Take a ride on the spouse gravy train

A few weeks ago, before my birthday, my dad, Tom, sent me an email. “Ma tells me you hit 26 tomorrow,” the message began. “I don’t keep track of such things so I’ll take her word for it. If she’s right: Happy Birthday.”

If he had ended the email there it wouldn’t have been out of character. Last year, my parents sent me a store-bought card in the mail that opened with, “Your opinions, and your outlook on life give me appreciation for so many things I might have otherwise missed.” My dad underlined the words “opinions” and “outlook” and wrote in all caps with a pen, “I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR OPINIONS OR OUTLOOK ON LIFE — BUT ANYWAY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY.”

So when I opened this year’s message I didn’t expect anything different. But after he wished me a happy birthday he continued. “I do know that at 26 you get kicked off [your mother’s] medical insurance. What to do?” he asked. “Stay healthy — or — do what I did.”

At 75 years old, my dad hasn’t worked a day of compensated pay in close to 40 years, and he’s plenty proud of it. He married my mother 37 years ago and has been the primary caretaker for their children (eventually we would number six) ever since. Or as he describes it, “I’ve skated on the spouse gravy train for damn near 40 years.”

His advice to me on my 26th birthday was simple: “Find some smart, hard-charging, ambitious and, above all, employed toots who gets good medical insurance from her work — coverage that also covers her spouse. Then marry her.”

From the start, my parents’ relationship was as simple and as functional as an axe. When they began seeing each other my mom was pregnant with a child by another man who was out of the picture. My mom was focused on her career and my dad was focused on never having one. For him, it was an easy decision to leave the workforce. So he legally adopted my sister, learned how to cook (sort of), and then had five more children of his own with my mom.

This week, on my parents’ 37th wedding anniversary, my dad recounted the day he got married in an email. “37 years ago today your Ma and I stood before a Cook County judge in Chicago city hall and with straight faces and did the ‘I do Dance’,” the email began. “Can’t recall the exact fee, but the ceremony and paperwork cost less than $20…I think the whole deal lasted no more than a few minutes.”

For Father’s Day in 2000, the local newspaper where we lived at the time wrote a feature about my dad entitled, “‘Mr. Mom’ doesn’t claim to be Mister Rogers.” In the article my dad revealed his secret to parenting that had guided him through the years. “I never lose sight of the fact that [children] are evil, lying, time-sucking little beasts,” he told the reporter. “You have to look at your kids honestly, and with hard eyes. They’re imperfect, and parents can’t make them perfect. My job is to make them more like me…their mother’s job is to undo all of that. That’s why God in his infinite wisdom issued two parents to each kid.”

The youngest of my parents’ brood left for college in the fall of 2016. So this last year has been the first in nearly four decades that my dad hasn’t had to act as chauffeur or personal chef. He has handled the change as seamlessly as one switches from pants to shorts in the middle of April.

“The transition to empty-nester status?” he asked. “Cake walk, falling off a log, easy peasy. Kids have been cluttering up my life for years. Change was very welcome.”

I used to think that even though my dad bitched and moaned about his child rearing responsibilities he’d be bored to tears without us. But I’ve come to learn that my dad has always found curious ways to pass the time. For years he stayed busy by looking after the various pets — goats, chickens, ducks, pigs, horse, and donkey — we’d accumulated at my parents’ home in Mississippi. Recently, they got a new puppy.

After he emailed me for my birthday, I replied and asked if he was serious about following a similar path as the one he chose. “It’s worked out, so far, pretty good for me,” he replied. “If munchkins are part of the scene, latch onto (with or without the benefit of clergy or social approval) a partner exactly like your Ma. Such a companion, partner, and guide will make the journey and adventure worth whatever effort you make.”

From Everything Changes, the Awl’s newsletter. Subscribe here.

This week I was sitting on a bench outside a sandwich shop with my dog, waiting while my boyfriend ordered our lunches inside, when a woman appeared in front of us and asked my dog if she wanted a treat. My dog did want a treat, she always wants a treat, and this woman seemingly had them at the ready in case she saw a dog who wanted a treat on the sidewalk because she had them in her hand and gave a little biscuit to Scully, then asked me if I wanted an extra in case Scully continued to be a good dog. I said yes. She handed it to me and gave Scully’s head a ruffle and then went on her way.

