Secret 7: I was arrested

I was 16 and working as the head busser in a restaurant. I was in charge and pretty full of myself. One particularly busy Friday night there was NO room for extra people. It was so busy that the bussers and waiters had to turn sideways to squeeze between tables and the fire marshal probably would have had a fit. A man walked in to the front door and asked the hostess if I was working tonight. She said that I was and told him what section he could find me in (on the other end of the place). So he moved his way through the throngs of tourists and approached me in the middle of my section and the conversation went something like this:

Man: Are you Sara xxx?

Me: Yes.

Man: (pulling out handcuffs and flashing his badge) I'm investigator Xxxx. You're going to have to come with me.

Me: WHAT!?

Man: (now putting handcuffs on me IN THE MIDDLE OF THE BUSY RESTAURANT) You're under arrest for drug trafficking in Texas.

Me: (Now panicking and teary) Whahuh!? But I've never even BEEN to Texas!!!

Man: Oh... Well, in that case, your mother says hi.

Oh, my mother was in TROUBLE with me for this one! My mother was a police dispatcher. An out of town officer was at the station and he had asked her for a recommendation for a place to eat. She said she had a great place in mind but could he do her a little favor while he was there? Not funny, mom. Not funny at all.

To make matters worse the man who owned the restaurant sometimes had "special" customers related to things that may have come off of his boats that were NOT fish. The police department was well aware of this but had so far been unable to prove anything. So after this incident he pulled me aside and told me flat out that he didn't care WHAT I had going on the side but that in future I was to keep it OUT of his place.

I think I might be scarred forever...

100th post AND Secret 6: I'm a thrift store mommy

This is a 30 Secrets in 30 Days AND it's my 100th post. I thought about making #100 something extra and all by itself but I think this secret is special since it's something that I share with all of my sisters and my mother.

Secret 6: I'm a thrift store mommy. Yeah, that's right. My kids own a LOT of stuff from Goodwill and St Vincent's and other thrift stores. I buy clothes, toys, sometimes furniture and a LOT of books. My kids don't yet understand that the stuff is used, or care that it is. When I was younger, but older than my kids are now, I was mortified to walk in there. It wasn't until after I moved out that I was able to see the value in thrift stores. The kids haven't yet figured out that some kids at school don't think it's cool and I'm not telling. Apparently credit card companies don't like it when you shop there either so I now pay cash or use debit only.

There are a few things that I won't buy there, of course, like underwear and shoes. And stuffed animals for the kids. The reason I won't buy stuffed animals is that my older sister, Middle-Middle, taught her dog that stuffed animals which smell like thrift stores are the dogs' toys, which I think was pretty brilliant really. I allow my dog the same rule because he ONLY chews on the animals with that scent. This way the stuffed animals that smell like the kids or like new don't smell like 'his' and he doesn't chew up their stuff, EVER.

My number one favorite thing to buy there is books. Today I got 27 books for the kids for $25 compared to an average of $5/children's book at a regular store which would have cost over $135. And, since I'm buying used preowned stuff I'm also helping to keep things out of landfills and help the environment. Yay, thrift stores!

Secret 5: The uproar over my name

This is the woman I was named for. She was a suffragette and a poet. At the time of my birth my parents thought I should be named for a family member. There was a great-grandmother on my mother's side and a great-great-grandmother on my father's side named Sara. My great-great-grandfather, also in the picture, was a historical figure in Oregon whose name is recognized by many people today and it seemed appropriate that I should be named for his wife. After the naming of me it came out that Sara was not actually his wife, however, as his first wife had never granted him a divorce. After the ink was dry on the birth certificate it became known that I was named after his mistress. Some accounts that I find online of his life call her his second wife and say they were married in the 1930s after the first wife had died. However in the text of an interview with Sara after his death she says that she told her mother that they were married in Europe to keep from upsetting her (and says this was probably the only lie she ever told) and other people just assumed that they were but she never mentions actually getting married... I'm still googling for more on that in any event as there is a specific date mentioned.

