Have you ever watched someone in an adjacent car at a traffic light doing an unmentionable thing? And felt smug? I have. But today, as I was sweeping dust UNDER the rug in my kitchen, I realized that I am simply REPLETE with such bad habits, and in an effort to seem much more human and approachable to my handful of faithful readers, I am now going on record with a list of my worst, but not disgusting, bad habits!
I watch all the most lurid reality shows on television. The more horrible, the better. Morbidly obese people getting gastric bypasses are fascinating. Those Hoarders? I just can’t look away! And I feel so superior watching the Nanny and all of her uncivilized charges! At least my children learned to say “Please” and “Thank you!”
I talk to myself incessantly. This seems quite innocent. But how many of you get into loud ARGUMENTS with yourselves! Do you chastise yourselves? How about hitting yourselves in the head? And I sometimes get into self arguments while shopping. The other day, while telling myself kind of loudly that “it is ridiculous to buy another down vest when you already have four!” a woman at the adjacent round ring moved away conspicuously.
I harbor envy. For every woman I see wearing either big diamonds or Tod’s loafers, I cherish negative thoughts. Perfectly landscaped gardens make me irritable. Women who toss off gourmet meals (my sister and daughter), make me want to sabotage the béchamel sauce. I WANT A GUCCI BAG!
I cheat on my diet all the time. Coffee ice cream is simply my undoing. Buttercream icing is like heroin!! As a result, I have to spend so much time atoning (or is it toning?) at the gym that they all know me by name there! And when I went on vacation without telling them, they CALLED THE HOUSE to make sure I was ok!
I spend WAY too much time in bed in the morning. Some days I am still lying there at lunch time! My mother instilled in me that PJ’s must come off before nine a.m., and here I sit RIGHT NOW, typing away in my jammies, and it is two o’clock in the afternoon! There are days when I just manage to get my clothes on in time to make dinner!
I never make grocery lists. As a result, we have four bottles of ketchup, three Worcestershire sauces, repetitive herbs and spices, and redundant olive oil. This drives my husband to distraction, and he has taken to making regular inventories of the cabinets, announcing loudly, “OK: TWO CINNAMONS. THREE DRY MUSTARDS. DO WE NEED BOTH OF THESE CRISCOS? HOW ABOUT BAKING SODA?”
I love candles, buy lots of them, and NEVER light them. For some reason, they always look much more glamorous in the store. The same goes for soaps. I have a stockpile of scented soaps that would cleanse the unwashed of THE WORLD. One bar, I bought in London at Fortnum and Mason thirty years ago, and I just can’t bear to use it. I am sure it has no scent whatsoever anymore!
I just love stinky cheese. My Dad introduced me to Limburger and Liederkranz when I was a child, and I was hooked forever. Some people have gone so far, when entering my kitchen, as to inquire if the dog has committed an indiscretion. It is never good when people check the bottom of their shoes when you serve the cheese plate!
And finally, one of my worst sins: I eavesdrop! It is especially bad in restaurants when I can’t pay attention to my own conversation, because the one at the next table is so much more interesting! Often, STARING accompanies this, to which my daughter has been known to say, “For God’s sake, Mom, cut it out!” In my defense, however, I must say that this habit has never gotten to the point of my attempting to JOIN conversations at other tables. My husband is the champion of this tactic, and it does embarrass the heck out of me!
Let’s face it, no one is perfect. That is probably me at the traffic light in the car next to you—dental flossing….
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Sunday, September 20, 2009
THIS OLD HOUSE
We have laughed here. We have cried here. There have been first dates and big fights here. Many delicious dinners have been served, along with pizza deliveries and Lean Cuisines. We have painted rooms, torn out plumbing, and sprayed weedkiller all over the place. Through it all, this house has stood sentinel over our family, somehow holding us together when times were great, and when we wondered if we could survive what life threw in our faces.
It is an old house, somewhere in the vicinity of one hundred years. A big, square box with nice airy rooms and high ceilings. I remember driving past it, wondering who lived there, and why that person surrounded the yard with high trees that hardly allowed a glimpse of the house they enclosed. I never imagined that one day the Campbells would move our furniture and our lives into the place.
The trees encircling the lot are long gone. The clapboards are a grayish white now, with lovely green shutters and front door. The front door is what I loved first: big, wide, and surrounded by sidelights crowned by a graceful fanlight. Two little benches flank the door. I like to sit on one and look out at the neighborhood.
Old houses have a way of making their families feel comfortable. Big rooms make breathing easier somehow. Nothing makes summer more enjoyable than a screened porch. Old houses invariably have big fireplaces, big windows, creaky floors, and lots of nooks. Our house has individual hallways leading into a couple of the bedrooms. It doesn’t make sense, but we love it. We have a door that leads into the kitchen where ice was once delivered. There was an inch of coal dust in the basement when we arrived. The butler’s pantry reminds me of Mr. Blanding’s dream house.
