by Bill Sommer
All I want for Christmas? For that cat to disappear.
Love,
Soph
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: December 23, 2012 at 10:04 PM
Subject: RE: Christmas Guest
I’m allergic 2 cats. We’ll have 2 hang @ my house frm now on.
Do u think Sam Pick wud go w/me 2 Turnabout? Who r u asking?
<3,
Sara
P.S. Can I borrow ur Coach bag?
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: December 23, 2012 at 10:18 PM
Subject: RE: Christmas Guest
Hey Sara,
Purse: The thing is total trash. It’s so small. I can’t fit my life inside. At least the old one accommodated phone, wallet, Saint Jude prayer card, my lucky pig, lip gloss, keys, emergency tampon, etc. I didn’t realize how well it held everything. Until now.
You and Sam: So cute.
Turnabout: Can’t say. I want it to be a surprise!
Love,
Soph
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: December 27, 2012 at 1:31 PM
Subject: RE: Dude!
Bummer about the punched-up suit. At least the red all over you was spiked juice and not your own gushing blood. I realize I’m being a bit of a silver-lining searcher, but sometimes it’s comforting to know that things could have been worse, like if Mrs. D hadn’t been on that bus. Which is something to consider the next time you find yourself around some booze. Booze is tricky. As a person who has turned bad decision-making into a kind of high art, I can say with confidence that booze has factored heavily in some of my all-time worst choices. Anyway, I hope you’ve paid off your debt to Star Arcade society by now. And I hope the social waters have calmed since then and you’re navigating them with ease.
Merry holidays and all that jazz,
D
From: [email protected]
Tro: [email protected]
Date: December 28, 2012 at 4:37 PM
Subject: Two Peas
Well, well. How are my wonderful grandbabies? Still perfect, I’m assuming. Christmas in south Florida is a bit of an odd proposition. We all went down to the beach this morning just because you can, even though it was cool and breezy and not quite an ideal beach day. I enjoyed the sun, but the company left something to be desired. Although it was enlightening.
I’m always looking for things that your brother and father have in common, and I don’t often find too much. But I could see it today. We rode down to the beach. We parked. We walked out and lay down a towel. And in all this time, neither your Dad nor Darren said a single word. For some reason, the only time either of those two are quiet is around the other, but they’re usually not this bad. So when Darren went and dove in the water for a few minutes, I asked your father what was wrong, and it turned out the whole reason he was sulky was because he’d run into McDowell High’s football coach at the grocery store when he was going to pick up a Christmas ham. That was three days ago, and the state semifinal game Henson lost to McDowell was two months ago! He said, “I know, I’m pathetic.” And I said to forget pathetic. It was downright unhealthy. Life is too short to be sad for two months about a high school football game. He said he hadn’t been sad for two months, just that seeing the McDowell guy reminded him of how hard it was to lose the game. “But you’ve lost playoff games before. Why’s this one different?” I asked, and he said it was because of how they’d lost. I asked him how, and your father, ever the model of elocution, said, “This kid, this kid I really like, this kid—not the best player, but a good kid, has some struggles but really a good kid—he totally screwed the pooch on the last play of the game. I mean big time. As in we probably woulda won if he hadn’t messed up.” He said the kid had been having problems and playing poorly leading up to that game and he probably should’ve been benched, but Dad had been giving him extra chances because he knew the kid had been having a hard time at home, and that just ended up causing them to lose and the other kids to be mad at the kid who botched the play.
By that time, Darren had come back. His swim consisted mostly of letting out primal screams and moans about how cold the water was, diving down below then popping back up and screaming in joyful agony again. I can remember him doing the exact same thing on vacation at the beach when he was about eight. Anyway, as we were walking to the car I asked him what was up, and he went into this big thing about how Corinne had left this residue on all of his senses—I don’t have to tell you all of it, it’s how he always talks—but he’d been making good headway in not hearing her voice in his head as often but that now it was back.
So there you have it. The Olmstead men: fall hard and heal slow. Beyond that, they can’t agree on anything.
Love,
Mom
P.S. Hug and kiss those grandbabies for me!
JANAUARY 2013
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: January 5, 2013 at 7:45 AM
Subject: RE: Dude!
Dear Darren,
Christmas consisted of me watching made-for-TV specials like “I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown.” Ever notice how none of the adults in Charlie Brown movies speak English? The teacher sounds like an off-tune trombone. It’s pretty freaking weird. Anyway, Mom and Dad also got me a new tennis racket—something I’ll never use. Given that the tennis instructor who gave me lessons for three years finally told Dad to save his money last spring, there are only two possible reasons that they got me this gift:
1) Dad played in college, and he still holds out hope that I might actually return one of his serves one day.
2) Tennis is a game you have to play with another person (which, of course, feeds Mom’s whole social interaction crusade).
What I really wanted for Christmas was the complete collection of all Whale Wars seasons on DVD.
