September 2006 Archives

The other morning, I decided to cook myself some eggs for breakfast. This decision came before caffiene. I staggered into the kitchen in my boxer shorts, looking for some cooking fat. The three most commonly used in this house are olive oil, unpasturized butter, and coconut oil, which is what I found sitting by the stove.

Of late, I've been reading Heat, Bill Buford's nonfiction account of what happens to an upper-middle-class writer when he decides to become one of Mario Batali's line cooks. Among the one million things I've learned about Molto Mario is that he likes his pans hot, almost smoking. So I put the coconut oil in my little All-Clad, and waited for the heat to rise.

After a couple of minutes, I cracked an egg, and showily dropped it into the pan. Apparently, even raw, viscous eggs make a splash when dropped from a certain height. Oil splattered out, peppering across my stomach in a thin band, just to the north of my belly button.

"Fuck!" I said.

I slid the second egg in more carefully while simultaneously applying a bag of frozen green beans to my stomach. I could feel the burns begin to blister already. But they didn't appear to be too serious.

When Regina returned home from dropping Elijah off at school, I showed her the results of my cookery.

"Why would you cook with your shirt off?" she said.

"You know I don't like getting dressed before noon. And at least I wasn't smoking a cigarette while I did it. That would have been even more stereotypical."

"Neal, you are such a goddamn idiot."

A few hours later, this goddamn idiot picked the kid up after school. On Thursdays, many parents take their kids to a park in Los Feliz. We joined them.

One of the mothers, drawn to Koreatown by blood, had some interesting snacks. Elijah quickly learned that he liked seaweed, though he was a bit confused about the fact that he was eating seaweed.

"Where did the seaweed come from?" he asked.

"From a farm."

"It doesn't come from the farm. Seaweed is in the ocean."

"It's an ocean farm," I said.

I had no idea what I was talking about. Then the mother asked:

"Anyone want some shrimp chips?"

Elijah heard two of his favorite foods combined. I haven't seen him that excited about food since the time I fed him a frozen "broccoli popsicle."

He ate a shrimp chip.

"Mmm," he said. "Shrimpy."

"Does he watch Pee Wee?" asked the mom.

We've been TIVOing Pee Wee's Playhouse every night off Adult Swim.

"Oh, yes."

Elijah, now encouraged, ate another shrimp chip.

"Mmm," he said. "Octopussy."

A vision of a slinky Maud Adams briefly crossed my brain. I felt proud of my son for accidentally making a clever pop-culture reference. So I decided to reward him.

"Hey, Elijah," I said. "Wanna see my burns?"

I returned home from the bookstore the other night with two little presents for Elijah: William Kotzwinkle's classic Walter The Farting Dog, and one of its sequels, Walter The Farting Dog: Trouble At The Yard Sale. Elijah, like every other human on earth, finds farting funny. These are the funniest and most charming farting books for kids around.

The next morning, I woke up about an hour after everyone else.

"Daddy," Regina said, "Elijah has a question for you."

"What?" I said.

"Why did you get me books about farting?" he asked.

"Because I think they're funny."

"No," he said. "It's because you're the stinkiest man in the world."

Sure, I can lay down some nasty ones, and occasionally it's dusk before I shower, but I still took offense.

"There are a lot of men in the world," I said. "There's no way I'm the stinkiest."

"You're the stinkiest man in our neighborhood," he said.

"What about the old guy down the street with all the garbage on his porch?"

"He's pretty stinky," Elijah admitted.

"OK," Regina said. "How about this: You're the stinkiest aging literary hipster who used to write for McSweeneys."

"Maybe..."

She continued, immediately reversing herself.

"What about that guy who wrote Lemon? He's probably pretty stinky, and he did live in France."

"That's a stereotype."

"Or the long-haired dude who wrote the book about dogs. Whatever happened to him?"

"I'm not sure," I said. "You know, this is kind of a pointless debate."

With the issue unsettled, I read Walter The Farting Dog to Elijah. Afterward, he sat on my stomach.

"You have a fat belly," he said.

"I do not," I replied.

He started poking me.

"It's hard!" he said.

