Welcome to Paradise (Part 1)

 Shortly before we turned off the highway, I told Jaime that I thought there were less MAGA signs in the rural part of the state than the last time we'd driven through. 

"Fewer," he said. 

The line between work and home has become way too blurred this year so we booked an Airbnb without wifi next to a small, private lake where we could teach Harper how to paddle board without embarrassing ourselves beyond the inherent humiliation of teaching your dog to paddle board. 

After losing cell service, I began reading the thorough instructions our hosts had written us to Jamie from a screen shot. But even in my distracted navigator's role, I noticed the signs. 

The first one posted on our cabin's dead end gravel road said, "We don't call 911." 

They got progressively more or less threatening after that depending on your gun control views and relationship with the lord god. 

The property owners' double wide was the last house on the road other than our slightly older trailer, and I was relieved to see no symbols of conviction on either except for an American flag on their front porch. 

Our host and his beagle were waiting to greet us under a sign reading, "Welcome to Paradise." He was wearing an "America First" shirt. The beagle wasn't wearing anything. I was wearing one that said, "Bad things happen in Philadelphia." 

I don't know if he got the reference, but I certainly got his. 

The owner's real name started with a B, so I'll give him the completely random name Barack to protect his identity. 

Barack thrust out his hand to shake Jaime's and told me I didn't have to wear a mask. I continued wearing a mask. He'd come by to collect some chicken eggs, which was a huge selling point for us. We don't eat eggs at home, but they are an integral part of the Spanish tortilla Jaime had been craving. 

We decided the chickens wouldn't mind if we ate their eggs before we met them, but the geese were a different story. We hadn't known about the geese. 

Barack told us the birds' back story. It was genuinely romantic, and Jaime decided he wanted to try a goose egg. I sent him out to ask our host because the bigger eggs weren't a part of the deal. The menfolk quickly found themselves at an impasse and asked me to come settle the score. 

Jaime learned that sure we could try the eggs, but they might have some premature goslings inside. Barack couldn't understand why Jaime was pooping his pants (his expression) over this, but I could. It was because we couldn't ask Mother Goose if it was okay with her. 

I felt that if I laid several eggs a week with the goose I loved, I would not mind if someone ate some of our babies. Jaime accepted my feelings and we decided to sacrifice the potential life for a novel experience that we felt could bring us closer to understanding our place in the universe. 

Barack was thoroughly confused at this point, but he collected two eggs and rinsed them off in the spigot.

To our relief, there were no overrated but universally handsome goslings in our eggs. We ate well then took Harper for a paddle.    

The Dress Code

 My friend Kelly has a themed fancy dress party for her birthday each year. When she turned 26, the dress code was glitter and flowers. 

And I fucking brought it. 

I wove some roses into a crown, found my sheer dress at the bottom of my closet and hand adhered as many rhinestones as I could fit onto nipple pasties.  

I did it for a combination of people: 

1. My Friend

2. The Guy I'd Just Met (Jaime) 

3. The People on the Street on the Way to the Club

4. The People in the Club 

5. Myself

6. Not My Long Suffering Family  

But more importantly, I looked amazing, felt even better and told someone in the bathroom who'd been hitting on that guy (Jaime) "no" when she asked to borrow my lipstick. It was one of the greatest nights of my life. 

That same guy (Jaime), and I heard about Switzerland's burka ban on the radio this morning. 

Within a year of bedazzling bandaids for my chest, I was standing fully clothed before a classroom of international college students in Parkville, Missouri. The majority were from Saudi Arabia and wanted to improve their English skills before entering bachelor's programs in the U.S. 

My male students didn't stick out too obviously in a college town, but most of my female students were in a hijab or niqab. 

And outside of our floor on campus, that drew some attention. 

After the radio story, I told Jaime that my feelings about head coverings had changed after that teaching experience. He already knew this, so I explained it to him again. 

