Something "Special"

I know I've been discussing my childhood with you guys a lot lately, but I promise you will be happy you read this one.

A week ago, my parents brought me a little present. It was a "book" I wrote in the 1st grade for school. And as you'll see, it's Something Special.

Ahem ahem ahem...




WHAT THIS PAGE IS:
The front and back cover, a portrait of our family with our house in the background. There's Dad, Mom, Hannah (age 1), Katie (age 10), Emily (age 7), and John (age 4)

NOTES:
1) I would like to apologize to Katie for giving her such girth, although the side pony tail might have been accurate for 1991, apologize to Hannah for my crayon ineptitude which resulted in her turtleneck onesie and lack of nose, and to John for forgetting to give him pants. Although, again, that might have been accurate for 1991.
2) I'm also concerned that this happened:
Teacher: "Now, kids, this is an important book you're writing. So make sure you title it something special."
Emily: "Got it. *writing* Somethiiiiing....speciallll..."




WHAT THIS PAGE IS:
This is a bird's eye "vew" of me, as a baby, standing on the scale in my parent's bedroom and weighing the feather-light baby weight of 20 pounds. I assume, as a baby, I would need help standing by myself, so my mother is helping me. To the side, you can see the top of the light, which I had clearly asked how to spell, considering my random stab at "drassor."

THE TEXT:
"If I could... ...be a baby I wood be light."

NOTES:
I don't really know what to tell you on this one. I clearly phoned it in. That, or I had spent all my time getting a mental grasp of my parent's bedroom from a bird's eye view that I didn't have time to properly explain my reasoning behind dedicating an entire page to such thoughts.




WHAT THIS PAGE IS:
I am standing in a single file line outside before school. Jon O. is patting my then spiked hair and calling me "Spike." (Pure genius that one.) I am giving the kind of snappy comeback that truly comes after days of consideration, "Jon put a sok in it I meen you all redy got your underwer! not!"

THE TEXT:
"When I grow up I get funnyer and funnyer. I love being lughed at! I'm grat at being funny and I bet you now how funny I am!"

NOTES:
1) I remember being acutely aware that my example joke was not very funny, but I couldn't figure out how to MAKE it funny. Let's review the facts:

a) "Put a sock in it": Modern idiom I had recently learned. Always funny.
b) Reference to underwear in someone's mouth: I mean, how can you go wrong with that?
c) "Not!": Hi. My name is Emily, and my sense of humor spawns directly from Pee Wee Herman. It's nice to meet you.
I mean, based on that evidence alone, this joke just hit a home run--NAY, a grand slam. I don't know what I was so worried about.

2) My blatant disregard toward instruction.
Teacher: "Now this page will start with 'When I grow up...' and you'll write about what you'll be when you grow up!"
Me: "Yeah, eff that. I'm going to need an entire page dedicated to an underwear joke."
3) I clearly set this page up to draw myself in a long line of students, each with their own totally accurate caricatures. But once I had myself in there, I got through one more skirt before saying "Ehh, screw it. They get the point."




WHAT THIS PAGE IS:
This is Easter morning in our living room, as evidenced by the creepy painting of a marble splashing in oil we used to have. Katie is discovering the traditional egg-on-the-clock egg, and John has found one of the "easy" (read, BABY) eggs under the couch.

THE TEXT:
Ester is my vavrit thig. man I bet you don't know how special Ester is to me. espashle that Jesus rows.

