My Awkward Wit and George H.W. Bush is My B.F.F.

Going back to school was a huge deal to me.  In my young adult years, I never took school seriously, and my GPA was a pitiful because of it.  I decided I needed a small break, and that small break turned into ten years.  After a decade of retail, getting married, having a baby, and a dream to one day own my very own movie theater, I enrolled back in school.

Preparing for my first semester back after such a long gap was exciting!  In my early college days, I admired the "older students" that I shared a class with.  They were there because they wanted to be there.  They took their classes seriously, got good grades, and I respected them.  They were there for a purpose, and now I was there for a purpose.  And maybe, just maybe, being in a classroom with some kids over ten years younger than me would be inspiring!

 I'll inspire the world!

First day of class, I offended one of my classmates.  While I was finally one of the "older students", he was an "older older student"; therefore, in my mind, he was supposed to receive extra respect.  In this particular class, we had to go around and introduce ourselves and ask each other a question from a list made up by our instructor.  If my short conversation with him was turned into a theater production made up of characters called "Me" and "Him", the script would have looked a little like this:

Me: Um, if you could be anyone for a day, who would it be?

Him: Ronald Reagan.

Me: (Laughing slightly) I bet you wouldn't want to be him now!

Him: (Straight faced and looking slightly annoyed) Why would you say that?

Me: (Now embarrassed and wishing I could walk away) Well, because he's dead.

Him: (Silent at first, for what felt like a long time, but probably only for a couple seconds) Yeah, but he did a lot of amazing things in his lifetime.

Yes, the play would have been just as bad as the awkward setting I was placed in real life.  I walked away wishing I could prove to him that I was more than a bad one-liner.  I knew a lot about Ronald Reagan!  He was an actor before he was in politics!  He did The Dark, Dark Hours  with James Dean!

Perhaps this short film wouldn't have given me much credit.

Berlin Wall, Cold War, assassination attempt driven by Twinkies... I'm a human Wikipedia!  The most important bit of information, the one I should have shared, was the fact that I consider myself to be a minor acquaintance of Ronald Reagan's Vice-President.

When I was eight years old, right after the inauguration of George H.W. Bush (former Vice-President to Reagan), I wrote a letter to our new president.  I was a kid and thought scary movies were evil.

Dear Mr. President,

Congratulations on being our president.  I know you will listen to me.  Scary movies are against God.  They give kids nightmares and are bad for everyone.  Can you make scary movies illegal?  

Sincerely,
Brooke  

I didn't know his address, so I trusted that simply writing "The White House" on the envelope would be enough for it to be sent to Washington D.C. and not the tarnished old white house down the block.


A few months went by and I forgot all about The Cause I was so passionate about.  I had more important distractions, anyway.  In elementary school, every holiday was celebrated with a party.  One particular day, my third grade class was celebrating Cinco De Mayo.  We made tacos.


*Side note: Is it weird that we cooked ground beef in class?  This was the 80's.  I'm not sure if the USDA would approve of this nowadays.  I'll find out in a few years when Shisha enters school.  I don't know if I would approve of other children and strange parents stirring up my child's meat.  For me, however, as an eight year old, it was a perfectly unquestionable scenario BECAUSE of the fact that it was the 80's.  It was a good time to be making beef!  

So there I was, mouth full of taco, when we all noticed a beautiful young woman entered our classroom.  It was Super Cool Aunt Sandra, and all the boys in my class dropped their tacos and rice and they stared at her glowing beauty. (Super Cool Aunt Sandra, or SCAS, will be a "character" of stories in the future, including why she was always so "super cool"). I stared, too, wondering what made her grace the presence of the third grade class of Laneview Elementary School.  Shouldn't SCAS be off doing something...cool?  She was  in her 20's, you know.

*Side note:  In the 80's, could anyone just enter a school classroom?  If it wasn't SCAS it could have been anyone.  Scary? 

SCAS approached me with a white sealed envelope.  "Brooke, I came here to give this to you myself." she told me.  "The is a letter from The White House!"

"The White House?" Michael K., my third grade crush, screamed.

"The White House!" the other children shouted!

The rest was a blur of excitement and praise as my classmates kept taking the letter out of my hands before I could open it.  Mr. Garcia, my teacher, finally grabbed it and gave it back to me, asking me to read it aloud, but not before he smiled sweetly at SCAS and asked her if she wanted some tacos.  She politely declined.  She was probably smart to do that.

As I opened the letter, SCAS walked out of the classroom with a proud look on her face.  I made a mental note to myself that I would be  her someday.

The letter contained a photo of George H.W. Bush leaning against a wooden fence with a horse in the background.  

   This is obviously not the actual photo.   I found the picture on a button

while surfing the web for images of what the photo looked like.

 Here you go.

