America, You Sexy Bitch Read online

  I have never minded taking risks when it comes to my own life—at times I have even relished testing the boundaries of the things I can get away with—but I’m feeling stupid and guilty that I might be putting my family in the path of someone I barely know and have reasons not to trust; he’s exactly the kind of Left-leaning comedian who loves to skewer people like us for gatherings just like this. What am I doing bringing this random guy and his road manager into the McCain lair, simply with the intention to observe and judge? What the hell have I gotten myself into? No, seriously.

  Michael: Some clarification: although I have said that we’re traveling the country by RV, that’s not entirely true. Our first few stops will be reached by airplane, then we will pick up the RV and meet our peculiar RV driver Cousin John, in Austin, Texas. Neither Meghan nor I are well-organized enough to choreograph this dance, so we’ve also hired my friend Stephie to accompany us as tour manager. With our input, she’s been putting together the itinerary, booking hotel rooms, contacting various people we want to meet, badgering Congressmen, and making the trip actually doable instead of the absurd Ambien-fueled fantasy it started as.

  I met Stephie a couple of years ago when my friend Michael Showalter and I hired her to be our assistant on a TV show. She was just out of college then, an aspiring writer and producer. The word most people use to describe her is “adorable,” because of her small size and big, moony eyes. My nickname for her is “Nermal.” Regular readers of “Garfield” will recall Nermal as Garfield’s nemesis, an impossibly cute kitten. That’s Stephie: impossibly, annoyingly cute.

  In many ways, she is Meghan’s opposite. Meghan is brash and outrageous. Stephie is demure and shy. Meghan is a honky-tonkin’, gun-totin’, whoopin’ and hollerin’ cowgirl. Stephie plays videogames and eats raw spinach out of a bag. As of this point, they have only spoken by phone. When they actually meet this morning, I am worried about how they will react to each other. I’m not sure how my little Nermal will do in a cat fight.

  “Hiiiii!” squeals Meghan when we find Stephie at the airport, wrapping her in a hug. I’ve known Stephie for three years and have never hugged her. I don’t think I’ve ever even touched her. Because girls other than my wife scare me.

  They start gabbing right away: How fun this is going to be, how excited they both are, Stephie’s fiancé Chris and their wedding plans, blah blah blah girl stuff blah blah blah. They’re just falling all over each other, instant BFFs. This is bullshit. Stephie’s my friend!

  I pout my way to the parking lot, where we pile into an SUV. The plan is to spend the night in Sedona, the Arizona Hamptons, that New Agey, feel-good, richy-rich Sun State oasis where the McCains have their country compound. Meghan keeps warning me that the house in Sedona is nothing fancy, but I don’t believe her. “Nothing fancy” in her world is, I suspect, something pretty f-ing fancy in mine.

  Arizona is gorgeous. Even when it’s 108 degrees, as it is now, it’s gorgeous. There’s just something about the vast red desert and crumbly distant mountains that stills the mind. Everything out here is baked down to its essence, an entire world lived in a microwave oven. As we drive, I notice that it looks cloudy towards the horizon. Maybe it will rain, but I don’t think so. I don’t think it ever rains here. No wonder there were so many gunfights back when this was the Wild West; people must go crazy in these conditions. All this sun is just unnatural. It’s beautiful, yeah, but I can’t imagine living here. What are we even supposed to do while we’re here other than die from dehydration?

  Meghan: The only plan I am completely sure of going in, is that my brothers are going to take Michael into the middle of the desert and teach him how to shoot a gun. This is something Michael has requested, and there seems to be a lot of momentum gearing up around this piece of our trip. We’ll go to our friend’s house in Prescott tomorrow, but first we are going to Sedona to meet my mother and the Harpers, who are longtime family friends and neighbors. My intent is to give Michael a glimpse into my upbringing, show him a bit of Arizona, and give him a chance to meet the woman who made me who I am. In the same way that I felt it was important to meet Michael’s wife, I think it is important for Michael and me to meet each other’s mothers. I had a better understanding of Michael after meeting his mother, and I want him to have a better understanding of me. I also want to give my mother peace of mind regarding the strange comedian I will be traveling with for the next month. For the record, my mother is not as enthusiastic about this little road trip/social experiment as I am.

