The Suburban You (18 page)

Your sole motivation for introducing this concept to your family is to get rid of the Ping-Pong table, and you have three obstacles to overcome. The first is convincing your son that he would somehow be better off without the table that he found and wheeled into your yard that Wednesday afternoon two weeks ago with your wife supervising. The second is convincing your wife of the same, which will probably be your biggest challenge. Her support of this rusted, delaminated, warped, and faded forty-five-square-foot-consuming piece of shit baffles you and is inconsistent with everything you know about her. She is usually very fastidious about things of this nature, or you assume that she is, because you know that every time you put your keys on the newly decorated entryway table it bothers her so much that she is compelled to move your keys to a place where you can never find them and then gets angry at you when you ask her where she has put them. The third obstacle to overcome is to provide a way to get rid of it.

It appears that you have addressed the third obstacle by coming up with the idea for the yard sale. You then figure that if you can get your kid to embrace the idea of selling the Ping-Pong table then your wife will go along. You talk it over privately with your son. You let him know how much you love Ping-Pong, which you do, and you let him know how much you love to play Ping-Pong with him, which you do. You call his attention to the rust and delaminating edges, the warped surfaces, and the faded color of the Ping-Pong table, and the amount of space it takes up in your yard.

You explore alternatives with him, like perhaps getting another Ping-Pong table, a new one that is made to be placed outdoors. Not quite convinced that this is the right move, you then tell him that he can sell it for whatever price he would like and keep all the money. A figure of $800 pops into his head (a $200 discount off of what he initially valued the table at) and he thinks that will go a long way to getting the laptop that he has been wanting for a year or so. You talk him down to something more realistic, say $100, knowing that it will probably cost you $100 to get rid of this white elephant. He believes that this is the way to go. He is sure this is the right thing. “Good decision,” you say. “Now go convince Mommy.” Well, he does, and he is excited.

The ads are in place and signs are posted around the neighborhood. The eight participating families haul all of their now unused toys, clothes, and other stuff over to the Swensens'. Their lawn becomes littered with brightly colored blow-molded plastic trucks, cars, and ironing boards. There are CDs, TVs, slides, plastic swimming pools, all the stuff that was once the mainstay of your kids' existence. You realize that, at eight years old, your son is no longer a child. His toys are real now, his music is grown-up, and his clothes are like yours, only cooler. He wants laptops, skis, and other stuff like that, which you like too.

It is morning and there is optimism when prices are set. The kids are actively involved in setting prices, with the basic formula being bigger equals more expensive. While the lawn sale was advertised to start at 10
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., many people show up at 8:30. You sell off whatever you can. Now that you have gotten the Ping-Pong table in this sale, your next objective is to not have to haul anything back to your house. “Sell everything,” you tell the kids. “If someone looks at all interested in anything on the lawn, offer them a price and get rid of it.” “Everything goes” is your mantra. And it does.

By midday, you have detected little customer interest in the Ping-Pong table. Not that you are really surprised, but for you it was the only reason for initiating this sale. If you do not get rid of it, you will judge the sale a failure. You think that if you begin playing Ping-Pong on the table your customers will see how much fun they could have with it and that they will then buy it. How they will get it home, you are not sure.

Ken, the neighbor across the street, who is not selling anything in the sale, comes out and you challenge him to a game. He has a great time and you let him win. You say, “Ken, this would be a terrific addition to your backyard, don't you think? You are a talented player. Just think how often you could play and how good you would get if the table was in your yard each and every day.” He looks at you and says, “There is no way that I would ever put this piece of shit in my yard. Don't even think about it.” He says this knowing exactly what you have in mind. He leaves, saying that he has to go down to the office for a few hours.

