• • •
I didn’t reread what I wrote on that journal page, not on that January day, though I noticed how my handwriting got big and jagged and crooked as I fought and scribbled “blood of our mother” the last few times, my hand growing tired and unhinged from confusion and pressing so hard. I looked up at the waves and remembered one particular birthday trip to Santa Cruz—the worst one. The best one.
Mac and I had woken up in the mood preceding a day trip to the beach, chatting for a few minutes while still in bed. I told him a friend was really interested in a woman she’d been dating.
“Is she down like four flats on a dump truck?” Mac smirked, cracking a dubious smile.
I raised my eyebrows, “I have no idea what that means.”
“Flats,” he said, lifting his hand in the air and flipping out his fingers. “On a dump truck…Wait. Are you serious?”
“Of course I’m serious. I do not understand your construction talk.” I said this in my bitchiest, most pretentious voice, knowing he’d play, knowing we were on the frequency of old friends.
“This is not construction, Janelle. This is about trucks.” He tilted his head forward toward me and looked at me side-eyed, as if that face was going to help me understand the simile.
I stared at him.
“What do you think it means?” he asked, almost hesitantly.
“I have no idea,” I said. “Something about flatbeds? Flats? The back of trucks?”
He shook his head and with a quick flash in his eye, said, “You know what? The next time you say something about Baldwin or Foucault I’m not even going to try to understand what you’re saying. I’m just going to say whatever stupid shit first comes to my mind, like you do.”
I roared in laughter. It was perfection, because that was exactly what I had done, and he saw it, and knew it, and yet I really had no idea what he was talking about, because so often, the obvious answer is lost on me. It’s right in front of my face, but I’m staring left, or right, or over in some dark minuscule corner, where vague metaphor and “deep meaning” lie.
I spent the first ten years of our marriage like that, trying to change Mac, trying to mold him into the man I thought he needed to be, the kind of man who could “fulfill me,” a better version of himself that only I could see, of course.
But it never worked. He never got better at organizing linen closets or finishing projects he started. He never got better at budgeting or perfect at anticipating family needs or articulating his deep emotional development. He never talked as I talked at him. He never got better at realizing my vision of “wedded bliss.” But during a particularly difficult moment at around marriage year ten, when I was four minutes away from divorce, Good News Jack asked, “Janelle, where did you get your ideas about marriage?”
“What do you mean?” I asked, frowning through the phone.
“Where did you get your ideas of romance, of what it’s all supposed to be?”
I traced my concepts of “marriage” all the way back to the beginning, all the way back to the magazine wedding dress shoved in my journal, to the yachts in the San Francisco Bay, to the love songs and teenaged daydreams.
I realized then it was Hallmark cards and Meg Ryan movies.
And I was wrong again.
“For people like us,” Jack said, “life is a series of discovering all the things we’ve been wrong about.”
That morning, the day we were heading to Santa Cruz, I stood cooking some bacon at the stove, and Mac sat in the dining room adjacent, and for some reason Georgia asked about our wedding photos, which I had burned, one by one, in the little apartment where I had lived alone, desperate and sure I would never need them again. The ones that showed us beneath the trees at the courthouse. The ones with Ava in a carrier on my mother. The ones of Mac and me holding hands and looking at one another with tears in our eyes.
I told Georgia, “Well, we don’t have any because your dad got upset one day and destroyed them all.”
I threw Mac a knowing smile.
Georgia asked, “Why did you do that, Daddy?”
I was about to own up to my lie, but before I could, Mac answered, “Because I was very sad, and I thought getting rid of those photos would make me feel better.”
After he said it, he looked up at me straight into my shame, with a love and compassion and forgiveness that now, sixteen years after that courthouse wedding, takes my breath away, as if I were standing in a white gown in a castle in France, or on a yacht in the San Francisco Bay. I held his eyes again, as I had done the night we met, and I couldn’t believe that love was mine.
But I had no evidence of the things to come back then. I wish I could elbow myself as I stood there. I’d say, “Hey, Janelle. Just wait. There’s some big love coming your way. The wedding doesn’t matter, kid.”
I never would have believed me, though. That’s for sure.
We were friends. We were always good friends. And mine were tears of joy after all.
As soon as we pulled into our parking spot at the Boardwalk in Santa Cruz, a beachfront amusement park, Mac jumped out through the passenger door and vomited on the asphalt. I figured that was an ominous sign. He spent the next five hours in the car, green-faced and sweating, while I tried not to lose four kids in the endless crowds and sweltering heat that is Santa Cruz in September. It was Rocket’s tenth birthday, after all, and I tried to make it great. I never forgot his first one, and I’ll never give up trying to repair it.