  I think a lot of times people have a different idea of what my family is like for all of the obvious and clichéd reasons shoved down your throat by the media and gossip blogs. Unfortunately, the older I get and the more people I meet, I find that a lot of the stereotypes about famous people turn out to be true, especially those about famous politicians. I have always felt lucky to have parents who love and support me unconditionally, but also ones with a very low tolerance for bullshit or any indication of spoiled brat behavior. Their strictness used to make me crazy growing up but now, as I am heading into my late twenties, I couldn’t be more grateful for the kind of childhood and sheltering my parents gave me. My parents somehow miraculously gave me a normal childhood and instilled morals and values in me while still letting me be my own person and make my own mistakes. I have no idea how they did it; they are incredible parents who did an incredible job, all within the ridiculous world of politics. I’m a lucky and blessed woman.

  I pull the car up to our cabin in Sedona—or more accurately in a canyon in Cottonwood. It’s not so much a ranch house as a collection of cabins clustered around a few ponds, on the banks of Oak Creek. I know, it’s all very Little House on the Prairie–sounding, but I love it here. That being said, I’m worried that Michael will somehow be disappointed that it doesn’t look more like a great lodge, or is more put together and architecturally well designed. The best way I can describe the cabins in Sedona is that they are super-homey, with all of the pictures, paintings, mementos, scratches, and imperfections that have collected around us as a family. It is unbelievably comfortable, cozy, and the kind of messy where no one feels like they have to dress up or worry about where they sit. As my mom says, “You can do anything to this place and not hurt it.”

  At this point, I don’t know if Michael is a diva about hotels or some kind of pillow princess. Most important, though, I’m nervous about how he will interact with my mother. She has tweeted him saying she is glad he is going to be spending the Fourth with us. Michael’s wife, Martha, later told me how freaked out he was when both my mother and my father tweeted him. Something about this made me happy. At least I wasn’t the only one freaked out about this particular portion of our voyage.

  As soon as I pull up to the house, my nerves calm. It’s like wading into familiar waters. The wraparound porch beckons with its wide, inviting staircase. Inside it’s cool, but not air-conditioned, and Mom is sitting in the living room watching the news. She clicks it off and brightly welcomes Michael and Stephie, asking if they would like a tour of the place. I exhale, proud of her ability to put every single person she meets instantly and genuinely at ease.

  As messy as the cabins may seem, they are situated on a beautiful and somewhat expansive area—picturesque in all of the ways one hopes a cabin in Sedona to be. A beautiful creek, orchards, chicken coops, ponds, ducks wandering around, weeping willows, the whole bit. We stroll through the grounds while the sun sets hot pink against the mountains in the distance, and all I can think about is Michael’s outfit. It might be the only time anyone has shown up in Sedona wearing linen pants who wasn’t a middle-aged woman.

  During dinner we settle into a friendly rhythm, for which I am grateful. My mother tells Michael about her work in the Congo, the Harpers catch me up on what their children are doing—they grew up next door and are as close as cousins. I feel happy to be here and for the first time think that this trip might actually be a good idea. Michael and Stephie fit right in and all of the tens
ion starts to slowly fade.

  Michael: Meghan wasn’t lying about the McCain country home. It’s modest. Simple. Homespun. It’s a shithole. (I’m kidding.) What I anticipated being a gated desert fortress is just a pleasant and well-loved series of small cabins tucked into a gorgeous valley floor. When we pull up to Camp McCain, I shake loose myself from the SUV and prepare to meet Meghan’s mom.I’m pretty freaked out to meet Cindy McCain. My impression of her from the media is that she’s an ice queen. Cold and remote and perhaps the proud owner of a fur coat made from 101 Dalmatians. I could not be more wrong.

