And riding horses is safe? Hello? Anybody else remember Christopher Reeve?
Now I’m ticked. I’m working hard here to find some common ground. I’m doing my best “like me” dance. And I’m still a day late and a dollar short (make that a few million dollars short) for this chick. Juicy doesn’t want to chat; she wants to pontificate. Not something this Jersey girl and her Carmela Soprano twang take kindly to. And so I let her have it. Lock, stock, and two smoking North Bergen barrels.
“Yeah, spinal cord injuries are the pits,” I said, hitting her with my best Valerie Harper-meets-Fran Drescher delivery. “But they’re not nearly as frequent in football as they are in riding. Horseback riding. Not riding the subway. Don’t want to make that mistake again! Although, you know,” I added, leaning in conspiratorially, and channeling every ounce of Manhattan-meets-Moonachie melodious-ness I can muster, “with the way those cars jerk back and forth, sending people flying, I’m surprised there aren’t more broken necks.” I pause to catch my breath and enjoy the fact that she can’t seem to get hers. “But really, when it comes to football, it’s so much safer than soccer or rugby or horseback riding. At least my boys are covered in pads. With serious helmets on their heads. Your kids are wearing what, a hubcap? I’ve got to hand it to you, though. You Southern gals don’t raise no sissies!”
A direct hit. And all without Tony’s (or even Hemingway’s) help. I can’t imagine we’ll be invited back, but I don’t care. Kudos, Carm. You’re now a made mom.
Hot News from Hicksville
TO: Friends & Family
FR: Starstruck Suzy
Date:Tuesday, 11:30 a.m.
Subject: Hollywood in the hinterland
Hey, all,
Who knew Virginia was a hotbed of Hollywood types? Certainly not me. I toiled for ages in New York City without ever seeing so much as a Rockette outside Radio City Music Hall, and now, just weeks into our Virginia adventure we run into Robert Duvall.
That’s right, dining in the Rail Stop Café (an establishment, we’ve come to find out, he used to co-own) was Tom Hagen himself. You know, Marlon Brando’s consigliere in The Godfather.
Hemingway, Casey, and I played it cool and kept the bumping into each other, whispering, furtive glances, and finger pointing to a minimum. Cuyler, on the other hand, completely flipped out. Seems he recognized Mr. Duvall from Lonesome Dove. He and Hemingway have been watching the miniseries on DVD, and Cuy’s so completely enthralled that for a minute we feared the family madman would run up and bellow, “Did you have to kill your horse?”
To our great relief he simply stood there staring, then dashed to our table, where he threw a spectacular fit over the lack of French fries on the menu. We thought it was a particularly Oscar-worthy performance; one that earned him the not-so-coveted Swat on the Ass award. I don’t think Mr. D. noticed, but as long as the maitre d’ missed it there’s always next time.
—Susan
Chapter Seven
TOSS ME BACK, I BEG YOU!
Between the bizarre cocktail party blather and the styles that pass for fashion around here, I find myself flopping around feeling like a fish out of water. The kids are doing fine; making friends, forgetting their homework, and generally showing us that the trauma of the big move is behind them. And Hemingway’s gotten into his groove, too; attending cattle sales, lunching at the Livestock Exchange, and taking seminars on such curious subjects as manure management and cattle breeding basics.
Of the four of us, I’m the most adrift and disorganized. I’ve got a million things to do, and yet I often waste the day wandering around Oakfield, making lists, losing them, and trying to avoid the kitchen.
Not because the kitchen isn’t gorgeous; it is. And not because it doesn’t contain every gourmet goodie imaginable; unfortunately it does. It’s just that it’s home to the massive pile of (to my way of thinking) bad news Nancy and Doug devour on a daily basis.
OK, OK. I have a confession to make: I am not a newspaper reader. This probably doesn’t come as a huge surprise, considering my background in magazines, but my preference for glossy pages has more to do with the fact that what’s inside most women’s books31 is fluff, and what’s inside most newspapers is hard, cold, frightening fact.32
Anyway, since we’re still living with my brother-in-law and he’s in the newspaper business, there’s no escaping them. They’re piled high on the kitchen table, competing with my kids to see what will kill the two-hundred-dollar, dry-clean-only, cream-colored tablecloth from Crème de la Crème first: crushed Count Chocula or newsprint.33
I do my best to dodge the myriad dailies that are delivered every morning, but sometimes, like today, we run head-on into each other over coffee and I catch a headline that sends me reeling.