NOTES:
1) Okay, I'm going to be straight up honest with you here. Ester had VERY little to do with Jesus rowing. And it had very MUCH to do with Cadbury creme eggs. But I knew, even then, that if you want to get in good with The Big Guy, you have to do all the right stuff. You can't call your brother "stupid," you have to pray before dinner and occasionally other meals, and you HAVE to appreciate religious holidays for religious reasons. Otherwise, as a 7 year-old who can think of nothing more wonderful in the world than finding various types of marshmallows in a colorful basket, you are going straight to hell.
2) Every time I read the word "espashle," I want to take little 1st grade Emily and squeeze her so hard, her eyes pop out of her little spiked head a little.
3) I must have just learned the phrase "I bet" from Katie or something. Clearly I was into it. I also like how I kind of sound like an old black man sitting on a bench telling my life story. "Man, I tell you what. You don't even KNOW."
4) Next to the marble picture is a little brown rectangle. I believe it is our doorbell, but to be honest with you, I STILL don't know what that brown box does. But isn't that a strangely specific thing to remember about my living room, considering I drew this at school? And how have I been so perplexed by something for almost 20 years without bothering to ask anyone about it?




WHAT THIS PAGE IS:
My father and mother are playing a board game (My mom is cross-legged and in a dress. Scandal!) and Katie and I are playing cards on our living room floor.

THE TEXT:
It's fun to play at or house but, we never have time! You know, mom gos to work dad to School we go to School and the little ones go to the baby sittirs.

NOTES:
1. I have to say, for someone who clearly didn't understand the concept that CRAYONS CAN'T BE ERASED JUST BECAUSE YOU MADE YOUR OWN HEAD ENORMOUS, it was a good effort for the commas on this page. I mean, 1 out of 2 ain't bad.
2. I 100% blame my father for the fact that I referred to someone 3 years younger than me as "the little ones."
3. That blue couch, man. I remember the day we got that couch. And I have to say--my rendition of it? Spot on. Spot. On. The thing is, though, that nothing else in that house even exists. We had no family portrait in which Hannah is falling into a small pit (I WISH) and we had no small windows with red curtains. So I ask you, tiny Emily: why the random attention to detail? Hmm?
4. Note that Hannah and John are no where to be found. That's because this picture embodies a happy place full of happy people, playing games and laughing into all hours of the night, as all the useless family members sleep.
5. I like that spelling and grammar were still just a shot in the dark at this point. I imagine myself like Pollock, just filling in blank space with splotches, hoping to appease the masses. "Capitalize here, lower case here...let's add some punctuation over here...that'll do, pig. That'll do."




WHAT THIS PAGE IS:
This is a white stretch limo with a red top pulling up to the red carpet, where throngs of smiling photographers await my appearance.

THE TEXT:
When I get older I hope too be the prasadint!

NOTES:
1. GOD I hope that's how Bush spells "president."
2. Okay clearly I never wanted to be president. Honestly, I think I saw someone else write that and just wrote it, too. At this point, I had no idea that I wanted to be a Muppeteer. I really just wanted to be important and famous. And who doesn't want that, ever? Can you blame me?
3. Also, can you blame me for being an annoying show-off who knows what the Big Dipper looks like?




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When Spiders Attack

Before we begin, may I remind you to become a fan on Facebook if you so choose, so you can get updates on my updates.

I need to ask you guys something, to find out if I am normal or not. [Insert *Oh, Emily, you’re NEVER normal! HAR!* joke here]

I understand that I am mainly alone in my irrational fear of whales.
And I understand that, while some also believed it was “making ends meat,” in the end, I was wrong.

But tell me I’m not alone on this one: Spiders while you are naked are 500 times scarier than spiders at any other time.

I alluded to this fear during a 'My Monday' comic. Yes, it’s all hilarious when I am a stick-figure. But seriously that morning I almost gave myself a heart attack. CORRECTION: That spider sneaking up on me all quiet-like and drinking my shower water almost gave me a heart attack.

I guess it’s just the whole vulnerability factor? I don’t know, I can’t quite place it. But...okay. Let me take you back in time.

In college, while I was still with Teenage Boyfriend, I decided to take a break from our Family Guy-and-campus-food marathon to shower. I’m in there, minding my own biz, when I look up and lo and behold, a spider on the ceiling. Whimpering but with shampoo in my hair and no feasible means of escape, I watch the spider, unblinking and trembling. And that’s when it happens.

The spider moves.

