Pictures Of You

It was a little after one in the afternoon on a sunny saturday and my kids were playing chicken in the pool. My two youngest daughters were on the shoulders on their oldest sister and her friend who is a boy.

The moment seemed innocuous but with the sunlight showing their smiles, the teenagers actually paying attention to the younger ones, and my phone in my hand tweeting about some ballgame, I felt compelled to snap a photo. What I beyond the smiles was the candidness of everyone involved. My daughters and their friend had no clue I was shooting a picture. The sincerity of the moment meant everything. Its photographs like that one that I find the most interesting.

I’m the least photogenic person I know. The camera not only adds ten pounds with me, but also 10 aging lines in my face, and exposing every flaw in I possess. When I started on social media in 2006, MySpace, I shuddered at having to put pictures online. We’re all judgemental. I saw the duckfaces, overly planned poses, and the wannabe models advertising their “best” look. I’ve taken maybe three good pictures in my life. At the time, I couldn’t track down my high school football photo so I tried the most cheesy “superhero” pose I could muster.

I’m envious of the gorgeous candid shots of people I see on twitter profiles, the Facebook albums, and blogs. I wish I could hire Annie Leibowitz to follow me around and wait for me to eat a cheeseburger in the sexiest fashion and shoot it for posterity.

This is one of my favorite pictures my family has ever taken.

There’s a lot going on here. It seems that me, my oldest daughter, Tay, and her mom, the Bobina are in crisis. Everyone appears miserable. The truth? This was us in a nutshell. Sixty seconds earlier we were happy, laughing, and enjoying a birthday party. Then, Tay, only 13 at the time because this picture is 3 years old, got into a small tiff with her mother and I over something ridiculous. Life with a teenage girl is like that. Her mom is flustered, I’m trying to avoid eye contact until the mood lifts and Tay is likely plotting her escape. Thirty seconds after the snapshot we were happy and laughing again. This picture is perfectly authentic. It was a moment in time and brutally honest. Here’s another favorite, again, about 3 years ago, when the girls walked into the ocean together unannounced. This one screams something.

If The Twitter and The Facebook really wanted to be interesting, they’d require that 90 percent of all photos posted be natural and poses be damned. We’d really get to know each other, then, wouldn’t we?

Now, if you can excuse me, I have to get my daily minumum low-level social media stalking in before bed.

Toady’s song was easy. I almost when with Elliot Smith’s Pictures of Me but since only six of you know who he is, I decided to play The Cure’s Pictures of You.

Woman

Your vow isn’t I do, it’s I am. You conquer me with a daily battle cry to be a superior lover, friend, and mother to our children. Woman, I’m awed by your allure.

****blogger’s note****

My wife, The Bobina,  refuses to let me buy her a mother’s day card, so I wrote this instead. It isn’t gross or too much information so you all should be big boys and girls and get through it. I love you Bobina.

It’s only 33 words because today is trifextra day – http://www.trifectawritingchallenge.com/2012/05/trifecta-week-twenty-six.html If I don’t talk to you all tomorrow, werd to you and your mothers. This song rocks and its fitting to my bad ass wife. Break out your air guitars and have a good time. Here’s Wolfmother’s Woman -

The Chemicals Between Us

It’s not you, it’s me. No, really, it’s always me.

I have a mental illness and today, for a brief moment, it almost killed me.

The sun was high, hard, and hot. The good fortune my wife was eager to share with my teenaged daughter and I wasn’t appealing to me. She found a new used car that the family could afford, and she wanted me to be happy. I couldn’t even fake a smile. My crazy was kicking my happy’s ass.

I don’t have the first frigging clue what kind of tree I would be, but Edvard Munch’s Scream is the painting I’d claim relation.

The distorted view, the sky, my appearance, and how I think the world sees me is so crushing because anxiety overwhelms me. My social anxiety disorder and the panic attacks that accompany it are almost crippling. I’m paranoid that the people who say they love me, really don’t. I’ll write something, go to put it my google document for my friends to read and edit, then break down and shake with fear that they’ll hate my art, and not respect me.

Life moves fast for me. If you let me be me, I can complete a two-hundred dollar grocery store trip in less time than Domino’s can deliver  a pizza.. The main reason I like punk, power-pop, and hard rock songs so much is they rarely last longer than three minutes. The problem with being in such a hurry, and being in such a flurry, is I suck at the details of life. Have you read my writing? The ideas are there. There’s structure and style. But I can’t edit. It’s too time consuming. Hit publish and let the talent speak, my anxiety-ridden mind thinks. At least I’m honest. I’ll take crazy truth over anything.