Anyway, several family members were extremely upset at my being named after his mistress and when my little sister was born a year later they named her after the actual wife's daughter for her first name and for her middle name she was named for a prominent family member still living. It drove my mother a little crazy because to of all of us sisters she had given names that didn't have shorter nicknames (she never liked being called by a nickname and wanted to make sure we didn't have one) and now Little-Little's first and middle names could both be shortened (and starting in high school she went only by the nickname).

I used to tell my mother that all of the trouble I got into in high school wasn't my fault. I was just highly spirited like my namesake and what did she expect? Though truly I was highly spirited, I think, because I am my mother's daughter.

Secret 4: Confession Christmas

When I was a sophomore in high school one of my older sisters got brave and told mom the truth about something that happened a long time ago. After that it all started spilling out and all of us were confessing things my mother never knew about (at least where the statute of limitations had passed, anyway, which seems to be roughly 10 years). My mother sat stunned, finally laughed, and said "I see. Okay, as long as we're telling the truth here... what happened to my gold watch with the marquee diamonds in it?" It got very quiet and then my oldest sister, Big-Big, said "oh, yeah... okay, well, [Little-Big] and I were playing pirates... and, uh, we needed a buried treasure...". It turns out that when they were little they had buried the watch in the sand box out back (the sand box on a hill) and that winter the bottom board broke off and the sand box was washed away in the storms. The watch was never found and is still somewhere on the butte despite attempts with a metal detector to locate it.

Ever since that year, whenever we get together at Christmas, we tell mom a few more things. Recently it came out what ACTUALLY caused that hole in my blanket when I was in high school. I was a sophomore and my friends and I had gone to the beach near our house for a bonfire. I got in trouble for smoking because of the small hole in my blanket that I had taken with me and I tried to tell mom that someone else was smoking (since I don't smoke). She didn't believe me and I got in trouble. However, I decided the punishment might be worse for the truth and let it go.

The truth is that this was shortly after the 4th of July. We had a ton of fireworks left over and had been setting them off for hours. We got bored with that and someone, I couldn't say who exactly, had the brilliant idea to throw everything that was left into the bonfire. I had my blanket wrapped around me and moved away, quickly, as flames started shooting out in every direction. Among the stuff thrown in there were bottle rockets that had become random missles and I was hit in the back, burning a hole in my blanket. There might also have been alcohol at that beach but who can be sure? I will say that IF there was, then not having any mixers except Mountain Dew would have been punishment enough for that part of it (seriously have you ever mixed MD with Jim Beam? Shudder...).

Secret 3: I don't eat condiments

I don't eat condiments. This includes Ketchup, mayo, mustard, salad dressing, ranch on anything, relish, etc. I do like a lot of asian sauces (soy sauce, teriyaki, kung pao) and I love enchilada sauce but you usually don't put those on a hamburger. ?!?!?... I just had a lightbulb moment. An enchilada burger actually might be pretty good...

Anyway, to get back on topic: when I was a little kid I didn't like any of these sauces because they smelled funny and tasted about the same. I tried them and was NOT interested. McDonalds didn't have a 'plain' option when I was little and I think my parents got a little tired of explaining it. Around that time Burger King capitalized on it and came out with their slogan 'Have it Your Way'. So my mother put a bumper sticker on the refrigerator that said "This is NOT Burger King and You Can't Have It Your Way!".

As an adult I figure that some of my tastes have changed and I might be able to like some condiments now. But I would probably have to try it a few times since they are an acquired taste. However, I also think that they aren't good for me anyway so do I really want to add one more thing that is unhealthy to my diet? Not so much. My children like some of these things (ketchup, ranch, and mustard) and so I keep them in the fridge (no need to put my hang up on them I guess) but when I go to In-N-Out or McDs I order my burger plain and the cashier raises an eyebrow and says "Just meat, cheese, and bun?". Yup, that's me!