In this house, we do our own plumbing. And when the sewer line backs up, the drill is messy, from mopping a floor full of toilet contents to driving hoses in that are soon covered with nasty blackness, which soon covers us with nasty blackness.
If I could be anywhere, it would be in a late 50's – early 60's nightclub with a great band playing latin inspired swing. Me, in my sheath dress, teased bouffant and cha-cha heels, dancing with nice looking people in suits, the music just lifting me away from daily cares to someplace pretty & passionate.
As I mop the shit, I put on Louis Prima & Prez Prado, and at least in moments I am carried away by Sam Butera's big and beautiful horn. A woman is a woman, but a man ain't nothing but a male, and that's why she learns to jump, jive and wail.
The job here, of course, is to figure out how to manage my mother, whose shortness of breath is worse since we got back from the hospital — she hasn't been upstairs to her bedroom in 24 hours, sleeping on her recliner in her robe — and how to manage my father, who needs an assistant plumber to understand his directions, and execute the work that isn't as easy at 81 years old.
But sometimes, I even get a glimpse of a me that no one else can see, when my hips swivel and I smile at the band, forgetting that my teeth are rancid and cracked.
But then, well, then, there is the plumbing to get back to.
More shit to mop, eh?
Callan 