I watched my wife experience satisfaction at being over our financial hardships of the past six months. She finally had enough money available to get a second family car that was safe to drive. My teenager was smiling and talking about being excited to drive the car, too. But I was sullen, disconnected, and anxious to be anywhere but with them. The pills weren’t working because they were new. The chemicals running through me weren’t balanced, yet. My mind was racing, my hands sweated, I couldn’t stop thinking about the writing I wasn’t getting done. I walked toward the road and thought, just for a second or two, would these beautiful women be better off without me. I found something inside of me. It was a peaceful place.  I turned, smiled at my wife and sixteen-year-old daughter and declared, “this is your new car, baby. We’ll come back tomorrow when they’re open and work out the details”. Their dirty blond manes danced around their warm, expressive faces. I leaned against a car on the lot, and muttered to myself “kiss my ass anxiety, I beat you this time.” Of course, there’s tomorrow to tackle, and that damn google document with Helene Troy’s chapters.

****blogger’s note****

This guitar riff is what my mind is like on days like today. These lyrics are pretty much what I’ve been experiencing with my family the past few days. Thank God, they love me so much. Today’s song is from Bush. Here’s The Chemicals Between Us.

She’s A Beauty

I walked by and saw her cavorting with vampires. She’s compelled by their beauty, both male and female. I roll my eyes and walked into the other room. Her legs spreading out on the couch makes my face light up. Her painted pink toes are wiggling as she’s connected to the stories intensely. After I’ve walked away, I hear her sexy laugh. A dog, a cat, and a brightened kitchen greet me in yellow sunlight. Distracted by pets on one leg and another leg, I turned and saw bright lights flicker continously. Pretty witches populated the television. My wife’s tastes are scary.

Welcome to the first edition of Mad Libs with Write on Edge!All you need to do for now is make a list of 30 words, per the part of speech list below.

1) noun
2) noun
3) noun
4) noun
5) -ing verb
6) noun
7) -ing verb
8 ) body part (plural)
9) -ing verb
10) body part
11) adjective
12) noun
13) adjective
14) -ed verb
15) adverb
16) -ed verb
17) adjective
18) noun
19) noun
20) noun
21) adjective
22) -ed verb
23) noun
24) noun
25) -ed verb
26) adjective
27) verb
28) adverb
29) adjective
30) verb

This is an April Fool’s Day writing exercise from my friends at http://writeonedge.com/2012/04/mad-libs-with-write-on-edge/ . I got home from the gym and wrote the first thirty words that surrounded me as my wife watched her favorite vampire and witches television shows.

Today’s song is what I listened to on my way home. It applies to my wife. It was her birthday yesterday. She deserves her own writing excercise. Here’s The Tubes, She’s a Beauty.

 

Brokenhearted

It’s happened. For the past four years, I’ve swam against the tide. Yesterday I felt myself drowning in the waves of reality. I’m a grown-up.

I try very hard to relate to my three daughters. I don’t immediately think their tastes and styles are dumb or odd. They are, but I always give them the benefit of the doubt. When I’m in the car with them I let them listen to their own music. This means the three major pop stations in Atlanta get plenty of work while we’re driving. Every once in a while one of their songs will bleed through my music snobbery thickened ear drums and I’ll think, “hmmm this isn’t the worst thing I’ve ever heard.” I’ve played Moves Like Jagger and Stereo Hearts in blog posts. My teenage daughter and I have a weird mutual admiration of Maroon 5, although Adam Levine’s twitter account dooshery has made me rethink my participation. But yesterday I realized my machinations have been for naught. I’m older. They’re younger. It’s time to give up the dream.

A few days ago, my sixteen-year-old was in a bad mood. I called it Thursday. In trying to cheer her up, I actually said.

“Baby, what do you think of Karmin’s Brokenhearted? That guitar riff’s decent and I don’t want to punch the radio when it comes on..”

Her blue eyes sparkled, her mouth formed what might look like a smile if the Mona Lisa was being tickled, and she caught herself agreeing with me.

“Ummm, yeah, well, maybe. It’s okay I guess. I gotta go upstairs.”

I claimed victory and threw out my shoulder patting myself on the back. I even went as far as tweeting and the facebooking the song, asking my alleged friends and followers if it was okay to like the song. The resounding response was “you’re trying too hard, fool.”  I didn’t heed the advice.

Yesterday, while driving with my teenager and my wife, a song came on the radio and I didn’t recognize anyone involved. The DJ said “here’s David Guetta with, (the name of the song).” Then a woman’s voice “sang” the first “verse”. The music was terrible. The voice was female. It didn’t sound like a David, and I’m very open minded. I asked my wife.

