1. Website that makes the correlation between multi-vitamins and acne.
2. Website about how our contaminated water supply is making babies gay.
3. www.eatingpiewithcelebrities.com – Photoshopped pictures of me binge-eating with famous people.
Those are the only ones I have been wanting to launch for a while now. Lengthening the list would just be being facetious.
Tonight Darren and I were in charge of his two-year-old niece Harper. We took her to my parents’ house because they were throwing a dinner party there for my Wyoming brother Jack. I think Harper had a pretty great time. She ran up to my grandma who was laid up on the couch and shouted, “I have no underpants on!” She approached Drs. Murray and Morris where they were discussing the steaks on the grill and proudly declared, “Banana banana!” She ate sushi, peanut butter, rasberries, and pico de gallo. She also got fizzy water up her nose for the first time, which almost made her head explode.
Toward the end of the night Harper and I reclined on the backyard hammock to look at the stars. She heard someone speaking to my brother Brad (home visiting from med school) and she asked me about him.
“He’s going to be a doctor,” I said.
“For Halloween?” said Harper.
“No, when he grows up,” I said.
“When I’m three I’m going to be a doctor,” she said confidently. Shortly thereafter we retrieved her underpants from where they were drying on a pole made for hanging plants, and we said goodbye.
I’ve been carbo-loading for days (maybe weeks), so I think I’m finally ready for the big soccer game tomorrow. A steady diet of mashed potatoes, macaroni, pizza, beer, and cookies always serves me well in competitive situations. However there has been a fingernail or an almond or something stuck in my throat for 24 hours now, and it’s throwing me off. Every time I swallow it’s like getting bitten by a little bug on my esophagus. Perhaps during play tomorrow I won’t swallow; I will spit. There’s nothing that symbolizes victory more than a ponytailed, spitting girl who likes to run around and kick people in the nuts.
Dear Angelina,
I heard the moving story you told at the Clinton Global Initiative about two Syrian refugees. You spoke of a young boy who cared for a man who, for religious reasons, had been tortured and left in a trash can to die. The man’s wounds were infected and riddled with maggots and the impoverished boy nursed him back to health.
Angelina, this is a good story, and a heartbreaking one, but I know something you don’t. Maggots actually promote healing because they eat the bacteria in open wounds. Maggots are natural debriders of necrotic tissue – they precisely remove the bad and leave the good. Meanwhile they disinfect wounds and assist in the healing process. So Angie, next time you want to cry about something, don’t cry about maggots. Maggots are on your side. Maggots are humanitarians too. Maggots were in Syria helping people way before you were. Keep up the good work though.
xo
Wistar
PS Feel free to comment on my blog.
Because there was some confusion at work this morning about who still needed a nap and who was going to be fully clothed during work hours, I was delighted to have lunch with my family. My little brother and his girlfriend are in town from Wyoming, so I brought them some bacon sandwiches. At my parents’ house, I found my grandmother stretched out in bed with the wool covers pulled up to her chin. She had a tear streaming down her cheek as she watched TV.
“What’s the matter?” I said, lying down beside her.
“The elephants,” she said. “They can’t find the water. It’s just agony.” She was watching the first episode of the Planet Earth documentary entitled Pole to Pole, wherein a herd of elephants treks hundreds of miles across the desert through dust storms and enemy territories in order to reach water. By the way, lately my grandmother describes everything as either bliss or agony. Bliss occurs when she gets to lie down in bed again, drink Coca-Cola, and watch soaps after a doctor’s appointment.
“It’s okay, Big Wis,” I said, “They’ll make it to the water eventually.” Her eyes stayed glued to the screen and she pulled the covers up to her nose so I could barely hear her.
“I can’t stand it,” she said. “I worry so about the animals.”
For a few days Jennifer has been collecting petitions on the Downtown Mall, advocating removal of the offensive Lewis/Clark/Sacagawea statue on West Main and Ridge. I imagine she has been attracting a lot of interest to her cause because a) She is Downtown during lunch rush; b) She has a lot of friends and supporters behind her; and c) She is wearing some kind of garish 80s prom gown and her hair is dyed crimson and purple.
Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the protesting Jennifer, my aunt Deliah was upstairs at City Hall peering through her office blinds at the scene on the mall below, going “What the fuck?” My family jokes that Deliah should start her own private detective agency because she always knows everyone’s business. The statue affair was no exception. Deliah quickly got on the ground to see what was going on. After citing the protesters for violations of city code, Deliah proceeded to grill the women on their motives. Not satisfied with their answers, Deliah decided that she should be the voice of public reason every lunch hour, dissenting against the dissenters.