The Saudi women in my classes were among the most confident, capable and powerful people I've ever met. It was quickly apparent to me that their headscarves were a matter of personal choice and expression. Maybe they had to wear them in Saudi Arabia, but they didn't have to in Missouri where a woman's autonomy over her own body is always sacred and protected. Men don't have any say, and women are not gaslit into voting against their own interests. 

Anyhoo, only one of my students wore a burka. She came late to every fucking class and scared the shit out of me every fucking time. After the split second it took me to realize she wasn't a ghost, I'd say, "Good morning, Nora!" And she'd answer, "Good morning, Miss Emma!" 

To this day, I have no idea what she looks like, and it doesn't matter. 

Because what people choose to wear or not wear just doesn't matter. Unless it's like an AK-47 to a capital building or school or something as whorish as that. 

What does matter is a country of 8.5 million people forcing a dress code upon 30 of its residents. That's not about freedom or security. That's about some racist Swiss. 

What matters is a country mandating women to cover certain parts of their bodies. That's not about religious beliefs. That's about some incompetent misogynists. 

And what matters is a school sending girls home for wearing tank tops and shorts because their education is less important than protecting boys from being held accountable for sexual harassment. 

It's so fucking stupid. I just hope that Nora and I chose to put on a burka and pasties because we wanted to, and that's what we felt most comfortable wearing. But let's be honest, with the amount of adhesive they have to put on those things, Nora won the comfortable contest. 

My Sparkle Queen Kelly 

My New Boyfriend (Who Didn't Have to Cover His Nipples)

My Choice

Judy Garland is Dead!

Last night, Jaime yelled from the kitchen table, "Judy Garland is dead!" 

This post has nothing to do with that. 

We hadn't taken Harper to the dog park for awhile because she had pink eye, and the whole of the Midwest has been smote by god for continuing to let Republicans have children. 

It was -1˚F (-20˚C) when we arrived at the park this morning. The car was trying to tell us that something was wrong, but we didn't listen because we fear taking responsibility for anything. The dog park is part of our Saturday routine along with picking up take out in midtown, so we pushed it.

Conjunctivitis Mary was napping in the back seat when Jaime got out to pick up our bento boxes. Normally, I am thrilled when he volunteers to grab the food, but today was special. We'd also decided to get something sweet from our favorite bakery, and that was far too important a job to trust to the man who once shouted, "Vanilla!," at a girl behind the counter of the most famous ice creamery in Missouri. She and I were both mortified. 

But he pulled vaccine rank on me (he managed to get his first shot) and hopped out. I turned the car back on so Harper and I wouldn't freeze the many nipples we have between us off while we waited.

Cypress Hill was right in the middle of Insane in the Brain when the car died a few minutes before Jaime returned with way too many things. I pretended to know nothing as he tried and failed to start our Sentra several times. 

I called to request roadside battery assistance from AAA, and the operator informed me a driver would contact us shortly. 

We ate every single thing in the first ten minutes of waiting. 

When we finished, Jaime told me to stay off my phone to conserve the battery as he leaned back in his seat and got on his phone. Harper snuggled him, and he started stroking her ears. 

Now that my family and phone were out, I decided to just let my mind take me wherever it wanted, and I was excited about it.  

The first thing I tried to imagine was being paralyzed. We watched Penguin Bloom last night, and even though it wasn't very good, I couldn't shake the willies of how easily life can fuck us. I was bad at being paralyzed. I couldn't not use my leg muscles to shift in my seat and wouldn't let my arms lift completely dead weight. 

The air bag warnings were in English and French. I was surprised at how well I could read the French version checking myself with the English side. Reading French is easier than being paralyzed. 

Then I tried to discern how many flavors I could still taste in my mouth from our lunch, but I could only taste the last thing I ate. I traced all the power lines around us with my finger and then with a pen. It was more fun with a pen. 

By then, Jaime was typing something. I asked about it, and he said he was leaving a goodbye message to a sociologist he liked. He is dying and his children had set up a message board for people to leave well wishes. I asked him if it was really more important to write a man he'd never met than to talk to his wife, and he said yes.  

