Caterwauling

Over at The Art of Getting By (a new addition to my blogroll), Janet tells of that precious, precarious time when children start to question the existence of Santa.

I remember those days — I always suspected my mom was behind it somehow, because Santa ALWAYS knew what I wanted. Which was never really much — I’ve always been sort of a loner, so I could be entertained with books and toys that didn’t require a gaggle of participants. (I hate board games to this day.) But back then, I could be pacified with images of Santa deploying a special elf to go clean out the bookstores with all of my requests.

I think it was in third grade when all of these suspicions about this magical entity wormed their way into my head, but I wanted to hold on for just another year. Then came fourth grade, when — as the designated “big kids” in the school, i.e., the oldest in elementary school — we got word that the whole Santa thing was just a farce.

I’ll never forget being in Ms. Carp’s class that holiday. (I loved that woman — I was so totally her teacher’s pet, especially after she caught me as a 9-year-old reading “The Great Gatsby” during a free period — Santa had done well by me, once again! Well, that and I had written to then-President Ronald Reagan, telling him I thought he was an asshole, and I actually got a response and a book from the Oval Office. You know how people curse you with hoping you have a child who’s just like you were? Lord, may the birth control continue working!!!)

Anyway, a couple of the popular, stuck-up bitches of my class (with whom I had been friends for about a day and a half), were teasing this kid Kevin who truly, honestly insisted there is SO a Santa Claus. They had older sisters and were thrilled to burst his bubble. And in doing so, they ruined it for the rest of us who were sort of on the fence about it anyway.

I don’t envy the position that put my teacher in. Janet’s entry touched me because she has been in that position — to take control of a class whose fundamental beliefs were shattering before her very eyes.

Ms. Carp quickly refuted the girls’ claims, telling us that it is a special time of year when all sorts of magic is possible. That we were certainly allowed to question it but the most important thing at the end of the day is to believe that magic would come to those who wanted to believe in it.

I loved her for that. We studied her so carefully, looking for signs that she wasn’t bullshitting us. And her expression gave nothing away, so we took her at face value. But that was the only year I looked for (and found) hidden presents and giftwrap. I never did it again, though — to this day, I am happy to open a gift when and only when the proper time has come.

I didn’t tell my mom what I’d done — even for as young as I was, I knew how important it was that all of her hard work be honored by my silence — at least for the time being. There was a woman whose sole joy in life was seeing her daughter’s face light up as perfect present after present was unveiled. Thank god I was smart enough back then to know that.

However, that was the year the innocence that belongs only to the very young died. I officially grew up. She left my stepfather a few months later and we moved in with my grandparents. I was happy to be rid of him, though. A lot of other bad things happened that year, too — 1984 was the year that my belief in magic gave up the ghost.

It’s taken me a long time, though, but I really do hope to see Santa Claus again. Because I know he’s out there somewhere — he’s just gotten a little bit lost along the way to my place. But I promise, I’ll let him in when he’s in the neighborhood again, because I think Ms. Carp was right — magic will only come to those who believe in it.

I still believe in you, Santa. …

Tiff wrote about an adorable munchkin on her flight who made her ovaries hurt. I had one of those on the flight from Memphis to DCA — just a little cherub, who was knee-high to a grasshopper, so they say. She was going to visit her grandma, and she was so excited.

To keep her quiet, her mom gave her a portable DVD player, and she watched “Toy Story” during the two-hour flight. She also had a little Woody doll, with whom she shared her window seat right in front of me.

She held him up to the window to make sure he got to see the Memphis and metro D.C. skylines, and she explained the handful of air pockets to him as “the plane acting silly.” She told him to think about how much fun they were going to have because they were spending Christmas with Grandma.

So friggin’ cute. I want one only if I can get one that sweet, smart and well-mannered.

Jet lag + exhaustion + letdown from having to leave an awesome trip behind + general suck = Midol time arriving a few days early. Take cover, kids — it’s a bitch-on-six-cylinders kind of day!

I knew it was coming, though. I had a layover in Memphis this weekend, and I had way too much time on my hands (read: only four gift shops and a 90-minute stay there. I bought some Memphis Mary and that was all she wrote). So I parked myself at my gate and decided to people-watch.

