With All The Lights Still On (Ghost Story, repost)

This is an old story from 2009 that I am reposting for a dear, sweet friend! The story still stands, but ages and life are way different 🙂

 

With All The Lights Still On

There is a dead bird on my front porch and I firmly believe that FedEx has avoided leaving my much-awaited package because of it.

My front door is surrounded by glass windows, the one above the door being the widest. It is this window that birds, it seems, cannot refuse smashing into, often causing them to die and burdening me with a fresh carcass at my door. Birds are all fancy feathers and songs till they’re lying dead at the entrance to your home. Then they’re just a nuisance; just stupid flying rats.

The sound created by birds hitting my window has never made it onto my list of dismissable house noises. It is loud, firm, and I confuse it with the sound of my front door shutting. And – if you couldn’t see this coming from ten miles away- I usually physically freeze, stop breathing and chalk it up to, yes…

a ghost.

If you know me, you’d think me silly for stories’ sake. If you know me well, you know I am deathly afraid of ghosts. Though I’ve never seen one, heard one, talked to one, or received any infinitesimal confirmation that ghosts exist, I am completely convinced that I am on the continuous verge of being haunted. Sure, who hasn’t slept for a week after watching The Grudge or refused to return a scary movie because the cover art is visibly ‘uninviting’? Who hasn’t, in their adulthood, slept at the foot of their parents’ bed after being unforeseeably subjected to a commercial for Mothman Prophecies? And really, when wasn’t the last time you made your mom and best friend come over to your house while you moved because-you claimed- a ghost was using your keyless entry to repeatedly lock you out of your car? (Yes, this is a true story. Happened over the summer. And, yes, my shame runs ocean-deep.)

I may not fear short skirts, competition, public speaking or public drunkenness, saying how I REALLY feel, admitting mistakes, falling off the bar or karaoke. But ghosts? Just.. Plain. Frightening.

On our recent trip to North Carolina I forced my sister and son to hear countless episodes of my favorite radio program This American Life. One episode, titled Fake Science, featured a story on amateur ghost hunters as well as audio of what they claimed were ghostly voices. In the back of my mind the bell of probable indecency rang being that I had a six-year-old in the car, but, really, I thought, Are you ever too young to be terrified? I have this horrible habit of considering my son adult-like, like me, forgetting that I myself am not much tougher than any average, dopey little girl.

For the entire duration of the program I reconfirmed with my son that he was not scared. No, he said, and asked even that I replay the audio. Here is when it’s a good thing that world leaders don’t call on me in times of national crises, because if my answer isn’t, “Fuck it! Let’s drink!” my default resolution is going to be, “Paralyzing fear is no excuse!” In other words: Despite anyone else’s presence, I can’t resist anything that interests me.

So we listened and discussed and reached our own unworldly conclusions. Then, so I thought, we dropped it.

My son instantly changed in the dark. That night he cowered at shadows and harbored tears of terror in the corners of his eyes which skewed his perceptions and caused him not to leave my side. Finally I told him it was time to take a shower. In the storm of refusal that set in, my son screamed, cried, even clawed his way out of the shower and gripped me with the finality of rigor mortis. “Please don’t leave me,” he begged, screaming. “Pleeeeeease!!!” My initial anger was broken by his desperate action. As I held my son in all his vulnerability, my heart broke, and, still holding him, I stepped into the shower. I was fully clothed: jeans, tennis shoes, t shirt, hat even. I stood with him for(what seemed like)ever, reassuring him over and over and over that “There are NO such things as ghosts,” and in that very breath seeing my arms full of goosebumps and resisting the urge to look over my shoulder to perhaps see some phantasmal figure shaking its head at my hypocrisy.

How is it, I questioned myself, that I got here like this? What course of action ultimately led me to be standing fully clothed in a shower, washing a crying six year old, claiming that the very thing I am ultimately, completely, and unequivocally afraid of does not, in any way, exist?

Aiden and I stood across from each other on the bathroom floor, each pitiable in our own respect. “You’re all wet, Mommy,” he said with a look that showed he knew I had just endured something unpleasant and unnecessary and may be on the verge of snapping into complete hysterics. The truth is: I was angry. I was angry at me because I do so many things I know better than to do, I do them with little thought, and my doing them causes upset in other people and reverts much more heartache back onto me. I was angry at me because I had to stand there in all my cowardice and explain to my son that I am scared too, that I have to choose to be brave, explaining to him in a web of words that I’m something simply stuck inbetween a woman and a child.

