Do you ever feel like a plastic bag
Drifting through the wind, wanting to start again?
I woke with one of those hormonal migraines. Not a great start to the day. My oldest son, who was staying with me, was born 28 years ago to the day, May 8th. It had made a most wonderful Mother’s Day gift. And now he just announced he’s in a severe depression.
Do you ever feel, feel so paper thin
Like a house of cards, one blow from caving in?
I spent the next several hours in a dark room, preparing to go to my youngest son’s fourth audition for a singing competition reality show. My headache was getting worse by the hour and I’m secretly praying for the call from Barnaby letting me off the hook. A call in which he will say, oops, he got the time wrong and it’s done. He will be on this new show or he won’t be, and I can then rest comfortably. But no, that doesn’t happen. At around 4:00 p.m. I walk into my husband’s office at home and announce in a very quiet, suffering voice that I will be heading to the downtown venue. I feel for him since he needs to wake up for work at 4:00 a.m. and tell him he can pass on this one. He offers to drive me anyway. What a relief, I accept the generous offer. I’d have jumped at if I weren’t in such pain.
Miraculously, we make it to downtown Los Angeles in twenty minutes. Crossing my fingers, it looks like things might work out well. We turn onto the right street and suddenly what come into focus are long lines with thousands of human beings. It looks like chaos, though I’m sure there is an order to it all. Dread sets in. I hate crowds. I text Barnaby a frantic message. There is a spooky line of regular people. He will know what I mean. I get a text back from Vice, the other member of his group. He says to tell a security guard that I’m a family member of Wild Thingz. I do, and it helps us get in much faster. We are led into a huge arena and herded here and there like cattle until we find our upper level seats. The rest of the place fills with all the “normal” people who waited for hours in line. They start to chant, Simon! Simon! And suddenly it sinks in what is about to play out. I do not watch reality shows very often, if at all. I have never watched the one this Simon was on before. I don’t, however, live under a rock, so I have landed on the channel a few times, long enough to see him abuse random performers. At this point, I’m terrified of what is about to happen to my kid. I look to my husband with sheer panic. “Is this one of those shows where the guy is REALLY mean?” I want him to answer, no, honey. He doesn’t. He tells me the truth as I start to curl into a fetal position. (more…)