Lip Service

Blog soundtrack:



I was up bright and early this morning and totally excited about my trip to see the BIG lipstick. Dressed in my ratty old vintage dress, which now had a large tear in the skirt and a huge hole under the right arm, and wearing my pink Nike running sneakers with Hello Kitty socks, I packed up my Italian straw basket (which does not smell of Samsara anymore, by the way) with my camera, wallet, phone, notebook, and bag of pens.

Ah, but where was my travel companion? I checked Nathan’s room, where I identified a large lump under the red, white, and blue comforter. Obviously, Nathan was not as excited about the trip as I was and clearly lost no sleep over the adventure last night.

“Nathan, we’ve got to get going soon!”
I heard a low “ugh”.
“Nathan, we’re leaving in 20 minutes!”
The lump sat up, revealing a very sleepy Nathan. Nathan, formerly known as the lump, said, “Whaaaaaaaaat?!?!?!?!?!!?” It was almost as if I had just shouted “Fire!” at him.
I said, “We’ve got to get going. Twenty minutes, okay?”
Of course, he said, “Okay”, and then pulled the red, white, and blue comforter back over his head becoming the lump, formerly known as Nathan.
Nathan seems to be one of those people who can go from sleep to wide awake with no transition time; that is, if I happened to go back to his room 15 minutes later, he would get up, put his sneakers on, and then walk out the door to the car.
And, about 15 minutes later, Nathan came downstairs. I didn't need to go back and roust him; ah, I knew he was excited about the trip, err, not! He said, “I’ll meet you in the car, Mom.”

At 8:15am, I joined him in the car and off we went. Well, we had to put gas into the car and then put two Dunkin Donuts ham and cheese croissants and a bottle of orange juice into Nathan before we could begin to even think about leaving to find the BIG lipstick.

The good thing about Nathan’s awake state, well, for the first hour, is that it’s not really a true awake state. It’s more like a semi-comatose state; therefore, I can play any CD I want until he is “awake”. Here’s a picture of me and Nathan in the Dunkin’ Donuts drive thru, which I think illustrates Nathan's semi-comatose state quite well.



After we got Nathan’s breakfast, he opened a Harry Potter book and proceeded to read. I thought given his current activity that I had at least 45 minutes of CD playing time; this was time in which I could not only play any CD I wanted, but the chances of Nathan saying my music was “horrible”, “dumb”, “awful” or using any other disparaging adjective was little to none.

But, sooner than I expected, I saw Nathan rifling through the CD case looking for “his” CDs. I thought I had thrown them all awa…I mean, put them all away safely in his room at home, but alas, he found one. This particular CD has one of my favorite Nine Inch Nails songs on it. The song is called “Only”, and here’s a bit of the lyric: “There is no you, there is only me, There is no f*cking you, There is only me.” Good stuff, huh? Anyway, thankfully, the song after this was General Public’s “Save it for Later”, which made my ears stop bleeding after listening to the Nine Inch Nails for about 3 minutes longer than I needed to.

After a two hour trip, we arrived in New Haven at about 10:45. And, is it just me or is MapQuest a big fat liar most of the time? Somehow I always seem to get bad directions or the travel time is totally off.

I had gotten directions to the Visitor Center; and when we were pretty close (or so “pants on fire” MapQuest said), we decided to park at a metered spot on the street. Personally, I’d rather navigate on foot than in a car, because at least when you’re lost on foot, no one beeps at you!

We got out of the car and loaded the parking meter with quarters until it read, “You have 2 hours to find the BIG lipstick!” and then we began to navigate our way to the Visitor Center at 149 Elm Street.

Here’s me upon arrival. Is that a "BIG lipstick" smile or what?!?!



As we walked down College Street, Nathan shook his head and said, “I can’t believe we drove all the way to frickin New Haven to see a frickin lipstick!” Oh, I could tell he was just as excited as I was about seeing the BIG lipstick!

