I’m forty years old. I’m nowhere near wisdom, but I have discovered that a person can be angry without acting like an asshole.

The Internet taught me that.

I’m angry. I’m angry a lot. Know what helps tip me into pissed? Reading people who act like assholes on the Internet just because they can.

I have learned not to act like an asshole in response. However-

Steve Jobs died today. I guarantee that my mom has never processed his name, and tomorrow when she opens the paper she’s going to ask me what the big deal is. You see- it is a big deal. Even if you’re a hater or too cool for school.

Tonight when the news hit Twitter I was following the news from the Wall Street protests, I was worrying about friends and family, I was worrying about my husband’s weight loss, small as it might be. I was worried about the fact that my son still won’t speak, although he will, “sing,” I was down from the attitude my daughter had given me earlier in the day. I was, for MANY reasons this week, just over the word CANCER. Sick of that motherfucker. Tired of its toll on those I love and those who love them.

Steve Jobs is dead, the AP reports.

Regardless of the fact that we knew it was coming, and we did, it set me into a peal of sobs.

People responded kindly. People will. Then the assholes started coming on, mocking people’s sadness, always bringing up how many other people die daily, and what’s one billionaire when kids are starving…

Here’s my take-

Fuck that.

If he didn’t touch your life in anyway shape or form- fine. Obviously he did, or you would have kept your mouth shut. He moved you enough to speak. The man might have been an asshole sometimes, but you know what? ALL of us can be assholes sometimes. And it’s usually over what matters most to us.

What I saw tonight was people grieving because the man had inspired them with his vision.

I saw people grieving because he’d died too young, regardless of his name or who he was.

I saw people grieving because cancer had taken him, and they’ve had loved ones stolen themselves.

I saw people caring about the man’s family, his children, the people who loved him.

Each and every day we get hammered by horror all over the globe, and we handle it, we feel, we have to stuff it away because if we don’t we’ll all walk around gibbering constantly. We take it and take it and then someone who has done something phenomenal passes away and we, as a group, FEEL DEEPLY. It pours out, and our sadness is for the passing and the details and the fact that goddamit ONE MORE FUCKING PERSON has been stolen, someone whose face we know, someone who has touched us at least tangentially…

I refuse to keep a tally of every horror I’ve wept over in my adulthood. I refuse to let assholes make me feel like I’m somehow less for making a statement about a single person when so many have suffered.

Here’s my confession- I cry when people die. I cry especially hard when young people die, and if you don’t think Jobs was young then you might want to live a bit longer. My first real boyfriend was born a year after Jobs. Fifty-six is still a baby. I will continue to cry for people I don’t know because I am moved, I will continue to roll my eyes over people thinking I suck for it, and I will continue to think that my ability to be moved keeps me human.

Tonight I cried because a young father died. I cried because I’ve watched a vital man waste away over the past few years and yet still hoped he’d kick cancer’s ass. I cried because that man’s vision helped me teach my late-speaking daughter how to talk when I introduced her to Internet toddler games on my eMac, and her interactions with that machine led her to memorize colors, shapes, and the alphabet when my personal efforts got nowhere. I cried because my daughter is five now and still uses that eMac and bitches when the Rainbow Wheel of Death spins incessantly, and that tickles me. I cried because another freaking human being who blazed trails was taken too soon.

I cried because I’m human. And I feel.

I don’t want to be cooler than thou. I don’t want to be an asshole.

And-

Fuck you, cancer. Fuck you sideways.

Almost everyone who watches my two-year-old son study everything and manipulate objects says to me- “He’s going to be an engineer when he grows up.”

My new answer is going to be, “Maybe. If he is, I hope he helps design the spaceship my daughter pilots to Mars.”

Because she wants to go to Mars. She’s talked about it for years. She wants to go to, “outer space,” and as Jonas has no goals yet, well, I concern myself with hers.