"I do situps."

"What are situps?"

I wanted to answer him. But instead, I let out a huge fart. A few seconds passed. Elijah began wagging his hand in front of his face. He climbed off me and ran into the other room.

"Mommy!" he said. "Daddy smells like old chicken!"

Last night around 9:30, a howl went up from Elijah's room.

"MAMA! I need you to cover me up and rub my back!"

Regina was otherwise occupied, and also immune to this stay-up-for-five-extra-minutes ploy. Then:

"I have to tell you something important!"

This went on for a few minutes, and he kept repeating the "something important" bit. Finally, I went into his room.

"I want mama."

"Mama is unavailable."

Elijah accepted the situation, so I put a blanket over him and rubbed his back.

"So what was this important thing you had to tell us?"

"I was wishing and wishing, but my wish didn't come true."

What was this, an episode of Full House? Anyway, I asked,

"What was your wish?"

"I wished I had all the ice cream."

"That's a good wish."

"Maybe when I wake up in the morning, it'll be in the freezer, and then I could sit at a table in the freezer and eat the ice cream all day."

"Maybe," I said.

And then I started laughing. He also started laughing.

"I'm very funny," he said.

"Don't get cocky, kid," I replied.

On Friday evening, I went to the Von's at Figueroa and Colorado to buy supplies for that night's Dodger game. When I got into the checkout line with my two bottles of Aquafina and my chocolate bar, the guy in front of me, who had a bunch of items, asked me if I wanted to go ahead of him. He was so friendly and good-humored that I refused. So I waited for him to finish, now in a jolly mood.

I turned around. The guy behind me was loading five cans of wet dog food onto the conveyor belt. I should have said, "Do you want to go ahead of me?", because that would have been passing down the karma. Instead, for some reason, I said,

"I hope those aren't for you."

I looked up and beheld the bitter, unshaven, face of an ex-con. His eyes were red-rimmed and blazing with permanent anger.

"Do you eat this?" he asked.

"No..."

"Do I look like I eat dog food?"

The proper answer was "you look like you could eat dog food," but really, I want to live to see my son graduate from kindergarten. So instead, I said,

"I was just being silly."

"Maybe it's not good to be silly."

"I'm really sorry. I hang around with three-year-olds all the time."

"I'm not three years old."

I apologized about eight more times, and thus survived another round of errands. Someday, I vowed to myself, I'll live in a neighborhood where the odds are actually low that I'll be murdered at the grocery store. But in a city where a starter home at the top of a decaying hill ringed by rusted-out cars goes for $550,000, that day won't come soon.

On Saturday, I took Elijah to the zoo, to which we have a yearly membership. This is fortunate. Otherwise, I'd get pretty annoyed at Elijah. He only wants to go to the zoo to eat popcorn. After that, he starts begging to go home.

"No," I said this weekend. "We're at the zoo, and we will see some animals."

Soon we arrived, after much slogging up and down hills, at the lion pit. A large crowd had gathered, and with good reason. The male lion was preparing to mount the female. Apparently, she didn't like the position, because she roared and snapped at him. Yet he persisted, following her around a tree, licking her butt the whole way. Finally, the female sprawled down, belly up, as if to say, "Take me, Aslan."

Then the lion king climbed aboard, thrust four or five times, roared orgasmically, and trotted off, looking satisfied.

"What are the lions doing?" Elijah asked.

"Making a baby."

"Is that how you and mommy made me?"

"It was a little less spontaneous than that. And it took even less time. But the basic mechanics were the same..."

On a previous visit to the zoo, Elijah and I witnessed the magnificent spectacle of a giraffe peeing in another giraffe's mouth. Now we'd seen lions fucking. What marvel awaits us during our next visit? A mountain goat getting a Dirty Sanchez? A crocodilian Cleveland Steamer? A tamarin gang bang? What will I tell him then?

