Don't Sleep With a Bubba

by Susan Reinhardt

  The following year was even worse. I promised myself that no matter how cheap the Elmer’s glue at Bargain Mart, I’d bypass that annual Back-to-School nightmare and shop for my kids’ lists at one of the office supply chains.

  Sure, I’d have to pay an extra dime for the glue, but chances were decent I’d still have two legs in working order once the trip was completed. I wouldn’t end up black-and-blue, leg in a cast, cane at my side from the stampede of metal carts and Moms on a Mission crashing into us for the last 24-count Crayola box slashed to a quarter. And chances were fairly promising I’d finish up the list in three hours instead of four days.

  It’s not like we can memorize the list from previous years and figure the glue sticks are a given. Only the vat of booger and snot sanitizers could be counted on. That and the jumbo box of tissues along with the gallon jug of anti-Ebola liquid soap for all those germs that merge when one packs twenty-two kids in a classroom.

  I stood grasping a cart in the middle of the store, frozen with fear, four lists in my buggy. True, I’m the mother of two, but this year I had two lists from each teacher, not counting the Wish List.

  I couldn’t blink or budge as the others politely murmured, “Excuse me,” and went about their business as if I were a car with a dead battery in the middle of Interstate 240. No one was offering jumper cables, but no one tried to mow me down either since we were in a fairly expensive store instead of the cattle stampede at the super-bargain centers.

  I was all but certain in this crowded but friendly store I’d also leave with most of the hairs on my head and the prospect of all teeth firmly planted in the gums. Last year, I read where in one state, a mother socked another mom in the mouth and four teeth went flying.

  Then there was the year when my daughter cussed (as I mentioned earlier) and I’d left with half the supply list and a blood blister near my left ear. A mother wanting a three-ring notebook binder, the one I held in my clutches, claimed it was in her cart and I’d flat-out stolen it.

  Her 5-year-old leaned over and yanked my hair with part of an ear, said a four-letter word and tried to decapitate me.

  “Git outta our way!” the mother spat, revealing a pair of honest-to-goodness fangs and no front teeth whatsoever. “I need this here binder for kinny-garden.”

  This year as I stood trapped in fear but in a lovely office supply store, a friendly and smiling salesperson asked if I needed help. I nearly fainted. In all the years at the bargain marts, I’d had to chase down the help and corner them, cowering back in housewares because they just couldn’t take it anymore, and who could blame them?

  These lists seem to grow longer and more bizarre each year.

  “May I help you find something?” the kind gentleman asked again, seeing I was semicomatose and speaking in tongues, not the kind in church but the kind when mothers have meltdowns.

  “Mrrrrrphhhh. Mrrrrrrrphhhh, splatcha mola folda mon usted como loco,” was all I could manage, handing over my lists.

  “Follow me please, to aisle 11. Most of these items are stocked there with the exception of those things on the Wish List. You’ll have to go to the grocery store or a pharmacy for those items.” He scanned the list further. “Some of these items may be available only on the Black Market.”

  “Sì, señor, mola folda Crayola, Mrrrrrrrphhhh.”

  Once I found the supplies, I thanked the man in my native language and moved onto the Wish Lists. I felt sorry for teachers who must fish greens from their own wallets for many of the supplies one would think the state could furnish.

  I scanned the list one last time to see what was missing. Jumbo boxes of tissue: check. Jugs of soap: check. Band-Aids, Tootsie POPS, Bounty paper towels: check.

  Coffee filters, Saran wrap, duct tape, boxes of animal crackers the size of Maytags: not yet.

  “It won’t be long,” I said, during a phone call to Mama, “when the lists ask for Starbucks, Xanax, bath oils and aftershave. Maybe even a pack of Camels and some Yellow Tail wine.”

  “At least you only have to do this once a year,” she said.

  “Yes, that’s right. Twice would do me in.”

  She made me a promise, fearing I’d end up in the cuckoo’s nest again.

  “Next time your children’s feet grow, I’ll take them to buy shoes,” she said. “If I can’t do that, I’ll at least trace them on the newspaper and take those to the store. How’s that?”

  Perfect.

  “And could you throw in a free waffle iron?”

  Sister Sandy and the Family Jewels

  P lease, Lord, don’t let the woman selling the Jesus pancake on eBay actually be related to me. Isn’t it enough I have a crazy Aunt Betty?

  I double-checked the item and felt my heart drop. There was no denying it. My younger sister by two years, who lives in Rich City, Georgia, and was married to a millionaire the first go-round, is running a small operation on eBay where she’s selling off her jewels from the first husband. That’s not the problem.

  I don’t think her second husband, a high school basketball coach, minds her hawking her prior mate’s jewels and spending the cash on play pretties for him.

  “I didn’t used to be so eBay savvy,” she said, a glass or two of wine loosening her tongue. “Oh, let’s face it, I used to be rich. Saving money didn’t matter much then. However, when I married a wonderful man whose riches lie in character not Wachovia, it was time to get creative. Why not start an Internet business? I thought to myself. Just like families gathered together around their radios in the 1950s, my family likes to gather around eBay. It’s wholesome entertainment.”

