Tag: humor

My dad is tougher than your dad. Yep. I speak the truth, so don’t even try to talk to me about it. My dad is taller than your dad, he’s funnier, and cooler, and you know what? He’s smarter, too. There’s proof. Uh huh, shut up there is!

My dad once swam across White Bear Lake with two of his kids clinging to his back—just for fun. And then there’s the time he threw a softball way the hell down Arcade Street. It was almost bar time so there weren’t any cars out, a warm summer night at Vogel’s Bar. All the guys went out there and bet on him, some one way, and some the other.

It’s important to get the facts straight and keep the myths alive, because dad is sick, and he’s not getting better. He’s getting ready to graduate to the Promised Land. The rest of us, his wife, his kids, grandkids, his sisters, and mother, we’ll be left behind to do the remembering.

My dad is here, for now. He wakes up and he goes to sleep, such as it is with his illness. He sometimes sits in a lazy-back chair where his feet don’t touch the ground. It is not comfortable. My dad is brave. He can hear and speak and see and eat and sometimes he is right there with you, and sometimes he’s not. He holds dear the sound of our mother’s voice. When he hears it, he knows where he is, at least; he’s with her, and he loves her. There might come a time when he no longer recognizes her voice, and will have to take solace in touch. Like we all did, at first.

My dad’s hands are thick and hard. They are the kind of hands that have always worked. He can kill mice with his bare hands. He can kill bats with a tennis racket. My dad would never play tennis. But he would kill a bat for you anytime. No trouble at all.

My dad is very handsome, and wore a white dinner jacket à la James Bond to his wedding. He was most comfortable, and equally as handsome, in blue jeans. Once, a long time ago, I made my dad a pair of ugly slippers out of potholders. He could look good in anything.

My dad has a heart of steel. People who know him appreciate the design. The flaws, the dings and scratches, only accentuate the authenticity of a classic. He loves his family, a fine meal, and a good laugh. He loves it when a job is well done and the bills are paid. His resting pulse is forty. My dad’s heart is like a powerfully built muscle car. A ’74 Mustang or maybe a mint ’79 Ford F-150.

My dad knows things before anybody else does. If something bad is going to happen to you, say you’re about to get screwed on a used car or your rain gutters are loose, he’ll be the first to warn you of impending danger. If you don’t listen to him, then that’s your problem. What is he? Your mother?

My dad is a superhero. One time my dad’s car got stuck deep in some mud, and he lifted the whole front end of the car out of the rut. No kidding. If you ask our mom about it, she shrugs it off. “It was a Volkswagen.” My dad does things that you should not try at home.

Recently, I related the Volkswagen story to my husband. He gave me a sweet sideways half-smile, a look I know too well. It means he doesn’t believe me. Since I am the Prime Minister of Exaggeration, there are grounds for this breach of faith. My husband knows my dad is a good guy, an honorable guy, but also a human guy like the rest of us. My husband also knows that one of my recent hobbies is to babble on about my dad in order to stave off the tide of anxiety I feel about losing him, so he draws me close. “Tell me some more about your dad.”

And in those indulgent arms I gabble, remembering everything I can, working around what I can’t. Every word of homage and praise a qualifier for sainthood.

Today you are nothing unless you have flawless, supple skin. Lustrous, thick, bouncy hair. Icy white teeth and breath so fresh it cryogenically freezes your date to the couch. (Take that, Fear-of-Calling-Back Man!)

Never mind that things are even worse for women. As more and more straight guys get “queer eye-tized,” I fear that it sets the bar even higher for girls, grooming-wise. I’m all for my man having clean teeth and fingernails, but I gotta tell you, sometimes a little butt fuzz is just about all that separates me from my favorite ape.

My friend Lori recently said, “Men are the new women.” Then what, dear God, are the old women expected to be? Every time I turn around, it feels like there’s some horrid new procedure or potion that I never knew I needed in order to be well put-together.

I am the kind of person who derives her beauty routine from what’s on sale at the all-night Walgreen’s and how much time is left at the end of the day. If I were to write a beauty book, its title might be something like Fifteen Bucks & Fifteen Minutes: How to Blindly Stab Your Way to Beauty—Some of the Time!