We have lived here for almost twenty years. It was here that I had the party where a tipsy guest fell down the two stairs leading into the kitchen, where a big tree fell down onto the deck and destroyed it while I watched, horrified, from an upstairs window. We spent a week last year without power, lighting candles and reading in bed with flashlights. I have gotten the best Christmas gifts ever in this house! There have been teen parties here, unauthorized, and resulting groundings. Dogs have peed. Cats have barfed.
This house has witnessed the worst days of our lives, when Charlie had the stroke that nearly killed him and we fought tooth and nail to get back what was taken away. It saw me stagger through the longest days of my existence. In this house we worked to put together the family that the stroke fractured, and by God, we did it somehow.
Now the house is a little emptier, with children grown and gone. The space is ameliorated somewhat with the five cats and the one dog that have taken the children’s place. Now this is a “retirement” home for two individuals, but the rooms are still full. There is now a blogging room filled with little slips of paper scrawled with potential topics of interest. The basement is an accordion studio, complete with amps, speakers, metronomes and music stands. There are seven litter boxes down there. Also in the basement is a wonderful museum erected to the memory of Girl Scouts, Indian Princesses, horse shows, high school and college theatre productions, and the War in Viet Nam. The kitchen holds, along with memories, an entire shelf of cookbooks that are never referenced, five sets of dishes for all those gourmet dinners that I have not yet concocted, and enough dust on the top of the cupboards to grow vegetables...
The rest of the house is the same. The bedrooms that once held horse statues, extension telephones, hot rollers, five million stuffed animals, and incredible amounts of disarray now have Martha Stewart duvet sets and artfully arranged accessories. The living room and den are full of the books that I keep vowing not to buy. There is a high definition TV! We have beautiful furniture now, instead of the tattered stuff that we had while raising kids, but it now is covered with pet hair rather than ketchup stains.
It is an old house. It is a family house. It is a great house. It is probably just exactly like yours.
It is an old house, somewhere in the vicinity of one hundred years. A big, square box with nice airy rooms and high ceilings. I remember driving past it, wondering who lived there, and why that person surrounded the yard with high trees that hardly allowed a glimpse of the house they enclosed. I never imagined that one day the Campbells would move our furniture and our lives into the place.
The trees encircling the lot are long gone. The clapboards are a grayish white now, with lovely green shutters and front door. The front door is what I loved first: big, wide, and surrounded by sidelights crowned by a graceful fanlight. Two little benches flank the door. I like to sit on one and look out at the neighborhood.
Old houses have a way of making their families feel comfortable. Big rooms make breathing easier somehow. Nothing makes summer more enjoyable than a screened porch. Old houses invariably have big fireplaces, big windows, creaky floors, and lots of nooks. Our house has individual hallways leading into a couple of the bedrooms. It doesn’t make sense, but we love it. We have a door that leads into the kitchen where ice was once delivered. There was an inch of coal dust in the basement when we arrived. The butler’s pantry reminds me of Mr. Blanding’s dream house.
We have lived here for almost twenty years. It was here that I had the party where a tipsy guest fell down the two stairs leading into the kitchen, where a big tree fell down onto the deck and destroyed it while I watched, horrified, from an upstairs window. We spent a week last year without power, lighting candles and reading in bed with flashlights. I have gotten the best Christmas gifts ever in this house! There have been teen parties here, unauthorized, and resulting groundings. Dogs have peed. Cats have barfed.
This house has witnessed the worst days of our lives, when Charlie had the stroke that nearly killed him and we fought tooth and nail to get back what was taken away. It saw me stagger through the longest days of my existence. In this house we worked to put together the family that the stroke fractured, and by God, we did it somehow.
Now the house is a little emptier, with children grown and gone. The space is ameliorated somewhat with the five cats and the one dog that have taken the children’s place. Now this is a “retirement” home for two individuals, but the rooms are still full. There is now a blogging room filled with little slips of paper scrawled with potential topics of interest. The basement is an accordion studio, complete with amps, speakers, metronomes and music stands. There are seven litter boxes down there. Also in the basement is a wonderful museum erected to the memory of Girl Scouts, Indian Princesses, horse shows, high school and college theatre productions, and the War in Viet Nam. The kitchen holds, along with memories, an entire shelf of cookbooks that are never referenced, five sets of dishes for all those gourmet dinners that I have not yet concocted, and enough dust on the top of the cupboards to grow vegetables...
