The Kitchen Shrink (3 page)

“Come off it. I admit, I’m not proud of myself for doing it with The Martinator, but it’s not like I committed a crime, cheated on anyone or killed somebody.”

“You pert near killed the perfect image I had of you,” Daria said. “So, my friend, let me tell you what I’m gonna do.”

Before I could even stop shaking my head, Daria had twirled and whirled her lush curves in an exotic dance around my kitchen, shaking her long glossy dark curls as she spilled out what she had done, all for little ol’ me, excitement bouncing off the dingy white tiles of my counter top. If it had been directed at someone other than myself, I would have been all for it. 

“Daria, thanks for thinking of me, but I’m not doing it. No how. No way. And just because I had a little indiscretion, doesn’t make me a candidate for something so bizarre.”

 “A little indiscretion? Honey, if that’s what you call a little indiscretion, I’d hate to see what a big boo-boo would be in your eyes. Now if you call it a little indigestion, that I could believe, because I want to vomit.”

 “Daria. Enough. Like you never slept with someone you later regretted.”

 “Yeah, like 20 years ago. When we were supposed to.”

 “Well, I did it. It’s over. It will never happen again. And, I’m fine.”

 “You will be.”

 “Will be what?”

 “You will be fine. I promise. The producers looked it all over, I had photos and I did a write-up, I even got you in before I knew how desperate you were.”

 My phone hummed in my back pocket. I never had ESP although I always wanted to, but I knew it was my son Ryan putting a rush on his ice cream order. I reached into the cupboard for a bowl and slammed it shut. A piece of drywall, about the size of one of Daria’s bottles of nail polish, fell from near the ceiling right on my head. “What the? Ouch,” I said rubbing through my hair.

 “Oh, this is just too perfect,” Daria said, retrieving the plaster piece from the floor, holding it up in her right fist like a medal.

 “What are you talking about?” I scooped the ice cream into the bowl and told Daria I’d be right back as I raced upstairs.

 “Ryan?” I knocked on his door.

 “Yup,” I heard from my son of many words.

 “Here you go,” I said, walking in and over to Ryan, who was lying on his bed. “How are you doing? How was school today?” Like I had to ask.

 “Fine.” This from the kid who loved getting book store gift cards from my relatives on his birthday so he could sell them to me at a markup.

 “What time do you have football?”

 “Hour.”

 I reached over and tried to ruffle his untidy wave of brown hair, but he jerked away. He always was pretty non-demonstrative. Even as a baby I had to work hard for cuddles. I decided to go for it. I sat on his bed, and touched his man-hairy leg. He kicked to bounce my hand off.

 “Sorry. I just miss you, that’s all.”

 Was that a nod? He scooped a bite of ice cream.

 “Everything going OK with you?”

 “Yup.”

 “Have you heard from your dad?”

 “Nope.”

 “Well, I know he’s going to your game. Maybe you can see him after.”

 No response.

 “How’s Nicole been?”

 Eyebrows rise. I always ask each of my kids how the other one is doing. Sometimes it pays off and I get some info, but usually not. I stood up. Then I leaned in for a hug. His muscle shirt held yesterday’s pungent efforts. He smelled like a musky sweaty testosterone filled almost-man, but I could still catch a whiff of my little baby Ryan. I pulled tighter and dropped a kiss on the top of his head.

 “ ‘anks,” I think I heard before I closed his door.

 Was he high? I wondered.

 I stopped by Nicole’s room just to say “hey” and knocked on her door before trying the handle. An inch into it, I heard “Go away! Get out! Quit spying on me!” she yelled, covering her cell phone.

 Heavy sigh. I headed downstairs to Daria and her plan that was so not going to happen. I may have lost my kids to the forces of puberty, but at least I had some control over my own life. “Daria,” I called out as I clattered back into the kitchen. She was on her cell and got off as soon as she saw me.

 “It’s almost a done deal,” she said. “They want to meet you!”

 “Who wants to meet me? What are you talking about and what have you done?”

Daria wheedled and cajoled. But I was having none of it. She actually wanted me to be on a reality TV show being produced by a friend of hers. Apparently, the network loved the idea and purchased 7 new shows to be aired beginning in May. Prime time. It was going to air across the country. As in everywhere. She said they already had three other participants, they just needed a fourth.

