The Great Rift Begins

The Great Rift began with the celebration of Siss' sixtieth birthday on April 23rd, 2007. At that point, we had been estranged for about two years, over another one of her moralistic summations of my life. Then, she suddenly e-mailed me to say that she had had an epiphany, and realized that I am the only sister she has. Well, I have always been the only sister she has, but I fell for the line again and embraced her back into my life. Mistake. You can't keep falling for people's sob stories and not expect to get burned, or at least singed. After a few months of sisterly correspondence, I proposed that I would do something big for her "Big Six-O". Of course, The Rag had beaten me to the punch, so she asked if we could do it a few weeks later, maybe in the first part of May. This was highly unnecessary, as The Rag actually did nothing for her birthday, but we agreed anyway. "We" is me and my significant other, who lives 200 miles from me in San Antonio, TX. Sig Oth and I planned a totally awesome four-day weekend, the first two days in Houston (my home) and the remaining two in San Antonio (his). I let Siss choose the activities, but the only thing she knew about Texas was the Alamo, and was quite excited to learn that it was in San Antonio. This is how America's monument to defeat became the cornerstone of the trip. Ironically yourself.

Sig was actually on to this irony and mentioned it to me, at the same time inventing the phrase "America's monument to defeat." For a computer scientist, he sometimes amazes me with his wit and wisdom. I think it must be the loonyness gathered from all those years spent staring at that gray screen covered in lines of code. Here is a sterling example: after our first vacation together, which we took in the summer of 2005 to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, Sig and I were sitting in a little bar in the Denver airport waiting for a connecting flight to Houston. He ordered one variety of red wine and I ordered another. They were both illustrative of the quality of wine that you get at an airport, but one was much worse than the other. When we ordered a second glass of the better wine, the first glass of the lesser wine remained on the table. Sig offered to split the new glass of wine with me by pouring some into my half-empty glass. When I objected to the combining of the two, he merely said "if we put them together, it will make Sangria"!

Pause....long pause. This remark was not funny unless the listener were able to immediately take the necessary steps to understand what composes Sangria and how this could be analogized to the two sorry wines that were on the table. I happen to like and appreciate this type of humor. This is why Sig and I are still a couple and also why I immediately adopted his moniker for the Alamo into my vocabulary, where it remains to this day.

Our first two days were to be spent as a sister act in Houston, and then segue into a leisurely drive on I-10 to San Antonio for the remaining time. Sig had booked a palatial room at the Hilton of the Americas in Houston for me and Siss. He left his credit card open for us to have dinner at the Skyline Grill a very nice dining area on the 24th floor, and for room service, the mini-bar, the spa, and whatever else we wanted.This, since Siss "simply couldn't" stay at my warehouse space because of her allergy to cats. She did, however, manage to come to the warehouse to inspect my stuff and rummage through my clothes, all without even a small wheeze. She also managed to open, inspect, and admire all her birthday surprises, which took some time. I am pleased to say that, during this interlude, Siss managed to refrain from commenting (either negatively or positively) about my lifestyle, my surroundings or the presence of six cats and a dog at my place. This was a relief, but it left me hanging as to exactly where the pendulum was in its arc. Was she in my back pocket our ready to sprint? Only the next four days would tell.

We arrived at the Hilton bag and baggage, a few hours before the birthday dinner reservation at Skyline Grill. I was greeted like a long-lost relative by the valet parking staff, which caused my sister's jaw to drop to her knees. You see, Sig is not only the love of my life, he is exactly as he described himself in one of his first e-mails to me: "generous to a fault". He had, on the many occasions we had stayed at the Hilton of the Americas, been unfailingly generous to the staff, and the valet attendant remembered my car, remembered me, remembered what I do for a living, and remembered to carry me around as if on a litter. Chops to him. Siss was astounded. Her bags were whisked away to the reserved room, and the bellman personally escorted us there. Sig had armed me with plenty of five-dollar bills, and instructed me on when to tip whom, and how. Not that I am a rube or anything, but Motel 6 doesn't run to valet parking or bellmen. After checking out the room and the contents of the mini-bar, which Motel 6 doesn't have, either, and which doesn't matter anyway because the Hilton's mini-bar has really crappy wine, Siss and I decided to use our few hours to good purpose. We took a field trip to the lobby floor, where there is a little sports bar that is open to the lobby and all the passers-by, tucked neatly in behind the fake Dale Chihulie chandelier. I know what real Dale Chihuli glass looks like. I saw some on exhibit at a gallery in downtown Houston. The Houston Press described the show as looking like "a sale table at Nieman Marcus". The sports bar at least had drinkable wine....barely. This is an ideal place for people-watching, as it lies directly between the check-in desk and one of the banks of elevators. Also, it serves a bar snack filled with salted nuts and sesame sticks, two of my favorite munchies. These snacks are great by themselves, but their true usefulness is to make drinkable the sports bar wine, the quality of which is somewhere between screw-cap and cardboard box.

We probably spent a good deal of time commenting on women's butts, mothers who couldn't control their children, men whose belt buckles disappeared between two separate stomach bulges, and outfits from both Vogue and the Salvation Army.

Back at the room and feeling mellow as only the grape allows, Siss began to unpack all the clothes she had commandeered from my place to wear on the trip. My shirts and shoes and handbags were fair game, being either size-neutral or common to us both. Pants and skirts were another matter altogether. Suffice it to say that Ms. Bosc brought her own. They tended to be wide-legged pants with drawstring waists and skirts with a slight bell. I am more drawn to straight sheaths with slits up the back or long, slithery tubes. The point here is that we used to be the same size. Her waist was much longer and smaller than mine, and it always ticked me off that I could not wear her prom gowns. This was probably a good thing, for she favored pink, the color of infant girls and Pepto-Bismal. The worm has turned. Now she can't fit into anything of mine.

At one point, we had considered wearing the same outfits to this bash; a.k.a. the birthday dinner. I have two Wolford pant outfits that have strapless tops and long, elegant, flowing legs.When Siss managed to shoe-horn into one of them, she admitted that it would be "rump-sprung" if she left it on any longer. This saved me from another humiliation like the sequined tops.

I have never seen anyone take so long in the bathroom or pay so much attention to the details of hair and makeup as I saw that evening. Her mascara wand was too skinny and she had to borrow mine. The shade of her eye shadow was wrong for the outfit. I wouldn't know. I wear the same color with everything, and it works for me. She changed tops at least four times. By the time Siss was teetering down the hall toward the elevator in my $800. black-and-white patent leather stilettos (courtesy of Sig), my stomach was churning and my eyes were glazing over. All I could see in front of them was an Ahi steak, very rare. Skyline Grill did this very well, until they unwisely 86'd it from the menu. Also, they used to present my favorite salad in a fennel bulb, which was quite cute, and they quit doing that, too. I guess Sig's splendid tipping goes only so far.