Some days I moisturize, some days I tone. Some days I pluck when I should really be exfoliating, and Lord knows, I’m doing it all wrong. I’ll pay for it later, unless I pay for someone to help me with it now. Either way, I’ll pay.

Every woman knows that achieving a “natural” glow for a night out can easily take two hours and involve ten different shades of powder, ranging subtly from champagne to mochachino. Somehow, this doesn’t bother most of us. We’ve accepted it. We even purport to enjoy it. Who doesn’t like to kick back, drink a glass of wine, and slather our scaly, tired feet with a microwavable packet of peppermint-oil sloughing mud? (Feels refreshing! Like you’re dancing on coals in hell!) You know, maybe round out the night drunkenly counting pores while gaping into a lighted, magnified mirror. A little “me time.”

Undoubtedly, this is the seed of narcissistic desperation that eventually gives way to total self-absorption implosion. Or at the very least, complete body hairlessness. I’m no expert, but stay with me here, I’ve got a theory. If you look at something long enough, its meaning is pliable. Sometimes your makeup mirror is like those holographic mind-bender posters. Stare in it for too long, and you see David Gest staring back at you. Next thing you know, you’ve got a $10,000 Visa bill, six weeks of unpaid post-op recuperation time, and Melanie Griffith’s upper lip.

Personally, my biggest beauty beef is that I’m at that “tween” stage of life where the lines around my eyes don’t disappear anymore when I stop smiling, and yet I have just about as much acne as your average tenth-grader. I’ve been to see the dermatologist and the pimples just keep popping up in all the same spots. My next step is to see a priest, because it seems that my chin is possessed. Once the holy man wrests the demon pustules from my visage, perhaps then, with a clear face, a clear heart and mind will follow.

Or maybe the curse of boils has been visited upon me by the Big Kahuna himself—as a reminder to take care of myself, but not put too much stock in what is only surface politics. Those fifteen minutes at the end of the day for me might be better spent cultivating attributes like integrity and kindness to others. Girlfriends, any stylist worth his weight in false eyelashes can tell you that beauty is only skin deep, but ugly—now that’s an inside job.

March 17th, 8:45 p.m., St. Patrick’s Day. With a name like Colleen, there’s no way in hell I’m going anywhere today. I used to work at Mickey’s Diner right in downtown St. Paul. I’ve seen enough green vomit to qualify me as an exorcist. So… maybe I’ll read the paper.

Business section headline. General Mills falls short of forecasts. CEO Steve Sanger blames sluggish stock value on slow response to “low carb” trend. Hmm. That would be a tough trend to follow for a flour company. Maybe they can transform the Doughboy into something with more Atkins appeal, like “Meatie Man” or “Cheesy Chap.” Hey, or the Bake-Off could award extra points for the entry with the least fiber content.

Front page. I usually save that for last. Too depressing. “DFL fires an early salvo at Pawlenty.” Democratic Party runs TV ads slamming the Governor’s record on the release of sexual predators and his position on the death penalty. Yep. I remember that one. Last summer. He was going to let a bunch of risky pervs out of lockdown to save the state some cash. I guess the state’s goal of keeping known offenders from re-offending is expendable. I have an idea. What about blending non-essential programs? Imagine driving down that lonely stretch of Highway 100 North, the one close to the office parks beyond 494 without the street lights, and coming upon a reassuring green sign: “The next 100 yards patrolled for sexual predators by the Girl Scouts of America.”

“Bubbles, noise may deter bighead carp.” State wildlife officials are proposing an underwater tube that will make a curtain of air bubbles across the Mississippi River to scare away invading Asian carp. You can scare away a hundred-pound fish with bubbles? I suppose that makes sense. Any time I see bubbles in the Bally’s swimming pool I get the hell out of there.

Business section again. Gas prices approaching the $2-a-gallon mark. While the price represents a nasty inconvenience to SUV drivers, the problem could be disastrous for the trucking industry, which is obviously affected by fuel prices. You know, if we can’t afford to ship oranges and asparagus to the middle of the country in the next fiscal year, I think General Mills will have its profit recovery in hand. Carb loading will become a necessity of survival.

