July 4ths Past

I don't remember ever not going out to see the fireworks. July 4th always felt to me to be a halfway mark in the year....it was like another New Year's Celebration! I always missed Dick Clark on July 4th, it was like having a celebration with fireworks without him was just sad.

The elation I felt when I saw a new kind of fireworks was highened...the only other time I felt that way was with my head buried in a book. Do this day I'm still amazed every time a firework takes a shape of a cube or a circle. How do they do that???

The last 4th of July I remember that doesn't bleed into the rest is one I spent without my parents. Last year, right before my wedding, my fiancee and I and my friend John went to the Sparks Marina to watch the "Star Spangled Sparks" fireworks. We sat around eating and set up chairs and talked about everything and nothing. We were bored while waiting for the fireworks, but it was nice to be bored with other people. We watched the seagulls, and named one Ed, because he looked like Ed Sullivan. I'm not kidding either, a seagull...exactly like Ed Sullivan. We couldn't stop joking about it.

Finally the fireworks started. I remember them being average, and remembered to July 4ths past that every year there was a new one. Not this year...but I was among friends, and we all laughed together, when halfway through they turned on the sprinklers on the other lawn, sending people flying. There were maybe 25-50 people there who had all laid down blankets and one even put up a small tent. They were all soaked by the time they got out of there.

I remember at the end of the night smiling and thinking how much fun it had been, and how after next month things were never going to be the same.

Con Cebolla? Or, A Mother's Day Story

My mother has beautiful olive skin and pitch black hair. We had gone into a Wendy's after visiting Wild Waters, the local water park. She was as dark as she had been all summer. My sister and I told her what we wanted, and we approached the counter to order.

My mom is hard of hearing, but she can read lips fairly well. Most of the time, though, she has master the art of smiling and nodding and asking me later what went on. She looked directly into the face of the cashier and the woman said "Como Estas?" my mom answered fine, and then she was asked if this was "para aqui y vendes?" My mom answered "for here, please." She asked for a baked potato, a cheeseburger, and a small bowl of chilli. The cashier took another look at my mother and said "Con Cebolla?" asking if we wanted onions on the chilli. Knowing my mom, she didn't hear and knowing she couldn't have anticipated this question, I opened my mouth to answer no. My mom smiled and said "no onions, please."

Good Guess, I thought to myself, knowing my mom took French and had no idea what this woman just said to her. I also thought it was amusing that this woman thought she was hispanic with her two incredible white children. It certainly validated the story she always told about how them almost didn't let her back into the country after she visited Mexico. They asked her how long she was visiting America, she said she needed to go throw up...they let the "gringa" through.

The cashier then gave her the total...in Spanish. My mom gave her the amount, having seen it on the registar. The woman behind the counter told in, in spanish, that her order would be out soon, and to have a nice day. She ended with a "thank you for coming," and my mother said "Your welcome."

By this time my sister and I were almost in tears on the floor. She had answered every question correctly, not knowing that this women wasn't even speaking the same language. The cashier was looking at my mother funny, not understanding why she didn't just answer her in Spanish.

Mom looked at my sister and I and asked "What?!?!"

Happy Mother's Day

Deja Vu-and Not in the Good Way

My parents hardly ever went to this McDonald's because of it's appearance. The bricks looked as if it had been an old Taco Bell, and they had converted it to a McDonald's sometime in the 70's. It should have been closed down years and years ago. It looked as if it doubled as a homeless shelter at night; dirt on the floor, which was always sticky, and sometimes sleeping bags tucked behind tables.

Mom told me to go find us a table while she waited for our food. I was six or seven, old enough to be able to take care of myself at a table. As soon as I was out of my mother's sight, I felt a grubby, rough hand grab my upper arm. It spun me around and I was face to face with what must have been a homeless man. His breath was a mix between alcohol and what smelt like grassy mud. Dirt was creased into his wrinkles, much like a Shar Pei when he has never been washed. His skin was poc-marked, and his eyes were a mystery. They were a dull glossed over brown, but they were trying to be vibrant.