2013 has gotten off to a rough start. Ever since Smith’s party, things at work have been pretty bad. Chin Piercing’s got me on a tight leash, which means that I can’t leave the break room to snag a slice of pizza from the snack station for lunch. Blunt, the guy who “cooks” in the snack station, won’t give me anything for free anymore either. Not even nachos (and I’m pretty sure that the cheese is made from paper cement or at least a derivative of glue). Blunt stole a dollar a day from the cash register for a whole year, which is a lot worse than soiling an Abominable Snowman costume. But now, he acts like the Pope around me.
How was your holiday?
Sincerely,
James
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: January 11, 2013 at 6:31 PM
Subject: Holiday In
Hey there James,
Christmas was weird. My sis and her family weren’t there, and my parents moved to West Palm Beach after I graduated because my dad got a job coaching there. He says Florida’s a “hotbed for football.” It’s definitely hot. I like 75 degree weather as much as the next guy, but it’s a little creepy on Christmas.
My dad got all his questions out of the way the first night about what I was going to do with myself since I’m not working at Testy Snobbin. While I was getting grilled, my mom jumped in with a question about what my dad was doing at twenty-three, and after much hemming, hawing, and listing of mitigating factors—mainly that he’d lived at home and had a part-time job while he was in college, and hence his schooling had cost his folks closer to 8 Gs than 80—he acknowledged that on his first Christmas after college graduation he’d just gotten home from a “summer” of backpacking in Europe that had lasted until December. This exchange followed:
“But I was working the last two months I was there,” he said.
“Doing what?” she said.
“Being an English-l
anguage tour guide in Rome.”
“And you just quit?” I said.
“I didn’t major in tour guiding!”
“You didn’t major in football coaching either,” I said.
“Blah blah blargh blargety bleat spriggety 80 thousand dollars!” (Approximate translation.)
This was mellower than he used to be, though. When I was in high school and college, he basically parented me like a football coach: lots of yelling when he was mad, lots of motivational speeches (it was halftime probably twice a week at our house), and high fives when I aced a test. I’m surprised he didn’t throw in a butt-smack every now and again, but luckily I never wore football pants.
After that first night, though, we had a good time. There was, of course, football to watch, and I like watching it with my dad. He’s in his element. After a lot of plays he leans back, puts his hands behind his head, and says, “You see what happened there?” I usually respond by saying something cheeky like, “Yes. The man threw a ball to the other man while some other men crashed into each other.” He just ignores me and goes into this really detailed explanation of the play and why it worked or failed. It’s like listening to my favorite film professor from school talk about a scene. He’s so deep inside it all. But that’s nothing compared to when he’s actually coaching. When his players perfectly execute a play that he designed, I think that’s about the happiest he can be. I hope one day to have a job that excites me that much and that I can get that deep inside of. The closest I think I’ve ever gotten was when I was editing my senior film project. It was a six-minute short my buddy wrote about a guy hanging out at his apartment by himself. It was exactly as boring as it sounds, but when I was trying to edit it, I’d be sifting through the takes, trying to arrange them into a story that actually made sense and said something about this guy’s life, and I’d look up and see that three hours had passed in what felt like twenty minutes.
On this trip home, though, all I’ve been able to focus on was the one thing I need to not be focusing on: Corinne. I was doing good. I really was. But I’m pretty bored because I don’t have any friends here. So I was sitting around, and because I’m an idiot, I was streaming KCRW, my favorite indie radio station from back in LA, and wouldn’t you know it, they play an interview with the Tipsy Gypsies. “Who?” you ask. Corinne’s band, that’s who! Argh! Anyway, she was charming as usual. Here’s a part of the transcript that I may or may not have made myself.
KCRW: So, Corinne. I can’t help but notice, there’s something, I don’t know, different about you compared to the rest of the band.
Corinne: You’re correct. Not many people notice right off that I’m the kind of person who wins in poker and all the rest of these poor things are the kind who don’t.
Steven Jetton: We just feel sorry for you on account of you having to haul that bass around all the time.
Corinne: Well, I appreciate the sympathy. But I never take it easy on him, even when the Civil War flashbacks are messing with his sleep.
(howling laughter from the band)
KPST: I didn’t know the age difference was that extreme, but at 22, you are considerably younger than the rest of the band. How did you meet these guys?
Corinne: Well, I’d been a fan of Steve and Emily and Bobby’s playing since I was a little girl. I grew up in Oakland, but my parents were teachers and loved to travel around to bluegrass festivals all summer. So I saw all these guys play a hundred times before I ever played with them. Eventually I started bringing my bass with me on the trips. We all jammed together at a festival up outside of San Luis Obispo when I was eighteen, and they haven’t been able to get rid of me since.
