Today when looking for something in a closet I found a book of CD’s.  I opened it up to discover that it was a bunch of CD’s that we took on tour with Thorazine.

Thorazine had a big ol’ Chevy Van that we had modified for the road.  The backseat was the very “safe” loveseat couch that although comfortable, was a complete hazard.  We bought the last couch from the side of the road in DC when on tour with Fear, which was a dream come true.   I remember how we felt like total rock stars when we put that new couch in the van.  Thorazine the band were four very different people.  The drummer D loved classic rock, the bass player Uncle Ross had more eclectic tastes that ranged from industrial to Tom Waits (ugh) to 80′s new wave.  Me I was all over the place, I love late 80′s rap, hardcore, metal, pop, punk, folk, new wave whatever.  My husband also had very eclectic tastes.  When you are stuck in a van with four people for months on end you have to agree on the music.  We got it down to about 20 CD’s we could all handle listening to in close quarters. 

When I found this book of CD’s I felt like I was stepping back in time.  I chose one CD to rock out to in the car on the way to swim team.  I chose the original Punk-O-Rama CD.  From the beginning bars of the Bad Religion song I was trust back into the van with the guys. Instantly I was driving across Nebraska, Wyoming, Texas, Oregon, California, or some state that you thought you would never ever get through because it was just that big.  Instead I looked into my rear view mirror at my new band of boys, who were happily playing with their DS’s.

There were some similarities.  The old Chevy Van did not have air conditioning so we were forever with the windows down blasting tunes on the highway.  My 12 year old SUV that runs great and is completely paid off,  unfortunately it does not have air conditioning. It broke a few years ago and to replace it was going to cost, $3000.  Here I was a tattooed Mom, driving her SUV with her mohawked kids to swim team in the suburbs blasting the Punk-O-Rama CD, the dudes in workman pickup trucks were giving us the thumbs up at every stop light.  It was a cathartic for all of us.  The kids were bopping their heads to the music as they played their games.   Aaron exclaimed he liked the Pennywise song best.  He thought I sang along best on that song, and I had to agree it was my favorite to sing along to.

Ryan who is suddenly very concerned with being, “cool”, has taken to calling me, “daw”, like as in “dawg”.  I have been schooling him on the fact that reading and speaking your mind well can also be cool.  He told a bunch of his second grade compadres that I was in a punk band.  All of a sudden they look at me differently and want to teach me the ways of their hidden handshakes.  I hope to show them that being smart is cool.  Pursuing a dream is cool.  Fighting for what you believe it is cool.  Calling your Mom “dawg” is way not cool….

Pennywise has left me with an ear worm.  I love singing this song. I want to be this singer of this band in my next life.

Yes, I know, I am very late tonight and I am so tired I feel like I am about to fall into a coma.  I got our chaotic kids home from swimming and my husband was home early for him.  The kids got, believe it or not, even more chaotic. We hustled them into bed and I sat down to finish a project that has been weighing on me all weekend the kids resisted sleep and took more trips to the bathroom and other heel dragging tactics than normal.  Finally I got to work on my project but suffice to say writing the same sentences with the same info nine different ways is hard, repetitive, and deceptively hard.  Suddenly, I could not find my phone I tore apart the house looking, I stripped searched the car, I stopped the washer and looked in my pants.  It was no where, wait it could be at the pool where I was sitting outside away from the very steamy pool building working.

I jumped in the car and drove the 20 minutes back to the pool.  There was my phone right were I was sitting.  Luckily, I was sitting against the building in the shade and my phone was protected from most of the rain by the eave.

To make a long story short.  I am tired and all my time since the kids went to bed has been working or running around the Greater Philadelphia Area looking for my stupid, I can’t live without it, phone.  Goodnight.  Harumph

I am sitting on my deck waiting for our guests to arrive.  We have fun plans for the kids, good food, drink, and friends old and new coming.  I was making potato salad this morning and I could not stop thinking about my Dad. I had memories of a Memorial Day when I was a kid.  We sat together in the kitchen staring at the thickest fog I had ever seen.  The weather was going to be glum and cold all day, I was so dissapointed because we were supposed to go to a pool party.  I remember my Dad saying, Cheer up kid.  Lets go to a matinee movie.

My Dad hated the movies.  He was a veteran of WWII and the loud artillery damaged his hearing.  From the time my Dad was forty, they year I was born, he was having hearing issues.  By his later years he wore hearing aids.  Talking to my Dad was a frustrating experience that did not improve with hearing aids.  Till the day he died he was sharp as a tack but couldn’t hear anything.  My Dad gave his hearing to his country.  So many more gave their lives.  What about the kids who didn’t have a Dad to take them to a movie he couldn’t hear?

I do not believe that war solves anything.  But I grew up during the end of the Vietnam War and no one should be treated the way those vets were.  War is the ugliest thing this planet has to offer. Thank you to the people who fought the wars valiantly, remembering those who passed, and here’s to leaders who know how to make better decisions before coming to blows.