Death By Ladybug

Call me morbid, but, in recent days, as I’ve tried to drift off at night, I’ve been convinced I’ll die a violent death while I slumber. My thoughts flood with the prospect of a demise almost beyond imagining:

Death … by ladybug.

They’re everywhere. Before I close my eyes, I try to count how many have taken residence on the ceiling. There’s no real logic in this. It’s one of those “enemy you know” scenarios, like when one counts rabid sheep. My subconscious tells me that if I’ve tallied thirteen, my next morning won’t suck if the same baker’s dozen are still there, and in the same place. It seldom works this way; ladybugs don’t keep the same hours.

You’d think I’d be happy to find them gone. All that does, in truth, is make me fret less about where they were, and a great deal more about where they now are. If they’re not above the bed, my brain tells me, they must be in the bed, and that does little to help me ignore the snooze button.

So I count.

There are, of course, those few lone wolves who skitter across the ceiling, left to right, front to back, shells rattling out an erratic symphony best described as ewww. They do this, making me restart my count over and over, before they come to a full stop in a tight formation directly above my head. I can’t help but think this is by design.

“One, two, three…hey, get back there! One, two…”

These rogues fear no magazine and no vacuum. They may know they’re tempting fate, but they take comfort in knowing they would die with dignity—as I hope I will, when the huddled mass of cowards in the corner (out of reach of the Dyson’s wand and too numerous to measure) swoop down and strip my bones clean while I chase butterflies and unicorns.

Then, as I watch the biggest of the spy-bugs stretch and yawn above me, I begin to worry that, before the full wave comes, an advance party will crawl into my open mouth and do a little Chorus Line, one singular sensation across my taste buds. I don’t know much about ladybugs, but I have read they bear an unpleasant taste.

How, I wonder, does anyone know this?

I’ve never seen Bobby Flay gush about Ladybug Tartare as an appetizer before a main course of Beetles à la King (“The key here, folks, is to maintain a high heat, so they don’t skip around so much, and turn them only once.”) I know not a single ladybug cuisine enthusiast, even though you might expect I would, given I live not far from counties where hounds are considered peers.

Perhaps I’m not adventurous enough, but when I see a vulgar insect, I don’t imagine how appetizing it would be on a toast point with a garlic aoli and a sprig of thyme.

“Patty, you have to try this. It's divine. Just remember...the antennae are garnish.”

I don’t want to eat it. I want to kill it before it kills me. I don’t want my last seconds on earth to be plagued with the realization there’s at least one thing I abhor more than brussels sprouts. So, with few other logical options, I wake Patty. After she clears enough fog from her eyes to feel confident in her you-insensitive-bastard glare, she grumbles, “What?”

I stay silent, but let my wide eyes drift from hers and up toward the heavens.

“Brian, what?”

“Shh-shh-shh. “Look. Up there.”

Her eyes ease up at first, and then leap from what-now to what-the-fuck in a nanosecond, just as they do when she comes home from work and finds I’ve left the toaster on the counter, a skin flick in the DVD player and a tuna-salad-soiled knife in the sink. But this moment is much juicier and preternatural. I’m shitting bricks, to be sure, but she’s shitting townhouses.

The bug nods and waves an armor-clad wing, the insect equivalent of, “Good on ya, love!” Patty does not wave back or exchange any such pleasantry. She’s a turtle now, and the paisley comforter is her cotton shell. I feel her racing pulse in my pillow.

From under the blankets, I hear, “Please, Brian … please get rid of him.”

“Him? How do you know it’s a male? It’s not like he’s pointing at us with a penis and doing a cabaret number.”

“Whatever. Get rid of her.”

“How do you know it’s a girl? It’s not like she’s…”

“Stop! Just get rid of it. Please!”

My vision’s not great, but I think the bug—boy or girl—looks wounded by her remarks.

And this is where I could be brave. I could be my wife’s Russell Crowe, her gladiator. I could grab a candle holder and squish the interloper against the ceiling with a macabre, “Hahahaha.” But another would soon take its place, and then another, and I’d spend the better part of the night naked and stretched out from mattress to ceiling—not one of my better looks. It would also mean I’d need to keep wiping the orange guts from the white paint, and I’d forget my count and have to start all over again.

