Why is it that people think walks in the rain are romantic? If this were true, Seattle would be the most romantic city in the world.

It’s not.

Let’s approach it this way– if walking in the rain was inherently romantic, then walking the dog in the rain should also be romantic. Not in a bestiality kind of way, but in a dreamy, introspective, beautiful world kind of way.

the Mona Lisa of dogs

Instead, walking in the rain with a dog is TERRIBLE. All you can think about is how wet your feet are, and how when you get home you’re going to have to wipe her feet off, and maybe give her a bath, and there’s rain sneaking along the side of your hood into your ear and if that car splashes you when it goes by, you will slash its tires, so help you god.

And you are hoping to end up walking around with a bag of poop in your hand. That is your best case scenario: poop. In your hand.

And look, I like my dog a lot better than anyone I’ve ever dated.*

We think that taking walks in the rain is romantic because the movies TELL US SO. And the movies don’t lie! They’re like the internet: truth machines.

Even better than walking in the rain: kissing in the rain. Have you ever made out in the rain? I grew up in Seattle. I’ve made out in the rain. Making out in the rain = not romantic. You can’t tell where the wetness is coming from— Raindrops? Saliva? Tears? Snot? You end up feeling like it’s all tongue. Everywhere. In your eyes. Hair. Up the sleeve of your jacket. Mashed between your noses.

Hot, right?

The whole idea that movies are trying to sell, I think, is that when you are with your one true love, you don’t notice what’s going around you— ie, you kiss in the middle of the street in NYC and you think you won’t die**, you get engaged on a roller coaster and don’t see the kid puking behind you into his dad’s cupped hands…. and you don’t feel the rain. Or at least, you don’t mind it. But do you seriously not notice wet socks just because the dude next to you is dreamy? Wet socks are the WORST.***

True love deadens all your nerves. Even as it pulls you into a state of transcendency and bliss.

….apparently I’ve been dating the wrong people. As in, not wizards or gods. Or really good anesthesiologists.

MM

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*Then again, you’ll notice “dated” is in past tense. I guess it’s not surprising I like my dog better than my ex-boyfriends.

**Let’s think of this from an evolutionary perspective. Say “love” does keep you from noticing your surroundings. Wouldn’t you die before you could procreate? It just doesn’t make sense, biologically. Then again— maybe you don’t notice your surroundings so that you’ll hurry up and procreate anywhere. Regardless of circumstances. Hmm. Will think on this more. Because like I said, the movies are truth machines, so they can be explained by science. You just have to find the right science. Michelle Bachmann-style.

***I tried to come up with a “He better have ___________ and ___________ if you expect me to forget wet socks.” But the best I could come up with was “bulletproof abs” and “the sensitivity of a trained therapist” and that didn’t seem to nearly cover it. Also bulletproof abs sound uncomfortable, and I’d really rather my bf wasn’t a therapist. He’d be so damn understanding whenever we fought. Then I tried “Show me the guy who can make me forget wet socks and I’ll show you Rhett Butler without the rape-y tendency.” That didn’t seem sufficient either.  Wet socks really are the worst.

It’s that time of year when the Internet makes lists of things for you to give to someone you know very well (right? I hope? I mean, if you’re letting them touch you on a consistent basis?)  and who the Internet has never met. The idea of this makes no sense— I mean, sure, your boyfriend might be exactly like the article author’s boyfriend, but I’m going to say chances are slim. And that if the similarities are too exact, you might want to look up the author’s FB profile and see if her boyfriend IS your boyfriend.

So instead of creating my own list of things you might give, I’m going to engage in that time-old tradition of ripping apart what someone else has said.

Jezebel has posted an article titled “Gifts for Someone You’re Planning to Dump.” OUCH.

Let me say this: the premise of the article rests on the assumption that dumping someone just before the holidays is worse than stringing them along for an extra month, dragging them to all your family functions, having them happily introduce you to grandma’s secret fudge recipe (and to grandma, possibly on her last Christmas; how awkward will that photo shoot be?), buying them a gift strategically chosen with said break-up in mind, and then leaving their frozen ass to thaw out on its own in January.

