Second Skin

You get to be my age and you realize that there isn't
much you haven't seen, heard or read about in one form
or the other.
There just isn't much going on that isn't a version of
something I haven't already experienced personally, or
vicariously, through friends and family.
So when I see something completely new, something I have
never seen before from any angle, it can be stunning in
it's freshness.
First in it's very revelation, and second that it even
happened.

A while ago I wrote a post about what it felt like to me,
a mother of a seventeen year old son, to be mistaken for a
cute "guy" on a motorcycle by three High School aged girls.
An innocent misconception on their part, it was an alien
incident for me.
For until recently, I had no idea what it's like to be male,
even for a second, in any situation.
Totally inhabiting my female gender, I know no other way of
relating, or being related to, than that of a female.
So I've been surprised to have humans of my gender, play off
the sight of me on a motorcycle as if I were what they thought
and perceived me to be, a man.
Is this what actors feel like when they dress in period
costumes and play a character?

Well, it happened again.
As soon as I got home yesterday after our Beginner Speed
Clinic, I changed into my cold weather gear, opened the
garage door and let my yellow pony out.
My goal was to try to catch up with some Ninja riders that
were getting together for a ride a bit south of me.
Never did find them, but I got 50 miles of road under my
tires.
Nice :)
Coming home, less than half mile from my house, I get the
red light in the center of town and am first in line in the
right lane.
Next to me, in the left turn lane, is a mini van. Out of the
corner of my left eye, I can see that there is some sort of
writing on the windows, like " Go Girls SV Soccer Team!!!",
so I turn my head to read what it says and doing so notice
the young girl in the back seat. I guess she might have been
8-10 yr.s old.
And I do what I do when I come across kids strapped into carts
at the grocery store who are looking around in boredom while
their parent shops, I wave.
Her facial expression is priceless.
Lightening quick, it goes from wide eyed surprise and an "O"
mouth expression, to a look of blushing disbelief, and a bright
smile.
A guy on a yellow sport bike has turned "his" head and waved
at her.
Oh my....I've done in again..and turn my head to face forward.
I don't feel like a liar, or a pervert, those girls don't know
I'm a Mom underneath the bike gear, but it does feel like I'm
gender bending or playing a role I'm not meaning to.

Maybe I should have bought a pink jacket instead of the yellow
one to match my bike...

Connecting

Another cell phone charge used up, and squeezed bone dry.
As the "beep-beep" continued running over his voice,it let
me know that at any moment our ongoing connection would
slip out into no man or woman's land, and hence non-existence.
So I trotted from one room to the next trying to locate the
actual land line phone that I hadn't used for ages.
That mystery was solved by making a quick tour of my sons
bedroom and I returned to mine and pulled my dresser out
from the wall and plugged into a dusty jack.

Once we start talking, we obviously don't want to stop.
There is back story and history, and there is today and
the day before.
There are hard things to share and easy.
It's outright spooky how his life has run on tracks so
similar to mine, yet so different, that I have come to
wonder if we were twins separated at birth and just raised
in differing social and family environs.
I read once that the great value of relationships, of
deeply relating with another soul, heart to heart,is the
self discovery that goes hand in hand with opening the
door to your secret places and letting the light in.

Love recognizes who you are.
The very bones of you.
And smiles at the sight.

