20/20 vision (I don't care if you call me 4 eyes)

I've had glasses since 3rd grade. I remember the day I got them as clear as a bell. It was third grade (which probably meant I was 9.) and I was in Mrs. Carel's class. I loved Mrs. Carel. She was young and cool, tall and pretty, athletic and outgoing. She had a laugh that filled up the room and a smile to follow. Everyone wanted her for a teacher. She did such fun things in the class room. It was more like being in an amusement park instead of school. We practiced spelling words in shaving cream on our desks and I think we even used chocolate pudding once... That was amazing.

Anyway, the day I got my glasses...

My appointment was first thing in the morning which meant I was going to be tardy to school. I hated being tardy for any reason. If I was ever tardy I would always come to class having this odd feeling that something great happened minutes before I got there and I missed out on it and all of the kids wouldn't tell me what it was so I was left out. (Sometimes I still feel that way.) It was a terrible feeling.

So I already knew it was going to be a bad day simply because I was tardy. But today, I had the added pressure of my new glasses. This was the kiss of death. It was a long walk to the class room with the slip from the secretary in the office with my excuse. The closer I got to the door, the more the anxiety grew. These things on my face were uncomfortable. They kept slipping down and pinching my nose.

My plan was to get in the classroom as fast as I could and slip into my desk and hopefully not be noticed. I opened the door as quietly as I could, ditched my book bag and coat, and slithered into my desk and put my head down. (Almost as if I was being punished.) As far as I could tell, my plan worked perfectly. I sat there in silence with my face burrowed into my elbow, breathing as quietly as possible. I was victorious! (or so I thought) After what felt like an eternity I picked up my head and looked around to see if anyone saw me come in. My glasses were fogged from my hot breath! Blasted! I could see very little but what I did see was her; she was standing at the front of my desk, hovering, waiting. As I looked up, through my foggy lenses, I saw her big bright smile. I don't know why but immediately I burst into tears and buried my face again. She was so sweet.

She bent down beside me, rubbed my head and whispered, "You look beautiful!"

I cleared the snot from my nose, wiped the tears off my face and looked at her again. "Really?" I whispered.

"Really." She replied. She went on, "Class, Julie has something very special to share with us today. Today, she got her first pair of glasses."

I was mortified but she urged me to stand and show everyone. So I did. With Mrs. Carel standing beside me I could face my peers and show them how beautiful I looked with my new glasses. After all, she said herself that I was beautiful and that meant the world to me. I loved my glasses from then on. (Which only lasted until I was 11. From then on it was contact lenses.) And to my recollection I don't know that anyone ever called me four eyes. I don't know that it never happened but I think because of Mrs. Carel's reassurance of my beauty that day, I never even noticed any insults from my peers.

And today I wanted to face another childhood memory head on; swimming in a public pool in a bathing suit. To any fat child this is hell, drenched in water. Oh the agony of having to strip down and put on a bathing suit that showed ALL of your lumps and bumps! And then have all of your peers get to see you and possibly mock and make fun of you? It makes me want to puke just thinking about it! And in my school district every child had to do it, period end of story.

So this morning I woke up and wondered, "what should I do today?" and after a bowl of oatmeal and a cup of coffee it came to me clear as day, today I was going to swim.

When I was young I LOVED to swim but only felt completely free to do it at my own home or at a trusted friend's house. I was so excited when we had a pool put in our back yard. If I remember right that was the summer going into sixth grade and I wanted to have all of my friends over for a pool party to celebrate on the last day of school. It was the funnest day I can remember. I spent the entire summer in that pool with my sister or the neighborhood kids. Honestly, I don't think there wasn't a day that I wasn't in that pool. I felt at home in the water. When I was in there, I was weightless and graceful. I could do hand stands underwater (Lord knows that would never happen on the ground.), make up beautiful ballet moves, and float on my back with all the sounds around me canceled out. It was peaceful, and my place to escape.

Through life circumstances we moved out of the house with the pool. My days of swimming freely, at home, where over.

