Sex, Death, Rock-n-Roll- and It’s Eternity In There

November 10, 2015Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I never really made it a point to contemplate the paradox of sex and death. Perhaps someone ten years (and more, sadly) removed from the enjoyment of carnal pleasure isn’t qualified to comment, but I still live, breathe and dream. I have desires whether I can act on them or not.

The French have a way of making things that can sound vulgar in English a little more mysterious and exotic. A ménage a trois doesn’t sound as bad as a threesome, even though it means exactly the same thing. So while calling an orgasm la petite mort (the little death) can seem a bit melodramatic and bordering on morbid, it is certainly apropos.

These things usually hit me when I least expect it, if not in unbidden memories, then in dreams.

Old Dr. Freud would be having a heyday with my dreams. The things I find myself embroiled in (in dreams, that is) that would leave me shocked and mortified in the waking world are beyond the pale. Which may be why they are safely relegated to dreams. The things I imagine are just too impossible for reality, and I will not attempt to chronicle them here.

Yes, Dream. After Dream (the Journey album) is awesome. My dreams are just bizarre. And rated X.

Many years ago, Stephen King wrote a short story called The Jaunt. It was about a scientist who discovered a virtually cost-free way to teleport people through time and space. The only problem is that living things would die shortly after being “jaunted”- unless they were put under anesthetic. At the end of the story, the man telling the story to his children awakes in horror as his son went through the Jaunt awake- and the son had aged by decades and decades and gone quite mad, before he dropped dead.

Before the son dropped dead his last words were, “It’s eternity in there.”

Of course The Jaunt’s version of eternity isn’t a positive one, so it’s probably not the best illustration of that moment where time stands still and the universe is simply two, but it’s a similar concept. There is a dimension beyond time, for good or ill.

When I was growing up I was given the impression that sex was The Ultimate Sin and the only thing worse than utilitarian procreational-only married sex is murder. It didn’t help that Mom is old-school Catholic (and I mean pre-Vatican II) and Dad is more or less a lapsed Regular Baptist. Both of their traditions will drill it in your head that you are better off dead than to have sex and enjoy it.

Yes, Christians are hypocrites, just like everyone else.

Good “Christian soldiers” are allowed to have sex only if they are married to each other, the lights are out, the only position is man-on-top missionary style, they only do it because they’re trying to make a baby, and they aren’t allowed to enjoy it.

We did what? For that? Why?

Since I never really had a desire to go out and kill people, (at least not a desire to kill anyone that overrides my fear of arrest and inevitable incarceration) then for me, sex was the only “mortal sin” that had any allure to it. And it had a LOT of allure to it when I was younger. I freely admit it. I just had a really hard time finding suitable, complicit males. That was probably a blessing in disguise, and nature’s way of chlorinating the gene pool to some extent.

I’m not into carpooling, because I’d rather “ride with Hitler” than with the friendly neighborhood serial killer. I like having my car all to myself.

My son doesn’t get the sex=mortal sin concept because I made a conscious effort not to represent it to him that way. My mother may have given me the “dirty duty” speech, but I didn’t pass that along, except for comedic effect, when he was much, much older.

The more a parent makes a “forbidden fruit” sound absolutely vile and horrible, the more likely the offspring are to run right out and try it to see if it’s as horrible as Mom and Dad contend. As much as possible, I tried to give him the rational approach to life, as in yes, sex is good, but with certain boundaries. Such as “try not to bang ex-strippers,” “wrap that rascal,” and “avoid venereal diseases.”

So where did they get it? The dance hall?

There is good reason for caution in the pursuit of all things amorous. The 1980s taught us that the anti-sex crowd had a point: sex with the wrong partner can kill you.

I guess once they give you AIDS, retribution is sort of pointless.

For centuries humanity has known the fear and shame of venereal diseases, and the possibility of a lifetime of pain or even an untimely death for a moment of pleasure are quite real.

Even given the potential risks involved with sexual congress, I don’t think I can agree with the lights-out missionary-position sex-for-procreation-only crowd. I do believe in caution in guarding one’s body as well as one’s heart and spirit, but not in total denial.

There is a certain distasteful and soul-killing element in the “friends with benefits” mentality, just as there is a distasteful and soul-killing element in the outright rejection of something that is a gift and a blessing in the proper context.

When the person and the moment is right, surrender to that universe of two. Savor, enjoy, revel, and live, and thank God for that rare opportunity.

It’s eternity in there.

“Normal?” – Not My Relatives! Wanna Pet My Kid’s Skunk?

October 27, 2015Tonya Lanthron 2 Comments

Yes. It’s a skunk. Yes. It is sleeping atop my offspring.

I am more of a dog person than anything. I like cats too, and I have cats, but to me there is nothing like the relationship one can have with a dog.

I have no idea what got the POMC started in on skunks, other than he really doesn’t connect with cats, and he’s somewhat freaky about dogs. He was dog bit rather severely when he was nine. His right hand might look normal now, but that dog chewed it up like burger meat and he has permanent nerve damage. Dogs have pretty much given him the creeps ever since, which really sucks.