“Who is this? The voice sounds female and vaguely familiar.”

My wife was equally clueless and my teenager, exasperated, announced.

“The DJ in the song is David Guetta. The singer is Nicki Minaj. The DJ does all the work so he gets credit.”

 I was “this close” to telling my kid how dumb that sounded. A DJ being credited with the song. Minaj was singing, all he did was turn tables and push buttons! Then it hit me. This is her time. This is her music. David Guetta, Nicky Minaj and Karmin are her Prince, Madonna, and Def Leppard (the artists on the radio when I was sixteen).

This sobering experience produced a mourning time for me. This will take a while to get over. I’m not cool. I’m not hip. I’m not going to relate to my teenager or her sisters for many years. When they start filing their own taxes, applying for home loans or looking for deals on gas grills, I’ll be available for them. I’m brokenhearted.

I stand by my claim that the guitar riff’s not bad and this song is catchy. Plus, they’re actually singing live on SNL. Here’s Karmin’s Brokenhearted.

 

Dream

I know you won’t believe anything in this post, but I don’t care. Few places or people on the internet will tell you their dreams, their real dreams, not pipe dreams or day dreams, but the crap that happens during REM sleep. Some of what I’m going to tell you will freak you out. It will confirm what you already thought of me. I’m remarkably weird and thoroughly complicated. So here we go.

I remember most of my dreams, in color, with full storylines, and they’re soundtracked.

Last night, for what seemed like hours on top of other hours, I dreamed that my wife worked for the President, was always away, and I was convinced she was having an affair with one of the President’s top aides. There were plot devices, double mcguffins, and a moment where I removed myself from the storyline to talk to myself about my paranoia. All the while two songs were playing, “3 Strange Days” by School of Fish and Forest for the Trees “Dream.

In my dream there was no proof The Bobina was doing anything wrong. The dream was exclusively about my insecurities as a husband, father, son, and friend. I listened to those two songs numerous times before I went to sleep, while researching two political posts ideas for my Friday column for http://www.sprocketink.com and pondering my wife working several hours late Friday night. So, seeds were planted.

The last of what I can completely recall of this dream played out over the lat lines of the Forest Through The Trees’ Dream song

Stretch it out, don’t doubt the amount
my brain is caught
I’m just blessed
Trip hoppin’, so I flow like a stream
It’s just a dream

I woke up and kissed my wife. She just rolled her eyes and went back to sleep.

*****blogger’s note****

My friend Mollie from http://mollieisokinuk.blogspot.com/  and @MollieisOkinUk ‘s husband wrote a cool post about the perfect meatball and that led Mollie to challenge me with Use Forest for the Trees’ “Dream” as a personal post. Then, things got weird.

Forest For The Trees – Dream

Dixie Chicken

My wife’s a witch. Please, allow me to explain. The Bobina has powers. I’ve never seen a wand. Her boiling cauldrons in the kitchen usually contain turkey chili or chicken marsala. She’s a trained chef. Yet, no matter how self-assured and strong-willed I am, she knows how to get her way with me. Saturday, I was in a nail salon for over an hour. Seriously.

In May, the love of my life, Deana, also known by her nickname, Bobina, and I will have known each other 4 years. I like to tell people she stalked me through mutual friends and Al Gore’s internets, but the truth is we were, somewhat dysfunctionally, destined to be together http://lancemyblogcanbeatupyourblog.wordpress.com/2011/05/14/two-blondes-in-a-bar/ 

It didn’t take long for Bobina to show her mind altering skills. During our first argument, about two months into dating, I tried to use my educated debate techniques. I hammered home three points. I used that college professorial voice and condescending attitude. Mid-sentence, while trying to expose her illogical points, she uttered.

 ”owww huhssssssh aw that! uuuu knowuh wut I mayeeeent!”

When The Bobina speaks, it sounds like maple syrup having a passionate love affair with deep fried pancakes topped with confectionary sugar. You melt. I’ve seen the woman use her blonde, sweet, deep southern charm on our 3 daughters, cashiers at Target, and TSA agents at a Mexican airport. She smuggled in candles, vanilla , and six political prisoners from Cancun. It was amazing.

That moment in our first argument helped me gain an appreciation for the southern accent I ran away from during my teens and twenties growing up in the Atlanta, Georgia suburbs. She’s made me proud of our dialect. Of course, the fact I get to kiss the mouth that speaks those rebel words makes me biased but still, it’s impossible to argue with her.

She says yaw instead of ya’ll, kuhler instead of color and thayt thang o’er theyer instead of whatever English is supposed to substitute. Mostly, when she’s mad at me, she makes Tahhhmuhs Layunince Buhrrrrsuuuunnnn sound sexy through 47 syllables. I immediately confess to being the man on the grassy noll and singing Milli Vanilli’s songs for them in 1989.