As I got older the, more I started to hate my body. By the time I was 13, the idea of getting in a bathing suit was a joke. I laughed when my friends would suggest a birthday party at the city pool, as if I was too cool for that. Secretly, I longed to be weightless and graceful again. Once or twice I might have put on a pair of shorts and tank top and slip into some water somewhere. It was never the same though. I hated the fact that I was fat: the grace and weightlessness where gone.

But today was a day to reclaim that love and dream of mine. I announced my intentions on the Internet as a safety net so I couldn't talk myself out of it. I checked the schedule at the YMCA and then was off to buy a suit to swim in.

When I got to the locker room at the Y and smelled the chlorine, the terror set in. As I looked around I saw all kinds of bodies of varying shapes, sizes, and colors. Some where old and flabby, and others where young and taut. I didn't dare stare because I didn't want anyone else to possibly feel insecure by my looking at them. I decided to keep my eyes to the floor. While changing into my suit was a lot of positive self talking and very little looking at myself in the mirror. I didn't want to see what I was sure everyone else could and did see, my round squishy body with lumps and bumps for all to see.

The plan was to leave my contacts in and wear goggles but man, those things hurt my face! They suctioned to me and didn't want to let go. No goggles. They had to go. So the contacts came out which meant everything from there on out was going to be a big blur. I wasn't too excited about that but I didn't want to turn back now.

Bathing suit on, contacts out, hair in a pony tail, towel covering me up. Deep breaths. I was ready for this. However, I didn't anticipate that I was going to have to drop my towel pool side and slither into the water. That was the hardest thing I had to do. But I did it. And the only way I did it was because I couldn't see if the other swimmers in the water were watching or not. There were just too fuzzy. I could sort of tell if their head was turned in my general direction but I had no idea what their eyes were on. The only person I knew was looking at me was the lifeguard. I can't blame her, it's her job to make sure we are safe.

It was like heaven. I swam for over an hour. Breast stroke, back stroke, butterfly... it all came right back to me. I did underwater handstands, kicked and moved my body in ways that I had long since forgotten. I was weightless and graceful again.

As I was changing in the locker room I decided that people are not watching me as closely as I think they are. Mostly when they look they aren't seeing me with 20/20 vision of judgement like I assumed. Everyone is too busy wrapping themselves in a towel, hoping their lumps and bumps won't be seen by the rest of us. So I stepped back from the mirror, still with no contacts, and looked at the girl with the squishy body. I think I finally got it. I was the only one looking at myself with 20/20 vision of judgement and criticism, shame and disgust.

And in that moment tears came. Not tears of sorrow or sadness, but tears of love and acceptance of my own self. Tears that whispered, "You look beautiful." and a heart that finally agreed.

A Jack of all trades

But master of none.

I've known for a very long time that I am unlike most people and find many different subjects interesting yet not interesting enough to pursue them beyond a few days of fascination. Often my interest waxes and wanes depending on a variety of different things: my economic status, current life situations, as well as attention span.

In these last few months I have bounced around from wanting to be an activist, a baker, a public speaker, an educator, a stay at home mom, maker of organic vegan lip balms, owner of an antique shop in New Orleans, a chicken farmer (thanks Mom), use my food industry knowledge to whip a restaurant in Des Moines back into shape (a la Gordon Ramsey), a jewelry maker, the next Anne Lamont (a fantastic writer), owner of a taco truck, a nutritionist, or a nurse. It's quite a list, I know.

And I'm not just talking about having a good idea and daydreaming about it. I mean, I have been convinced, to one degree or another, that any one of these aforementioned occupations could very well be my life's destiny. I have so many good, no, great ideas that it's often hard to know what to do with them all. Maybe I should write them down? Write a story? Maybe just let them go?

I don't know if it really matters what I do with these ideas. Maybe in 50 years I will have wished to keep a journal. Maybe not.

But today, I added another possible occupation to my list. Private Investigator.

Don't laugh! It's totally possible and here's why I believe that.

We (my mom and sister and I) were looking at an online edition of a local news paper where I grew up and mostly mocking the lack of anything interesting to report on. We really started to yuck it up when we ran across a weekly segment called "Warrant of the week".