It was a tiny kindness but it stuck with me this week, given what this week was like in the world.

So I have a little mission for you for the next few days, if you are up for it.

The little mission is noticing.

Over the next few days, see if you come across examples of people doing tiny kindnesses — for strangers or for people they know. Maybe a bit bigger than holding open a door, but not necessarily that much more.

You can send them to me as you see them at laura@theawl.com, or wait to share until next Thursday when we’ll check in about this.

Good luck. Here’s a cute photo of my dog, who is a good dog.

From Everything Changes, the Awl’s newsletter. Subscribe here.

JARED is approaching the Oval Office to ask TRUMP if he can relinquish some of his responsibilities. His portfolio, he plans to argue, is quite large for someone also being personally investigated by ROBERT MUELLER. KELLYANNE CONWAY intervenes and invites JARED to play team-building exercises she is coordinating in the hallway outside her office. IVANKA is having lunch with her personal lawyer, which means that JARED is also babysitting the KUSHNER CHILDREN.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [in baby talk voice]: Is it ‘Take Your Adorable Children to Work’ day? Where’s mom?

KUSHNER CHILDREN [in unison]: Meeting with her lawyer

JARED [guiltily]: Our lawyer.

KUSHNER CHILDREN [in unison]: Her.

JARED looks pleadingly at his daughter.

JARED’S DAUGHTER [sensibly]: Her lawyer, dad.

JARED whispers to his children and then texts his mom’s cleaning lady STEFA to go find his mom. When STEFA never responds, JARED posts to Facebook, looking for recommendations for attorneys in the DC area.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [putting on her metaphorical tour guide hat]: This is the exact hallway George Stephanopoulos threw up in because H — [KELLYANNE CONWAY claps to the TRUMP ADMINISTRATION.] — we’re calling her H now. [KELLYANNE CONWAY kneels down, making soft eye contact with the KUSHNER CHILDREN.] Because H screamed at him so nastily.

JARED’s son whispers to him that he has to go to the bathroom.

JARED [babysitting]: Do you know where it is?

JARED’s son nods.

JARED [gesturing to the bathroom near the Oval Office]: OK, then. Text me when you’re finished.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [passive aggressively, to JARED]: We’re doing ice breakers and other get-to-know-you games. We realized we wouldn’t be in so much trouble if we actually knew something about the people we work with.

BEKAH MERCER [diabolically]: Trust falls.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [aggressively, to REINCE PRIEBUS]: Why is she here? This is what I’m talking about. Donors mixing with staffers mixing with foreign powers. It stops now. [KELLYANNE CONWAY addresses the KUSHNER CHILDREN warmly.] You’re just in time for two truths and a lie. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, please go first.

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS [truthfully]: Whenever I’m at an ATM, I cover the camera lens so hackers or whoever can’t read my PIN number.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [passive aggressively, to JARED]: It’s common sense. They can see us from those things. Safety first.

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS [truthfully]: Number two. I only got this job because of who my father is —

SEAN SPICER [walking in while eating a cheeseburger sub sandwich]: That’s the lie.

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS [surprising even herself]: That’s actually true. Should I keep going?

KELLYANNE waves SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS on as SEAN SPICER asks REINCE PRIEBUS if he has a nail clipper.

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS [lying]: I got my start in politics registering people to vote and then shredding their registration forms before the ink even dried.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [happily]: That’s the lie. Republicans would never register anyone to vote. Reince, you’re up.

REINCE PRIEBUS [cooperatively]: One. I always thought I’d work in the White House but never under these circumstances.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [fake snoring]: Nevermind, it’s my turn. Reince, we’re firing you, and hiring a showrunner. The American people are having trouble following all the plot lines and we need someone with story experience. That’s one. Two. The President hired me because I know how to campaign to women who hate other women.

REINCE PRIEBUS leaks to the New York Times that he is firing himself.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [looking directly into a camera that is not there]: And three. I’m kind of the mother hen around here. [KELLYANNE CONWAY curtsies inexplicably.] Everyone, there’s birthday cake in the mini fridge that I saved for a rainy day.