It’s her supernatural powers of speech and persuasion that make me glad I went ahead and put a rang (her word) on it.

Here’s some of The Bobina:

 

*****blogger’s note****

RemembeRED: Colloquialisms and Dialect 

It never fails to shock me when my sons speak with a regional Southern Maryland dialect “Mahm! I need some wah-durr.”

It leads me back to a tidbit from my linguistics class: a trained linguist can determine, just from listening to one’s speech, the birthplace of the speaker within thirty miles.

So, in the spirit of dialect, slang, and turns of phrase, this week’s RemembeRED prompt is: Write a piece of creative non-fiction in which turns of phrase, dialect, slang, or colloquialisms feature prominently.

Let’s keep it to 400 words.

Today’s song is a southern rock n roll classic. If you live where I do, it’s like a church hymn. If you ever have a chance to be with a  Dixie Chicken aka Southern Belle, do so. Here’s Little Feat’s Dixie Chicken…

Running With The Devil

If you ever want to quote or attribute anything to my name, use this:

Screw cleanliness. Self awareness is next to Godliness.

Love is a lot of things. One thing it is, that people rarely talk about, is compromising your principles for harmony. I’m coming up on four years with the loves of my life, my wife, the Bobina, and my two of my three daughters,, 16-year-old Tay, and 7-year-old Goose. Before they came along, my middle daughter, now 8-year-old Bug, and I had an odd bi-weekly habit. I’d take her to, what I call the main ring of Hell, the Mall of Georgia. I’d let her “ride the ponies” (carousel) and play on the playground. Then we’d buy a couple of cookies (oatmeal raisin for me, whatever she wanted for her) and call it a good 2 hours. I did it for her. I loved her so much that I sucked up my disgust for crass consumerism and unnecssary crowds. I’d pop a couple of  extra pills and we’d have a good time.

I know my faults. There are many. Mostly, I have a low tolerance for nonsense. As opened-minded as I think I am, I have serious deals with music and other forms of pop culture snobbery. When I first met my wife, my myspace (remember that social media before it became a crack den?) “handle” was “Lance, Music Snob”. I made fun of other people’s music. Thinking back, I wanted to punch me too.

Saturday, I found my version of The Holy Grail. In the mall of georgia courtyard is a small store called The Rock Shop. http://www.facebook.com/rockshopmusic?sk=wall Inside are vintage t-shirts, posters, and DVDs of some of my favorite punk and rock bands like The Ramones, The Misfits, Alice in Chains, Iron Maiden, The Clash, and many more. While I contemplated spending 20 bucks I didn’t really have on getting a 1992 Alice in Chains concert tee, the proprieter, a well tattooed dude about my age, chatted up a weird guy who was thumbing through Van Halen merchandise. My hands were on the t-shirt, I felt my debit card in my ripped blue jeans pocket when the bomb dropped.

Shop owner: ” you know, Van Halen is back on tour and has a new CD coming out. I can pre-order it for you.”

Weird guy: “Yeah, I’m excited but I’m also disappointed. Sammy Hagar’s not involved. I mean I like David Lee Roth but the band was so much tighter with Sammy.”

My fists clenched and my temples throbbed. Diamond Dave is Van Halen, you giant jackass! ….I said it under my breath.

I realized that I really had changed. My wife and kids have mellowed me and given me perspective. Four years ago, I would have yelled at the weird guy, gotten thrown out of a great new place, and wasted an opportunity to look forward to the mall with the women I love. My wife called me at the exact moment the conversation happened inside the rock shop. It was like she knew something was going down. I walked out and started breathing normally again.

Yesterday, for the sake of this blog, I compromised another principle. I suppressed my deep dislike for The Facebook and re-opened my idle account after two years burning up the internets with twitter and this blog. http://www.facebook.com/lance.burson &  http://www.facebook.com/lance.burson?sk=info&edit=1#!/pages/My-Blog-Can-Beat-Up-Your-Blog/339720439382777?sk=wall 

I’m enjoying the new avenues to talk to friends, family, and fellow writers. If I see Nickelback or Van Hagar mentioned positively in a status or post I’ll ignore it or maybe go to the gym and hit a speed bag.

I’ve dealt with my Devil. Now, like Diamond Dave’s Van Halen, in 1978, I’m just running with it.

All The Small Things

If “the devil is in the details” then I’m possessed by a demon that laughs at exorcism. I joke about me being part robot. I often say that I can get more out of a 24 day than most people get out of a month. The truth is, I accomplish the big things – my family is provided for, I have a career, this blog is never neglected – but I ignore or mismanage the smaller things in life that leave me feeling freakishly worried.