Morality is SO HARD, you guys!

Anyhoodle. The list includes a series of things that are great for mourning break-ups, including headphones, a quilt, boozy accessories, and food. Ok, whatever.

And then it includes a few things to get your ex started on a hobby: a plant or a cookbook. Let’s discuss.

My opening argument: WTF.

Who wants their new hobby to be GIVEN to them by their ex? How condescending is it to be all, “Hey babe, you’re going to need something to fill your empty, lonely, terrible hours with once I’m gone, so….here’s a thing….every time you look at it you’ll be reminded of me….just try to ignore that.”

So of course now I’m thinking about the love fern in How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days– remember that? Kate Hudson, in her role as obnoxious girlfriend, gives Matthew McConaughey a plant and tells him it’s their love fern and they have to keep it alive as a symbol of their relationship. He lets it die, of course, and then she fake-cries, and then at the end of the movie it’s on the back of his motorcycle when he chases her down….

And people say rom-coms give us unrealistic expectations for relationships.

Or, alternatively, there’s this story: my sister’s ex-boyfriend gave her an orchid (when they were still together). After they broke up, she did what any sensible person would do: she stopped watering it.

Look, guys, it wasn’t a puppy, it was a plant, and I’m not a mind-reader, but I’m guessing she didn’t feel like looking at it every day and it’s hard to wrap your mind around throwing something out that’s still alive. Passive resistance is okay once you break-up. In fact, it’s sort of the name of the game, no? I would guess a lot of us can’t quite throw out things our exes gave us, but we can hide them / accidentally knock them over / treat them badly / lose them. This is why there’s so much talk about protecting the kids when people go through a divorce. OH GOD I JUST SAID THAT. WATER YOUR BABIES, GUYS.

But my sister’s roommate was a devoted plant caregiver and he kept watering it. That thing lived forever. Orchids are super delicate, you guys, and that plant would not die. I think she convinced the roommate to take it with him when he moved out two years later.

The only thing worse than giving someone you’re planning to break up with a plant is giving someone with cancer a dog:

PLEASE DON’T COMBINE THESE STORIES AND GIVE SOMEONE YOU’RE BREAKING UP WITH A DOG. OH MY GOD. That’s like handing them a stack of cuddly, warm, peeing bills that will come due right around the time you flaunt your new girlfriend in their face on FB.

MM

PS. This is also my sister who I had the following conversation with:

Her: I don’t understand why people get engaged during the holidays.

Me: Yeah, I did the opposite and had a holiday break-up.

Her: No, you didn’t.

Me: What?

Her: It was Thanksgiving. Doesn’t count.

Me: You’re not going to give me this one?

Her: No. You can call it a Thanksgiving break-up if you want.

Me: Really? You’re really not going to just let me have this?

Her: No.

I’ve been having dreams where I get rejected. No telling whether this has to do with my personal or my literary life. Last night I was on a boat going up a river when it happened, and I have to say, the setting was beautiful. The water was crisp and clear, the life preservers were a crisp orange, the sun was shining, and my hair looked great. I stood at the boat’s railing and watched a crocodile go by as I was shot down. Lovely.

In honor of my subconscious, I’m going to share today my first experience with (not) publishing in the literary world. Names have been changed to protect the guilty. I call it…

Up the River of Denial: and I hope You all like Me

The first literary journal to accept a poem of mine for publication never published my poem. I submitted to Great Review in the South (GRITS) in the youthful blush of my first semester in an MFA program. Full of panache and coffee, I sent packet after packet of five poems tied with bright, shiny bows of hope off to literary editors whose offices were filled with similar bits of dead trees.

Months later, by the time I received an email from some woman in Connecticut, I’d forgotten who I’d submitted to, why I’d submitted to them, and what poems I had submitted.

