We’ve lived in this house for twenty years now, so we figured it was time to do a little landscaping. The original shrubberies were nearly the size of the house and dead on the inside, and it was time for them to go. Well past time, in fact. At first we thought we could pull them out by the roots, so we tied a heavy chain around them and hooked the other end to the 4-wheel-drive truck and gave them a tug. Nothing, unless you call the chain sliding up the tree and laughing at us something. So we got out the little electric chain saw and cut them babies off right flat to the ground, if by “flat to the ground” you really mean “a good foot of trunk still there.”

Then it started to rain again – we’ve had severe thunderstorms here almost every day this summer so far – and we had to stop. We’re not finished, and everything looks lopsided, but some time before I die eventually, we’ll get the rest of the gigantic shrubs out of there.

So, we went to WalMart and walked up and down the Garden Center aisles, looking at this and that and wondering what most of it was for, and saying intelligent things like “Look! Pretty!” and making fun of the lawn ornaments even while secretly thinking some of the little limestone kittens were cute.

I actually heard myself saying, “Look, Buddha is sitting with Mary the Mother of God, St. Francis of Assisi, and a segmented dragon. If only the world could get along like that.”

Vaguely remembering that some of the homes we’d driven past for inspiration had some kind of black stuff lining the mulchy areas, we grabbed a huge roll of plastic edging and got in line at the checkout. It being WalMart, there was, naturally, only one cashier working and we were possibly 23rd in line to check out. Trying to check out in the local WalMart is kind of like trying to blast off in a NASA rocket. They SAY it will be five minutes, but you KNOW it’s really going to be six hours, or even next week. “10, 9, 8, 7. . . OOPS, delay. . . . 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5. . . OOPS, sorry. . .10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3. . . price check. . . etc.”

One of my former students saw us in line and whispered, “You don’t want to buy that stuff.”

“We don’t?”

“No, you really don’t. That stuff is horrible.”

Then he gave me his business card and whatta you know, he was a professional landscaper.

He came out to the house and looked around and to his eternal credit didn’t start laughing until he was back in his van and exiting the driveway. I mean, I have NO artistic sense at all. I know it when I see it, but I can’t create it myself. Unless you agree with me that an old shower curtain liner does a pretty good job of keeping the weeds away from grapevines. . . .

It’s too late to make a long story short so I’ll just say this: we hired a professional landscaper to do the basic remove-the-top-layer, dig the little trenches, lay the landscaping cloth that costs more per yard than wedding-dress-satin, and spread the mulch. This guy was a really nice 7th grader and he seems to have grown into a really nice man, and although our conversation about how he now has kids who are several years older than he was when I had him in class might have upset me a little bit (darn mirror!) I think we’ve found another former student that we can trust with real-world stuff.

We like to hire former students whenever we can. Not just ANY former student, mind you, but you know what? Most of those former students who were hardworking and trustworthy as kids grow into adults who are hardworking and trustworthy.

It’s not his fault that when I look at him, I see a quiet, smiling 12-year-old, sitting in the second row from the windows, third seat from the back, with two Matchbox cars on his desk which he won’t touch until he finishes his quiz.

It’s that memory of his ability to put off his fun until he finished his work that made me hire him.

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly

In the mood for a rant? I am.

People who toss their cigarette butts out the window of their car are creeps.

People who drop their cigarette butts on the parking lot are jerks.

People who drop their cigarette butts into flower pots are scum.

People who drop their cigarette butts in someone else’s yard are dirty, dirty people.

To sum up: People who drop their cigarette butts anywhere that is not in their own home or car are inconsiderate boors.

One more thing: Please seal up your house or car thoroughly so your stench does not seep out and further nastify the planet. Also, please bathe – and use a scrubbing brush – before you leave your personal environmental hell-hole. EVERY time. Nothing will ever make you smell presentable, but every little bit helps.

Also? If you are a smoker and you try to hide the rankness by using a quart of perfume, give it up. You’re not fooling anybody, and you still stink. Breath mints don’t hide it, either.

You can throw glitter all over a pile of manure, but it will still be manure and it will still stink.

Also, shame on you. If you’ve ever read a thousand essays by eleven-year-olds about how their parents love their nicotine habit far more than they love their children, maybe you’d be ashamed of yourself enough to at least taper off a bit. Or not. Some smokers don’t love their children as much as they love their cigarettes, and I’ve seen tons of these “people” at conferences. (Can you say “Pee YOU?”) We had to spray down the hallways and the room after these conferences, but at least the parents showed up. Their kids had no socks or warm coats or pencils or gym shoes and were mostly on the school dole as far as books, lunch, breakfast, and before-and-after-school care, but Mom had one open pack and at least two spares in her open purse, there beside the food stamps.

And now for the quiz: How many pairs of little socks can be purchased for the price of a pack of cigarettes?