He spoke to me, almost in tounges; He described everything you'd ever not want to know about the world; He told me my parents were going to die and leave me someday, that I would die too, and that no one would care about me. He talked about many other things, and I was frozen to the spot. I was afraid of what he would do if I tried to break free of him. He almost had me locked to him with his eyes, somehow I couldn't move even if I wanted to.

Finally another patron told him to leave me alone. He released his grip on me, and I felt the scrape of dirt that fell from his hands. I looked down at my arm and saw that he had left a dirty print of his hand. I never forgot how scary that was, being held captive. But I never told my mom, and she never asked why I kept brushing dirt off my arm the whole meal.

Around seven or eight years later, we came back to that same McDonald's. We were shopping in the area, and it was the only place that my sister would eat at. I tried to talk her into something else, since I had never wanted to go back to that McDonalds. My sister was the same age I had been when we last went there, and I had the encounter with the homeless man.

My sister had a terrible habit of running off, which she did as soon as we got to the counter. I went to go get her from my mom, but I took my time getting to the area where she had run off to. I rounded the corner and saw her; her arm was being held the same way, by the same man. At first I couldn't believe my eyes, but I would have recongized that man anywhere. He had changed his speech to more profanity than I remembered, but there he was. This time he had an eye patch over one eye. A skateboard was tucked under the table. Although I was as terrified as if it had happned to me all over again, I called out my sister's name and told her to "get over here NOW." Once again the man loosened his grip and Amanda wasted no time getting away from him. We never talked about it, and I never mentioned that the same thing had happened to me, just before she was born. He was even in the same booth.

This homeless man started popping up everywhere. He rode the skateboard around town and screamed obsenities. He never made sense, and I swear he followed me everywhere I had a job. When I worked at Hollywood Video, he would hide in the bushes and scream at me when I went outside to check the dropbox. He walked the mall where I was selling calendars for Waldenbooks. He was everywhere. Until one day, he disappeared. I never saw him again.

That McDonalds was closed a few years later, a nicer one built a block away. It only took them a few months to get the floor permently sticky though.

Me at 3 months old

Pictures by Paige

Ode to my Father

I never felt that anything was missing out of my life. When I was little I just assumed that what my dad did was the definition of what a father was. I never thought he wasn't doing what he was supposed to be doing. It was in second grade, when it was announced that we would be making something for father's day, that I was told differently. I said "They have a day for those people?" I was met with the most bewildered faces I have ever seen. It was soon explained to me exactly what a father was.

He wasn't easy to live with, to this day he isn't. But he is who I am, he is who made me into what I am today. When I look deep within myself, and go back to both my parents heritage, I know that some of it lives inside of me. There is a southern belle inside me eating grits and red eye gravy to her hearts content, and is so polite it seems to drip from her lips. I have few memories of when we visited North Carolina, but what I remember most is the atmosphere. It was so humid, and it bothered me, but it also felt like home to me. Gone With the Wind is one of my favorite movies because I know that my great great grandparents were there living that same exsistence.

My father told the same stories and jokes, so many times I knew all the punchlines and still remember them. Growing up he would embaress me and make me cry. But now that I am where I am today, I miss him. He is part of my soul. I wish I could go back in time and cut him some slack. I was rude and disrespectful to my father. I felt like he had no right to tell me what to do because he wasn't around a lot. Unlike the characater in Big Fish, I didn't believe that he had another life when he was away for months at a time. But I knew his mind wasn't at home when he was there. I inherited a lot of his traits for him not being around a whole lot.

I miss him, and I wish I could have one more day how it used to be, with me living at home, so I could enjoy co-habitation with the only father I will ever have.

The Wilber D. May Museum

Field trips were always exciting, whether it was kindergarten or senior year of high school. The one that always fascinated and scared me at the same time was the May Museum.

It was never really explained to us kids who Mr. May was, or why he had this museum. Maybe it was explained, but we sure weren’t listening. The museum consisted of animals that had gone through that wonderful activity known as taxidermy. There were dead animals in every exhibit, even the ones that were just a little scene from his living room. In fact it was his living room that was the most disgusting thing I had ever seen.

