My summer stress level is so high that I’m suffering from recurring dress rehearsal dreams where I’m the most ill-prepared dancer backstage. Typically, I have forgotten the choreography, have no costumes and am missing a shoe.

I haven’t danced in years, so the premise is absurd, but that’s the way it is with dreams, isn’t it?

It takes all of my semi-conscious strength to pull away from the hardwoods and turn my face away from the wall of mirrors and familiar faces of days gone by.

And when I do, I awaken in a panic-stricken state, toes pointed, body curled into a modern contracted shape. And then I remember, as the cliche goes, that life for me no longer has dress rehearsals. Those are simply the memories that my sleeping body seeks for comfort; the memories of when stress surfaced from passion, not from work.

Today I called up TDS and realized that in eight months, no new quips or essays have graced its electronic pages. My mind quickly shifted to the dress rehearsal dreams, to their growing frequency, and to the words I’ve published elsewhere as of late.

This summer, I took on a new role that keeps me writing at a greater pace than I’ve maintained before. And while, yes, I’ve written about the most trivial of news subjects, I’ve also written craftily on the subjects I hold dear, extending those Cameron Crowe scenes into this hot Austin existence.

While my mind is riddled with stress, this soundtrack plays. Though my sleeping body still sweats as my muscle memory calls up eight-counts from decades past, these songs keep my feet on the ground, with or without that missing shoe.

It’s a bit off, isn’t it? A playlist that darts from ’80s love-child songs written for outlaw country singers to raunchy punk and gin-fueled cheating songs?

It’s a little off, but then again, I guess every dream — every dress rehearsal — is deserving of its own music.

1. Stevie Nicks – “Leather and Lace”
2. Iggy & The Stooges – “I Need Somebody”
3. Crosby, Stills & Nash – “Love The One You’re With”
4. Robert Earl Keen – “Paint the Town Beige”
5. Cory Branan – “Darken My Door”
6. Turnpike Troubadours – “Gin, Smoke, Lies”
7. Hayes Carll – “Drunken Poet’s Dream”
8. Ray Wylie Hubbard – “Down Home Country Blues”
9. Justin Jones – “Christmas Night”
10. Ani DiFranco – “Overlap”

Listen for yourself: http://spoti.fi/OKjEKr.

Tammy was tough on me, too. When my boyfriend would play at her bar, she’d look after me. She’d reprimand me if I did anything stupid, like the time I walked out the back door while talking on the phone. “You never do that,” she scolded when I walked back in. “Don’t go out that back door by yourself again.”

Tammy was tough, but there was one tune that wore down her exterior. And when That Song, laced with lyrics of loneliness and destruction, was played, it didn’t matter if I were sitting by myself—as oft happened—or at a table with friends. When it was time for That Song, Tammy would call my name, and I would step in.

She’d step in front of the bar and circumvent the room, turning off every neon sign one by one. Then she’d tell her patrons to be quiet. This was a song to listen to. And as the first strums of the guitar were heard, we’d sit down together in front of the stage and she’d grab my hand. Most times she was crying by the end of the second chorus, singing along, too. But as the song would end, so would her softness fade. It only lasted as long as a cigarette can be smoked.

Then the lights would come back on one by one, the songs that followed mimicking customary honky-tonk sounds. Tammy would go back to fishing out cold beers to people who probably didn’t need them.

I saw Tammy quite a bit. I got used to her six-minute reprieve of toughness: to the hand holding, the dim lights, the subtle tears.

I even went to Tammy’s backyard wedding. At the reception, she requested That Song for her first dance. I had a feeling she would, but I couldn’t understand why. Why would you want the first song of your wedding to be about “drinking to yesterday” and a “line of stools and an empty bar”?

It took me a few years, but I understand it a little more now.

Tammy was tough. Tammy was cans of Coors and yesterdays and emptiness. Even though those words were sorrowful, they were her words: words that let her fall soft and grab a hand in the smokey haze of a bar.

And that night, when she danced to That Song at her wedding, she didn’t have to turn off any neon signs or grab the hand of a near stranger. She didn’t need a front row seat for her reprieve. I think her softness lasted longer than six minutes that night: longer than a cigarette can be smoked.

That’s what the Casella family suggests. I like it just fine with a vegetarian lasagna on a cold near-December night. Bebe takes it early in the day—in December, too. Even at a post-Christmas brunch she’ll take a pinot grigio. It must be the notes of “lively green apples and pears” that draw her in. It must be an early taste of summer. Not the $6.00 price tag.

Unrelated rag photo.

Reader.

