All posts by Eve Ogden Schaub

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About Eve Ogden Schaub

Serial memoirist Eve O. Schaub lives with her family in Vermont and enjoys performing experiments on them so she can write about it. Author of Year of No Sugar (2014) and Year of No Clutter (2017) and most recently Year of No GARBAGE (2023). Find her on Twitter @Eveschaub IG or eveschaub.com.

Thank You For Flying

One in a Thousand, ,

E.O. Schaub

Hello folks, hi there, how’re you doing today.

I’d just like to take a moment to introduce myself. I’m the father of the baby who’ll be in the front row of the aircraft screaming for the majority of the flight today, so if you have any questions, comments, or unsolicited advice you’d like to offer, I’d be happy to take those from you at this time.

But before we begin, I’d also like to introduce my wife Lauren who is here next to me. For those of you in the back who do not have a clear view at this time, she’ll be the one with the liquid baby Tylenol in her hair and an entire strawberry breakfast bar stuck to her pantleg later on in the flight. If you happen to have brought your lunch with you onboard the aircraft today, please be aware that the baby’s mother’s diet today has consisted entirely of dehydrated apple squares, two Wintergreen Lifesavers, and one Ritz Bitz. Thank you, now let’s take some questions. Continue reading Thank You For Flying →

The Library Rules of Etiquette

One in a Thousand, ,

E.O. Schaub

Author’s note: this essay is dedicated to Beth, the librarian, who we love and who puts up with all our crap… and snacks.

It all started out rather innocently. You see, our family attends dance class twice a week at the Pawlet Public Library- a beloved local community center housed in the town’s former three-room schoolhouse. In the afternoons when the ballerinas disappear into the room to the right, many siblings and parents head to the children’s room on the left to spend the hour playing and reading books.

Then, suddenly one dreary Monday afternoon – or was it Thursday?- and without warning, a small, typed paper notice appeared on the door jam of the children’s room, and no one thought very much of it. Not at first.

“Parents please clean up after your children… Remember, this is a library first. Thank You.”

Some time shortly thereafter came a second notice, regarding the handling of soggy footwear, directing them to the use of plastic mats in the hallway corner. Also, at this time parents and other patrons might have glanced up to notice a half-eaten cookie scotch-taped to the original note. In retrospect, this was a somewhat ominous harbinger of things to come.

The next sign to appear was much larger than its forebears, handwritten on poster board, and festooned with large capital letters. It read as follows:

Library Rules of Etiquette:

  1. NO YELLING- use indoor voice
  2. NO RUNNING- use walking feet
  3. Food only at tables
  4. Clean up after yourself
  5. RESPECT the books, toys, space, each other and yourself
  6. Share with each other

Next to the sign was taped a small, mysterious flat object, which upon closer inspection revealed itself to be a pancake.

It seemed that this might be the end of the matter, until a few weeks later, when a series of modifications to the posterboard appeared, employing several rather emphatic shades of fruit-scented marker. The new, improved sign now read:

Library Rules of Etiquette:

  1. NO YELLING- use indoor voice, please please
  2. NO RUNNING- use walking feet, this means you
  3. Food only at tables NO FOOD
  4. Clean up after yourself for Pete’s sake
  5. RESPECT the books, toys, space, each other and yourself, not to mention the librarian, thank you
  6. Share with each other, EXCEPT Kleenexes

Additionally, some new rules had been added:

  1. NO GAMBLING
  2. NO Origami Page Folding
  3. NO setting ANYTHING on fire
  4. NO- and we cannot emphasize this enough- NO using fellow library patrons as “Home Base”

Two more objects had been added to the sign, apparently with a stapler: a small basket of chili-cheese fries, and a somewhat linty wad of salt-water taffy.

Due to a snow day, our next trip to the library was not until two weeks later, but already several significant additional upgrades to the sign had materialized, accentuated by some very determined-looking glitter glue and a squadron of happy face stickers. The new improved sign now read:

Library Rules of Etiquette:

  1. NO YELLING- use indoor voice, please please please please PLEASE
  2. NO RUNNING- use walking feet, this means you, Andrew Delano
  3. Food only at tables NO FOOD: yes, this includes gum, cotton candy, cottage cheese, Hot Pockets and Spam
  4. Clean up after yourself for Pete’s sake, Andrew Delano’s mother does not work here
  5. RESPECT the books, toys, space, each other and yourself, not to mention the librarian, thank you, also please respect the privacy and temperament of Herboldt the fish-tank iguana who suffers post-traumatic stress disorder and sweaty jowl syndrome
  6. Share with each other, EXCEPT Kleenexes, cough drops, and anything from inside your nose
  1. NO GAMBLING. NO FIREWORKS. NO WAISSAILING REINACTMENTS. NO READER’S DIGEST FIGHTS. NO DEWEY DECIMAL JOKES.
  1. NO Origami Page Folding, No book-oriented performance art, No collage or decoupage of ANY KIND
  2. NO setting ANYTHING on fire and yes this includes in the bathroom, parking lot, AND the librarian’s desk
  3. NO- and we cannot emphasize this enough- NO using fellow library patrons as “Home Base,” human shields or improvised battering rams