No, I won’t deal with the ladybugs. I’ll hide under the sheets and hope they won’t rain down upon me, or find a way to squeeze into my eardrum. Let them host a convention to help sort out the ladybugs from the fellabugs. Hell, they can have a no-holds-barred orgy up there. I don’t care. And if, as the prayer goes, I should die before I wake, I’ll at least have better-than-average odds to shed this mortal coil from a sound slumber. I can now sleep, and sleep well, because I now know Patty will not.

Receding Heirlines

"An angry father is most cruel towards himself."– Pubilius Syrus

After several lazy afternoons scanning online sites of famous quotations, searching for that one quip that would so fully encapsulate my experience as man, husband and father I could spare myself the hassle of coining my own, this nugget gave me pause. What stopped me wasn’t the message. No, all I could think was, “Wow, how angry was his father? What monster would curse his kid with the name Pubilius?”

Was it common practice in first-century BC to dole out names that sound queer both as a whole and in any shortened form? Pubilius? Why not Marcellus, which leaves its owner the option of being just “Mark”? Or John, which, because it tangles the tongue, some pronounce “Jack”? Or even “Billy”? No, scratch that—it sounds stupid, like something you’d call a one-hit-wonder country singer.

Life on the arid Syrian schoolyard could not have been a picnic for young Pubie. Still, as I digested this quote, something moved me.

An angry father is most cruel towards himself.

What kind of ridiculous shit is that? Why in god’s name would I target myself for malice when I spend every waking hour with a figurative “kick me” sign on my back? We’ll never know what the Syrus kids slipped into dad’s wine the day he penned this twaddle—perhaps just more wine—but I like to think he meant to write this:

“Only a masochistic dunderhead would be most cruel towards himself. A smart and angry father prefers to be cruel to his kids.” – Brian O’Mara-Croft

As a parent of five, I have been angry—very angry. Oh, the many flavors of rage I’ve savored. The veins in my forehead stay bulged and throbbing in mere anticipation of my next tirade. When I’m in this state, slapping a mosquito on my forehead would launch a fountain of gore. I love my children with all my heart. I just abhor the way their minds work.

Who stashed the milk next to the cookies in the pantry? Sure, I get it that Oreos and two-percent enjoy a perfect marriage, but are memories so short these items need to be kept side-by-side to recall this? Is a deafening argument in which every third word is “idiot” and every sixth word, “fuck”, really so compelling it can’t wait until I wrap up my speakerphone call with an important client? And what on earth possesses the lot of them to burst, five-wide and unannounced, into our bedroom just as I’m making my best love?

“I’m busy here! GET OUT!”

“But why are you and Mommy nakee? And why are you shoving her? Is she stuck?”

“A little. Now close the door.”

My own father was no stranger to moments of fury. He exercised the option, as did others of his generation, to position a “Board of Education” in plain view on the kitchen wall. It may well have been an idle threat, but none of we three boys dared cut in line to snatch top spot in the pecking order. He never used the paddle—although once, when the hockey stick I left on the garage floor launched the car’s side mirror, in dozens of pieces, down the driveway and into the street, I watched his hands tremble toward it.

Today, a parent merely mentions the word “spanking” in the abstract—as in, “If I don’t spank you now, I’ll always wish I had”—and a kid’s finger hovers over the first speed-dial button, a direct line to DCFS.

Just try me, old man.

At times I have been cruel, if only by accident (or, as the more particular might propose, from negligence). I’ve flipped my kids over my shoulder—“Wheeee!”—only to miss the catch on the other side (“Whoops.”) I’ve rushed their delicate noggins headlong into awnings, car doors and picture frames. I’ve led tender bare feet across lava-hot pavement. I’ve tossed baseballs and Frisbees toward their hands—and into their faces.

One night, I loaded my infant son into a “baby backpack” to join me on a winter walk. Although the air was frigid and the wind stiff, I worked up a steady sweat. My son did not. When we returned an hour later, he had to relearn the ability to walk. If you closely examine the face of this same son, now a 20-year-old survivor of my questionable parenting, you may detect a subtle shift in skin tone as you scan from left to right. Who knew sunlight beaming through car windows could permanently flash-fry an infant’s cheek?

