How Do You Know That You Love Her?

You know that you love her...

...because she has increased your reflexes by 200% due to you being a live target when she trains for her archery competitions

...when she hesitatingly allows you to hold her as you cry at the end of sad movies

...if you were pandas and you never questioned her having just one more piece of bamboo

...when you built an actual pedestal for her to stand on and she gave you one loud clap (you found out soon afterwards that the clap was actually to turn her spotlight on)

...because even though she often spends her weekend afternoons plotting to overthrow your empire by taking it down from the inside you still appreciate her organizational skills

...if she was a lioness, you would remove that thorn from her paw even if it led to your being gravely injured (she is a lion afterall)

...because even when she seems to go out of her way to annoy you, you still would never make fun of her near-ridiculous collection of miniature farm animal figurines

...when her mood swings liken your home life to "The Killing Fields" and you still take crochet lessons with her on Wednesdays

...if although she laughs at your "dreams" of having a real job that gives you satisfaction and a sense of worth, you can't help but laugh along - damn infectious laugh!

...because she helped you build a large train set in your rec room complete with people, trees, buildings and a toll booth that she insisted had to collect $100 from you every time the train passed

...as despite your countless hours of volunteering with at-risk-youths she constantly makes fun of not only your nose, but also the nose of your father and looks stylish while doing it

...because when she beats you at Monopoly yet again she allows you to join her in the celebration

...if the quaint cabin in the woods that you spent the summer building looks amazing and she allows you to stay in the cabin for the grand opening and even though she immediately afterwards changes all of the locks, it receives only positive comments and complements from all of your friends including a begrudging one from her

...because she absolutely loves your extravagant 5-course birthday dinner you made for her even though she spends the entire dinner trying to send dishes back

...when the screenplay you wrote gets optioned for a pilot, she somehow takes all of the credit and receives all of the accolades and fame, but she does give you assistant to the associate producer credit

...if after you win a friendly tennis match with her she lets you enjoy it for a few minutes before she makes you apologize profusely

...because after a beautiful getaway weekend together she only implies that you should be questioning her motives once 

...if sales from her version of your autobiography (which was written entirely from her perspective and only makes occasional mention of you) donates a small amount of its proceeds to a charity in your name

...because her insisting that you taste all of her food to ensure no one has attempted to poison her results in you eating some really amazing food

...when your hair starts to grey at the temples, she demonstrates sympathy for you by getting a perm (it should be said that you misread most of her actions as sympathetic)

... because even after she put limits on your weekly conversation time, she did give you extended visitations with your beloved teddy bear that she confiscated

...if she decides to start playing more games with you to add more fun to the relationship - the main game being hide-n-seek where she hides really well for days at a time - (one time she came back looking like she had just been to Mardi Gras)

...when her friends "jokingly" refer to you as "the butler" or "the help" or "the pool boy" because it makes you blush

...if your horrible and insulting comedy duo performs at a local club and she allows you to take center stage at the end (coincidentally this always occurs when the audience starts pelting you with tomatoes)

...because she buys you increasingly beautiful and hairier cats for your birthday each year and you enjoy these amazingly cute animals all-the-while sneezing up a storm and buying yearly supplies of allergy medications

...when she hugs you so strongly each Monday morning leaving marks and bruises so that the hug will "last" for the whole week

When I Stop to Think Again: At the Park

It is a beautiful summer day. A light wind rustles through the trees in its futile attempt to try to convince me that it is still spring. I am strolling through the park of my youth. I spent so many hours here playing - so many memories of my childhood happened here and I am flooded with nostalgia. Today, the playground is teeming with small kids and the women who love them. Some would call the park tranquil - those people would be wrong as the screaming of the kids is pervasive (or maybe it is all relative and they lead ridiculously loud and hectic lives) . I sit down against a tree and lean back and try to get back in touch with what I have left behind. I scan my surroundings and a wry grin flashes across my face as I think.....