The rest of the house is the same. The bedrooms that once held horse statues, extension telephones, hot rollers, five million stuffed animals, and incredible amounts of disarray now have Martha Stewart duvet sets and artfully arranged accessories. The living room and den are full of the books that I keep vowing not to buy. There is a high definition TV! We have beautiful furniture now, instead of the tattered stuff that we had while raising kids, but it now is covered with pet hair rather than ketchup stains.
It is an old house. It is a family house. It is a great house. It is probably just exactly like yours.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
WHAT I DID ON MY SUMMER VACATION: LOS ANGELES
We are home, and we are exhausted, poor, and a little sad. Our beautiful daughter is wildly successful, the owner of a fantastic apartment, and in a relationship with a gem of a man. She cooks! She cleans! She hosts great parties! And now, thanks to us, she has a beautiful patio!
A little backstory. Our trip to California involved a wedding in San Francisco. It involved the perfect setting, the best of friends, the most beautiful bride, and the best partying we have done in years. After that, we traveled to Los Angeles to spend what my husband thought was a week of vacation visiting our older daughter.
A talent agent, this girl is a go-getter of mythic proportions. She reps some very recognizable faces, and she makes multi-tasking look like child’s play. Riding in the car with Marion is an exercise in self control, as I had to bite cheeks to keep from shrieking “Navigating this nightmare traffic and texting while carrying on a conversation with your parents is DANGEROUS!” She arranged for us to visit the set of “CSI New York,” which was so AMAZING. Eat your hearts out, America—I was actually in the morgue and GOT TO PULL OUT A SLAB! I met AJ Buckley, who is a cast member (very handsome)!
Charlie, ever optimistic, purchased three Los Angeles tour books before we left. As Marion had to work during the week that we were there, Charlie had visions of doing the Griffith Park Observatory, the Getty, and perhaps even the Tar Pits. I knew better than to burst his bubble before we departed; I didn’t want to plunge him into gloom.
The reality of the LA sojourn consisted of more prosaic pastimes. Marion has a new apartment. It has a large, private patio out back. The patio is empty. Her parents have an American Express card. Her mother is an HGTV maven. Put that all together, and it spells WORK, WORK, AND A LOT OF SWEATING.
Los Angeles has all the stores needed to furnish even the most lavish of lanais. But an unfortunate truth about that city is the fact that it is like one unending strip mall. To do the proper comparison shopping for patio gear and plantings requires putting around two hundred miles on the odometer and spending at least seven hours just LOOKING AT STUFF BEFORE COMMITTING TO BUY. This part of the project took one full day.
The following day, after an exciting visit to the CSI set, where Charlie actively campaigned to become an extra (unsuccessfully, and much to his daughter’s aggravation), we put another couple of hundred miles on the car. But this time, we bought FURNITURE. Tip: Smith and Hawken may be going out of business, but 50% off there still amounts to HUNDREDS of dollars for a chair! Home Depot, on the other hand, sells patio tables and chair SETS for that same amount! (Home Depot is three hundred miles away from Smith and Hawken, incidentally.) Loading the car with table, chairs, other tables, and other chairs was a challenge, but Charlie crammed all that merchandise in!
That night, instead of sitting at a chic bistro eating mussels and drinking wine, we hunkered over instructions translated into English by Chinese folk (“add bolt to table leg elegantly”). By eleven that night, we had the tables and chairs assembled and looking great! The pizza we had delivered was good, too!
The next day was also successful. Plants. Back to Home Depot. We bought palm trees, ficus trees, ferns, and incidentals. If it weren’t for a curmudgeonly but delightful gay man (you know who you are, Stan), we wouldn’t have been able to do it. But Stan told us exactly what to buy, what pots to put each plant in, the soil, the fertilizer, the hose, and everything. The only thing he didn’t do was pay.
In Los Angeles, every home store has legions of hopeful Mexican men congregating outside, looking for work of any kind. Stan arranged for one of them, a gracious man named Raul, to load up and deliver our haul. Despite nearly losing Raul on the highway twice, we all made it back to the apartment, where Raul nearly took the top off his truck in an attempt to enter the parking structure.
Marion then directed the potting process, causing near exhaustion and dehydration in all of us. That girl is a slavedriver! The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. That is a metaphor—an apple tree is about the only item we left behind at the Home Depot. While we potted the plants and Marion prohibited anyone from taking even a five second rest, Charlie carted away the trash we generated and was caught gazing longingly at the AAA guidebook that he left on the kitchen counter in the apartment.
The result was fantastic! The three of us and Marion’s friend Bryan did not require any direct medical attention, the patio is worthy of Architectural Digest, we were able to have Marion’s friends over on Sunday night for a cookout, and our muscles did not get really sore for another two days. Success!