JARED stares at his phone, waiting for his son’s text that he is done in the bathroom. His mind wanders, and he remembers his friend Seth’s karate-themed birthday party, when they were eight. JARED was the last child to be picked up from the dojo. STEFA was late because her own son had the chicken pox. JARED can’t believe that he once called STEFA ‘Mom.’

KELLYANNE CONWAY [snapping her fingers]: Earth to Jared. Do you want any birthday cake?

JARED thinks about what a hassle the cake will be to enter into MyFitnessPal and walks away to find his mentor, GARY COHN. There’s a loud screech outside. It’s STEVE BANNON on a crotch rocket. He storms into the White House dressed like a Vietnam vet who would’ve voted for Nixon because he believed he would end the war but got in a bar brawl with some Black Panthers and was hospitalized instead.

STEVE BANNON [alcohol on his breath]: Who had Athlete’s foot and who the fuck showered in the bathroom off the Oval Office?

KELLYANNE CONWAY [putting on her metaphorical nun habit]: Steve, quiet down. You’re going to get President Trump all riled up.

BEKAH MERCER [maniacally]: We want him riled up. We want him shattering old constructs.

KELLYANNE CONWAY: Only liberals say “construct.” When I was in law school this asshole I knew used to think he was funny when he said that murder is a construct. [KELLYANNE CONWAY pivots towards REINCE PRIEBUS.] Can you do your job one last time and get her out of here?

REINCE PRIEBUS walks away, defiantly, intending to whoop it up with some alpha males, but finding JARED instead. JARED is reading an issue of The Economist from the array that GARY COHN’s admin has spread out like it’s a doctor’s office, but for people who believe that declaring bankruptcy is a personal failing and not the direct cause of medical bills.

JARED [elevator pitching]: I’m working on my new business idea. It’s microfinancing but for the white working class.

REINCE PRIEBUS [conservatively]: I like your spirit, bud, but that’s called Social Security disability insurance, which we are against.

JARED [losing his audience]: Well, they’re micropayments. They’d be very small.

REINCE PRIEBUS [standing up to check on the Senate Republicans]: Right. Well, we can talk about this later.

IVANKA slips in quietly. She whispers to JARED that she knows he is going to flip on them.

KELLYANNE CONWAY [putting on her metaphorical woman who hates other women hat]: Look who’s decided to grace us with her presence. [KELLYANNE CONWAY kneels down and makes soft eye contact with the KUSHNER CHILDREN.] Children, it’s your mother.

IVANKA [powerfully]: Why are you addressing them so comfortably? What’s going on here?

KELLYANNE CONWAY: We’re playing two truths and a lie. So we can get to know each other better.

IVANKA [while texting her mainstream media back channels that she and JARED orchestrated her father’s pivot on the DREAMER children]: How many times do I have to tell you? It’s all lies, Kellyanne. It’s. All. Lies.

KELLYANNE [truthfully]: In case you haven’t noticed, Bob Mueller is assembling a team of Ivy League Avengers to destroy us all.

JARED [channeling a simpler time, the NBA Finals, five days ago]: I’m not on a super team.

IVANKA [calmly, to JARED]: Who are you ever talking to? I thought you had to meet with my father. He’s in there now.

JARED rises. He opens YouTube on his phone, puts in his headphones, and watches the “It’s not your fault” scene from Good Will Hunting three times before knocking on his father-in-law’s door. Meanwhile his daughter explains to KELLYANNE CONWAY that you eat Ethiopian food with this spongy bread not utensils, and his son reappears, to tell JARED that he couldn’t find the bathroom but he really has to go now.

Guatemala Diaries, Part V

The boat from Livingston, Guatemala to Punta Gorda, Belize, took about an hour and a half. I thought the ride was fun. M. and Alexis had a miserable ride but rebounded fast. They’re not complainers, those two. I was having such a good time on this trip and I hoped they were, too. I may never know.

We waited two hours for our bus to Independence, sitting on benches on the bus station porch. I read a book about dams and politics that I will never finish because I already know why people build so many dams — it’s because people are jerks!

I walked around for a bit. Belize is silly with these orange flowering trees called Mayflowers that are beautiful against the sea. I went into a small public library. Their collection was haphazard and expected, lots of Sidney Sheldon and encyclopedias, The Bluest Eye, and a brand-new hardback of Amy Poehler’s book. I picked up some novel I have never heard of that looked good. No one had taken it out for years.

