Zimas at the Gun Club
September 11, 2007
My niece, Cassidy, is getting married this weekend. Actually, she's getting married tomorrow. They couldn't find anyone to officiate on the weekend with such short notice, so the legal stuff will happen tomorrow, and the wedding party will be on Saturday: a pig roast at a gun club in Pennsylvania.
The groom's mother has done most of the planning. My mother asked if she could do anything to help, but was told not to worry, it was under control. "Well, can I bring something?" she asked.
"A jello mold."
I spoke to my mother last night.
"I keep asking if I can bring anything," she said, "and she keeps telling me: Jello molds, jello molds, jello molds. I don't know anything about making a jello mold."
"What's there to know?" I said. "You just mix it up in a bowl, chill it, and flop it over on a plate. Done."
"There's more to it than that," she said, and proceeded to give me detailed instructions on how to make a fancy two-tone, fruit-filled jello mold. "You have to chill the jello before you put the second flavor on top, but not so chilled that it sets up completely, or it won't stick together. There's actually a lot of room for error."
"I thought you didn't know anything about jello molds."
My mother and father are driving to Pennsylvania today to be present at the actual ceremony and to be available to help with last-minute party planning.
"I don't know when I'm going to get time to make a jello mold," my mother said. "Maybe I can make it to the hotel room. I can ask the kitchen for some hot water, and I can chill it in the room's refrigerator."
"Ma, you're nuts. Those in-room refrigerators are tiny — if there even is one. How many people are going to be at the party? Fifty? That's a pretty big jello mold. Maybe you can just buy one at a supermarket or something."
"Maybe."
My mother might've gone to her niece's new apartment and made the jello there, but Cassidy and her future husband got evicted the other day. Just a couple of days before their wedding.
I thought it was odd that Cassidy and her fiancé, JJ, moved into a new apartment so soon before the wedding. "Why not wait until afterwards?" I wondered. But, young and impulsive, they wanted to do everything all at once and right away.
They found two apartments they liked. One was a little cheaper, but the landlord requested that they take care of the lawn. Okay, they decided, mow the lawn every once in a while in exchange for cheaper rent. No problem.
The other day, the landlord asked Cassidy where her husband was.
"At work," she said.
"I told him he needed to cut the grass today, and he hasn't done it."
(They'd only been in the apartment a few days— hadn't even unpacked their stuff yet.)
"Well, I don't know anything about it," said Cassidy. "I'll ask him when he gets home."
When JJ got home from work, the landlord asked him why he hadn't cut the grass. "I told you to cut the grass today."
"No, you didn't," he said.
"Yes, I did,"
They went back and forth, back and forth, until JJ snapped and said, "Bullshit. You did not ask me to cut the grass today."
The next morning, there was a note tacked to their front door telling them that the landlord wanted them out, "for fear of my safety and the safety of my young daughters."
"Bullshit is right," I said when my mother told me the story. "Do they have a lease?"
"I don't know, but the lady sounds cuckoo. I think they just want to cut their losses and get out of there. Fortunately, they hadn't unpacked everything yet."
I'll try to get the whole story this weekend.
September 17, 2007
I nearly titled this post, "A Nice Day for a White (Trash) Wedding," but I didn't want to offend anyone. Especially my niece, who I love dearly and who threw a great party. She'd probably forgive me, though. After all, it was a pig roast at a gun club in the woods with plastic buckets full of Zima and wine coolers, guests clomping barefoot on asphalt to novelty country tunes, kids huffing helium, and the bride and groom in T-shirts and jeans. When it was all over and I said goodbye to Cassidy and Jason, congratulated them, and wished them bon voyage on their honeymoon, they both thanked me for coming.
"I wouldn't have missed it for the world," I said. And it was true.
A long drive down a winding country road brought us to a large wooden shelter with a corrugated metal roof festooned with crepe paper, balloons, and Christmas lights. The pig was roasting in a stainless steel drum, and people were setting up aluminum foil pans filled with casseroles. I didn't recognize anyone.
I wasn't sure how long it would take to drive from Brooklyn to the small town outside of Hazleton, Pennsylvania, and we arrived about an hour early. There were plenty of people there, though. Including a handful of young kids that were loose and wild, huffing on helium straight from the tank. One in particular was running around the picnic tables, twirling through the open dance floor, chattering in helium-induced high-pitched tones that were probably only a little higher than his pre-adolescent natural voice. He was laughing and running, tripped on the asphalt floor, and fell face-first into one of the picnic tables.
"Are you okay?" asked Cassidy.
The kid was dazed and didn't answer. He was flopped over the edge of the table, clutching at the paper tablecloth cloth waiting for the world around him to catch up. Slowly, the color returned to his round red cheeks, and then they continued to turn a shade deeper from embarrassment. He stood up and shook his head a few times, then scurried away to recuperate.
"JJ," Cassidy yelled across the room -- although with no walls, it wasn't exactly a room -- "JJ, I think you'd better put the helium tank away."
Slowly, more guests arrived. Parents grand grandparents, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, and before long, it was time for a champagne toast in plastic glasses.
Jason's mother stood up and gave a short speech. "Since the best man declined to toast," she began, "I'm going to do it."
My aunt Teresa, a stickler for protocol, whispered, "Who's the best man? Where is he? I'll kill him."
JJ’s brother tried to make himself as small as possible, shrinking in his seat, glassy-eyed and red-faced.
Aside from my aunt, however, no one else seemed to care who gave the first toast as long as it meant that things were underway and we'd be eating soon.
Deborah had checked the weather forecast before we left, so we knew it would be chilly on the mountain, but despite bringing a couple of extra layers, she was still cold. We stood by the fire to warm up. Corn wrapped in soaking wet burlap was heating up on a steel plate over the open flame, turning the area into a steam bath.
Once Deborah's blood was warm and pumping smoothly again, we took a walk.
Several yards away stood an inflatable castle for the kids to jump around in. A fan that kept the castle inflated became unplugged, and the kids started screaming as the castle collapsed around them. It happened several times throughout the day.
The bathrooms were red wooden shacks in the woods, but with running water and flushing toilets. I came out from the men's side, brushing cob webs and spiderwebs out of my hair.
"There's a huge hairy spider in the women's room," said Deborah.
I peeked inside and took a picture of it. Then Deborah took her camera out of its case and did the same.
"Are you copying me?" I said.
"No. You're copying me."
Thus began a competition over photo ops that lasted the rest of the day. Deborah won her fair share, including a better picture of the spider. She also got a better photo of the jello mold, and a few movies, too (I haven't had a chance ot raid her camera yet), but she felt trumped when I showed her this photo of an illustration on the inflated castle:
"Uh!" she said, jealous. "Oh my god. Where did you get that?"
"If it's out there, I'll find it."
We stayed at a hotel in Hazleton — a town that recently made headlines for making it illegal to be an illegal immigrant — and took a long, leisurely Sunday drive home, through the Pennsylvania hills and New Jersey farmland, to Brooklyn, to sleep in the city that never sleeps.
