I’m swallowing the beans of a Taco Bell enchilada when the nausea sets in. Pausing, I glance at the table where yellow processed cheese congeals on 99 cent nachos. I sit back and take a break from eating.
Across from me, dwarfed in the mustard-colored booth sits my six year old son, Jeb. He eagerly devours his bean and cheese burrito, the refried sludge smearing on his chin. Seated beside him is his father, Rex, dressed in an orange sweater and distressed jeans. He, too, readily eats his assortment of pseudo-mexican food spread on the brown plastic tray before him. Read more
Memories of Yaz at Payless Shoe Source
I’m in Payless Shoe Source with my 6 year old trying on his first pair of tie shoes.
He doesn’t know how to tie bows yet but I’m hoping these new Converse-style kicks will inspire him.
Jeb pulls the tongue of the shoe out and wrestles with the laces while Erasure’s “Chains of Love” bleeds out over the shoe store sound system.
“…come to me, cover me, hold me, together we’ll break these chains of love…”
The synthesized sounds take me back to 1986, when I was 15, wearing Keds and listening to Yaz. That summer my friend and I met Marcus, the older boy with the long ponytail who chewed Big Red and drove us around in his Audi listening to “Upstairs at Eric’s” at high volume.
Back at Payless Shoes I tie Jeb’s bright white laces and put a thumb to the toe to check for space.
“How do they feel? Do they feel like they fit?”
He nods and smiles.
“…they used to talk about the weather, making plans together, days would last forever…”
I’m 36 now, on my knees in the size 1 aisle listening to Vince Clarke’s keyboards in a whole new context.
“…don’t give up, don’t give up now, together with me and my baby break the chains of love…”
We buy the shoes.
And when we get home – I can’t believe it – Jeb ties them on his first try.
Coupons
Jeb discovers the concept of coupons
the free Longs Drugs store booklet is in our post office box
advertising images of electric nose hair trimmers for $7.99
V05 Shampoo
and Hershey bars
are on sale
he’s in the back seat as we drive home
flipping through his book of options
brimming with more enthusiasm than I have heard all week
“even soda!”
“even cereal!”
“this is unbelievable!”
He is in amazement that one can open the mailbox
be gifted a book of consumer goods
and be able to receive these items at reduced rates
by simply presenting a piece of paper
He grasps the concept like an alien that just landed on planet earth
(which at the age of six, he sort of is)
reminding me of all I take for granted
all the coupon books I’ve cursed on their way to the recycle bin
my sadness for the trees lost
to sell a can of Van de Camp baked beans
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