‘The Dictator’ may surprise you when you laugh out loud, in spite of your reservations

Good advice in many situations: “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”

When in Japan, eat with chopsticks.

When on Illinois interstate highways, drive fast and follow slow drivers with Wisconsin plates so closely as to pressure them to move to right lane.

When spending time with 17-year-olds, learn to appreciate Sacha Baron Cohen.

This is how I came to spend good money and 90 minutes of my life with “The Dictator” this past weekend. My stepson wanted to see it, and I wanted to spend time with my stepson.

Five years ago, Caswell adopted a new accent and a verbal tic for six months after seeing “Borat.” The 13-year-old delighted in Borat’s low-brow mockumentary humor. I must have heard “I want to make sexy time” at least 10,000 times. Thank goodness, he grew out of it. And yet, he’s a Sacha Baron Cohen fan.

And so, “The Dictator” held the promise of new lows and grating lines. And you know what? It wasn’t too bad. In fact, I laughed out loud several times. And, at the end, I very much appreciated the satire of the dictator’s speech on dictatorships.

Given that it stars Cohen, “The Dictator” is filled with potty humor, embarrassing sexual references, shocking racist comments and a musical version of a four-syllable expletive that will have you singing words that would make your mother blush. But it also has a plot, a love interest and a searing perspective on our American values that will make you wonder if the democracy Egypt is establishing with its presidential vote today for the first time in thousands of years is worth it.

You’ll appreciate “The Dictator” most if you have a strong stomach for shock humor, a basic understanding of current affairs and an appreciation for Cohen’s comedic courage. And, of course, love the one you’re with. Good company makes any outing better.

Big news in little game

SPORTS PAGE

Cold Spring 12-year-old gets hit in team’s first loss

Cold Spring right fielder Drew, nephew to renowned blogger Minnesota Transplant, had this to say after Tuesday’s first loss of the season:

“Where are we going to eat, Dad?”

The Cold Spring baseball team took a tough loss against the Osseo-Maple Grove, 3-1. The team is now 8-1-1* (*tie was officially a loss determined by a coin flip in bad weather earlier this season).

Drew strengthened the bottom of the batting order with a walk, a hit and at least two stolen bases. He got caught in a run-down in the third inning and was stranded on base in the sixth. He barely missed a hard hit ball while fielding his position, but redeemed himself later while fielding a grounder and firing it back to the infield with pinpoint accuracy.

The game was played in near perfect May conditions in front of an ardent crowd that included Auntie, visiting from Illinois, at the Weaver Lake fields.

In the other big Major League Baseball game of the day, Twins right fielder Erik Kamatsu was 1 for 3 in a 5-0 loss to the Cleveland Indians.

Minnesota Transplant was the sports editor for a quarter while attending the University of Minnesota-Morris in 1988. She never attended a game. Thank goodness for the sports copy generated by the university public relations team.

A rare name for a rare woman: My mother

My cherished mother turns 71 today. Happy birthday, dear Mother! How I adore you.

She is the best mother on the planet, at least for me. She loves me no matter what and that’s just what a flawed, struggling middle-aged woman like me needs some days.

She is an interesting person in her 70s, but in honor of her birthday today, let’s turn to her early years.

She was born Karen Meleese in 1941 in western North Dakota. You can see by this picture, presumably taken on the farm where she lived, how flat the landscape was.

“Karen” was the 19th most popular girl’s name in America that year, according to the Social Security Administration. It’s her unique middle name, “Meleese,” that fascinates me. Both my sister and I have talked about using that name for a daughter but, alas, I did not bear children and my sister delivered only sons.

“Meleese” comes from a 1910 book by James Oliver Curwood, “The Danger Trail.” My grandfather appreciated language — he loved to read, recited poetry and once sold magazine subscriptions for a living — so I suppose he ran across this uncommon name and committed it to memory, intending to use it at some point.

When my mother was born, he found his use.

Thanks to the World Wide Web, I discovered the character’s name plays a major role in Curwood’s book. Here’s an excerpt:

He stood looking down into her glowing face in silence. Then, “They are gone,” he repeated. “They were the men who tried to kill me at Prince Albert. I have let them go — for you. Will you tell me your name?”