You arouse interest in the game and everyone wants to play. It is 3:45 and you have another fifteen minutes to sell this dog, when Carol, Ken's wife, steps out of her car and sees the Ping-Pong table. She is excited. She tells you how much her husband, Ken, loves Ping-Pong. Her teenage daughter, who has gotten out of the car with Carol, tells her mother that she loves Ping-Pong too. “Can we get it, Mom?” she asks. You reinforce Carol's impression. “Carol, you know, Ken was here earlier playing Ping-Pong with me, and I have never seen him so happy. He is a great player.” You add, “He even beat me. It would be a terrific surprise for him. Your daughter is enthusiastic. It would be a wonderful thing to do for her. She will be going off to college pretty soon. There will be fewer and fewer opportunities to bring the kind of happiness and joy to your teenager than the opportunity that you will have today to buy this Ping-Pong table. I will even deliver and install it.” You are laying it on because Carol is the only person all day who has showed any interest in the Ping-Pong table and is probably your last chance, despite the fact that her husband, Ken, told you an hour earlier that there was no way he wanted anything to do with that piece of shit.

You make this last representation because Carol lives just across the street from the Swensens' yard. It is closer to her house than yours. You tell Carol that you will inspect her yard with her. “Let's find the perfect spot for it,” you say to Carol. Her daughter comes as well, and before even going into the backyard you find the spot that was made for this Ping-Pong table, on one side of their house. “Carol,” you say, “there is no better location in this entire suburb for this Ping-Pong table than right here. It will be right off of your side door, in an easy-to-get-to location. It will not take up any precious backyard space and will bring happiness into your family like you have never known.” You add, “Just think of Ken's expression when he comes home.”

Carol laughs, because you think she knows that you just want to get rid of this thing, but she seems to be enjoying your pitch. You announce to Carol that the price has dropped from $100 to $10.

Carol looks at her daughter, who is beaming with encouragement, and says the words you have been hoping to hear: “OK, bring it over.” Without hesitating, you enlist the help of your friend to assist you wheel it over. You collect $10 and pass that along to your kid.

So When Did Halloween Become Such a Big Deal?

For the entire month of October, you will obsess about what you will be for Halloween, because you have already been invited to two Halloween parties and it is not yet even October 1. You do not have any idea yet what you will be and you know that you will have to outdo the police uniform that you came up with last year; it was fun to bust your neighbors, showing up to the Kostases' party at 11:30
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., telling them that a neighbor complained about the noise and could they please keep it down, otherwise you would have to arrest some people.

Halloween was once a minor, second-tier kids' holiday, but it has somehow snuck up on you and become a big-deal grown-up holiday. It is also different from most other big holidays: for Christmas, the Fourth of July, Easter, Thanksgiving, and New Year's, you just need to show up. Not for Halloween. Not anymore. This is a holiday that each year requires more and more creativity. In your suburb, the bar is set high. People take this holiday seriously; just go by the Franzes' to see how elaborately their house is decorated if you have any doubts about that. There is an annual party with your kids at the Roushes' that just three years ago was a low-key affair where adults hung out mostly in their kitchen, in their regular clothes, while kids in costumes played around.

This past year, the party moved outside and into a big tent, the kind of tent that is rented from a professional party-rental store that is located somewhere other than the suburb where you live. It is the kind of tent that requires professional assembly, probably union labor working on double time. There is a live band playing as you walk in, and a haunted house in the garage.

Then there is the Lauters' party. This is another annual parent-kid party, and includes a parade around the neighborhood. Parents have to get dressed up for this one too. There is trick-or-treating, which, when you were young, involved you going to your friend's house and a bunch of you going to all the neighbors in the neighborhood. You all dressed up as bums, because it was a costume that you could slap together in fifteen minutes. The days of throwing on a pair of ripped-up pants and a dirty shirt are over.

Each of these parties is a catered affair, with tuxedoed men and women serving from a full bar that was brought in for the occasion, with hors d'oeuvres and main courses served on fine china. There is silver tableware.

You think on this. Could you imagine your parents getting dressed up for Halloween as you do? Could you imagine your father getting dressed up as the cop you were last year? The thought of it is absurd. Yet here you are, you, all your friends, and all your neighbors, getting dressed up for Halloween in ridiculous costumes.