I was convinced Mac’s sickness was my fault on account of my bad behavior at Starbucks a couple of hours before. I had been flippant and rude to one of the baristas because they charged us extra for a dash of soy milk as cream, even though I explained that Mac can’t drink milk and “nobody ever charges us for a little bit for his coffee.” I was thus convinced they had poisoned him with spoiled soymilk. I vowed once again never to snap at the people preparing my food.
By the end of the day, it was clear Mac wouldn’t make the three-hour drive home, so we paid $300 for a last-minute motel room that should have cost $100, and piled our children into the tiny rectangle. After dinner, Ava started feeling sick. And then Rocket. I began to think perhaps my bad behavior had not caused the illness. By two a.m., everyone was sick except me, so I passed the night rotating around the bathroom and beds, and I thought, Well, obviously I am in hell. As the only well person, I cleaned vomit and changed Arlo’s diarrhea diapers, unpacked the car and helped the kids wash their faces and sip water and change out of puke clothes.
I woke up the next morning after one hour of sleep, facing a three-hour car ride over winding roads with four sick children and a barely recovering husband. We had to get home. Mac had to work the next day, and staying would cost too much money anyway. I loaded everyone into the car and drove straight to a liquor store, where I knew they’d sell those red party cups, which would be perfect vomit cups.
It was a beautiful day, but my eyes ached in the sun, my bones heavy from exhaustion. I had spent the whole day before in the relentless heat, and in crowds, my God, the fucking crowds. And now I’m standing here in a liquor store buying bottles of water and red party cups. I gathered it all into my arms and walked to the checkout line, where I saw a woman who swept my mind immediately, erasing every thought and filling every crevice.
It was twelve p.m. on a Sunday. She stood in front of me in a ruffled skirt and combat boots and tights. It was too hot for such a get-up, and she’d probably been wearing it since Friday, when things were better. Her hair was sticking out and frizzy around a few-day-old braid. When she turned, I saw tattoos along the side of her face, which was swollen and pale with bloodshot eyes. The alcohol radiated off her body, and the smell smacked me into eight, nine, ten years ago.
That sweet-stale reek. Cigarettes and sweat.
“Can you give me a deal on a pint?” she asked the cashier.
He had already put her pint on the counter, grabbing it before she asked. He knew what she wanted. I look
ed down at the bottle. Rot-gut whiskey.
My kind of girl.
“No, sorry,” he said, offering a vague smile. He didn’t have to say it, though. We both knew what his face meant: “It’s been too many times.”
I considered setting my stuff down on the counter, because my arms were achy against the cold drinks, but I didn’t want her to feel rushed. She had enough stress.
“It’s cool, man, give me a minute,” she said. “You know I’m good for it, though.” She set some change and a couple of dollar bills on the counter.
“How much do I owe you?” she asked, and her feigned cheerfulness made my heart damn near crack.
One dollar and seven cents more for the rot-gut pint.
She dug in her bag and in the folds of her green canvas jacket, pulling a nickel or two from the plastic penny holder on the left.
I used to do that. Saved me a few times, too.
She remained seven cents short. I opened my purse to grab a dime when she said, “Hold on!” and ran to the back of the store, where I watched her grab a dime off the floor. She placed it on the counter triumphantly.
“We’re good today, man!”
I was happy she didn’t have to take money from me. I was happy she got her pint without a front or a handout, and I was happy she could kill the shakes. I knew she was thinking, I’ll be okay today, and I was glad that moment was happening for her, though it wouldn’t be enough.
It will never be enough.
There will never be enough.
She grabbed her whiskey and turned around, wafting that smell again, but as she faced me, she stopped, and looked me right in the eyes. She paused, and looked harder with her chin high and proud.
“Any day now I’ll be back to my normal self,” she said.
I held her gaze. I couldn’t speak. Her words seemed to knock the breath out of me. I smiled a little and nodded, seeing her as best I could. She probably didn’t notice my nod, or my smile, but I watched her walk outside and get on her bike. I watched her ride away in the clear sunlight.
God dammit, why did you say that to me? Why? Of all the people and things and moments in the world, I stood behind you on just another alcoholic day in a liquor store and smelled your smell, my old smell, and you spoke the saddest words maybe I’ve ever heard in my life, and your watery eyes were mine again, yet they were not. Because I’m free now.
Why?
I’m a stranger to you. A nobody. A nothing.
When I was you I would have turned away from a woman like me, all clear-eyed in the midday with kids and shit.
“Oh, fuck you, lady. Fuck you and your decent life.” That’s what I would have thought.
(And then, in the throes of the morning, I would have begged God to join you.)
I knew her. The pain. The hope. The energy in the unopened bottle. The strength pulsing through the walls of the glass in my hand. Just this last pint. Just this one. I’m okay today. It’s okay.
Tomorrow I’ll pull it together.
And tomorrow, tomorrow I’ll be me again.
Any day now. Any day now I’ll be back to my normal self.