“Yes — that much — now. It is Meleese.”

“Meleese!”

The name fell from him sharply. In an instant there recurred to him all that Croisset had said, and there almost came from his lips the half-breed’s words, which had burned themselves in his memory, “Perhaps you will understand when I tell you this warning is sent to you by the little Meleese.” What had Croisset meant?

“Meleese,” he repeated, looking strangely into the girl’s face.

“Yes — Meleese — “

She drew back from him slowly, the color fading from her cheeks; and as she saw the light in his eyes, there burst from her a short, stifled cry.

“Now — you understand — you understand why you must go back into the South,” she almost sobbed. “Oh, I have sinned to tell you my name! But you will go, won’t you? You will go — for me –”

In an album she made for me, Mother mused, “In my dreams about growing up, I was going to live on a ranch in Wyoming and be a cowgirl and change my name to Lovica.”

Whatever you call her — “Karen,” “Karen Meleese,” perhaps “Lovica” — her best name to me is “Mom.”

May you have a blessed day, Mom. I love you!

Practicing the psychology of love on spring break

While accurate, “stepmother” doesn’t have the most appealing ring to it.

If it doesn’t say “wicked” as the fairy tales would have us believe, it certainly says “second class.” In some circles, stepmoms call themselves “smoms” or “bonus moms.”

I’ve been a stepmother for five years, and I’ve learned my place. I’m not a mom, and I’ll never be a mom. But I’m the best darn stepmother I can be.

Still, that leaves me with a less-than-desirable title. Once, my stepson asked me if he should call me “Mom.” He was living with us full-time at the time, and I was doing everything a mom would do, but I was fully cognizant that I wasn’t his mom. I said, “Call me whatever you’re comfortable calling me as long as it isn’t an expletive.”

He settled on calling me by my first name.

That holds a certain intimacy (a person’s name is music to one’s ears) in our little circle, but it didn’t erase the title. Always when introducing myself, I say “stepmother.”

I ran across a new parental title this week in a book I’m reading: “The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth.” It’s an amazing book with new insights in every chapter which I may share in future posts. I’m reading it, perhaps ironically, because my stepdaughter is reading it.

In it, the author M. Scott Peck describes the transformation of biological parents which comes with the commitment of sticking with the being created at conception. Biological parents transform into psychological parents.

While I don’t hold the title of biological parent, I believe I’ve transformed into a psychological parent. (I joked with my Beloved that that would make me a psycho parent for short. Just kidding! That’s worse than stepparent.)

In any case, I’m exercising my psychological parent muscles this week.

My 17-year-old stepson, who lives in Minnesota, is visiting for spring break.

After spending the weekend with my sister’s family which includes three little boys ages 12, 8 and 3, he asked me today why I didn’t want to be a mom.

“I thought I’ve shared that with you,” I said.

“You have. Just remind me,” he said.

“I just never wanted to have a baby. I don’t have that maternal instinct,” I said. “And since I didn’t ever feel compelled to have a baby, I didn’t want to take on all the work a baby represents.  I wasn’t into 2 a.m. feedings and getting up at 6 a.m. on Saturdays.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

I turned around in the front seat of the vehicle to face him.”But I love you,” I said. “I’m just glad that when I met you, you already knew how to feed yourself.”

So if I’m lacking in the instinctual and physical sacrifices necessary to be a parent, I embrace the psychological challenges of being an effective parent. I especially embrace the challenges after reading Peck’s definition of love, which demands effort against the “inertia of laziness”: “Love is always work or courage. If an act is not one of work or courage, then it is not an act of love. There are no exceptions.”

So call me whatever amuses you. But don’t call me lazy.

An interview with the artist

Cat in tree. By Logan R., age 8.

Minnesota Transplant: What color is this cat?

Logan: Calico.

Minnesota Transplant: Why calico?

Logan: I heard it from [big brother] Drew and now I know what it means — a bunch of different colors.

Minnesota Transplant: Why are the cat’s ears red?

Logan: Because that’s how cats’ ears look.

Minnesota Transplant: So you’re a dedicated realist?