Like baby sea turtles, some of my children may not see adulthood. Thankfully, I have spares.

Take my youngest son, Connor. Years ago, in a supermarket, I asked him to help me transfer groceries from the cart to the checkout conveyor belt. This, I thought, would both expedite the process and allow me to bond with the five-year-old. I lobbed him a box of raisin bran, and then a package of extra raisins. I tossed a tub of ice cream.

“Good job, little man. Nice snag.”

Upping the ante, I flipped a loaf of bread around my back, and a sack of Cheetos up from under my leg. He caught all with a flourish, and alley-ooped each onto the belt.

“Wow, you’re good at this. Feel like a challenge?”

He nodded and scrunched his eyes. “Bring it.”

I grabbed the next closest item —a bag of some vegetable—and split-finger-fastballed it in Connor’s direction.

Everything moved in slow motion. When this happens, you know things won’t end well. I see every movement as clearly today as a decade ago. The bag pinwheeling through the air. My son’s eyes opening wide in eager anticipation. Tiny hands snapping forward to make the grab. My wife Patty’s eyes also growing wide, her lips following suit with a dramatic “Brian!!! Noooooo…..” Connor’s fingers closing around the bag. These same digits falling back as the look of glee gives way to a mask of stark terror. The bag dropping to the floor with a dull thud. Two screams—one from him, another from Patty. An utterly dumbfounded look on my face.

“What?!?”

I’d never bought fresh artichokes before. I had no idea they were Mother Nature’s version of throwing stars. When at long last I stemmed the steady flow of tears—and ventured a tepid reply to Patty’s legitimate query about what the hell was wrong with me—I fished out the Cherry Garcia and passed the whole tub of apology to Connor.

He recoiled in terror—presuming, I’m sure, it would pop open and shower him with broken glass and starving rats. Then he pouted.

“You hurt me.”

When I removed the lid and nothing vile beset his now fractured sense of trust, he at last accepted my peace offering.

“Here…this is for you.” I looked at him, pleading. “Please don’t write a tell-all.”

He’s fourteen now, and so far has shown no interest in learning how to sign his name, let alone inscribe bitter tirades about child abuse disguised as harmless fun. He’ll even eat artichokes. I’d dodged a bullet.

On those occasions when I reflect upon my win-loss ratio as a parent—usually when there’s nothing on TV and my relentless petitioning for a midday slap-and-tickle has fallen yet again upon deaf ears—I wonder what the sum-total of my efforts will be.

Will my heirs gaze fondly on my portrait, a giant, tacky, gilt-edged monstrosity dwarfing the fireplace below? Will my descendants be known not by their given names, but as Son of Brian, or Grandson of Brian, or Second Nephew Thrice Removed—also of Brian? Or will I recede in memory until I’m no more than an insignificant skid mark on an otherwise vibrant fabric of life and the living?

Will my children ever quote me to their children or grandchildren from stories I’ve left behind? I like to imagine they’ll boast, proudly, “You know…your grandfather penned great tomes about playing with himself!” Or they’ll ask, “Can you guess how many times Grandpa violated Grandma? No? Why not read his books?” Oh, what a glorious and mysterious legacy my namesakes will inherit.

I, like all fathers, do hope my kids will take away something positive when my mortal coil unravels like every Slinky I’ve ever owned or touched. My father, I’m sure, once said to my mother, “I’ll never do that when I’m a parent.” And I once promised, “Because my parents did this, I’ll never have children. I may even lop off my penis. You just watch.” In turn, my kids will rework the parenting rules to suit their needs and circumstances. None will get it quite right; no one ever has.

Still, with any luck, they’ll remember the choices I’ve made along the way, and will learn from my mistakes. They won’t freeze, cook, bash, maim or threaten their offspring. They’ll lock the door before they go at it like minks. And, with any luck, they may gently pass artichokes into their kids’ hands, rather than hurl the entire brood into a shrieking, bloody nightmare.