Here is where Darren comes in. This afternoon D made his way downtown to get lunch as usual when he ran into his sister Jennifer in a prom dress and my aunt Deliah in her city uniform having a heated debate about Sacagawea. Before he realized what was going on, he said “Deliah, have you met my sister Jennifer? Jennifer, have you met Wistar’s aunt Deliah?” They suddenly realized that the other was not just a random crazy person on the Downtown Mall, and that they had a piece of common ground.
Did anyone bear witness to this? I want quotes.
I think this is funny because my beloved, strong-willed aunt and my boyfriend’s amazing, equally strong-willed sister, were anonymously sparring on the mall about the symbolism of a Native American woman who died 95 years ago. I think Sacagawea would have been proud of both of them.
Wistar’s nightly news:
1. My cousin Mimi just got engaged.
2. My fiction class thinks I’m gross. I took the criticism very well in the classroom tonight, but now I want to curl up and die. Sometimes words take a while to sink in. Words like “Wistar, I felt like your story was bludgeoning me.”
3. I am going to become an expert on amputation. Does anyone have a friend or relative who has had something amputated recently? I am specifically looking for information about transtibial prostheses.
4. I booked a hotel room in Williamsburg for Homecoming weekend. I hope there is more going on at W&M than the usual football game, a capella group reunions, and pancake-eating. Please come hang out with me at the back of the Green Leafe. It has been five years since graduation and my alcohol tolerance has gone way down. You might glean some slurred wisdom about what life has taught me in the intervening years about failure, suffering, and the proper way to apply makeup.
Two medical posts today.
1. Young Brooklyn doctor opens medical practice for uninsured artists. Makes housecalls on motor scooter and answers questions about your rashes on the instant messenger. I wonder how many of these conversations turn into cyber sex. “Now tell me where it’s swollen. Tell me what it feels like.” You know all those artsy types are going to be video chatting with the good doctor, showing him their engorged nipples.
PS Is the above post too graphic? I don’t even know anymore.
2. Doctors aren’t trying to torture you (or my grandmother); they actually do not perceive your pain. To save them from daily trauma brought on by over-empathizing with their patients, doctors’ brains experience detachment from their pain receptors when someone is suffering. I wonder if this works for parents who are doctors, and if this explains why my dad was always trying to staple our leg wounds together in the backyard.
I know it’s been a long time since we’ve had fresh produce in the house. Or bread. Or meat/cheese/cereal/caloric sustenance. But mostly I am finally, after many hungry months, capitulating to this grocery store visit because I am out of sugarless gum. And Christian’s Pizza is right next to Giant so before shopping I can finish a good book while I eat my gourmet slice of artichoke olive tortellini sun-dried tomato broccoli pine nut whatever. I started George Plimpton’s The Curious Case of Sidd Finch last night. It’s quirky, yes, but in an old school, charming way. It’s about a Buddhist monk who is recruited by the New York Mets for his 168 mph fastball. The book is great research for the new gig I got editing a former professor’s sports novel. I have been finding that when you ignore every loathsome personal memory you have about sports (being forced to play them in the rain, being on the losing-est team in the league, being on a team with popular bitchy girls who hate you), sports writing can be pretty entertaining.
Last night in writing workshop, Middle mentioned NanoWrimo, the National Novel Writing Month that owes much of its popularity to being fun to say. Not only can people churn out novels like robots, but they can actually sound like robots when they explain what they’re doing. “Na-no-wri-mo,” I thought. “Hehe.”
“It’s only 50,000 words in November,” Middle said. “We can even get a head-start.” Annie, a full time student at UVA, looked aghast.
“I’ll do it,” I said. “What’s the big deal?” Selvi reminded me that some people had jobs.
Middle and I smiled at each other, complicit in our marathon novel-writing plans. I imagined that the whole coffee shop was solemnly witnessing a historic event. It reminded me of last Saturday when Darren and I played soccer for the Crutchfield team, and he scored (what could be considered) the game-winning goal. I ran across the field and slapped him ten and gave him a kiss. I assumed that all the other players were watching us, thinking “Aww. Look at those lovebirds. That is so cute.” Then I heard “Hustle back, Crutchfield! Get in position! Anyone need a sub?”