Tomato Juice

Plain tomato juice is not one of those food items that I keep
in the pantry.
I like V8 Juice though,and actually have some in the fridge.
Well, I did have some in the fridge.
Still in recovery mode from getting up so early Sunday for our
League Meet, I went up to bed early Monday evening and asked my
son to take the dogs out before he went to bed.
"Sure Mom!"
Slept like a rock until I woke up with the odor of skunk
in my nostrils.
Since there's a fairly large wooded area with a creek at the
bottom of our street, we often get deer and other critters
in our yard.
And being that our house is pretty old and way less than air
tight, it's not unusual to get a whiff of skunk several times
a month.
So I didn't think anything of it.
The first time, or the second time I woke up.
"Man, that's one strong smelling skunk!" I thought, right before
I fell back into a deep sleep.
Then it was time to get up. I felt refreshed, the big dog wasn't
whining as usual to go out and I went downstairs to start my
morning routine.
Walking towards the kitchen I noticed it was nippy, and thought
I'd have to turn the heat on.
That's when I realized that the big dog hadn't whined to go out,
because he wasn't in the mudroom.
In fact he wasn't in the house.
Nor was our Jack Russell.
The back door stood ajar...with muddy foot prints all over what
had been clean dog bedding..
Oh shit!
It's raining, it's 5am in the morning, and my son hadn't shut the
back door tight last night after taking the dogs out.
How many hours ago?
Multiple.
Shit!
"Here doggie, doggie", isn't going to wash.
These dogs are always on a tie when they go outside, and now that
they have tasted freedom?
I'm screwed...
But I go out anyway.
Nothing.
So, I do what every woman who has a man in the house would do, I
wake him up and have him go out and look for the escapees.
In an hour he had the Jack back and I took both the V8 Juice the
dog up to the tub.
Poor thing was freezing and still had bits of her prey,(poor skunk)
wedged in her teeth.
PHEW!
Did she ever stink!
V8 juice straight out of the fridge didn't make her life any easier
at that point, but I had to do what I had to do.
Son calls me on the cell.
"Mom. I found Tubbs. But he is too tired to walk. Can you come pick
us up in the car?"
They are 1 block away.
"Has he been sprayed?"
"I think so"
No way is that dog going in my car for a mere block.
"Drag his butt back if you have to"

That's the short of it.
My house smelled so thickly of skunk Tuesday, that I thought we were
going to have to move.
I boiled Apple Cider vinegar in an effort to break the straggle hold
and my son thought we were going to die from the toxic cloud..
Sigh...

League Meet #1 Part One

When the alarm went off at 3am Sunday morning,
(can you call that hour "morning"?), it wasn't
as difficult to get out of bed as I thought it
would be.
I'd changed from practice wheels to race wheels
the night before,and everything was packed up
waiting by the front door.
Coffee?
Check.
Bathroom?
Check.
Dogs out?
Check.
Oatmeal ready to eat?
Check?
Uniform on?
Check.
Heading out the door my cell phone rang.
Who'd be calling me at four in the morning??
He would.

:)

So, I drove 40 minutes south in the dark,
passing numerous deer in and on the side of
the road, talked to "him", and ate my oatmeal
at the same time.
Multitasking the miles away.
Aren't I just something or what?
LOL

Second in line at Frenchtown's door at 4:45, we
talked till the warm folks inside, let all the
frozen people outside, in too.
(still think we are all nuts to race this early...)

Anyway, I wasn't nervous like I have been in the
past.
Well, not until it was time for me to check in for
my first race, a 700m.
Instead of this huge battle between, "don't race",
"do race", now I recognize that uncomfortable
feeling as the adrenaline rush that goes hand in
hand with stepping up to the line.
After competing for 3 seasons, there are enough
races under my wheels that, after the start is
out of the way, I'm pretty confident on the floor
itself.
Might not be the fastest 51 year old, but I am
one of the few 51 year olds, of the female variety,
that race on inlines. So I no longer beat myself
up like I used to for not being very fast.
Perhaps because the truth is, I get faster every
year.
Not in leaps and bounds but inch by inch.

Now it's a common feeling among racers at the first
League Meet, to be less than enthusiastic.
I think it's because there is never any down time
when your an inline speed skater.
If your not training or racing indoor, your training
and racing outdoors.
And that endless season, year in, year out, wears on
ya.
Despite this fact, your wondering how your going to
stack up to the other skaters in your division, that
you haven't raced against indoors since Nationals.
And you won't have that answer until you get out on
the floor and the gun goes off.
Once that first race is a done deal, I think we all
breath a sigh of relief, because it's never as bad as
we imagine it "might" be.