I wanted to stare at where she last stood, to stay with her. I wanted to chase after her. I wanted to say something. Instead I met eyes with the man behind the counter. It was time to pay, time to go on. It felt weird, once again, to be on this side of normalcy.
Me and this dude at work at the liquor store. Me, buying water and red cups because my kids are sick and we have to drive home. Me, tired from being up all night in a motel room during a trip gone awry. Me, frustrated with the day, but, well, lost in the web of the normal life.
You buying a pint with scavenged change at noon, looking to tomorrow. You telling me you’re okay while you stink and waste away. You riding away in hope, until the shakes come again.
Me pulling out my debit card and spending nine dollars.
I used to grab pennies out of the plastic container to buy pints. Ancient Age whiskey, a pack of Pall Malls, and a Coke if I had extra money. If I think really hard, maybe I can remember the exact amount of those three items. The cost of okay. The cost of the day. I’d dig in the folds of my car, under rugs and in deeper and deeper spots as if I hadn’t looked there already.
Sometimes he’d give me a pint on credit. But never the Pall Malls. He knew I’d be fine without those. I always paid him back as soon as I could because I knew I’d need his help again. After the first pull hit my gut I’d feel hope, and the shakes would quiet, and I’d know just like her that tomorrow would be different.
Tomorrow I’ll call my mom and get sober. I’ll get with Ava and Rocket and work. I’ll call my dad. I’ll tell him everything. I’ll eat some good food and clean my car and above all I’ll never drink again.
Any day now I’ll be back to my normal self.
Any moment. Maybe this moment.
I wanted to tell that lady that the most important word in that strange sentence was “self.” The word she can’t forget. The word she can’t let go of. She has one. It’s there. Buried beneath a few thousand years of separation and pain, or so it feels, but it’s still intact, on fire, alive, pulsing through the reek of shame and humiliation, the part of her who looked at the woman behind her in line and knew they were the same.
I was still thinking of her as I got in my car and passed out the red cups. I wish I would have bought you the pint. I wish I would have handed it to you and said, before you could speak, “I see you.”
I wished I had told her I saw God in her cracked eyes—that it’s been years, but I still love her.
Instead, I got in the car and threw it in reverse and turned on “Ripple” because I needed to hear Jerry sing it: “If I knew the way, I would take you home”—because that’s what I wanted to tell that lady, really, and that’s where I was headed.
Home.
Ava saw me staring, and asked me what was wrong.
“Nothing, baby,” I said, and squeezed her wrist, so just for a moment I could feel our pulse.
Acknowledgments
A massive thank you to my manager, Jermaine Johnson, for seeing something in my work that was worth pursuing, for that eight p.m. email that changed my life, and for the direction and brilliance and humor of our every call. And to my agent, Richard Abate, for teaching me what the hell a book proposal is and giving me more essential writing guidance in five-minute phone calls than I got in the entirety of my college career. Working with 3 Arts is probably the greatest honor of my life. Don’t tell my kids.
To Lauren Hummel at Hachette, thank you for your editorial clarity, insight, and tireless work, and for seeing this book always as what I hoped it would be. You know how I feel about “magic,” but the intersection of our lives was, well, you know.
Michael Barrs and Michelle Aielli, thank you for your incredible work on marketing and publicity. Thank you also to Mauro DiPreta, Mike Olivo, Sean Ford, and Marisol Salaman. The Hachette team was better than I ever could have imagined.
To the readers of Renegade Mothering, where do I fucking begin? Thank you for reading all these years, for every comment and email, for not getting too angry when I crossed that line, or maybe for sticking around because I crossed that line. In absolutely unequivocal terms: THIS BOOK IS BECAUSE OF YOU. You became my people when I was sure I had no people.
To the Sauce Tank for handling my exquisite insecurity, my Pescadero renegades for writing anyway, and to you, Dave E., for sticking around and delivering the truth, thank you.
Sarah, my dear friend, from that bastard red tree to you in my kitchen after Joan died, you live the art I’m trying to write.
Skyler Paul, I could not have written a single sentence as clean as a bone without you, soul friend. Let’s hum those radio songs.
Dad, thank you for watching kids and supporting cabin trips, for our conversations and the pride in your voice, but mostly for teaching me how to spot bullshit from a very young age. And Neena, thank you for loving me even when you didn't have to, and
for giving me Jerry.
And, you, mama, whom I couldn’t possibly thank sufficiently, I’ll just say thank you for the billion moments of help, now and before, for posting my writing on the refrigerator when I was ten, and for always leading me home.
Ava, Rocket, Georgia, and Arlo: You are my best.
Mac, you are the reason I kept writing when I was sure it was pointless and you were right, my love. You saw what I could not with those kindest brown eyes. I love you terribly.
And finally, to the alcoholic who still suffers, and the children of alcoholics, with every word I typed, you were never far from my mind.
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I'm Just Happy to Be Here Page 26