Happy Father’s Day TeTe

Rather that subject you all to another post about how wonderful Babu is and how spoiled I am, I thought I’d give a shout out to my girl TeTe, who is a single mother 99% of the time. The other 1% is when her worthless (ex?)-husband shows up, promises to buy me a bottle of good vodka and then leaves again with no warning. I think my heart breaks a little every time it happens, I can’t imagine what her kids go through. What he lacks TeTe more than makes up for.

I just love TeTe, she was there in the thick of things with me while I was learning to be a single parent myself. She was the first one on the block to know what was really going on in our house and she stuck with me the whole summer when the rest of the neighborhood was busy either gossiping, maligning my out of control children, or treating me with something akin to a leper that was dying by avoiding me at all costs. Apparently divorce makes people one of three things, vicious, uncomfortable or protective. TeTe falls into the protective category.

I met her one winter day shortly after we moved in, they were building her house across the street. She and her little boy were looking at the outside of the house trying to figure out how to actually get in. We have some pretty high porches here and I let her know that she could lift up the garage door and go in that way, so they wouldn’t have to climb up forms, rock and gaps to the front door. She moved in the next spring and we have been friends ever since. TeTe is a very private person with a strong personality. If she wants you to know her business she will tell you, if you overstep and ask she will let you know that’s a question you don’t need to asking. No apologies, get your nose out of her business. get to know her and you’ll know her business automatically by extension, but she isn’t going to be calling you spilling it all over the place, it’ll come up in conversation naturally. She is definitely on the short list of other women who are allowed to tell me what to do, she earned it while we were bonding.

At first is was countless nights by the firepit with the rest of the hood, the first 2 summers held some serious shenanigans, it was legendary and I don’t know that we will ever have a summer that tops the 2nd one. We have a pretty good start on it this summer. I’d pull my Randy Watson disappearing and go to bed routine, and at like 2 in the morning there would be giggling and people coming up my stairs, then I’d find myself in bed with TeTe and Turds Wife, telling me to get up and come back out there. So the 3 of us would be out back or on the front porch, me in my jammies and the rest of the guys still up down by the fire. We came to be known as the party cul-de-sac, I can’t disagree with that and I’m giggling at some of those memories just typing this. The single mother summer there weren’t many fire pits, my neighbors having to sit there and watch Babu try to move out with my kids crying and screaming while holding on to him didn’t really scream let’s party all summer long around here. It was mostly me and TeTe and the occasional appearance from one of the guys. The nice thing about it mostly being the 2 of us was we got to sit and just quietly talk about Paul and what was the latest news with the love triangle. She got to hear my match.com dating stories from profile to inactive account. And we got closer.

I asked TeTe to make me a cd of some music I could listen to over the summer. She responded with 3 of them, I imported them into my itunes as Tete’s songs for Lola’s heartbreak Summer Volume 1, 2 and 3. She was my back-up neighbor to keep an eye out on the kids, or let them go to her house when I needed to leave for work before I could get them on the bus in the fall. Once Babu moved back in she was right back on board with us as a couple. We didn’t even need to discuss it, she just jumped right back on. When I started planning GNO’s again I invited her, and she has been going out with us ever since.

TeTe is a constant source of entertainment. She is a level of fearlessly be yourself that I aspire to reach, and in case you haven’t noticed I feel like I have it pretty together in that area. She is tall and gorgeous. When we go out she is often hands down the hottest looking Mommy. Men flock to her and she is kind of exempt from the do not go off alone without telling someone rule because 1-there is a high probability there is a gun in her purse, and if there is you can bet she knows how to use it 2- She is the one I’d take with me to go handle a situation anyway 3-she will not hesitate to kick your ass if you step out of line boys 4- she is grown and single so it isn’t my business. Still, that doesn’t keep me from always wanting to know where everyone is when we go out, and one outrageous night we went out and I couldn’t locate her. So I texted, and I’d have the pic of it if she would quit changing her number, but this was the basic conversation.

Lola- Where are you

TeTe- Dude took me to subway, I’ll be back in a bit

I can’t even type it without laughing, because this is what happened next. In case you haven’t read any my other GNO posts our nights follow a pattern. Pre-drinking, get to club early and spend the whole night usually in one club, go get something to eat and laugh about the grope pit and any other stories. That night there were a bunch of us, Shorty, Tete, Sugar Baby, Fun Size, and at least 3 others I am forgetting. That night we stumbled to HotBox and somehow FunSize boyfriend, who later drove us all home and that was a story in itself, bought us a pizza. Bonus points to any of you hearing Strongbad in your heads right now. Anyhow, in the pizza place there is this big window we like to sit at so we can people watch and laugh. We are sitting and standing there having fun giving shit to the constant barrage of dudes who are now walking in there to try to talk to one or another of us and/or get pizza. TeTe is eating a slice of pizza, she has a half a subway sandwich in her huge purse (we make fun of her and then proceed to make her carry all our shit all night long) and she is telling us about also going to the pizza food truck earlier that night with a different dude.

sidebar: The most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me is the night little boy in a Teenage Mutant Nina Turtle costume with a the Napoleonic ego tried to get me to follow him to the bathroom b/c he was just CERTAIN I wanted to see his BIG turtle, he was in law school. I informed him that I was not now, nor had I ever been bathroom Betty. Babu and I had a good laugh later about what he obviously thought I would just be so overcome with appreciation and do TO it if he could just get me to look dammit!

Then she sees it, walking down the street is the dude that took her to subway. He is walking with another girl and they are BOTH eating, wait for it, Quizno’s. So not only had TeTe taken a food tour over the 5 hours we were in the bar district, but apparently there is a whole ” Hey Sweet Thang, can I buy you a fish sandwich” Ladies Man sub culture we didn’t even know about. We all are now laughing so hard we can barely eat our pizza. The Dude took me to Subway line is entrenched in our Meme’s and TeTe gets constant shit about it.

One more quick story, It’s Father’s Day after all, so I can on about TeTe for a bit. TeTe is a business woman and an entrepreneur. She works hard to make a living and usually does it in a way that is on her own terms. So she starts new things with some random frequency to supplement her main business line. But the funny thing is they are often way out of left field, and completely unrelated to the last thing or the thing before that. Last night we were talking about this evening’s ( writtten Friday) GNO and she volunteered to drive because she has a van now. The last time I checked she had a sweet black BMW so I had to ask, “Why did you get a van?”. the answer, she is starting a new business and hopes to have 3 vans in her fleet before she is done. We are having this conversation  in my  front yard while I’m trying to water and I just start laughing and doubling over. “OMG TeTe, I just love you, what the hell are you doing now?” “Imma Hustler Baby” she laughs back at me. So I took to calling it her hustler van.

When I requested her blessing to write this post, she sent me this……

Happy FATHERS DAY TETE! You keep doing what you do girl!!!!