Logan: What?

Minnesota Transplant: What’ s your favorite color?

Logan: Green.

Minnesota Transplant: Why?

Logan: Because more people like blue, and not as many people like green, and I like to be different. And green doesn’t represent anything bad.

Minnesota Transplant: What does black represent?

Logan: Guns.

Minnesota Transplant: So what does green represent?

Logan: Grass and trees and peaceful prairie.

Minnesota Transplant: So how many tools do you think you have to choose from?

Logan: Eighty-eight.

Minnesota Transplant: There are way more than 88 tools in your palette.

Logan: Two hundred then.

Minnesota Transplant: Describe them.

Logan: Markers, crayons, colored pencils, pastels, smelly markers.

Minnesota Transplant: What’s your favorite smelly marker?

Logan: Orange is my favorite.

Minnesota Transplant: Why did you have me smell the marshmallow one then?

Logan: Because that’s my least favorite.

Minnesota Transplant: What’s your favorite subject in school?

Logan: Math.

Minnesota Transplant: What’s your least favorite?

Logan: Music.

Minnesota Transplant: Why?

Logan: Because my music teacher is really grouchy.

[17-year-old cousin] Caswell: Like my dad?

Logan: No. Worse.

Minnesota Transplant: What do you want to be when you grow up?

Logan: A pilot.

Minnesota Transplant: What happened to mime? I thought you wanted to be a mime.

Logan: I can be both.

Minnesota Transplant [extending her hand]: Thank you for the interview.

Logan [walking away]: I don’t want to shake your hand!

Minnesota Transplant: So you’re a tortured artist?

Logan: What? You’re weird, Auntie.

Memories as clear as smudge

Music is a powerful catalyst to evoking a memory.

Someday, when I’m 102 and sitting around the social hall at the nursing home, some old fogey who’s retired and out volunteering but not yet old enough for my chair will come in with an antique electric guitar and start playing “Beth” by Kiss, and I’ll start chattering on and on about some short boy named Chris and how I slow-danced with him while he stood on a chair in the junior high cafeteria during a Friday night dance in seventh grade. “Where’s Chris? I don’t want to dance with a short boy. And why are the lights on? Turn off the lights!” And then I’ll start singing along: “Beth, I hear you calling but I can’t come home right now. …”

And the nurse’s aides, who are 20something and standing around eldersitting us, will roll their genetically engineered eyes and text to each other, “God, I hate it when we play the oldies around here and the old ladies just won’t shut up.”

Something like that anyway.

While I was sitting in Ash Wednesday service tonight, we sang “Just As I Am, Without One Plea” and I was suddenly struck with thoughts of my sister. Not sure why that hymn reminds me of my sister who I would describe as a God-loving Christian who is, at best, lukewarm about going to church.

I think she had to learn that hymn as a child for some public event having to do with church or school, and she wandered around the house for weeks singing those lyrics. I called her to get the 411 (“Good for you for going to church,” she said), and she can’t remember either, but she immediately started reciting the lyrics.

Music is like that. I can remember all 50 U.S. states because of a song. I know the words to 1 John 4: 7-8 because I learned the verses set to music at Lutheran Island Camp when I was 12. And I think of a freakishly short kid named Chris when I hear Kiss.

At least I think his name was Chris.

Just as I am, without one plea,
but that thy blood was shed for me,
and that thou bidst me come to thee,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

~ Charlotte Eliot

Point A: 15 live chickens in the trunk. Point B: 15 dead chickens in the freezer. What’s it take to get from Point A to Point B?

The fresher the food, the better it tastes.

Right?

This maxim applies to a lot of foods. Shore lunch, restaurant lobster tanks, garden tomatoes and warm-from-the-oven brownies come to mind.

But not chicken.

Over a workmanlike dinner of sautéed chicken breast on a bed of quinoa pilaf with a side of steamed broccoli, my Beloved commented on the freshness of the chicken.

Frankly, he’s lucky when he gets chicken at all. I have a policy against bone-in chicken. I do not prepare bone-in-chicken. The thought of tackling those joints with a butcher knife makes me shudder.

