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 |  It's who we are. It's what we stare at in the middle of the night. It's a bug zapper. |
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My friends, When we were young and newly hatched—also young and in love—my husband and I lived with our four young children on the Space Coast of Florida. The massive propulsion of rocket and shuttle launches from Cape Kennedy often rocked the windows and doors of our little love cottage. We were always properly respectful and impressed by the reach of mankind’s achievements. It was a point of pride to stop whatever we were doing (dishes, dinner, dancing, sleeping, fist fighting, etc.) to watch the eastern horizon—hands on hearts, tears in eyes—as the United States of America raced into the frontier of space. One deep, dark morning (about 2:00 am) I shook my husband awake to watch yet another triumph of human advancement. “Get up,” I mumbled to Sherwood, “the shuttle’s going up. We gotta’ watch.” Sherwood moaned, “The garbage is out all ready. Let me die.” He did not open his eyes. “Come on. We should watch. Night launches are amazing.” He dragged himself upright and clung to the window ledge behind our bed. We knelt, with our chins braced on the ledge, our bleary eyes fixed on a blazing light in the eastern sky. We watched. The light did not appear to move. We stared some more. The light remain fixed. We struggled to focus. The light blazed away. We waited for the light to fade into the blackness of space. It did not. We watched and watched and watched. The light stubbornly refused to move. At last, collapsing back into my pillow I said, “Honey, go back to sleep.” Sounding confused, miffed, and a little whiney Sherwood asked, “Why?” “Because for the last eight to ten minutes we’ve been staring at our next door neighbor’s bug zapper.” He went back to sleep. And I lived to worship at the altar of space exploration another day. This story pretty much sums up who we are, and how we got this way—excessive staring at bug zappers. And this is my blog, a space-age way of recording one’s thoughts, ideas, embarrassments, and foibles for the entire known world. Once upon a time, I would have made this record on papyrus, rolled it up, stuffed it into a ceramic jar, and asked to have the whole thing buried with me in my sarcophagus. I still might. Disclaimer: Some of the stuff you will read here is true. Some of it is not. Some of it is the result of wishful thinking. Some of it is the result of too much thinking, and some of it is the result of too little thinking. But all of it will be written with joy and laughter, because the alternative is despair and weeping, and isn’t there more than enough of that stuff out there? Thank you for your support, Linda (Zippity the Zapped) Zern |
| Our boy goat hit puberty, which sent him spiraling into mindless wooing. Mindless wooing consists of getting his head stuck in field fence and grunting at the neighbor’s girl goats. So I had to move him to a pasture, one field removed from the neighbor’s trampy girl goats. Herding goats is like herding goats. They’re all over the place. So I got a bucket of feed to trick them into a new pasture. But then the horses hear the tink, tink, tink of oats in a bucket so they come running. Except that Tracker, a big bully boy, hates the goats, so the goats can’t be with the horses, but before I know what’s happened, the horses—hearing that tink sound—have snuck through the open work shop door and into the barn with the goats. But they can’t be with the goats because Tracker will stomp goats into goat paste. So I wrangle Tracker out of the barn and into the goat pasture that the goats can’t be in because our boy goat is in love. While I’m wrangling Tracker, Mavis the Goat—who is related to a magician and a prison escapee—slips out of the barn through a crack, wanders over to her old pasture, jumps up on her goat house, burps up a wad of goat oats, and settles in with Tracker, the goat hater. The other goats, envying Mavis her agency, began to probe the fences for weaknesses. I reinforce every microscopic goat exit with epoxy and rope. In the meantime, Charlie, goat neutral horse, has been snacking it up with random goats. I chase him into another paddock, slam the gate shut, and then count the number of beads of sweat rolling down my nose. Six hours have passed and no one is where they’re supposed to be all because one boy goat fell in love. Linda (We All Fall Down) Zern |