We are now home. Charlie has donated the tour books to the library, and we will be sending in payments to the credit card company for months. But as any of you who are parents out there know, no investment gives better returns than an investment in one’s children.
I mused about this one all the way home on the plane. Life is a series of connections, and the most important ones, between parents and children, can all too often fracture. Our other most important connection to our spouses, invariably ends with one partner living on without the other. I vowed last night to hold on to my lifelines with all my strength. But I also made a promise to myself to become as independent as possible, while continuously looking outward for new experiences and people.
YOU ONLY GO AROUND ONCE. MY AIM IS TO GO AROUND WITHOUT GETTING DIZZY.
Friday, August 28, 2009
A BIRD IN THE HAND
Our life here at the homestead is usually uneventful. But when something happens, it always turns into a saga. The latest unfolded on a seemingly uneventful morning. As usual, Charlie was hard at work communicating with 2000 of his closest friends on the computer. I was engaged in my usual activity for the early morning: drinking coffee in my PJ’s and reading the paper.
Suddenly, we both noticed an odd thing: our five cats were lined up in front of the glass fireplace doors, mesmerized, looking just like five guys at a bar watching Monday Night Football on the big screen. “OH MY GOD, THERE IS SOMETHING IN THERE!” I exclaimed. Charlie then assumed a position behind the cats, and peered in. “I think it is a small animal of some kind, maybe a raccoon.”
I assumed a position behind the cats and Charlie. IT MOVED. In my fright, I goosed Charlie, who stumbled forward. As we jostled about, spilling coffee and stubbing our toes on the decorative stonework around the hearth, we both realized that the animal in question was a little bird. A darling little sparrow.
“He can’t fly back up the chimney! How will he get out?” I wailed. As calm as ever, Charlie pragmatically answered, “When he dies in there, then I can get him out.”
“WHAT? You CAN’T let that poor little thing DIE! We have to get him out!”
Charlie pointed out the obvious. Getting the bird out would most certainly entail his death anyway, with five lethal felines just waiting for the moment to strike as soon as the glass fireplace doors opened. So we spent fifteen minutes chasing cats, capturing them, and locking them in the basement.
Back to the fireplace. ME: “Can we just reach in there and get him?” CHARLIE: “Are you kidding? As soon as we open the doors, he will fly out and we will never catch him.” ME: “Then let’s get the cats back in here. They won’t let him get far!” CHARLIE: “Are you an idiot? I thought you didn’t want the bird to die!”
Next idea. Armed with duct tape and a large garden and leaf bag, we affixed the bag tightly around the entire fireplace opening with the tape. Genius! We then managed to pry the glass doors open without disturbing the bag. And we waited. After ten minutes, it dawned on us that sparrows are not stupid enough to fly into black bags.
Back to square one. CHARLIE: “Get the cats out here. Let’s let them catch it, and then we can snatch it from them.” ME: “Who will be the snatcher?” The answer was obvious. I put on gloves, long sleeves for pecking protection, and let the cats out. We had a moment of silence, and then ripped off the trash bag.
I opened the door. The little bird, scared out of his mind, stared at me, and I at him. Suddenly, he made a break for it, and I grabbed him. The gloves came up empty. Before I could even register surprise, chaos ensued! Charlie, who never let go of his coffee cup during the entire proceedings, gestured wildly with said cup, flinging coffee all over the rug. I dashed wildly about, but the bird landed on the top of the armoire next to the sofa.
But our intrepid Bengal cat Salami (that is ANOTHER story) reverted to the wild at that very moment! Faster than a speeding cheetah, he LEAPT from the floor to the top of the armoire in a single bound. The bird was in Salami’s jaws!
Fast, fast, fast—I shook off the gloves, ran down the front hall after the cat, turned right into the TV room, emerged back into the living room. I was panting, sweating, and swearing. Charlie watched in amazement as I deftly grabbed the cat. Rushing to Charl, holding the cat at arm’s length, I shouted, “GET THE BIRD, GET THE BIRD, BEFORE HE DROPS IT!!”
Charlie, whose reaction time was never fast, even before he had a stroke, remained holding his empty coffee mug. He seemed stunned. So I had to revert to the wild myself! The cavewoman in me came out, and I swung the cat around, pinned him to the handwoven antique Persian rug my mother-in-law gave me, and with ONE GLOVELESS HAND, snatched the hapless bird. Running towards the front door, shrieking, brought Charlie to his senses, and he rushed to open it.
SUCCESS. I flung the bird to freedom. Relieved, I sank into a chair. Charlie looked at me with undisguised admiration. He gazed at me for a few moments, and then asked the question:
“How do you think she got in there in the first place? Do you suppose there is a nest up there?”