Not only does it move, but it moves TOWARD ME. And of course the ceiling is all moist from condensation, so the spider is walking on shaky ground. It lifts one leg and seems to dangle there for a moment. So I did what any God-and-spider-fearing person would do: I splashed water toward it. I was hoping this would send the message to the spider of, “Hey now. Back off. There is more where this came from and I am not afraid to drown you.”

APPARENTLY the message sent was, “Hey, friend! Wanna play tag? YOU'RE IT!” The spider crawled closer. And closer.

And at this point, I’m not afraid to admit it. I screamed. Yes, screamed. Because a spider had taken maybe 3 steps closer to me.

Teenage Boyfriend called through the door, “Are you okay?”

Through my tears I managed to call out, “Sss...sp...spider...”

“Are you serious?”

I turned off the shower, wrapped a towel around myself and opened the door, looking not-unlike this (minus the hook and mustache)


TB grabbed a wad of toilet paper, reached up, and got the bugger. My hero. I returned to my shower, shaking mildly from the memories.


A second story. This time, I am living on the 1st floor in Chicago. Sadly, this is before I had spider-killing foster Super Kitty. I am alone. I am alone, and on the toilet. When I stand up, what do I see on the tank behind me?

AN ENORMOUS SPIDER.

But not even a regularly enormous spider, but a spider with legs the length of a small crane. It is like the queen bee of Daddy Long Legs.

Which means:
1) That spider was like ONE inch away from me while I was half-naked and it probably saw all my bits and is making a mental note to tell all its friends about it.
2) It could have reached out and touched me *shudder, shudder*
3) Now I have an uncrushable spider, because its legs are so long, they will crunch. CRUNCH, PEOPLE. I DO NOT KILL THINGS THAT CRUNCH.

But I can’t just let this spider hang out. Something that was that close to me SHALL NOT be allowed to come near me again. And I also can’t kill it. And I can’t ask my boyfriend to squish it because at this point I was dating The Irishman and he was all living in Ireland and such. And I couldn’t make Sara do it because she was away being an actress.

So it is Emily v. Spider. What can I do? OH! I know. I can put it in some kind of receptacle and take it outside. Genius.

I run to the kitchen and grab some expendable Tupperware (because God knows I’m throwing that bowl away once this spider has touched it) and I slam it over the spider, who has now moved onto the wall. Except...crap. I forgot to get a cover for the Tupperware.

So now I am standing like this


And I have no escape. I can’t move the Tupperware, because now the spider is hip to my scheme (mraaah, see) and will quickly run and hide while I go find a top. Luckily, and mysteriously, I actually had some packing tape nearby. I don’t know what it was doing in my bathroom. I assume I was making funny faces in the mirror with it. But it was there nonetheless. So I do what any normal person would do: I tape the Tupperware to the wall and text Sara to get home because it’s an EMERGENCY.

Sara comes storming in like a bat out of hell, rushing through the apartment yelling "WHERE?! WHAT?! WHAT DO YOU NEED?!"

I whimpered in a tiny-yet-terrified voice from the bathroom, "In here!"

Sara runs over, sees the situation, rolls her eyes in a World Award-Winning eye roll, and disposes of the spider properly for me. My hero.

So this is where I stand in the World of Spiders:
-If I am clothed, the spider is terrifying.
-If I am naked, the spider will potentially kill me and my unborn children.
-If the SPIDER is clothed, it is...hilarious?

Thoughts?

Making Ends Meat

I'm going to give you guys some free advice: Do not spend the day listening to old songs that remind you of your exes and then spend the evening reading people's wedding stories. Your dreams will be all kinds of crazy.

Now, as promised, I need to explain to you a little something. It is called "Making ends meat."



When you don't have a lot of money, you still need to buy food. So you go to the butcher with your pennies and you say, "What can I get with this?" The butcher chops off the ends of the salami, maybe gives you the gristly sides of some chicken. The green edges of the beef. Because that's all you can afford. You are making ends meat. We all know this saying. It makes perfect sense.