People tell me she’s going to be a lawyer or an actress because of her flair for dramatics. No one comments on her love of space. No one mentions anything to me,really, in person except her flair for being a girl.

Livvie- you are five years old today. One year from today I will finally let you watch Star Wars and also Star Trek. We will stay up late each night of the Star Wars Trilogy, the good ones, and we’ll eat popcorn and you can see how a Princess really behaves. You will see what people imagine other galaxies to be, and I will finally give you the better lenses for your telescope.

And if your dreams of space keep you tethered to the ground instead of flying to Mars, even if you lose those dreams and find something else- your desires and talents and wonder are just as important as your brother’s.

You’re not an engineer. Who cares? You’re freaking awesome. You’re my nerd-girl wonderchild rainbow-unicorn pink and purple Princess who wants to know even when she doesn’t understand. You thirst.

And you’re the best daughter I could have had.

Happy Fifth Birthday, Livvie Bean. I’ve got your back.

This weekend, the weekend and beyond of Hurricane Irene, has been, well, shit. Doesn’t matter what most of the media is saying. Doesn’t matter what a lot of wankers on the Internet are wanking. Doesn’t matter that this disaster doesn’t, “measure up” to others. Just doesn’t matter.

This weekend has been shit. The storm? Shit. She shat on people’s lives, and she killed. Doesn’t really matter that she hasn’t killed multiple thousands. She killed. The Outer Banks were slammed hard, parts of the Philadelphia and New Jersey areas were slammed hard, and NY State and Vermont and Connecticut… Massachusetts…

A long time ago, almost eighty-one years ago, my mother was born in the city of Schenectady, NY. Swear it exists. You might have heard about it by now this weekend for proof. It’s not just Vaudeville.

No. Go Google Schenectady and Vaudeville. Then come back.

So when my mom was born there it was because The Depression was going on, and my grandmother needed to be near her family while my grandfather tried to find work. My family is from Upstate NY. Grandmom- Schenectady by way of Germany. Grandpop- Mineville by way of Canada. France etc prior. She spent summer after summer up there during The War, and as a kid I spent a great deal of time up visiting my relatives. I spent a lot of time in the next town over- Rotterdam Junction. My cousin, the one who had her heart attack a couple of weeks ago? Her sons were two of my best friends as a kid. Her son Scott taught me how to skip a stone for the first time on the stream in the woods behind their house. Her son Jason was my nerd-in-arms.

At their house I got drunk and so mosquito-bitten that I used Apple Riunite as a remedy because it had alcohol. Another time, sober at 3am, I drove back to the Stardust Motor Inn with two friends passed out in my back seat, and the road was so empty I pushed my Beretta to 110mph for about 5 seconds before letting off the gas. Just to see if the speedometer went that high. I got back to about 60mph right before a curve. I was 18.

Scott and Jason’s mom was a superb person to take care of a random kid and teenager staying. She was strict. She was sweet. She’s still a pistol, at 65, and when I hear her smoke-heavy voice on the phone my heart trips.

The sign entering The Junction used to read, “Rotterdam Junction- A Nice Place to Live.” It’s been too many years now since I’ve been there. “Up home.”

She and her immediate family are pretty much the last family we have up there, now.

We last heard from Kathy on Saturday I think, while I had no power for 22 hours due to Irene, and my mom was waiting for her arrival. My mom started trying to reach her on Sunday morning. She’d had a heart attack, right? Things were looking bad for the area. I worried yesterday. Went to bed. Woke up at 319am and barely got back to sleep. Checked for news on the region overnight. Things were getting worse.

You watch stuff on the news, I know this from other matters, and you feel horror and sadness, but when it’s your family that you have no contact with, no idea what’s going on, and you watch waters (or anything) close in on them from hundreds of miles away it makes you physically sick. Good people, nice people, homes, livelihoods, all of it getting swamped. Nothing to do but either stare at the photos and fret, avoid it altogether, or do something.

I put out a call to Twitter asking for information. A few people chimed in, but two people, Nickie and Jessica, specifically helped me so much I will never forget it.