Particularly for those who used to depend on Metro Transit. They’re having a tough time making it to the grocery store as the strike wears on, and I imagine they could use a product with a prolonged shelf life. Especially if they can’t get to work, stop paying bills, and their power gets shut off. With no refrigeration, a colorful pouch of substantial, rib-sticking flour will come to the rescue and feed those children! Note to General Mills CEO Steve Sanger: Here’s a new product line for the new permanent underclass. Pillsbury Paste! In eighteen colors and four mouth-watering meat flavors—just add water! Roll it into pellets, add some sugar and a talking bear, and call it breakfast.

Back to the front page. “Bush ads call Kerry vote anti-soldier.” Kerry ads say Bush ads lie. Remaining soldiers in Iraq try not to get blown into anti-soldier matter.

“Inquiry into Medicare bill ordered.” During the Medicare debate, Bush administration officials cited an estimate of $400 billion over ten years in their rehaul plan. A document prepared by Medicare’s chief actuary before the vote, but not shared with Congress, estimated the amount closer to $551 billion. In a bold move, Surgeon General Richard Carmona will chair a special task force that will hold as many as five “listening sessions” on the issue. “Operation Mollify” begins Friday.

I’d better check out the metro section. Pawlenty again. “Pawlenty puts gambling on table.” Governor says if tribes refuse to share casino profits, “we are going to entertain other options.” Options under consideration include an all-you-can-eat buffet at the National Guard Armory, two-drink-minimum Williams and Ree concerts in the Capitol rotunda, and Ann-Margret for lieutenant governor.

Comics page. Nothing funny here. Dilbert still hates his job. Cathy’s still fat. Garfield’s still lazy. And the Family Circle kids remain ignorant of Mommy’s burning desire to escape.

This just in. Paul Douglas’s weather page says spring is on the way. What a job. He said that last year.

Wisconsin Estate Sale, Antiques, Collectables, Linens, Furniture. Quality Household Miscellaneous. Pole Barn Full of Tools. Everything Must Go! Friday,
Saturday and Sunday. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to write one of those ads. But let me tell you, it’s pretty hard to make the words “household miscellaneous” jump off the page. And I had a personal stake in it, too. My parents, their sale. Last November, and I’m still having nightmares about it. But when I catch a case of the sweats at 3 a.m., it’s not my father’s illness I’m thinking about, or the inevitability of his physical decline. I’m not thinking about my mother’s heart, either, which breaks a little more each day as she tries to ease her husband’s suffering. I think about those things in the daylight, in my world, where it seems safer: A world of belligerent teens and gassy old dogs, of crackpot schemes, and my own husband, who I’m beginning to realize just might love me as much as he says he does.

In the daylight, as tough as things can be sometimes, it’s easier to put life’s trials into perspective. It’s possible to look at them more as rites of passage. But the thought process that I employ to force my fears into submission dissolves as soon as I hit the sheets. In dreams I’m racing through a field of lidless Tupperware containers, chasing after buyers and screaming “ONLY FIFTY CENTS! FIFTY CENTS! FIFTY CENTS!”

I get it. It’s the futility of the situation that haunts me. In sleep, it’s just transferred to a related event of tangible effort. I can’t make my dad better, and I can’t take away my mother’s pain. Any more than I can put a dollar value on a rusted coffee can full of nails.

I decided to run my parents’ estate sale when I found out that the only person who ran sales in their community would demand 35 percent of the take. I did a mental tally of what they had left at their house, and in the words of Ed Kruse, well, the hell with that. Any and all profits could stay with my folks. I took a week off from work to get the sale ready. Dear friends and family rallied to the cause. Heavy lifting was done. Coffee was made and drunk. Eye-catching groupings of mom’s tchotchkes were arranged and priced. Joyce, a church friend of my mother’s, enlisted the help of her handy husband Dwayne, and he personally knocked signs in the grass along the highway, five miles in each direction so that no one could miss them.

One of my biggest concerns was the pole barn. It was, indeed, full of tools—some old, many new and never used. It was also full of dreaded Halloween bugs, those nasty ladybug wannabes that crawl into every last crack and corner and never ever ever die. They go dormant, like Cher. There was no way I could hope to empty the barn—much less run outside to staff it anytime someone wanted to buy a pitchfork or a mower. The day before the sale began, a wiry little man arrived early in a big truck. Delbert said he’d heard there were some tools for sale, and wanted to know if he could take an early look. I walked him out to the barn and told him I’d give him a deal. Five hundred bucks if he hauled everything away: my dad’s landscaping tools, his fishing tackle, the jigsaw and workbench. And the bugs. There was a moment of silence while Delbert calculated the merchandise versus the job at hand. Then he turned to me and said: “I ’spect I’ll take it.”