| “The pork belly futures contract became an icon of futures and commodities trading.” I don’t even understand that sentence, but I know it’s as American as apple pie futures. Here’s my take on it. Pigs have bellies. Pig bellies are finite, and that means it’s possible to run out of pork tummies. The price goes up. The price goes down, depending. People eat bacon. Right? The problem is that the world gets to thinking that everything is bacon and might run out. At our house it is not uncommon to hear comments like, “If your bacon has formed a pyramid on your plate, you have too much bacon. Put seven pieces of bacon back.” Bacon, it’s finite. Love is not bacon. As the grandparent of, soon to be, fourteen grandchildren, I feel confident making that statement. When we had our first baby I thought my feelings for him were like pork belly futures, limited and finite, and that I couldn’t possibly love anyone else the way I loved that rosy- cheeked little boy. But then we had a quiet, graceful little girl with huge blue eyes and the love got bigger—not smaller. Then came another daughter, with a feisty attitude and a smart mouth that made us laugh, followed by a son with an attitude so cheerful that it dazzled, and the love got bigger yet. A friend of mine explained it like this. “Everyone in college is pretty sure that children will suck them dry. That’s what conventional wisdom teaches. That’s what society says. But I looked around and saw that ninety percent of everyone, in the end, wanted what I already had, even Madonna.” “I can’t imagine life without her.” (Madonna the Singer, speaking of her first daughter) I know. Right? And unlike pork bellies, love is one of those things that the more you get the more there is, and the more there is, the more you can have and the bigger it becomes. Love, it just never runs out. Linda (Love it Up) Zern |
| Race Bannon was my Intro to Computers professor. Race Bannon was also a character from the television cartoon “Johnny Quest” in 1964. He was a spy—the cartoon character, not the professor. I think. Dr. Bannon could have been a spy. When Dr. Bannon told us his name, I may have been the only one in the room to look surprised, being the only one who was alive and watching Friday evening cartoons in 1964. I probably was the only one to remember the Cuban Missile Crisis and the panic that went with it as well. But that’s another post. I had high hopes for Dr. Bannon. Shoot, I had high hopes for Intro to Computers. He insisted that we memorize the two-page explanation for how the letter A gets from the computer keyboard to the computer screen. It took half the entire test time to write out the sequence, which was only one question. I still don’t know how the A gets from the keyboard to the screen. Sigh. In addition, Dr. Bannon was a bit of a . . . creeper. He seemed fascinated to impress on our class how many porn sites existed on the Internet. (He used an actual number; I can’t remember what it was, and I threw those notes out.) He talked about porn every single class. He also liked to hit on the bosomy coeds during our class breaks, but that’s another post too. It’s true; there’s a ton of pointless, destructive websites out there, but I have since learned that the Internet is more than porn. Did you know, that you can type in the question, what are the top 100 “Prepper” websites and the Google machine will answer you? Did you know, that you can type in the question, what is the recipe for making bleach for long term storage AND THERE IS A RECIPE? Did you know that there are hundreds of sources for buying food storage, often with free or minimal shipping? Sure. Sure. Plenty of porn but there’s also a heap of dehydrated, freeze-dried corn in number ten cans that can keep your family going even in the worst of times, which is the opposite of the best of times, also beans, meat, soup bases, milk, rice, pasta . . . and so forth. Now there a lot of highly educated, academic types that might point fingers and call you a crazy, conspiracy, prepper kook. Sure. Sure. My advice: Take a few computer classes, you’ll get over caring. Dr. Race Bannon? He was arrested halfway through Intro to Computers and escorted off the campus in handcuffs. I made an A. Linda (Ready Steady) Zern |