He had ferrets in high school, much to my mother’s disgust, because ferrets have a funk. Even I can smell ferret funk, which means they must smell pretty nasty to most people. Odor aside, they just never really thrilled me much. I’ve heard them described as “cat snakes,” which is about right. Dinky, sneaky little bastards as far as I’m concerned.

In the skunk’s defense, he is de-scented and the only thing about him that really smells is his shit. Skunk shit is nasty, nasty, nasty. The skunk himself, however, is very clean and doesn’t really have a smell to him.

Even so, I’d rather deal with a dog or a cat. Skunks have sensitive digestive systems and special nutritional needs. They have to have their food specially prepared (sort of like feeding a toddler) unlike a dog or cat who can eat prepackaged dog or cat food and be cool with it. It’s also a real pain in the hiney to find a vet who will deal with skunks. Their anatomy and physiology is nothing like dogs or cats, so the vets that will work with them generally cost up the wazoo.

Most vets don’t want to see anything that isn’t a cat or a dog. I can’t say I blame them.

Skunks are a vector for rabies in the wild, which is enough to scare off most people from owning them. However, the truth is that the only way for any mammal to get rabies is to be bitten by something with rabies. Domestic, captive born skunks don’t have rabies, and won’t get rabies unless something with rabies bites them. Captive born and kept indoors, skunks are just as safe to keep as a pet (and not a rabies risk!) as an indoor cat.

Harmless as Jezebel? I don’t give my indoor cats rabies shots because there’s no way for them to get bitten by something that’s rabid.

The dogs do get rabies shots because a.) they go outside and therefore in theory can be bitten by something rabid, and b.) state law requires it.

I am one of those weird people who can really go off on bizarre tangents at times. I bought – and read with fascination- this book some while back- Rabid: A Cultural History of the World’s Most Diabolical Virus.. It’s a compelling read on a rather off the wall subject. I will have to let the illustrious offspring borrow this one if he’s in the mood for some enlightening late night reading. Of course my tastes in literature are mostly non-fiction (science and history) and often tend to gravitate toward the macabre.

I don’t think I have one “normal” relative. Not one. My son passes for normal most of the time, but they are all certifiable.

Mom is probably the one that’s the closest to the cuckoo’s nest- she’s bi-polar with a heaping helping of anxiety, OCD, and extreme naïveté to go along with it. Jerry is a laundry list of fun beginning with adult ADHD, Helpless Man syndrome, and ending with a rip roaring case of what I call “functional drunk.”

Dad’s gotten a lot more fun since he’s gotten old. It wouldn’t surprise me that like his own father he decides now that he’s 70 years old that, “I’m not old. I’m middle aged.” Nobody had the heart to tell Grandpa when he turned 70 that it was highly unlikely he’d see 140, but he did live to be 91. I guess it’s all about your attitude.

There’s a phenomenon with some older people where their frontal lobe (the “traffic cop” of the brain) sort of wears out and doesn’t screen one’s conversation as thoroughly as it once did, or probably should.

So Dad, who used to be rather tight-lipped and taciturn, has gotten rather cheeky as he ages. His oh-so scathing commentary is starting to remind me of my grandmother and great-grandmother (ironically my mother’s mother and grandmother, go figure) and it’s a hoot. It drives Mom nuts, on the rare occasion she actually gets the reference and/or the double entendre. I’m glad that most of the time it goes over her head, for her own sanity and well being.

Mom has her own special brand of near-senility which is even more creepy than my Dad flipping off traffic. She has always gravitated to the mega-weird parts of Catholicism which is downright scary, but the older she gets the more she watches EWTN, goes to Mass and Confession, and is grabbing on that rosary. Normally I would say religious disciplines would be a good thing, but she gets Really Weird with it. She thought that if she left EWTN on all the time full blast that the POMC would see the Catholic light and become a priest. Never mind that he’s pretty much agnostic and really creeped by “men in dresses.”

To top that off, she’s also blithely ignorant that it’s really, really gauche to ask someone who is a confessional Lutheran and who has done a lot of theological and spiritual soul searching to come on down to the Catholic cathedral to venerate some dead saint’s bones. Apparently the Catholic school she went to didn’t teach too much about Martin Luther, the 95 Theses, and the Reformation.

I had to decline the bone-gazing and necromancy out of conscience, but as far as she knows I declined because I had to do laundry. I’d rather tell a little white lie – though I really did do laundry- than go through a detailed theological dissertation on why I don’t venerate saints’ bones. I don’t need to hurt her feelings.

Even the POMC is borderline OCD. His car and motorcycle both are testament to that.

Both of my sisters could be called “castrating bitches,” due to the fact that they both can run a man like a railroad.

And here I sit with my own frailties and funky wiring.

Short Attention Span Theatre, House Hunting, and Feminine Mystique?

April 22, 2015Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I love old Victorian architecture, but not being “handy” – this would be a bad idea, at least for me.

