Linda Sands » girls

Only in a restroom in Cusseta, Alabama.

Linda — Fri, 08 May 2009 13:07:00 +0000

Writers see the world… differently.
It looks kind of like this:
EVERYTHING IS, HAS, WAS, WILL OR CAN BE A STORY.

Just as everyone you meet is a potential character and every conversation you hear may be stored away for later use. Having a writer as a friend can be dangerous, partying with fellow writers fills my well. (Hello Southampton friends!)
It is so nice when people “get you,” when explanations are unnecessary and when you can experience truly witty parlay.

So, it will come as no surprise to my writing friends that I found a story in a restroom in Cusseta, Alabama last week.

Stopping for gas and potty break with 2 gal pals, I waited in the dimly lit white washed pine sol scented back hall for my friend to finish up in the “one seater.” It seemed like an ordinary gas station/convenience mart, gas pumps, checkout counter in the round, coffee, energy drinks and steamed franks for the road.

And trust me there was nothing special about the ladies restroom. Single unlidded toilet, one sink, electric hand dryer mounted to wall, small waste basket…
All details I took in mid squat, until my eye was drawn to the small yellow bag littering the floor. First thought? Why didn’t my friend who was just in here pick this up?
Then I noticed the receipt under my foot.
I finished my business then picked up both. The bag was from Dollar General. The receipt went with the bag.
First thought. Some lady was in a hurry for feminine hygiene products.
But no.

Receipt was for the Dollar General on Hwy 29. Store #10320.
Purchase: one Early Pregnancy Test Kit
cost:
$1.00
tax .07
paid in cash

The plot thickens.

I’m seeing in my mind’s eye the harried girl who ran in here, the first stop before she had to go home, before she had to return to school. The worried woman who filled up her car, then made her way to the restroom before she had to go home to the husband she’s cheating on? The hopeful and excited single woman who hopes a one dollar test is just as good as the real thing because this might be the answer, this might change everything…

and then, you KNOW what I want to do.

I washed my hands, took my time with the dryer positioned over the full waste basket, watched as it blew the loose paper towels, saw it uncover the purple and white box, and something else beneath… and then I thought about what I would say to my friends- and I hesitated. I thought about what people would think about me if I …
and I left.

Because as much as I wanted to reach in that trash can and find out if the pee stick said yes or no… I would rather never know, because now I’m able to write two different endings for two different women, a multitude of stories. (and seeing as I have this horrible problem with manipulating truths- I don’t do it well- I don’t have that ultimate statement standing in my way.)

Odder still, was that the 3rd girl in our group who was waiting in the hall for her turn in the ladies room was regaled by a story of confusion, sadness,and despair told by a woman who’d found this gas station by mistake. She’d left a divorce counseling session and was crying so much and was so upset that she had been driving in the wrong direction for miles.
It was a good thing she needed gas and a bathroom, she said, or she might have ended up in Florida.

Lordy. I love Alabama.

Because March is Women's History Month…or Life Tips from Thelma and Louise

Linda — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 12:10:00 +0000

I should talk about the role of women in history- how we have changed the world both with our own actions and voices and also by our encouragement and support of those weak-kneed bumbling idiots ruled by two heads, yes… men.

I could send you HERE to test your knowledge of the role of women in our history.
or link you to historical books and films that toot the feminine and not so feminine horn of achievement…
or I could just offer this:

13 Life Tips From Thelma and Louise

1. You get what you settle for. “I still have to ask Darryl if I can go,” Thelma said. “He never lets me do a g-d damned thing. “You get what you settle for,” said Louise. Darryl treated Thelma like crap – but the thing is, she let him. She took everything he dished out without speaking up for herself, and that’s now way to achieve your life goals.

2. Stay connected to your friends. Women need each other. We need to talk, gossip, laugh, cry, pray, exercise, eat, and vent together. And, like Thelma and Louise, we need to get out of town together….not that I’m saying you need to drive cross country, kill a guy in self-defense, or run from the police to bond with your girlfriends! But, you do need support when you’re setting and achieving goals.

