I Made People Sad Telling a (Funny) Story

When my father's liver was shutting down, the chemicals released made him feel like there were bugs under his skin - an exquisite kind of torture on top of the insult that was cancer. Marijuana is not legal in Indiana, but it was near Christmas, and...well, Santa apparently knows a guy.

Stoned Santa?

My father was not a pot-smoking kind of man. In fact, he claimed to have made it all the way through the Vietnam War having never tried it, although I suspect he may have been lying. He had pretty strict notions of what was appropriate for a daughter to know about her father.

And my family had a lot of rituals around Christmas Eve. Church. PIzza. White Christmas. An early present. Very wholesome. It was nice.

So, as the holy time approached, and as Dad became more and more uncomfortable, someone (me) may have written a letter to Santa asking him to deliver something that might help take away the bug-crawls. And he did!

This story, then, is really about how my proper father and I very improperly got high together over the kitchen sink on Christmas Eve. It's funny because neither of us really knew what we were doing. It's funny because me, the novice, had to teach my Dad how to use a one-hitter. It's funny because it's a bit of a familial taboo, and because it's Christmas Eve and it's almost like my friend who watches Silence of the Lambs with her family while opening presents. Pot and the Baby Jesus just don't go together in my world.

But I have yet to tell this story in a way that makes people feel the joy inherent in that brief moment. The humor, and the love, and the unexpected intimacy. 

Tonight I tried again. And failed again. 

It may be that this story is many things, but funny, it just ain't.

I Lied to Girl Scouts

Evidence of my betrayal.

My neighborhood is full of Girl Scouts selling cookies. There is one who sets up shop right outside the Starbucks, with a card table and a mildly hovering mother, like a corporate lemonade stand. I managed to NOT buy the latte, but couldn't resist the Thin Mints. Ok, fine. It's once a year. That's not a fail, even though I had declared this to be No Sweets March (only coincidentally occurring with Lent). I suppose it might have been a fail to eat one of the sleeves while waiting for my beer. BUT STILL. That is not the fail this post is about.

Two hours later, I went to the grocery store for cat food and San Pelligrino (of course). Just past the bagger, a rival troop was set up, complete with card table and mildly hovering mother. But - armed with (half) a box of Thin Mints in my bag - I just smiled and wished them luck. On the way out, I was accosted by two more Girl Scouts, members of the same troop, clearly there to ensnare victims going into the store and to guilt those of us who had managed to escape. 

"Buy some cookies?" they pleaded.

And this is where it happened. "Oh, I just did!" I said, showing them the box in my messenger bag. One of them gave me a high five, and the other said, "Gee, thanks!" Or something like that. Possibly less Jimmy Olson-ish.

I lied to them. I bought cookies from their nemesis and passed the box off as their own.

I lied to Girl Scouts.