Steve-o is finally bound and determined to buy a house. It’s probably a good idea, since Mom is getting even nuttier than normal. I know it’s getting bad for him when she leaves her TV on the EWTN (the 24/7 all-Catholic, all the time,) channel full blast all the time. I know she’s trying to work the Catholic brownie point system- and the older she gets the more paranoid she gets about it- but Steve-o’s not Catholic. If she’s looking for a conversion candidate so she can earn points for redeeming a heathen, I can think of much easier prey.

If Mom only knew. ALL guys do it.

All of his religious instruction took place in a Lutheran church (where “self abuse” and/or contraception are not generally considered sins), and even so, he’s not a particularly religious kind of guy. Wigging him out on the more bizarre points of Catholicism, which you will get a real education on if you watch EWTN for very long, is NOT going to result in him converting to Catholicism and joining the priesthood.

Major Logo FAIL. In So Many Ways…

I am surprised he’s not having nightmares similar to the ones I had as a child over some of the more bizarre teachings. He likes women and the horizontal mambo way too much for that noise. He is at a point in his life where he is really questioning the existence of God and there is nothing apart from the power of the Holy Spirit Himself that will be able to bring him to faith. Even then, sincerely it would take an Act of God to get him to even consider going back to church- any Christian church. Right now spiritually he is rather injured and cynical. He’s at that difficult point of finding it hard to believe in God because he is thinking, “How can a good God let me down- and let me hurt so bad?” He’s still getting over being rejected by his daughter’s mother, and even though he would never admit how much that crushed him, that was a really deep wound.

I know this because I have been there too, as far as being rejected and feeling as if God abandoned me. I went through that doubt and angst for about seven years at one time. Steve-o is too authentic and too intellectual to “get it” about faith easily, or without perusing the evidence. He’s going to have to be one of those seekers and knockers and askers (more like screamers at times…) like I was. For him faith will be like it is for me- only by the hard way. An unexamined faith, and a faith without doubts, is not faith at all.

Faith is vexing, but unbelief is illogical.

I don’t mean to bash Catholics, and frankly, I can go along with most of what the RCC (Roman Catholic Church) teaches. I have the same problems with Catholicism that Martin Luther had- the primacy of the pope, the celibacy of priests, the purchase of indulgences for the forgiveness of sins, and the whole concept of a brownie point system where forgiveness is earned in any way by what people do. I’ve actually read the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and according to their rules, if you don’t believe and go along with everything the Church teaches, then by definition, you can’t claim to be Catholic. I have real intellectual problems with just accepting what some person (not God) or even some “esteemed group of people” says without being accorded any sort of space for analysis or debate. That makes me Protestant by definition. Just sayin’.

No, this is NOT me.

I’m still struggling with the concept of the feminine image of God and the importance of beauty in God’s view that we have been going over in our study. Maybe that whole concept sort of pisses me off in a way, because I’ve never seen myself as beautiful, and I’ve never really been regarded as much more than a Fetcher of Beer, or someone to whine at about food, or someone to clean up when there’s dog shit on the floor. From my earliest memory I’ve been defined by what I can or can’t do, (and by how epic my failures are) but I’ve never felt as if anyone saw me as having any sort of native, intrinsic value.

I know that I talk the talk and I get it, at least intellectually, that salvation is a gift of grace- nothing that I can earn or deserve- but deep in my heart of hearts I am still that pathetic, geeky little girl who the other kids threw mud and bugs at. I’m still the awkward kid who doesn’t belong, still the girl the guys approached to get her phone number- so they could call her sisters. I was never anyone’s first choice, and was doing good to be a consolation prize.

I’m still sticking with the study even though it’s tearing open some really old wounds. Heart is a LOT harder to reach than Mind.

That’s what continuous multitasking will do for you.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I really don’t enjoy multitasking. I don’t like being interrupted at all. When I’m doing what I want to be doing I don’t get distracted…until someone else bugs me and nags me about doing something else or doing something in addition to what I’m doing.

Sometimes I just need to tell the rest of the world to bite me sideways.

Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust, and Life is a Limited Time Offer

February 18, 2015Tonya Lanthron 2 Comments

I’m not sure which one(s) is (are) dead in the pic, but I’m pretty sure they all are by now.

It’s Ash Wednesday again- a day to reflect on personal mortality and the myriad imperfections of humanity, so here I am trotting out the postmortem pics collection. As macabre as it is, I know I’m not the only one who is fascinated with Victorian era postmortem photography. As for the kid in the above pic, he looks like he’s seen a ghost. Mom and Dad look pretty much comatose, which is why I can’t tell for sure who’s dead and who’s not. I’m pretty sure I would have the same expression on my face as the kid if I were required to sit that close to dead people, so that’s another reason why I wonder if the kid, the parents, just one or the other parent, or all three were dead when this pic was taken. The reality is, now anyway, that they are all dead, unless the kid is 120 or something. Physical death is a 100% probability- it’s going to happen- and it’s just a question of when.