Imagine, then, me. Circa college. COLLEGE. I am in someone's office, discussing this and that. I look down and notice a book sitting on a pile on the floor. It is blue. There is a man in a suit with his arms crossed. And the title: "Making ends meet."

Hubba whaaa? HUBBA HUBBA WHAAAAAA?!

I go on as usual, pretending that the wheels in my head are not slowly cranking. "Mmm-hmm. Mmm-hmm. Yes, I see." But in my head, I'm going "WHAT IN GOD'S NAME IS GOING ON?! MEET?! MAKING ENDS MEET?! WHAT ENDS? WHERE? HOW?"

I rushed home to my parents.

"Mother. Tell me right now. How. Do you spell. "Making ends meat"?

"M-a-k-i-n-g (space) e-n-d-s (space) m-e-e-t." She told me calmly. My face dropped. "Oh, Emily. It hasn't happened again, has it?

Yes, that's right. This situation is not uncommon to my life. It happens so often, in fact, that Michelle and I have dubbed it "having our world turned upside down." (It happens to her a lot, too.) The most traumatizing example of this was during my freshman year of high school when I got in a very heated discussion with Kim about the meaning of "having your work cut out for you."

I argued: well, it's been cut out for you. It's simple. It's almost done. It'll be easy, a breeze.

She argued...frankly, she argued the correct usage of the phrase. I had gone 15 years of my life misunderstanding a common English idiom. Oh, and not JUST misunderstanding it, but thinking it meant THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE OF WHAT IT ACTUALLY MEANS. Then there were of course the countless songs I have had explained to me over the years. Bopper Ann? It's not BOPPER ANN. Niether is it "She's my little two scoop, you know what I got."

And now in college, it happened again. But this time, I would not be pushed into a corner of idiocy. I went around to everyone I knew and I asked them how to spell the phrase. And what I discovered was this: I was not alone.

My friend, Kevin M, had the best reaction. When I told him it was "meet", his jaw dropped. He spent some time trying to convince the rest of our friends that it was "meat" and then ended it by backing out the door while pointing at everyone, yelling, "SCREW YOU! SCREW ALLLLLL OF YOUUUUUUU!"

There are a lot of people in the world who believe the phrase is "Making ends meat." In fact, I even started a DJ radio argument a few years later about it. They were asking for people to call or write in if they had "just discovered something." (The DJ had just found out you don't have to write www. before you search something. Child's play.) So I emailed in about my situation, and it turns out, the traffic girl also thought it was "meat." Then they asked people to call and weigh in on the subject and guess what? LOTS of people think that it's "meat." Adults. Grown, smart, useful adults.

Here is the thing: both phrases, in my mind, make just as much/just as little sense.

On the one hand, you have no money to make the ends of cloths meet to sew clothing.
On the other hand, you have no money to afford the good cuts of beef.

Therefore, I will concede and spell it "meet" from now on, as long as you recognize that it wasn't THAT stupid for me to have believed it to be "meat" for two decades. And to all those who scoff me and my meat/meet fiasco, I simply say good day to you.

I also have a few other phrases I want to throw out there for discussion, and perhaps to turn your world upside down like mine has been:

Did you know the word is "ulterior"? Ulterior motives. Not alterior, as I thought. You know how I leaned this? From a Sunday comic strip. THAT was a new low.

And two that I actually DID get right growing up:
1) The phrase is "all of a sudden." It is NOT "all the sudden." Neither make sense, I know. However, one is wrong.
2) Flesh it out. Flush it out. These are two different phrases. To flush something out means to reveal something that is concealed, like flushing something from its hiding place. But if you've gotta develop a plan. An outline. A genius idea. You flesh it out. FLESH.

So what else is out there? What have you learned slightly too late? I'm sure everyone's got one. Don't make me feel like a huge, lonely loser. Let's hear them in the comments!