“Can I buy this?” I asked.

“No,” the librarian said.

The trip from Punta Gorda to Independence was two hours, on a school bus. Then came a short taxi ride and then another boat, twenty minutes through an alley of mangroves, to Placencia.

There was some anxiety when we arrived because it was a low season and there did not seem to be a lot of choice where to stay. We went to one hotel but it was kind of expensive. So M. sat on the beach and Alexis and I went off in search of an alternative.

Stuff seemed closed, or semi-closed. We saw four white guys in board shorts throwing a football on the beach. Alexis and I looked at each other warily — I doubt either of us had ever voluntarily approached four white guys throwing a football. But we headed up the sandy walkway. It was a cheery establishment: bright yellow cabins with blue trim, a small pool, a bar, and in front, the water.

When we asked if there was someone we could talk to, they laughed and said they had not seen anyone for days. One of them took us across the street to a big orange house where they said the lady in charge lived. He had spiky dark hair and a sunburn entirely confined to the front panel of his thin body. “I’m Cody,” he said, stating the obvious.

We knocked on the front door, and no one answered. “I guess she’s not here,” I said. But Cody, drinking a Belikin (“The Beer of Belize”) that was certainly not his first of the day, wasn’t ready to give up. He held a hand up to his mouth and shouted “Yo! Is anyone there? Hello?” After a minute or so he nodded, and took a confident swig from his beer. “She’s coming.”

A sweet woman who was only semi in charge and only spoke Spanish appeared. She wanted $160 a night for the place, a small cottage with three beds, nice, but not too nice. I made a face — not because I thought it was too much, but because it was the same as the last place. She said $140, and I said we could do $120. She said fine.

Then Cody offered me a beer. Alexis said she didn’t want one, but I was sure M. did. Cody gave me two beers, drawing an end to what was by far the most gangster five minutes of my life.

Not a lot happened during our three days in Belize. We sat on a beach. We speculated as to whether the hot 5oish Belizean owner of our hotel actually liked her way older extremely dorky American boyfriend, who thought San Diego was the greatest place on earth. Cody and his buddies left and gave us all their booze. I worked on my stories and argued with people on Facebook about whether Elena Ferrante was boring or not. M. and Alexis read the books sitting around the rental. M.’s was a spy novel; Alexis’s, I, Alex Cross, a detective novel by paperback king James Patterson.

James Patterson’s author photo takes up the entire back cover of his book. We stared at him for a while and decided that he was the kind of guy a woman meets and plots to marry and then slowly poisons or just fucks to death, for his money of course. Belize was beautiful, relaxing, and full of men being put into the James Patterzone. Based on my short visit, there’s not much else to say.

Part Four:

I Almost Let You Into Heaven

Part Three:

Human Sacrifice, “Family Style”

Part Two:

The Fancy Bus

Part One:

Just Get On A Plane And Go

Bonnie Parker’s snake ring, “Yellow Submarine” bell, and an antique dildo

Lot 1: She’s a Cold-Hearted Snake

What does it say about you — or your intended — if your promise ring features a three-headed snake? Bonnie Parker, already married to an imprisoned murderer, received this jewel-studded token of affection from her ex-con boyfriend, Clyde Barrow. As a pair, Bonnie & Clyde, were notorious bank robbers and cop killers in the early 1930s. Clyde crafted this ring for Bonnie during one of his brief stints in jail. He engraved his personal hallmark, a musical note struck by an arrow, inside the silver-toned band.

These two were unlucky in love. Following a crime spree that left several of their gang dead or captured, Sheriff Smoot Schmid (say that five times fast) and his deputies ambushed the couple in Texas on November 22, 1933 — but they escaped. From Bonnie and Clyde’s bullet-riddled Ford, the deputies claimed some booty: this ring, lipstick cases, and other personal effects. Schmid kept the ring for himself. Law enforcement officials finally succeeded in dispatching the infamous duo on May 23, 1934.

At $40,000, this incredible artifact might make a perfect engagement or vow-renewal ring, for the right power couple — say, Frank and Claire Underwood? It goes to auction in Boston on June 24.

Lot 2: Ahoy, Beatles!