Until yesterday, Elijah had two pairs of shoes in rotation: some blue Crocs that were too small, and a pair of orange Crocs that were a little too big, causing him to trip and skin his knees a lot. Also, he got blisters from them. For those of you who don't know, Crocs--rubber closed-toe sandals with little air holes dotting the top of the shoe--are the de rigeur preschool footwear of the moment. They are, I believe, Scandanavian in origin. If they're not, they probably should be. Anyway, Elijah was complaining, and he doesn't need any more reasons to complain. It was time for his fall shoes.

Regina took him to the mall yesterday. She returned with a pair of navy-blue Pumas that looked just as comfortable as anything I own. Apparently, he'd tried on the exact same pair at a different store an hour before she bought these, claiming that the first pair made him uncomfortable, though we later found out that was because the saleslady made him wear itchy socks. Good lord. Anyway, he liked this pair, claiming they gave him the power to "run really really fast, faster than all the people in the world, and Hot Man."

Morning came. Regina woke up with Elijah. I slept an hour longer, getting up in time to drive him to school. As I staggered about the house, trying to find clean clothes, I heard this from the living room:

"NEAL! I need your help! NOW!"

Really, I should just wake up every morning by having a teakettle full of boiling water poured on myself. It would be easier.

I took Elijah to school this morning. We got there a little late, so all his friends were already running around the schoolyard. His buddy Sean, the Dodger fan, was there, wearing his Number 5 T-shirt.

"What happened last night, Sean?" I asked.

"Nomar hit a home run," he said.

Sean's mother was hanging over the balcony.

"Did you see it?" she said.

"Of course I saw it."

"Greg woke me up this morning, gave me a cup of tea, and said, 'watch this.' I cried for 20 minutes."

The kids were still bustling all around me at that point, so I threw my hat up in the air and started jumping. They all bounced off me, at least five of them, even though only Sean had any idea what I was doing. He raised a hand for me to slap. I picked him up and kept jumping.

"Me, daddy, me," Elijah said.

So I picked Elijah up as well.

"WHOOOOO!" I shouted, though I don't have much of a voice today.

"The Dodgers hit 20 home runs and 40 home runs," Elijah said, "and they went into the parking lot and then into the ocean, and they won."

"Close enough," I said.

I threw myself on the concrete, pumping my fist all the way, and the kids piled on.

Perhaps you don't want to picture me writhing and shrieking on my sofa, alone, at 11 PM on a Monday night. Perhaps you're not interesting in the image of me tearing the T-shirt off my chest. And you definitely don't want to hear about me dropping to my knees and weeping. But when your baseball team hits four consecutive home runs in the bottom of the 9th inning to tie the game (a feat that has only happened four times in baseball history, and not since 1963, and never in such dramatic context), and then wins with a two-run homer in the bottom of the tenth to win a game that puts them into first place with fewer than two weeks to go into the season, well, that's what happens.

I just witnessed the second-greatest moment in Dodgers history. And that may have been the greatest single baseball game of all time. It was certainly the greatest comeback of all time. I still can't believe it. I just can't. That game is NEVER coming off the TIVO.

If anyone doesn't know what I'm talking about, look it up.

Oh man.

Elijah, having been put to bed an hour previous, charged into the living room.

"I have to go poopie!" he announced.

"You know where the bathroom is. I ain't stoppin' you."

I said this with a bit of a stereotypical street accent, because I was watching The WIre and I tend to absorb the speaking patterns of any show in which I'm immersed. A month ago, I might have added "cocksucker." Anyway, Elijah left.

"Who's got ass duty?" I asked Regina.

"It's to you," she said.

A couple of minutes later, we heard the familiar shriek from the john.

"I'M READY TO WIPE!"

So I went into the bathroom and checked out the bowl. It was crowded.

"Dang, Elijah," I said. "That's impressive."

"I made a really big stinky poop," he said.

I wiped his ass.

"Be sure to clean it real good," Regina shouted from the other room.

"No, Regina," I said. "I refuse because I want our son to have a dirty butt."

"I'm just saying."

That task done, I washed my hands.

"Now it's your turn," I said to the boy.

He held up his right index finger.

"What?"

"I have a boo-boo."

"There is no boo-boo on that finger. Now wash your hands."