“You would be so perfect for it! It’s not like all those other gross reality TV shows. You don’t have to rappel off a building, eat cow balls or hook up with anybody, unless you want to that is,” she laughed. “This is a good thing. It’s Martha Stewart meets home renovation meets Dr. Phil who hooks up with Dr. Laura Berman, but not in a sexual way,” she said, adding, “unless you want it to. Oh, Lisby. Look at you. You have been so down and you are such a great person. Come on, open yourself up and just try something new and get your house re-done, for free!”

“Daria. In case you haven’t noticed. I’m in the middle of a not great life right now. Why in the world would I want to go on national television and air my dirty laundry? I just can’t understand people who do that. Or why they do that. You of all people know that my kids are at that rebellious stage. I have no idea what they’re going to do next. And I can’t do that to them, put them on TV, under the microscope of the whole voyeuristic world.”

“Elizabeth, listen to me. This is a good thing. It could be the reality TV kick in the pants that you need. This really could be good therapy for you. And,” she megaphoned her hands around her mouth, “YOU CAN GET YOUR HOUSE FIXED UP FOR FREE!” Call us frustrated cheerleaders, we seem to holler at each other like that, a lot.

“Have you not heard a word I said?” I asked her. “My kids call me Mrs. Moody Mean Jeans, it’s not like we have some lovely family tableau going on around here. In fact, there really is nothing interesting going on.” Nothing I want the public to see, I thought, remembering the hissy fit I had thrown that very morning when Nicole had tried to pass a whole jumbled laundry basket of clean clothes back down to me to be washed and folded. Again.

“Well, there was something pretty interesting going on the other night,” Daria muttered under her breath, but loud enough I heard her all the same.

“Thank you for winning my argument for me. Do you really think I want something like sleeping with the Martinator on TV?”

“You said it was never going to happen again.”

“Well, it’s not, I’m just saying, life is messy. No need to rub my nose in it. Trust me. My life would make for bad TV. I’m sure there are hundreds of people who would jump at the chance. I prefer to live my little life fucking up off screen, thank you very much.”

“Lisby. Listen. There is nothing real about reality television. Just do it to get your house fixed up, meet some people, have some fun. Fun is what you are sorely lacking, my friend. I even think they want it to be a helpful, feel-good show.’”

“Nice idea, but I know how it works. They want the drama. They catch me screaming at my kids for, oh, I don’t know, staying out all night and then they edit it making me look like a shrew going off the deep end and cut it to look like I freak out when my daughter asks me for a drink of water or something. “

“Sure, they do have their tricks for creating a good storyline,” Daria agreed. “But this is different, it’s more a Do-It-Yourself show.”

“Do what myself?” I snapped. “I’m not a construction worker. I’m not an actress, I don’t have big boobs, I wasn’t in a sex tape and I will never, ever understand Snookie, OK? There is absolutely nothing special about me. In fact, I can’t think of anyone else less likely to be in a reality series. So, just forget it. I can’t handle this right now. I have enough going on, you know, trying to work out my real life and real life problems without worrying about fake reality.”

“Honey, I understand. Believe me, I do,” she countered. “Just think about it. Just meet the producers and let them explain how they want this to be different. This show is called “The Kitchen Shrink,” with the premise that if your life is messed up your house probably is, too, and by fixing up both, it becomes the ultimate life and home makeover. They plan on using home renovation as a living model of Feng Shui to restore harmony and balance to your world. It’ll be hands-on and the viewers will get to know you as you take concrete, ha ha, steps to physically change and improve your environment to see what happens in your life. Lisby, I really want this for you. You know I’ve got your back, don’t you?”

I shrugged my shoulders.

“Come on,” she continued, pushing her luck. “Look what happened when I wasn’t around. Martinator? Need I say more?”

“No, you need not, smart ass.”

As if Daria was working some voodoo or something, the toilet backed up and my computer died the very next day. Daria had also called my darling daughter Nicole and sold her on the idea and the glamour of being on a reality TV show. She and Ryan double-teamed me in a rare display of unity. They usually joined forces to wear me down on something, like how they were the only kids on the planet without an iPhone and if I cared anything about them and their social well-being I would ante up. Like I was depriving them of food, shelter or the ridiculousness that is known as Abercrombie and Fitch clothing. Or worse, Juicy Couture. I had offered to just stencil ‘diva’ on the back of Nicole’s sweat pants; she was not amused.