A few days after John, Paul, George, and Ringo recorded the song, “Yellow Submarine,” at Abbey Road Studios on May 26, 1966, their producer George Martin thought it needed more zing. Or ding, as it were. He rummaged through the studio’s prop closet and found this cast brass ship’s bell — and, apparently, a whistle and an old-fashioned cash register — which he “used to provide unusual sound effects on a nautical theme.”

All that according to Bonhams in London, which will auction the bell with Fab Four provenance on June 28. In very British speak, the auctioneer added, “The ‘Special Effects Cupboard’ became redundant,” in 1983, and the bell was given away, accompanied by a letter of authenticity from the studio’s former chairman.

Beatle-crazed Boomers will be queuing up to bid the $9,000+ it will take to get it.

Lot 3: “Lady’s Companion”

Coming up at an “erotica sale” in London on June 29 is this “Lady’s Oriental Companion,” a euphemism not for a fine rug or an Asian lover but for this chiseled stone dildo. We are offered no clues as to its origins, but the naughty antique measures about eleven inches and features a stylized eagle’s head at its base. After all, nothing evokes pleasure more than a fierce bird of prey. Housed in a leather clamshell case (pun intended?), the sex toy is valued at $250–350. If you’re a connoisseur, a second soapstone penis of similar size can also be had.

Further examine this auction’s catalog and you’ll find all manner of sensual art and photography, such as the randy painting seen below, applied directly to fore edge of a circa 1850 edition of Henry Kirke White’s posthumous poems and letters.

Rebecca Rego Barry is the author of Rare Books Uncovered: True Stories of Fantastic Finds in Unlikely Places.

Notes on life

by Liana Finck

This is the world in which we live.

Yesterday, as is too often the case in my terrible, tortured life, I was distracted and discomforted when Sponge’s 1994 alternative hit “Plowed” once again occupied space in my mind unbidden and refused to vacate no matter how many attempts I made at ejection. Even the usual surefire method for getting a tune out of your head failed to remove it. I was discussing this torture with someone who expressed surprise, since there’s not even a hook to the song, but I explained that what had stuck with me was the line “in a world of human wreckage,” which I suddenly understood to be the best description of Twitter ever invented. So from now on when Sponge’s 1994 alternative hit “Plowed” gets stuck in my head, which, as mentioned, occurs with disturbing frequency, it will remind me of Twitter, which will make things even worse. Anyway, here’s music that is not Sponge’s 1994 alternative hit “Plowed.” It is instead an ambient reconstruction of music by Portland’s Beacon Sound Choir. Enjoy.

★★★ A night under the roar of the air conditioner ended in a morning splashed with heavy rain. By the walk to school, the downpour had ended; by midmorning a sunbather was dangling sandaled toes out under a balcony railing. The thermometer and the forecast agreed that the heat wave should have been over, but the humidity was so thick that the change barely registered. The heat still lingered inside the school, as the children crowded around the table for post-concert lemonade and played tag in the hallways outside their art show. Only in the last bright part toward evening did the promised coolness come. The doorman advised someone to stash the unwanted remains of an ice-cream cone up by the shrubbery, where the birds on their way to roost could get at it. Rich-toned light stuck to the bricks and glowed on the people out in Hells Kitchen. Traffic was light, the taxi window was half down, and the signals were green after green.

And other tweets not sent by Luke Mazur

Luke:

NYT-Special Counsel Mueller is looking at possible money laundering by Trump associates, perhaps helped by Russians. https://t.co/kiBu89BLxB

 — @greenhousenyt

Silvia: I KNOW
god
it’s all happening
(Ed note: it’s not)

Luke: the cable mini series of this all in 20 years will be good though

Silvia: therewon’t be any cable though

Luke: right yeah
streaming to our eyes

Silvia: FX Rx

Luke: fxx rx will stream us the simpsons
i wonder if there will be new episodes still

Silvia: the AI bots will write them and they will be good

Luke: will bots also write the rankings of every episodes

Silvia: are you bot entertained

Luke: haha jared money laundered
and trump knows and/or helped him

Silvia: he can’t have known either

Luke: yeah youre right
he found out like a day ago
or tomorrow morning

Silvia:

If you look at Obama's press conference six days after the election, it's like he knew all this was going to happen https://t.co/yWcrTaMDzP

 — @pourmecoffee

Luke: oh yeah he knew this was going to end this way
that’s why he wasn’t super terrified
just regular terrified

