Kimberly Williams, IT Girl

If I ever need to slip into anonymity with an alter ego and a new career track, I'm going to need an alias. And a new career. I like to be prepared for any eventuality, so this morning I logged on to rumandmonkey.com to discover my untraceable alias name. Kimberly Williams. Got it. Don't tell anyone.

Now, to figure out my new career, I thought I'd see what kind of Office Moron I am and get some leads that way. Laugh it up, folks, you always suspected...


Which Office Moron Are You?
Rum and Monkey: jamming your photocopier one tray at a time.

So... if I seem to have dropped off the planet, take a look around for Kimberly Williams, IT Girl. But don't call me Kim. I hate that.

St. Patrick

When I was a young girl, my uncle Pat was easily my favorite. The youngest of my mother's three brothers, he lived with us until we moved to Tennessee. I had unlimited access to him and he had unlimited time for me. At the time, he was either a senior in high school or recently graduated, and to my eight-year-old mind (which didn't connect sex to the word), Uncle Pat was as much a boyfriend as an uncle -- someone with whom you snuggle, laugh, and play. I loved, loved, loved my Uncle Pat. He, in some ways more than my father did, became the model for what I would look for in later relationships and I often find myself involved with men closer to Pat's age than to my own.

In the twenty-some years since my family moved away from Michigan, I've lost contact with most of my aunts and uncles, who knew me only as a child. As people, we have very little connection, but as family, that connection is unavoidable. I still love my uncle Pat, but it's been years since I've seen or talked to him, which is what makes this news so difficult: he's dying. He's been given a few days. Not a year, not months, not even a week. Days.

We've known for months that his chances of defeating the cancer he's been battling weren't good, but now it seems they are nil. There is a call I need to make, but I don't know how to do it. How do you call a man who you haven't spoken to in years and tell him that you love him? How do you cross that gap without making it obvious that this call is goodbye? He has so much to deal with in these few days; am I hurting or helping to strike him with yet another reminder that someone he's loved is calling him now because he won't be there to answer later? It seems more cruel than kind.

What do you say to someone you love but barely know? And how do you say it without crying? Aren't there already more tears than he can suffer? Isn't it hard enough to live your last few days surrounded by people who know they are your last without the constant ringing reminder of the thing you want most desperately to forget? The thing you don't want to be true.

How can I be one of those reminders? ... And how can I not?

The Wayside

In February, I started Blogging. With no job, few obligations, and a lot of free time alone in a new city, I had little else to do. I wrote almost daily, as ideas for "articles" crossed my mind. It was intended as a way to keep my writing sharp, not as a place to post my diary to the world, but a diary is what my blog seems to have become. As I've found ways to fill my daytimes, I've had less time to dwell on abstract ideas. Or perhaps it's simply that fewer ideas now come. But I have started something. Shortly after I began blogging, my mother jumped on the idea. She'd recently divorced her career to avoid divorcing her too-traveled husband and she, too, needed an outlet for her time and energies. Soon afterwards, my brother began one as well. It's his that now means the most to me.

My brother and I are separated by 5 years and a lot of life. When we moved from Michigan to Tennessee, I was eight but he was not yet four. I had a number of troubles adjusting to the new state, including the loss of friends and extended family and transferring from a Top 10 to a Bottom 10 school system, but my brother was too young to be so attached to Michigan, and in Tennessee he flourished. While I fell into early depressions, gaining weight and resentment, his health dramatically improved. His asthma disappeared, his stomach troubles ended, and he entered the only school system he'd know healthy and robust. He had neighborhood friends -- not always the ones I'd have chosen for him, but better than no friends at all -- and, although I was older, my brother took Alpha position between us.

Ten years later, when I was graduating from high school and my brother had yet to enter it, I moved out of the house. While my mother and brother fought for the Household Alpha title, I determined that I could be Alpha without the fight in my own home. However, I missed the connection to my brother's high school years. I knew that he played football and dated girls, but I didn't know what he thought about, what his dreams were, or what he hoped to be. When he was graduating from high school, he was deciding to start a family. His first wife and first child came hard upon the ceremony.