| Because I am so engrossing and we live in an era that celebrates the glory of accomplishing absolutely nothing, I’d like to share with my friends and family a day in my fascinating, engrossing life. 3:00am – I am awakened from a troubled sleep by a circus troop of raccoons assaulting the family trashcans. 3:13am – Motion sensor light comes on as the raccoons form “HUMAN” pyramid. That’s right; I said HUMAN. I imagine the raccoon heap now measures 4’ 11” inches in height and comes up to my chin. 3:20am – I race outside in my fluffy bathrobe with a broom to confront raccoon troop. Trip over garbage slung thirty feet in all directions. Realize raccoons have thrown invisibility cloak over themselves. 3:27am – Shake broom at nothing. Watch hair on arms stand up when the coyotes start howling. 3:28am – Go back to bed. Attempt to sleep. 5:00am – QUIT trying to attempt to sleep. 6:00am – Say a simple prayer of thanks that every man-jack of us have lived to see another day. (Note: We will be the first to admit that our family may occasionally merit Biblical destruction.) 6:09am – Check out cable news. Feel vindicated that every prediction I’ve ever made is coming true. Turn up the volume when it’s reported that a woman in North Carolina was attacked in her sleep IN HER BED by a surly—also rabid—raccoon. 6:12am – Shuffle to the bathroom and because I’ve caught my great grandmother’s arthritis, I daydream about my granddaughters having to push me to the mailbox in a wheelchair every day. They will chatter happily as they push. Say a prayer of gratitude for such a wonderful granddaughters. 6:31am – Limbs and appendages begin to bend. Postpone nursing home reservation. 7:27am – Feed good animals (not garbage eating night marauders) stuff. 9:00am – Go to yoga and during meditation time, when I’m supposed to be emptying my mind of all stressful thoughts, I try to calculate the force necessary to kill a raccoon with a rock. 10:07am – Declare yoga a bust. Decide to try combat kick boxing next time. Noon – Eat macaroni or rice or beans. I’m not kidding. 12:00pm to When-I-run-out-of-steam-or-the-coyotes-howl: I scribble and scribble words on virtual paper. Words that no one may ever read, but I still feel compelled to write, in spite of the fact that it makes me look like an agoraphobic shut-in. Bedtime – When the sun sets and the chickens go to sleep, because I’m saving precious energy and resources for future generations—also I can work in bed while wearing pajamas. Don’t be jealous. Tomorrow – Rinse and Repeat Linda (Night Stalker and Fascinating Person) Zern |
| When I was a girl, the phone sat in one place on the kitchen counter. It did not hitch rides in our pants. It did not display text messages from the bug man. It did not beep, bleep, blink, or monitor heart rates. It was a simpler time. Now, there is social media and people talking smack in tech shorthand. It’s like drowning in Babylonian graffiti. I have absolutely no idea what is going on. “You have to be on Twitter,” my kids said. “I am on Twitter. Haven’t you friended me?” They didn’t even have the good manners to look uncomfortable. “I don’t get Twitter,” I #complained. They didn’t even have the good manners to hide their #scoffing. “Seriously. What are those weirdo messages? I can’t understand anything on Twitter. I mean what is #Xtl #blog #skip amc long $25.00 #skip #to #my #Lou supposed to be about? What happened to subjects and predicates? What happened to #language.” They didn’t even have the good manners to look up from their blinking machines. I’d lost them down those LCD rabbit holes. I sighed. Daughter #2 (that means number not a hash-tag) looked up from her machine to say, “Mom, you really need to be on Instagram. It’s the latest thing. It’s like Twitter but with pictures.” “What? You mean picture writing like on the walls of an ancient temple?” The green glow of her computer screen highlighted her cheekbones. She scrolled away, presumably on Instagram. It’s okay. I’ll keep trying, to connect, to decipher, to find the Rosetta Stone of social media shorthand. That’s what I keep telling myself. But then I check my Facebook page and see a message that says, “The stump is healing nicely.” Whaaaaaaaat????????? What stump? Which limb? Who’s body parts? Huh? Linda (Hash-Tag Harpy) Zern |
| Too graphic. Too intense. Too scary. “I don’t even watch the news,” they said. Too sad. It’s some of what I heard from a small handful of readers after sending them an advanced copy of my novel, Beyond the Strandline. The novel is set in a dystopian future following a collapse of the power grid after a solar storm. Shew! That’s a mouthful. Put it this way, it’s a future without running water or city halls. NOTE: I have to confess that it is a bit of a head rush to be able to write something that gives people the willies. I won’t lie. It’s a story set in a future that looks more like the past . . . and the present in more than a few places around the globe. Discussing the surprising feedback on the book, a friend of mine, remarked, “What are they reading?” I’m not sure. But what I am sure of is that one of the purposes of fiction is being able to send a reader to places and to experience things unimaginable in everyday life. It’s a safe way to look into the ‘heart of darkness’ and