120 short with also previous shortness
But I don't care cuz Obama won. And I am going to sleep. Dinner, then Morning, then Thanksgiving Day. Sam's there, I think. Tomorrow is a big catch-up day.
[2012.11.06][1526][9845]
Beth tried to remember what Anne looked like, what she had sounded like. Beth and Anne were the same age, but had very little in common. Anne was interested in neither university nor college and had met Sam while waitressing at the local diner. Anne and Mom hit it off, though, swapping stories about similar upbringings and the various blessings of small town life. Both were middle children in larger families and had moved to Beth’s hometown from larger metropolitan areas.
“It must have been nice to have Sam here for a while. And Anne.” Beth tried to lay a comforting hand on her mother’s shoulder.
“It was, but Sam is Sam. You know, he and I, we have a hard time getting along. Well, it all worked out for the best.” Mom placed the envelope back into the piles. “Help me move this mail somewhere else.”
“We could go through it first?” Beth tossed two catalogs into the trash bag. “I know you won’t need these.”
They busied themselves with the mail. All of the catalogs got thrown into the bag, and most of the bank statements were set aside to be shredded. Mom gathered her pile of letters in one hand and Dad’s mail in the other. She left for the living room.
Mom was placing the mail on the the bookcase as Beth heard the garage door open. Dad had taken half the day off, but he loved to go the gym when he had the opportunity. As he got older, He became more and more interested in his appearance, in working out and buying better clothes. He started ironing his pants when Beth left for college, not that Mom had ever ironed a pair of trousers in her life. His outfits were color coordinated, wrinkle-free and lintless. To add insult to injury, Dad had more than three pairs of shoes for work now, one more than Beth herself.
More eerie than his appearance makeover was his new youthful taste in music. He commuted to work by car and must have gotten tired of listening to his decades-old country music cassettes one day. The day that her father tried to get her interested in hip-hop was a revelation. He blasted the music, the bass shaking his truck’s windows, while picking her up from the mall. The entire way home, Beth pretended that he had Carly never let her forget it, and continued to suggest that Beth buy him whacky industrial or transient music. It was hard to admit that her Dad was much cooler and with it than she was. Her Dad was finally, after so many years of being the same person day after day, discovering who he could be and exploring other personas.
Beth shifted the filled trash bag to the shoe pile and headed out to the garage. In many ways, he was the person she most wanted to become someday: he kept up a steady career trajectory for over two decades, worked hard to support a family who loved him and he was still open to change even after fifty years of living a pretty decent life. Ever since he took on a new role in his office, they had talked less on the phone, but she knew that didn’t mean that he wasn’t thinking of her or that she thought any less of him. Dad must not have mentioned Sam’s moves in and out of the house because she already was so judgemental of Sam at the moment anyway.
She knew, she understood. It wasn’t Sam’s fault that he didn’t know what he wanted or how he could change his life or even where to start. Auntie Joan said that Sam would surprise them all someday. He kept on surprising them, really, and not in good or bad ways. His life seemed to catch even him off guard most days. If Carly was telling Beth the truth and Sam did want to try things beyond surviving on a day to day basis and going from job to job, then it was a good thing. Beth could be supportive, again, and not be a raging nagger. Especially if Dad and Mom had taken both Sam and Anne in, it was the least she could do.
Running over to the garage, she grabbed her father in a bear hug.
“Hey Bear.” He wrapped his arms around her. Her father was a large, imposing man, a head taller than she. In his workout shorts and tshirt, he looked more like a hip barista post workout than an office manager. His hair was thinning out, but his crew cut was severe enough to make it seem like a choice, and not the inevitable march of time.
“Hey Daddy.” Beth revelled in the warmth of his embrace. He was preternaturally warm, like the surface of the sun, especially when it was cold out. “Its good to see you.” Pulling away, she grabbed his workout bag and strolled to the house, Dad following along behind. They walked amiably in silence.
It was this kind of silence she missed most at school. Even silence in the library had a different quality: it was filled with expectations, the anxiety of last minute research and the strange absence of hygienic standards for it’s less socially aware denizens. With her father, she could relax and be content with what she was doing in the moment.
“Bear.” Dad placed a hand on her shoulder.
She turned, aware that the look on her face was at the very least confused. “Yeah?”
“I didn’t tell you before you came back today, but your room is all cleared out.” He cleared his throat, and averted his gaze to the ground. “Your Mom and I wanted to tell you before you got here, but things got busy.” He rubbed his hands together, then wiped them on his shorts. “Anyway, your things are still around.”
“I kind of expected it.” Beth shrugged. “You guys gave away the bed, and well, Mom was telling me about Sam and Anne. Pretty crazy story.” Slinging the workout bag over an arm, she continued. “I think its great that you gave that bed to those newlyweds, and took Sam and Anne in. I think it was good. I wish I could have helped, too, but I’m so far away.”
