My Life

Let me regale you with one such tale that occurred about a year ago. My dad, your typical straight-laced, principal type that he is has a strange obsession with the band Metallica. I really don’t understand his taste in music. It’s all, “hell yeah, biker rock” type stuff when he sits behind a desk all day and balances budgets and reprimands children. It’s beyond me. Perhaps it’s the mid-life crisis knocking on his door talking, I DON’T KNOW. When it comes to him, I live by the “Don’t ask” rule.

Anyway, he bought tickets to the Metallica (Lamb of God was also playing) concert in Oakland. Granted, I hate Oakland with a passion. Since my dad is also a cheap-ass, he makes us stay in the cheap, unsafe part of town. Not really sure if there is a “safe” part of Oakland anyway, but you get my point. The hotel we usually stay at when we’re in Oakland… someone actually got murdered in the lobby. This is the kind of hardcore shit that little white girls such as myself shouldn’t even venture into. I’d end up in a ditch if I was by myself.

So here we are, in an area that makes me visibly nervous, to go see a metal show with my parents. Sounds fun right? Oh, it was a blast. We all stuck out like sore thumbs. Luckily I had the good sense to wear my See You Next Tuesday shirt with the bloody cat on it (don’t ask), so I blended in for the most part. We get our seats. My dad is really getting into it, it was scary. And scarring. Halfway into the show, some biker dude behind us takes out some weed and starts smoking. My mom all the while is having a fit because 1. she hates that kind of music and 2. the dude is tokin’ up behind us. So she told me, and I quote, “Meghan, don’t breathe. You’ll get high.” Don’t breathe… okay, mom, I’ll get right on that. Then my dad left and was gone until the end of the show. And sorry mom, I did breathe.

Top five most awkward nights of my life.

You'd think that I would know by now to trust my gut and ignore what my heart tells me, but I guess life hasn't taught me anything yet.

If there's one thing I'm sure of, it's that I was born in a time in which I don't belong. I love an era that I was not a part of: the '60s. I wish I could've been a part of the music scene back then. Nothing like that will ever happen again.

17 Years Gone

It was December 3, at night, when it truly hit me that I would never be seventeen again. Seventeen hadn't been a significant year, no new lessons learned, no new life experiences. It had been filled with tests, school, and college applications. Certainly nothing to get weepy over. But there I was... Visibly shaken by the prospect of seventeen slipping through my fingers. Maybe it was the fact that adulthood has been knocking ever louder on the door and I'm just not completely ready to open it yet. Not quite ready to hand over my childhood for a job and responsibilities. I'm not sure if I ever will. I have a feeling eighteen will be a good year though. I can feel it. In the words of Alice Cooper, "I'm eighteen and I don´t know what I want." I hope I find out soon though.

Turkey Fatigue

After the third consecutive day of "Thanksgiving dinner", I no longer want to eat or even lay eyes on a turkey for the duration of my life. In fact, just the thought of looking at one makes me queasy. They're safe from me. I'm not going to eat another bite of that bird for quite some time. Rejoice, turkeys! One less person is out there eating your brethren. You have successfully converted me to an "anti-eating-turkey" mentality.

Father, Father

I'm more like my dad than I'd ever care to admit. We're both quiet. We're both introspective. Both excessively impatient. We have more similarities combined than I share with my mother. And yet, I'm not close to him in the least.

We used to be closer. I'm not quite sure what happened along the line that forever changed that. Ever since we made the move further up the northern Californian expanse, something happened that I can't quite put my finger on. Somewhere along the line he started working more and I started talking less. He didn't have time to kick the soccer ball in the backyard anymore and I didn't have time to bother. I was too busy being a teenager besides. Too wrapped up in my first boyfriend to care.

But now that time has come and passed and I've matured, I see clearly the veritable canyon between us. We never did talk much, but now I say maybe 10 words to him daily. And I don't have the first idea on how to go about mending it.

We're similar. So similar that I can't of anything to fix it.