Sunday at CVS

I never know how to start these entries. As I look back on past ones, they normally open with some erratic mini monologue about the current state of things. Sometimes, they start with just a contrite passage that typically sheds light on a hopeful resolution to follow. Some are just stories. Pointless, entertainment at best. I guess this one is just a story too.

We were seated beneath the window, with the weight of the ceiling hanging over us. I felt small and nestled in the slipshod blanket fort we had crafted using starchy white sheets and cotton-clumped pillows. It was like those I had made when I was a kid, but this time the blankets were less soft and there weren’t as many stray greasy popcorn kernels in the crevices. I slumped my shoulders, the small of my back wedged into the corner of the wall. My spine touched the divide where the sand-colored popcorn paint and mahogany wood floor wed. The bone whiteness of the mattress liner, our fort's sunken roof, wove in and out of my legs stretched out in front of me. I looked down at my prickly shins, my right knee still puffed from surgery last July. Outside the window, the sky was a vast and empty blue, not a single fleck of fluffy white to be seen. Pigeons and seagulls peppered the ledge of the apartment building that faces mine, squawked with a familiar cadence, and then flew away in hoards at a time. I tried softening my face, letting gravity take me over, but the gentle breeze passing through the open window kept me awake. Each breath of January air kept the skin on my arms rough and icy.

There we sat side by side, loosely propped up against the wall, like limp stuffed animals sitting on a shelf. I suppose I was the only one awake. He slowly sunk harder and heavier into me with every increment of breath, his ear making a soft indentation as he unknowingly, unconsciously, burrowed the side of his face onto the top of my head. It reminded me of getting your blood pressure taken at the CVS. I could almost hear it; the velcro crackling when I adjusted the polyester band. The soft beeps chiming their unsurprising rhythm, squeezing a little more snuggly into you after each sound. I could picture the way my chin used to fold into my neck, as I craned to see over my shoulder and secure the band onto my upper arm, each little cleft of nylon latching onto its counterpart. I smiled at the idea of how consistently, how predictably his weight fell into mine. It didn’t lull me to sleep as it should have. My mind drifted to other things.

I thought about a lot of things while this life-sized blood pressure cuff slowly constricted.

I thought about my mom first.

When I was home for Christmas, I got into the habit of finishing my day in my parent’s bathroom, helping myself to all the serums, creams, moisturizer, toners, and lotions that sat atop a shiny metal tray. The tray was a timeless silver, the kind you would see appear on a butler's hand in a 17th century period piece or so. It stood a bit out of place, far too polished amongst the hodge podge of makeup bags and retainer cases that scattered the chalky marble countertop. I would dampen my face with cold water from the faucet, far too impatient to wait for it to warm. Then I would reach for the cleanser, the bottle with the white label and sea glassy tint. Next, I’d grab whatever teeny jar I was instructed pair it with, pump the liquid onto my fingertips, apply generously, then do this again three or four more times until my face glistened like the morning dew on a summer lawn.

When I was extra lucky, my mom’s routine synchronized with mine. At the same hour and minute, we would be standing beside each other in the mirror for a few minutes of vanity and swap miniature bottles of different products that arguably, did much of anything at all. I would fiddle with my blemishes that freckled my chin while she smoothed her wrinkles with the heel of her hand. She’d pull back the skin beside her eyes, lower her chin, and affix her face in the center of the mirror, voguing different angles with her new dimensions.

I loved this concept. I loved the silly height difference between us. I loved knowing she was once twenty-two years old once too. Although, we often jokingly question if we would have been friends at the same age. I loved that we both wore headbands during our face routine that revealed our matching widow's peaks, hers far more defined than mine.

We have our hips and our hairlines in common, but we aren’t spittingly similar. I share her capacity for love I think, or I at least hope to be as charitable as she is when I grow older. I think my mom is radiant now, simply in the way that a pretty woman is radiant. She carries with her now the air of the beauty she possessed when she was younger. When she pulls her cheeks back for the mirror in this stretched execution, this stunning debutante is revealed to me.

Oh, it is so jarring the difference in grace, she and I. She blows dry her hair to fluff and volume, while mine lays limp after the shower. I hover over the kitchen counter and eat leftovers cold, a lazy arm stablizing me while I feed myself with my fingers. She crosses her legs with her back straight while seated as I sit across from her, hunched over like a prawn. I am the poster child for what flunking cotillion classes would look like, and that is because I nearly did. Though ironically, my cinema-debut-sized headshot still adorns the halls of the country club. My family thinks I wear too baggy of clothes. They’re right, I do. Even though she and I are not the same, I like being a woman after her.

That’s all.

I thought of all of these things in the few seconds she contorted her face. Then, as we scrubbed and prodded and smoothed our T-zones, my mind wandered to other things of lesser pertinence.

I like to think about how good things turn lousy. Not in a nihlistic way, “life is suffering kind of way”, although I find that is a fun trope to play with too. Instead, I see these stories like little comedy bits. The part of the movie, show, book where the dazzling idea turns into a limp one. It reminds you really just how un-serious everything is. The other week, my dad and I decided to catch a movie before I headed back to Spain. We were overdue for a daddy-daughter date and thought we’d treat ourselves to dinner and a show. We stopped at our favorite mexican spot downtown beforehand. I got to hear how my dad spent his time in Jamaica, or what his friends looked like in college, and the assortment of random jobs he has had in his lifetime. All while gabbing over a glass of tempranillo and tortilla chips, salted and warm. Does everyone collectively discover something new about their fathers with age? How did I just find out he was a bouncer on the weekends? Or played baseball all four years of high school?

Sigh, he's so elusive. I fear I talk too much to ever be cool and elusive.