I thought about the debate my 6th graders had, unprompted by me, this week. Is cannibalism a form of bullying? They were pretty split down the middle. 

The last thing I did before calling my brother was write "help us" backwards in the condensation on the window. It had been over an hour. No one was coming for us. I added the word "please" while he was on his way. 

It took him less than a minute to jump start our battery. He asked if we'd tried to stop anyone in the busy parking lot we were in for help, but we hadn't thought of that. 

He nailed it!

The Vaccine (Part 2) ***Please Read the First Part First***

 While futilely setting up my classroom in October, I found a book called The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. A kid I don't know had written her name all over it, and I wondered what Jazmine had thought about the book. I took it home. 

Henrietta Lacks was born in an old slave cabin in rural Virginia, but she was living in Baltimore when she was diagnosed with cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins. She was 31 years old and had just given birth to her fifth child who had grown alongside the cells that would kill her. She liked to dance. She was buried within the year. 

The small piece of her that wasn't, a small scraping of her cancer, had begun dividing and multiplying months before her death, but she didn't know it. None of her family members did, and they wouldn't find out until many years later. At that point, if we collected all of Henrietta Lacks' nearly weightless, microscopic pieces, they would weigh more than 50 million metric tons. She was 5ft. tall. 

When I was in college, my gynecologist who had patted my knees and told me to keep my legs together called and told me I had HPV. I was devastated not because I was worried I'd develop cervical cancer but because I thought that was the end of my sex life that was just beginning. That same year, I learned that everyone has HPV and received the Gardasil vaccine. I will never get the strain of HPV that killed Henrietta Lacks, and it's because of her. 

My mother's smallpox vaccination scar is on her left arm. It's circular, and I like looking at it. She doesn't remember getting it. 

I asked my friend if she was planning to get the Covid vaccine. She said she was really nervous about it. I said I wasn't nervous at all and that I'd applied to be in the trials. It's easy to be brave when nothing bad has ever happened to you. 

Then she told me this: 

The smallpox vaccine predates Henrietta Lacks. She may have gotten it herself and been immune. It's impossible to know what she was exposed to in life, but every single day of her afterlife, she battles something: polio, cancers, HIV and AIDS, zero gravity in space, radiation from nuclear explosions, cosmetics, tuberculosis, experimental treatments, Covid 19, etc. in Petri dishes and test tubes.  

Henrietta Lacks would have turned 100 years old in 2020. She probably wouldn't still be alive, but she could be. She might have been one of the very first people to receive the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine. Or maybe if she were still alive those vaccines wouldn't exist? 

I don't know how many big decisions she got to make in her life. She certainly didn't get to decide the circumstances that caused her cancer, how her cancer would be treated or if her cells could be used in scientific research. She also didn't get to decide who would capitalize off her miraculous cells. It wasn't her family. It was mostly White people, including myself, who would use them and her story to their benefit. 

If she could have known that the study of that small piece of her would eradicate polio in the US within a few years and worldwide within decades, save millions of children from developing the cancer and receiving the treatment that left her in agony in the last months of her life, help people have the babies they want but can't make on their own and provide hope to billions during a global pandemic, would she have felt scared or proud? Or would she have just wanted her life to be saved? 

The woman who stood in front of me in line for the vaccine was very small, and I noticed the sweatpants we were both wearing were the exact same color. The man who'd given me directions to the building would have said we were wearing red pants, but we were wearing maroon.

The only time I saw her face was when she looked back while the hospital employee was explaining to me that I couldn't get it that day. Through the shine of her visor, I could tell that she was very old and had a very beautiful face. I have no idea exactly how old, but she certainly would have shared some living years with Henrietta Lacks, and I wonder if they would have had more in common than their pants. 

I'm sure the small woman got the vaccine on Wednesday. Her second dose was probably scheduled that day, too, and I really hope she can see her family and friends soon. 