“Oh, all right.” His relieved smile signalled to her that he felt guilty.
“I’m sure you both had reasons for not telling me. Sam didn’t mention it either. I think he was embarrassed.” She knocked her hand against one of his massive hands. “Guess what?”
He crossed his arms and leaned back.
“Carly told me that she ran into Sam last week.” Beth grinned. “He was asking questions about classes at community college and how hard it would be to get in. I think he’s really going to try again.” She nodded. “That’s great news, right!”
“Pretty good news, Bear.” He imitated her nod. “Try not to get your hopes up.”
Beth shifted from one foot to the other. “You don’t seem that excited.”
“I want to be, but Beth, we’ve heard this from him before.” He sighed. “Last year, he wanted to enlist. So he enlisted, but then he left after basic training. The year before, he tried to work his way up through that insurance company in downtown, but then he left after his first promotion. The year before that, he was bumming around home while you were a senior in high school.”
“And this year, he came home for a little while. And now he’s got his own place, and a new job and a different girlfriend.” Beth tried to sound upbeat. “I hear everyone out of college is doing it. Carly’s doing it. Might be moving out soon. Hip new trends of the not so young.”
Dad guffawed. “You sound like my sister.”
Beth swung the workout bag up and down jauntily. “She could be right. Sam might need time to figure out what he really wants, and then he’ll settle into something.” She stilled the bag. “Maybe he would have made a horrible soldier, or a horrible insurance salesman. We don’t know.”
“He doesn’t either.”
“He seems to be gelling with the telemarketing job he got a month ago.” This wasn’t a lie, not entirely. Although Sam complained, his whining didn’t hold a candle to the epic rants he gave while working at the local hardware store. “Or at least, he recognizes that what he’s doing isn’t what he wants to do, in less time than a few months. That’s progress.”
“Slow progress.” Dad nodded. “Bethie, how’s school going?”
“You could ask me inside.” Beth turned to the front door. “Its cold out.” They wandered inside to the living room. She tossed his bag near the TV and jumped onto the recliner, carefully choosing the side that actually worked and pulling the lever. “Ah, full relaxation.”
Dad chuckled, and sat next to her. “TV?”
“Mom made dinner, so, probably not.” She relaxed into the lounger. “This is pretty comfortable. Do you sit on this side?”
“Mom does.” He leaned into the straight seat back.
[2012.11.06][1526][9845]
Beth tried to remember what Anne looked like, what she had sounded like. Beth and Anne were the same age, but had very little in common. Anne was interested in neither university nor college and had met Sam while waitressing at the local diner. Anne and Mom hit it off, though, swapping stories about similar upbringings and the various blessings of small town life. Both were middle children in larger families and had moved to Beth’s hometown from larger metropolitan areas.
“It must have been nice to have Sam here for a while. And Anne.” Beth tried to lay a comforting hand on her mother’s shoulder.
“It was, but Sam is Sam. You know, he and I, we have a hard time getting along. Well, it all worked out for the best.” Mom placed the envelope back into the piles. “Help me move this mail somewhere else.”
“We could go through it first?” Beth tossed two catalogs into the trash bag. “I know you won’t need these.”
They busied themselves with the mail. All of the catalogs got thrown into the bag, and most of the bank statements were set aside to be shredded. Mom gathered her pile of letters in one hand and Dad’s mail in the other. She left for the living room.
Mom was placing the mail on the the bookcase as Beth heard the garage door open. Dad had taken half the day off, but he loved to go the gym when he had the opportunity. As he got older, He became more and more interested in his appearance, in working out and buying better clothes. He started ironing his pants when Beth left for college, not that Mom had ever ironed a pair of trousers in her life. His outfits were color coordinated, wrinkle-free and lintless. To add insult to injury, Dad had more than three pairs of shoes for work now, one more than Beth herself.
More eerie than his appearance makeover was his new youthful taste in music. He commuted to work by car and must have gotten tired of listening to his decades-old country music cassettes one day. The day that her father tried to get her interested in hip-hop was a revelation. He blasted the music, the bass shaking his truck’s windows, while picking her up from the mall. The entire way home, Beth pretended that he had Carly never let her forget it, and continued to suggest that Beth buy him whacky industrial or transient music. It was hard to admit that her Dad was much cooler and with it than she was. Her Dad was finally, after so many years of being the same person day after day, discovering who he could be and exploring other personas.
