The Great White North

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My favorite time of year is here! The time of year where I no longer have to worry if my ass cheeks are hanging out of the bottom of my shorts. The time of year my frame is no longer a terrain of small bodies of sweat and dried kneetop and elbowtops. A time where I can resort back to dressing like Truman Capote. A time of cardigans and scarves and stockings and pants and soon enough I’ll be bitching about how cold it is even thought it’s only 65.

In two weeks I will be heading up to the Vermont Film Festival with my honey sweetie child (the longer you date and become more comfortable with someone, the more obnoxious nouns you add to their name) for a screening of his first film, Mars. At that time, my mother will take a carload of people including my auditorily-challenged grandmother, the cognitively-challenged Lionel, and the hyper-activelly challenged Jack Russell Terrier named Lucy and meeting us in Burlington.

This will be the first time my mother meets my boyfriend, something that has been bugging her ever since her ex-husband (my father) met him back in June. “Why the hell does he get to meet Geoff first? I’m your mother!” Even Lionel’s son while visiting Austin from Burlington got to meet Geoff before my mother did. The anticipation has built so much that I half expect my mother to start stuttering and blushing while meeting Geoff.  Grandma will most likely say, “He’s such a nice man, but what’s up with that beard? He’s needs to brush it, just like how you need to brush your hair!” and then she’ll chase me with a brush much like she did when I was 5. Lionel will probably be off trying to find ice cream to stick his fingers into, and Lucy will most likely be doing the same thing.

I’ve never been to Burlington, Vermont and I’m excited. I’ve been told it’s like Austin and Ithaca, New York- very much a collegetown. From there I will be driving back with the clan to upstate New York for a week. I’m sad that I was unable to go back North this summer because it is truly one of the most beautiful places in American that time of year. By November it will be an insufferable hell hole filled with pale-ass, grimacing humans and dead nature.

Getting out of Austin will feel good. I’ve definitely become a hermit since taking my writing more seriously and not getting out and experiencing life is detrimental to creative fodder. A trip home always creates enough content for a lifetime. Seeing Lionel will be challenging since his slow advancement into Alzheimer’s is something I’ve only heard about, not seen. I hope that in my week home, I’ll be able to give my Mom and Grandma some relief. When I first moved away, I loved to be babied and lazy while visiting home. Now I’m getting to the age where things are changing and I can’t deny it anymore.

On a side note- my father is now on a first name basis with William Shatner.