I could even get into a little Southern Baptist soteriology (even though it’s a bit odd because SB’s don’t observe Ash Wednesday) right about now too. Turn or burn, baby. You are gonna be worm food, so now’s your time to Get Right with the Lawd-uh!

Somehow seeking salvation from a dog and pony show like this seems about as effective as taking driving lessons from Ted Kennedy.

I do like her wig though. If only it were black.

I have had a rather cynical relationship with organized religion through the years. When I decided to read the Catechism of the Catholic Church (which many self-proclaimed Catholics have not) I learned that if I am to be intellectually honest with myself and with God there is no way I can claim to be Roman Catholic. There is some Weird Stuff in there. I almost joined an SB church because their theology tends to be very black and white. Saved/not saved, sin/not sin, and so on. You can know if you’re IN or OUT. I love the Baptist emphasis on Bible study too- but- for me the big problem with Baptists in general is that they tend to put too much on human free will- such as we “choose” to believe. I’m here to say that I firmly believe it’s God doing the choosing, and I don’t claim to understand that.

I discovered confessional Lutheranism when I was in college, and of all the interpretations and expressions of Christianity, to me it makes the most sense. Lutheranism- in its classic sense, is not perfect, but it allows for the grey areas, and allows for intellectual honesty and questions. There is space for the mystery that is God. There is understanding for my lack of ability to comprehend.

I have a hard time understanding why you would take pics of a dead kid surrounded by paper angels, but it was a different time.

I wish I could believe spiritual things as black and white (and there are some things that are) but I find myself asking way too many questions- questions where I simply have to accept the mystery and be okay that the answer is either something I don’t know or can’t understand.

I’m glad that I’m not the one who makes the vast decisions of the cosmos. I’m doing good to decide what to wear or what to eat, and grateful to have both clothes and food.

I’m pretty sure no one is going to want to memorialize me in stained glass.

I have more questions than answers and more failures than successes, but I have to believe there is some reason why I am sucking up valuable oxygen for the time being, whether I get it or not.

(Jesus said:) “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal.For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Matthew 6:19-21 (NRSV)

Today’s questions would be, “Where is my treasure? Where is my heart?”

I really have to think about both of those questions today.

Discipline Your Kids, A Fresh Outlook, and I Need a Road Trip- Bad

April 17, 2014Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

Do your kids a favor- teach them to behave like civilized people- at least in public!

When I was growing up in the dark ages of the 1970s-early 1980s, acting out in public was a sure fire way to get yourself beaten into the next county by the next nearest adult. If you were unfortunate enough to be beaten out in public by a non-parental adult, when one’s parents did find out, (and they always did) you were beaten again- to make sure you were beaten good enough. Now people are afraid to even say anything to someone else’s miscreant child, fearing the wrath and possible litigation by the parents. That sucks. There are a good number of kids I see out in public that could use a good old fashioned hiney-warming. I’d do it… if I thought the parents would have the good sense to back me up. I guess they would rather announce to the world that their children are being raised by wolves than to administer a bit of well placed correction.

There was no sparing the rod (or spoiling this child) in my family. Believe that.

Mom (being the good Catholic mother she aspired to be) would beat the daylights out of you for messing up the Catholic Calisthenics during Mass. Even if you were a toddler (sorry, NO nursery) you did not sit when the rest of the congregation kneeled, nor did you stand when the rest of the congregation sat. You did not have a coloring book, crayons or Cheerios. You sang every word to every hymn, and you did not fail to respond with the correct responses as printed in the Missal.

The word “Missal”- for those who were fortunate enough to have been raised in a Protestant tradition-isn’t a typo. I am a bit of a spelling Nazi after all. “Missal” is sort of the Catholic how-to guide to Mass, and is never to be used as a “missile,” as in a projectile to throw at an annoying sibling. Even though my sisters did.

Siblings fight. So why do people have multiple children? Especially if one of them just ends up being a punching bag?

As an adult I can appreciate liturgical worship- and I do- but it was baffling to me as a kid.

Sunday morning Mass sort of went like this:

Dad drops us off at church. Dad did not do Mass. Ever. He would be back in about an hour or two. Church wasn’t Dad’s cup of tea, especially in a church where, as he would say, “the preacher wears a dress.”

Follow Mom up the steps and (unless you wanted dragged out by the hair and back handed within an inch of your life) don’t forget to bless yourself with holy water and genuflect (another foreign word for Protestants- kneel before you walk down the aisle to find a seat because you’re approaching the altar) before sitting in whatever seat she thinks you should sit in. Mom liked to park us in the second or third pew from the very front- where the priest can be sure to give you the stink eye any time the word “hell” is mentioned. Hope and pray that (as usual) I didn’t get sandwiched between both sisters and therefore was open to assault from both sides.

Find the Missal. Follow the instructions to the letter even while being poked, prodded, pinched and wet willie’d from both sides.

Spend a few minutes wondering why Jesus chooses to live in the funky gold box where the communion wafers were stored- when He’s not out and about looking for sins and finding reasons why you should go to hell, that is.

Sing the closing hymn and hope Mom didn’t decide to chit-chat with every single one of her old bitty friends on the way out, although it was inevitable that she would.