They either had homes under threat or family under threat, and they still took a moment to reach out to a worried person down in North Carolina and keep feeding up-to-the-moment information. I kept my mother up-to-date via phone. One of the women lives in the hard-hit area, and I’m hoping now she’s okay. The other grew up there, and her dad volunteers in the fire department.

And I thought, “Wait. Jason was in the FD.”

And he knew him. She asked. And I passed a message along. And he said he’d deliver it.

And then as the flood rose and people were being evacuated from their roofs via boats I was informed that everyone had been evacuated, no one was missing-

A stranger told me that. Another stranger pretty much held my hand today while her home was threatened, just because MY family was in danger.

I haven’t heard from Jason yet, but he now has my cell phone number thanks to a stranger. I hope the damage is minimal, I fear not, but right now my mother and I only care about their lives. And the lives of all of the other strangers who were hurt badly this weekend in whatever fashion.

It takes just a moment to turn a stranger into a friend. No one is actually faceless. We’re all here.

And this is A Nice Place to Live.

Good luck to all in the aftermath and rebuilding. People will help.

Or- why does EVERY damn thing have to be black and white?

Hurricane Irene seems to be on her way here.

Hurricane Fran at Landfall 9/5/1996

Hurricane Season officially starts June 1st for the Atlantic, and our governor gave the traditional, “Hey, we’re here, get your ducks in a row,” speech.

People in the comments section under the news story were hideous.

The first thing that struck me was that it seemed most of them hadn’t been in this state very long, or they just hadn’t lived in an area that was ever really hit. Although- if you look to the left there? Hurricane Fran was larger than the entire state when she made landfall that day in 1996. Only the far western portion of our state seemed to escape some shit.

It was some shit.

I got pissed reading those comments. Seems a lot of people these days seem to be so freaking self-centered that only THEIR lives matter. Their locations. I am an ISLAND goddammit.

It doesn’t work that way, sorry to say.

No matter where your piece of real estate is in the Great North State, there is a gigantic state full of towns and people around you who share your abbreviation on an envelope. So the governor told people to get ready just in case. Just do it and shut up. So what if there hasn’t been a major hurricane that made landfall on the continental US in years. It doesn’t mean that Baby Jesus cried them away.

Just shut the fuck up, get over your damn argumentative selves, and lay in some freaking supplies. Just in case. What does it hurt?

And if these folks are just trolls? Move on to something not having to do with life and death, potentially.

I have to say I’m glad I moved here in 1995 so I could see the aftermath of Fran and eventually Floyd. Especially Fran. I don’t know where these high-horse people come from (yeah, read North) who live in the Wake County area and think that just because it won’t affect them it has no affect at all…

They should do some reading.

On the other hand-

Brilliantbugger on Photobucket

The media is going to try to get people to panic. And they do. They fill up the airwaves with non-stop coverage of drizzle and wind gusts, and poor shmucks stand out near the increasing storm surge while dramatic music and graphics play on-screen.

There are always dramatic music and graphics.

They will use hyperbolic language (as they are on the TV behind my head, already) and at the same time hedge their bets over where landfall will be and when.

They will hype and hype and then hype some more, and you know, depending on the year, it’s not such a bad thing.

Thing is- many people won’t listen to anything other than panic-mongering. I think they know this at the old news stations for this stuff. They just managed to dramatically detail the worst storms to hit the state in an effort to get people to freaking prepare.

People get complacent. People go with what’s normal. For many years now North Carolina has escaped major storms, so there’s a shit-ton of people who have never experienced one. The hype might cause them to mock more, but in the end- someone told them so.

It takes almost no time at all to prepare if you’re in city-limits, and if not, it takes a bit more time. Then you go about your business.

I’m out of batteries.

I had to refill the water bottles for flushing. Thirty-eight gallon jugs should give us a little over 12 toilet flushes.

We have 3/4 of a tank of propane for the grill.

