Searching for Pan’s Perfume

Welcome to Heathen Gulch

4 May 2008 at 3:58 am (Down Time) (family, home)

Home, home on the farm

Where the dial-up still takes all day long

Where there’s still snow on the hills

And they say it might snow more still

But hey, at least it’s rent-free

Yes.  I’m home.  In Gifford, Washington.  Where is Gifford, Washington, you might ask, as many have before you.  Well, let me tell you.  Gifford, Washington, is a “town” 70 miles north of Spokane, Washington, nestled on the banks of the Columbia River.  *(This far north, it’s actually technically Lake Roosevelt, due to the Grand Coulee dam, but we in Heathen Gulch – as the home of my parents, the place where I grew up, was fondly dubbed – prefer to refer to the river’s pre-”progress” grandeur and stick to calling it the Columbia.)  I refer to Gifford as a “town” in quotes because really it’s nothing more than a post office (well, okay, and there’s one house next to the post office).  But, FYI, a place is a town if it has it’s own postal code, so that post office sitting on the side of Highway 25 apparently qualifies as one.  And there you have Gifford.

You can imagine that life in Gifford doesn’t get too terribly exciting, especially given gas prices these days which makes it really difficult to seek excitement elsewhere.  Don’t get me wrong, I mean, the Stranger Creek Grange’s Mexican buffet in honor of Cinco de Mayo, which we attended tonight, was sure a hoot and a holler, but remember that Cinco de Mayo only comes once a year.  So yeah, life could get pretty boring.  But remember, I’m sitting in the living room of a place called Heathen Gulch conversing with the family that occupies it (mine).

Tonight’s topic of conversation, you ask?  Well… I can only threaten to murder the gagnormous ficus sitting to the side of the living room, blocking the view between the one couch and the TV, so many times, so that’s off the menu.  I can only laugh at the creme-puff on legs that used to be a dog for so long, so that’s out.  There are only so many jokes that can be made at the expense of my sister’s schnoz – hereditary courtesy of my dear papa – at least until I think of more.  And my family has already given me extensive shit about the lobster-and-paste state of my face (I forgot to put on sunscreen again while working all day outside with my bandana on – hello FOREHEAD LINE).

So, with all those topics exhausted, it is of course natural that the following topic would ensue: HEAVY PETTING.

Okay.  Stop laughing.  Seriously, my parents and I are in agreement – we don’t get why that expression is so funny.  I mean, yeah, when I used it as a teenager, I used it kind of tongue-in-cheek (no pun intended), but I did use it.  It was not an unfamiliar or unused term.  But here sits my little sister laughing her ass off when my mom drops the term in passing.  She thinks it’s hilarious, as (she says) do her friends.  And I remember some people on the Ice also cracking up when I dropped the term in conversation.  Seriously, is it that funny?  I mean, as my mom pointed out in a very extensive and detailed description:

“First base is making out; second base is heavy petting; third base is finger action; and a home run is fucking.”

Well, thank you Mom for clearing that up!

Please don’t be shocked, appalled, disgusted, or discriminatory in any way.  Yes, my mom did say the words “finger action,” but hey, that’s Mom.  Those’re the ‘rents, that’s the fam.

This is HEATHEN GULCH.  Suck it!

Home can be tedious, it can seem sometimes depressing that after four years of living on my own, I’m living back in my parents house, fights can and do happen.  But then I remember, I’m living here for a reason, there are great reasons that I currently find myself without a house or money (yay traveling!), and if I wasn’t here, I’d be missing all of these incredibly open and enlightening conversations.

And hey, if I ever need to vent any real frustration, there’s always that ficus…