It’s a wonder – or should I say a gift of the Spirit- that I can set foot in church at all. But that is a very long story.

I do appreciate the aesthetic of Gothic architecture, especially if we don’t try to jack it up by doing a “70s update” on a 19th century (or earlier) building. The church I went to as a kid was one of those beautiful Gothic style churches- until someone decided the interior needed a cheesy 70s update that included green astroturf carpet, everything painted white and green (acck!) and just plain hokey furniture. Either you want to go modern or have the Gothic aesthetic, but the two styles don’t mix. It’s church, not steampunk (which is half ways tolerable, ’cause steampunk is cool) and definitely not the set of “The Price is Right,” which is what that hideous “renovation” reminded me of.

Just substitute green for red, and that was pretty much how tacky it looked.

Church would have been a bit more interesting with Bob Barker. At least when I was a little kid. Grandma loved “The Price is Right.” That was back when Bob Barker still dyed his hair.

I need a road trip but don’t really have anywhere I want to go or, should I say, can afford to go and have time to go. I still want to go to the Mütter Museum in Philadelphia and I’m going to have to figure out the logistics. I have to go to my nephew’s graduation in NC next month, but that’s more of a “have to” than a recreational pursuit. Not to mention Dad scares the living hell out of me with his need for speed while driving in the mountains. I’ve never been comfortable with mountain driving- especially considering we will probably be in their Dodge minivan. It will probably be my luck it will be rainy and windy too while he’s going 90MPH down a 6% grade.

The last time I let Dad drive on a road trip, I closed my eyes and put the Ramones’ “I Wanna Be Sedated” on repeat. That helped.

I really, really need some quality ivory tower time, as in several days of being completely away from dealing with other humans. The bad thing is that’s not going to happen.

No, I Don’t Have Any Green Clothes

March 17, 2014Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I don’t own any green clothes. I don’t like the idea of weirdos trying to pinch me, either.

St. Patty’s Day isn’t really high on my radar of secular holidays. I don’t drink beer, and even if I did, it wouldn’t be green.

It’s sort of depressing that someone took the guy who brought Christianity to the heathens in Ireland and turned his festival day into a drinking holiday. I still think green beer and leprechauns would be more suitable if we were celebrating Benny Hill’s birthday, but maybe that’s just me.

I guess it’s a good thing leprechauns are white. Otherwise we wouldn’t be able to make fun of them. Or get creeped out by them. I always looked at leprechauns as sort of creepy mini-trolls.

At least it’s not Hans Strudel.

When did German=Fruity?

The Irish have always been sort of “people who get picked on.” Maybe it’s because a lot of them are Catholic. Maybe it’s because they like to get drunk and fight. But the same descriptives also apply to Italians, and nobody bothers them.

Then there’s the Thrifty Scotsman, which is a stereotype I can understand. My grandmother’s father immigrated (legally, may I add- Dad has his documentation) from Scotland. My great grandfather died long before I was born, but my grandmother was one of the most thrifty people I ever knew- cutting coupons, hitting the sales, stocking up on dozens of three-pound cans of Folger’s when it was cheap, and so forth. That might have been because she was half Scots (her mother was German) but it might have been because she grew up in the Depression, too.

Grandma always had a few extra cans of Folger’s.

I don’t think I’ve had green clothes since I was old enough to buy my own clothes. Almost everything I have is either pink, black or jeans.

Suicide: I Sort of Understand- But- The Dirt Nap Awaits Us All

November 25, 2013Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

“And I usually drink my dinner!”

I really enjoyed Burgess Meredith’s performances in the “Grumpy Old Men” movies. I especially enjoyed the death reference from the movie “Grumpier Old Men”:

Grandpa:   What the… what the hell is this?
John:   That’s lite beer.
Grandpa:   Gee, I weigh ninety goddamn pounds, and you bring me this sloppin’ foam?
John:   Ariel’s got me on a diet because the doc said my cholesterol’s a little too high.
Grandpa:   Well let me tell you something now, Johnny. Last Thursday, I turned 95 years old. And I never exercised a day in my life. Every morning, I wake up, and I smoke a cigarette. And then I eat five strips of bacon. And for lunch, I eat a bacon sandwich. And for a midday snack?
John:   Bacon.
Grandpa:   Bacon! A whole damn plate! And I usually drink my dinner. Now according to all of them flat-belly experts, I should’ve took a dirt nap like thirty years ago. But each year comes and goes, and I’m still here. Ha! And they keep dyin’. You know? Sometimes I wonder if God forgot about me. Just goes to show you, huh?

Suicide isn’t a joke, even though I sort of understand the mentality behind wanting to just plain blot out. There have been times in my life when I’ve thought about it, and then the old Catholic teaching that suicide is a mortal sin sticks in my head. In old school Catholic thought, killing yourself is more or less similar to drawing the “go to jail” card in Monopoly, but with a twist:

I don’t know why, but this was always my visual for “Mortal Sin.”

