That One Time at the Ice Cream Parlor

Last year, I royally screwed up the walls of my powder room when I got the brilliantly dumb idea to scrape off the painted-over (yes, they painted it) wallpaper.  Hint, when you scrape down to the cardboard-y stuff of the drywall, it’s not a good thing.  But hey, I’m not much of a DIY-er.  And this isn’t a DIY blog. 

So now my powder room is super scary with walls that are waiting for my brother to come fix them to be redone and repainted.  In the meantime, I’m left with interesting wall art to stare out when I’m on the toilet.  Oh come on, we all sit on the toilet.  It’s okay to talk about it.

This is my favorite -

Depending on how you look at it, it can either be a giraffe taking a dump or it can be a boob.  It’s all about how we interpret the things we see – or don’t want to see, maybe.  It’s funny how everyone has a different perspective on things, even if they’re in the same exact situation. 

And now, I will tell you about that one time at the ice cream parlor.

When I was 17, my family went on our annual summer vacation to the Jersey Shore.  One night, we went to Tory’s, the local old-fashioned ice cream parlor where the waitresses wore poodle skirts, the Cokes came in old-fashioned bottles, and the guys working behind the counter were jerks – soda jerks, that is!  It was a great place and the model for the ice cream parlor that I’m going to open one day and we went there a lot when we were on vacation.  This particular night, my mom, brother and I, and some cousins were waiting outside in line to get seats for our large party. 

Behind us were a couple of teenage boys.  It didn’t take long before they began making fun of me and the way that I looked.  Look, I’ve dealt with teasing and rude comments and stares for much of my life.  I took a pretty passive approach, well, by passive, I mean avoidance – duck my head, take the long way to bypass certain hallways, sit at the front of the bus – so, yeah, I’m an avoider, not a fighter. 

But that night, I was with my big brother.  And while my mother was completely oblivious to what was going on, my brother was there and he listened to these non-soda jerk jerks make fun of me.  How I wanted him to say do something.  I don’t know what - maybe punch them or kick them in the, well, you know where.  Basically, I would’ve been okay if he had hurt them anyway he could’ve.  But he didn’t.  He just stood there and he made lame little jokes and I just stood there getting madder and madder – not at those mean boys behind us but the very, very mean boy who wouldn’t stand up for me.

The whole situation made me so mad that for years I threw it up to my brother – remember that time at the ice cream parlor when you didn’t defend me?!  Remember that time when you didn’t do anything to help me?!  I held onto that anger pain for a long time.  Too long, probably.

With age, comes wisdom, right?  For years, I focused on what my brother didn’t do.  But here’s the thing, he didn’t do what I wanted him to do…but he did do something.  He tried to make me laugh and ignore those awful boys because, in the grand scheme of things, those boys just didn't matter.  But because I was so angry, I didn't learn the lesson from that night.  A lesson that I only pieced together while I was sitting on the toilet.  Oh right, like you’ve never had an epiphany on the toilet before?      

The world is filled with giraffes and boobs (stupid dumbasses, not breasts – although there are a lot of them in the world too.)  Back to the lesson. Giraffes stand tall, they rise above it all, they’re noble and graceful.  And they tower over the boobs of the world because boobs are just boobs and they don’t matter to giraffes at all. 

It’s up to you to either be a giraffe or a boob. 

Be a giraffe.