The email came from “poetry editor” and started, “Dear Marggaret.” I thought, everyone makes typos.  The next line read: “We would like to publish ‘At the KFC in Wallingford.’” The poem was actually titled “At the QFC in Wallingford,” but details! I was going to be published!

I read on: “We request that You submit a bio and pic to appear with the publication. Please include the name as You want it to appear in your bio text.” Wait. Why were the “you’s” capitalized? No matter! A bio and a pic! How professional! They were going to publish my poems in Great Review in the South (GRITS)!

I eagerly looked it up. A Confederate flag waved in my face. I blinked, looked again, google-searched “Confederate flag” to confirm. Yes, that was a confederate flag gif on the banner of their website. Their mission statement said, “We at Great Review in the South (GRITS) are proud to publish quality literature of all kinds. . . and We thank You for the opportunity to read Your work.” No matter what page I clicked on, every header and every sidebar boasted a Confederate flag. Perhaps more disturbing was the fact that every pronoun was capitalized.

I sighed, and then I emailed out my good news to friends and family anyway. I replied to the mysterious “poetry editor” email address with the correction for the title, worded as politely as I possibly could word it, clarifying that “QFC” is a grocery store chain in the Pacific Northwest—since “KFC” is an actual place of business, and a food-related one at that, I was fairly sure she would not realize the typo without my help.

But the poem was—and is—about a very old woman named Bettylu who works at the deli counter, ghoulishly slicing lunch meat with a thickly bandaged finger, and such things do not exist in KFCs. They sell fried meat, not lunch meat. I wrote a bio, I painstakingly chose a picture, and I asked which issue I might be appearing in. I did not capitalize my pronouns. I did not point out that Margaret has only one “g.”

Three days later, I received an email saying simply: “Margaret …fogive me the publication has QVC correct, it was just my letter to you.”

Who knew there were so many chains with three letter acronyms, so many variations on “QFC”?  Were this to appear as the title, the poem would make even less sense. Does QVC sell food? At least she spelled my name correctly this time. Even if she did forget the “r” in “forgive.” Maybe this woman had bandaged fingers.

Months went by.  I received an email from a Reginald one day that read, “We invite You to read the new edition of Great Review in the South (GRITS) and We thank You for Your continued support.” My heart beat slightly faster. This was it! I clicked on the link, I looked at the Confederate flags, I spent five minutes looking for the journal content and finally, I downloaded the unwieldy PDFs from the website. My poems were not there.

I am an unusual breed of persistent. I emailed the mysterious “Reginald” back and congratulated him on the new issue and its fine literary merit. I typed out a quick account of my email exchange with “poetry editor,” pointing out that she had not responded to my question re: what issue my poems would appear in, and—what the hell, I thought—I clarified again that “my poem is titled ‘At the QFC in Wallingford’ (rather than KFC or QVC).” I said I was honored to be included in the journal and thanked him.

I tried to force myself to capitalize my pronouns. Clearly it was part of the culture of this journal. What ever lead them to that place, I could not imagine. Dark forces of self-importance? Mass delusions of royalty? An overly developed sense of an unseen “you” as an omnipotent force?

…The spoiled Prince faced His last moments as the Dark, Brooding Funder of the Arts towered over Him. “Please, don’t kill Me,” he said. “You shall have all my riches and my dignity, too.  I’m begging You.” Each time I read an improperly capitalized pronoun, my mind increased its volume, its emphasis, the depth of the groveling bow until finally, its speaker hit his head on the floor. And died.

I could not and did not capitalize my pronouns.

Reginald emailed me back saying, “She has left the journal and all the work from Her time has been published. If you would like to resubmit We have a new Poetry Editor. and thank You for the compliments.” I stared hard at that lower-case “and” at the beginning of the sentence, willing it to switch places with either the “We” or the “You.”

His email signature was “giving some back and some in new places,” a spectacularly dirty phrase which made me think not at all of literary sharing, but rather, of herpes.

I did not resubmit.

No one else has been interested in publishing “At the QFC in Wallingford.”