The chicken wasn’t organic. It wasn’t free-range. It wasn’t grass-fed.

But it was boneless, skinless and purchased in bulk at Costco, where the chicken is injected with less water than the chicken at the super supermarket.

Like most suburbanites, we are far removed from the origins of our meal. Our neighbor once had a chicken, but I think that chicken was a pet, not dinner.

I do, however, know what it means to run around like a chicken with its head cut off.

You know how some early memories of momentous occasions are seared into your brain? One of my first memories is my hand on my mother’s belly when my little brother was kicking. From the inside out. Realizing an alien is alive inside your mother is a pretty momentous occasion.

So is a headless, wild chicken dancing around your driveway.

When I was 7 or 8, my town-dwelling parents butchered chickens in their garage.

My mother thought she could save some money by buying live chickens and butchering them herself. “I grew up on a farm and watched my dad kill them and my mother clean them, but I had never actually cleaned one,” she remembers now.

“But I bought 15 chickens. Live chickens. I thought, ‘I can do that.’”

My dad didn’t know she intended to buy live chickens, but he’s a little like my Beloved. He can do pretty much anything. Sometimes, there are swear words involved, but he can pull off complicated tasks like fixing hot rollers and installing crown molding. And butchering chickens.

So he brings them home in the trunk of the car. Fifteen chickens in a crate in the trunk. On a sweltering summer day in shadeless southern Minnesota.

And wouldn’t you know it? Besides courier duty, Dad’s not off the hook yet with Mom’s great money-saving idea. They’re a team after all. He had actually butchered chickens before, not just as an observer. He was the go-to butcher when he was a boy and my grandmother wanted chicken for dinner.

So Dad cut off the heads of Mom’s chickens.

That’s when I saw chickens run around like, well, chickens with their heads cut off. I don’t remember much after that. I assume I made myself scarce. But Mom remembers.

“It was so hot, maybe it was hotter than normal,” my mother remembers. “And we had to get this job done. Fifteen chickens seemed like 1,500 chickens before we got done.”

Nope, Dad’s not off duty yet. “Then I realized I had never plucked a chicken or drawn the insides out,” Mom says. “So he had to do that, too.”

I’m on the phone with Mom, and Dad is hearing the conversation. “You just reach in there and pull ‘em out!” Dad chimes in.

Yuck.

“After you remove the feathers, you still have pin feathers,” Mom says. “You have to singe off the pin feathers. If you ever smelled burning chicken feathers, that was worse than the garbage later. The whole thing stinks to high heaven.”

So my parents have the feathers and guts of 15 chickens to dispose of. One garbage bag isn’t enough, so they use two bags.

Still not enough.

Remember, it’s the middle of summer. It’s hot. And in suburbia, garbage gets picked up once a week. And it doesn’t get picked up the Day of the Chicken Massacre.

“Every fly in the country came to our garage,” Mom says. “Then every cat and dog in the neighborhood came to our garage.”

My parents were familiar with the garbage man, and they begged him to make a special stop to please come pick up their garbage early.

He did. Thank the Lord, the garbage was gone, and the freezer was full.

“What do you mean?” I ask. “You didn’t eat them right away? Fresh chicken?”

Turns out, there’s a downside to being familiar with the origin of your chicken.

“We froze ‘em!” Mom says. “Put ‘em in the freezer for later on. You have to understand, it is very difficult to eat that chicken for dinnertime when you just did that in the morning. So we didn’t eat those chickens right after we killed them. Later on, they tasted just fine, but the whole process, I never want to do it again.”

Skinless, boneless chicken breasts from Costco never sounded so good.

Pennies from heaven

Those otherwise worthless copper-colored discs sporting Abe Lincoln’s likeness mean a lot to some people in mourning.

Some people believe our deceased loved ones remind of their presence with serendipitous pennies. You might have heard the stories: A mother stumbles across a penny with the year of her dead daughter’s birth. A woman picks up a penny with the year of her anniversary and feels her deceased husband is looking after her.

I don’t know about pennies from heaven. I’m not convinced a soul engaged in the eternal rapture is going to hang around our puny, fleeting lives leaving pennies for us to find. I hope eternity is better than watching Earth’s foibles like bad episodic television.

But God works in mysterious ways, and some small coincidences bring a bounty of comfort.

My brother Curt died 13 years ago today, and I miss him and the relationship we might have had if he were still alive. But I think of him often in common circumstances haloed with strange coincidence:

• My nephew, Drew, was conceived very close to the time my brother died. Drew — a joy to our family — was born nine months later, and his middle name is Curtis.
• My sister’s second son Logan was born on Aug. 4, Curt’s birthday.
• My sister’s third son Breck shares his status with my brother, also third in birth order. And both Curt and Breck’s conceptions were surprises.

My new family has Curt coincidences, too.

I met my stepson, Caswell, when he was 12. Curt was 12 when I left home to go to college. As I dated my now-husband and contemplated stepmothering Caswell, I felt like God was giving me a second chance to form a relationship with a 12-year-old boy. Also coincidentally, Caswell shares Curt’s initials: CW.

I thought of my brother often last summer when I was spending every weekend at the stock car races my Beloved and his brother. Curt was a gear head who studied to be a car mechanic. A true Minnesotan, he loved snowmobiling and even raced them in the summer; grass snowmobile racing is great fun, I’m told. Curt would have loved the stock car races, and my devotion to those weekly races this past summer fostered an even better relationship between me and the man who’s not my brother, but like a brother — my brother-in-law, Ted.

And today, another Curt coincidence. He wouldn’t want me and my family continuing to dwell in sorrow on this day, the anniversary of his death. The date now has a new significance. Our family celebrates another new baby — my cousin’s daughter Karletta was born this morning.

Coincidence? Sure. Strange things happen all the time, and we choose to assign meaning to these things. Whether Curt is looking down on our fleeting little existence and influencing it or not, we’re certainly thinking fondly of him today.

Ketchup makes everything better (really?)

Now I’ve seen everything.

I knew my brother-in-law loved ketchup, and I knew he bought ketchup in gallon containers and passed this obsession on to my nephews. But I didn’t fully appreciate the depths of this addiction.

At dinner tonight, my 12-year-old nephew dutifully squirted ketchup and mustard on his hot dog. This is reasonable, expected and perhaps even essential. Every red-blooded American kid would accent an all-beef hot dog with ketchup.

Then he proceeded to spurt a pile of the red stuff next to his canned green beans and corn.

“What are you doing?!” I asked.

“Eating ketchup with my vegetables,” he said nonchalantly as he forked a bunch of beans dripping with ketchup.

“I’ve got to take a picture of this,” I said.

And I did.

Dinner isn't complete without the red stuff. I guess.

I’ve seen people eat ketchup with hot dogs and burgers. And potatoes of all shapes, sizes and flavors. And eggs, OK, I get it. I can even imagine dipping my green bean fries in ketchup.

But green beans and corn?

Well, yes. Of course. This boy is eating his vegetables. What’s wrong with that?

Nothing.

It’s just that … well … I appreciate weird foods, but I’m not going to put ketchup on my corn.

Here’s what’s really funny.

My nephew, the ketchup lover?

He dressed as mustard for Halloween.

Shower power

As an inordinately tall woman, I have the opportunity to store my plastic ware (a.k.a. Tupperware) in the cupboard above my stove and my sweaters in a pile on the top shelf of my closet.

Other woman can’t reach such heights, but I can.

On the downside (get it?), I spend a lot of time crouched under short shower heads.

But no longer at my sister and brother-in-law’s house. My brother-in-law remodeled the basement bathroom this summer, and he installed a truly delightful waterfall shower head in the newly re-tiled shower. What used to be a space shuttle-like claustrophobic telephone booth is now a spacious corner, beautifully accented with glass block. When you have a 36-inch inseam, you really appreciate not having to fold your leg up on the soap dish like a frog to shave.

My best friend, too, is in the midst of a bathroom remodel, and she is adding a tiled bathroom, too. I am inspired to replace the workman-like cubicle shower and carpeting in my master bath with such modern amenities. In the meantime, I emptied the hot water heater this morning lingering in shower built so well and so beautifully by my brother–in-law. Nice work, Chuck.