Beth shifted the filled trash bag to the shoe pile and headed out to the garage. In many ways, he was the person she most wanted to become someday: he kept up a steady career trajectory for over two decades, worked hard to support a family who loved him and he was still open to change even after fifty years of living a pretty decent life. Ever since he took on a new role in his office, they had talked less on the phone, but she knew that didn’t mean that he wasn’t thinking of her or that she thought any less of him. Dad must not have mentioned Sam’s moves in and out of the house because she already was so judgemental of Sam at the moment anyway.
She knew, she understood. It wasn’t Sam’s fault that he didn’t know what he wanted or how he could change his life or even where to start. Auntie Joan said that Sam would surprise them all someday. He kept on surprising them, really, and not in good or bad ways. His life seemed to catch even him off guard most days. If Carly was telling Beth the truth and Sam did want to try things beyond surviving on a day to day basis and going from job to job, then it was a good thing. Beth could be supportive, again, and not be a raging nagger. Especially if Dad and Mom had taken both Sam and Anne in, it was the least she could do.
Running over to the garage, she grabbed her father in a bear hug.
“Hey Bear.” He wrapped his arms around her. Her father was a large, imposing man, a head taller than she. In his workout shorts and tshirt, he looked more like a hip barista post workout than an office manager. His hair was thinning out, but his crew cut was severe enough to make it seem like a choice, and not the inevitable march of time.
“Hey Daddy.” Beth revelled in the warmth of his embrace. He was preternaturally warm, like the surface of the sun, especially when it was cold out. “Its good to see you.” Pulling away, she grabbed his workout bag and strolled to the house, Dad following along behind. They walked amiably in silence.
It was this kind of silence she missed most at school. Even silence in the library had a different quality: it was filled with expectations, the anxiety of last minute research and the strange absence of hygienic standards for it’s less socially aware denizens. With her father, she could relax and be content with what she was doing in the moment.
“Bear.” Dad placed a hand on her shoulder.
She turned, aware that the look on her face was at the very least confused. “Yeah?”
“I didn’t tell you before you came back today, but your room is all cleared out.” He cleared his throat, and averted his gaze to the ground. “Your Mom and I wanted to tell you before you got here, but things got busy.” He rubbed his hands together, then wiped them on his shorts. “Anyway, your things are still around.”
“I kind of expected it.” Beth shrugged. “You guys gave away the bed, and well, Mom was telling me about Sam and Anne. Pretty crazy story.” Slinging the workout bag over an arm, she continued. “I think its great that you gave that bed to those newlyweds, and took Sam and Anne in. I think it was good. I wish I could have helped, too, but I’m so far away.”
“Oh, all right.” His relieved smile signalled to her that he felt guilty.
“I’m sure you both had reasons for not telling me. Sam didn’t mention it either. I think he was embarrassed.” She knocked her hand against one of his massive hands. “Guess what?”
He crossed his arms and leaned back.
“Carly told me that she ran into Sam last week.” Beth grinned. “He was asking questions about classes at community college and how hard it would be to get in. I think he’s really going to try again.” She nodded. “That’s great news, right!”
“Pretty good news, Bear.” He imitated her nod. “Try not to get your hopes up.”
Beth shifted from one foot to the other. “You don’t seem that excited.”
“I want to be, but Beth, we’ve heard this from him before.” He sighed. “Last year, he wanted to enlist. So he enlisted, but then he left after basic training. The year before, he tried to work his way up through that insurance company in downtown, but then he left after his first promotion. The year before that, he was bumming around home while you were a senior in high school.”
“And this year, he came home for a little while. And now he’s got his own place, and a new job and a different girlfriend.” Beth tried to sound upbeat. “I hear everyone out of college is doing it. Carly’s doing it. Might be moving out soon. Hip new trends of the not so young.”
Dad guffawed. “You sound like my sister.”
Beth swung the workout bag up and down jauntily. “She could be right. Sam might need time to figure out what he really wants, and then he’ll settle into something.” She stilled the bag. “Maybe he would have made a horrible soldier, or a horrible insurance salesman. We don’t know.”
“He doesn’t either.”
“He seems to be gelling with the telemarketing job he got a month ago.” This wasn’t a lie, not entirely. Although Sam complained, his whining didn’t hold a candle to the epic rants he gave while working at the local hardware store. “Or at least, he recognizes that what he’s doing isn’t what he wants to do, in less time than a few months. That’s progress.”
“Slow progress.” Dad nodded. “Bethie, how’s school going?”
“You could ask me inside.” Beth turned to the front door. “Its cold out.” They wandered inside to the living room. She tossed his bag near the TV and jumped onto the recliner, carefully choosing the side that actually worked and pulling the lever. “Ah, full relaxation.”
Dad chuckled, and sat next to her. “TV?”
“Mom made dinner, so, probably not.” She relaxed into the lounger. “This is pretty comfortable. Do you sit on this side?”
“Mom does.” He leaned into the straight seat back.