The older I get, the more I realize that what seems like the end of the world really isn’t the end of the world. It might hurt like hell. It might be physical pain, or even chronic pain that never really goes away. It might be that nameless void in which there are no words or even tears, but only a sharp and consuming bolt of terror and sadness and longing that knocks your breath away. Even that is not the end of the world.

The older I get, the more tenaciously I cling to life- if only because experience has taught me that there is life (and good life to be had) even beyond the unspeakable, nameless void of grief, beyond the burning pain of rejection, beyond the uncertainty of worldly trappings, and even in the endurance of chronic physical pain.

Hell? Or is it just Detroit?

I know it’s hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, especially when you’re a fifteen year old kid and all you’ve ever known is deprivation and loss and a sad sense of being unworthy of sucking up valuable oxygen. I’ve been there.

I don’t know exactly what kind of despair was behind the recent teen suicides here in central Ohio. I know I wouldn’t want to be a high school kid today, but things sucked back in my world too. We faced an uncertain future. There were people like me with thick glasses and bad clothes and geeky habits who were just about as popular as stepping in dog shit on a hot day, but we survived. Some of us went on to thrive, although in my case I wouldn’t claim any kind of stellar, charmed life- but it’s life. I’ll take what I can get and give what I can give and at the end of the day, that’s all.

I don’t have the answers. I’m not God, which is a good thing, because if I controlled the world it would be pretty much unrecognizable. There would be a lot of buff dudes in Spandex, and no such thing as rap music. That much I could guarantee, but then again I am not the one in control.

There is a certain amount of peace in accepting that there are some questions that will never be answered and some concepts that I was never designed to understand. I don’t have much comfort or solace for those who survive after a loved one commits suicide except to say that there is life beyond the breathless void, and that some day there will be good life beyond that void. I will also say that God is big enough to take whatever anger and frustration and pain that you are willing to surrender to Him.

Our time is short. That doesn’t necessarily disturb me too much. I’ve been close to death, and I’m not afraid to die. I don’t like the prospect of suffering and pain and I understand that there are times when death would be a relief and a comfort. As far as I can tell, as of right now, I’m not there yet.

Ask not for whom the bell tolls…

Picking On the Emotionally Impaired, and I Wanna Be Sedated

November 4, 2013Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

But how do you keep them out? They’re like zombies- and they’re multiplying.

Every once in awhile I like the Ramones, even though their songs are to music as junk food is to real food- trite, and full of empty calories, but oddly satisfying while they are being consumed. I don’t think I could sit through hours and hours of “Blitzkrieg Bop” and “I Wanna Be Sedated,” but I like to just zone out and not have to think too much every now and then. The Ramones are good for that.

My penchant for rock, metal and the occasional grunge or punk fix would make my voice teachers cringe, but the line between classical music and orchestral metal is a very fine one. Even though I’ve not played bass or fronted a metal band in 20 years, I still find the musician in me analyzing what I’m listening to. I still have an appreciation for what is technically good and what is more or less musical junk food, for whatever that’s worth. I hate to say it, but that’s probably why most of my MP3 collection dates back to 1985 and earlier.

There is some good new music out there today, but it’s not mainstream. You have to know where to look. The unholy crud that is currently polluting the airwaves and the TV screens generally does suck. It sucks like sucking has never sucked before. We have fantastic, amazing, digital technology but we’re recording and distributing total crap on it. We traded Steve Perry for Katy Perry (really sucky trade there) and I don’t understand why. I mean in 1981 we had Steve Perry as the greatest singer ever and Ronald Reagan as president. Today we have Katy Perry and Obama. Go figure. The evidence for devolution is right before our eyes (and ears.) Blecch.

I’m just thankful that through the gift of technology I can bring the past up to date in some ways. I can get good music on MP3s and save good songs to my SD card so I can spare myself from the pollution of the airwaves.

When Jerry and I went on the train ride last week it was cold. The train was delayed because they had oversold and had to add cars to the train. A fat old lady took Jerry’s seat while he decided to go out and smoke because we had to wait, even when I told him that it was crowded, therefore, the “move your feet lose your seat” rule would come into play, so we had to find different seats to sit together. Even so, it was a good time and very interesting. The train car we rode in until the first stop was built in 1927, the second car we rode on for the rest of the trip was built in the mid 1950s and had two levels. We sat up top in the second car for a better view.

On the first car we sat behind a Japanese family. Mom and Dad were facing Jerry and I, while their teenage son and preteen daughter were sitting across from their parents. I could see over the boy’s shoulder that he was more interested in his i-phone and his animé cartoons that would be porn if they weren’t cartoons. My question is, since animé is just cartoons, is it really porn or is it just a porn substitute? His mother probably still would have been mortified if she had seen what I was getting an eyeful of, but either she didn’t know or didn’t care about what Junior was watching.