Ready?
WHITE SUPREMACISTS SEEK RECRUITS. And I was worried there wouldn’t be enough clubs here in cow country for my kids to join. Silly me. Who needs the Boy Scouts when you’ve got skinheads?
Or how about this one: PANEL RAISES PENALTY FOR DRUNKEN HUNTING. According to the article, it’s now a Class One misdemeanor (punishable by a $250 fine and confiscation of your cooler) to get totally soused and run around with a rifle. (Whew. Not only is this good news on a personal level, it’s also the perfect conversational tidbit for the next cocktail party. If we ever get invited to one again.)
Frankly, the local newspapers are enough to keep me wondering what kind of world I’ve entered. But just to make sure I stay completely shell-shocked, Hemingway’s subscribed to more than a couple of popular rural publications. His new favorite? A monthly manual called Grass Farmer.
Now I ask you, who the hell farms grass? You cut grass. You water grass. You fertilize grass. But farm it? And why didn’t he tell me this was what he wanted to do? Had I known, we could have stayed in Ridgewood, stocked up on Scotts Turf Builder, and perfected the patch in front of our house. But no. We had to pack up everything we own and move to Two-Turtleneck and Too-Tight-Pants Land. All this just so he can farm grass? Maybe I should simply start smoking it.
The other tome he’s tucked into lately is Shotgun News. Casey discovered this font of firearm intelligence, ammo, and camo ads at, of all things, the gun show. Yes, the gun show frequented by a bunch of weird Waco types wearing fatigues34 and pretending to be in the military, and folks like my brother-in-law, Hemingway, and Casey, who know they’re not in the military and wouldn’t dream of costuming themselves to the contrary.
Even my husband’s bedtime book reading has gotten bizarre. Right now he’s alternately plowing through both The Plot Against America and Storey’s Guide to Raising Chick-ens. If I find he’s stockpiling feed, I’ll know for sure he’s hatching a plan to use pullets35 to take out terrorists.
I’ve got to hand it to Hemingway, though. For a Dumont boy whose closest contact with wildlife was the keg parties he hosted in high school, he’s totally into this agriculture stuff. At this point he’s read two years’ worth of back issues of a magazine called Progressive Farmer and can speak knowledgeably about the best bull36 for a small herd of cattle, essential tractor accessories,37 and several “fabulous ways to freeze your garden’s bounty!”38 He’s also attended a couple of seminars on something called rotational grazing,39 mastered the ins and outs of cattle auctions (at which it seems you cannot bid on your favorite bovine if you’re not wearing a John Deere or New Holland baseball cap, a mistake he’ll never make again; he learned the hard way that his Giants cap doesn’t cut it), and attended several farm safety and equipment-repair workshops at places like Tractor Supply.40
Sometimes I’ll catch him late at night on his laptop, drawing up grand plans for Nate’s Place. “The goal is to be totally organic and self-sustaining, Sue.” “Uh huh, hon. Sure thing.” (An even surer thing is that I’ve no clue what he’s talking about.) “We’ll get chickens so we can have eggs, and you can plant a vegetable garden.”
I can plant a vegetable garden? I’m unsure we’ve met. Hello, my name is Susan, and I’m a m
anicure addict.
“We’re also going to get goats. They’re tough to fence in, but the milk’s great.” Goat milk? OK, then. You tell the kids we’re going goat. I don’t want them smothering me in my sleep.
“What if we keep pigs,” he continues, “and bees?”
“Sounds good,” I reply, hopping into bed with the Pottery Barn catalog, a mega-pack of Post-it notes, and the memory of Cocktail Party Preggers flashing through my mind. (Thank God one of us had the good sense to get our tubes tied.) “We can grow honey-glazed ham!”
One patented McLook41 later, I’m consumed by my catalog and several copies of Coastal Living. In addition, I’ve come to two conclusions: one, that as soon as Hemingway has this “self-sustaining” farm stuff out of his system we’re moving to the beach, and two, if I still feel like a fish out of water on the water, it might be time to bite the bullet (and buy a bulletproof vest) and go back to the Big Apple.