Suddenly, we both noticed an odd thing: our five cats were lined up in front of the glass fireplace doors, mesmerized, looking just like five guys at a bar watching Monday Night Football on the big screen. “OH MY GOD, THERE IS SOMETHING IN THERE!” I exclaimed. Charlie then assumed a position behind the cats, and peered in. “I think it is a small animal of some kind, maybe a raccoon.”
I assumed a position behind the cats and Charlie. IT MOVED. In my fright, I goosed Charlie, who stumbled forward. As we jostled about, spilling coffee and stubbing our toes on the decorative stonework around the hearth, we both realized that the animal in question was a little bird. A darling little sparrow.
“He can’t fly back up the chimney! How will he get out?” I wailed. As calm as ever, Charlie pragmatically answered, “When he dies in there, then I can get him out.”
“WHAT? You CAN’T let that poor little thing DIE! We have to get him out!”
Charlie pointed out the obvious. Getting the bird out would most certainly entail his death anyway, with five lethal felines just waiting for the moment to strike as soon as the glass fireplace doors opened. So we spent fifteen minutes chasing cats, capturing them, and locking them in the basement.
Back to the fireplace. ME: “Can we just reach in there and get him?” CHARLIE: “Are you kidding? As soon as we open the doors, he will fly out and we will never catch him.” ME: “Then let’s get the cats back in here. They won’t let him get far!” CHARLIE: “Are you an idiot? I thought you didn’t want the bird to die!”
Next idea. Armed with duct tape and a large garden and leaf bag, we affixed the bag tightly around the entire fireplace opening with the tape. Genius! We then managed to pry the glass doors open without disturbing the bag. And we waited. After ten minutes, it dawned on us that sparrows are not stupid enough to fly into black bags.
Back to square one. CHARLIE: “Get the cats out here. Let’s let them catch it, and then we can snatch it from them.” ME: “Who will be the snatcher?” The answer was obvious. I put on gloves, long sleeves for pecking protection, and let the cats out. We had a moment of silence, and then ripped off the trash bag.
I opened the door. The little bird, scared out of his mind, stared at me, and I at him. Suddenly, he made a break for it, and I grabbed him. The gloves came up empty. Before I could even register surprise, chaos ensued! Charlie, who never let go of his coffee cup during the entire proceedings, gestured wildly with said cup, flinging coffee all over the rug. I dashed wildly about, but the bird landed on the top of the armoire next to the sofa.
But our intrepid Bengal cat Salami (that is ANOTHER story) reverted to the wild at that very moment! Faster than a speeding cheetah, he LEAPT from the floor to the top of the armoire in a single bound. The bird was in Salami’s jaws!
Fast, fast, fast—I shook off the gloves, ran down the front hall after the cat, turned right into the TV room, emerged back into the living room. I was panting, sweating, and swearing. Charlie watched in amazement as I deftly grabbed the cat. Rushing to Charl, holding the cat at arm’s length, I shouted, “GET THE BIRD, GET THE BIRD, BEFORE HE DROPS IT!!”
Charlie, whose reaction time was never fast, even before he had a stroke, remained holding his empty coffee mug. He seemed stunned. So I had to revert to the wild myself! The cavewoman in me came out, and I swung the cat around, pinned him to the handwoven antique Persian rug my mother-in-law gave me, and with ONE GLOVELESS HAND, snatched the hapless bird. Running towards the front door, shrieking, brought Charlie to his senses, and he rushed to open it.
SUCCESS. I flung the bird to freedom. Relieved, I sank into a chair. Charlie looked at me with undisguised admiration. He gazed at me for a few moments, and then asked the question:
“How do you think she got in there in the first place? Do you suppose there is a nest up there?”
I NEVER LEARNED THIS FROM MY MOTHER!
My mother gave me lots of advice. I have remembered much of it and used little of it. Mothers in my Mom’s day were concerned with what might happen to you if you suddenly had to go to the emergency room: WHAT WOULD THOSE DOCTORS THINK IF THEY DISCOVERED A SAFTETY PIN HOLDING YOUR BRA STRAP TOGETHER? As a Mother myself, I today’s world much more complicated, and the issues I nag my daughters about are MUCH more fraught!
Do you have to wear those eight inch heels? Podiatrists all over the world are profiting from this trend. Do men REALLY like women who are well over six feet tall? I you keep this up, by the time you are thirty, you will be a cripple, I guarantee you!
Do you have to send a text message every twenty seconds? Are your friends that needy? Or that lonely? What do you all TELL each other all the time? Why is it better to text than to talk? And you could DIE if you do it while driving!