We arrived at the Visitor Center and found a student inside manning the information desk; he was working on a paper in which I could only make out the words “infertility in Egypt”. He welcomed us, and he asked if we were interested in a tour. Actually, while all I could think about was the BIG lipstick, I thought that since we were there, a tour might be interesting.

I glanced at Nathan, who gave me his “No way!” look. It’s funny how over time, your kid can give you one look and in it you can read several paragraphs. I could hear Nathan saying, “Look, I don’t know why we should go on a tour, because I could never get into this college. And besides, we came here just to see the BIG lipstick, so let’s find the frickin BIG lipstick and be done with it!” Yes, I got all that from just from one look.

I thanked the young man, but I told him that at this point, we were really only interested in a map so we could walk around the campus. He said, “Are you sure? Because if you really want to get to know the campus, a tour is a great way to do it.” I agreed, but I told him we only stopped by in New Haven on a whim. (Okay, I was as bad as MapQuest in that moment, but I wasn’t ready to tell some 20-year-old that I had just driven two hours to see a BIG lipstick!) He then gave up on trying to sell us the tour by saying, “Well, okay.” And, I said, “I heard that you have an interesting Claes Oldenburg sculpture here. Where exactly would that be?” Still eager to help us obtain the full Yale experience, he pulled out a map, circled the Visitor Center on it, and then circled Morse College (a.k.a. home of the BIG lipstick).

He then said, “The college is only open to Summer students, and the sculpture is inside the college grounds.” I frowned. (What? I just drove two hours to see the BIG lipstick! Say it’s not so!) He saw my disappointment and said, “But, if you hang out by the gate for a bit, I’m sure you could get one of the students to let you in, because you guys don’t look suspect or anything like that.” Well, if anything, Nathan and I could feel good about looking “normal”, although "normal" was a stretch for me in that vintage dress with those pink sneakers and Hello Kitty socks.

So, I thanked him, took the map, and off Nathan and I went. Funny, but Nathan is very good at navigating with a map. I found this perplexing, because when I tell him the cream cheese is on the second shelf of the refrigerator at home, he says, “No, Mom. It’s not here. I’ve looked everywhere.” Of course, then I go to the refrigerator, move two items out of the way on the second shelf, and voila, there’s the cream cheese. Note to Self: Create a map of the refrigerator for Nathan.

We made our way down Elm Street and were about to cross York Street when we passed Saybrook College. I saw a man come out of the Saybrook College gate, and I noticed he was wearing a blue polo shirt emblazoned with “Yale University Facilities” on the left breast pocket. I figured that perhaps this gentleman might be able to help us get into Morse College if we could not find a student to let us in. Hey, it’s all about networking, even when you’re trying to see a BIG lipstick!

I said, “Excuse me, we’re heading to Morse College. We’re trying to see the Claes Oldenburg sculpture there. Is it possible to get in there to see it?”
He said, “Oh, Morse college is closed for renovations, and that sculpture was temporarily moved to another town for restoration during the renovations.”
I heard myself screaming, “Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!”; however, it was funny, because my mouth was still closed.
I looked at Nathan.
Nathan glared at me and said, “I can’t believe we drove all the way to frickin New Haven to see a frickin lipstick that isn’t even frickin here!”, but like me just a moment before, his mouth never opened.

I was about to say, no, more like whine, to this man that we had just driven two hours to see the BIG lipstick, but at that point, I realized that even though this man knew we were interested in the BIG lipstick, he didn’t have to know that we drove two hours just to see a BIG lipstick that was now not there. I thanked him for the information, and he walked off.

I looked at Nathan, and all I could manage to say was, “Oops!” Err, yes, I guess I probably should have called Yale on Tuesday to see if the BIG lipstick was still in residence, but the thought of a wasted four hour drive was easier to swallow than calling Yale and asking, “I’m coming to visit your school tomorrow to see the BIG lipstick. So, is it still there?” Who knew that a BIG lipstick could be temporarily out of order?

Nathan looked pretty disgruntled considering that it was pretty clear from the get go that he didn’t really care if he saw the BIG lipstick. Actually, I think that all my chattering about the BIG lipstick had actually gotten him quite curious about it, though he’s a 16-year-old boy; thus, he’d never admit that.