process ways to survive, cope, or even thrive in a world that might be unrecognizable. Fiction is a window. In the book, Tess and her family are surviving and thriving in isolation after the collapse of civilization, living off and on the land. Parrish, a young man who comes to live on their ranch, is a survivor of being forced to fight as a child soldier. The local mall has become a haven for slave traders and tyrants. Presently, the single greatest health hazard facing the globe is a lack of access to clean water. Tess’s family deals with the problem in several ways. Would you know how to purify water not provided by electricity or the big water tank in the sky? The United Nations estimates that up to a three hundred thousand children are routinely forced to fight in armed conflicts and wars around the world. Women and children impressed into armies and paramilitary groups are a sure sign that the fabric of a society has blown apart. American gangs mimic military organizations in a lot of respects. Seventy-five percent of members of gangs are under the age of eighteen. Child soldiers are already here. The United Nations estimates that slavery has never been practiced in greater numbers in the history of the world. The slave traders are here. Europe is dealing with the sight of dead babies washed up on beaches as Middle Eastern refugees flee to Europe to escape the gory truth of what is happening to their civilizations. Survival is being able to have a positive mental attitude in the face of a potentially horrifying reality. Reading fiction can be a dry run—an exercise if you will—before the big . . . challenge. |
| I have a smallpox scar. I have a smallpox scar from having smallpox stuffed into me with a needle by the government. I was five when the government gave me smallpox. Okay, they gave me a teeny, tiny speck of smallpox, but the scar is still ugly. Since then I’ve been inoculated, biopsied, C-sectioned, extracted, stapled, stitched, sliced and diced. And now I’m crazy. When I go to the doctor my CO2 levels go way up, because I hyperventilate, and when I go to the dentist my blood pressure sky rockets. Oddly enough, getting sharp objects jammed into body parts does not get easier with time. Now, I have to be drugged out of my mind when I have to have sharp objects jammed into body parts. I am a cancer-surviving pansy. For my latest dental torture session on Thursday, my dentist and his gang gave me a sedative-hypnotic. It made me go to sleep for Thursday—the whole day—and I didn’t read the “medication guide” until AFTER the procedure. What a hoot. Those medicine-warning labels are the funniest reading on earth, in my opinion. Who writes those things? Apparently, a side effect of taking a sedative-hypnotic can be something called “traveler’s amnesia.” This is side effect that can cause someone to be (and I quote) “NOT fully awake and do an activity that they will NOT remember doing. Reported activities include: driving a car (sleep driving), making and eating food, talking on the phone, having sex, and sleep-walking.” Since Thursday has disappeared from my memory, I have developed a vague sense of unease about the “travel amnesia” possibilities. What if, at some point during my Thursday—all day—nap, I put on a gypsy outfit, drove to the lakefront, and played a tambourine for loose change? What if I went horseback riding—naked? What if I drove my John Deere lawn tractor to the Florida Mall, so I could buy a pretzel, with salt? What if I killed somebody? Traveler’s amnesia. Yikes. What if I joined a motorcycle gang, got a tattoo of a giant butterfly on my right butt cheek, and promised to be a drug mule? What if . . . oh . . .wait a minute . . . there’s something here under the bedcovers. Hey . . . what the . . . it’s a tambourine, and there’s a buck twenty-three in it. I can’t seem to find the gypsy outfit. So, was I naked while playing the tambourine? Amnesia is so annoying. Linda (No More Cavities) Zern ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| Boys enjoy sticks. That’s my official unscientific, non-governmental grant approved conclusion. After years and years and years of observing boys in their natural habitat, just like that “Gorillas in the Mist” lady did with those mountain gorillas, I am prepared to report that boys and sticks go together like gorillas and mist. From my field notes: Tried to mow the yard today. Had to stop every three and a half feet to pick up large, sharp tipped sticks approximately one foot long to twelve and half feet in length. I realized that these sticks did not arrive in the middle of the yard by themselves. The sticks were dragged, hurled, slung, and dropped by human