I think about the sand in the sandbox. Always being shaped into walls and crammed into buckets to make castles. So useful in the building of civic sand structures and all it wants to do is dance!

I think about the skinny trees with the drooping branches that kid after kid has hoisted themselves up on. The step-ladder of nature, a route to the top. The once-strong branches hang low to the ground, bent and almost broken. I know it has had a hard life, but it could have been turned into paper, so it should quit whining or I'll call my friend at the mill.

I think about the slide. So smooth, so shiny, so metallic. So unlike my aunt in at least two ways that come to mind.

I think about the monkey bars almost daring me to swing on them. I imagine them to be friends, or at least it makes me feel better if they are friends. Now I start to wonder if they are and it makes me sad.

I think about the bushes near the old clubhouse. A hideout for kids and an outhouse for dogs and often times vice versa. What has it done to deserve this?  When I walk past it, I swear I heard it whisper "please take me with you!"

I think about the old basketball hoop with the tattered net. This once proud statue has seen many a game, a contest, a battle. Tears of anguish were shed by the losers and cheers of rejoice by the winners. This majestic beacon has watched it all and is the sum of all of these grand experiences. How must it feel now as a dog urinates on it?

I think about the water fountain. I wonder if it misses the other, more elaborate ornate fountains it grew up with and hung out with at the fountain factory. While others were constructed with the finest of materials, I'm sure he endured much teasing and bullying over being so thick and concrete. And yet, he lives his life as the focal point of the park, the hub where all people gather. Whenever he remembers the name calling of his youth he just reminds himself that he is now the dispenser of the fluid of life. The years of therapy were worth it.

I think about the swing and I am sure that she is the envy of all the other equipment at the playground. Soaring into the sky, almost touching the branches of the tree, nearly flying away from it all. Everything else must see the swing as a footloose-and-fancy-free type character who is cutely oblivious to how inadequate it makes everyone else feel.

I sit on the grass on the hill. How tough it must be to band together as one! How does the greener grass on top convince the slightly shriveled and browner blades on the periphery to work together towards a common goal and become much more than the sum of its parts? Can one renegade group of grass take down the whole group? Do they all wish they led a more interesting existence like their cousins wheat and alfalfa?

I toss a shiny rock up in the air and clasp it in my hand. This is an oddly satisfying experience, except that I am fairly intimidated by its smoothness and how rubbing it and perversely enjoying the lack of imperfections reminds me of how much my back resembles the surface of the moon. 

I think about the small wading pool filled with laughing little kids and crying littler kids. I vividly remember the obscenely criminal coldness of the water. As a child I spent hours in that pool without a care in the world. I throw caution to the wind and jump in - I am recapturing my youth and I have never felt more alive nor more totally and completely numb. I can hear the pool saying "look at you with your walking and talking and ability to love, well I can make your lips turn blue and your teeth chatter - booyah!"

I think about the bench I am sitting on. All of these years together, me and the bench and I just feel so badly about how one-sided the relationship has become. I wish somehow, just once, that he could sit on me.

The rings call out to me. I look around just to make sure they are talking to me. "Come swing on us." It is a tempting proposition and I almost give in to their siren song, and then I remember what my grandfather cryptically said to me as he clipped his toenails on my 9th birthday  "never trust the rings - at first you'll just do one ring, then it will become two and the next thing you know it will be 'ring this' and 'ring that' and only a steady dose of a month of the seesaw will cure you."

I have a sneaking suspicion that I am being watched. I turn around quickly and there is no one there. No one, except for the soccer goal post. That annoying goal post acts like the judge, jury and executioner at the park. Seasons come, seasons go, and it just stands there, making me deal with my flaws one missed shot on goal at a time. I guarantee he has no real friends.

I think about the tire swing and all of the times I wish we could trade places. He'd have the nose bleeds, the rare Ancient Greek complexes, the imaginary girlfriends who always ran away to become international models and I'd be the round mound of swingtastic fun.