Everything was made of some kind of animal. The lampshades hung off of hooves of zebras, even the couch was being suspended in air by hooves of sheep and horses. This man was obviously a hunter. Two tusks surround the fireplace, and above the mantel is the head of a giant hippo. The walls are covered in animal heads from every end of the earth: tigers, antelope, buffalo, zebras, rhinos, and even hyenas. Flattened bobcats were used as headrests on one of the couches. There were antlers, antlers everywhere. And that was just one room.

There were individual displays of tigers, a giraffe, an entire gathering of deer. But the one that to this day I still will not get close to, the polar bear. One of the first visits I took there put me off of that bear forever. A bunch of boys were joking around and banging on the glass that separated the bear and the group. They hit it so hard that the bear began to rock back and forth, and nearly came crashing through the pane, it’s glass eyes cold and frightening. From then on the entire place was haunted to me. Down to the stuffed monkeys in the rafters it had me spooked. The creepiest thing about this place, though, is the actual shrunken head. It might very well one of the last. How many people can say they have seen a real shrunken head?

Because it had me spooked, it put me off the entire ‘May Center’ altogether. Because you see there was more than just the May Museum, but the ‘Great Basin Adventure’ as well. In the center was what looked like a miniature version of the mountain in Disneyland. Inside was a mine, and it had mannequins of miners that talked, and lit up when you were passing by. They cried, “Fire in the hole!” in the darkness of the cave, and then lit up to show you the surprised mannequin about to be blown up by the explosives. It scared me to death. I refused to go in there, and only liked the log flume ride, which was only one tiny drop into the water. It was nothing to write home about.
But that, my friend, is what fuels my fear of mannequins and taxidermied animals.

The Reoccuring Dream

It always begins the same way: I hear voices, but I don’t see anything. I can feel the ground beneath my feet; it is a rough cobblestone. Suddenly a voice comes from out of the darkness, asking me if I’m sure I want to do this. He tells me my mission is to find the Jewel of Light for him. Because of its brightness I am the only one equipped to complete this mission. It will be a long journey, but when I turn over the Jewel to him, he has sworn to restore my sight.

I feel someone hand me a relief map, which they refer to as a “high” map, to guide me through my journey. Someone else hands me a knapsack filled with food and water for my trek. I’m given a long wooden staff, which feels smooth against my hand.

My journey starts in the west, and my open-faced compass tells me we are headed toward the mountains in my map. They are treacherous and hard to climb, I feel them under me as I nearly scale the mountain wall to get to the other side. There is a village there, the Village of the Smalls. The people of this village will help me to find the Jewel of Light.

As I approach the village the dream takes a different turn. I either here them run to greet me, or I hear nothing and smell the burnt remains of their township. I find them all dead in their huts, or the bring me into their prospering community and give me a feast fit for a king. Either way I spend the night there, then they promise to lead me as far as they can to the Jewel of Light. Or I have to go it alone, finding a map to the Jewel in one of their smoldering dwellings.

It is a long walk across a desert; I can feel the sun beating down on the top of my head, the sweat coming out of my pores and dripping down the back of my neck. I reach a rock formation that I sit under in the shade for awhile in order to cool off. Then I make my way to the top of the rock formation to the point where the Jewel should be. It is not there. I stood in the place where it should have been and pondered what to do, when the ground quaked beneath me. I felt myself being lowered as if in an elevator, and after a short time it stopped. I felt in front of me and found the Jewel. It was as big as an ostrich egg, and was a round cut jewel. I wrapped the jewel in a piece of fabric given to me by the people who sent me on this mission, and I was on my way back.

I thankfully didn’t have to go back the way I came, I found myself a shortcut. It was still a long journey back to the Kingdom that wanted this jewel. When I finally arrived they took the Jewel from me and let me rest in a room for a day or so. Then they again called me into the room with the cobblestone floor.

“You have brought us the Jewel of Light, and for your reward, I will now return your sight!”

There is a bright light flash and for a second everything comes into focus…and then I wake up. But before I do, this is what I see;

It is a great hall in a medieval castle. Before me is a line of people: A Merlin-type figure, a couple of knights in full regalia, a great King and his Queen, and their daughter, the princess. They all look exquisite and beautiful, and behind them is a large mirror. It covers floor to ceiling behind them, and I can see their reflections in it.