And while tons of people caught my eye, I most remember a young Southern gentleman, about my age, who walked slowly, with a little bit of a limp.

But why I was enraptured by him was how he would walk up to every uniformed service member he saw — which was a lot — and he stopped each one to shake their hands and to say thank you for everything they are doing to serve our country.

And I burst into tears all six times I witnessed it up-close. He may have acquired a war injury as a young soldier himself, perhaps explaining his careful gait. Maybe he was just brought up with mannners and/or he’s a true Southern gentleman, with his approaching of these military men, most of whom looked to be barely 18.

In any event, I don’t know if those deployed fighters were as touched by this young man as I was, but this blog entry is my little way of saluting him right back, especially because he didn’t seem like the type of guy who would have even thought about being noticed or remembered for such a small (but so significant) act of kindness and gratitude.

*Crying again, this time realizing industrial, Costco-sized bottle of Midol is at work. Waah!*

So I walked into Reagan National early Tuesday morning, luggage in tow, to the America West counter.

It was one of those rare occasions in which I wanted to deal with a real, live human at the ticket counter. But I suppose I should have defined human.

Anywho, I got into line — I was first, behind two people at the electronic ticket dispenser Because I had a minute, I grabbed my wallet and yanked out my driver’s license in one fluid motion. I say this because some jerkoff walked up to the side of the counter and got serviced RIGHT AWAY while I waited. Me? Not happy.

One of the machines opened up, and this little man who CLEARLY had short-man syndrome snarled at me to go to it already. So I lugged my bags up to it, whereupon it promptly told me that I couldn’t check in because you can only check in eight hours or fewer, prior to your flight. Seeing as though my flight was leaving in, oh, an HOUR, this was Not Good.

So I asked the Sniveling Little Shit to help me. He acted like I had just eaten his breakfast and stormed out to show me what I’d done wrong. Which was nothing because I’m not a goddamned moron, so he had to check me in himself, which took all of 60 seconds.

Meanwhile, a guy came up to the next machine and it gave him a whole different type of error. So when the Sniveling Little Shit snuck out from behind the big, bad counter, I didn’t really see him.

The thing is, I have this one suitcase that literally takes all of my might to lift. It’s for suits and stuff, and there’s so much hardware and so damn many zippers that the thing is heavy without any clothes in it. Shove in a few dozen yards of clothing, and yay carpal tunnel.

Anyway, I totally did not plan this, but when I gathered up all my strength and hoisted that big-ass suitcase into the air, I (accidentally, I promise!) HIT the Sniveling Little Shit and sent him FLYING across the aisle! Hah!

Oh, to see his legs going in opposite directions warmed my frosty little heart that day. I sort of choked out a half-assed, “Sorry!” before scooting away to hand over my bags to security.

All told, I wasn’t the ONLY one flying that day!

My favorite memory from my trip was definitely when I was standing atop the Eiffel Tower (a half-scale replica of the one in Paris), overlooking the Bellagio Hotel, which has the most magnificent fountains. Every 15 minutes, there’s a water show, where the fountains dance in myriad patterns — no two (consecutive) shows are the same. And there’s music to complement the movements.

It was near midnight on my last day in Vegas, and I really just wanted some peace and quiet. If I could have brought my journal up there with me, I would have — it was just a prime thinking location. But, alas, people talked. A lot. And the only thing that kept me from throwing anyone off the building was the fact that talking to other tourons tourists helped us to figure out the song that was playing, which was perfect (and it sure beat the previous Celine Dion song. Ugh).

The gal next to me asked if I were a movie buff. I kind of shrugged and asked what movie she was thinking about. She said she didn’t know but the song came from it. I had a few ideas, but in talking, she said, “Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour were in it.” I said, “Somewhere in Time” and I thought she could have just hugged me. And I would have hugged her back, because I would have been humming the song for weeks without knowing what it was.

In any event, I’d watched the fountains from inside Circo, where I don’t even want to talk about what my meal cost but wow, hello that’s the way to live! But they were more breathtaking at nearly 550 feet.

And guess who left her fully charged digital camera AT HOME before this odyssey began? *sigh* That would be the same girl who bought a camera phone, oh, YESTERDAY.