I think about the small, baby pine cones on the pine tree. Though now they are small, one day they may grow to become large pine cones. It's all a big scam and we all know it. They think they will be pine trees some day, but it's all a lie and we are all complicit. They are on a one way trip to nowheres-ville. Just like my aunt Frenchie.

What would my life be like if I became a fence? I could no longer play the "race" card as it would make absolutely no sense at all. Come to think of it, all card playing would most likely have to cease as would using scrapbooking techniques to make amazing invitations - mostly due to the lack of hands, but also because can you imagine a boring old fence being creative enough to design a card?1?!? Fences seem so conservative and a bit annoyed at being climbed on all the time. At best, they are like large arms hugging the park and keeping everything safe and warm and at worse, they are instruments of "the man" trying to oppress us all. The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle.

I think about the abandoned young toddler's shoe. How it must feel? Does it miss it's twin? Did the foot complete it? Will it still be here in a few thousand years as sole proof that humanity once trod here? Will the aliens think we were one-legged beings with a sole tiny foot? Or possibly they will think that we were a race of gigantic shoe-like creatures with this being a fossilized baby?

I think about the dandelions. Not too sure what to think about them except how beautiful they are and how we should all pray before them and repeat after them "all hail our new leaders, our saviours, our  Gods in flowery weed form". What was I saying? I sort of dazed off for a second...oh yeah, dandelions... I think I read somewhere that dandelions may look innocent but there is a myth that they are exceptionally good at hypnosis and mind control and selling insurance.

It's Complicated

You suck because you do (I'd say I'm sorry, but it's not my fault).

You don't suck because you are so kind. Just last week you showed up out of the blue and clipped the librarians in-grown toenail.

You suck because you insist on being the funniest person at your Friday night poker games. When others are funnier (you usually take informal polls) you ask them politely to leave or start insulting their grandmothers. This got really awkward when George coincidentally brought along his grandmother one night and she took offense and berated you until you gave in and made nachos.

You don't suck because you recycle. This is mostly a good thing, except when you recycle with too much attitude. That ruffles the feathers of your neighbours - especially the one who collects rare bird feathers from around the world and specifically when you tried to recycle those feathers.

You suck because when you volunteered to teach under-privileged youths basketball you took it way too seriously and conducted practices more like a drill sergeant. Yes, the kids learned a lot of basketball and life skills, but were all of the 5am practices in the pouring rain and meetings with Freudian-trained sports psychologists who tried to analyze their dreams in order to help them sink more free throws while undergoing extreme heckling really necessary for these 6 and 7 year old kids especially considering there were no games against other opponents and most would rather have been playing hopscotch.

You don't suck because you often stand on the street corner and give random hugs to passersby who seem down in the dumps. True most people are scared of you and there have been a number of taser-incidents and multiple restraining orders, but once one of your hugs saved a life - yours.

You suck because you borrowed a cup of sugar from your next door neighbour every Saturday for a year under the guise of making sugar cookies for your nieces only as part of a sugar-focused pyramid scheme that was used as a front to make yourself rich and keep others like your gullible and too-loose-with-sugar neighbour down.

You don't suck because you "rescued" a monkey from the zoo (some less enlightened people want to call it stealing) by dressing up as a bunch of bananas. You repainted and redecorated your entire house to look like a jungle so the monkey would feel at home. There was an adjustment period - feces were hurled, lamps were broken, but in time the monkey fit in so well, too well, that when your landlord had to take sides in a tenant disagreement, he sided with the monkey and gave you one month's notice. 