Out of candles.

Will not buy new food this week.

How hard is this?

We don’t panic, but we sure as hell make preparations. When did even that become a bone of contention for people on the Internet?

What the hell is up with people nowadays?

On Friday my almost 65-year-old cousin had a “massive” heart attack.

Massive is in quotes because we still don’t have the info on how much damage was done to the muscle. I do know, though, that the problem artery was 100% blocked. A stent was placed. She’s been a pistol in the hospital, which, if you knew her, well…

It’s not abnormal.

Thing is, my mom drove up there Friday morning. Cousin lives outside of Schenectady (yes it does exist), NY, so it takes my mom about 5 hours to get there. Sometimes less. She has a lead foot. Sometime after 10am Friday our cousin called me and asked if my mom had left yet. We chatted. We chatted for quite awhile. She sounded fine.

Then that night my mom called with the news that said cousin was in ICU.

After establishing that she was in fact among the living and should be for awhile my first thought was, “How much is this going to cost?”

Because, you see, they’re working poor.

Or, well, she is. Her husband has had terrible heart issues for over three decades now. He’s not employed. She works for a bank taking calls. The house is paid off, thank the gods, but-

How much is this going to cost?

Charity begins at home. Sure. Absofuckinglutely. Her insurance will cover some, but she’ll have to scrabble, at age 65, to come up with the rest. Take out a second mortgage on their home? Maybe. What. The. Fuck.

When my inheritance from my father came through when I was young I sent my cousin a few thousand dollars to get by so she wouldn’t have her house foreclosed. She paid off every last cent. It took years. I didn’t even care. It was a gift. Charity begins at home. But she sent me a check every month with a current tally, and I appreciated it, but not as much as I do now.

THESE are the people whom this government is failing. They don’t want free rides. They work their asses off past the retirement age that used to be, and the people who think that handouts are for losers infect the whole process.

It’s not a goddamn handout. It’s a help up. It’s a help out. It’s extending your hand and doing a favor for your goddamn neighbor or someone who might even be related to you.

These people work, and they work hard. They work themselves so sick that one day they can be on the phone giggling and then collapse on the floor and end up in an ambulance.

Sure, she smokes. She doesn’t drink. She takes care of herself other than the smokes. I’ll be damned if I’ll judge her for that, because I know what she’s self-medicating against.

She’s paid into her life since she started working decades ago. She supported others. Our family has supported her when we can. I know, as sure as I’m sitting here, that with this my mother will be sending her money every month to make sure that they survive these medical bills.

My husband told me a co-worker’s recent heart attack and stent cost $36k.

I imagine it can. I also imagine that if we’re so goddamned concerned with USA-USA-USA! and keeping the flag alive we can take care of our goddamn own somehow.

Social Security is not the Devil. Federal assistance for health problems and care is not the Devil.It just needs to be handled right. Charity begins at home, goddamn it, and that doesn’t necessarily mean your own place of worship or your own family.

Let’s take care of our own. Please. Be human.

USA

Etc…

Today.

Gosh.

Our next-door neighbor seems like a nice enough person when she’s alone and dealing with us. She’s in her 50s? Maybe? She looks older.

When she’s involved with her daughter and grandsons things change.

For almost two years now we’ve been listening to cussing and tirades whenever her daughter’s car pulls into the drive with the kids and our neighbor. I’ve heard her tell the boys (Maybe 8 and 10) to shut the fuck up and get inside. I’ve heard the boys throw the F-Word around. Yelling at her. I’d decided that if ever I caught them again using that language with their grandmother they’d have to deal with me.

The daughter, in her 30s? Not a prize. I don’t know their issues. I don’t know their diagnoses, if any. I don’t care. What I care about is the kids. Mine. Hers. All of them.