Henrietta Lacks, on the other hand, is still multiplying because she's infinite as long as we let her be. 

https://www.npr.org/2010/02/02/123232331/henrietta-lacks-a-donors-immortal-legacy

https://www.statnews.com/2017/04/14/henrietta-lacks-hela-cells-science/

http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2020/vessels-for-collective-progress-the-use-of-hela-cells-in-covid-19-research/

Skloot, Rebecca. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. New York: Crown Publishers, 2010.

The Vaccine (Part 1)

 The email saying I could register for the Covid vaccine hit my inbox while I was teaching 8th Grade American Government. 

But at the same time, and for the very first time, my students had meaningful questions about their assignment. 

The website kept crashing as I frantically tried to enter my information in between hearing my name called from black, faceless squares on Zoom. One attempt went through. I had an appointment for Wednesday, January 27th at 9:10am. 

The morning of my appointment, I felt elated. I had absolutely no concerns or fears. It was just pure relief. I put up independent work for my students, kissed Jaime and said, "Bye. I'm going to get a life changing vaccine now." 

I got to the hospital right on time despite the ice and snow from the night before and put two quarters in the parking meter hoping I'd bought myself enough time. Then I got lost twice. A nice man gave me directions to the building where they were administering the vaccine. "It has a big purple sign in front of it. Can't miss it." 

The sign was more of a taupey mauve, but I trusted that I was in the right place. 

By then, I was no longer on time so I too excitedly said "yes" when a women inside the entrance asked me if I had an appointment. She told me where to stand, and I got a clipboard. An employee came to collect my paperwork and check me in before skeptically asking if I had any conditions that allowed me to get the vaccine today. I said I didn't but that I'm a teacher and we'd been given the go ahead to register. 

She acted exasperated and explained that they'd realized they didn't have enough of the vaccine the previous afternoon to vaccinate teachers unless they had conditions that put them at a higher risk. 

Okay. Well, I was clearly not at that fucking meeting and quite frankly would have appreciated an email. 

She asked me...and it's very important to me that you know that she asked me...if I wanted to speak to the supervisor. 

This Karen did, so I parked my ass aside to wait for the supervisor. It was during this time that I could finally look down the line I had been standing in. Not only was I the youngest person, I was the youngest by decades, maybe centuries? I was clearly also the healthiest and among the wealthiest despite my sweatpants and serious split ends. But you can get away with those things in your youth. 

Jesus Christ, Karen. 

I got information from the supervisor detailing the list of conditions I thankfully do not have and an explanation that teachers are in Phase 1B- Tier 3: Critical Infrastructure not Phase 1B- Tier 2: High-Risk Individuals and that they only had enough for them...hopefully. 

I spoke to my HR director and sent her a photo of my hard copy, another list in history that might actually decide who lives and who dies, because I didn't want my colleagues to be surprised if they were lucky enough to be turned away, but I also didn't want to discourage them from trying if they weren't so fortunate. 

I wasn't disappointed anymore. I just wanted to get home, but I couldn't find my car. 

When I finally got back to it, I had one minute left on the meter. Fuck yes. I'd timed it perfectly. 

The Things We Don't Want Back

Disclaimer: This post has been edited to delete the name of an abuser, rapist and racist. We don't want him back. 

For the first time in our lives, Jaime and I have really started to plan for the future, and the only reason we're doing this is because 2020-2021 won't allow it. 

Q: Should we sell the house after we pay it off or rent it to traveling nurses? 

A: Well, if it weren't for this doggone virus, we could convert a church in the Basque Country into a vacation home with a paella oven and skate park.  

Q: Should we have a kid? 

A: Well, why not? The community could help us raise it to be anti-racist, and they'd be at least trilingual. We'd dress it in non-binary clothing until it teaches us who they are, but alas, Covid. 

After 10 months of this, we're annoying even ourselves, so we've switched to planning what we will not return to even when it's safe, and that's much more fun. 

Concerts are pretty high on our list.