Silvia: he prob knew about the hacking and everything
that’s why his smile was so big and relaxed

Luke: right and he was like these fucking dumbasses (about us, the voters)
also he knew about kamala emerging as a star during the hearings

Silvia: obamacle
sorry

Silvia: he’s tweeting luke
elph
daytime tweeting

Luke: i saw
he was just at the supreme court too haha
oh wow he called hillary H
the hammering phones lmao

Silvia: clearly it’s him tweeting

Luke: he is obsessed w her
i forgot he said she hammered phones
he thinks about it daily

Silvia: lol

Luke: someone should tweet that he is running against kamala now
it’s too late though

Guatemala Diaries, Part IV

Alexis’s boyfriend flew out the day after we went to Tikal. When I came down to breakfast, she was alone, drinking a banana licuado and staring at the flat surface of Lake Petén. “I didn’t know you were writing about us,” she said. Alexis is thirtyish and studying to teach ESL after several years as a civil servant. She is sensible and engaging in spite of having been raised in a culture which doesn’t value either quality.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “You are the most normal person in your family and will be represented as such.”

“Thank you,” she said, touched.

Presently, M. came down and tried to order a hot chocolate. “What are you, ten?” I asked him. Having finished Ten Greek Plays he was now reading Kafka’s short stories and didn’t look up. When the waitress delivered his banana licuado he thanked her and she smiled a little more than may have been necessary.

“I think she likes you,” I said.

“Most ladies do,” he said.

After we ate, it was time to decide where to go next. It’s tricky to get three people to make a decision. It is especially tricky when two of these people are related and come from a family with entrenched values about thrift, and the third person’s philosophy about money is “in for a penny, in for a pound.” More issues in the mix: Alexis and I have typically gendered people-pleasing issues. Well, actually: I am not actually a pleaser at all and can get suddenly aggressive upon discovering that I have somehow cornered myself. The final twist: M. has this routine where he argues for what he wants and people give into him expecting him to just shut the fuck up about it. Then, once engaged in the very activity for which he lobbied so hard, he sets about trying to ruin everyone’s enjoyment of it by speculating aloud that everyone should in fact have done the other thing, or, something else altogether.

It would not have surprised me if we spent the rest of our lives sitting in the bus station in Flores. But we managed to agree to go to a place called Rio Dulce, and stay overnight. From there, we would take a boat up the Rio Dulce to a town on the Caribbean called Livingston.

Rio Dulce itself was hot and crowded. We took a taxi to a hotel, little A-frame cabins set off from the river with a nice pool. This is probably the narrative of many American travelers visiting slightly off-the-beaten path places like this, and one has mixed feelings about arriving in a dusty town and being like “Peace!” I don’t know that anyone in the town of Rio Dulce was terribly interested in us.

We had lunch on an open porch overlooking a big cement bridge, which M. informed me was “beautiful and well-engineered, which are really the same thing.” M. and I drank Gallos, the beer of Guatemala. When I opened one I would address Gallo’s rooster logo with a cheery, “Hello, new best friend!” then hold the bottle up to my ear and say “Awww! I love you too!”

I never tired of this.

There were allegedly a lot of snotty rich people at this hotel, but they were like wallpaper to me. Also, I don’t think they were that rich. It’s not like M. and Alexis have never been anywhere or done anything or grew up really poor. But they just feel bad about treating themselves well, at all.

“Places like this make me feel pretentious,” Alexis said. “They don’t make you feel that way?”

“I know I’m pretentious,” I said. “It’s a done deal, a foregone conclusion, water under the well-engineered, beautiful puente.”

She said she didn’t think I was pretentious and I nodded and said, “I am.”

A thunderstorm rolled in as we ate lunch. M. spoke knowledgeably about its being very far away and a few minutes later we were nearly knocked out of our chairs by a clap of thunder. “I’m going in the pool,” M. announced.

I suggested he wait a little while.

“Why, because I just ate?” He got up.

Lightening hit the river and a few seconds later we heard M. jump into the pool.

“Your brother is actually in the pool,” I said to Alexis.

She nodded helplessly.