Another ten years passed while our lives continued on different paths. He took a "real" job to support his family as his family grew while I worked several part-time jobs to make ends meet before settling on a long commute between two demanding jobs which was so ridiculously dangerous that even I have a hard time believing I did it. During those years, I spent very little time with family, and I ended them by moving away from my family to Nashville.

My brother's life has continued to grow and change, as mine has, without my supervision. He is now the father of four, a home-owner, and a grown-up. I missed a lot of this transition. My brother is a man a barely know. But I've got the basics. And I read his blog. And every day I learn a little more.

It's time for me to step back up to the plate and write more than a diary. Because I can only hope that my brother learns a little bit about me, too.

At The Old Globe 

Detail in Balboa Park 

Picasa Success!  

Alive and Kicking

As the week progresses, things in San Diego are picking up.

California law is completely on my side regarding the accident -- red light or no red light, the cars behind me should have had distance to stop. The insurance companies involved agree that the two drivers behind me will share in the cost of repair to the company vehicle and the folks at my father's company have been very supportive while working out the details.

In Tennessee, my roommate helped to settle the registration issue with my "abandoned" van. The story in convoluted, but eventually boils down to this: I'd inherited the wrong plates with the van; the right plates were available and current, save for the sticker to prove it; and stickers were swapped so that the van would not only be safe from towing but also accurately plated. Whew.

With the car issues behind me, I'm taking some time in San Diego to catch up sightseeing. On Monday, I roamed through Balboa Park, soaking in the Spanish architecture, botanical garden, lily pond, and Museum of Art. On Tuesday, I visited the San Diego Zoo's Wild Animal Park, where "herds of elephants, giraffes, rhinos, and antelope are among the hundreds of animals you can see roaming the scenic rolling landscape of East and North Africa, the Asian Plains, a Eurasian Waterhole, South Africa, and the Mongolian Steppe." On Wednesday, I had rolls of film developed and began my second San Diego album. Knock wood if you will. I continue to have success with my traveling camera.

This morning I attempted to add my photos into evidence on this blog, but after a night spent listening to rude and rowdy neighbors gathered under my window, I'm quick to lose patience with the process. So far, it's a pain in the Pic-asa.

Up in Smoke

I was involved in a traffic accident today. I stopped at a red light; the two cars behind me did not. The car I was driving isn't mine. It is a company car. My father's company car. A car I was driving home after taking my father to the airport. A new car. A car that now needs some body work.

Adding insult to injury, the CHiP who processed the accident asked a personal question while taking my info. My out-of-state license made no mention of my weight. He asked. I told him. And I was embarrassed. I, too, need some body work.

Since I've been in San Diego, I've gained at least 10 pounds. Probably more than that. There's good food and plenty of it when Dad's in town. But I suspect my changing diet hasn't been the primary source of my gain. I suspect that giving cigarettes the heave-ho had something to do with it. I've heard that quitters generally gain at least as much as I have. And it's been three months today.

My Life Finally Tracked Me Down

Try as you might to run, your life will eventually find you wherever you are. I'm not particularly fond of mine, overall. Bad juju. But here it is. It found me.

It seems that I was allowed to enjoy San Diego for only as long as my show was running. When it closed on schedule, my life expected me to return to Nashville post-haste. I didn't. But this morning I took my parents to the airport, sending them back to Tennessee without me. And as soon as they were gone, life tapped me on the shoulder and made me look directly into the sucker punch. "Ya shoulda gone home."

I'll have to write about California highways and traffic control some day. I'll have to write about the continuing bad luck I have on return trips from the airport. I'll have to write about a lot of things. But not now. Now I want to wallow. Wallow, wallow, wallow.

By God, it was red.

A-partment-POPLEXY

I hope there is a special place in hell for apartment managers.

In the week after our return from Disneyland, I’ve seen the closing of my show and a violent illness. I’ve watched my mother compile a scrapbook while I, on the other hand, compiled my taxes. The trip to Anaheim was wonderful and I hope to write about it soon, but the week that followed was the pits.