You suck because when you wanted to break up with your hyper-controlling girlfriend (when you agreed to her exact plans for the long weekend, she still got angry because she wanted to agree for you) you were slightly too elaborate. In the winter you got rid of your hot tub and your backyard vegetable patch. In the spring you wanted to plant tree saplings in your backyard to spell the words "I'm sorry, I don't love you anymore. Now, before you get angry - you are still amazing - don't hurt me, I just need to move on. I hope you understand." but the store ran out of saplings, so you just said "No mas!". The next few months were a blur - you took helicopter lessons, helped her overcome vertigo, and surprised her for her birthday with a personal helicopter ride that included a romantic picnic lunch in a vineyard overlooking the lake and finally circled over your property and lent her your binoculars so she could see that it was over.

You don't suck because you made an incredible meal for a best friend's birthday party entirely from scratch. You started by growing the tomatoes, onions, garlic and basil for the sauce. You went out to buy some actual durum wheat and spent time milling it into semolina to make the pasta. This also involved buying a hen and caring for it like your own child, until it produced some eggs (a few broke because you decided to juggle them). You cold-pressed your own olive oil and bought a goat, that you learned to milk and made your own feta cheese. The salad was easy, except the process of making your own vinegar (thankfully, you had coincidentally started this a few years ago on a dare from your father, who had a very negative view of your vinegar-making abilities). The meal was incredible and was a true example of your love for your friend, but it was served 6 months late and only sort of made up for the frustration and boredom due to the wait. All were glad they didn't decide to draw straws and start eating each other.

You suck because you are always flaunting your intelligence. You always know all the answers, the right place to go, the correct thing to do - you never make mistakes and you let everyone know this all the time. These traits, annoying as they may be, could be overlooked if you didn't also have impeccably straight and white teeth.

You don't suck because you took the lead in rebuilding your uncle's house after the big storm. The only problem being that you decided not to use any doors in the new design. This interesting avant-garde choice was made worse when we all decided to follow your decision to build the house from the inside. After the final nail was hammered, we all looked around and noticed there were no doors. The house was beautiful and it was so amazing of you to help your uncle, but we stayed trapped inside that house for 3 weeks forced to live off crackers and dried cherries.

You suck because you wrapped Jim's entire house with his stock of toilet paper everyday for a month only stopping when his gastroenterologist pleaded with you to put an end to the madness.

You don't suck because you saved an injured chicken who was laying by the side of the road. You spent months rehabilitating its broken wing, nursing it back to health, trying to give it flying lessons as you don't believe in giving in to disabilities. This only ended when he read your journal and surmised, correctly, that you were only in it for the eggs.

You suck because you drove around town and bought all of the spoons.

You don't suck because after watching a particularly moving documentary about a hill tribe in Cambodia you flew halfway across the world and helped them build a school and comprehensively taught the children English. You broke into tears when the thank you letter arrived in the mail a few weeks later. It was beautifully written and so rewarding an end to the whole experience. The tears were mostly due to the fact that they not only spelled 'paradoxical' incorrectly but also mixed up the present continuous and present perfect verb tenses throughout. You fought the urge to call the whole thing a waste of time.

You suck because the one time people wanted you to suck you didn't. Your mom got stung by a jellyfish while swimming off the coast of Thailand. All you had to do was suck out the poison or urinate on the sting. You were too busy doing your sudoku.

You don't suck because you bought a trampoline and allowed the kids of the neighbourhood to come over and use it no charge. After a full afternoon of bouncing and laughing, the kids would sit around the old oak tree while you amused them with stories from your youth. Day would turn to night and many a marshmallow was roasted and cup of lemonade was drank. These days were ones to be enjoyed and remembered. Until one kid forgot to say thanks a third time and you proceeded to break the trampoline in front of all of those crying kids. 

You suck because once you decided to climb a mountain and would only come down if your bagel was perfectly toasted.

You don't suck because you are a lover of fine wine, a cuddler of cute animals, a singer of superior arias and a wearer of fine silk. But, your refusal to raise your hand before speaking earned you garbage duty for a week.

You suck because you laugh when you should cry, yell when you should whisper, do the hustle when you should disco, run when you should walk and roll over when you should sit.