To be continued..

Racing

Been a few posts since I commented on anything
having to do with skating, which plays such
a large role in my life.

Of late, I've been slightly more occupied
with my romantic nature..

But, there is a time and place for everything.

Tomorrow is our 1st League Meet of the 2007-
2008 season and though I'm not on fire for it,
I will attend, and likely race.
Getting put of my warm bed at 3am, on a Sunday
doesn't turn me on.
Yet, if I don't, I won't get a place to sit of
my choosing floor side.
No, I'll have to squeeze in between all the
other still sleepy people who are squeezing in
between all the other sleepy people.
Rinks are notorious for their lack of seating.
So general space to move around is at a premium
when it comes time to host a league meet or an
Invitational.
Stepping over or on people who are trying to catch
a few zzz's, or trying to tie their boots up goes
hand in hand with the race scene.

Last night my race wheels came out of storage.
Going to feel freaky being in them again.
Probably fall right on my ass.

Song Of My Heart

It was so strange yesterday to have the radio on
in my office,just like all the other days of the
week, and be more attuned to certain lyrics.
Those of love songs.

Get back Jack!

You mean to tell me, that after one long intense
phone conversation, and one night of waking up in
the wee hours and having "his" name be my first
thought, that I'm, I'm..

I'm what?

So, he left a message on my cell phone last night,
and I listened to it,like one would when you notice
you have voice mail, and then listened to it two
more times in five minutes just to hear the depth of
his voice, that slight tremble of feeling he used to
let me know what he was thinking, you think that
means something?

Nah.

Really.

It doesn't mean a thing..

My Cell Phone

Is just like anybody else's.
A very convenient tool.
My son calls me on it when he gets home from school,
and I often talk to friends during my drive into work
in the morning.
But I'm not on it all the time.
That's because,I'm on the phone at work all the time.
It's part and parcel of my job. So when my work day ends,
I usually don't want to be on the phone for very long.
Not so last night.
I was on my cell phone so long my battery died.
See, "He" and I exchanged numbers yesterday..

Normally it takes 50 minutes to drive home.
Yesterday it took 2 hours.
Not that traffic was bad, oh no, the roads were fine,
traffic was fine.
No, it took 2 hours because as I came closer to town and
home, I realized I was going to have to end the call once
I pulled into my driveway.
Instead, I pulled over next to the High School athletic
fields and kept listening.
Then, a little closer to home, pulled into the Community
Park, and kept talking.
Later I found myself in a parking lot over at Stabler.
Listening and talking.
Sweet Jesus, what was going on?

What can I say..
"He" makes me laugh.

And I make him snort laugh.

Hell, it must be love..

Right?

LOL!

And, it sure felt funny thinking about my son finding
out that Mom is interested in somebody, and that the
somebody is interested back.

Well, eventually it started getting dark.
And it really was time to go home and face the inevitable.
Backing into the driveway, phone to ear, I started to
the house and went out back to the garage instead.
Chicken!
Opening the over head door, still on the phone,I looked
at the Ninja and the conversation turned to motorcycles.
"He" used to ride and still has the "M" on his license..

Finally, I knew I had to face the music.
I walked up to the back door, and into my own house. The
one I was worried about entering, with a phone glued to
my head.
My son and I exchanged hellos, and I headed up stairs, to
my room, to my bed, which I laid across like a teenager..
and talked to "Him" till my phone died..
Sigh...

Back downstairs.
Ever perceptive, my son asked, "Who was that?"

How awkward..
.....

Ahhhh...
Ahhhh...

"Would it be OK with you, if I, well, was "interested"
in somebody"?

:) Bright smile

"Sure Mom. I know how that stuff is"
(He does?)
"It's not like I'm a kid"

Well.
That wasn't so bad, but it sure felt weird..asking my son
if it was OK for me to talk on the phone...and so on..