Over our pre-game wine and dine, we shared stories. I am at the age where I can finally tell stories without as much censorship that was warranted in high school. That feels good. After our chuckles and giggles, we signed the check, hopped in the car, swapped our recent finds on Spotify, and walked into the theatre (Alamo Drafthouse, my favorite). We nestled into the big leather chairs and the movie flickered on.

Retrospectively, it was suffice to say it may have been the worst choice of movie to watch with your father.

The first few scenes weren’t so bad. A little drawn out admittedly, but a cheeky plot, esteemed cast, all shot in black and white. Cool. All was well until about forty minutes in when the movie turned into one big porn shoot. For the next two hours of the film, I watched Emma Stone work in a Parisian brothel and get railed by different ugly french men over…and over….and over again. The discomfort was suffocating. I couldn’t burrow my head into my sweatshirt any more without becoming a part of it completely. It was one of those insufferable decisions you just have to sit with until it’s over. A good thing turned lousy.

We tried to rescue it on the ride home, discuss the artistic angles the director had used, the creative direction of the script, but there was just so. much. sex. Some would argue it was part of the artistic process. To shoot every position. Every orffice. They’d argue it was necessary to the fabric of the film.

But I’d say that is was just shitty art.

And that’s a funny conversation to have too. Does all art deserve to be seen? I’d argue no. Because some of it sucks. Some of it sucks so bad that it makes me laugh to watch people swoon over it. It makes me laugh when people point out what they find to be complex and virtuous the same things I find lazy and uninspired. Who is more of a prick out of the two? The appreciator or the scoffer? Probably both if I had to choose.

On the way home that night, I began to think about things I liked.

I like to remember that the actors who starred in black and white movies did indeed see in color, that their eyes weren't stuck in a colorless world that I used to imagine. I like to hear the hum of a parked car after having driven for miles; the invisible sounds in the undercarriage jumping around like a tinny bag of popcorn sparks. I like when I'm falling asleep beside someone and they beat me to the punch. When I hold on to consciousness long enough to hear their last little audible puff of air before their head sinks into the pillow with a thump. I like to learn what my friends consider heaven. I like to hear what anybody thinks about heaven, for that matter.

During my break at work, I waltzed down to the cafe at the bottom of San Vicente’s steep and slippery stone steps. I walked in, to no suprise, to see old men drinking their 2pm vermouth in fellowship. Beside them, a Pirates of the Carribean themed slot machine shrieking, a Gaelic ballad blasting through the speakers, a cold draft ruminating through the door that stays propped open all year long. I used to really hate this feng-shui but I find it funny now. I situated myself on the tiny wooden stool, my chest just barely reaching the lip of the counter. Miserable. I wedged one foot on the wooden bar of the stool and the other in the slot of the tobacco machine beside me for stability. Tepe served me my cafe mediano accompanied by one packet of sugar. I swirled the white granules into the warm brown coffee with a spoon fit for Thumbilina. Soon after, Anna joined me too. She awkwardly hoisted herself onto the stool as I did minutes before and began telling her story from the weekend.

After about a thirty seconds of retelling, Anna stopped and studied my face.

“Wait. You were there I thought?,” she questioned.

I wasn’t.

“Ah,” she continued, “I always get my stories mixed up. Remembering who was there and who wasn’t. When I relive a good memory, I picture all my friends there. Sometimes it is hard to separate who was actually present and who wasn't.”

I suppose her heaven has everyone she knows there, everyone identifiable, all sharing the same memories. In my heaven, I picture we all embody ourselves at our best ages. Maybe I will meet my second grade teacher Mrs. Pittman when she was 14 instead of 45. Or I’ll see my friend from eight grade summer camp in his 86 year-old body, perhaps his best year yet. Some people I’ve talked to believe heaven is not so much a place, but an infinite void that you’re still calmly conscious in. Sounds a bit boring in my opinion. But I think I understand what they picture. I compare that to the feeling a few seconds before going under the knife. I’ve felt it a handful of times for various, stupid surgeries. This absent feeling just before anesthesia takes effect, plummeting slowly into a warm and peaceful nothingness. Laying supine, numb, and counting backwards from ten while your breath fogs underneath a sterile, rubber mask until the lights go out for a while. My old church leader argues there definitely will not be animals in heaven. Of course he told me this right after my first dog died. I'm not fond of the guy. My brother’s idea of heaven doesn’t appeal to any whimsical notions either. He thinks it will be a beautiful physical place, but we won’t be able to recognize anyone from Earth, that we’ll all just be indistinguishable orbs of light. He says it won’t matter because we will all be at peace. Dull.

I find it fun to talk about the end, even if this is just the beginning. I’ve been more conscious of risks lately, “the end” more namely, but maybe that’s just getting older. I always wear my seatbelt on planes now. Sometimes for fun even, I even queue doomy music while we descend. Just in case. Nowadays, I don’t talk to the twitchy 30 year old in the hostel who rattles on about how Marxism changed his life. I think before how I would have sat and listened. I would've taken a risk of discomfort to hear him out. He would have thrown two dollar words at me to appear intelligent. I would have pretended to care and respect him. Now I excuse myself from his monologue and eat my lukewarm soup-in-a-box in the other room. After a night out in Malága with a Dutchie, Norweigan, and fellow American, we found the bars bland so we went to the beach. As I looked out at the dim ocean, I thought about the idea of getting swept away by the rough Mediterranean Sea at three in the morning. I wondered how long it would take me to give up treading water if I were swept out. I thought about whether there were sharks near shore this time of year. There were. 50 different species actually. I consider these risks that I didn't really before.

I ran bare-bottomed with my new friends into the crashing waves despite it. The cold water electrified me, my hands barely visible in front of me. Massive, dark waves plummeted over my head. It was scary but thrilling. Yes, maybe risky, but I think that the instinct I had beforehand was a commendable one.

Photos from life in Cantabria: