“Me too! Me too!,” shouts Deb, flicking the iPod off so fast I’m sure she’s going to flip the space shuttle spiriting us and two hundred pairs of shoes, tee shirts, shorts, several bottles of tequila, a gallon of margarita mix, a case of chardonnay, and a cardboard box bursting with Doritos, Tostitos, and all manner of no-nos for our “yes, yes!” girls getaway weekend. “I always think about getting one!”
“If you want one, get one. What’s the hold up?” snaps Diana, Deb’s younger sister, and the only one among us who’s single, childless, and completely unaccustomed to having to make decisions by committee.
“The hold up is my husband,” I respond, clutching the dashboard and wondering how Deb’s managing to do ninety in the left lane while craning her head around to catch every morsel of conversation, and if it’s really going to hurt when we hurtle into the median. “He’s completely anti tattoo. He says it shows a distinct lack of breeding.”
“Houston, we have a blueblood!”
Did we have to keep invoking Houston? For a split second I secretly hope Jenn’s little guys are enjoying a Crazy Glue free-for-all, and then I catch myself. She’s a dear friend. And no one deserves to find a frog in the freezer. Again. “Trust me,” I reply, “Houston cannot help us.”
“A lack of breeding!” Diana bellows. “He’s what, related to the Royals or something?”
Bingo. My mother-in-law, God rest her soul, was a Brit. She wasn’t related to the Queen Mum, but from the way she talked about Diana, Charles and their two princes you’d have thought they were old Cricket partners.
I share this tidbit with my friends and watch happily as it completely unhinges them. In seconds we’re all laughing and chanting, “Lack of breeding! Lack of breeding!” and listing things and activities we love that attest to our spectacularly poor pedigrees.
Ankle bracelets. Cobalt blue hair extensions. Cold pizza and beer for breakfast. Black nail polish. (Trust me; there’s nothing like the reaction folks give a Goth mom.) Spiraling into hip-shaking, sexy pout-making “So You Think You Can Dance” mode in the middle of the mall at the first muzaky strains of “Let’s Stay Together.” (And continuing to dance no matter how fast our mortified offspring freak out and fly into Abercrombie and Fitch. Like they weren’t headed there anyway.) Toe rings. Trashy novels. And of course, tattoos.
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