I adore libraries. Obviously: they’re buildings with books. For free. Even if books aren’t your style, they have movies. My one complaint is that they should allow food. I hate reading without eating.

And I understand that I’m part of a school system– the California State Universities– that is hurting like a stake stabbed under your thumbnail right now. They’re hurting so badly that when the graduate student union asked the president of my university to waive tuition for TAs (a standard practice across the country so that the meager sums they pay us to teach their courses don’t immediately go back to them in the form of US paying for OUR classes), he said that we shouldn’t worry about tuition. Because the university might shut down. Tomorrow.

If that isn’t a reason to exercise fee deferment eligibility, I don’t know what it is.

But, Library! I turned that book in on Monday! I don’t think hitting me up for late fees for a book that you lost is the way to go.

Me: So I turned that book in. To the box that says “Return Books Here.” Was I not supposed to do that?

Library Guy: When’d you turn it in?

Me: The day it was due.

Library Guy: It says here you haven’t turned it in yet.

Me: ….

Library Guy: Ok, I’ll fill out this form here claiming you SAY you “turned it in.”

Me: What then?

Library Guy: We’ll look for it. You’ll hear back from us in about five weeks. If we can’t find it, we’ll charge you for the book.

Me: But I turned it in.

Library Guy: Sure you did. If we can’t find it, then we charge you for it.

Me: Really? That’s how you’re going to play this?

Rumor is they charge more than the book retails for. Rumor is this has happened to at least 4 people that I know. I think I’m getting scammed. By the smallest, most white-collar, liberal-intelligentsia crime ring ever. You’d think they could just ask for donations.

What’s even better is that it’s a book that was sent over from the nearest University of California school. A system which gives their graduate TAs tuition waivers. It was a book that my poor, broke-ass library doesn’t even have.

OH THE INHUMANITY.

MM

I understand that you want us to look over the syllabus before the semester starts. I even understand that you want us to read some things, sometimes, before the semester starts— and look, two very very short stories is a totally acceptable amount of reading to do before class on Monday. 

And I get that you want us to have a hard copy of the syllabus! I do! Even in this technophile world, it’s nice to all sit there and stare at the same thing together on the first day, our little fingers following along as you read the whole thing out loud to us even though we are in the process of earning what might be considered, seen in a certain light, a very very advanced reading degree. We are extremely, totally literate people.

BUT GUYS. What’s this “find the syllabus online and print it out and bring it to class” business? The syllabus is the LAST thing you are responsible for providing for us (books: no, stories: online, each other’s work: we photocopy). Did the department put a ban on FACULTY using the photocopier? 

This is going to be a grim year, folks. When my professors ask us to bring potluck now, I’m going to wonder if the university has slashed their salaries so badly they’re trying to get themselves fed before they go home. 

xoxo,

MM

PS– It’s the first day of my supposedly last year of school ever! WAH re: first day. Summer is cool. I like it. It is mayor of my heartsville. I am totally that graduate student who is like, “But I get so much work done when I don’t have classes!” …I read a lot of books this summer. 

PPS– I say “supposedly last year” because let’s be honest. If I last two years without the academic calendar, we’ll all be shocked. I’m casting about for things to apply for now out of sheer fear of being released into the wild. Would you like to see my GRE scores? Can I get you a letter of recommendation with that muffin? Just please let me print my own syllabus and eat it for dinner.

My family has something against doing tourist things. I haven’t identified what it is, but I offer the following evidence:

a) I’ve been to Hawaii almost every year of my life. Usually for about a ten day stretch. For the first 17 years, we went to Oahu almost every time. I didn’t see Pearl Harbor until I was 16.

b) I went to Paris with my mom. Instead of going up the Eiffel Tower, we took a nap under it.

c) I’ve been to about 4 US National/State Parks and most of those were by accident. Or school field trips. On one such trip I petted a tarantula. An odd amount of our science curriculum was devoted to arachnids.*

d) I don’t know what state the Grand Canyon is in. I keep looking it up and forgetting. Arizona? Utah? Montana? That state between Utah and Montana? (Ok, so this has more to do with my sketchy inability to retain geography.)