Today, feeling somewhat better, I set about cleaning the San Diego apartment with my mother. It was a chore that had been neglected during and aggravated by my sickness, and one overdue after having had quite a few visitors the week before. As I walked outside with the trash, I found a notice from the apartment complex at the door. A notice reminding “all residents” that no items may hang over the balcony rail. A notice that only one residence received. Ours.

It turns out that my mother, after laundering the hall rug, had set it over the rail to dry. And, it seems, this is against policy. I haven’t read the lease; I suppose that she was warned. However, I am starting to lose my patience with an apartment complex that can spot a 3 foot throw rug at 900 yards and find time to print and post a notice before the thing is dry but cannot manage to stop alarms ringing in the middle of the night, provide after-hours lock-out service for its thousands of residents, or bother to admonish privileged college kids who vibrate the building with bass-enhanced rap music at 2 and 3 in the morning. It’s the eagle-eyed deaf patrol. At least our clean rugs suggest that we are maintaining the property rather than shaking the foundation apart from it. When our place does a Tacoma Narrows tumble into the apartment below, I had darn well better see an Equity Residential notice outside the crumblings of Mr. Jiggy-With-It’s door!

Meanwhile, in Nashville, AIMCO is no better steward of my money. Despite my monthly rent payments and communication with property managers, AIMCO is threatening to tow my vehicle from a parking spot included in my lease. While I’ve been in California, my tags have expired, causing the complex to label my van “abandoned.” Though I’ve explained my situation, they’ve explained that only making the tags current will rectify it. This is a bit difficult to handle from several thousand miles away and I resent having to; I pay for that parking spot, AIMCO takes my money and has been told the van’s not abandoned, and new tags will not move the vehicle or bring me home to drive it. It is no more or less “abandoned” by the changing of one single sticky digit when the situation is known and the rent is paid.

So now I sit stewing, knowing that I’ve seen neighboring balconies used for storage, concerned that I’ll be vehicle-free when I return to Nashville, and unsure when my return will be. I am hoping to see a Padres game before I leave San Diego, after all. Wait! Let’s think about this. The bus and trolley lines converge at PETCO Park, so there would be no parking problems; there’s bound to be plenty of shelter under the bleachers; and there are probably no rails to worry about hanging rugs on. Maybe they need a troll.

On second thought… maybe I’ll pass. The upstairs neighbors might get a bit rowdy.

It's Alarming II: The Sequel

A month or so ago, I found myself pacing the early morning sidewalks as I waited for a fire alert to end. Tonight, the alarms went off again. This time, though, there were 9 of us in the apartment, 6 of whom had just arrived from Tennessee -- 2 adult people, 3 of the 10-and-under variety, one barely more than a year old, and all of them trying to sleep after a long flight to California. It was not yet midnight, but to their fresh-from-the-Central-Time-Zone bodies, the Pacific clock was irrelevant. This felt like 2 a.m. Great time for an alarm. Welcome to San Diego! Or, more specifically, welcome to La Apartment Complex.

Amazingly, only adults seemed to stir. Despite the screeching siren, the children, to whom the trip had been a last-minute surprise, remained abed. It was a big day for them, after all. For all save one, it included their first plane ride. And with Disneyland only days away, more firsts are in store. I imagine they'll sleep this soundly on most nights in California.

As before, it was a false alarm and the screeching did, in time, come to an end. I was particularly happy for this, knowing (after a little wrong-side-of-the-locked-door incident) that there would be no rescue via "maintenance" at so late an hour. I had feared that we'd have to wait for the office to open in the morning to find relief. There is no assistance after hours, sorry. The leasing office opens at 9 on Saturdays, thank you for calling. We appreciate your business, please write a large check and deliver it to us promptly; good night. And don't call back!

With everyone back in their beds and a few moments steal-able at the computer, I write this in the wee hours, fully aware that children who would wake earlier than me in any time zone are going to out-wake me by an additional two hours as 6 o'clock here equates to 8 o'clock -- or worse, as 4 a.m. equates to 6 -- in their little bodies. It's going to be a short night for me. But tomorrow night....

Tell my new airbed to get ready. Tomorrow night, I plan on sleeping like those kids. Alarm or no alarm.