Who invented pub crawls? Yes, I taught you to set goals. But what is the purpose of deliberately setting out to get drunk, flash your boobs, give lap dances to strangers, and then want to DIE the next morning? Is there a benefit to this that I am missing somehow?
What is the difference between downloading and UPLOADING? Do you need worms to go phishing? Is autosense anything close to COMMON sense? And if a HASH TAG is what I think it is, you better NOT be IT in that game!
Believe me when I tell you that having a career is great, but having a CHILD is greater. That biological clock thing is REAL. And really, the fact that it is possible for fifty year old women to gestate successfully HELPS THEIR MOTHERS NOT AT ALL. I would like to have a grandchild that I would be young enough to pick up, and still sane enough to recognize! By the time you are in your forties, I will be closing in on wearing diapers myself!
Really, the whole concept of multi-tasking has just gone too far. I know your generation is brilliant, competitive, and driven. But texting while driving, using your blackberry and your computer simultaneously, eating your lunch at the dry cleaners, and working on your Master’s thesis while on the treadmill just seems counter productive to me.
Remember to set some time aside for family. Book clubs, teams in training, yes, BLOGS, Ebay, eco tourism, TiVo, and fantasy football are all very important aspects of your life. But walking around the block with your Dad, emailing your sister, sitting around at Thanksgiving for just one more helping of potatoes, and calling home once a week are essential building blocks of life. Remember that thing about smelling roses?
Well, we have some unbelievable rose bushes here in our yard! Want to come over and have a whiff?
Do you have to wear those eight inch heels? Podiatrists all over the world are profiting from this trend. Do men REALLY like women who are well over six feet tall? I you keep this up, by the time you are thirty, you will be a cripple, I guarantee you!
Do you have to send a text message every twenty seconds? Are your friends that needy? Or that lonely? What do you all TELL each other all the time? Why is it better to text than to talk? And you could DIE if you do it while driving!
Who invented pub crawls? Yes, I taught you to set goals. But what is the purpose of deliberately setting out to get drunk, flash your boobs, give lap dances to strangers, and then want to DIE the next morning? Is there a benefit to this that I am missing somehow?
What is the difference between downloading and UPLOADING? Do you need worms to go phishing? Is autosense anything close to COMMON sense? And if a HASH TAG is what I think it is, you better NOT be IT in that game!
Believe me when I tell you that having a career is great, but having a CHILD is greater. That biological clock thing is REAL. And really, the fact that it is possible for fifty year old women to gestate successfully HELPS THEIR MOTHERS NOT AT ALL. I would like to have a grandchild that I would be young enough to pick up, and still sane enough to recognize! By the time you are in your forties, I will be closing in on wearing diapers myself!
Really, the whole concept of multi-tasking has just gone too far. I know your generation is brilliant, competitive, and driven. But texting while driving, using your blackberry and your computer simultaneously, eating your lunch at the dry cleaners, and working on your Master’s thesis while on the treadmill just seems counter productive to me.
Remember to set some time aside for family. Book clubs, teams in training, yes, BLOGS, Ebay, eco tourism, TiVo, and fantasy football are all very important aspects of your life. But walking around the block with your Dad, emailing your sister, sitting around at Thanksgiving for just one more helping of potatoes, and calling home once a week are essential building blocks of life. Remember that thing about smelling roses?
Well, we have some unbelievable rose bushes here in our yard! Want to come over and have a whiff?
PART TWO--MY FAVORITE THINGS
Raindrops on roses are fine. Whiskers on kittens are adorable. But COME ON. Who in their right mind would put these on a list of their favorites? It is time to revise that old saw and get REAL. Today’s world has turned so many times since Julie Andrews climbed that mountain! Here are a few of MY favorite things:
Central air conditioning. How in heaven’s name has mankind done without it? And now, with global warming? I can’t even imagine how pioneer women got through menopause.
Target. In one place, there is everything a person could want. In one day, at one place, I can stock up on underwear, coffee filters, popcorn, dental floss, patio furniture, M and M’s, and Swiffer Wet Jet refills. It is as near to achieving Nirvana as I will ever get.
The microwave oven. Without this, life on earth would grind to a halt. People would be late for work, waiting for water to boil for coffee. Long lines would form at take out windows. Families would miss soccer practices and be late for church. The company that makes Pizza Rolls would go out of business. My God, the ENTIRE ECONOMY would suffer!
CAKE. And if it is chocolate, with butter cream icing, I would commit a CRIME to get some.