Accept my apologies for the sheer lack of content that has graced the pages of this, our little Two Dollar Stove. The point of Two Dollar Stove was to be a home to stories… a home to content shaped in my head that had no other home on paper or Web. And so it lived briefly and vibrantly, a little life being breathed into it just as it was needed. But over the last sixth months (time still does exist in this space we call the Internet), this hub has become less a “mild attempt at blogging” and more a “quarterly update of 500 words or less.” It’s not for lack of content, as much as an overload of changes.

In May, I moved back to the City I Love (after leaving the City I Love for “love,” which could be a blog of its own) to take a job that has filled my free time and afforded me a place to publish writings on the things I love. Namely things about music—my own tiny Austin-centric page right out of a Cameron Crowe screenplay (but with less drugs, sex, buses and oversized coats).

And during this overload, I experienced a block. Not a block as serious as the one experienced when trying to write that story about biscuits, just one where writing things to be published outweighed writing other things to be self-published on a self-serving blog.

Recently, my pot was stirred by a host of influences, most importantly for this case by a not-so-little blog from Austin.

Because of this pot stirring, I’m working on a state of improvement: A cleaning of mind and space that I plan to maintain at least through December 23 (when shit gets tough). I’ve begun the process in my physical space by moving my bed into my “study” (hardly an appropriate term when you live in a 600-square-foot garage apartment), rearranging my remaining interchangeable bedroom/study furnishings and polishing the floors with a concentrated lemon scented cleaner.

As far as this space is concerned? I’ve decided to just post. My biggest aversion to this is that I cannot promise perfectly-edited, well-planned anecdotes that have been mulled over for months (as that is the typical Two Dollar Stove writing process). The point of this site was never to post recipes or paint samples or style faves: The point was to lend a home to the real stories and (often weird) thoughts that roam through my head.

So as we embark on this very cheap journey together, the only thing I ask is for you to stay with me. I can promise nothing more than a space free of posts on paint color and holiday crafts… at least through December 23 when shit gets tough.

When I turned 21, Bebe presented me with a thick, three-inch, three-ring binder filled with zig-zag bordered photos: jagged memories from my life glued to card stock. There was even a page dedicated to my high school boyfriend. Although our relationship had faltered, his cherub face and curly locks still found a home in the book. Because a scrapbook is nothing without a boyfriend or a prom.

Last Christmas, Bebe took me page by page through her own scrapbook. All 85 years.

In her book there are lots of men. As we turn the pages, faded black-and-whites of high school friends become photos of Bebe and my grandfather until their divorce. There are newer photos featuring more recent man friends, ones I’ve heard of, if only casually. Near the book’s end is a photo from the early ’90s of Bebe and a man on a cruise.

“What’s his name, Bebe?” I ask. “Oh, him? I don’t remember,” she replies without regard. It doesn’t bother her that she can’t recall his name. “It was just a week-long trip to The Bahamas.”

When we close the book, Bebe finds a loose photo to show. But this one isn’t of my grandfather or any other contemporary companion.

“This is Raymond,” Bebe says. “Isn’t he handsome?”

In her hands she holds a black-and-white snapshot of young Raymond standing next to a glowing Bebe of 16. No jagged edges or glue marks scar this photo; this photo is not to be anonymously bound to the pages of a book. This one is to be held and called by name.

Of Sapphires and Diamonds

Bebe has a special way of delivering advice. A well-planned endeavor from start to finish, Bebe’s formula doesn’t waiver much: Gift. Pause. Strike.

A month ago I was greeted with a surprise gift outside my front door: a ring of sapphire encircled in diamonds. Bebe had purchased me a replica of Princess Kate’s engagement ring. A piece of costume jewelry, but nonetheless, a heartwarming gesture from my grandmother.  A subtle suggestion that I am her princess, I presumed. That or another reminder that I should find a new beau, and stat.

I called Bebe the next morning to thank her for the trinket. “No problem,” she said. “I ordered it right off the TV! Even got one for myself!” And while she had me on the phone, Bebe wanted to share some advice for my upcoming interview.

Her advice was succinct. “I already told your mother this, but tell them that after your father died you and your mom traveled to London.”

Trying to follow her logic, I stumbled over my words. “Oh. Yeah. Okay. I’ll… I’ll see if I can work that in, Bebe.”

“Don’t just see… make it work,” she demanded. “That way they know that your dad is dead and you’ve been abroad.”

Bebe’s strategy, though off, was clear. I would give the interview a royal one-two punch: while wearing my new Kate Middleton replica engagement ring, I would tell stories of my trip of mourning through the English countryside. Thus, in one fell swoop, proving myself both a stylish and worldly candidate. (Who needs work experience and connections when you’ve been to London?)

I didn’t wear the ring, and I didn’t “make it work.” The sapphire seemed a little flashy and somehow I couldn’t successfully navigate a conversation about digital media into one of a sad nineteen-year-old meandering through castles and abbeys on overpriced group tours. But I did land the job.