The sale was a huge success. I worked in a white heat, re-arranging wares after each wave of shoppers swept through. In the waning hours of the last day, the new owner of the house showed up. A single man with a classic car collection. My sister Tracy had brought a bottle of champagne, which we poured into paper cups. The three of us stood out on the deck, and toasted good old times and new ones to come. The man told us how nice that pole barn was going to be for his cars, and I laughed in relief, thinking of Delbert.

We cleaned up, ran a vacuum, said our goodbyes. I was the last to leave, but not the last to see the place. Tracy would come back in two weeks with our mom, for the closing. I’m still coming to grips with the fact that everything must go.

Orange Alert, everybody. Avoid crowds. But go shopping. Keep the economy strong. Have an emergency plan in place. A central location for you and your family to meet in the event of, oh, I don’t know…an explosion? The deadly release of a new Ben Affleck movie? Wash your hands, please, but masks are for the Jackson family.

September 12, 2001, I went to the gym. I have a lifetime membership to Bally’s Total Fitness. As it turns out, a person can live a lifetime in just under five hours a year, three of those in the hot tub. But I digress.

I had resolved that my life would forevermore be one long act of virtue. I hit the treadmill, then the weights. As I struggled to switch plates on the barbell, a rather studly man took pity on me and offered his assistance. He had flawless skin, the color of Ceylon tea, and his arms swelled in beautiful rounds out of his T-shirt. His back, held strong and straight, moved gracefully into powerful legs. His body was a temple, a sculpture, a shrine to decent living and strength.

He set the bar and stayed to spot me. He talked a little bit about the use of free weights and I noticed that my friend had an accent. Now, I’ve never been off the continent, and I am not what you’d call a citizen of the world. I am, however, in the people business, and I like to hear of other places, even if I can’t go there.

So I gave Handsome my best line. “Sounds like you got an accent there. Where are you from? North or South Dakota?”

His eyes clouded over and he said, “Why? Are you afraid that I am a terrorist because I sound different? I am from here, same place as you.”

I was horrified that I’d offended him and I tried to explain myself. “I was just curious about where your accent comes from. About where you come from and—”

“I’ll tell you where I come from,” he said quietly, still angry. “I come from a place that has known true devastation, true terror. Look, what has happened, it is tragedy. But it is not devastation. If it were, you and I would not be here right now; we would be fighting to live, to eat. Let me tell you about where I come from.

“Where I come from, people have the grace to starve to death. Here, if catastrophe reigned, the rich would eat the zoo animals, the middle class would eat their dogs, and the poor would eat each other.” And with that, he stalked off.

I looked down at the fat pooling in my waist and thought, “I don’t have the grace to starve myself for two hours.” Then I thought: “Oh my God, he’s right!” And, like it or not, that man’s words haunted me as I feebly completed my workout, mind reeling, my eyes furtively darting round the room. Bally’s turned into Cub Foods.

At first, I settled on the Costco-size person, and then I realized that my normal bulk shopping habits wouldn’t fly in the event of grid failure. Fun-size people would have to do—a more “European” shopping pattern, just buying enough for the day ahead. And suppose there were no market. Could I go “Ventura” and hunt the deadliest prey of all? Honey, I can’t stalk celery. And the only thing I’ve ever killed is time.

Extreme situations force the strength or weakness of a person’s character out of the spider hole. One thing’s for sure: Disaster will come, be it up close and personal or worldwide and cataclysmic. Is it possible to duct-tape your heart to withstand suffering? Can you buy enough batteries to keep it beating until it heals? How do you go about your life while being prepared?

This past holiday season under Orange Alert I thought about my gym buddy. Since then, I read the papers a little more carefully, and I still wonder where he comes from. Thing is, it could be a few different places, where grace lives.

I swear to heaven that it sounded like a good idea at the time.

Hypnotized by HGTV, we took a perfectly good kitchen (if not our aesthetic ideal), ripped it out by the seams, and have for the last four months given a painful, bloody Lamaze-style birth to the placement of each pantry cupboard, each major home appliance, each light fixture.

