That Awkward Age

Hello, Lindsay -- Just Call Me Char!

I've got a theory why Southerners were often given double first names when I was a kid.

That's because good Southern ladies didn't cuss. and when they got mad at their kids, they needed nice long names to yell in combination with their last names to take the place of profanity, as in, "Charlotte Gail Benge -- stop reading Shakespeare by flashlight!" (I just made that up. I can't recall that ever really happening.)

Otherwise, they would have just imploded.

I was called Charlotte Gail for six years by my parents until I went to first grade where I was burdened with the ridiculous task of having to print my whole name ten times every morning with a brick-sized pencil on triple-lined paper. I suffered from carpal tunnel syndrome before it had been invented. Always the practical one, I got wise to my plight and realized that if I cut off my first name I was shaving 50 percent of my work load! An efficiency expert at so young an age.

My parents, especially my father, who had given the ephemeral me that name before he's had a wife in which to plant me, were not thrilled when I came home from school one day and announed that I was no longer "Charlotte Gail," but simply "Gail." It was my first act of rebellion. They gradually accepted my preference, but I still have a 94-year-old aunt who calls me Charlotte Gail. (Southern ladies, not having an alterntive to cussing, don't give up easily.)

After my first marriage ended, I proudly laid claim to my maiden name. Then when I remarried, I considered keeping that name, but it became confusing because my son from my first marriage had one name, I had a second and my new husband had a third. Then Bob expressed a desire to adopt Abram, changing his name to his, with whom he shared no DNA, and mine would be different from theirs. Too weird. Perhaps I would hypenate mine -- Gail Benge-Kent. Too long. 

So we all became Kents. I thought an added benefit would be that the nice, short Anglo-Saxon name would never have to be spelled for anyone. Not so. Now they spell it "Kintz," "Bent," "Cut"... Some dangerously approaching the spelling of a word where I will not go in a PG blog like this. "Like Superman! ... you know, Clark Kent!" I often find myself having to explain. Geesh.

As I obtained my MFA in Creative Writing, I began to dream about seeing my name as an author on the many books I would surely published. Curious, I checked to see if anyone else was publishing as "Gail Kent."

Yes, indeed. There is a deceased author named Gail Kent. And by deceased, I mean she was deceased when she became an author. Really. A book called, "In Death We Do Not Part," by Marshall and Gail Kent is a New Age book about a woman named Gail Kent who died and then channeled an account of her life after death through her husband Marshall.

I read the book, and it's quite interesting, but call me old fashioned. I may get reviews calling my writing DOA, but I don't want to be confused with a dead writer.  Lord knows, I've worried that I may be dead before I ever get published. There is some comfort in the idea that I might be able to publish once I get to the other side, but I'd just as soon differentiate myself from this other Gail Kent.

I just heard that Lindsay Lohan, following in the footsteps of Oprah, Beyonce, the artist formerly known as Prince (now known as unpronounceable gobbledygook) and Cher, has decided to drop the last name and go by "Lindsay."  I'm thinking "Gail" is just too pedestrian a name to go that route, so I'm thinking of working with my "legacy name," Charlotte," which is just a bit too long. How about "Char"?

So now I only need the 400-page manuscript -- and the Betty Ford Center rehab tour -- to go with it. Whaddya think?

Photo by jingdianmeinv1

Letter

 

Nobody 

writes  

anymore.

They’ve stopped 

teaching cursive

to school kids. 

Did you know?

An antiquated waste 

for the

computer-aged.

I find it difficult to perfume

electronic communiqués. 

Zeros and ones 

lack olfactory 

translation. We’re 

deprived of crisp white 

vellum, like sheets 

we once loved in

in Innsbruck.

Remember?

Après ski

we were 

all knee-and-elbow summits

unter dem Federbett

a study in angles and slopes

ascenders and descenders.

Single beds

jammed together

created our own unlined landscape.

Which is the natural state –

passion or its aftermath?