I know I’ve talked a lot about Corinne but haven’t mentioned many of the particulars of the breakup. And that’s mostly because I still hadn’t been quite able to make sense of it myself. But hearing that interview drudged up a lot of memories, and now some of it’s becoming clear. I’ve been sifting through the footage, trying to make sense of it. Reading that interview, I realized that I was so jealous of all the attention she got because she’s such a rare creature—a beautiful, sharp-tongued, bass-playing semi-hippie in the land of plastic surgery and gourmet restaurants for dogs—that I got totally paranoid and tried to go to every gig she had because I was sure that if I didn’t, she’d meet her male equivalent, some banjo player with six-pack abs and a Harvard degree to fall back on, and leave me in a second. I basically did the Gollum from Lord of the Rings “My precious!” thing, only with a person instead of a ring. Eventually, the (in hindsight) utterly predictable process played out: paranoia, smothering, getting dumped.
In a moment of weakness the other night, I logged onto the Book of Faces and memorized every pixel of every picture of her and her new boyfriend and had the following realization: Crap, he’s not even new anymore. Been almost a year.
All right, back to the Internetwork to search for gainful employment (and not look at the Book of Faces. So. Hard. Not to. Though.).
DarrenSearchOfJob
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: January 17, 2013 at 11:21 PM
Subject: RE: Holiday In
Dear D-bomb:
I’ve been thinking about your email and the Facebook stuff with Corinne. Why hasn’t she unfriended you? Maybe that’s a good sign?
Sincerely,
Jam-in’
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: January 25, 2013 at 7:21 PM
Subject: Workin’ it
Eh. I doubt it. I’m pretty sure she’s either just being polite or she actually wouldn’t mind being my friend. I’m not sure which is worse. I imagine that the Friend Zone with Corinne would be pretty unbearable since I used to occupy the More-Than-a-Friend Zone. If I were some sort of emotional Superman, I could maybe stand it, but alas, I’m not.
But I have some good news to report. I got a J-O-B! I was really close to becoming an insurance man with Luke, but then I stumbled across an ad for an after-school program job at this middle school in town. I started thinking about the time I spent volunteering at your school, and then I started thinking about how cool it’s been getting to know you recently, so I applied. I got the job, and I have you to thank. So thanks!
I work with sixth and seventh graders, much less mature than old men such as yourself. It’s hard to believe a fart could have brought me such a mixture of glee, pride, hilarity, embarrassment, and general big-deal-ness as it does the boys here, but I suppose it did. The girls ain’t perfect either, but their ridiculousness tends to come out in slightly less ridiculous ways, if that makes any sense. You’d like the teacher I work with. She doesn’t take any crap, that’s for sure. I can be doing everything I can to get them to be quiet and it’s like I’m not even in the room, and she can say two words and give them this crazy death-scowl and they hush up in a millisecond. Impressive. I’ve gotta work on that death scowl. Anyway, it’s good to have a little income coming in, and I don’t have to get coffee for people or get sore shoulders holding a boom mic over my head for hours.
It’s a tiring gig, though, for sure. I’m WIPED when I get home. But I’m still carving out time to watch docs and cast about for what would be a great subject for one. I have a notebook full of ideas, but none of them are quite singing to me yet.
Keep it breezy,
Darren aka Mr. Olmstead
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: January 27, 2013 at 3:40 PM
Subject: RE: Workin’ It
Dear Mr. Olmstead,
Things have been nuts here. I heard that someone (read: Coxson) started a Facebook page in my name (“Whale Boy”) as a joke—complete with a picture of me at Smith’s in the yeti costume and a doctored version of my school photo where I have a blowhole on the top of my head and baleen teeth. I can’t confirm any of this as I am not on Facebook because I’
ve never cared to waste time reading about who is “in a relationship” or what music people “like.” I’m pretty sure that the Facebook page with my name was started as a joke and the goal was to make sure that I had ZERO friends.
I guess that kind of backfired because my page has gone viral (at least according to this kid in my Advanced Calc class) and now I have something like 1,000 “friends.” At school, it’s like I’m a celebrity—fist bumps, high fives, even the occasional butt smack. Any other kid would be in his glory. But I wish I could just float through the hall like plankton. Like before.
Sincerely,
Average James
FEBRUARY 2013
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: February 1, 2013 at 8:20 AM
Subject: Wax Floors
Hi Peter,
Is it ok if I wax the floors in your office since you’re out of town? How’s FL?
—Stanley P. Duckett
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: February 1, 2013 at 8:21 AM
Subject: Out of the Office
Thank you for your email. I am currently out of the office until 2/6/13 and I will have infrequent access to email. For immediate help, please contact Steven Kauffman at [email protected]. I look forward to speaking with you upon my return.
Best,
Peter
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: February 1, 2013 at 9:31 AM
Subject: RE: Wax Floors
Dear Stanley,
You might want to hold off on waxing the floors. I might be back sooner than I thought. I was supposed to meet my sister last night at a local crab shack for dinner. In my backpack, I had a gift-wrapped vegan cookbook and a bracelet inscribed with: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.” The bracelet was silver—which always looked so good against Elsie’s pale skin—and the woman in the store told me that the inscription was part of a serenity prayer, something that former addicts say in recovery. I also took the shells Elsie sent me in a little box. My plan was to give them back to her so that she could use any money from selling them to take a college class.