I can see their reflections, but I do not see mine. I don’t have a reflection in that mirror.
Did my imagination just forget to put one in? The popular theory with everyone is that I was a Vampire. I didn’t think I was, but I did want to know what I had been in that dream. I had the dream off and on from the time I was 6 years old until I was 12 or 13, and I never figured out who I was supposed to be, or what my subconscious was trying to tell me.

I Shouldn't Exist...

"I read it in the newspaper a couple of days ago. Some guys is developing a bomb big enough to destroy the entire United States. He said he'd be done a few months after you turn sixteen, and then he's going to set it off."

At the tender age of eight, this was said to me by an older kid in the lunch room. I was facing the stage, and as he spoke I stared at the stop light we had on the stage. It had been brought in to help us keep quiet. At the time it was at Yellow, which meant we had to lower our voices. I couldn't have spoken even if I wanted to. I had just found out I had no future. I was going to die at the age of sixteen.

I lived my life until I was sixteen as if I was going to die. I never thought I would be able to vote, drink, gamble (not that I cared about that), even drive. By the time I got older I realized that there was no way at all this was true, but I felt in my heart that something was going to happen to me anyway.

I lived my entire sixteenth year in fear. I honestly prepared my room everyday so that I knew what it looked like before I died. I dropped into a very deep depression. The day I turned seventeen held no joy for me. In fact it was thrown by my best friend who promptly told me after the party I was a drag to be with, and that we shouldn't be friends anymore.

The first three years of driving felt odd to me, as if I wasn't ever meant to do it. In fact I didn't even bother getting my license until I was seventeen. By everytime I went somewhere on my own, I never found a good parking spot. I would park far away, and as soon as I was out of my car everyone in the first few spots would pull out. I didn't really live life anymore because it wasn't worth living if I was going to die anyday now.

The depression got deeper, and I quickly got to the point where I didn't have any friends. I liked a boy who refused to like me back, that didn't help at all. When we went to a swim meet together and he told me that was going to the junior prom with someone else (who was also on the swim team) Everything came crashing down. It was the straw that broke the camel's back.

I got to thinking about the lack of friends that I had, the seperation I felt from the world around me, the fact that a boy simply wouldn't like me back, the fact that everything had gone wrong in my life. Then it dawned on me through the tears of my torment...I was supposed to be dead. God must have passed over me by accident. I had fallen through the cracks on the Angel of Death's list. I knew what I had to do.

I opened the door to the Embassy Suites hotel room we were all staying in that night, and I took off for the stairs. I tore the door open with all my might and walked up the stairs as quickly as I could in my berginstocks. I watched as every floor I went up a sign called to me saying "roof axcess."

I had reached the top. The door was electric, the stairs sort of ended into it. I punched the big red button that opened the roof. My mind was already reeling with someone finding my body. I could see the mess I would make all of the pavement. "Who will have to clean it up?" I wondered. Would my crush finally see then that I was worthy? That it was his fault and he should have just gone out with me?

The electrical engine whirred as it started to open. Then stop. I got a little irritated, as I would when the garage door keep getting caught on something and going back. I punched the round button again, sure that this time it would open.

It did not. It was locked.

I screamed louder than I have ever screamed in my life. I had gotten past over, it wasn't even like I was killing myself, I just wanted to correct the mistake that God had made. I'm not supposed to be here! I started kicking the door, then pounding into it with my knuckles. Within minutes they had become bloody. I pounded on that door until I had no strength left in me. It was seven flights of steps down, back to the hotel room. The hotel room that held all the other team mates was open, and I had to walk right past it.

I couldn't do it. It was shameful to have such a failure. I would wait until everyone was asleep...but they were playing truth or dare, and I'm sure they planned to stay up all night. I had failed. I should be dead, instead I'm still here, and I still have to deal with what is going on....that I had become so depressed I had pushed everyone away. No one would be my friend because I was a downer to be with. I pushed that to the back of my mind and started down the stairs to my walk of shame. Not that anyone would know what I did.