“Why do so many men who grew up in rural Northern California want to die in hideous accidents outdoors?” I asked. Instead of answering, she asked if I thought we should stay here one more night. I admired her political savvy, getting me alone, sniffing out the direction of the wind. I said I kind of wanted to stay another night. She said she’d be up for that but also up for moving on. “But don’t you think this place is pretentious?” I asked.

“Kind of,” she said. “But it’s also pretty nice.”

The thing about people who say they don’t want nice things is that they actually do.

Once the storm was at a safe distance I joined M. in the pool. He pointed out a rusty nail protruding from the cement wall of a hot tub. “As a person, I am enjoying this country,” he said. “As an attorney, all I see is lawsuits.”

We did leave Rio Dulce for Livingston the next day, right after a morning kayak trip to see howler monkeys. The trip up the river took about two hours and blew my mind. On one side of us were sheer cliffs thick with trees, ten shades of green. People lived in little huts along the river. One of them was painted with a Nike swoosh.

Livingston is different from the rest of Guatemala. The people there don’t consider themselves Guatemalan, but Garifuna. They have their own language, their own customs. I am sorry to say I don’t know much more, except to say that several people there bragged that Livingston is better than the rest of the country, more peaceful, more friendly. I am not saying this is true. I am just saying that’s what they said. Also almost all of the people I met in Livingston were Seventh-day Adventists and believed that I was one too. I will get to that later.

On the boat I saw an unread Facebook message from before I left from a friend who’d been to Guatemala, which read: “You don’t have to worry about malaria shots, I mean it’s not like you’re going all the way to Livingston.”

Naturally, M. was delighted at the prospect of contracting malaria. Once I found out that our chances were pretty low, I was like “This will never happen to me!” My greatest fears, in order, are 1. mountain lions and 2. Tie between ISIS and sharks. People are always lecturing me about this, especially ISIS, like I’ve never heard of the Balfour Declaration, like if ISIS ever cuts off my head my last words aren’t going to be “Gosh Darnit, this is ALL MY/LORD ROTHSCHILD/WOODROW WILSON/BOTH GEORGE BUSHES/BARACK OBAMA’s fault.” You can’t help what you’re afraid of. I mean, who lies in bed at night like, “I can’t fall asleep because I am afraid that I will never fully grasp the extent to which my hideous privilege has poisoned the world?” I mean, sure, I think about it, but I only like to obsess over things that seem to have some kind of bottom.

So my two little NORCAL-raised Communist traveling companions had the idea that we were going to go to some hostel type place outside of town, and I was willing to check it out. But then we got there, and it was just really just kind of pushing it for me. We walked down a trash-laden beach. We saw a toilet seat floating in the water. It was M.’s dream.

A woman working at the hotel’s dark bar showed us a room with no mosquito nets, and gaps in the wall. I was like, “Ma’am, I don’t know if you know this but ISIS could totally get into this room, and so could mosquitos.” But then, somehow, we just agreed to stay there, because I thought they wanted to and I didn’t want to be an asshole. But then once they were making up the room, I saw that neither of them really wanted to stay there, and hit the eject button. Actually, I jumped up and down on the eject button.

We went to a really nice place that cost the same amount of money, the place I wanted to stay in all along. “Oh my God,” Alexis said, emerging from our lovely bathroom, hands clasped in girlish excitement, “They have a HAIR DRYER here!”

The two of them promptly got in the giant pool that they made fun of me for wanting and cavorted like seals for hours. If they hadn’t been so delightful I might have killed them.

That night, they went out, and I stayed in the room. I heard a choir and found the source, a woman singing along with a karaoke machine in a bright yellow non-air conditioned Seventh-day Adventist Church. An old woman came up and took my hands and asked me where I was from. I told her that I was from California and that I had just heard the music in my hotel and wandered in. Then we sang, the woman sharing her hymnal with me. I used to be in a church choir even though I have never believed in God and I fought to keep tears out of my eyes because I was enjoying this so much and was reminded of this thing I used to do that was so long gone.

During the sermon the minister said that people who watched telenovelas would not go to heaven, even if they did everything else right. “Who wants to one day hear God say, ‘I almost let you into Heaven?’” he demanded, and I shook my head and laughed along with everyone else.

Part Three:

Human Sacrifice, “Family Style”

Part Two:

The Fancy Bus

Part One:

Just Get On A Plane And Go