the pieces of my life

Day 16 of Nanowrimo (challenge: use “”We began the day in the sunflower room”):

Jocelyn, though, was always temperamental. Hers was a life filled with daily dramas. She’d storm in and flounce upon the couch, regaling me with stories from school in which she was always the wronged heroine. I’m sure her traumas were real, but they were always out of proportion to the actual mishaps. I remember the tale of one disastrous slumber party her junior year of high school for which I’m sure I never got the true story. I was home during my freshman year at Tulane, and the two of us were sitting at Wolfie’s at 21st and Collins at a table in the back at 2 a.m. I was gnawing on an oversized pickle and picking at a pepper.

We had just left Heather Cohen’s Hanukkah party and I was getting the story of why she and Jon Blisker weren’t on speaking terms anymore.

“So Jennifer Pollock had her annual start of school slumber party. I don’t know why I even went—it’s been lame for years. Her mother treats us like we’re still at North Beach Elementary. You know, we began the day with chocolate chip cookies in the sunflower room.”

I waved my pickle in a bad Groucho imitation and attempted to mimic his voice as I said, “They got a sunflower room? Do you like sunflowers?”

Jocelyn looked at me like I was crazy. “What are you doing?”

I shook my pickle up and down. “You’re supposed to say ‘I adore them. How did you know’? Although it was supposed to be a gardenia.”

“What are you talking you about?” Jocelyn looked exasperated. I had just completed an elective in Jewish American Humor in Film and for it had written a paper entitled To Jew or Not to Jew: Comedy of the Marx Brothers. Got an A minus on it. I was pretty pleased and that was the point I began to complete an actual career in filmmaking.

“It’s from A Day at the Races. You’re supposed to say, ‘I adore them. How did you know?’ and I—as Dr. Hackenbush—would reply ‘I didn’t, so I got you forget-me-nots. One whiff of this and you’ll forget everything.’”

Jocelyn stared at me for about five beats before saying, “Am I telling a story here or not?”

“Yes, yes,” I said contrite, taking a bite of my pickle to show I had been sufficiently chastened. “You were in the sunflower room. What is up with that? A grown woman with a sunflower room?”

“Mrs. Pollock names all of her rooms based on the motif in which she’s decorated them. She thinks it sounds more sophisticated to say ‘the sunflower room’ as opposed to the sun room. The living room is the beach room. The dining room is the Provence room and the eat-in part of the kitchen is the Tuscany room.”

“Oh dear God,” I said.

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