  From the moment we step inside, Cindy goes out of her way to make me feel welcomed and relaxed. What I (and I think much of the country) took as aloofness is actually poise and, I suspect, shyness. I never really considered before how difficult it must be for political spouses to willingly put themselves in the public eye just because their husband or wife has political aspirations. That would suck.

  At dinner, I sit beside Cindy and listen to her describe her work with women in the Congo. It’s work she’s passionate about and committed to, spending weeks at a time touring the war-torn African country, hardly the sort of thing a spoiled senator’s wife would devote herself to. Why did I have that muddle-headed impression of this lovely woman? Where did that narrative come from? And why was I so willing to believe it? This is annoying: the first new McCain I meet is already forcing me to rethink my stereotypes.

  Meghan: Later that night we drive into Sedona and stop into this bar called The Olde Sedonan and watch the locals perform karaoke. I do my best not to make any jokes about the fact that Michael is dressed like Paula Deen, and Michael does his best not to talk to me about guns. He is clearly nervous about meeting my well-armed military brothers in the morning, and I have half a mind to let him sweat through his girly pants. Instead I patiently explain that other than the terrible, insane shooting of Representative Giffords, Arizona has been a place where people for the most part know how to keep safe around their guns. That we are taught from practically birth that guns are for protection, hunting, and, yes, sometimes target practice. I can tell he’s not buying it, though, and decide to wait until he has one in his hand to wait for his final judgment. That always changes things. Even the most daisy-toting peace lover will get all excited by the feel of steel.

  Michael: Arizona has some of the loosest gun control laws in the country, so much so that if you prefer people not bring their guns into your drinking establishment or house of worship or medical clinic, you need to post a sign requesting that people leave their firearms elsewhere.

  While we sip some whiskey in Sedona, Meghan tells me about her brothers and their guns. She’s got an assortment of siblings, but it’s her two younger brothers and sister that I’m meeting tomorrow: Bridget is a sophomore at Arizona State University; Jack is a navy captain; Jimmy is a former marine.

  “They’ve got a lot of guns,” she says, checking my eyes for fear. Then to clarify lest I don’t understand what she means, she tells me, “No. A lot of guns.”

  “Do you have a gun?” I ask.

  “Yes,” she says as though it’s a crazy question. “But they’ve got a lot of guns.”

  This is one thing I am quickly learning about Republicans: they are afraid. Democrats are afraid too, I think, but it’s different. Democrats are afraid for the future. Republicans are frightened for the future also, but they are equally or more terrified of the RIGHT NOW! In the Republican worldview, menace lurks around every corner. Whether it’s zombies coming to eat our brains or robbers or rapists or immigrants or liberal politicians, they believe there is a nightmare army of evildoers out there whose only objective in life is to take what’s theirs. That’s why they are “conservatives.” They want to conserve their shit from the bad guys. What’s the most effective way to do that? Guns.

  I explain to Meghan that growing up in New Jersey, I never fired a gun. Never even saw a gun that wasn’t attached to a policeman’s utility belt. Gun culture just isn’t the same kind of thing on the East Coast. I’m not sure why. If anybody should be afraid, it’s us. If you’ve ever seen The Sopranos you know why. The whole state is mobbed up and corrupt and filled with angry meatheads who blew out their knees playing high school football and never mentally recovered. Yes, New Jersey is also “the Garden State” and home to Princeton University, but mostly it’s just kind of douchey. Honestly, we probably need some of Arizona’s guns in New Jersey, because living there can be a scary experience for anybody not named The Situation.

  Meghan: It’s the Fourth of July, and I wake up early and walk over to the cabin Michael and Stephie are sharing. I’m nervous and anxious all over again. Michael’s sitting on the living room couch, holding a mug of coffee and contemplating a bench covered in pillows adorned with my father’s smiling face. They were decorations at a dinner party held in Dad’s honor during the 2000 convention in Philadelphia, and are every bit as funny and slightly ridiculous as you might be picturing. The only sight funnier is Michael in his pajamas and Crocs—clearly the one time he took his Crocs off in front of me was embarrassing enough for him to now sleep in them.