The Enumclaw Police Department, in cooperation with The Courier-Herald, sponsors
a “Warrant of the Week” program. This program is designed to capture people who
currently have warrants out for their arrest by utilizing tips that citizens
provide to the Enumclaw Police. The arrest warrants for these people have been
issued by Enumclaw Municipal Court. Once a week, a photo of a wanted person,
along with a brief description of the crime, is published. Citizens who may have
information as to the whereabouts of the wanted person are encouraged to call
the Enumclaw Police Department at 360-825-3505. Callers may remain anonymous.

This week's warrant features a young man who was arrested for driving under the influence. Apparently Chris M. is the man of the week.

(*Names have been changed to protect not only myself but the innocent and the stupid.)

Christopher M. has a warrant issued for his arrest for reckless driving. M. was stopped by Enumclaw police on May 6, 2006, while attempting to drive while intoxicated and subsequently was arrested for physical control of a motor vehicle while under the influence of alcohol. M. had already been contacted by officers and warned not to drive due to his intoxication. M. waited for officers to leave the area and then attempted to drive away. As he was doing so an officer returned to the area to check on M., finding him behind the wheel. M. is 5 feet, 6 inches tall and approximately 160 pounds. He has blond hair and hazel eyes. M.’s last known address was in Puyallup.

So what do I do? First, I google him. Nothing. I then decide to search Facebook to see if there are any hits... and what to you know. We've got a match. After poking around a little bit and looking at his pictures, I'm sure this is the guy. He also has a link to his business he owns, Shine Auto Detailing; phone number and website provided. Shine Auto Detailing has a Washington State business license that is registered to his wife, Jennifer. Mailing address (I'm assuming this is their home) as well as physical address of the business. I found all of this information in about 15 minutes.

Damn, I'm good!

So, I call the tip line and explain my information to the nice lady on the other end.

Her very confused response, "Facebook? You found this guy on Facebook and this is your tip? Uhmmm... okay."

"Yes, Facebook. There is a picture of him that matches his warrant and everything. He's right there!"

"Umm... and you don't know him in any way? You only know him from the Internet?"

"No, I don't know him. I don't even "know" him on the Internet. I'm just a curious woman who knows just enough about the world wide web to be useful. I just wanted you all to know that you can find this guy and bring him in."

"..."

"I probably sound like a lunatic, don't I?"

"..."

(All the while Mom and sister are laughing at my end of the conversation.)

"Uh, okay ma'am. I've taken down your 'tip' and will let an officer know."

Oh yeah right. By "taken down my tip" she means made a confused face to the woman at the desk next to her. She's not going to tell anyone about my "Facebook tip."

But gosh darn it, I've got some HOT information and I'm not going to let it go. So what do I do? I email all of this information to the Lieutenant.

Good afternoon Lieutenant Southerland,

In reviewing your posting on the Courier
Herald Warrant of the Week I did a simple search on a popular social networking
site and found Mr. M.. Here is a link to the information I
found. There is a photo on this social networking site that matches the
photo on the Courier Herald website.
As you can see, he is a business owner
in Tacoma, owning a business called Shine Auto Detail. The website for
this business can be found here. A phone number is also provided.
I hope this helps in apprehending Mr. M.. Please let me know if I
can be of any further assistance.

I assumed it would end there but gosh darn it, I had to make my information known!

But was I proven wrong! I got a phone call 45 minutes later from the investigating officer wanting to know a little more information. Apparently Lieutenant Sortland found my information useful and forwarded it on to the appropriate person. Ha!

"Ms. R., thank you very much for this information. It is going to be very helpful in finding Mr. M.. We really really appreciate it."

Not even a hint of patronizing or sarcasm. I felt like a hero.

And then later this evening, an email from the Lieutenant himself expressing his gratitude.

I'm not going to go chasing this guy down and try to earn a reward. I am just a humble servant using the tools I have...

(Camera pulls away from medium shot of me looking very gruff and tough in all black, hand cuffs in my hand. Music plays, "Bad boys bad boys, whatcha gonna do? whatcha gonna do when I COME FOR YOU?")