e) I’ve never been to Seafair. Well, ok, when I was 22 I went on my sister’s friend’s boat to watch the Blue Angels show. I spent the whole time feeling vaguely like I was going to throw up– there is an insane amount of boat traffic during Seafair– which wasn’t helped by the 3 people who were so hungover they were puking off the side.

f) I had to take myself to see the nation’s Capitol this year. We went once before and my parents swear that we saw the memorials and the reflecting pool and the mall— by saying “No really, I remember it very clearly. We drove by them. But it was too hard to find parking so we didn’t get out of the car.”

Anyway, the first time I can really remember touring was in Rome when I was eleven and the morning after we got off the plane, this very sweet woman named Francesca took us on a tour of the ruins. I hated her on sight. It only got worse as the day went on. She probably had a very slight accent but in my memory she sounds like a trash compactor with a retainer. I had no idea what she was saying, and that b**tch dragged us through the entire city to stare at piles of rocks while traffic whizzed by. Just when I thought we were going to get some relief she started in on the museums.

I was pretty sure that we’d been touring for about fifteen hours at that point, and I distinctly remember lying down on a bench in a museum that claimed to be air-conditioned and feeling my bones melt into a gelatinous heap. I was convinced my parents could not possibly have paid someone to torture us in such a way— although I’m not sure what alternative explanation I thought existed. She clearly hadn’t kidnapped us, and my mom and dad kept talking about how fantastic she was– so maybe I just thought the heat had brainwashed everyone.

Clearly I was the only one responding in a rational manner by wilting dramatically and demanding more gelato. (I stand by this stance. Whenever it’s over 90 degrees the only sensible thing to do is lie on the floor in front of a fan. I don’t care if you’re in Italy. And that faint push of warm air they call air conditioning? Yeah. And they say Mussolini was a bad era. It’s shocking to me that the oils don’t melt right off the canvases.)

Ok, now it sounds like my family doesn’t do tourist things because I’m a whiny pain in the ass. I assure you that isn’t true. I mean, the part about that being why we don’t do tourist things. I can’t really dispute the whiny pain in the ass status after that story. Although I have gotten comparatively better at not dripping gelato on my shirt. Comparatively being the key word.

In other news, Pearl Harbor was a really moving experience.

Hope your summer touring is all sunny-side-up. And free of throw-up.

MM

*Edit: that was Discovery Park. That’s part of the Seattle Parks and Recreation system. Huh.

Does packing for a long trip make anyone else want to set fire to everything they own and go live in the woods with one pair of jeans and one flannel shirt?

Or, alternatively, buy a whole new wardrobe when you get wherever you’re going if such a thing were economically and ecologically feasible?

No? Just me? Ok. Carry on, then.

Love,

MM

PS– The trip in question is me, going to Seattle, for a month, where apparently it is still winter even though the calendar belies such views. And yes, I plan on packing the sun in my carry-on if God and TSA will let me.

It makes me really nervous when you park outside my house.

So maybe next time, when you go get Subway, you could keep that in mind?

Love,

MM

PS. I really want a cookie now. Thanks a lot.

As Mark Twain said, “I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.”

I loved Obama’s speech— loved that he took credit for the mission and made it clear that it was not only under his watch, but also was completely controlled by him and the result of his good decision-making, loved that he reminded us peace with Parkistan was integral to the success of the mission, loved that he drew firm distinctions between Osama bin Laden and the rest of the Islamic world. I loved the silent, still walk-away down the hallway. It’s about time the Democrats figured out how to talk about their achievements in clear-cut ways with bold statements and dramatic visual rhetoric (nerd alert).

But I don’t particularly like jingoism. Ever. It makes me nervous. I hate chants of “America, fuck yeah!” I always feel like the tar and feathers can’t be far behind.