  After a few days pondering how to raise start-up funds, Sandy realized she had a perfectly good Rolex watch that had been sitting in her jewelry box for years.

  “It was a gift from my former husband, Daddy Warbucks,” she said. “I would sell that on eBay and use the money to start our family’s online business. I wanted a name that we could have fun with. People do have a sense of humor, don’t they? That’s why we settled on THC’s Family Jewels: http://stores. ebay.com/THC-Family-Jewels. ‘The THC stands for ‘The Hidden Closet,’ and ‘Family Jewels’ is to remind us of…Well, you know what it reminds folks of…

  “The name has received almost unanimous support. I did have one lady cover her mouth as if in horror and say, ‘I thought you were a Christian.’ I just smiled and said, ‘What Bible verse says that you have to lose your sense of humor in order to gain salvation? Don’t you think Jesus ever joked?’

  “We have had a blast coming up with catch phrases. We have actually used, ‘Prices that won’t make you turn left and cough,’ and ‘There’s nothing more precious than the family jewels.’ We stopped short of the suggestions, ‘Take home a sackful,’ and, ‘Don’t blow your wad elsewhere.’ We do have some class, you know.”

  It wasn’t long before the Family Jewels slipped in the Jesus pancake. Everything was hunky-dory until a couple of days when obviously her serotonin levels skyrocketed and she decided to branch out from the jewelry and add to her little store what she thought would be taken as a joke.

  I was checking to see how well her aqua ring was selling when I stumbled upon her Jesus pancake and gave her a call.

  “Have you lost your mind? What is this thing? And whose ugly teeth are those?”

  “It’s called ‘The Jesus Pancake 2…the Saga Continues,’” she said. “Those ugly choppers you see up close on the ad are Chad’s, your precio
us nephew’s. He needs braces, so I crammed the camera lens through his stretched lips and told bidders any money would go to his orthodontia fund.”

  “Does Mama know?” I asked, realizing this could be considered highly sacrilegious.

  “It’s a joke, Susan. I put a big disclaimer on the ad saying we love Jesus plenty and that the auction was just for fun. You know we can afford braces for Chad. He’s the one who wrote Jesus across the pancake with the maple syrup. It took us 100 pancakes to get it just right.”

  Sister Sandy, after collecting quite a few bids for her hotcake, was booted off eBay for violating one or more of their rules. After reading her ad, I went online and was shocked to see so many breakfast items claiming to have the likeness of the Lord embedded in them, and even more stunned people were bidding on the phony merchandise.

  Here’s my take on all this craziness. If you really want to see Jesus, get thee heathen self into a church. You won’t find the real thing hiding out in boxes of Aunt Jemima or Kellogg’s. After careful research here’s what I found these hoodwinking sellers are claiming:

  Jesus On My Toast: “I grilled a couple of slices of toast this morning for breakfast…. I don’t really have the heart to eat Our Savior so I’ve eBayed it. The toast comes in a clear, airtight plastic bag.”

  Someone sent this seller a comment: “That is not the real Jesus. My toaster makes better Jesuses than that.”

  Well, na, na, ne, boo, boo.

  Here is another ad:

  Miracle : “About three years ago, I put a simple, regular piece of sandwich bread in my toaster. When it came out, to my surprise, it looked like Jesus Christ…Do not miss this offer to have Jesus closer than ever before in your life.” The starting bid for the stale bread was $100.

  Another seller, claiming the “digital age is among us, praise the Lord, and aren’t buyers fed up with the poor qualities of the deities on edibles?” was offering to emblazon any food item, including tortillas and pita bread, with the faces of religious figures. He reeled in dozens of bidding idiots.

  Here’s my all-time favorite…

  Miracle Jesus Pancake: “This amazing pancake is in near mint condition with the exception of a bite mark from my 2-year-old son. It’s also starting to shrivel up from dehydration.”

  Comment from a potential bidder: “What type of person draws on a pancake and then puts it on eBay to make a few bucks?”

  Answer from seller: “What type of person searches eBay for miracle Jesus pancakes?

  In My Sister’s Former Life—Where the Living Is Easy

  T he whole eBay stuff was strange because my sister had never once been the type to do anything but spend the money her first husband, David “The Wig Man,” made. Back then, before she married David II, there was something about my lovely sister that sent me into fits of panic every time I scheduled a trip to see her.

  I was jealous, consumed by the green of envy. I guess it was her petite perfection, the way I could stand next to her and feel like an Olympic shot-put champion. The way I could never spot the slightest ripple of bad eating on her perfectly buffed and tanned body. The way her nails looked as if they were done an hour earlier, and mine as if I’d spent the past forty years scrubbing pots with Brillo.

  Her son, back in her rich-lady days, was turning 3 on Memorial Day weekend, and I was invited to her perfect house for his perfect party, complete with its Star Wars theme, all characters in full costume in the 90-degree Georgia heat and, if that wasn’t enough, a carnival-size Moon Bouncer.

