Out, You Demons of Stupidity

It only took about 10 years, but I finally did it. Following a bout of unrelenting bad luck culminating with being abandoned penniless and desperate 2,000 miles from home without a place to sleep by an unreliable addict relative on a bender, forced to rely on the kindness of friends and strangers (and by the way, when did I become the kind of woman who gets her way by dissolving into tears in public? But I've tried it three times in the last two months, and let me tell you, IT WORKS!), only to be followed up with returning home to find my car broken into and the CD player stolen, I finally managed to convince even my most coldly logical, practical, and un-superstitious friends that, actually, there is such a thing as "luck," that it comes in varieties good and bad, and that I really do have bad, bad luck.

Now I know how missionaries feel when they convert a pagan to Christianity. Finally, even the doubters are forced to admit I attract negative energy like Jessica Simpson attracts lousy boyfriends and dog-stealing coyotes. If John Mayer shows up on my doorstep strumming a guitar, me and my little aura of doom will be sent off to Afghanistan to topple Al Qaeda.

But it's OK, I can be flippant about my drug-addicted relative who left me stranded (for FOUR DAYS!), violated automobile, and negative bank account. Because soon, my troubles will be over.

So what if, in the last two months alone, my cell phone died, my car failed inspection, my toilet seat broke, and an attempt to have some furniture delivered resulted in a) public tears, b) family rift, c) my very first ever attempted bribery, and d) $220 down the drain? So what if my kitchen sink AND bathroom sink both sprung leaks and flooded the floor, and I stepped on and broke my only pair of glasses (and I don't have a vision plan)? So what if I lost my subway map, my nice leather gloves, and my pretty new scarf that I'd only worn four times? So what if the zipper broke on my cheap handbag, right in the middle of an important meeting where I was attempting to look professional, only to have scraps of paper, three different types of lip balm and gloss, Santa Claus-themed hand cream (Stocking Stuffer '08; thanks, Mom!) and, of course, a tampon suddenly on display. That is all behind me now.

So what if I go to the doctor for a hepatitis booster and am told, unsolicited, that I probably can't have kids any more as my eggs are now too old and rotten ("I don't really want kids, so it's not an issue for me, thanks" -- "Oh, but lots of women your age have had healthy children, I'm not saying you can't, just that it will be harder now" -- "But I don't want kids" -- "Well, it's not too late, but it will certainly be harder for you" -- "I'm OK with not having kids! Can I have my booster shot now please?")

[Yes, the doctor lectured me on an issue that is not an issue for me, then actually left without giving me the my vaccination, and I had to ask the receptionist to go find her and bring her back to give me the shot, because in her zeal to tell me I'm too fucking old to have kids I don't even want, she left without actually giving me what I came there for. But I forgive her, because this was in Manhattan, land of the Menopausal Mom, where a childless woman in her 30s who sees her doctor has only one thing on her mind. Seriously, try finding an ob/gyn in Manhattan who ISN'T a fertility specialist.]

So what if my boss is actively trying to sabotage me? So what if my family arrived three hours late for Thanksgiving, bitching about traffic and in foul moods, while I spent pretty much the entire day alone in the kitchen, stirring shit? So what if the turkey was undercooked? History.

All of this is behind me now.

My sister is somewhat, shall we say, more susceptible to belief in the supernatural than I am. She believes in ghosts, spirits, demons, Heaven, Hell, and tarot cards. She's also more of an optimist: she believes that when your car breaks down and requires $600 of work at the same exact time you are given a $560 bonus at work, that this is the work of God, stepping in to help you by providing you with the money you need. I believe it's the work of Satan, who knew I had already charged a $600 plane ticket and needed that bonus money to pay it off.

Needless to say, she too is convinced of my "bad mojo." My endless stream of misfortunes has even become an affectionate family joke, as in, "We'd better not invite Catherine over for Christmas or the roof might cave in and we'll all get struck by lightning, ha ha. No really, you don't have to drive home this year. We'll mail your gifts!"

Enter my new best friend: the White Sage Smudge Stick.



This thick bundle of aromatic dried leaves resembles the world's fattest joint, and, according to the package, its "incredibly strong, aromatic resins" and "pungent scent" are often used in purification rituals. My sister promises that it will cleanse my home of negative energy.

Smudge Stick was a gift that my sister brought to me for Thanksgiving, but not before she made sure the holiday began in the proper spirit by calling my mother at 9am and saying, "Catherine called. She said Thanksgiving is cancelled. The roaches ate the turkey." (Which was not true-- the roaches were occupied with a half-eaten hamburger left on the floor specifically to distract them from the turkey.)

(Just kidding. I do not leave food on the floor, only mouse poison and unopened bottles of Diet Coke.)

Unfortunately, by the time she arrived with my salvation, the Smudge Stick, I'd already attempted to cook the turkey...which ended up an unfortunate victim of well-intentioned maternal sabotage and my own turkey-roasting insecurities.

"It says on the package to loosely stuff the turkey," I said, reading directly from the Butterball label.

"I always pack my stuffing in tightly," said my mother, who was roasted probably 45 more turkeys than I ever have or will. So I stuffed it in tightly, insuring, I realized later, that it would have no room to expand once it heated and filled with hot air, and came bursting out of the turkey's ass like the world's largest baseball-shaped hemorrhoid.

"It says to cook it at 325 degrees," I said, again reading from the label.