I’d been told that the boys were mean to animals. One day our dog Ginny ran to the fence because one of the grandsons was there, and he asked me if he could pet her. I told him yes. I weeded the garden with one eye on the fence, and that boy’s face was shining. Ginny can do that to a person. She loves. She’s super-heavy-duty dog love, and it cracks me up when cable guys and whatnot ask me to lock her in a room when they come in. That dog found a kid that day who just wanted to love something, and she loved him back.

My heart. That boy.

Today she tried to protect him through our fence.

I was on our deck with Livvie while Jonas napped, and I had just cleaned and filled the kiddie pool for her. She was on the deck splashing around, and I’d gone down the steps and into the garden to weed. The dog took off for the fence when she heard the car pull in next door. Then I heard the yelling.

By yelling, I mean psychotic screaming of cuss words. At her own mother. With her son standing right there.

I heard a door slam, and it was quiet for a moment. I looked up at Livvie. She was off. She doesn’t know the words, but she can tell when someone is angry, and she was making like a deer in the headlights. As I started back to the steps I heard the woman slam out of her mother’s house and the tirade started again. Calling her a motherfucking bitch. Screaming that she wasn’t the fucking bitch, her mother was the fucking bitch. Screaming that she’s not a goddamn nigg*r lover.

I had enough. My kid was staring at the deck floor and I said, “Don’t worry about it.”

She said, “You’re sorry?”

I said, “I’m sorry you had to hear that. Don’t worry about it. I’ll be right back.”

And then I walked my never-ever-ever-have-fought-a-single-person-self to the fence and stood three feet from the chain link while she screeched. Her son, all 10 years old of him, lover of my dog, turned and watched me as I said,

“My five year old is out here. You need to stop.”

I did not yell. I raised my voice only enough for her to hear me over her hysterics.

The boy stared at me.

She, bent into her car and not looking at me, shut her mouth.

Her boy still stared.

I walked away. Called the dog into the house. Stayed on the deck with my kid.

It bugged the shit out of me doing that in front of her son, really, but it had to be done. If he comes back to the yard and wants to pet my dog he can. He needs sanity. Even the four-legged, lick your face off kind. But I am done with that woman.

I could have screamed at her. I could have caused a scene. But kids were outside. And I needed to be a voice of reason. Even with few words. Those few words worked.

Who’da thunk it?

We’re leaving here, though, as soon as we can. My daughter had never heard most of those words before today. She’d heard, “Goddamn” a couple of times but never repeated it.

I’m not looking forward to explaining the N-Word to her. Because if it’s not something I’ve said, she retains EVERYTHING.

I’m also not looking forward to possible retaliation. Maybe? Maybe not.

The maybe is enough for me. I embarrassed her in front of her son. In her eyes.

To me? She did that long, long ago.

Do me a favor, okay? Think before you freak. Take a look around. Imagine what it sounds like to others.

And then- STOP.

Livvie just pulled two slips of paper from a Mickey Mouse bowl.

The winners of free copies of Deer Hunting with Jesus are-

Tammy Castleberry

and

Teri Anne Stanley

Please send me an email at julie @ jasummerell.com and let me know which format you prefer, your email address for digital delivery if so, or your physical address for paperback.

And remember- pass it on.

Happy Friday!

I had no idea when I started reading this book that it would give me insight into my marriage, but it has.

The other day I saw Tyrus Books pop up on the Twitter stream with an offer of a copy of Joe Bageant’s Deer Hunting with Jesus if you raised your hand and asked for one.

I wanted one. The lovely Steve Weddle had mentioned a few months back that I’d probably enjoy it, and the book had been sitting in my Amazon cart’s saved for later section since he did. Getting this Kindle copy for my laptop was great, because I love instant gratification (even if that gratification did technically take a few months).

I started reading the book Tuesday morning while trying to get us ready to head to the library for the kids’ summer reading program, and it was difficult to pull away. I’ve just reached Chapter Four, and within the first three chapters and the introduction I learned something amazing.

This man (Rest him. He passed away in April) finally helped me understand my husband better.