You don't suck because you are me, and I rock!

A World With No Belts

He loves both slow, romantic, moon-lit strolls on the beach and sprinting, wildly down the beach frothing at the mouth like a rabid dog.

She prefers folding and unfolding all of the linen in the house on a daily basis, though she is considering reducing this to a weekly activity so she can fit in more first-person shooter games.

He needs to drink five cups of tea every morning or else he is a monster to deal with at work; a big furry, cuddly monster who is one huge hairy ball of cuteness. 

She dreams of a world with no belts.

He washes his car every Sunday using long, rhythmic, powerful strokes. It is awe-inspiring and stunning to behold. He could have been an incredible tennis player or possibly a world famous artist, which explains why he weeps uncontrollably while he washes.

She fries egg after egg after egg often as many as 12 a day and then spends the time afterwards rating and comparing them using a complex 15-item, 10-point scale she developed in her search for perfection. Subconsciously she is just trying to please her father.

He sits in his chair, drumming his fingers, furling and unfurling his brow,  ritualistically breathing in and out, clearing his throat, suppressing the desire to scream and plotting his next move. No wonder he hasn't been able to either find a willing opponent nor finish a game of checkers in years.

She often goes for walks in the forest, trying to get away from the hustle and bustle of her life, imagining herself with comically large, bushy eye brows.

He can rattle off lyrics of rare country and western songs which bothers his group of heavy-metal loving classmates in his Friday afternoon pottery class.

She loves brushing and styling her hair. She will often allow her hair to become so tangled and stringy that she has to literally attack it with every brush, comb and conditioner that she owns. When she finally styles it perfectly, she rises slowly from her chair, brush held above her head triumphantly, sweat dripping from her face, her arch-enemy vanquished once again, she then falls to her knees and starts slowly allowing her hair to become knotted and tangled once again.

He sits alone in the dark waiting for the others to sit with him.

She once wrapped herself entirely in slices of cheese and ate herself out. This gave her a sense of accomplishment unlike any she had felt before (although similar to when she wrapped herself in cured meats) and also a really yucky tummy.

He rehearsed his routine for days, perfecting each step, reminding himself to smile with his eyes, carrying himself like a champion, waiting for the spotlight that never came. Then he remembered the community theatre never purchased a spotlight, opting for a new espresso machine instead which immediately broke. He stood backstage punching the wall, angry at his missed opportunity and the fact he would never have another incredible espresso from that machine again. 

She daydreams of fantastic backyard parties - everybody is invited - the ladies from the office, her dentist, the guy who delivers her newspaper, her sister. She is always on the other side of the gate, watching the fun, hoping to be let in, wondering why they needed to use four different locks to keep her out and bewildered by how they procured her yard without her permission.

He eats with his eyes and sees with his mouth. This makes even the most boring dinner REALLY exciting and socially awkward.

She only draws pictures of rainbows - she just loves them so much. Except for the red part, that just makes her so jealous.

He goes for long runs in the evenings - the rush of wind in his hair, the time to think, the sheer amount of goosebumps. To battle the boredom, he only listens to audiotapes of his German teacher from his youth loudly and abruptly clearing her throat.

She loves knitting. So much so that she has learned to make scarfs and legwarmers. Then she decided to knit a long poncho that she wore all the time. Due to the comfort and the aesthetics, she spent one crazy weekend drinking pot after pot of Earl Grey tea and knitting. The end result was a large quilt that covered everything in her apartment. It was so beautiful, but it was hard to tell where the poncho ended and the wall and floor coverings began.

He has decided to eat more things in sauce-form.

She called her favourite radio show in an attempt to win a contest. Unfortunately she was so nervous she could only let out a series of beeps and clicks. Later that evening she had a knock on her door and there was a large gathering of men with horn-rimmed glasses and pocket protectors trying to do her taxes.

He smiles.

She yawns.