Behind me, Regina's cat Teacake, fat, old and stupid, was attempting to get into the bathtub so he could drink from the faucet. Elijah stepped on the digital scale.

"I'm waiting for it to say zero so I can weigh Teacake."

"You're not going to weigh Teacake. You're going to wash your hands."

"NO! I have to weigh Teacake."

"Teacake doesn't want to be weighed."

Elijah picked up the cat, who hissed. Some wrestling ensued, after which the cat was running away in terror, I had somehow managed to get some soap on Elijah's hands, and Elijah was howling.

"You get into bed right now," I said.

"I want my mama!"

His mama appeared.

"Good lord, Elijah," she said. "Daddy was just trying to wash your hands so you wouldn't get poop in your boo-boo."

Five minutes later, Elijah was asleep, and I was that much closer to the grave.

Despite the chaotic atmosphere of Elijah's summer swim classes, which at times resembled the evacuation of Dunkirk led by Valley Girls in mirrored sunglasses, the boy still picked up a few skills. He had no problem noodling around under water for 20 seconds. He learned various floating positions, as well as how to monkey-crawl along the side of the pool, and he did something called his "doggie-kittie." This used to be known as doggie paddling, but I guess that's something else that's changed from my youth, along with little things such as the fact that Pluto is no longer a planet and that the brontosaurus is now called the apatosaurus.

But these pieces still didn't add up to swimming. I took it upon myself to close the gap. We had a pool at our disposal every day in Vancouver, so I gave Elijah instruction. I told him to do his "turtle float", his "Superman arms," and his "pancake float." This didn't help much. He'd launch himself off the steps, flail helplessly in a circle for a few seconds, and then grasp for my chest desperately, all the while grinning like an idiot underwater.

"You need to swim," I said.

"I am swimming," he said.

"Actually, you're drowning. It's creative drowning, but it's still drowning. And I don't want you to drown."

So here's what I told him: "Do your doggie-kitties. And kick while you're doing them. Swim in a straight line. And if you run out of breath, lift your head out of the water."

On our last day of vacation, he spread his arms, and glided beautifully off the top step, and then starting moving his arms in a perfect crawl, while kicking his legs. When he reached me, I said,

"Do you realize what you're doing?"

"What?"

"You're swimming!"

"I am?"

"Yes. How did you do that?"

"Because I did what you told me."

"You mean you were actually listening?"

"Uh-huh."

Since we got home, I've taken Elijah swimming twice, once on Labor Day to our neighborhood pool, and once to the aquatic center where he took his lessons. He now systematically swims several feet from the side of the pool into my arms, and then back to the steps when I release him. Other times, I whip him around in a circle, let him go, he moves himself around underwater to locate me, and then swims back to my arms. He still hasn't figured out how to lift his head out of the water to take a breath. But I trust that will evolve in time.

I've taught my son how to do something useful. It's really gratifying. Whenever I see him swim, I want to cry with pride. Still, I feel uncomfortable. Have I really done something right for once? It hardly seems possible.

The other day at school, Elijah's teacher showed the kids how to make pasta. It had some sort of chicken cream sauce. At dinner that night, the boy told us about the recipe.

"She made it with that thing that's like onion, but smaller," he said.

"You mean garlic?" Regina said.

"Uh-huh," Elijah said. "Garlic. And there was something called rosemary! It smelled really good!"

Now, I don't remember what I learned in preschool. Hell, I don't even remember what I watched on TV last night. But I'm pretty certain that I didn't learn about rosemary until after college. Still, it seems like a good lesson for my boy, who's showing uncommon taste in food.

Last night, Regina made pizza, using store-bought crust. One of the pizzas, at Elijah's request, had black olives, capers, and mozzarella. Regina deployed ground beef and fresh tomatoes onto the other one. Both, I decided, could stand improvement by way of the anchovy. It's probably my favorite condiment; to my mind, the truly best foods--bone marrow, pork cheeks, runny, aged cheese, and the anchovy--bear a taste and smell that's faintly redolent of ass. I really wanted to share my anchovy passion with my son.