“It’ll be fun, Mom, and you know it. You’re really good at decorating and stuff and you are a good talker. You’ll be great,” wheedled my daughter, proving she had charm when she wanted to.

“Yeah,” chimed in my young man of few words. “It’ll be cool.”

“What?” I asked them. “Are you guys thinking you’ll be discovered and become someone famous? Or that you’ll meet movie stars?”

The expressions on their faces told me that thought or two had crossed their minds.

“You guys. It won’t be like that. We’ll have cameras in our faces all the time. They’ll be here when we fight, when we have a messy house,” I trailed off and looked at Nicole. “When you don’t have your make-up on…”

She shook her head, sending her long hair tumbling over her shoulders as if she weren’t a narcissistic hedonist from way back.

“We don’t care, do we Nicole?” Ryan said.

“No. Mom, we really think you need this. Take a chance. Don’t be such a…” I could see her grope for the worst thing she could come up with. She found it. “Don’t be like Grandma.”

Oh, if there’s one thing that makes me grit my teeth so hard I could practically shoot sparks between my fillings, it was being told I was like my mother. My kids had witnessed my husband use that ploy many a time to get his way, knowing I’d do just about anything to avoid that label.

 Maybe Daria and my kids had a point. I was in a rut. It was a big ol’ single, suburban, going-nowhere-fast boring blur of a rut. I Googled myself and all that came up was a hit for me as a basketball scorekeeper for Ryan’s 7th grade team. Good times. All I remember about that is some eager-beaver seven-foot tall dad who used to stand so close to me at the scorekeeper table jingling keys in his pocket that I thought he was going to pop his penis in my ear.

Is that all there is? That’s my legacy? Maybe I needed to take a risk. What did I have to lose? My pride? Been there. My privacy? Done that.

“Please, please.” My kids wheedled like they wanted more text messaging minutes or something. But I stood firm and relied on my best parenting skills.

“Will you clean your rooms?” I crossed my arms across my chest to show them I meant business. Nicole hugged and kissed me, just like she used to, and Ryan leaned down and head butted me in the general direction of my heart, his version of a hug. I can’t believe I actually agreed, but the truth is, my kitchen, and my bathroom, and my bedroom, and well, even the family room could all use a make-over.

As I waited for Daria, I walked around the downstairs, trying to figure out what I would change, if I could. Our house was in Pleasantville; a deep, dark suburban neighborhood in the North County of San Diego in an area called Rancho Penasquitos. It was an old Indian name that meant “little cliffs” but friends of ours always insisted on calling it Rancho Skinny Penis. My husband, trying to attach himself to a more important coastal address, always tried to tell people we lived in east-east Del Mar. That’s like people who live in Pacific Beach trying to say they live in La Jolla. Or people who live in Los Angeles and say they live in Beverly Hills but don’t really own the 90210 zip code. Geosnobbery was alive and well in our great state. Our house was only about eleven years old, but, unless you lived in southern California, you may not know that is way past its sell-by date, and prime time for cosmetic enhancement.

Its tannish stucco had become stained and faded under the red clay roof tiles. Inside, the carpet was, let’s just say ‘lived in’. Brett and I had always talked about replacing it once the kids were grown and gone and finished spilling Slurpees on it. The kitchen looked drab and dingy, like the whole damn thing could have used Crest white strips. I myself was kind of looking forward to a fresh start; like in that allergy commercial where once you took a pill the whole world looked bright and shiny again.

My funds could use a make-over too, since the divorce had put the kibosh to any free-wheeling spending and I was back to square one, hoping the water heater didn’t blow because that would really hurt. I used to be a news producer a million years ago, which was where Brett and I met in the first place. Once the kids came along I was lucky enough to be a stay-at-home mom. It was hard re-entering the work place now, especially since I wanted to be home in the afternoon for the kids. Don’t say it, I know, they’re old enough, but they’re going to be gone all too soon and I wanted to be there for them. Besides, even if I wanted to return to the news desk, which I didn’t, the world of local news had changed so much I’m sure I would be as welcome as a wounded dinosaur. Which is what I would feel like around all the smart, young ivy-leaguers running the joint. While they would provide news coverage of the dying dinosaur—if it bleeds, it leads—they certainly wouldn’t want to hang out and work with it every day.