We have weathered swirling Iraqi sandstorms of sawdust as new floors were placed and finished, fled clouds of toxic polyurethane gas as wooden surfaces were sealed, and watched the dumpster in our front yard fill up with the shattered remains of our once calm lives. My husband estimates that it’s also half full of hundred-dollar bills.

Our entry in the brutally competitive South Minneapolis home-remodeling derby got out of control in a classic example of mission creep. The kitchen remodel begat the brainstorm of knocking down the living room walls and making everything flow. That led to the inspiration to replace the first floor’s retirement-age windows with modern ones. The great new light and sightlines made the old fireplace look frowsy, so we ordered a radical facelift. Each project dominoed into a half-dozen others.

We can hold no one but ourselves responsible for this, our own personal Alamo. We cannot indulge in a soul-exfoliating self-pity party, and neither can we finger-point our way to blamelessness. Note to the contractors: Please send all future invoices and correspondence to Husband and Wife, Chumptown, USA.

Our household consists of three teenagers, two adults, and a predictable stream of neighbor kids. That makes for one busy kitchen. Oh, I promised in the beginning of this unrest that I’d drink Slim Fast and Instant Breakfast every morning, and hand the kids piping hot toaster strudels on the way to school, then make it up to them nutritionally with crisp, sweet apples and a balanced, root-vegetable-laden slow-cooker meal in the evening. But no. Pizza it is, three times a week, and pizza it will be, until this is all said and done with.

Not all the feathers in our humble nest are ruffled. The mini camp kitchen in our basement TV room is like a dream come true to our kids. Now, they need only slog five feet’s distance from the beanbag chair to the microwave oven, jab at the buttons blindly while keeping both eyes focused on the Cartoon Network, and in thirty seconds yank out a salty, yellow gravy-rich Santa Fe chicken pocket. The middle teen eats a diet that consists of Wonder Bread, peanut butter sandwiches, and microwaved bacon. While he remains Keith Richards-thin, we’re convinced that he’s on his way to total cholesterol collapse. We’re thinking of stirring a Flintstone vitamin/Lipitor drug cocktail into the Skippy. It’s chunky style; he’ll never notice.

We actually bought the components of this dream kitchen last year. They sat out on our breezy sleeping porch during the warm months, ruining our summer. And now, rested by their vacation, they’re ruining our winter, disrupting the school year, business trips, and major holidays.

Maybe that’s not a bad thing. On the last two holidays we’ve hosted, major snafus have gone down. Last Christmas, we forgot to turn the oven on and we served up a fully frozen ham for dinner. And the Thanksgiving before that, I set the turkey on fire. I was trying to save time, using one of those newfangled Reynolds Oven Bags. The fire department tracked the problem to me shoving a twenty-two-pound turkey into a fifteen-pound bag. Old habits die hard, I guess. That’s the same logic I apply to my wardrobe.

Or maybe it’s just that our kitchen space is cursed. I should look at this project as an exorcism. A healing time to clear out the bad culinary juju and begin afresh. The next holiday we’re set to host is Easter, and if all goes well, we might have the countertops in by then. We’ll say a prayer of Thanksgiving. Jesus saves. And Domino’s delivers.

Aw, hell. You won’t believe what I got myself into. So I’ll just tell you. I’m going to be a guest speaker at my old high school for career day.

Delicious irony #1: I never completed high school.
Delicious irony #2: Either they never bothered to check this fact, or they don’t care.

My dilemma came about innocently enough. Last week a favorite old teacher of mine (Home Economics—easy A) contacted me through the dark magic of the Internet and asked if I’d like to share the secret of my success. Hmm. Instantly, a cartoon devil and a cartoon angel appeared on my shoulders. The demon, as always, spoke first. “Righteous! That is soooo cool! You have to do it—just make it up as you go along—half of those snot rags won’t be listening. And you’ll get welcomed back to your old stomping grounds as a hero! You’ll probably even get to drink crappy coffee in the teachers’ lounge!”

And the angel whispered: “No, Colleen. It would be wrong. The other half of the snot rags would be listening, and it would be unethical for you to pretend that your creative successes in life have had anything to do with basic education.”