Unfortunately, I have moved numerous times since Cinco De Mayo, 1989.  I no longer have the letter to quote verbatim.  I can summarize, telling you that he talked about the importance of education and how much he cares about our Nation's young people.  He did not address my idea to ban scary movies, nor, as you all could figure out, did anything get done about it.  I'd like to think that he did bring it up during a meeting, but perhaps I should have had a petition with 5,000 signatures or something like that.  It probably is a good thing nothing came out of my Cause.  My husband and grandmother would probably never forgive me if I was The Face of the ban on movies like Day of the Dead, Dawn of the Dead, and Dance of the Dead.


The aftermath was the greatest thing that could have happened to me.  I was the star of my class!  It was only for a day, but what an amazing day!  I was picked first to be on the kickball team.  I was given an extra taco!  Michael K. gave me a tennis ball and told me to give it to "my friend, The President."  


If I called George H.W. Bush up directly, he would have no idea who I was, and probably wouldn't let me sleep on his and Barbara's couch if I showed up at his door.  No matter, I still consider myself an acquaintance and I choose to believe he has my letter in a scrapbook somewhere.

My Daughter's Determination and My Adventures in Going Insane...For a Doll

My 14 month old daughter is obsessed with cell phones.  Recently, she dropped my husband's cell phone on the hard floor, cracked it, and then it went black and never recovered.  In a future blog, I will discuss my feelings about smartphones and how I find them rather unnecessary.  While my phone is not as high tech as my husband's was, I still want to preserve it, especially since it is our only functioning phone.

"Shisha" (the untypical nickname I gave my daughter, which, going forward, I will use to refer to her) was not happy nor satisfied with me as I put my phone up high on her diaper changing station turned stuffed animal shelf.  At first, she cried, which she quickly realized got her no where.  Then she took matters into her own hands.  She pulled all her stuffed animals down, and with all the strength she had in her 23 pound body, she climbed onto the bed, reached her little arms up to the top of the shelf, and pulled her body up to the top.  From there, she grabbed my phone and speed dialed her Nana. 

I do admit, while I worried that this new found strength of hers was going to be a new issue going forward, I also had a sense of pride in her determination for something she really wanted.  I let Shisha bask in the glory of her accomplishment for a small window of time (I stood close by for her safety), and then I calmly pulled her down while she screamed and possibly shouted obscenities in her native baby language.

It got me thinking.  Have I ever been determined for any specific thing as much as she was for my phone?  It took a few minutes, and then I looked to the living room and saw a very cherished object displayed on my entertainment center.

A little over ten years ago, two days before Christmas, I was wandering down the toy section of Wal-Mart.    I passed by the Barbies and scanned over the "Special Edition" dolls from that year.  There was Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, a couple of the less popular members of NSync (poor Joey Fatone), and...WHAT?!?!?  There is was, glowing in the fluorescent lights overhead.  It was James Dean.

As he leaned against the tiny cardboard bricks in the plastic box, he ever-so-coolly gestured me over and spoke to me in his calm and collected voice, "You need me.  I belong on display in your home because I'm James Dean and you love me and must have me.  And you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.  If I wasn't dead and made into a 12 inch piece of plastic, I would take you out on the town..."

"You need me."

 Unfortunately, the $50 price tag became the interference of our love connection since I was shopping for others that day.  I did put him on my Christmas list; however, I never received him under the tree.  I can't blame anyone.  On top of the expense, I'm sure all my presents were purchased by the time I frantically added him to my list in serial killer handwriting.

The day after Christmas, I was on a mission.  I called almost every toy store, Kmart, Wal-Mart, and Target that I knew I could drive to.  Everyone said the same thing: "Sold out."  Sold out?  How could anyone else dare to buy my James Dean doll?  

With a few places still on my list, I gave up.  I was exhausted and couldn't do it anymore.  If it wasn't meant to be, it wasn't meant to be.

That night, I had a dream.  I was walking through an empty Wal-Mart, the same fluorescent lights blinding me as I dragged my feet from aisle to aisle in my flannel Old Navy pajamas and Sponge Bob slippers.  On an otherwise empty shelf, my James Dean doll stood.  His words echoed throughout the store: "Don't give up.  Find me."

   "Find me."

I woke up that morning with one place in mind.  There was one Wal-Mart I haven't called.  It was in a town that was 45 minutes away.  I called and asked to be directed to the toy department.

A woman picked up after being put on hold for 10 minutes.  "Can I help you?"

"Um, yes, I'm hoping you can. You see," I explained, "I've been calling everywhere trying to find this James Dean doll.  I was hoping-"

"Hey," she interrupted in a hushed tone, "hold on just a second, okay?"  I waited, on hold, for a couple more minutes before she came back on the phone.  "He's here."

I tried to hold in my excitement, but it was impossible.  "He's there?" I screamed.  "He's in your store?"

"Yes," she whispered.  "I only have one left, okay?  I can hide him for a day, but that's all I can promise."