My best conclusion- my punishment of sorts- was dripping wet clothes and a bit tongue. Perhaps it is my own unwillingness to face my own fears, perhaps it is my complete disregard for other people on the fatuous premise that a little raunch never hurt anyone. But I do know this above that: You can’t cause a problem and blame anyone else for yourself being showered in its consequence.

I went into my room alone and laid in bed barely-breathing still with all the lights on, checking the hallway for any ghosts that may happen to pass by.

How’s My Driving?

I saw this on my drive: a truck bed carrying a truck bed pulling a truck bed carrying a truck bed. It was almost too much absurdity for me to handle. I was sure I was passing the ends of the earth.

So, last week I made plans to watch my son’s final cross country race in Knoxville, Tn.  My son is living with his dad this school year, while my life steadily declines in the hopes of some veritable phoenix rising from the ashes of it. But that is not yet the case. It seems as though, daily, things get wronger and wronger.

To be at the race with time to spare, I had to leave Louisville no later than noon.  I set my alarm for 6:30am, and promptly hit the snooze until after 10am. I have time, I thought.  Laziness is not a good platform for reason.

So before I left, I tried to tie up some loose ends to feel less overwhelmed. I went to pay my court costs for my DUI, only to find that since it was a BANK HOLIDAY I couldn’t move money from my savings to cover it. I don’t understand this. I was trying to make a fucking ELECTRONIC transfer. It’s not like there’s a mouse in the middle of this deal, spinning in a wheel to make my money physically move from one place where MY money is to another place where MY money is.  All an electronic transfer does is make numbers move. It’s not even real cash, it’s just numbers. But I guess numbers need a holiday too.

I did manage to drop my comforter off at the cleaners, which was good because I was starting to feel pretty filthy for sleeping next to a massive red wine stain. Which also served as a reminder that I feel fine with drinking wine in bed. Which served as a reminder that I am a complete and utter sloth.

While driving around all day, I did what I usually do which is drain my phone batteries by being feverishly addicted to all forms of media one can access from a phone.  Texting everyone to say nothing, calling people to whine and bitch about nothing, checking your facebook interminably because I’m obsessed with you…. These are the important things that make my battery go from fully charged to about 10% life within 2 hours.  But, No sweat, I thought to myself, that’s what car chargers are for.

My last task of the morning was to get a new car charger, as I had left mine in the car of a friend. So, I went to AT&T to buy a new one, not wanting to make the 20minute drive to pick mine up from my friend. I got into my car, plugged the thing in, and nothing. There was no juice in that Hi-C box. So, I went in and I started like heckling the guy like it’s his personal fault the charger is defective, he tested it, and said it was fine. I refused to believe this, because when I set my mind to something, I have a hard time giving up the dream.

So, I huffed off to find my friend at work to locate MY car charger. Because I’m  100% sure MY car charger will work and everything else is the store’s fault.

No.

I got my car charger from my friend, plugged it in, nothing again. So my friend explains: “You might have a fuse out.” Like I have time to deal with this. ANOTHER thing. ONE MORE fucking thing.

By this time it’s 12:15pm. I’m 15 minutes behind schedule, it taking 4 hours to get to Knoxville and the race being at 4:30pm. Still, though, I knew I could make it if I left no later than 1:00pm.

So, I searched for a solution the Allison way: by freaking out, calling everyone I know, and yelling.

Though I may appear to have it together, I assure you, I don’t. I was fiercely committed to the idea that I could not drive to Knoxville without a charged phone. A million worst-case scenarios ran through my mind: getting a flat tire 15 miles from the nearest service station, getting into a wreck and the other person passes out and I can’t call 911, getting somehow kidnapped by an angry gang of Mexicans who force me to traffic drugs, alien abduction…. I don’t know. But I was sure all of these things would happen if I didn’t have my phone.

One of my friends simply said, “Just go, Allison. You’ll figure it out. Just go and worry about it when you get there.” That answer seemed too easy and to make too much sense. In my mind, everything is arduous and anywhere I’m not familiar with is like the movie Labyrinth, with its impossible mazes, riddles, creepy puppets, and of course a super sexy David Bowie at the end.

The clock was then reading past 1:30pm. I called Aiden’s dad, almost cancelling. He, too, said, “Just come, meet me here, you’ll get here when you get here, even late.” So, against my internal sense of impending disaster, I got on the road… 8% battery to spare.

Before I left, I stopped back at AT&T to pick up my only phone-charging option: a solar-powered phone case. The sun was out, the phone charger boasts 8 hours of extra life, and so I threw $100 at the problem, snapped my phone into it, and set it on the dash.