In the face of such brutal logic, the proud demon raged. He puffed out his little cinnamon-colored chest and scraped at the filthy sawdust floor of my brain with his cloven hoof, kicking up dirt and leaving all rational thought clouded in a sandstorm of bitter, congestive arrogance. “Don’t be lame!” He bellowed. “What are you, chicken?! BOK-BOK-BOK-BOK!”

Reeling, I hit reply, typed in an affirmative, and hit send. The angel shook her head sadly and floated away in the turquoise mist of higher aspiration, to the place where DVDs are returned on time, and vegetables are eaten at every meal.

“Wicked sweet, chica.” The demon paused and gave me the thumbs up before heading out the door. “I gotta go. Got to…uh, polish my horn—but when you get to school, tell the lunch lady I said hi. And tell her to keep playin’ that Powerball, ’cause ya never know!” Poof.

Now I’m stuck. The only way to redeem this situation is to tell them the truth. So here it is, kids. I hate to puncture those rock-star daydreams with a sharp economic truth, but your teachers are right: No high school diploma + no secondary education = twenty-odd years of minimum wage. Folks like me in the non-graduating class are more likely to bear children outside of committed relationships, and those children are susceptible to a veritable Russian roulette wheel of bad fortune. Substandard health care. Dangerous neighborhoods. Neglect. And the longer you wait to go back to school, the less likely it is to make any sort of difference in your income. (Pretty tough luck in the job market to be a forty-five-year-old with a brand-new associate’s degree.)

I can tell them about the regularly recurring intervals of social fear that I encounter in conversation with minds more educated than mine. How I pray the frozen smile and glassy stare will cover my ignorance until I can change the subject to something I’m well-versed in, like back issues of People. How I’ve made a spare living from tips, and from making comedic sport of every foolhardy choice I ever made. That when you make five bucks an hour, you can’t afford to be too proud—because wearing that neon dunce cap has paid the rent for me more than once.

Would I be on a different career path if I had earned my diploma all those years ago? I suppose not. Would I be better off? I’m sure of it. That little piece of paper is a building block, a support beam. A place to plan, to nurture life passions that can sustain us through to the end of one goal, and then another. I’ll tell them that in life, rarely are things so beautifully cut and dried, so simple, as showing up between the hours of 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. and working hard. Earning your marks. And if there’s one thing I learned to be, it’s a hard worker. It’s what makes me what I am. An unqualified success.

How many shopping days left until Christmas? Well, whatever it is, it’s not enough. Cry all you want during your next trip to Target about the Bleeding Skull Halloween costumes hanging next to the icicle lights and the faux-fir tree display. Do you hear what I hear? It’s the rat-a-tat-tat of mass merchants gunning for our rummy-tum-tums.

Every year around this time I kick myself for not starting earlier. Like, oh, I don’t know: maybe in August? The idea would be to try to spread the financial strain over weeks and weeks rather than concentrate it into one hellish month of gorging and gouging. Like dental work, I put it off until it’s too late, or till it hurts. Forget credit card purchases and “deferred billing.” All over the department stores the cheery signs declare, “No payments until February 3rd!” What a good idea. I can see myself now, coming to in the aftermath of holiday parties and get-togethers with an extra layer of gelatinous chub quilting my jowls, and, surprise, about five hundred dollars in the hole. It won’t just seem like the darkest day of the year, it truly will be.

There’s also an intricate system of checks and balances involved in gift giving. Who to buy for? How much is too much? How little says, “This really is the least I could do?” It’s not the thought that counts anymore, but the deliberation. What you give says so much about what you think about the other person. Last year, my sister’s gift told me that she thought I was the kind of person who made her own doughnuts.

Some couples give detailed “wish lists” to one another. This is wrong. The only acceptable time for a person over the age of twelve who is not a bride to request a specific gift is when they’re asking for bone marrow, a kidney, or primary custody of the children. Which is essentially a form of re-gifting.

And then there’s the gift of gab. Some people just give till it hurts. You know you’ve been there. Office party: knocking back a styrofoam cup of warm, nutmeg-speckled sluice while eyeing the cutie-pie standing at the buffet table near the pumpkin squares. But before you can make your move, darkness descends in the form of a boring coworker. You try to escape, but the air around you is quickly converted to sleeping gas, and soon a coagulated topskin forms on your egg, milk, and booze treat. Initially you listen, then move on to presenting an outward show of listening (which is just as good to your captor) while your eyes glaze over like a holiday ham. Meanwhile the sugar plum over at the buffet has wandered out of flirting range.