boys as they roamed through the mists. A boy will pick up a stick before he will bathe, wash, brush, or comb. A stick can never be sharp enough for boys. Opening the microwave oven to discover a pile of random sticks inside is evidence that boys are near and possibly foraging for food. My husband, who is a boy, cheerfully handed pocketknives to two junior members of our gorilla troop, Zac and Kip, showing them how to sharpen already pointy sticks to a state of hypodermic needle sharpness. Their faces were incandescent with stick whittling joy. My husband, the Poppy, said, “Whittle, boys. Whittle.” Conner, their older brother, a sensible boy who talks like a forty-five year old man, looked on—horrified—as his little brothers chopped and chipped away. Bits of stick exploded into sawdust. Looking at me, Conner said, “I see what you mean about Poppy. He is a fool and a clown.” Surprised, I said, “I don’t remember ever calling him a clown.” Whittling is not exclusive to juvenile members of the troop. Older, mature males of the troop will sit chopping at wood with sharp objects, showing off their tool making abilities. Unfortunately, the stick whittling never seems to result in anything resembling a tool, just naked sticks. Naked sticks that they leave at my house—inside, tucked away in corners and closests. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do with a pile of naked, whittled on sticks. They don’t fit in the microwave. Boys also like stones. Florida is not known for its rocks or stones. There aren’t any. So, the boys in our family enjoy peeling up the concrete stepping stones of my garden walkway. It makes me want to hit them with sticks. But I don’t, because I’m not a clown and a fool—well, not today. Linda (Stick, Stick, Goose) Zern |
| “Remember one man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” Daddy said when they got to the garage sale and handed her a one dollar bill. It’s what he always said. Mia hated the way the wrinkled dollar smelled, but she loved the way it made her feel and what it meant—time with Daddy. “Daddy, doesn’t it make you think of the beach?” Mia pointed at the sheets, stretching over the lawn and covered with candy dishes and yellowed Tupperware. The breeze tickled at the frayed edges of the sheets and tangled her ponytail. His crooked smile made her think of a question mark. She tried again. “You know the beach . . . that raggedy line of seaweed after the water goes out? That’s all mixed up with broken shells but if you walk slow and look hard you can find a whole sand dollar that’s not all broken to bits—sometimes. It’s like that to me here.” He patted her head. "Like finding a great deal." Daddy held her hand as they wandered through card tables piled with blouses and winter sweaters. He always wore his work coveralls streaked with grease on the pockets when they went treasure hunting together; his name stitched in blue and black on his chest. “Like sea treasures,” she said. “You’re a funny girl, Mia.” That's what he always said. She felt itchy when grownups said that stuff to her, not sure if it was a good thing to be a funny girl who saw seaweed in the flutter of sheets on the grass at a yard sale. He left her in front of a table with books and puzzles and games. Sometimes he looked at her like she was a sand dollar hidden under a pile of torn chip bags and barnacles. She thought he looked tired and rumpled like the money. He left to look for sensible treasures like torque wrenches and channel-lock pliers. She picked up a book and was disappointed to see that she’d read it and was rejecting the puzzles as too easy when the glitter of sun on glass caught her eye. Maybe it was glass or crystal or even diamonds? Piled next to her were jars, dishes, mismatched pots and pans, and somewhere in all that jumble the tantalizing sparkle of magic. She felt it. Mia walked to the edge of a paisley blanket and saw it—a glowing face of crystal arching away into an elegant curve. A crystal ball. It was a crystal ball, a real one, half hidden and tipped on its edge against a chipped bowl. She froze when the sun hit the crystal ball and splintered into a hundred shards of glittering fire. The sign read, Everything One Dollar. Mia could hardly breathe. She looked at her daddy and flipped a hand at him, not wanting to give it away, but tempted to yell at him to hurry. Hurry, hurry before someone else discovered her crystal ball and scooped it up. She waved harder and then went to get him. “Daddy,” she said, tugging at his shirtsleeve. “Daddy, do you see it?” She didn’t want to take the chance and point, so she dipped her head towards the blanket, whispering, “Daddy, there. Look! Next