Pets. I don’t trust people who don’t like animals. I cannot fathom a life without them. Siamese cats are the very best. They think they rule the world. Second to Siamese are cats of any variety, shape or size, as long as the purr mechanism is in working order. Dogs are best when mixed of breed, about to be eliminated at the shelter, and forever grateful to you for rescuing them. Pets give you love, courage, and renewed faith in living. Plus furballs on the carpet, scuff marks on the hardwood, and a crowded bed at night.
Self tanning lotion. Oh, my gosh, did you know about this stuff? Those days of turning orange after two applications are gone! Now I can wear Capri pants proudly! A word of caution, however—the warning on the label about washing hands after applying is still of utmost importance.
Shout wipes. These must have been invented for the Baby Boomer generation. With our eyesight going and our eye/hand coordination on the decline, eating at a restaurant can be MIGHTY EMBARRASSING! But now, just whip one of these out of your pocket or purse, and in seconds, that salad dressing will vanish from the front of your shirt!
Cell phones. Now I can call my daughters from ANYWHERE, ANYTIME! I can have a conversation in the checkout line at Walgreen’s! I can contact my gynecologist while filling my car up with gas! I can have my own unique ringtone, and since I am so old and hearing impaired, I can set the volume up real high—so that EVERYONE at the grocery store can hear “Amazing Grace” on the bagpipes when I get a call! And with Twitter, I can tell the world what I am doing every minute, all the time!
Finally, HERE IS A NOTE TO MY HUSBAND: The above listing is a small compendium of things that I love, but as far as YOU are concerned, just one thing counts:
DIAMONDS.
Central air conditioning. How in heaven’s name has mankind done without it? And now, with global warming? I can’t even imagine how pioneer women got through menopause.
Target. In one place, there is everything a person could want. In one day, at one place, I can stock up on underwear, coffee filters, popcorn, dental floss, patio furniture, M and M’s, and Swiffer Wet Jet refills. It is as near to achieving Nirvana as I will ever get.
The microwave oven. Without this, life on earth would grind to a halt. People would be late for work, waiting for water to boil for coffee. Long lines would form at take out windows. Families would miss soccer practices and be late for church. The company that makes Pizza Rolls would go out of business. My God, the ENTIRE ECONOMY would suffer!
CAKE. And if it is chocolate, with butter cream icing, I would commit a CRIME to get some.
Pets. I don’t trust people who don’t like animals. I cannot fathom a life without them. Siamese cats are the very best. They think they rule the world. Second to Siamese are cats of any variety, shape or size, as long as the purr mechanism is in working order. Dogs are best when mixed of breed, about to be eliminated at the shelter, and forever grateful to you for rescuing them. Pets give you love, courage, and renewed faith in living. Plus furballs on the carpet, scuff marks on the hardwood, and a crowded bed at night.
Self tanning lotion. Oh, my gosh, did you know about this stuff? Those days of turning orange after two applications are gone! Now I can wear Capri pants proudly! A word of caution, however—the warning on the label about washing hands after applying is still of utmost importance.
Shout wipes. These must have been invented for the Baby Boomer generation. With our eyesight going and our eye/hand coordination on the decline, eating at a restaurant can be MIGHTY EMBARRASSING! But now, just whip one of these out of your pocket or purse, and in seconds, that salad dressing will vanish from the front of your shirt!
Cell phones. Now I can call my daughters from ANYWHERE, ANYTIME! I can have a conversation in the checkout line at Walgreen’s! I can contact my gynecologist while filling my car up with gas! I can have my own unique ringtone, and since I am so old and hearing impaired, I can set the volume up real high—so that EVERYONE at the grocery store can hear “Amazing Grace” on the bagpipes when I get a call! And with Twitter, I can tell the world what I am doing every minute, all the time!
Finally, HERE IS A NOTE TO MY HUSBAND: The above listing is a small compendium of things that I love, but as far as YOU are concerned, just one thing counts:
DIAMONDS.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
THE FIRST OF A TWO PART SERIES
I have passions. I don’t just like things, I LOVE THEM. And why waste calories disliking something, when you can HATE it? Some people say I am a drama queen. I disagree. I simply KNOW MY OWN MIND. Here are some of the many things I simply despise:
Bad grammar. As a career English teacher, I spent twenty years in the trenches, battling improper pronoun reference, subject verb disagreements, dangling participles, mixed metaphors, tense shift, and sentence fragments. It was a losing battle and a lost cause. Of course, the fact that I commit many of the crimes I so valiantly sought to punish is beside the point. Totally.
Bad manners. Don’t stack your dishes at a restaurant. Cover your mouth when you cough. Don’t interrupt, for heaven’s sakes. Put your napkin IN YOUR LAP. If you get a present, send a thank you note! If someone has a black eye, DON’T ask how it happened! And geesh—stop staring!