"I always put mine in at 350," said my mother.

"Maybe your oven ran colder than mine. My oven thermometer says it's at 325 exactly."

"Well, I don't know...you can risk it if you want...I always do 350...but you can do what you want, it's YOUR turkey." (Read "funeral" for "turkey".)

I hung up the phone and turned the oven up to 350.

Four hours and thirty minutes later, I checked on the turkey. According to the meat thermometer, it was ready--180 in the thigh, 165 in the stuffing, which meant it should be done, and 4.5 hours was the recommended roasting time on the Butterball label. Of course, a meddling guest was putting the meat thermometer in the freezer, then taking it out again, and repeatedly jabbing the turkey, so I have no idea if this reading was accurate.

Last year I roasted a turkey with great success, and it cooked in a mere 3.5 hours, despite weighing 4 pounds MORE than this turkey, which after 4.5 hours at 350 did not seem to be done. For some reason this year (DARK CLOUD OF EVIL HANGING OVER HEAD), luck was not on my side.

"I'd leave it in longer," says my mother. "I don't think it's done."

Given her considerable roasting experience, I'm about to take her advice and put the turkey back into the oven, when she delivers her final act of maternal sabotage: "But then, I like dry turkey."

Ah, yes, dry turkey! Everyone knows you don't want of those MOIST, JUICY turkeys! Tender turkey meat--ugh! I feel sick even thinking about slices of turkey so juicy they need no gravy or cranberry sauce. Dry turkey--that's what you're aiming for! The longer it sits in the oven dehydrating, the better! Tender turkey is for wimps--people like us need turkey as dry, tough, and hardened as our leathery and withered little souls. So I take it out of the oven.

Of course, I did not yet have a chance to fumigate with the smoke of the White Mountain Sage, so it did not have a chance to work its power. The turkey turned into a nightmare, white and mostly cooked on the outside, and oozing globs of red slime and bloody juices on the inside.

"That turkey looks like it was shot, not butchered," said one guest. "Normally you'd never see blood pool up in the bottom like that! They usually hang them and drain the blood before packing them. I've never seen that before!"

This year my traditional Thanksgiving beer, drunk once I'm done cooking and can celebrate leaving the sweltering kitchen and joining the family to eat, was supplemented with two or three more.

Everything else turned out fine. It was as if the stuffing, cranberry sauce, various potatoes and pies were extra tasty, to make up for the turkey refusing to cook. The turkey was de-stuffed, shoved back into the oven at 400 degrees, and left for another hour, after which it was cooked, although at that point no one was hungry.

My brother called from Alaska to congratulate me. Despite the fact that only two hours had passed, thanks to the miracle of cell phones and text messaging, and despite being in another time zone, he'd already been informed of my attempted salmonella assassination. "I heard you tried to take them all out in one fell swoop," he says. "Nice job."

Everyone went home, and I tried to relax. At least no one had a heart attack or food poisoning. That was something to be thankful for--we all had our health (that is, all of us except the unfortunate black sheep suffering from drug addiction and family censure, which becomes more depressing every time I think of it).

Then my mother called, after having gotten lost on the way home. She has a Garmin GPS but didn't bring it, "because we knew where we were going," except the whole point of the GPS is that she's now old and therefore should NEVER BE WITHOUT A GPS, proving you can lead a horse to water but if you give the horse a GPS it will still get lost on its way to the water trough because how can you force the horse to use the GPS unless you implant it in the horse's head and then activate it with a remote control device?

After that, I instituted a new tradition: the ritual post-Thanksgiving purification of negative energy.

I followed the instructions, lit the end of the White Sage Smudge Stick, then blew it out. Let the purification begin!

The stick begins to emit streams of smoke. And more smoke. Boy does it smoke. Thick, creamy pale smoke fills the apartment. I open the windows. Out, negative spirits! Soon I'm choking and coughing and my eyes are watering, but it's nothing a little Sam Adams can't cure. I wave the stick around the apartment. I feel like I should be chanting. I'd feel ridiculous, but again it's nothing the Sam Adams can't cure. I've done worse things under the influence than attempt to ritually cleanse my dwelling of evil spirits that spoil my turkey and steal my car radio.

How do I know, exactly, where the negative energy is coming from? The bedroom? The bathroom? The kitchen? I make sure to fill the entire apartment with smoke before dousing the tip of the stick in water, then collapsing into bed with my laptop and my beer. I thought it would smell like incense, but it smells more herbal...piney, and sort of like really strong potpourri. At the very least I hope it smokes out the roaches.

I might have to purify the car, too (which just started making this funny rattling noise whenever I press down on the accelerator, which does not bode well for my holiday travel plans). I'd bring it to my office, except I'm afraid the power of the White Sage Smudge might cause the building to collapse--intense negative energy is all that's holding that place together. The only way that place could be cleansed is with a virus ten times stronger than H1N1. I'm trying to decide: if I get laid off, is that a sign that the ritual expulsion of evil is working, or not?

So far, the weekend hasn't been too bad. I'm going to smoke out the negative mojo every day for a few days and see how it goes.

I have noticed one positive side effect of the sage-scented smoke: the scent of rancid turkey grease that usually hangs in the air and saturates my hair for at least 3 days following roasting seems to be gone. Hair that doesn't smell like rancid turkey grease--surely this is a sign.