California, Part II: The Golden Boy or The Inherent Inequality of Karmic Balance

My brother Mime and his wife Mrs. Mime are in California this fall so Mime can complete an internship. They live with Mrs. Mime’s family about an hour south of where The Accidental Housewife and Mr. Big live, so they drove up to visit. Now I have written before about how Mime just seems to court good luck. He wins Nintendo Wiis, he lands paid internships, he leads a charmed life. You readers have heard this before. So you won’t be surprised to learn that the charm has followed him to California. A week before I arrived in California, Mime called to tell me not to worry about the California fires because his office had been evacuated and he and all the servers were on their way to the L.A. office. During the evacuation, Mime’s company had done a good deed and helped a neighbor take down their computers and servers and get them out of the office. When they all moved back in, the owner of the neighboring company brought all the employees in Mime’s office the Deluxe Edition DVD of Transformers. Which was Mime’s favorite movie this summer. His boss assured their neighbor that it wasn't necessary to spend that much money in thanks etc, when the neighbor said that he got the DVDs for free because he was somehow (Mime told me, I just can't remember) related to one of the stars. After hearing this story, I was loudly declaring that this would only happen to Mime when Mrs. Mime quietly said, “Tell her about Disneyland.” Mime was reluctant to tell the Disneyland story at first, but The Accidental Housewife and I finally convinced him to spill the beans.

The Disneyland Story: Mrs. Mime’s family lives pretty close to Anaheim, so they get season passes to Disneyland and this fall Mime and Mrs. Mime got them too. So a couple Fridays past the whole family decided to go to Disneyland. Mime had some issues to deal with at work and was running late so he got there after the family. He was standing waiting for the tram from the parking lot to the park and was on his mobile finishing up some stuff with his boss. His boss then started asking him questions about Washington state and the conversation lasted for a bit. When Mime hung up, there was a tap on his shoulder and the man behind him started asking him questions about Washington. Mime said he recognized the man, but couldn’t place him until he saw his wife. Posh Spice. So Mime spent the rest of the time waiting for the tram having a nice conversation with David and Victoria Beckham, only he couldn’t remember Victoria Beckham’s real name and therefore never actually addressed her, as he didn’t think she would appreciate being called ‘Posh Spice.’ The tram came and they all got on and then Mr. Beckham was tapped on the shoulder and Mime thought their conversation had come to an end. Only it wasn’t just some fan who tapped Mr. Beckham on the shoulder, but rather Derek Jeter. Who was on the tram with Alex Rodgriguez, Roger Clemens and assorted wives and/or girlfriends. And Mime wasn’t left out of the conversation. Even when they all got off the tram, the group got Mime through security, offered to buy him a ticket, and took him through the hidden VIP entrance with them. They also invited him to join them that evening, but since he was meeting his wife they understood and gave him a couple of locations they were going to be at that evening if Mime and Mrs. Mime wanted to catch up with them. And that is The Disneyland Story. Mime had the quintessential California experience everyone thinks they are going to have when going to California for the first time, but never actually do.

It has been my experience that Mime’s continual good luck has to be balanced out. That balance is usually achieved by some misery on my part. Which brings us to my vacation. Mr. Big is a big fan of the band America ('Horse With No Name', 'Ventura Highway'). In fact he actually admits to liking their song “Muskrat Love.” America was performing at a club the Friday I was visiting so he and The Accidental Housewife got me a ticket too. I like America as well, having heard them since I was in utero because my mom liked them. The concert was held at a club where you could eat dinner before hand and then enjoy the show either standing in the back or at your table. Since there was just the three of us, we were seated at a bar table, with the elevated bar stools. Which was great, since it afforded us a good view of the stage. There was also a bar. Which meant that there were a lot of inebriated folks my parents’ age in the audience. One man in particular found it very difficult not to touch me on his way to and from the bar. The first time I chalked up to him not seeing my hand on the back of my chair. The second time, when he touched my side, precariously close enough to certain areas to have constituted as ‘feeling up’ should his hand have lingered, I was extraordinarily unhappy. When he blatantly attempted to look down my not-at-all-low-cut shirt on his next trip, both The Accidental Housewife and I went blind with rage. Sadly, Mr. Big had moved to the back of the house due to a bad back and wanting a better view of what was really an excellent concert. The only thing that kept me from walking over to Touchy McFeely's table, where he sat with HIS WIFE, and bloodying his nose was the mysterious youngish-looking bald man halfway across the room who looked amazingly like Michael Rosenbaum. So I distracted myself with trying to figure out if it really was him. The cons being a) his TV show films in Vancouver, B.C., b) up until I noticed him, I was very much the youngest adult in the room (some parents had brought a few pre-teens and teens, but I don’t know how many were there against their will), c) I had been wearing my contacts all day and they were quite dried out and blurry by then and d) I don’t have luck like that. The pros being a) he did look a lot like Mr. Rosenbaum, b) I saw an episode of Cribs that featured Mr. Rosenbaum and he is just quirky enough to be at a concert for a band from the 70s, c) there had been a limo in the parking lot when we pulled up, and d) trying to decide kept me from purposely tripping the drunken Touchy McFeely the next time he walked past our table. I guess I can feel at peace knowing that my being nearly-groped by an age-inappropriate stranger allowed Mime to meet some of his sports heroes. I don’t think I would be this Zen about it if he had met some FBL members.