3. Celebrate your differences. This life tip from the Thelma and Louise movie involves not just tolerating your friends’ differences, but celebrating them. Thelma was a married stay-at-home housewife with a domineering, annoying husband. She wasn’t as mature or jaded as Louise, who worked as a waitress in a coffee shop and had a lot more life experience (including being raped in “past life”).

4. Take care of yourself. Always, always watch your back, even when you’re having fun, even when you’re surrounded by people you trust. At the bar a few hours after their road trip, Thelma drank too much and ended up in the parking lot with a guy – Harlan. Louise stopped him from raping her. “We’re just having a little fun,” Harlan said. “In the future, when a woman’s crying like that, she ain’t having any fun,” Louise said, voice trembling. “I should’ve f-ked her,” said Harlan. “Suck my —.” So Louise shot him. “You watch your mouth, buddy,” she said. Louise knew not only how to take care of herself, she knew how to take care of Thelma, too. And Harlan.

5. Keep a cushion of money in your account. You probably won’t need it because you’ve just murdered a rapist, but it’s still a great life tip from the Thelma and Louise movie. Always have three months of “mad money” that you can easily access, just in case you lose your job, run into health problems, or decide to take an extended vacation. Not having a fluffy cushion of money is a common financial mistake many women make – and it’ll stop you from achieving your life goals.

6. Trust your gut. Louise did not want to pick up that hottie hitchhiker (Brad Pitt); her gut instinct told her to stay away. Thelma, who doesn’t seem to have much of a gut instinct to trust, wanted to give him a ride and wouldn’t stop talking about it. So, they ended up giving him a ride, and it was the second biggest mistake they made.

7. Pick your battles. “He is an asshole,” Thelma said about her husband. “Most of the time I just let it slide.” This life tip from the Thelma and Louise movie isn’t about letting things slide; it’s about knowing where to draw the line. Setting your boundaries is about self-respect. People will treat you the way you let them – in fact, you teach people how to treat you by how you treat yourself and what you’ll take from others. To achieve your life goals, be aware of how you let people treat you…and how you treat them.

8. Figure out why you’re into the bad boys. Despite their different personalities, both Thelma and Louise were totally into bad boys! Thelma found hers on the road (J.D., the hottie hitchhiker who taught her how to rob a store). Louise’s bad boy boyfriend was hers all along. It’s cool to be into bad boys – as long as you don’t expect them to change.

9. Buckle up for the consequences. This life tip from the Thelma and Louise movie runs throughout the whole movie: If you’re hooked up with a bad boy or the most decent husband in the world, be prepared for the natural consequences. Like what? The possibility that you’ll get hurt – whether he’s never around when you need him or he’s around a little too much. Or, he could steal all your money…like J.D. did to Thelma and Louise. Don’t let this stop you from taking risks to achieve your life goals, but just be prepared for what happens next (both good and bad!).

10. Take turns being strong. Louise was the strong woman throughout most of the movie. Until J.D. stole their money; then, Thelma became strong. Sex with J.D. gave her the self-confidence she needed to take control of her life. By the end – when Thelma was putting the crying cop into the trunk of his police cruiser – Louise wasn’t the only strong woman in the movie. Thelma overcame her fear and grew into a strong, self-confident woman.

11. Take risks to get what you need. Thelma, in her new role as the strong woman, robbed the store to get the money that they needed to get to Mexico to start their lives over again. Now, I’m not advocating robbery. I’m stressing that this life tip from the Thelma and Louise movie is about taking risks despite your fears, and taking what you need to achieve your life goals.

12. Be open with your friends, because keeping secrets creates distance. Louise waited until the end of the movie to tell Thelma that she was raped in Texas, in her earlier life. Throughout their friendship, Thelma never really knew Louise – she didn’t know her motivations, fears, or past experiences.