  Normally, I have about half a cup of confidence. But when face-to-face with my younger sister by two years, especially during her hoity-toity days, I became awkward and huge, my clothes suddenly ill-fitting, flesh seeming to swell beneath them. I felt like a 2 AM Wal-Mart shopper in fleece.

  I loved telling my friends about Sandy and Rich David and their mansion and millions. Perfect Sandy who is also (most of the time) kindhearted and generous.

  “She’s got it all,” I’d say to my friends, and they’d shake their heads and roll their eyes when I whipped out the pictures of her palace and her sunny-haired children. Sandy, standing in the foreground as if she’d never missed a night’s sleep or eaten a cream-filled doughnut in her life. Sandy, who doesn’t have to work and can spend her mornings drinking Mocha Lattes at Starbucks, followed by a two-hour toning at her spa, and later, shopping with friends or sipping margaritas after tennis matches at the country club.

  “We live in two different worlds,” I’d say, and my friends would nod as if they, too, had siblings who’d hopped off the path of their shared histories and into luxurious places some lives seem destined toward. Actually, my dear friend and fellow book club member Nancy Twigg has a sister who was the governor of Nebraska’s wife for eight years before turning into a senator’s wife when he went to Washington. She is well known in Nebraska for her tasteful renovations of the Governor’s Mansion during her stay.

  I tried to imagine my sister living in the Governor’s Mansion for eight years and wondered how Nancy dealt with it. She told me her sister was pretty normal and lots of fun, even if she had been the first lady and a senator’s wife for Lord knows how many more.

  With my sister, back in her free-spending Platinum years, we had few similarities other than big ears (though hers were fixed) and children.

  “She discovered she was pregnant while on a second honeymoon in Hawaii,” I’d say at cocktail parties to my wine-sipping friends. “And I learned my news in the ladies’ room of the West Asheville Kmart. I ran around and asked every stranger I saw, ‘Is this test really positive? Are you sure you see two lines?’ Most backed away as if I were showing them a rattlesnake. It never dawned on me I was cramming a peed-on stick in their faces.”

  I should have seen my sister’s flight from common ground coming. She was a cheerleader whose light bones and agile body sent her flying and spinning down football fields, always the girl at the top of the pyramids. I was the one squatting at the bottom, the bent, broad-shouldered base whose job was to support such beauties, to lift all the Sandys up high so the world could pay them homage.

  After college, Sandy chose a career in television and paid good money to have her ears sewn snugly to her skull, so that when broadcasting live during hurricanes, the gale-force winds wouldn’t reveal our secret: mule ears minus proper cartilage, the starch of all decent ear sets.

  I chose a career in which I could hide behind words, save my money and stand in the eye of storms without worrying about faulty ears.

  Faced with these memories and the Memorial Day Star Wars birthday party vacation, faced with perfection in the elegant form of Mrs. Sandy Pitts (prior to her marriage to David II), I felt the panic broaden. To calm down I took action, first Cloroxing the news ink from my elbows until they turned white and crusty. Next, I shaved my legs and applied some dark, native-woman tanning gel that dried squiggly, like my kid’s finger paintings. Thinking of Sandy’s long, sculptured nails, I saved time and bit mine to near bone.

  For good measure, I slathered on an alphahydroxy peel-off mask that ran into my eyebrows and ripped the right one in half. My only comfort was knowing that there’s one in every family, a Mr. or Ms. Perfect. Someone with a 20-inch waist and ears not daunted by a sudden blast of wind.

  It’s not her fault perfection looms and blooms. It wasn’t her fault that during the cushy years
of Wig Man David, she lived in the kind of neighborhood where keeping up with the Joneses had surpassed a few choice dogwoods or a new Beemer in the triple garage.

  In her gated burb of new money and semimansions, it seemed that landscaping was one of the most outward and obvious ways the neighbors competed. Sandy called one day back then to tell me the latest with her neighbors.

  “What it is,” she began, “is we live next door to this really rich widow woman. I bet you anything her landscaping costs more than her house.”

  Sometimes, it was too much talking to a sister who spent her days sipping lattes and wondering whether or not to fire her yard crew. Other days I was glad I was a corporate and domestic minion and had no excesses or frivolities, that my only yardman is the fellow I wed years ago.

  “Once that old biddy moved in,” my sister said, continuing on with the state of the widow’s grounds, “I became painfully aware of how inadequate our lawn-care company was compared to the one she was using.

  “I would watch her landscapers closely, and one day one of them came over to tell me I had a fungus in my grass and he didn’t want it to spread over to his client’s fine lawn. That’s when I decided I had had it. I drank another cup of coffee, called my landscaper up and told her firmly we no longer needed her services.”

  “Was she upset?” I interrupted.

  “No, but I did miss my annual poinsettia from her at Christmas.”

  The next day my sister up and stole her neighbor’s yard help. She shared with him her visions and said if there was one thing she hated about wintertime it was that her Bermuda grass turned brown for months.

  “Well, why don’t you just plant some fescue?” I had said and she gasped in horror. No one, she said, dared plant that lower-class grass in her upscale neighborhood.