I’ve never owned anything solar-powered, as I am not a hippie and have gotten on well with electricity for 29 years, but I’m beginning to think the sun is full of shit. This case did not charge, and in fact lost what little power it had within an hour, draining my phone of 3 extra precious percents of power. As I read the instructions, it stated that the solar-powered charger must first be wall-charged BEFORE it can be solar charged. So, wait, what? What’s the point? If you need power to solar-power, then what good is solar power? No good, I realized. That’s why the sun goes down at night. It has to be plugged in.

So, I’m on the road and I’m listening to Less Than Jake and I’m trying to be steady and stoic and not shrivel into a sniffling ball of bratitude.  As I headed down the on ramp to 64, I passed a hitchhiker who promptly gave me the  middle finger. Really? Could things possibly get any more totally fucked up? Even the hitchhiker was foreboding, and I was certain that I was heading towards disaster.

But the thing was, the thing that kept me all along the while, was thinking about how disappointed my son would be if I didn’t show up, even late. I had to disappoint him the weekend I got my DUI, missing an event I promised to make because of my own irresponsibility. And he didn’t ask me to come to his race, I made that commitment, I told him for weeks I would be there.  I just couldn’t bear the thought of disappointing him AGAIN, as I know I’ve been such a disappointment in so many ways over his 9 little years on this planet.

As soon as I arrived in Knoxville, my phone completely died. Though I had the wherewithal to hand-write directions to the race location, and though I thought I was thorough, I missed some specifics on the last part of which interstate to take.  At the crossroads, I held on tight and went with the wind, immediately being sure I had taken the wrong exit.  I began to sweat, becoming more and more desperate, no phone to check directions or even call for them, no idea how long I would drive until I could turn around.

4:26pm, the clock read. I’ve lost this battle.

Just as I had given up hope, I looked up to realize the next exit, the one at which I was going to turn around, was actually THE exit, my exit, the right exit. My heart swelled with a weird form of gratitude and my eyes welled with tears, and I just cried a little in the relief of it. That’s the thing about Me vs. The Universe: we are always butting heads. But somehow, when the Universe gives me all kinds of shit and I choose to move along with it, the cosmos give me a strange sort of pity-pardon at the eleventh hour and I end up coming out ok.

I looked at the clock: 4:29pm. One minute. The Universe gave me one minute.

I parked about a mile away from the race site, this particular race being attended by over a thousand people. So I got out of my car, and I ran. I ran in the rain with no umbrella, in a white top and my favorite Frye leather boots. I was soaked to a visible bra and ankle-deep in mud when I arrived at the meeting place, my attempt to look like a put-together mom trumped by the elements.  I looked everywhere, no sign of them, no sign of what race was going on, panic again setting in. I was sure they’d raced, and I was sure I’d missed it.

Just then, I heard, “Allison, Allison!!” It was my ex, running at me “They boys are about to start!” He wasn’t at the meeting place because my son was at the start line, running, literally within two minutes. I had just enough time to get to the start, hug my elated son, and watch him take off.

When I saw my son running towards the finish line, I could see the determination and pain in his face, his little body wittering with the empty-fuel shake of being pushed beyond its limit. I knew what he was doing: he was trying with everything in his little self to impress me.  Because he loves me so much. Because despite all my shortcomings as a mother, he wants my attention, my praise, and my love above everything.  Because he was so happy I was there to watch him.

I guess that’s the thing about unconditional love: You can be shitty six-ways-sideways and still be worthy of it.

He came in second for his school, timing a mile in 7 minutes and 12 second, over a full minute better than his best mile previous.  So there I was, in now-ruined boots and a see-through top, hugging my sweat-soaked son in the pouring, cold rain, and I doubt I’ve ever felt happier than I did in that moment.

As we were driving back to the hotel, I said to Aiden, “I can’t believe I made it.” I hadn’t stopped, I hadn’t peed all day or eaten or anything. If I had, if I had just been two minutes behind, I would have missed the whole thing. Two minutes. And I almost, almost…. I was two minutes away from never leaving Louisville.

“I knew you’d make it, Mom”, he said. “Whenever I would think about it, I knew, I had the feeling you’d make it.” And I wondered: If there is an all-driving force governing what I believe is chance and circumstance, was it his determination, his positivity, his unwavering belief in my making it that ultimately made it happen, when I was two minutes shy of almost giving up?

Whatever it was, we drove to our hotel, happily, hungrily and soaking wet to the bone. There we ordered a ton of room service, dried off, plugged in all our electronic devices, and fell asleep…

Everything recharging.