So, here’s where he admits his disappointment, and I’m pretty sure he wanted to comment on my state of mind, too, but I subtly remind him that I’m still the boss of him.

At this point, there was only one thing to do – soothe the savage beast!
Lunch time!



Over lunch, Nathan examined the map of the University, naming various buildings and schools out loud. Finally, he stopped and asked me, “What’s the Institute of Sacred Music? And, what’s sacred music?” Before I could answer, he said, “It sounds like it’s ritual chanting for sacrifices!” I was glad he tried to answer his own question before I could, because I had no idea either, and chanting for sacrifices sounded like a pretty good guess to me.

After finishing lunch at Wall Street Pizza, we decided that the best way to recover from the disappointment of not being able to see the BIG lipstick would be to drown our sorrows in Yale University apparel; thus, I handed Nathan the map, and we headed to the bookstore.

I try to bring one of my friends a t-shirt home every time I go somewhere of interest. So far, he has a t-shirt from Chuy’s in Austin, TX; a Rocky t-shirt from Philly, and a t-shirt from Nantucket. I told him this morning that I needed to get him a Yale t-shirt. He told me that not having gone there, he’d probably feel uncomfortable wearing one “unless it was obscurely geeky.” Here's your t-shirt then! AND, nothing quite says “geek” like a college motto in Latin, yeah?!



Also, nothing says geekier than being able to read a college motto in Latin, which I can. Those four l-o-n-g years of Latin were good for something. No, I’m not fluent, but I can say, “Roma in Italia est”, which will come in handy if I ever bump into a Roman gladiator, who has just stepped out of a time machine, and he’s forgotten where home is.

When we brought our purchases to the register, the woman behind the counter asked us if we were visiting and where we were from. I tackled the less embarrassing question first. Then I said, “We’re visiting the campus, but not really in the college way. Um, it’s kind of crazy.” She then said, “Oh, now you have to tell me why you're here when you put it like that!”

I looked at Nathan, he rolled his eyes, and then I said, “Well, we came to see the BIG lipstick, the Claes Oldenburg sculpture.” She hesitated, laughed, and then said, “Yes. I know that.” I told her that we had missed the sculpture, drove two hours just to see it, and so on. Somehow it seemed much easier to share my tale of woe with a woman selling me a pink Yale tank top and a pair of pink Yale shorts than with a Yale Facilities guy or Yale student writing about infertility in Egypt.

She sympathized and then wished us a safe trip home; however, I’m sure the minute we walked out of the bookstore, she said to her co-worker, “That crazy lady just drove two hours just to see the BIG lipstick!” And, I am pretty sure this is what Nathan was thinking most of the day, but then again, he signed up for this trip willingly.

As we walked out of the bookstore, I told Nathan that I was sorry to have dragged him on this somewhat National Lampoon-ish adventure, and then I immediately went into trying-to-make-your-son-feel-like-he-hasn’t-wasted-the-last-five-hours-of-his-day excuse mode and said, “But, we got to spend some quality mother-son time together!” Actually, it was the first time in a long time that we got to spend a day together. He then put his arm around me and said, “Mom, it’s okay. I know I could have been chillaxin* at home, but I’m here with you, aren’t I?!”

*I can only guess that this is a cross between chilling and relaxing.

So, here’s our day in pictures sans the BIG lipstick! (As you can see, I'm not into the "This is the yadda building" and "This is the yadda yadda building" kind of pictures.)



While we didn’t get to see the BIG lipstick, at least Nathan and I could say that we attended Yale, even if it was only just for a day. And, I was quick to tell Nathan that we could always come back another time to see the BIG lipstick, but I would call first to make sure the BIG lipstick was home before we drove two hours to "frickin New Haven."

Anyway, I think that one of my friends summed up the day best for me before the day even began by saying:

One of life's greatest pleasures -- going on a random quest with your own child who "gets" you.