I remember Steve-o’s brief infatuation with animé “sort-of-porn” at the same age. I knew full well what he was gawking at online, but I figured if I made a big scene over it like my mother did over anything even remotely risqué that it would become an obsession for him. She was more wigged out about finding rubbers in his personal effects than about finding cigarettes, which struck me odd. Sex can potentially kill you, but wearing a rubber can help prevent STDs, so he’s mitigating that risk. Cigarettes are in no way safe. I was more upset about the smokes. But Mom’s Catholic, and as far as I know for Catholics, smoking is not considered a sin- you can be a priest and smoke- but sex (unless one is married and having sex for procreational reasons only) is a mortal sin. Doesn’t that suck?

I’m no paragon of moral virtue, so I have absolutely no room to talk.

Dog Doo, Tea Bagging, Dingbats and Family Annoyances

January 29, 2013Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I’ve never been much for political correctness, but my boobs aren’t speaking to you, bubba.

I’ve always had a sort of loathing for meetings/seminars/workshops in which the facilitator requires the participants to wear name tags. At least a name tag like this could have served a practical purpose in a few of those sort of events. I appreciate my anonymity, and hide behind it whenever I can. I never had the choice of a cute HK tag to wear, even as the only chick at most of the automotive functions (there still aren’t very many female parts or service managers in car dealerships) I’ve attended.

I really don’t give two shits in a high wind if some stranger from Moose Dick, Alaska, who I will never see again, remembers my boobs, or my name. I’d rather he forget them both. Unless he’s hot, and there are exactly -0- hot guys on the planet who have ever bothered to drool on my shirt.

I’ve considered it a plus when the boob-oglers had teeth and hair.

Of course now that I’m older, the kinds of guys who would be ogling my cleavage (providing their vision is still good enough) have gotten even more scary than they used to be.

Some older guys are hot. Unfortunately they were hot when they were younger too, and they ignored me then, too. I was a kegger when I was 21, and that has not improved with age. I am not one of the beautiful people, and usually that doesn’t bother me much.

I guess if you’re that dumb, you deserve to be removed from the gene pool.

Today I’m sounding pretty misandrist (which is unusual for me, because I generally like men and get along better with them than with other women) and I’m sure it has to do with Jerry. He did go and work out last night which I am proud of him for. I just hope he isn’t too disheartened to find out that he can’t keep up with me. I can bench press more than he can. But in all fairness I quit smoking over 10 years ago, I don’t drink, and I’ve been working out already pretty consistently for the past 3 years. He’s 12 years older than me, still smokes like a freight train, considers beer a food group, and lifts weights 12 ounces at a time. That mindset apparently doesn’t do jack for your upper body strength.

Jerry can be a horrible dingbat at times and he displayed that today. I really hate any family member calling me at work unless it’s something important. Usually it’s dumb shit that can wait. Unless someone is in the hospital or dead, or by some Miracle of God I’ve come into some serious money, I really don’t want to hear about it. I have to talk to enough people and hear about enough problems while I’m at work without listening to anyone’s tirade about this that or the other thing that I can’t remedy until later anyway. Jerry calls me with stupid shit (pun intended) such as “Sheena had the shits all over the floor.”

Yes, Jerry, clean it up! With your bare hands! Why not?

So then I get to dread cleaning up congealed diarrheal dog shit for all the rest of the day. Thanks, Jerry, for being the shit monitor. How about YOU cleaning it up every once in awhile? Jerry’s really good about pointing out the (blessedly rare) dog or cat accidents, but then he claims that “I can’t clean it up, because I’ll puke.” Granted, I have a very limited sense of smell, but I can see, and I can feel, and I can be weird about germs, so what makes you think cleaning up shit is less gross for me, Captain Oblivious?

Mom is just as bad. She will call me with some (usually) imagined crisis (usually involving Steve-o, Sophie, or one of my nephews) that I can’t do a damned thing about, only to find out later that she was making yet another mountain out of another molehill. Steve-o is 21. If he decides he wants to hang out with his buddies, or whatever, it’s not a Federal case. As far as how he is raising his daughter, he and her mother seem to be doing a good job. Barring neglect or abuse, I will not intervene with their parenting. I had a hell of enough time raising my own offspring to be butting in on how others raise theirs.

As far as parenting my nephews, apparently she doesn’t have the courage to approach my sisters every time she thinks they’ve stepped outside their bounds. In reality, my sisters are much stricter with my nephews than I ever was with Steve-o. Unless they are doing illegal things or egregiously immoral things, it is none of my business and my sisters are responsible for correcting them anyway.

“Mother” does not start with “s.” She is his grandmother, but the no-smother clause works with grandparents as well. She might be Catholic, but, Steve-o’s not. (See the video clip from Monty Python’s Meaning of Life on Protestantism which is pretty funny.) Though I may not approve of fornication, I also know that a.) he’s going to, and b.) if he’s going to, using a rubber is a pretty good idea. He already has one offspring that we know about.

“Oooh, what are you doing with condoms!”