Among my extended group of friends, we try to have a little fun with tradition. This year, instead of “Secret Santa” gifts, we’re having “Surprised Santa.” We’ll meet for dinner and drinks at a lovely, expensively priced bistro. We will imbibe to our heart’s content, and at closing time, in ones and in pairs, stealthily sneak out of the cafe until there is only one of us left holding the check. Santa!

Budgeting for a family during the holiday season can be tough. When I was a kid, my mom used to stuff our stockings with toiletries, things she was going to have to buy for us anyway. Years later, I imagine her raiding the medicine cabinet well past midnight on Christmas Eve: While her family sleeps, her vision clouded by exhaustion, she desperately tries to decide which one of us kids would appreciate the extra toothbrush versus the Doan’s Backache Pills.

Bestowing gifts on family and friends now is more of a challenge. Most people I know have too much swag already. Our houses look like Pier One. The things we could all use, like patience, goodwill, and faith, are in short supply. Most of us wander through this time of year wound as tight as a spool of curling ribbon. Be sure to make time for yourself. Maybe do a little retail therapy.

September 12, 2003, 1:37 p.m. Two days over deadline. Behind in not only this job, but all of the other part-time jobs that create this dubious, ever shifting “whole” of self-employment. OK, Colleen, get a grip. Don’t subdivide your anxiety; just concentrate on one thing at a time.

3:41 p.m. Staring at the screen for hours won’t help. Must…finish…column.…Oh, for crying out loud. It’s only 750 words. It’s not rocket science.

4:02 p.m. Friend calls. Says she’s sorry she didn’t “remember” to invite me to her birthday party. Well, take this one on the chin. Maybe she’s getting so old that she is having cognitive thought degeneration. Make note to send her flowers, an info packet from the Alzheimer’s Association, and a sample of Clinique’s total turnaround eye-repair serum.

4:24 p.m. Why did I quit smoking?

4:25 p.m. Maybe I should get my tongue pierced.

4:29 p.m. Partial list of things I hate: The Madonna–Britney MTV French kiss. (She’s old enough to be her mother! Bad! Wrong!) George and Laura Bush. (Pay-per-view should get those two to French kiss.) George Sr. and Barbara. (She’s old enough to be his mother! Bad! Wrong!) The Denny Hecker ads on MTC buses. (Did Franco Columbo inflate Denny’s head?) Cell phones. (If you get mad at the person you’re talking to, you can’t slam the phone down into the cradle for dramatic effect.) Bennifer, Pilates, and Mary-Kate Olsen. (Ashley seems like she might be OK.) “Mean People Suck!” buttons. (Some of my best friends are mean.)

4:49 p.m. My big show is coming up. Pantages Theatre, October 3, 4, and 5. Will anyone call for tickets? I think I remember the number. It’s (612) 673-0404. God, I hope they call now! (NOW!)

4:53 p.m. Maybe I can just write about odd stuff in the news. Like that sad, freaky deal with the bank robber/pizza guy who had the bomb locked to his neck. No, that’s not funny for sure. The only way that could be funny is if it were a scene in a Coen Brothers movie. Who would be good to play the sad, freaky pizza guy? Steve Buscemi? It would be more fun to see him being played by Tom Cruise. Smug bastard. Boom.

5:17 p.m. Maybe I should read The Rake for ideas. What are the other columnists up to? I wonder if they’re blowing the deadline too. What’s this—a new column? Sex & the Married Man? Dude. Men frequent any and all branches of the sex industry for one reason only. It’s business, baby. It’s a direct path to paradise that requires only an ID and a little cash. It does not require any outlay of personality, or social-emotional compromise that a relationship—even a one-night stand—would take. It is not for the sake of variety. If it were, there are plenty of social clubs for variety-lovin’ folk. Oh, but then a guy would have to go to the trouble of developing those relationships, huh? Or, more important, would have to admit to himself that what he really wants is not an exclusive relationship, but an all-you-can-eat trip to the booty buffet. Women aren’t frigid if they don’t condone this behavior. They aren’t necessarily threatened either. Think of it like business. Supply and demand.