Saturdays in Suburbia vs. Saturdays in the Sticks
If my mentioning the gun show earlier got your attention, here are several other Saturday in suburbia vs. Saturday in the sticks comparisons that will really blow you away. Surprisingly, at least to me, I’m not completely anti-the country stuff. In fact there are several rural activities I prefer to their more cosmopolitan counterparts.
• Car Show vs. Tractor Show Men in dress shirts and jeans, or men who dress prettier than I do? Hmm. I’m going with the guys in the jeans (and the John Deere-logoed baseball caps). They’ve got just as much money as the Brooks Brothers contingent at the car show, and some of those closed-cab Mahindras are as sexy as any Maserati.
Best way to spend a Saturday: Tractor Show
• Seventh on Sixth vs. the Swineway Speedway One Saturday I’m applauding the collections at the annual fashion week in New York’s Bryant Park; the next I’m cheering on a passel of squealing pigs racing around the Swineway Speedway at the Fauquier County Fair. The difference is night and day, blond and brunet, Balenciagas and work boots.
Best way to spend a Saturday: Seventh on Sixth
• Potluck Dinner vs. Pig Roast I love foraging through my fridge, grabbing whatever’s not too moldy to make a decent dinner, and gathering at a friend’s for a little potluck and Pinot Grigio. But what I really love about it is that there’s no pig involved. Which means there’s no chance I’ll discover a decapitated hog head propped up on a platter with an apple stuck in its mouth, and pass out. Again.
Best way to spend a Saturday: Potluck Dinner
• Westminster Dog Show vs. Poultry Show I feel about dogs at the dog show the way I do about men at the car show. If they’re prettier than I am, that’s a problem. Birds, on the other hand, don’t bother me. Why? Because it doesn’t matter how beautiful their coloring or impressive their lineage; their ET-like feet beat mine in the ugly department any day.
Best way to spend a Saturday: Poultry Show
• Hair Show vs. Hog Show At one you’re treated to the latest in cut, color, style, and shine. At the other you see it on humans. While enjoying champagne and caviar in a four-star hotel, and surrounded by people who smell like a million bucks. Not a million boars.
Best way to spend a Saturday: Hair Show
Chapter Eight
SUPER SUZY
Greetings from snow-covered Oakfield Estate,42 where right this instant six beautiful, hungry deer are digging through the drifts surrounding our Dodge Durango, looking for breakfast. (If I’d known they were going to come this close, I’d have encouraged the boys to drop food outside the car, instead of just in it.) It’s a nice change, though, from the Dachshund-size rodents I used to see running along the subway tracks, toting chunks of discarded cheeseburgers, French fries, and once, a huge stalk of broccoli I watched a mama rat excavate from a crushed container of Chinese food. She dragged it over to her kiddies, and they chowed right down. I was so impressed. Even rat babies know to eat their greens. But my sons? Please. They much prefer something picked from their proboscis than any kind of produce.
Speaking of litter, do you believe there’s no garbage pickup here? None. Nada. Nyet. So folks store it all up—the meal scrapings, magazines, newspapers, plastic bottles, cardboard, clear glass, and green glass—and make weekly runs to the recycling center to dispose of their refuse.
This works fine until you can’t get to the dump. You’re sick. Snowed in. Have a flat tire, or can’t get to your car because it is surrounded by famished fawns. Then those Hefty Cinch Saks seem to multiply overnight. The bags of glass and plastic begin reproducing pretty quickly, too, and before you know it the rising mountain of wine bottles makes you wonder if Betty Ford and not Nate’s Place is where you really belong. Soon your garage43 is filled to the rafters with waste. But amazingly, it doesn’t smell like a trash scow off the Jersey coast. Why? Because the frighteningly stinky stuff is stored in the freezer.
It’s ingenious, actually. And it works. Until the kids pull apart a plastic Food Lion bag frozen solid with last night’s chicken instead of the chocolate ice cream they were looking for.
Having been in Virginia now six weeks, all of them at Doug and Nancy’s, as progress on our house is moving with the speed of flowing molasses, we decided on Friday to see some more of our new state. So we visited Fauquier Hospital in Warrenton. Specifically, the emergency room. A wan shade of green, if you’re wondering, with seats that could use a bit more padding, unless you pack your own as I do.