Welcome to the Microcosm

As the long evenings of summer disappear along with an increasingly elusive sun, as the greens transform to reds and oranges, and as the crisp air of autumn hints at the promise of winter just months away, Patty and I often give in to wanderlust (I prefer garden-variety lust, but that's another story). For Patty, our truck becomes our vessel for adventure, for meandering treks along unpaved roads with no set timetable and, often, no set destination. For me, these outings chew up hours that might otherwise be filled with home repair assignments I work so hard to avoid.

Most times, we happen upon tiny but quaint communities untouched by the hustle and bustle of urban sprawl, places that have instead adopted a more laid-back charm as their definition of progress. These villages boast wine shops, antique stores and gift boutiques, nestled among mom-and-pop office supply and shoe shops that have miraculously survived the megamall age. I'm a small-town boy, so visits to such places often inspire moments of nostalgia, and serve as a refreshing change from charmless suburbia.

Some stores offer handmade jewelry and knick-knacks by local artisans. With Patty on board, these villages cost us a small fortune, because Patty is stronger than most at finding something unique we just can’t pass up lest it be lost to us forever.

This past Saturday, we stopped at a small town where being literal was apparently the order of the day. Railroad Street ran directly parallel to the Amtrak tracks. Center Street and Main Street, running in opposite directions, divided the town. I looked on a local map, and felt no surprise to find Church Street as one of the main routes. I did feel some surprise to find no street named “Liquor Lane”, because the number of pubs in town was surpassed only by the selection of places of faith. For just a moment, as I did a tally of the saloons, I thought, "I could live here forever."

After Patty satisfied her shopping urge by picking up a pair of earrings ("We have to buy something, don't you think?"), I suggested that we stop into one of the town’s bars for a drink. She agreed. We selected one and walked through the door. We didn’t immediately realize we’d also walked through a portal into the past.

As we received our drinks, in plastic cups (which immediately made me think this was one of those places where glass is frowned upon, “just in case”), I scanned the patrons. The man beside me, who kept regaling the bartender with stories about his son—to whom he referred not by name but as “M’boy”—sported a bushy mustache that obscured both his upper and lower lips. I whispered in Patty's ear.

“Check it out. Does anyone have just a mustache anymore?”

Before she could reply, a cursory scan down the bar provided an answer. Yes. In this town, mustaches were not only acceptable but, it would seem, required. All of the men had them. I felt out of place. I felt even more conspicuous when I reached into my backpack (which caused everyone in the bar to cast a disapproving look, as though I was fishing through a Louis Vuitton purse for my lost lipstick) and pulled out my cell phone (the appearance of which inspired looks that suggested all present considered me “high-falutin’”).

At the end of the bar, two men—one with hair to his waist (and a mustache) and the other with no hair at all (other than a mustache)—entertained their female companion, who had no mustache but whose hairstyle harkened back to the rock videos of the early 80s. The less hirsute of the two kept the woman giggling with a loud demonstration of how many pot-smoking terms he knew, which he presented as an uncategorized list:

“Blunt. Mary Jane. Reefer. Bong. Spliff. Doobie. Munchies.”

He paused only long enough for her to look up and admire the expanse of arm clearly visible below his wife-beater shirt. Said shirt bore the name of yet another local bar. Another scan of the room revealed that everyone was content being a walking billboard for a vice of choice--a bar, brand of cigarettes or variety of beer.

I turned to the man next to me.

“There’s a lot of bars in town, huh?”

“Well, they come and go." He reeled off an impressive list. "Oh, and there used to be a place over on Center Street, but it wasn’t very busy, and then it burned down.” He said the latter without even a hint of suspicion. “M’boy likes the Silver Saddle.” He then turned back to his beer in a way that suggested that since I insisted on carrying a purse, future conversations were not encouraged.

I suggested to Patty that, if she was amenable, I'd be content to chug my drink immediately and hit the road. She agreed. Before we left, I stopped into the bathroom. It was designed for one person, and provided the choice of a urinal or a toilet. I chose the urinal, but looked over at the toilet just long enough to notice that another patron had opted against the urinal because doing so would mean he’d be unable to pee all over the seat. I decided we really needed to get going.

Moments later, we were back in the truck, on a freeway, with a new set of earrings and my backpack-purse, heading back to what we, in the suburbs, define as civilization.