For the entire month of October, the question of what you will be occupies your mind and nothing crops up. You have now been invited to five parties, three adults-only and two family parties, each hosted by friends who have staked out the holiday as theirs. It is the day of your first party and you have not thought of anything clever. You look at the police uniform hanging in your closet from last year and remember how much of a hit you were. You put it on. You go to your first party and you are greeted by Sandy, who comments, “Oh, so you decided to be a policeman again. Very clever.” You feel you have let her down. You make a mental note to begin planning your Halloween costume in August of next year.

Get a Haircut

It is the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and you, along with your family, are leaving for a suburb of San Francisco to visit with your sister, her family, and your parents. This will be a family reunion. The relatives whom your family spent each Thanksgiving with when you were growing up in a suburb of New York are also coming. They are coming from Long Island, where you grew up. Your cousin is coming from a town next to Southampton, a town that is always in the
Wall Street Journal
, a town that has become synonymous with the Wall Street market boom of the late nineties. She is coming to this suburb of San Francisco with her family, and her parents, who live a half hour away from her, are coming as well.

You have not seen your immediate family in six months, since your last business trip to San Francisco, and you have not seen your cousin, her family, and your aunt and uncle for a few years.

Since your parents moved from a suburb of New York on Long Island to a suburb of San Francisco, you have little reason to go to Long Island, even though you travel to New York City frequently. You want to make the most favorable impression possible on these favorite relatives of yours, whom you have not seen in a long time, and a good start to that is showing up with the right haircut. You want them to walk away from the experience thinking, Boy, doesn't Mark look good. Still so youthful-looking, thin, and in shape, and what a terrific haircut. This is what you want them to say on the plane trip home and this is what you want them to say when they are folding up the sofa bed and putting the cover back on the hot tub after you leave. You want to look good. You want to look together. You want to look like the corporate executive that you are.

You usually get your haircuts in the big building where you work. You were instrumental in retaining a hair salon run by a guy named Michael. You worked hard to retain Michael because you like having a place in your building where you can go to and get a haircut in twelve minutes. You have worked on this twelve-minute haircut with Sandi, who works for Michael, over several years and she has it down. Sandi is now the only one that you will get a haircut from. She is fast and she knows exactly what haircut you want. A few times when she was not in and you “had” to get your haircut that day, it was a mistake and your friend-boss was the only person man enough to let you know. He was also always nice enough to call your bad haircut to the attention of all of your colleagues.

Well, during the week preceding your Saturday departure for San Francisco you intend to get a haircut from Sandi at Michael's, but by the time you think of it it is Friday. You call down to Michael, who, because you have helped him so much with his business, will always squeeze you in anytime you want. He was the one who set you up with Sandi in the first place. When Michael answers, as he usually does, he will tell you some dirty jokes. Michael likes dirty jokes, and, whatever dirty joke you may have, it is nothing compared with what Michael comes up with. Only his dirty jokes are extracted from his real-life experiences.

Michael has been divorced and he has hired only the most attractive women to give haircuts and sweep his floors. Michael knows how to give his clientele what they want in a hair salon. He talks about rim jobs and other stuff like that, which you have never heard of and don't quite know what they are but sound like they would feel really good. On that day, Michael reveals to you that Sandi is not in. You know better than to get set up with someone else and you say you will give him a call back next week.

Your hair is shaggy and needs to be cut. You have a dilemma.

The next morning, Saturday, you wake up and you have a 1
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. flight that day. You look in the mirror and imagine your relatives, whom you have not seen in such a long time, saying, when you leave them, “Wasn't Mark's hair so shaggy? I thought that he was such a big-shot corporate executive. Why doesn't he get a haircut? I'm sure there is a hair salon in that big building that he tells us he runs.” You do not want this to be the dominant impression that your relatives are left with, so that Saturday morning you ask your wife where you should go to get a haircut.