See, earlier this week Casey was sick. Coughing, sneezing, body aches, runny nose, and watery eyes. The poor kid was just oozing from every orifice, and at some point he oozed onto Cuy. Because by Friday Cuyler was sick. He was OK in the morning, so I took him to school, and then I took Case to the doctor, where he was diagnosed with a major sinus infection.44
OK, so I drop Casey at school45 and head to the pharmacy to have his prescription filled. After driving what feels like a hundred miles, I’m not back at Oakfield five minutes when the phone rings. It’s the nurse at Cuyler’s school, asking me to please come retrieve my disease-ridden offspring.
So I race to school and there’s my younger son, coughing, nose running like a pair of hose, and so hot you could fry an egg on his forehead. I fly immediately into Super Suzy mode46 and call the doctor. They can’t see him. They’re completely booked. Oh, wait, they’ve had a cancellation. He’s in!
Cut to Cuy on the examining table, where this wonderful, gentle nurse is trying to take his temperature. Since Super Suzy uses a Braun Thermoscan, her kids have never had to hold a thermometer under their tongues, and Cuy’s in no condition to get the hang of it now. To further prove this point, he bites down and breaks it. This rattles the nurse and Super Suzy, who both rush to rinse his mouth out with water and confirm the mercury is still where it’s supposed to be and that there’s no glass going down the kid’s gullet. The second thermometer meets a similar fate, and finally we give up and take his temp the old-fashioned way.47
It’s a hundred and three. And the doctor keeps listening and listening and listening to Cuy’s lungs. And checking the oxygen meter on the kid’s thumb. And doing a dozen other doctorly things. And finally he says to me, “You know, when kids present with symptoms like this we usually admit them.”
As Super Suzy mode has begun to fade, leaving me freaked out and fatigued, I have no clue what he means. Admit them to what? College? The kid’s not even old enough to tap a beer keg. What fraternity will he pledge?
And then it dawns on me. We’re going to the hospital. Time to call Super Stu.48
With Super Stu at the wheel, we rush to the emergency room. They’re actually expecting us (yay!), but they can’t take us (boo!).
See, it’s begun to drizzle, and according to the admitting nurse, that means no one in the state of Virginia can control the pickup trucks they’re all tearing around in. So the ER’s quickly getting overrun with all manner of car accidents. And of course those who arrive with a steering wheel protruding from their solar plexus need to be treated before kids
who may or may not have pneumonia.49
So we wait. And wait. And soon the ER is SRO. And just about four hours after our arrival, they come to get Cuy.
Three chest X-rays, one IV—administered while Super Stu has him in a headlock—six vials of blood (“Can I have that back? What if I run out?”), three new stuffed animals, one dose of amoxicillin, and two and a half more scary, exhausting hours later, the verdict is in: Cuy has a serious virus but no pneumonia, thank God. He doesn’t need to be admitted. We’re home free.
Not so fast, folks.
Remember that rain I mentioned? Well, the good news is it’s stopped, so we don’t have to play adult bumper cars on our way back to Oakfield. But the bad news is its friend fog has rolled in to wreak further havoc on our lives.
It’s as if a shroud of cotton gauze surrounds the car and we can’t see two feet in front of us. Cuy’s completely oblivious to the situation and keeps asking me to turn up the volume on the Rolling Stones CD I happen to have in the CD player. Super Stu, who has years of experience driving in a fog—unfortunately usually alcohol induced—is concentrating on driving ohhhhhh sooooooo slooooooowwly while Mick Jagger is describing the overall visibility by wailing “Paint It Black.” As for me, I’m sharing the front passenger seat with GUILT and PANIC, so it’s pretty crowded. PANIC keeps screaming that we’re going to get killed, and GUILT keeps asking me why I didn’t insist the hospital keep Cuy overnight. I try summoning Super Suzy, but her cell phone’s off.
Suddenly, there’s a break in the fog, Super Stu accelerates to an entire six miles per hour, and we nearly drive head-on into a deer. A huge buck, actually, who saunters in front of the Durango like a werewolf emerging from the mist and looks Stu dead in the eye like we’re in his way.
Confessions of a Counterfeit Farm Girl Page 5