to that broken bowl. Can you believe it? And it’s only a dollar. It’s magic for only one dollar.” “Mia, what do you want me to see?” He squinted. Dragging him to the edge of the blanket, she said, “There daddy.” She bent down, desperate enough now to pick the crystal ball up, to hold it in front of her like a chalice. He looked at it and then looked at her, puzzled. “What do you think this is?” He pulled the magical globe out of her hands. “Shhh, daddy, they’ll hear you.” How could he not know? “Daddy," she whispered. "It’s a crystal ball! Look . . . just look!” “But honey,” he said, turning the ball of glass in his chapped hands. He shook it. Tipping it over, he watched as a shower of dried up mosquitoes and flies fell out of its hollow center. “We have one just like it in the bathroom.” He held up her crystal ball to the sun. It became a dusty glass covering for a bathroom light fixture. “Oh,” she said, softer than a breath. “But I thought . . .” She covered her mouth with her hand to hide the way she needed to bite her lip—hard. Her hand smelled like the money—sweaty skin and fingernail dirt. He tossed the light fixture back into the heap and patted her on the head. “Next time, funny Mia. Next time you’ll find treasure.” |
| Her name is Ever Jane Zern. She is number twelve of our twelve grandchildren. She is freshly hatched and a girl. Her parents will dress her in pink and glue bows to her head. This will cause her to grow breasts and enjoy glitter. That’s the theory. No. Seriously. I’ve paid good, good money to hear highly educated teacher-types tell me that gender is the arbitrary result of the Target’s toy aisle labeling system. Sure. Sure. Then I remember that I live on a farm, and that I’ve been chased by roosters with three-inch, razor sharp spurs—not hens, which are girl chickens—but roosters, which are boy chickens with spikes on their legs, called spurs. Nobody glues anything to those chicken’s heads. Trust me. And they’ve never been to Target—not even once. Animals. They’re animals. And aren’t we animals too. Right? I know because other wildly educated teacher-types have taught me that human beings are animals just like Bonobo monkeys. NOTE: They always pick Bonobo monkeys because Bonobos are notorious for greeting each other by getting freaky and by having sex with strange monkeys they’ve just met. It’s their way of saying, “Howdy.” And aren’t human-being-animals just like that? Or should be? Sure. Sure. We’re animals like those sex fiend monkeys. Except when we’re not and then we’re super complicated animals—so says one young college educated man on Facebook. We’re exactly like Bonobo sex fiend monkeys except when that theory isn’t convenient . . . like when that Facebook guy finally gets a girlfriend, and he doesn’t want her saying, “Howdy,” like a monkey. Bunk. It’s all bunk. On the weekend, our grandchildren descend upon our home like a pile of monkeys. There are boys in the pile and there are girls in the pile. Games are played. Fights break out. Holes are dug. People are buried up to their necks and abandoned. No . . . no . . . no . . . that’s not true. I digress. Besides, it only happened once. My husband plays the part of The Poppy on the weekends. As The Poppy he is often cast in the role of monster in the Monster game. The Monster game is simple. He pretends to be a kid-eating monster as he chases a gaggle of shrieking children around the yard. The children are getting older and faster. The monster is just getting older. Recently, the monster game ended badly—for the monster—when he tripped and flew fifteen feet across the yard, rolling and bouncing and bruising as he flew. He wound up flat on his back, surrounded by a tribe of juvenile monster evaders. The boys in the crowd stared down, accessing the situation. One poked the monster with a stick. Another said, “When he recovers he’s not going to catch me.” Still another boy said, “Is he dead?” He did not sound overly worried. “A little respect, gentlemen,” I said. “A little respect. A mighty foe has fallen.” The girls in the mob reacted very differently. “Awwww, she hurt herself,” said a two-year old girl. Another of the little girls got busy brushing leaves and sticks off the downed monster and helping him retrieve his glasses while the boys watched, occasionally poking at the wounded creature with a stick. The whole incident re-enforced for me the notion that girls are not boys, and that if we let them, boys will act like monkeys with sticks, but that doesn’t make them monkeys; it makes them barbarians. Monster update: He’s on painkillers until his ribs heal. Linda (Howdy Do) Zern |
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