It would be a year before I pulled myself up out of the depression that had started that day in the lunchroom when I was eight. And they say words are just words.

To this day I still wonder if something was supposed to happen...everytime I go somewhere and get the worst parking spot in the place, when they lose my reservations, etc. Was my life truely meant to be happening now? Either way, I'm living it now, and I'm not going to let anyone take it away from me.

Great Reno Balloon Races

Every year in September were the Great Reno Balloon Races. You woke up so early in the morning it felt like you just feel asleep. It was pitch black outside your window, you couldn't even see the tree that brushed the pane of glass when it was a windy night.

Rubbing the sleep from your eyes, you stumble out of bed and cover your eyes as you turn on your lamp. You still wince from the brightness as the light floods the room and out into the hall. The kitchen light is already on where Mom is downstairs making hot chocolate and putting it into the old '70s blue thermos.

You reach for the warm clothes that mom made you set out before you went to bed. In actuality you haven't sleep more than 3 or 4 hours because you were so excited about the balloon Races. You have woken up this early to go to Dawn Patrol. The actual Races aren't until later in the day, but the whole event is over by 10AM.

After packing the car with the hot chocolate and blankets you set off. You pull the car off the freeway, any other time of year a very illegal offense, but police allow it these three days. Much like Mardi Gras and women with their tops off, it's an arrestable offense if done one day before or after.

After waiting for what seems like forever, you see down at the park the balloons start to fill up with air. There are always four brightly decorated balloons for dawn patrol. The fabric used to make these balloons make the whole balloon light up against the sky, with the sun illuminating the background. When you were little your Dad made a lot of money taking pictures of the balloon races, especially Dawn Patrol. Finally they are up in the air, and the effect is breathtaking. Up against the mountains the balloons are so close and yet so far away. They co-ordinate so that they light up at the same time. Your heart races as you watch these giants light up in the sky.

As they land you feel a sense of loss, for you will not see the spectacle for another year. But the chocolate is warming your body and you drift off to sleep, as does your family in the car.

The best kind of way to wake up is a little late, after the balloons have taken off. You'll never know another scene as great as waking up and being surrounded by these wonderful machines. Machines even sounds like the wrong word. Creatures seem more appropriate.

Your eyes slowly open and you catch your breath as you see them all around you. You get out of the car even though you know it will be freezing, and look at the wonderment that are these balloons. The biggest deal is that in the later years they don't just come in regular balloon form. There is the Energizer Bunny, a Panda, an Eagle's Head, a bottle of champane. Your whole family has a favorite. You search the sky for yours with wonderment.

First Memories

There are things you remember because people tell you about them all the time. I know my first word was Light, but only because my parents have told me. These stories will be about my memories, and the memories of my parents, because they are part of who I am.


My first memory was pre-school. I called it preschool, but it was really a daycare where they taught you one thing a day and you did what you want the rest of the time. I am the same person I was then.

His name was Troy. I don't remember how, but we were together. We were in love. We pulled our cots together for naps, which I refused to take. When they split us up and he stayed at the park while I went back to Momma Louisa's. I remember looking out the window as the van pulled away from the park. Tears streamed down my face and my heart sunk deeper and deeper the farther away I got.

Once he went off with a bunch of other girls for coloring time. I was in a rage of jealousy, and I was determined to tell him off. Then he came up to me, with the rest of the girls trailing behind. He held up a picture he drew and colored for me, with the girl's help. I felt my heart swoon. I knew I loved him with all my heart.

A few weeks later we had all gone across the street and got balloons for someone's birthday. Everyone decided they would let go of their balloons at the same time. I didn't want to let mine go, I wanted to keep it and show it to my Mom when I got picked up. They all peer-pressured me into doing it, but I was the last to let go. I looked above my head and watched all the balloons go in a bunch, and felt a sense of loss bigger than I had ever felt before.

I spent the day in the office, and refused to go into the daycare. They had a parrot in the office I watched all day, enraptured. This continued all week until my Mom asked if I didn't want to go there anymore. The answer was yes.