Cooking every day is a pain. For the life of me, when people say that they RELAX by cooking, I simply don’t get it! How can peeling, chopping, measuring, proofing, stuffing, basting, skinning, straining, boning, and bain marie-ing be RELAXING? Is following a recipe that has fifteen steps remotely enjoyable? How did Julie Powell do it? How did Julia CHILD do it? Why does anyone do it, except for restaurant chefs and Stouffers?
I hate packing for trips. Will it be sunny and hot, or chilly? Should I take a sweater? Will I need something dressy? Should I take two or three pairs of shoes? Will I look like a tourist if I wear sneakers? Are Capri pants considered stylish in New York City? Do they wear leggings in London? How can I leave town for ten days with just ONE suitcase? Why is it my husband can go anywhere, for any duration, with just a carry on?
Chain letters. Guilt, guilt, guilt! It is my fault that there is no cure for cancer, that world peace is still a faint hope, and that my family is not rich beyond our wildest dreams. If only I had taken the time to forward that email on to ten people, or copy that chain letter and buy stamps in order to send it on! I have to live with this every day. No wonder I can’t sleep at night!
Hardware stores are the pits. OMG, there is simply NOTHING for me to buy at a hardware store! How my husband can spend hours in one is a mystery to me! And those big box home stores are worse! Grills, lawnmowers, storm windows, grouting, weather stripping, power tools—the list goes on and on, and on, and ON. We go in for a dowel, and an HOUR later, we are still browsing. The only thing worse than a hardware store is a COMPUTER store….
Small talk. I can’t make small talk for the LIFE of me! How do people navigate parties successfully? I can never think of anything to ASK anyone. Is it because I see a room full of strangers and want to keep it that way? I just can’t seem to muster up any enthusiasm for chatting up unfamiliar folks. I don’t want to know what they do, where they live, how many kids they have, who they voted for, what their stand is on health care, what surgeries they have had lately, if they eat organic food, or if they have ever run a marathon. Sartre had it ALMOST right. “Hell is other people.”
AT A COCKTAIL PARTY!
Bad grammar. As a career English teacher, I spent twenty years in the trenches, battling improper pronoun reference, subject verb disagreements, dangling participles, mixed metaphors, tense shift, and sentence fragments. It was a losing battle and a lost cause. Of course, the fact that I commit many of the crimes I so valiantly sought to punish is beside the point. Totally.
Bad manners. Don’t stack your dishes at a restaurant. Cover your mouth when you cough. Don’t interrupt, for heaven’s sakes. Put your napkin IN YOUR LAP. If you get a present, send a thank you note! If someone has a black eye, DON’T ask how it happened! And geesh—stop staring!
Cooking every day is a pain. For the life of me, when people say that they RELAX by cooking, I simply don’t get it! How can peeling, chopping, measuring, proofing, stuffing, basting, skinning, straining, boning, and bain marie-ing be RELAXING? Is following a recipe that has fifteen steps remotely enjoyable? How did Julie Powell do it? How did Julia CHILD do it? Why does anyone do it, except for restaurant chefs and Stouffers?
I hate packing for trips. Will it be sunny and hot, or chilly? Should I take a sweater? Will I need something dressy? Should I take two or three pairs of shoes? Will I look like a tourist if I wear sneakers? Are Capri pants considered stylish in New York City? Do they wear leggings in London? How can I leave town for ten days with just ONE suitcase? Why is it my husband can go anywhere, for any duration, with just a carry on?
Chain letters. Guilt, guilt, guilt! It is my fault that there is no cure for cancer, that world peace is still a faint hope, and that my family is not rich beyond our wildest dreams. If only I had taken the time to forward that email on to ten people, or copy that chain letter and buy stamps in order to send it on! I have to live with this every day. No wonder I can’t sleep at night!
Hardware stores are the pits. OMG, there is simply NOTHING for me to buy at a hardware store! How my husband can spend hours in one is a mystery to me! And those big box home stores are worse! Grills, lawnmowers, storm windows, grouting, weather stripping, power tools—the list goes on and on, and on, and ON. We go in for a dowel, and an HOUR later, we are still browsing. The only thing worse than a hardware store is a COMPUTER store….
Small talk. I can’t make small talk for the LIFE of me! How do people navigate parties successfully? I can never think of anything to ASK anyone. Is it because I see a room full of strangers and want to keep it that way? I just can’t seem to muster up any enthusiasm for chatting up unfamiliar folks. I don’t want to know what they do, where they live, how many kids they have, who they voted for, what their stand is on health care, what surgeries they have had lately, if they eat organic food, or if they have ever run a marathon. Sartre had it ALMOST right. “Hell is other people.”
AT A COCKTAIL PARTY!
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