We came to this understanding after I told Jaime about my experience at a goth rock show when I was 16 having no way of knowing then that my future spouse was simultaneously performing trash metal concerts shirtless in Spain.

Still want us to have kids? 

I'd gone with my high school boyfriend who was imposing and a pretty good creep block, but realistically, what chance does an 18-year-old boy have at a concert that catered to Incels? 

That spooky rapist put on a fucking fabulous show, and I was really into it until the first time the crowd broke the front barricade. The barrier was fixed, but the crowd broke through again. After the third time, we saw a helicopter take off from behind the stage, and assuming their abusive nymph king was in it, the concert-goers started to riot. 

Being at the level of most every one else's armpit was suffocating and scary. My boyfriend was trying to block me from the worst of it, but he was also looking for a way out of the crowd. It was really the person behind me who was protecting me from the crushing sea of goth Midwesterners. 

In a quick letup of the chaos, I glanced back to see who'd been so thoughtful. 

It was Charles Manson. 

I am not kidding. Between his two crazy eyes was a swastika. Thank goodness it was Halloween. 

Anyway, I repeated versions of this experience for years getting drinks spilled on me, strangers' penises pressed against my back and even crowd surfing close enough to Billie Jo Armstrong to realize it was not worth it before doing it for another decade or so. But this time I swear I'm done. 

Jaime says this shirt-on photo is from one of 

his rock concerts and not from his trash metal days. 

Teenage Emma would not have had a chance in hell.

Ketchup and Other Crimes Against Humanity

 Jaime is pretty forgiving of American culture, but like every immigrant, he has his grievances. 

"There's just a lack of an understanding of refinement," he explained as if it were news to me. 

He was talking about our flavor combinations, but he made sure to include plenty of examples outside of the culinary arts. 

I'd just dropped off some gingerbread Trumps at our neighbors', and, like always, I returned with a grocery bag full of food. This bag was heavier than usual because one of their mothers had remembered us and sent some Christmas snacks. 

It was the white chocolate peppermint popcorn that really sent him. 

"Mint's only place is in tea as far as I'm concerned. And chewing gum. Chewing gum is fine, but Americans put it in everything. The only thing that's missing is your precious ketchup!" For the past week, he'd been angrily shaking dark chocolate covered pretzels into a mug of oat milk for his afternoon snack. The bag that came with our latest Imperfect Foods order included little bits of crushed peppermint folded into the chocolate, and he was fucking livid. 

I only recently learned about his aversion to this particular combination after I bought a bag of peppermint bark at Costco. I'd bought them for our mail person, lovingly placed eight pieces in an envelope and clipped it to our box. 

I showed him the bag of the remaining 790 squares and feigned disappointment that we'd have to eat them all. "I'm not eating that. You'll have to do it yourself," was his response, and suddenly, it didn't sound fun anymore. 

Chocolate and peanut butter is another one he can't abide. Really, peanut butter and anything. This isn't unique to him. Even though they have a better name for it, peanut butter (mantequilla de cacahuete) is very hard to find in Spain, and I had to defend peanut butter and jelly to every Spaniard I met. 

It wasn't just that they thought PB&J sounded gross. It sounded so abhorrently sickening to them that they thought we made it up for television shows but didn't actually eat it. 

These and more were brought up during his surprisingly long diatribe, and I think the Colombian Exchange was mentioned at least twice. 

I let him get it out of his system because (1) it was very funny, and (2) a couple hours before, I had to coach him through spitting into a small vial for his Covid test. 

"Tilt your head forward! No, forward not back. Stop blowing bubbles! The bubbles are just air! You're filling the tube with air," are some things I had to say, and you just can't take someone like that seriously no matter how refined his tastes are. 

This is a gingerbread Trump. 

A note from Jaime: His final word on the subject is "snarf". If you don't know what snarf is, it's baked Fritos covered in peanut butter and corn syrup: a Midwestern family's delight and a Valencian's waking nightmare.