Attention residents of Orange County and surrounding counties! I've managed to worm my way onto the bill of a very interesting reading series, The Writer's Garage, run by the legendary Mike Martt of Thelonius Monster. The idea here is to mix reading and punk-rock, something I've been trying to do for years with little success. I'm appearing next Wednesday night, September 13, at DiPiazza's Lava Lounge in Long Beach. Also on the bill: Mike Watt of the Minutemen and Kira Roessler from Black Flag. I'm sure they'll never have seen the likes of me. Maybe Watt can say hello to Iggy Pop for me when he plays with him in Buenos Aires about a week later. Talk about range! Anyway, it's 5 bucks, I'll be reading at 8 PM and will be reading from Alternadad. Come by and exchange pleasantries.

Now I'll tell my final vacation story, I promise.

One of the first things I do when I take a holiday, even when I'm travelling with family and especially when I know that I'm not going to have to drive, and especially especially in a place with relaxed attitudes toward drug use, is to seek out a small bag of marijuana for my personal use. And I wasn't going to visit Vancouver without scoring me some legendary BC bud. So the first night we were there, after we got Elijah to sleep on the sofabed, I headed off to the 300 block of West Hastings Street, which everyone who reads certain Internet forums knows is the best place in Vancouver for tourists to buy weed.

We also went to Seattle on our trip, paying a little weekend visit to my cousin Michael, his wife Catherine, and their 14-month-ish old son. The boy appears to be a mild, happy, friendly child who gives them no out-of-the-ordinary trouble. They were about as prepared for Elijah as FEMA was for Hurricane Katrina.

By the time Michael took us on a hike in the mountains of Washington on Sunday, we'd managed to downgrade Elijah to a Tropical Storm. An hour or so up, we reached a picnic-perfect setting among a copse of trees. At this point, Elijah decided that Regina was sitting on his "favorite rock," which, of course, he'd never seen before and would never see again.

"It's my best place in the whole world and if I don't sit there I will be dead!" he said.

While Regina didn't actually give a crap about the rock in particular, she did give a crap about succumbing to the whims of a whiny child on the verge of his fourth birthday. She stood her ground. Elijah moaned, clawed at his face, and then, eventually, howled, filling the forest with his agony. The hurricane whipped up again.

"PLEASE, mama! I have to sit on that rock! Please, please, please?"

"No," she said.

"WHYYYYYYYYYYY?"

"Because I'm sitting here."

"NOOOOOOOOO!"

This went on for ten minutes, maybe more. Regina, a good Protestant girl, worried that we were disturbing the peace of the other hikers. I tried to imagine myself alone on a sandy beach, smoking a joint under partly cloudy 75-degree skies, and then alternately falling asleep and reading a good, pulpy novel.

"NOOOOOOOOO!" Elijah said.

Finally, the fever broke when Michael said, "Hey, Elijah."

"What?" Elijah sniffled.

"Let's take off our clothes and jump in the lake."

Let me tell you: Nothing revives the spirit like spending a weekend with your family at a hotel in Vancouver, British Columbia. Elijah did quite well. He slept on a sofabed, ate room service, and watched Canadian kids' TV, which is just as annoying as American kids' TV, only with fewer commercials and slightly less violence.

One morning, Elijah and I descended into the lobby while Regina and Hercules were putting on their faces up in the room. The seat at the concierge desk was empty. Elijah sat down. Another guest found that adorable and approached him, with a British accent.

"Pardon me," he said. "But can you recommend somewhere for lunch today?"

Elijah pondered this a moment, and then said,

"I think you should eat at Ice Cream Harbor."

A collective "awwww" wafted over from the reception desk, which was populated by cute women in their 20s who hadn't yet seen the dark side of child-rearing. Later that day, we returned home from our charming family bike ride. We found a card in our room, thanking Elijah for all his hard work, and bestowing upon him the gift of two free pints of ice cream.

He ran around the room, flapping his arms and saying "YAY! ICE CREAM!" I nearly forgave him for the on-the-floor temper tantrum he'd thrown earlier in a sandwich shop because his shoes had gotten wet in the grass. But not quite.

Also on our trip, I took Elijah into the steam room for the first time.