Room...and bored

At age 17, I left my hometown of 13,000 people and moved to a modest basement apartment in the northern part of Toronto. An ambitious college student who was relieved to have at last escaped the perceived hell of rural living, I quickly became homesick, and took the train home many weekends.

On one such return visit, my parents informed me they had offered up the use of the sofa in my new pad, free of charge, to the daughter of an acquaintance.

"You did what?"

"We told her she could stay with you. It's only for a month."

"But why?" You should imagine a whine here.

"Because it seems like the right thing to do. Besides, her family has always been good to us."

"Dad, you are a customer in her father's restaurant. A paying customer. No, wait...a regular, paying customer. Getting a good breakfast that you paid for doesn't really qualify as a debt owed."

My arguments fell on deaf ears. My parents paid most of the cost of my apartment, so it was mostly their space to loan out to any near-strangers for whom they felt the slightest affinity. Besides, they pointed out I could get rides home on weekends from my new roomie, who owned a car. I might have offered more of a protest but, well, my mom intimidated me. She still does.

Pat (not her real name; okay, I’m lying, it was her real name) moved in early the next week. At first, I wasn’t completely averse to the idea of having a companion. My apartment was a 90-minute transit ride from my school, so none of my fellow students wanted anything to do with visiting me. I had been spending most evenings (a) sitting in a chair watching television and chewing my nails, (b) playing with myself, (c) pretending I had no laundry and a surplus of friends, and (d) waiting for my landlord to go out for the evening so I could steal some of the weed he stashed under his sofa cushions.

On top of this boundless excitement, having a living, breathing person around didn’t seem horrible, although it would put some constraints on (b).

"Okay, Dad, she can stay...but just for a month."

He looked at me the same way I now look at my kids whenever they refer to our home as "my house".

"You're doing the right thing, son."

Within a week, I discovered that I truly could hate a person more than I hate sauerkraut or laundry. Allow me to explain.

First, the rides home. Pat liked to smoke cigarettes, but didn’t buy smokes.

"I'm not really a smoker."

This meant that any cigarette I lit became a community smoke for smokers and non-smokers alike. I wouldn’t have minded so much were it not for the fact Pat was what we called a “juicer”. This meant that the dry cigarette I passed to her returned seconds later as a hot, spit-saturated sponge caked in lipstick. The shoulders of highways across Southern Ontario became littered with half-finished cigarettes thanks to yours truly. My lung capacity began to improve.

The worst part of living with Pat, though, was her immediate comfort in my space. Case in point: she enjoyed talking on the phone. My phone. Nobody could reach me. For all I knew, every person I had ever known could have died and been buried and I wouldn’t have had a clue. I seethed, but said nothing.

I said nothing because interrupting any of Pat’s conversations—all of which were, apparently, of national importance—caused her to toss me that subtle, “And what the fuck do YOU want?” glare. Besides, interrupting her calls would mean going into my own bedroom, which had largely become off-limits except when she decided I could sleep. I didn’t want any part of that space, because Pat apparently felt all calls were somehow enhanced if she took them while sprawled, face down, on my bed, in an oversized sweatshirt…and undersized panties. Sounds kinda hot, right? Not so much.

I blame my frustration for my judgmental nature. Really, a kinder person would describe my roommate’s posterior as “voluptuous”, “generous” or “Rubenesque”. I was not such a person, so I recalled it to friends (and the strangers I was soon hitting up for conversation) as “Jesus, that is one huge dimpled golf-ball of an ass”. Below said Titleist were ample legs that resembled balloons from which air was slowly escaping. Until I saw my first Vermeer painting years later, the term “milky white” brought no positive images to mind; all I could think about were Pat’s limp, cellulite-clad limbs. (In case you were wondering, I was bitter.)

For the month Pat stayed with me, she proved to be long on promises and short on delivery. Every day I heard about the cases of beer and countless food items that would soon be clogging our fridge. I heard about the good times we’d share visiting parties and bars. Instead, for weeks, I stayed thirsty, hungry...and out of my room.

When Pat finally left, I spent an entire evening stretched out on my bed, taking long, satisfying (and deliciously dry) drags on one cigarette after another, dreaming of beer and food, and relishing my new-found independence.

My brother moved in a week later.