying to figure out if I believe in the idea of "growing apart"--I can't decide if I think it's inevitable or a sort of cop-out. I want to believe that true friendships have a way of riding the crest of life, rather than catching the wave. They are constant though peaks and valleys, through those times of inseparable connections and the subsequent lapses in conversation. But history and heartache tell me otherwise.
I ran into an old friend the other day, and after catching up on all the people we both knew and getting some gossip, we were at a loss for words.
A few days later I finally talked to a dear friend with whom I had had no contact in over 4 months, and we spoke for almost three hours as if no time had passed at all.
Both of those people I have called my best friend at some point in my life; why is one still so solid while the other has floundered? Back to my damn is to was question of my previous post.
So I guess the new question is: Where is the spot where we stop living memories and start reliving them?
Caroline's question was, "What makes a best friend? Is it proximity in distance or proximity of morals, ideas, goals, choices, an idea of a fun night? Is it neither?"
Glad those questions are rhetorical, cuz they are more than I know. I know what I feel though. I firmly believe that a best friend is someone who knows you in ways that you don't know. There is more than comfortable camaraderie, more than shared memories, more than similarities. I've heard it said that you like someone because; you love someone although. There is a stark reality to deep and true fellowship. Best friends are as fun as they are gritty; as substantive as they are silly; as full as they are flirty. We are at an age where friends are splitting apart to coagulate into subgroups of the newly-married, the parents, the singles, the couples, the fast-trackers, the students, the wanderers; the taxonomic code for the 20-somethings. To have any sort of fellowship that can withstand that is a wonder.
I talked to a friend today who is in a rather vicious fight with a friend. They are no longer speaking and probably won't for a long time, if ever. But my friend was brutally honest when he said that if his friend was ever in need, he wouldn't hesitate to be there for him, no questions or favors asked. I asked why. He said, "Because he is my friend."
I have drawers, boxes and frames full of photos of blooming, wilting, and withered friendships. They stare back at me, visceral and visual bastions of memories, reminders of what comes and, all too often, goes. They become like ghosts. I have had the creme-de-la-creme of best friends; there are nights when I'd like to exercise their memories, others when I would love to see them and smile once more--not like old times, but in an ever-refreshing, ever growing manner.
"There are ghosts from my past that own more of my soul
Than I thought I had given away
They linger in closets and under my bed
And in pictures less proudly displayed..." [J.Knapp]

Listing Slightly

As of late my thoughts have become rather structured, thus I have given in to obsessive list making. It's more than things to do, buy, sell or organize; it's more abstract. Like I spent over an hour the other day thinking about what would be on my celebrity iTunes playlist, if I were indeed a celebrity commissioned to make just such a list. It is a good list, but it's 30 songs long.
The countdown to the invasion of Iraq was the spring of my senior year of college, and for some reason my friend Dylan and I took it as a sign that the "civilized" world as we know it was perilously close to blowing up and we became obsessed with what we would do in such a situation. Like we would be in a bar, talking about sources of vitamin C in the winter months.
Since then this topic has become a favorite of mine, especially in the list making department. There are lots of lists to be made about the end of the world. For example: what to pack and why. Who do I bring and why. Where do I go? What should I learn between then and now? What should I purchase for my end of the world survival pack?
Between books I've been reading and the current situation of the world I've come to see that we are past due for a major disaster, and I don't say that in a fatalist, wear-a-sandwich-board-and-yell sort of way, I say that in a very logical, scientific way. We as a planet go through major periods of geographic and meteorological upheaval, and to have had such a stretch of relative calm for so long is not only abnormal it's scary.
And I've lost my steam.
Sorry that's it, I'm falling asleep.
So yeah, I made these two lists (the packing for disaster and/or iTunes) . I'll post 'em if I have the chance.