I only wish Jerry had been calling to bitch about something as trivial as dog shit. Apparently he failed to understand what I meant, on numerous occasions, when I said I was cancelling a very expensive automatic recurring withdrawal from my checking account (i.e. that I could no longer pay for his life insurance, etc. that had been coming out of my checking account, and that he swore up and down, “yeah, I’ll pay you for it” but never did.) Apparently (oh lucky freaking me) dumb-ass answered the home phone when he was home at lunch, which is only really there for phone solicitors and other people I don’t want to talk to. So the insurance people were wondering why we had cancelled, etc. (and those people are annoying as shit when they call because they get a spiff on every policy they convince you not to cancel) so, not remembering I said I was cancelling the EFT, he proceeded to call me at work and give me a nasty little tirade about it.

Just because I’m used to irrational tirades doesn’t mean I enjoy them.

Joy.

I know I shouldn’t let him take financial advantage of me, (and I’m done with subsidizing these ridiculously overpriced insurance policies) but I will have hell to pay for it. I’m not looking forward to that at all.

Ode to the Crapper, Snake Handlers, and Reality Bites

January 14, 2013Tonya Lanthron 2 Comments

I had an ’88 VW Fox that was similar to this car, only mine was a 4 door, and I knew better than to run it into a tank.

I am not your friendly neighborhood optimist. There are times when I wish I could be, but I was the kid who asked the catechism teacher* (*but NOT any of the teachers who were also nuns) where the bathroom is in heaven. I’m probably the only person on the planet twisted enough to ask that question, but it has a rational foundation. It’s always wise to know the proximity of the nearest crapper, and as much as I would hope eliminatory functions will not be necessary in the next life, I figure if there’s toilets in church, then the need for commodes might just transcend the Great Beyond. It would be my luck.

They would probably be cool old-style Victorian era crappers like this one.

There was indoor plumbing in the late Victorian era, but only rich folks had it. Poor folks had to use the outhouse. My grandparents didn’t get indoor plumbing until the late 1950’s. No, I am not that old. I wasn’t born until the late 1960’s, so I don’t know about their particular outhouse from personal experience. The closest I ever got to a real outhouse was having to use the latrines at the Girl Scout Camp and the State Parks and/or Porto Johns. That was bad enough.

I’m glad I don’t have balls. I do wonder, though, if it’s so nasty, why are you lingering long enough to pull out a Sharpie and make commentary on the Porto-John wall?

For the uninitiated, outhouses may contain snakes, spiders, biting insects such as wasps and hornets, raccoons, mice and possums, or a combination of all of the above. Non-venomous snakes don’t really phase me. I have a ball python. Jerry has a rather tempermental red-tail boa. But pythons and boas are constrictors. They can bite you and that’s not fun, but generally a bite from a constrictor will simply leave you with a few puncture wounds- not much worse than a cat scratch. It’s rare for constrictors that are handled to bite unless they’re hungry and you smell like food.

This is a ball python. Pythons are NON-venomous snakes. I have one just like it, and I have no problem picking him up. He eats juvenile rats.

Venomous snakes are quite another matter. I pretty much know what the “harmless” snakes, such as garter snakes, ball pythons, boas, rat snakes, etc. look like. Rattlesnakes and copperheads are NOT snakes to be handled unless you know what the hell you’re doing, and even those people get bit rather often and sometimes die from it.

Perhaps I shouldn’t mock the snake handlers, but I think the Lord gives out something called “discernment,” and He would rather see people use that to avoid doing dangerous things, instead of people doing irrational things that increase the chances of them earning their Darwin Awards.

The thing I never really understood about snake handling is how is it any different from any other risky behavior? Did Jesus tell people to get drunk and drive, or to run with scissors? It just doesn’t make much sense. Thankfully the snake handling tradition is obscure and it takes its origin from the long ending of the Gospel of Mark, that does not occur in all of the original manuscripts:

“And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes in their hands, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.” Mark 16:16-18 (NRSV)

I wonder if this disclaimer would hold up in court? Does it also apply to the coffee, or are Pentecostals allowed to drink coffee?

I don’t take that snippet from the Gospel of Mark as a directive for going out and deliberately picking up rattlesnakes and copperheads or swilling poison for something to do, but I wasn’t raised in Appalachia or in the Pentecostal tradition. I was raised with old-school Catholicism, which is plenty scary enough, even without venomous snakes or cyanide being involved. We had to deal with nuns. Most of the really creepy stuff associated with Catholicism has to do with the whole business of praying to the dead, people getting the stigmata, and exorcisms, and other way out supernatural freaky kinds of things. I don’t disbelieve in the supernatural, but I do believe that when the spirit world makes itself known here on earth that it’s usually demons and such behind it, and I’d rather steer way clear of that noise.

I have my share of problems, but at least for now my head is screwed on straight, for what it’s worth.

So, maybe I’m the only one to have made the inquiry regarding the necessity of the loo in the Great Beyond. Maybe not. I’m not the only one who wondered why people’s clothes stayed clean on Gilligan’s Island even though they didn’t have either washing machines nor access to Tide.

They are simply too clean.

Maybe there was some of this under the seats in the Minnow or something.

ELYSIANHUNTER, ALWAYS INCITEFUL:

Because comedy is the flipside of tragedy

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