C’mere. I’ll let you in on a little secret. Women can have sex anytime they want. It’s true! I could cram fried chickens into my mouth until my can was the size of a papasan ottoman—walk out my front door, and, within fifteen minutes, have sexual intercourse with a man.

Hell, there might even be a fetish site dedicated to papasan-sized rear ends. The point is, I could always be somebody’s prom queen. All women could. And we know this. Therefore we do not value sex above the other good things that life has to offer, like luxury hand towels, or artisan cheese. Or a hilarious one-woman show: (612) 673-0404.

Men, on the other hand, never know when or if they will ever get to have sex again. The booty business exists so that men can purchase what they have never been able to achieve on their own. Sexual sovereignty. So, Tiger, don’t kid yourself that your rabid libido is blazing a path to Dream Girls. It’s your innate fear of being left high and dry. (Thanks, Stuart. I owe you one!)

6:54 p.m. 742 words. Over and out.

1972. I don’t remember the month, but it was warm enough for me not to be wearing a jacket, just my head-to- toe Garanimals red outfit. A T-shirt and jeans in my signature color. I was four years old. I could dress myself, and when I put on that outfit, baby, I meant business.

Everybody in my family was busy moving their stuff into our new house. I was told to stay in the yard, but the hell with that. I started knocking on doors up and down the block as soon as I could slip away, determined not to waste an instant of the first day in the new neighborhood.

I saw a likely place right at the end of the block; white stucco with pretty purple flowers and a front yard littered with toys. The big front door was open, and through the screen door, you could hear a TV on too loud (just the way I liked it) and kids yelling.

I marched right up to the screen and because you can’t knock on a screen, I mashed my face right up against it and yelled, “Hey!”

Instantly, a big boy and girl and a littler boy and girl appeared at the door. We all stared at each other for a second, and I pointed at the littler girl (because she was closest to my size) and said, “I’m here to talk to her.” The others shrugged and went back to the TV, and the little one opened the door and came outside.

She had long, dark-brown hair and black, glittery eyes that were shaped like crescents. We stood looking at each other, and the excitement was almost more than I could bear. “Well, what do you want?” she asked me.

“My name is Colleen.” I told her. “Today, I moved into the yellow house over there.” I pointed, and then turning back to her with a wide baby-toothed grin, “I’m here to be your friend.” And so we were.

At that age, I guess, it can be that easy. During my school years, my friendships were largely based on who I had classes with, and later on, who had a cigarette. At work in the foodservice industry, I have met and served alongside a revolving mélange of people who I sometimes have very little in common with, other than the task at hand. What turns an acquaintanceship into a full-blown friendship is the sharing, of course. Whether that comes in the form of a favorite (or abhorrent) teacher, a smoky treat, or marrying the ketchups while griping about the craptacular tippers at table twenty.

2003. I watch my new friendships like an anxious gambler. I’ve only got so much to put on the table. Now that I have a husband and children, the time I spend on my established friendships is usually relegated to a hurried, misspelled Instant Messenger paragraph or a weekly session of voicemail tag.

When I talk to my friend Roxanne, who moved to New York City three years ago, I cradle the cordless phone between my ear and shoulder while conquering Mt. St. Laundry. By the time I make it from the base camp where the unmatched socks live to the summit of unfolded bath towels, both of us are out of oxygen. She’s cleaning too, doing her dishes. (In a tiny Manhattan apartment, doing laundry means scraping the gunk out of your panties in the sink and drying them in the microwave. Ah, big-city livin’.) We’re staying in touch, but we’re not giving it our full attention the way we used to before life filled up with priorities. Chris, who just moved to New Orleans, has vanished after a single magnolia-scented email gloating about the sensuous pleasures of his new home. It’s warm there. I don’t expect to hear from him again.

Now I’m bombarded by popup ads from Classmates.com and it seems friendship has evolved into something artificial and pushy and strained, like a Pampered Chef party.

Whenever I meet somebody who’s new to the Twin Cities, they tell me how hard it is to make friends. They blame the frigid weather or the families that have lived here forever or Scandinavian reserve. Even if you’ve been here all your life, it can be daunting.

So take it from me. Don’t be afraid to knock on some doors. But don’t come to my house. I’m busy.