And, per Bebe’s advice, I think I’ll be updating my resume and LinkedIn profile with a new tagline that better speaks to my unique offerings.

“Fatherless Twenty-Something. Visitor of Castles. In England.“

Shot from an Abandoned Taqueria

December 2001. My dad and I, accompanied by my grandparents, set off on a road trip to Houston. Grandaddy and Granny packed a cooler. Dad brought his box of cassettes. His best music was on cassette.

Dad drove. Grandaddy navigated. Granny read Danielle Steel. Thirty minutes into our drive, we arrived at the Thunderbird Cafe in Hillsboro. Attached to the Thunderbird Motel on I-35, it was my grandparents’ favorite place to stop for breakfast. Dad and I had never been.

What we entered was a small-town twilight zone; I wouldn’t be surprised if second hands were spinning counter-clockwise at the Thunderbird that day. I don’t remember the contents of our breakfasts, I just know there were biscuits. A basket of biscuits appeared before our drinks arrived. And before we finished those, someone appeared from the kitchen with another basket of hot biscuits.

“Biscuits?” he asked with an encouraging, if not slightly demented, smile. Before Dad and I could complete a silent “What the fuck is with the biscuits?” exchange, my grandparents ushered another batch of biscuits to the table. Dad and I must have exchanged a dozen glances during that breakfast. The Thunderbird Cafe was run by Biscuit Pushers.

When we got back on the road, Dad popped in a cassette: Eagles – Their Greatest Hits. Grandaddy watched the road. Granny read. For the next few hours, Dad and I sang. We sang all the hits, both volumes. Sometimes I stopped to listen to his harmonies. Sometimes I matched them. Mostly, we just sang.

Occasionally, I’d break from song to mimic a Biscuit Pusher. “Biscuits?” I’d ask shrilly, shoulders pulled up to my ears, mouth in a crazed half-smile. I would catch Dad’s inaudible laugh in the rear view mirror. Grandaddy would watch the road. Granny would turn another page.

The Thunderbird Cafe is gone now. Dad is gone, too. Grandaddy and Granny are still here, but these days he does the driving and she can’t read. They don’t remember the biscuits and they don’t know the harmonies for “Peaceful Easy Feeling.”

But I do. And on occasion I journey past the shell of the Thunderbird Cafe, whose last days were spent as a mediocre taqueria. Sometimes I let the 17-year-old in me come out. Sometimes I resurrect the biscuit joke, alone in the car, with the face and the inflection and all of it. I used to not, but I don’t see the harm these days… I’m already standing on the ground.

Closet Heads

I’m suffering from extreme writer’s block. Last night I started writing an anecdote about biscuits that’s going nowhere. I feel like these Styrofoam heads that inhabit my grandmother’s closet. Except I wear less makeup and always have hair.

The heads are older than me. I bet they’ve been a fixture in Bebe’s life for thirty years. Perched on her shelf, sitting on her dressing table, standing in her bathroom, their eyes are always open.

Sometimes, these heads hold wigs. But if these heads could talk…

Red Wall

I work in a basement. My office boasts faux walls and fluorescent lighting suspended from chains secured to concrete. When I moved in the walls were blue, of the ‘baby’ or ‘sky’ variety. Nothing about me is blue, not my eyes, not my sentiment… I’ve never gravitated toward the hue. Over the recent holiday, my spirited coworker convinced her sister to assist in painting my office a color more suited to my disposition. They settled on three walls of fire engine red offset by one of tan and completed the project on Christmas Day.

Now people stop when they walk by, and from adjoining offices I can see reflections of red in the air ducts. Nettie and Pam say “it’s like being in your mother’s womb.” A daily rebirth at the office, I gather. I guess things could be worse.

Exhibit A: Hanson.

Exhibit A

At the end of 8th grade, I bought a Hanson CD and rocked out to Mmmbop and some heart wrenching song about a yearbook all summer long. Until I started high school.

Once I learned that bubblegum pop performed by three longhaired brothers wasn’t so cool, I hid the evidence. I hid it so well, in fact, that it didn’t resurface until a few years later when my snooping cousin made an embarrassing discovery.

That was The Night Hanson Died. All it took was a lighter, a dose of shame and a little teen angst to establish a new truth: Hanson Sucks. Rather than destroy the CD completely, we burned it. Cracked it. Scarred it. What remained was a singed trophy proving my allegiance to all things cool and hatred of all things pop.

I rediscovered this record of rebellion last summer while pilfering through some forgotten drawers. It was one of the most sobering moments I’ve had in a while, so I keep Hanson around for future discovery.

Because sometimes you need a reminder, no matter how small, of just how uncool you can be.