Flotsam

What would you do if someone were calling you at night, singing John Prine songs onto your answering machine and leaving slurred, vaguely hostile messages?
What if that person were drunk? And an unmedicated manic-depressive?
What would you do if that person were your father?

By Thursday night, my father’s mania had reached a familiar tipping point. The steady battering of nonsensical monologues gives way to belligerent, manipulative ploys for attention. The phone calls ramp up—from once a day to twice, three, four times an hour.

Here is my horrible secret about dealing with a manic-depressive:
Sometimes the depression is a relief, because at least it brings quiet.

Yesterday morning, after a night rendered sleepless by my ringing phone and a cat like a nocturnal air-raid alarm, I stumbled out of bed in a foul mood.

I dumped some cereal into a Tupperware bowl to take to work, only to find that all of our Tupperware lids had disappeared. Just last week, our pizza cutter went missing. Either we have been the victims of a very specific burglar or our kitchenware is escaping on its own.
Maybe it is because I am absentmindedly imagining my pizza cutter rolling down the sidewalk, giddy with freedom, that I cut myself as I tear off a piece of plastic wrap to cover my cereal. Then, as I angrily shove the package back into an overstuffed kitchen drawer, I cut THE SAME FINGER on the box of aluminum foil.
Now, I am bleeding.
We have no band-aids, so I wrap a piece of toilet paper around my hand and leave for work.

I arrive at the office with my bleeding finger and black mood to find that Frumpy, esq.* has returned from her vacation—a day earlier than I expected.

There aren’t many people I truly dislike. In fact, Frumpy, esq., the attorney on my tiny editorial team, is the only one I can think of. She is inconsiderate, difficult to work with, and tends to blame others for her own mistakes. I admit that the fact that she wears tapered pleated stretch pants, has stiff waterfall bangs, and is perpetually bra-less does not help matters.
Frumpy recently announced her pregnancy. She is 45.
“We were worried it would take awhile, because of my age,” she said, “But I guess I’m just lucky, because I got pregnant right away!”
She apologized for not sharing the news sooner, but said she had wanted to wait until it was “safe” before telling people.
“Oh,” I asked, “How far along are you?”
“Seven weeks.”

After what seemed to be an especially long workday, the Actually and I had an appointment to look at a possible reception site downtown. We were approaching a busy intersection when my ankle wobbled on my platform wedge–with a dramatic wrenching, scraping fall, I found myself on the ground, thighs open, one leg twisted under me. The wind gusted and my dress blew over my face as I gave a gynecologist’s eye view of my Lady Parts to a homeless man and a gaggle of young professionals.
The Actually hauled me upward, and in a desperate bid to reclaim my dignity I laughed breezily, said loudly “Oh, I’m fine, I’m fine!” and walked straight into oncoming traffic.

Horns blared, and the Actually hoisted me across the street. He supported me as I hobbled into the first available doorway to assess the damage: my knee was skinned and bleeding, and a good eight inches of leg was scraped. Something horrible had happened to the top of my foot, at the ankle–something that had involved the removal of most of my skin and a rapidly swelling lump of bruise.

It was the sort of day during which you can almost hear the laughtrack. It was the sort of day that calls for sleep, butterfat, and alcohol, not necessarily in that order.

After sustaining multiple injuries and flashing half the metropolitan area, I managed to snatch a lovely evening from the jaws of my horrible day by turning on my laptop and spending some time with the soulful, wisecracking women of the Internet. The wine helped, too, but never mind about that. The point is, the humor, companionship and insight of those who share their lives via fiber optic cable make my life better, and are worth celebrating. Which is what Amy is doing right now (or, okay, a couple of days ago, but it’s hard to keep abreast of current events with your skirt over your head).
Surely you have favorite online writers, and posts you return to because they are particularly funny, or searing, or true. Like Amalah herself, or Jul, or any of the Smokey posts at Gone Feral, or Alice’s birth story at Finslippy, or…I could go on, but instead I will go here and nominate a few of my favorites. I hope you will do the same.

It is only a small way to say thank you, but I have a package of frozen French-cut green beans on my swollen foot, and am in no condition to assemble fruit baskets.

UPDATED TO ADD: Ok, Amy has officially given the contest a name. And the name? Is “The John Cougar Mellencamp Hurt So Good Blog Award of Excellence.” And there are buttons. If that doesn’t make you want to participate…{throws up hands}.

*Names have been changed.