I read that falling in

love is akin

to mental 

illness. Myself, I 

choose messy strikeovers,

D’Nealian failures 

to predictable keystroke

legibility.

Well, it’s late.

The weatherman 

scrawls on the screen, says

“tomorrow’s temperature

will take your heart

away.” Impossible.

My lungs are empty,

my breath sealed in this 

envelope.

(Again: pulled from my deep files.)

Photo: LaurenV.

Conscriptionis Interruptus

My fingers poised over 

f-d-s-a-j-k-l-;

as my high school typing teacher 

taught.

I wait for inspiration

but only interruptions come.

A call from my son, excited 

about his new job selling Chevys;

today is his birthday, number 27. 

He’s scoping out used cars for me

to find one less used.

“Got a six-cylinder in good 

condition, 

low mileage, a nice pewter paint job.

Peppy, real peppy,” he says. 

I forget to wish him happy birthday

so I call back on his cell. 

“Labor Day and it’s your birthday,” I say,

and he gets the irony.

His daughter, my granddaughter, downstairs calls, 

“G.G., where are you?”

“Up here, Honey, in my office writing; 

please watch cartoons.

Sponge Bob is on.”

She climbs muffling carpeted steps:

one-two

one-two

then run run run run on

hardwood to the swivel chair, 

and, “Spin me around, G.G.” 

Pigtails fly.

I fix her snack and get more coffee

but first empty the dishwasher

and wake my teenager

sleeping late the last day before school starts.

He hasn’t finished the summer reading and declares 

it will be okay; 

he has read the Spark Notes. We argue.

“Keep her down here then,” I say.

“I’m trying to write.”

He snarls.

I stare at the cursor 

a vertical eye blinking 

mocking me in rhythm with 

a song I can’t get out of my head.  

I remember that phenomenon is called 

an Ohrwurm in German: Ear worm.

Such a perfect word in another language,

and I wonder why there isn’t an English equivalent.

The green fuzzy frog perched on the monitor 

with the duck and bear wait

patiently for me to perform 

on the keyboard like a pianist

but my brain’s stiff and there’s no music.

Cheyenne again.

She shows me the grape 

in her mouth. 

“I need apple now.”

The phone again:

my husband at work. 

“How about lunch at 12:30 at Wendy’s?

Meet me with the kids

if you’re not doing anything important.”

And I agree: 

“OK. Nothing important happening here.”

Just a thousand paper cuts on my soul.

(Another one from the deep files.)

Photo/illustration: orkboi

I Spent Eight Years and $25K for an MFA and All I Got Was This Stupid Blog

It’s been a year since I graduated with my master’s degree in writing. To get this degree, I spent a lot of money I didn’t have, gave up every spare moment I wasn’t working at my job, drove through the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel at peak traffic hour, and sat through weekly workshops where would-be writers ripped out their hearts and served them up to each other to be stomped on.

In the nicest possible way, of course. And all for the sake of the art.

I’m still on the department email list, and periodically I get updates about the accomplishments of students and alumni. This one’s got a new novel coming out. That one’s just won a big award.

I’m very happy for them.

Except I want to rip out their hearts and stomp on them. I mean that in the nicest possible way, of course.

I’m feeling a bit John McCain-ish. I’m much older than most of them, and I’ve wanted to be a published writer all my life, and here these young whipper-snappers are, making it to the White House – I mean Random House – before it’s their turn.

They’re annoying in the same way that those drivers behind me in the merge lane pull out and go around me rather than waiting their turn. If there’s not a law, there should be.

Now that I’ve got the degree, I’m spending most of my time trying to figure out how to pay off the credit card on which I charged my tuition and books, rather than writing the Great American Novel. By the time that is paid off, I should be well into dementia.

So here I am with my blog, giving it away for free. But there are intangible rewards.

Just the other day, my husband was getting testy, and all I had to do was warn him: “Don’t make me blog about you.”

That’s power worth a National Book Award. Almost.

Photo: dbdbrobot