  Soon after, we leave for Prescott, which is about an hour away from Sedona. The plan is to stay at our friend Jackie White’s horse ranch, where we will meet up with the boys, shoot some guns, and then attend the “World’s Oldest Rodeo.”

  At this point Michael and I are still in the get-to-know-you phase of our relationship, and although we are getting along just fine so far, we haven’t exactly crossed the threshold of the RV stage of our road romance, and the inorganic nature of spending time in closer quarters is beginning to once again loom large.

  On the tense drive up to Prescott we stop in a small, former mining town called Jerome. It’s a place mostly known for the local mining boom in the late 1800s and was proclaimed “the wickedest town in the west” in 1903 by the New York Sun for its scandalous reputation for prostitution and gambling. All of that wicked merriment is a thing of the past, and these days Jerome can only boast the random ghost story and the feat of residing five thousand feet above sea level. We stop to get lunch at a vegan-friendly—oh, Jerome, how far you’ve fallen—restaurant because it looks nice and Stephie has an extremely sensitive stomach and strict dietary needs. While we are eating, the screeching tones of “God Bless America” waft through an open window from someplace down the street. We initially try to ignore it, but soon realize that we need to investigate. I’m as patriotic as the next guy, but this song needs to be put out of its misery.

  Michael: After eating, we walk up the street towards the source of the music. About five blocks away, we spy a speaker set up in an open garage. Sitting in a lawn chair, wearing a sash and a tiara, is a girl around ten years old. She’s got a card table set up. On the card table is a tangle of homemade jewelry and a pile of CDs with her picture on them. This is what’s been interrupting our digestion.

  “Would you like to support me going to States?” the girl asks us.

  It turns out she’s a beauty pageant contestant trying to pay her way to the state competition the following Friday. But here’s the thing, and I am going to say this in the most delicate way I know how: her singing sucks.

  She tells us the beauty contest is a “natural” competition. No makeup allowed, no skimpy clothes. “It’s nothing like Toddlers and Tiaras,” she says proudly.

  A beefy middle-aged guy comes out of the building and sits behind the card table. “Tell ’em why you’re doing it,” he says.

  “Because I want to raise money for the pageant so I can buy, uh, food for like the . . . help me get the food and it will help me, like, pay for all my expenses.”

  Left unexplained is how “getting food” will help her pay whatever terrible expenses she has incurred. Regardless, I suspect she will need to work on her oratory skills a little bit before States. When she finishes her version of a world peace pageant speech, I buy a CD for five dollars and wish her luck because I love this little beauty contes
tant with her screechy, off-key voice, plain looks, and terrible speaking skills. I want her to win States. She’s got my vote just for sitting in the sun in her limp sash and playing her patriotic caterwauling at full volume through all Jerome on the Fourth of July.

  Leaving her behind, we stroll farther up the road to a souvenir shop where I buy each of my kids a present.

  For my son, a tarantula encased in resin; for my daughter, a scorpion encased in resin, both recommended by Meghan as treasures from her own childhood. I think the gifts will freak the kids out, which is an appealing idea. The cashier is an older, wiry guy wearing a baseball cap that reads VIETNAM VET.

  “You’re a Vietnam vet, huh?” I say.

  “Sixty-eight,” he says.

  “Her father was there too,” I say, nodding at Meghan.

  “There were a lot of us.” It’s clear he doesn’t want to talk about his service, so I don’t push. As he’s ringing me up he holds up the tarantula paperweight and says, “I’ve got a family down south who does these for me,” he says. “They send their kids out at night with flashlights to get the tarantulas.”

  “Their kids?” I ask. “How old?”

  “Young,” he says. I get the impression he means like eight or ten years old, which is how old my kids are. I do not think of myself as a pantywaist parent, but I cannot imagine a scenario in which I send my children out into the night to catch tarantulas.

  “After they turn over the critters, the mom does the resin work,” he says as though this is a normal occupation. Is this the Addams Family?

  “How did you find them?” I ask.