"I'll be there in a half hour!"  I told her.  "My name is Brooke."

"Okay, ask for Jeri." Click.

Before I left, I explained to my mom and older sister that I was heading out to get my doll.  My sister, bless her heart, logically tried to talk me out of it.

"You know it's there.  Isn't that good enough?"

In her defense, I would say the same thing to my daughter if she went insane and was on the verge of making a $50 purchase when she didn't even pay her car insurance yet.  But at that point, my mind was already lost.  You couldn't stop me!  I gave her a look that implied that she was the crazy one, then I grabbed my keys, jumped in my yellow pinto, and I turned a 45 minute drive into a half hour.

I went straight to the toy department where I found a stout middle aged lady stocking the board games.  I told her I was looking for Jeri.  She turned to me quickly, then looked around to see if anyone was watching.

"Are you Brooke?" she asked as she continued to look around.

"Um, yes.  Do you have my doll?"

She gestured for me to follow her.  "Come with me."

She led me across Wal-Mart to the "Home" section, and we walked down the bath towel aisle.  She carefully pulled out a neatly folded stack of canary colored towels, and gently placed them on the shelf below.  From the newly formed hole within the stacks of towels, she reached in and pulled out my James Dean doll.

It was a beautiful moment.  As I looked down at him in the dented and torn up plastic box, the Hallelujah Chorus played from the Heavens.  We were united...finally!

I thanked Jeri for seemingly risking her job (and possibly her life) for me.  I went to the checkout and made my purchase.  Then I walked back to my pinto and buckled James in the passenger seat next to me.  I had my doll.  My prized possession.  And do I regret making that expensive purchase all those years ago?

No.

Autobiographies and Getting Drunk with Danny DeVito

Over the past month, I have developed a strange obsession with celebrity autobiographies.  Once a week, I've been heading to the library to find another book.  Intently I would read, getting lost in the circle of feeling bad for the star whom made a lot of money writing a story to make me feel bad.  Love it!  I cried when Tatum O'Neal struggled with her drug problem and dealt with her dad issues.  I cried when MacKenzie Phillips struggled with her drug problem and dealt with her dad issues.  And Cybill Shepherd...well, I tried to feel bad for her.  It's really hard to feel bad for a beauty queen turn actress who's biggest problem was being too pretty.

 This is the conclusion I have made for myself a long time ago:  Being famous in your mind is a lot better than being famous in real life.  In your mind, you can control who loves you, go anywhere in the world, be a movie star, and never have to worry about the dark side of fame.  Of course, if you're into the dark side, go for it.  It's your imagination! 

In my mind, I am the host of a late night talk show.  Unlike a certain cynical female late night host some of us know of from a major entertainment cable channel, I'm amazing enough to be on NBC!  I follow Jay Leno and Jimmy Fallon.  Sorry, Carson Daily.  Your show was too boring and got cancelled...in my mind.

Although I'm on at 1:30ish in the morning, my ratings are equal to that of The Tonight Show because I am an incredibly witty female and loved by all...in my mind.  I have unconventional fun with my guests.  Just last Tuesday I was doing shots of Patron with Danny DeVito.  I couldn't keep up, but he kept going.

Every Friday is a musical guest.  Once I had Wang Chung!

(This is my mind, not yours!)

You see, when you're a celebrity in your mind, you can do whatever you want without criticism and live in a bubble where everyone JUST MIGHT WANT to Wang Chung tonight! 

I just don't think that Cybill Shepherd will ever like me or be on my show...in real life OR my mind. 

Not Exactly MacKenzie Phillips...

My name is Brookford.  It's actually Brooke Ford; however, in an attempt to distinguish myself, I thought it would be best to put myself on the same level as Brookford, North Carolina.  I have never been there- I had to Google it- and I am sure it's an amazing place.

You can call me Brooklyn Starr.

Before you put forth the time and effort to actually subscribe to my blog and read my future stories, I feel obligated to give you a little insight of what you're in for.  I mean, have you ever checked out a book at the library without its jacket?  No?  Well, that ruins my whole point.

I've probably lived a life of less rebellion than the gal who played the robot in Small Wonder.  I was, however, the robot from Small Wonder in second grade.

I do not have such an inspirational and heartfelt story of surviving a night of drug and alcoholic driven debacle involving waking up in an alley with puke in my hair.  I do promise to one day tell the story of when I first got drunk at the VERY young age of 25 on New Year Eve in an art gallery.  It's not exactly parallel to the biography of MacKenzie Phillips, but, I mean, thank God!

And so, my friends, this is a collection of my attempts of rebellion, my obsession with James Dean, and everything in between as I've gone through this awkward journey of life.  Along the way, I have managed to keep my faith in God, stay a brunette (experimenting with different shades), and somehow land myself a handsome husband- that looks like James Dean.