Most of the negativity in my life is my fault. Yesterday, while exchanging Happy New Year pleasantries with my writer friends, one of them, the excellent poet Marian – http://www.runawaysentence.com, said something to me that felt like a cold shower on my face after an all night New Year’s Eve drunken bender.

“You aren’t the best when it comes to spelling. It took a long time for me to read and comment you regularly because of the typos and small mistakes. They add up, you know.”

Marian is great to me. She’s a brilliant writer with a terrific sense of humor who treats me like a member of her family. Her comment was in the middle of a paragraph of nice. The way my brain works allows for most of the positive to be drowned by the tiniest of negative. I appreciate her pointing this out. It led to a blog post.

As I fine tooth comb the novel I wrote last year, in hope of getting it published, I’m confident in the big parts  – story, characters, style – the book is far from being ready to be read because of the errors in punctuation, spelling, adverb excess, and sentence fragments. How many times have you read a book, watched a television show or listened to a CD and said to yourself “you, know, this would be better if they’d corrected this or paid attention to that”?

The devil is in the details in my life. Age is wrecking my memory, eyesight, and organizational skills. Unless I have a list, don’t send me to the grocery story. My children are known as “that one”, “what’s her name”, and “hey you”. My wife has a nickname, Bobina, that has 4 variations, yet, I will point and say “hey, whatever”. This all leads to bad habits that can crush creativity and efficiency. This isn’t good for a husband, father, communications project manager, and aspiring novelist.

I realize it’s sunday and writing about the devil seems inappropriate, but I’m weird and metaphors are hella wicked awesome.

As you peruse the internet today and read about people pledging to lose weight, be better with their finances, and cut down on their social media, do me a favor and ask yourself, “if these maroons threw holy water on their bad habits, would their devil scram?” Pat yourself on the back for using the words maroon and scram, and come back here. I’m not promising anything but I will write a lot, and try to be better.

Happy New Year. Delve into Twelve.

Today’s song is from Blink 182. I’m not the biggest fan of the power pop not very punks but this song reps what I’m talking about. Also, it will get you going so you can defeat the devil in your details. Here’s All The Small Things….

2000 Light Years

Today was supposed to be the day my life changed forever. I made plans to meet up with the woman my wife approved of me seeing on the side, my novel. Three weeks ago, just after Nanowrimo ended, I completed the ending to the book I’ve been writing, rewriting, and editing since February. You can find parts of it, on this blog, under the page heading “Crazy Robot Stories”. There’s about thirty thousand words there for you to peruse. I hit the 50 thousand word requirement to “win” Nanowrimo, about a week early, then over the following two weeks wrote another 33 thousand words and produced a manuscript. My friends, fellow writers, told me to put it away for a while, and start anew after Christmas. So I did.

Today’s the day after Santy Claus. I had planned to break open files and start nipping and tucking Caleb, Breann, and the evil Ava. Then life happened. Again. My wife had to work. My mother in law is ill. That left me working from home and hanging with my middle child, 8 year old “Bug”. Bug is more of a boy than actual boys here age. By noon, when we met her mom for lunch and to buy a discount Christmas tree (our poor skinny meth addict looking one is being kicked out of the house tomorrow), Bug and I had a nerf gun battle, run errands, and watched at the first three episodes of the new show Austin and Ally.

I’m looking at my mistress, now. She’s better looking than I thought, three weeks ago. Her beginning is tight and her ending is delightfully complex. I’m staring at characters that interest more than most real people I’ve ever encountered. Yet, the amount of editing is staggering. I need time with my other woman.

A little while I go I took Bug to my favorite used record store. I found some old Green Day, then two minutes later, Bug announces “i’ve got to go to the bathroom and there’s one in this dumb place.” So much for musical inspiration for writing today.

The frontline women in my life are prioritied. My wife gets off from work in 30 minutes. My 7 year old daughter gets back home from her other family in less than an hour. Bug just bounded downstairs begging me to inspect her room. She organized her room to accomodate a new desk and other stuff. That means I have to end this post.

The important parts of this check-in is; I’ve finished the first draft of my novel and you aren’t being bored with an end of the year look back or a meaningless list of something. I can’t wait to show you what I’ve accomplished.

Now, Bug and I have to get in some one-on-one nerf basketball.

Today’s song is from Green Day with they were awesome snot-nosed punks from Berkeley, California. From 1992 loud  Kerplunk record, here’s 2000 Light Years Away. It’s a metaphor for my girlfriend, the book.