13. Be comfortable with loose ends. The last life tip from Thelma and Louise has to be about the ending. Ah, that glorious, mysterious ending in which we really don’t know what happens next! Could they actually get away? Will there be a sequel? That’s exactly how life is. We don’t know for sure how it’s gonna end because it’s never really over…until it’s really over.

Supporting the Arts.

Linda — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 21:24:00 +0000

This is my friend Karen with our author pal, Jack Riggs.

not sure why I was looking past, over and above the camera… but I look as happy as I felt for Jack’s success.
Buy his book HERE. The Fireman’s Wife.

No, I wasn’t telling him how to sign the book, I think I was telling him to stay away from frou-frou Fireman type drinks.

We sat in a hot hot hot ( FIRE!) library auditorium and listened to Jack read about Cassie and Peck, and then we went here to cool down in the 20degree Hotlanta weather.
Fun change for a weekday night.

Sometimes people get it and sometimes…

Linda — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 15:16:00 +0000

you just don’t want to go into it any more.

For the rest of you. Here’s a story.When I was a kid, we used to have a telephone on a long long cord. We would pull it across the hallway from the kitchen to the basement door, where we would sit on the third step down and have private conversations with our boyfriends. Or for my sisters- their friends. My dad tripped over that cord a few times and made it even longer , so that there was enough slack to twist around your finger or get knotted up in your long blonde hair as you talked in whispers to boys from the wrong side of town. Once I picked up the extension when my sister was talking about her plan to sneak over to the local drinking spot in the woods for a party after the big game- even though she was grounded. I used that to my advantage.
Thing was, when I was down there, perched on the steps, I would doodle on the wall– names, designs, phone numbers- when they were only 5 digits long–I had written some boys names over others, scratched out the eyes and added devil horns to the heads of poorly sketched cheerleaders. My sisters joined in and soon that wall was estrogen induced art. It told stories of our youth and was more permanent than the journal I’d lose when packing up the third apartment.
A few years ago my father called us all to tell us he had painted over the wall- not that he was going to, but that he had done it. Without even a photograph. I miss that wall. I miss the snarls in my hair from that cord. I miss having a place where I can close the door and write my secrets on a wall in plain view.

Cleaning out my purse, I found this:

Linda — Sun, 30 Dec 2007 18:23:00 +0000

A wadded up bar napkin with this story scratched in black ink:

Once upon a time in a bar far, far away
three young boys struck up their guitars and played.
It was a song about sex, about remorse, about the lack of educated women in the check-out line at the Walmart.
It made the people sad- the girls cried and the bartender poured out her soul to the man in the black hat.
Then they danced.

What’s in the bottom of your purse?
…

The Price of Being Nice, Bitches.

Linda — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 15:23:00 +0000

What does it really cost a girl to BE NICE?

I told a friend a story and in it I must have said at least three times, that I was trying to be nice, and that, well, that’s just being nice, isn’t it?
And she said, “It’s sad isn’t it?”
“What?”
“That we, as women still feel it’s necessary to Be Nice.”

And that’s how it sounded, like capital letters or self-important titles—I certainly never thought of boys as being NICE and the ones that were, well, they never appealed to me.

My mom said that in her day, girls would say, “He’s a ni-iice boy,” while running their pinky finger across their eyebrow. It was code for: the guy is gay.
Maybe that was when being nice stopped paying off for men.

I think when women try so hard to BE NICE all the time they lose a bit of their identity. They sell themselves short. Though I am not saying you should be a bitch all the time, or tell the absolute, uncouched truth whenever you’re asked your opinion, but… the amount of time and imagination and stress and hemming and hawing and honestly, moral conundrums involved are a bit more than one really needs.
And frankly the whole, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all” thing was probably quoted by some asshole who loved silence.

According to the my best friend in the world, The Almighty Amazon: Nice Girls Don’t get Rich, they don’t get the corner office and they don’t change the world.

So, step up Bitches.
And, if you can’t say something nice, come sit by me.*

*paraphrased from some famous writer bitch.