As if to underscore the seriousness of the matter, the bottom of the sign had been additionally underlined with the duct-taping of a black forest cherry torte.

It seemed that, since their inception only a short time ago, the Rules of Library Etiquette has evolved considerably. If we had thought this most recent and explicated version of library rules was the last word, however, we were gravely mistaken. In fact, one penultimate sign had yet to appear, and appear it did:

Librarian on Vacation

Will return when there are no longer water balloon fights in the mini-kitchen, when ALL of the baby board books have been glued permanently to the shelves and when the VHS video-tape forts have been disassembled and returned to their color-coded, alphabetized shelf locations. Also–

Unfortunately, the sign was illegible past this point due to the presence of a rather large beef brisket attached by nail gun and dripping Bacon-Onion Worchestershire sauce.

Wassailing Away

One in a Thousand, , ,

E.O. Schaub

Now, I know most of you out there probably spent the evening of January seventeenth in much the same way as I did: wandering through a snowy apple orchard in the dark, carrying torches and banging on percussive instruments. However, for those few of you who didn’t, perhaps I should explain.

You see, last week we were lucky enough to be invited along on a wassailing— yes, as in “Here we go a-wassailing…” (not to mention the ever-popular eighties hit “Come Wassail Away (with me)” by Styx.) An event with roots in the old english countryside-— we’re talking Beowolf old here— wassailing evolved as a ritualistic way to celebrate and encourage the health of the apple orchard for the coming year. Personally, there’s nothing I like better than a good old fashioned pagan ritual to start the New Year off right. After all the crass, “Buy me a Barbie Hummer!” commercialism of Christmastime, it can be something of a relief to return to a simpler time when celebrations merely involved riotous public drunkenness and animal sacrifice.

Kidding! Of course, no animals were intentionally slaughtered at this event. Our friend Sue, who along with her husband Dan, own the orchard in question and were the masterminds behind the event, billed the evening as “The safest event featuring both firearms and alcohol north of the Mason-Dixon line.” Well, you certainly can’t pass up an opportunity like that.

Now, gathering around a ninety year old apple tree to sing songs to it, pour cider on its roots, stick bread in its branches and shoot the bad spirits out of it sounds straightforward enough, but there are in fact many important details which must be observed if you are truly going to ward off such godless fruit terrorists as the Obliquebanded Leafroller, the Spotted Tentiform Bud Maggot, and the Fourteen-Nostrilled Bucket-Weevil.

And I know what you’re saying to yourself. You’re saying, “Eve, next Twelfth Night will be here before we know it. Do you have any tips for our next wassailing?” As a matter of fact, I do.

YOUR HANDY WASSAILING CHECKLIST:

Ask yourself:

-Do I have a large vat of ceremonial booze strong enough to erode paint? Can it be transported to the wassailing site on sticks/ by antique rickshaw/ on the back of a pregnant donkey?

-Is there an assortment of appropriately festive headgear? Beaded headresses, floral garlands and mostly-dead animals are popular choices.

-On a related note, will there be good blackmail photographs after the fact?

-Do I have good stuff for making noise? A must for every reveler, noisemakers may include drums, whistles, castanets and electronic banjo.

-Can I burn stuff?

-Will it make the neighbors pee their pants/ call the police/ move?

Once you have covered the basics above, some optional nice touches include:

-Tim’s brother wearing horns

-Sue directing mass pandemonium from behind a clipboard

-Accordion music

-Steve, armed and torch-bearing, directing traffic between pedestrian revelers and pale, panic-stricken motorists.

Of course, if you are conducting your wassailing within the state of Vermont you will need to have a potluck immediately following the event in order to avoid a hefty fine. It will be mass chaos with children eating twelve desserts under the table before spending the rest of the evening jumping on one another and howling like wild animals. Adults, still wearing puffy coats and funny hats will be chatting and laughing with wind-red cheeks and ample amounts of hard cider to go around, somehow sopping up soup with forks and eating noodles with spoons. You won’t remember when you have ever had such a good time.

You know, I knew we had chosen the right place to live.