Check it out; this was written in February of 1993:

“I love my mom but she don’t love me much. how do I know, it’s because if she has to chose between me and her cigs, i don’t have a chance. My dad he sent me cash for my band uniform and mom she found it and drove to Walmart in the middle of the night and spent every dime for cigarets. Know what she said when I found it gone and cried? Sorry, kid, mommy’s gotta have em. Suck it up. then my dad he asked me about band and i told him and he yelled and mom hit me for ratting her out. I want to live with him, mom’s house stinks and is always cloudy with smoke and it makes everytghin in there smell bad incluing me and i hate it and i hate her for not loving me. she just loves her addictoin nothing else. I know she just wants me so she can buy cigs with the money dad sends her for me. I love her too, beside hating her but i know she will alwyas love her smokes more. she cougfs all the time and her voice is scrachy and she would steal for herself i know because she steals from me for herself. Sometimes dad gives me money direct and i hide it and mom serches for it and finds it and screams at me for making her serch and she buys more cigs with it. This makes me real sad all the time. Also i know i smell bad, it’s not my fault, and i wash off at school every day but i know it still stinks. i hate her for making my whole world stink but i love her and i wish she loved me but know she don’t. If she loved me, she’d walk through fire for me but she’d rather smoke it than be inconvenience and that’s how I know she don’t really love me at all. just herself.”

The kid’s right, too.

We called CPS about this but were told they could do nothing because the mother had done nothing actually wrong. Oh really.

One more judgmental heartless rant before I have to go mock some babies who cried because they were hungry and for, to quote my idol Dr. Cox, “. . .packing a load so big I’m seriously considering hiring a stable boy.”

Adults who indulge themselves in any way while denying a child a basic need are complete and total wastes of earth space.

Don’t anyone DARE whine about pity or indulgence for a drug addict on my blog, either. I really don’t care. Life is full of choices, and if someone chooses himself/herself over a child, that someone really doesn’t deserve any pity.

“But I DO love my kids! I can’t help myself, it’s an addiction, an ADDICTION! It’s not my fault, I’m addicted! It’s the cigarette company’s fault, not mine! Don’t blame me! I’m sorry! I just can’t HELP IT!”

Cry me a river.

As the kid’s lovely mom put it, “Suck it up.” You made your bed; now lie in it. And for God’s sake, let someone else have your child. Since you don’t love him enough to take care of him, let someone else do it.

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly

I was sitting here trying to think of something interesting to blog about; that’s right, just sitting here not bothering anybody or plotting to take over the world: just sitting here looking at my screen and my sleeping cat’s legs dangling down over the keyboard, and suddenly I started thinking about college.

Not the one where I teach – the one I went to, myself. You know, the only big university in the world? Indiana University, Bloomington? Yes, the Big Red one. The Bobby Knight one.

And as I was sitting here remembering my college days, I realized, with more than just a little bit of horror, that two of my roommates and three of my college boyfriends are. . . . dead now.

Joyce died several years ago of the flu. Four children under the age of eight, and she got the flu, and died before anybody could even comprehend what was happening. Christie, who was one of the kindest people I’ve ever met, died last year of Lou Gehrig’s Disease. I googled her name a few months ago and apparently she donated all of her personal papers to a university in Iowa. Among her papers was a category entitled “Personal Letters.” I wonder if any of MY letters now reside in the archives of a college in Iowa. Bruce, who was a health nut and practically lived outdoors, died of cancer. Meid dropped dead of an aneurysm while with a patient. Mike died of AIDS – apparently, everybody “knew” except me. Not that it would have mattered in the least.

In my mind, they’re we’re all alive and young and hot and laughing and eagerly awaiting whatever life will bring. Sometimes, I guess, life hands us a bad hand, with no trumps and no aces. It’s luck. I really wish we could ask life for a re-deal.

When I think of college, I also remember Viking Dinners in the dorm. That’s a random dinner wherein nobody is allowed to use silverware. Inevitably, there was soup, and if we were lucky, there was Zebra Pudding. (I wish I knew how to make that; it was awesome. )

Mike’s face would be covered with fluffy white stuff and some streaks of chocolate. Christie would have food all over her thick waist-length hair. Joyce would sniff and refuse to participate. Bruce would laugh sarcastically and pretend not to enjoy himself when we all knew he was having more fun than anybody. Meid ate so much I got out of the habit of watching him at dinner, so I don’t really remember how he approached Viking Dinners. As for me, I don’t remember how I did Viking Dinner, either. I’ve always been a watcher, not a do-er, far too insecure to go out on a limb in those days, but I hope I walked out of the dining room with a little chocolate in my hair on those nights.

I guess the older we get, the more likely we are to have deceased friends. All of these people were far too young to die; we’re supposed to be in our late nineties when that happens! I guess all we can do is appreciate each other while we still have each other, and not let petty things come between us. I’ve always been glad I wrote to Joyce and forgave her for her part in that , um, let’s call it a disagreement about where college boyfriends are supposed to sleep when one has a roommate, “thing,” and that she wrote back and took all of the blame.

It was no fun sleeping in the hallway all those nights when I was paying half of the rent for the room. Joyce and I parted company at the end of that year NOT on the best of terms.

Two weeks after I got her letter of apology, she was dead.

So, there we go, and there we go. College gave me far more memories than just these, of course, but tonight, these are what my mind is focusing on.

Let’s all be nice to one another, shall we? Far nicer than we even NEED to be.

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly