Banjo Man went on a road trip without me yesterday.
That was a little sad for me, because instead of sitting in the heated passenger seat and giving directions while drinking coffee and punching out songs from the I-pod, I stayed home, at my desk, to work.
I don’t like to stay home and work.
This is the very last time.
Banjo Man bought himself a brand new 2015 large-print road map. He doesn’t trust my Garmin GPS device, especially not after the Road Through Chicago Debacle of last October, when I trusted the GPS directions and Banjo Man woke up from his nap to discover we were driving to O’Hare airport.
He didn’t even want the Garmin in the car. He dumped it on a chair in the workroom before he left. I’ll rescue it for June, though. Because when it works I love it.
I know I can find Idaho in here somewhere.
He called to say he’d arrived safely, but reluctantly admitted he’d passed two exits before realizing he’d missed his turn.
See? He needed me to scream, “Here! Turn here! I told you, TURN HERE!!!!”
Retired Mountain Man sent an email last week with this video.
3000 miles away, in the midst of a record-breaking historic winter misery, I was inspired.
So I put the ice clamps on my boots and braved the light snow that would turn into 6″ by the time it was over, I went to the grocery store and bought some daffodil stalks.
Yes, stalks. Only two were maybe a tiny bit open, showing just a peek of yellow.
Wow! Banjo Man and I were on the edge of our seats–our big comfy seats on the big comfy couch, that is–watching this movie last night.
This is one of those movies where you DO NOT KNOW what is going to happen next.
You may think it’s going to be one of those “genius kid drummer meets mean-but-means-well teacher”, but it’s not.
We have some flawed characters here, people. And an absolutely perfect screenplay. Start to finish, this is one really good movie.
You don’t have to be a musician to like this movie. You don’t have to be a teacher, though I would like to watch it with a teacher and see his/her reaction. You don’t have to be a cocky and scared 19 year old boy. You don’t even have to like drums. Or jazz.
But if you’ve ever wondered how some people are the best at what they do, and what it takes to be “great”, then you’re gonna love this.
My father spent his winters looking for “good ice”. He loved to play hockey, loved to be on ice skates, and enjoyed hauling us from pond to pond in his quest for “good ice”. He would come home from work and announce that he’d driven by such-and-such pond and he’d seen people skating on it and…off we’d go. Nothing would make my father stop a car faster than seeing people ice skating.
I still look for good ice, out of habit, gawking out the car window to see if various local ponds have frozen over. Good ice is a pond that has frozen like glass, does not have frozen ripples from the wind or snow melted into it destroying the surface, and is not covered with a ton of snow. Though some snow is not an issue, if it is covering good ice. A couple of snow shovels and some boys who want to play hockey can clean off a large section of ice in no time.
Sometimes my father would try out a local outdoor rink, but those places were usually too crowded. He preferred the local ponds or the rivers surrounded by woods and out of the wind. While he and my brother and the neighborhood kids played hockey, I practiced my Peggy Fleming moves and attempted to dance to the music in my head. I was skinny and quiet and I loved to skate. He would always skate with me, too. Arm and arm we’d go for a dance around the pond, with him singing happily to give us a beat to follow. There might be a fire and the roasting of hot dogs, too, if it was a weekend day and the ice was so good that no one wanted to go home until dark.
When I was in high school, the popular boys would call our house on Sunday morning and ask to speak to my father. They knew who to call when they found “good ice” somewhere and wanted a pick up hockey game.
But there is good ice and bad ice and as you see from the photo, nothing is going to skate on here except our car and the UPS truck.
General Tso’s Chicken and fried pork dumplings from Golden Chopstix.
This morning I am counting the hours until I can eat Chinese leftovers for lunch. I was up at 4:30 AM, staring into the refrigerator and wondering if I could last for 7 hours.
I can. I will. I am strong.
Sort of.
Yesterday we drove twenty minutes south to the new Michael’s, because I had a double coupon for framing. Banjo Man and I went through our piles of photographs and art and posters and memorabilia and picked out four things to have framed.
Two were gifts of poems by Idaho poet Paul Croy.
Illustration by David Kendall.
He was a dear, sweet man who was loved and respected by everyone who knew him. We bought a wood cook stove from him in the 1970’s and he made us huckleberry pancakes.
That wood cook stove was stolen from our cabin and I am still beyond angry over that.
So we were very particular as to how we wanted these framed. I think they’ll be beautiful. I’m excited.
To read one of his books of poetry, Old Blazes, click HERE.
Then Banjo Man wanted to go out for Chinese and I wanted to order take-out and go home to the cozy living room and the Big Couch. I won. But my phone battery was dead. Banjo Man had a little bit of life in his, so we managed to order our food after 6 aborted dialing attempts.
We are not good with cell phones.
I don’t think we’re going to get any better, either. Banjo Man explained how he’d read an article about Apple Pay and that it was going to be “the future” of commerce, due mostly to the fact that it couldn’t be hacked.
I asked him if he thought we would ever be able to use an I-phone, never mind how to pay for groceries and Chinese take-out with it.
He had no answer.
This morning it was below zero again. We don’t care any more.
To be fair, some of the lines were funny. If you were an actor or in show business in any way, you would think those lines were fall-off-the-couch hilarious.
I tried, I really tried, to keep an open mind and not say anything critical about the strange jazz drumming soundtrack or the Flying Mental Illness Bird.
So I kept silent, made jigsaw puzzles on the Kindle and looked at my watch a lot.
I kept Banjo Man company on the Big Couch, and that was my good deed for Saturday. After all, sometimes he watches “Buying Alaska” and “Fixer Upper” with me.
That was what we woke up to Saturday morning. Banjo Man stared at the outdoor thermometer for long moments and then as we huddled by the gas stove we had it confirmed by a stunned weatherman on tv.
I think we’re starting to get used to it.
Here are some of our rules for surviving this awful February:
1. Do not go anywhere.
2. Eat a lot of bean soups.
3. Don’t bother wearing anything but old black leggings (me), flannel lined khakis (Banjo Man) and old wool sweaters (both of us). No one is coming over and no one is going to see you.
4. Save money on shampoo. (See #1 and #3) You can use the extra bucks for the propane bill.
5. Watch a lot of television. Mini-series are great because that gives you something to look forward to all day as you huddle in your igloo office working. There were 22 episodes in Season One of BlackList, thank God. And that was only the beginning.
I think Banjo Man has a hat just like that.
6. Order the new season of Game of Thrones. Limit yourself to one episode a night. Try to get your neighbor on the couch to call you “Khaleesi”. Pretend you look like this:
But you really look like this:
7. Tell each other every night how glad you are to have the Giant Couch and the Giant television.
Finding this in the store was one of the best days ever!!!!
8. Order a new cd every day from Amazon. Downloading MP3 albums doesn’t count because the resulting computer glitches cause stress, while opening the daily box from Amazon is an *event*.
I love these smiley boxes.
9. Learn new songs.
10. Blog more.
11. Download guitar lessons from Troy. He is my best friend (See #1 and #3) and is very patient when I rewind his instructions over and over again.
12. Plan the summer road trip. Google prehistoric Indian mounds, “the best antique malls in Ohio” and the West Virginia Country Music Hall of Fame.
Serpentine Mound
13. Pretend you are somewhere else. We like to pretend we are in Austin. Banjo Man isn’t very good at this, but if I make a margarita in a beer mug I can pretty much picture myself at the Saxon Pub on a Wednesday night watching Cindy Cashdollar set up her six lap steel guitars. Especially if I close my eyes and chug.
Cindy Cashdollar tuning up for Johnny Nicholas and Hellbent at the Saxon Pub.
14. Look at pictures of the lake.
15. Work, work, work.
16. Plan my retirement party.
Yes, there is tequila in there.
17. Do jigsaw puzzles on my Kindle. Kristanix is by far the best app!
18. Reorganize recipes in binders while watching television. (See #5)
19. Reorganize music into five different binders while watching television. Alphabetize by song titles. (See #5)
20. Be creative with how to get exercise with the Stamina Elliptical Machine. I have mine under the desk and I peddle as I write. Like right now. The price keeps going up (mine was a lot less expensive) so maybe everyone in New England is ordering them? My butt is going to be as hard as a rock by July.
21. Take pictures of the animals that are not likely to make it through the winter.
is there any more pie? 