My husband was raised poor and country. I was raised poor and suburban. You might not think there’s a difference, that poor is poor, but holy fuck you’d be wrong.

My husband is a redneck, and having been with him for seven years now I get upset when people dismiss rednecks as stupid, racist, and boorish. Mr. Bageant described rednecks this way-

-Jane Austen

Weathercock. Get it? HAHAHAHAHA Oh shut up

So, yeah, come on. Let’s whip out our weather penises and slap them down on this here table. Don’t mind the glitter glue. You might like it.

Really, folks? Really?

It’s all relative, folks.

It is hot as fuck on this side of the country. It is. There are areas of the East coast that haven’t seen temps like this for sustained periods in an eon. Today I realized, too, that I don’t remember the last time (I’m talking years) that I bitched because it hadn’t stopped raining in days.

The weather is a mess. Climate change is real. Whether it’s cyclical or not, there’s no denying we ain’t helping matters, and over the last ten years my fair state has been getting hotter and drier in the summer.

Let me wave my hands a second in that, “be that as it may” gesture.

What the FUCK is wrong with everyone? In the winters I’ve noticed, and damn if I’m not noticing it now- the competitiveness. One person says he’s hot, too hot, and another person chimes in with, “You think YOU’RE hot…”

Has life always been a contest? Or is this shit new to the Internet? See, I don’t remember things being quite this stupid. I remember Johnny Carson saying, “It was so hot today…” (How hot WAS it…?) and chuckle chuckle hee.

It’s hot. I don’t give a fuck where you’re from or what you deal with on an annual basis. If someone is suddenly dealing with severe heat in a region where people STILL don’t generally install central air (Hello Wisconsin! and Maine…), that person is going to be uncomfortable. More than uncomfortable. Their bodies can’t deal with it well.

Official temps taken at airports mean nothing, by the way. I’m learning this. Yesterday our backyard was 120 degrees, and our front yard was 111, and the airport (in the shade) said something like 102. Staying in the shade is a nice idea, but who gets to do that? And for us, I’m sorry, 120 was goddamnawful. The people in areas where the temp rarely even hits 95 and is going up to 100?

I feel for them.

This is why it pisses me right the fuck off in winter when comedians crack jokes about folks down here in the South feeling cold when the temp goes into the 20s. That shit doesn’t happen. Teens? Even more rare. If you have a night in North Carolina when your boogers freeze you go back inside, crack open a drink, and celebrate the difference.

That’s the thing, though, isn’t it? Most lucky folks have heat. Even in Florida people have heat. You get cold enough, you go inside and warm yourself up. In this shit? This blistering, smoggy, thick and wet sear that the nation is dealing with?

A lot of folks only escape when they’re at work. You know, if they’re lucky enough to work in air conditioning.

We have road work going on near us right now, and every time I drive past the folks I eyeball to see if they have enough to drink. The other day I was mentally checking my budget to see what I could spare at the store in order to grab them cases of water when I finally saw their supply.

This, folks, is the suck.

Today it rained. It rained one half an inch and the temp slammed from 107 to 74 degrees, and my kid and I danced in it. I threw out my arms like Andy Dufresne and fell to my knees. It was cold rain. For a bit there was no thunder or lightning. We opened our mouths and let it all run inside.

It was glorious.

The temp shot back up to 110 eventually, but for about 3 hours we had relief. We played outside. We drank hot chocolate with marshmallows because it was so cold inside with the air running. We wore robes. It was GLORIOUS. If I could have shared it with about 100 people off the top of my head I would have.

I moved to NC 16 years ago, and the summers were hot. It was nothing like this. Over the past 10 years they’ve been getting hotter, and more importantly, drier. I watched people bitch about days and days of rain this past spring and felt jealous. Real envy.

When did this become a contest?

And why?

People have the right to bitch about what upsets their apple cart. One does not HAVE to listen to it. Either say something nice or don’t say one goddamn thing at all.

And go eat a popsicle. You’ll be happier.