But I also don’t like this quote from a Salon article that’s all over FB: “When we lose the sadness part — when all we do is happily scream ‘USA! USA! USA!’ at news of yet more killing in a now unending back-and-forth war — it’s a sign we may be inadvertently letting the monsters win.” I mean…anyone else see something spectacularly wrong with using the word “monsters” in the middle of this lesson about compassion?

Anyway. It’s important to acknowledge the significance of completing something we thought was important enough to dedicate the efforts of two presidents and countless soldiers to. I’m just not sure Facebook is meant to be all things at all times, you know?

I do like this friend’s FB post: “Phew, now I can get back to living my life to its fullest, without fear or compromise, head down and charging through the world with my medium sized American cock swinging between my legs!”

….Thanks, Shane, for saying all that needs saying.

So. I’ll see you in two days, Facebook, when you’re back to information about relationship statuses, the weather, sports, and what people are eating. And by the way— can you make a page that’s solely relationship status updates? Because that– that I think we can all get behind.

MM

P.S. Shoutout to the fact that Obama’s special report cut into the Celebrity Apprentice! Oh, The Donald. You’ve had a hard week, haven’t you? Maybe take a vacation. Someplace without internet or telephones. Maybe you should just go stand next to these guys. You just *might* look better in comparison. No promises.

My dad once told me that nothing good happens after 1 am. I can’t remember the exact context of this conversation– no doubt I was lobbying for a later curfew– but I do remember how adamant he was. Nothing, he said, absolutely nothing good happens after 1 am. There is never any reason to be out then. Go home.

At any rate, it’s never really been a danger with me: I’m what you might call a sleeper. That’s right. Not a night owl, not a morning person. I am all about the cozy comforter and soft downy pillows and overly realistic dreams about people I knew long ago.

But what I’ve learned is this. Nothing interesting happens before 1 am. I mean, yes, after 1 am there are fights and people get arrested and people are more likely to driving more drunk than they should be and those are not good things.

But take this example: Two years running now, I have gone to a friend’s birthday party and missed the action. Last year I left around 12:30. The party was winding down, the drinks had been drunk (the people were drunk), there was hardly anyone left, and whoever was left was all sleepily smoking cigarettes in the sideyard. AND APPARENTLY THERE WAS A DANCE PARTY AFTER I LEFT. WHAT THE HELL. I LOVE A DANCE PARTY.

Ahem. This year, I stayed until 1:15. Note: that is after 1:00. Just to be sure. I yawned and rocked back and forth on my heels and generally almost fell over from tipsy tiredness. I watched those suckers smoke their cigarettes, I stuck around long enough to have a friend yell at me, unprompted, that BOYS WILL BREAK YOUR HEART THEY JUST DON’T KNOW HOW TO LOVE DON’T DO IT.

Let’s be honest, the party’s usually over after that conversation.

But still I stayed!

I stayed and watched a friend lie down, or maybe fall down, on the sidewalk, and refuse to get up until someone else reached down and brushed his teeth with a finger for a solid two minutes. Yep.

Three more people left. The vodka in my friend’s purse was gone. Someone was eating the raspberries off the top of the cake.

The birthday girl took out the recycling. The party was over. Dead. Finito. I walked home with three of the few remaining people, just to ensure that the critical mass was shifted my way.

AND I MISSED THE DANCE PARTY. AGAIN. WTF.

In Rome, there was rather an extreme case of this. My roommate and I would be out eating dinner until ten or eleven, walking and eating gelato until midnight, and then, everyone tired and headed for bed, we would call it quits. The next day we would find out that the undergraduates had all met up at, like, what must have been 2 or 3 in the morning, gone to a gay club or a bar made entirely of ice, and been drinking, I don’t know what, maybe absinthe? Unicorn blood? And making out with Italian men.

That still seems made up to me. I refuse to believe it exists. Who LEAVES THEIR HOUSE AT 2 AM TO START THEIR NIGHT?

I’m such a terrible party-er. People need to learn to get drunk quicker so they can get their scandal in by midnight so I can see it and still get home to bed. Don’t they know it’s about me?

Love,

MM