Traditions
Lisa’s birthday is tomorrow and I can’t stop thinking about the night she came into our world. I’ve told the story so many times to her and Mariel, to friends, acquaintances, and readers that it has settled into our family history with its rough edges smoothed out and details softened. It’s become our tradition to tell our daughters the story of their births on their birthdays. This year I look forward to regaling Lisa’s boyfriend, Matt and perhaps even pulling out the video we have of our days-old baby girl cooing on her changing table. It’s a mother’s duty to embarrass her children. We do it as naturally as breathing.
I suppose this birthday-telling is as close to the ancient bards that we’ll ever get. It’s a song we’ve memorized. We have no pictures, no videos of the birth, just memories. Steve and I had no family in the area, no doting grandparents, anxious sisters or brothers, or waiting-in-the-wings aunts and uncles. We were alone on that December 26th evening not even knowing that Lisa would make her appearance the next morning, one week early. Since it was my first birth I didn’t understand that I was having contractions until they got stronger as evening approached.
It didn’t feel real. How could we possibly be having a baby when we still felt like babies ourselves? But Lisa didn’t care if we were ready, she was. We raced to Mt. Auburn hospital at 11:00 that cold, cold night and spent the rest of the night waiting for her highness to make her appearance. I’ll never forget my doctor, Mitch Levine, settling in on the window seat of my room prepared to spend the night until Lisa was ready.
She finally came at 8:00 in the morning, eyes so wide that Mitch asked, “What are you looking at Bright Eyes?” Our little Bright Eyes had finally arrived to wreak havoc in our world. But though the first months weren’t easy and there were too many times when I felt overwhelmed, scared, and confused, our lives adapted to her rhythms and before we could even blink a year had gone by. That’s when I began the tradition of decorating her, and later Mariel’s, room the night before their big days so that they would wake up to a birthday world.
Lisa and Matt will be coming over tonight to celebrate and since I could no longer decorate her room, I had decided to decorate the house. I took down yet another attic box and started digging. There were things that I remembered, balloons and banners, but when I unearthed the candles and games I sat back on my heels. You see another tradition we had was buying number candles for the birthday cakes. I had developed some sort of superstition about reusing the candles so between the two girls I had 47 years of candles stored away. I decided that next year we would begin recycling the numbers in the interest of saving money and the earth.
But it was the games that stopped me. Over the years we had held some ingenious parties for our girls. We were really boring in the early years, taking them and their friends to various gyms or restaurants, but as they grew so did our sense of adventure. One year we took Mariel’s friends to the Blue Hills for a nature hike and animal adventure. The educational director asked Mariel to choose a bird or animal in their zoo to be part of the presentation. Mariel chose a raccoon. Unfortunately the raccoon died before the party and we had to make up a story to tell her so that she could choose something else. Quilla the porcupine made a great understudy.
The best parties were the ones at our house. One that I had discovered in the box was our Game-Girl blowout. I sat there looking at a long list of planned games, a complete Jeopardy board, and a flow chart (could you tell that Steve was a computer programmer?) outlining the steps to a game that we had invented.
But our piece de résistance was the, “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego” mystery adventure. We had recreated the popular PBS children’s geography show in our house. Steve played the host and I was the chief, decked out in a trench coat and a fedora. We gave the kids magnifying glasses, notepads, clues and almanacs to use as references. With the Rockapella CD blaring in the background, we set our detectives on a world journey to catch Interpol’s notorious thieves. It was a blast.
I sat there on the kitchen floor holding the clues in my hand aching for a time machine. But then I decided that instead of wallowing in tradition-nostalgia I would begin some new ones.
The funny thing is we had already begun without knowing it. The other day Lisa told me that she had introduced Matt to our sacred Sunday night Chinese dinner followed by the NPR show, “Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me.” I laughed to myself. It was truly a tradition to cherish.
This year we’re starting a new one for Lisa’s birthday—a sushi dinner at home in front of the fireplace. And for the first time, instead of racing out to order a cake, I’m baking one myself. But we’ll keep the pink roses and the Champagne. Certain traditions are worth holding onto.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
All I Want For Chanukah
All I Want For Chanukah
This year Chanukah has been the same, yet different. Usually the only thing that changes is the date. Since the Jewish calendar is a lunar one, the dates of all the Jewish holidays change from year to year. Somewhat like Goldilocks’ dilemma, sometimes they’re too early, sometimes too late, and sometimes just right. So there are years when Chanukah comes out at the end of December, or nicely in the middle of the month, and sometimes it appears at the end of November. One year when Lisa was in pre-school we celebrated Chanukah right after Thanksgiving. The kids had just finished learning about turkeys and Plymouth Rock when they began studying Judah Maccabee. Lisa came home and informed me that the pilgrims lit Chanukah menorahs. Sometimes it’s just way too early.
This year since the first night of Chanukah was on Friday night, Mariel excitedly told us that she would be able to come home. Her one problem was that her store manager had informed everyone that no one was allowed to take any vacation time until after Christmas. So she successfully called the employee-complaint hot line that her store had set up, to protest not being able to celebrate her holiday. She takes her Chanukah seriously!
Lisa called to tell me that she would be coming home Saturday night and asked if she could bring her boyfriend, Matt. That meant that we would have a nice full house. Knowing that my girls would be home for the week-end gave my spirits a much needed lift.
Like most people these days we’re watching our budget. This year though we wouldn’t be buying any flat-screen TV’s or vacation packages, I wanted to give the girls small gifts. That was how Chanukah was always traditionally celebrated--- with family, food and chocolate coins for playing the dreidel game. We have our own tradition when it comes to chocolate. Though I do buy milk chocolate chocolate coins to fill our plastic dreidels I also stock up on Godivas. That’s one thing I didn’t change.
I also fulfilled another family tradition. I bought too many boxes of Chanukah candles. Every year because we light several menorahs each night, I’m always sure that I’m going to run out so I buy extra candles. Then I come home to find that I already had fifty boxes in our Chanukah box in the attic. Every year I swear that I will not buy more candles and then every year I do. Some things never change.
This was the year that I finally emptied out the Chanukah box. I have too many heavy-duty plastic storage containers in the attic, two of which are dedicated to the trappings of Chanukah and Passover. They’re mostly filled with all of the holiday decorations that Lisa and Mariel had created in kindergarten and religious school. Our Chanukah container was crammed with colored posters, pasted collages, Judah Maccabees made out of various household items, and deidels. When the kids were little I would decorate the house like a crazy person. I hung banners and dreidels, flags and pictures. I also had plastic menorahs and latkes to stick on the windows ….. talk about tacky. I also created a display in the entry way that included stuffed Chanukah bears (don’t ask!) and menorahs. I hadn’t decorated for years but I couldn’t throw out anything those little hands had created. But this year was different.
Mariel and I went through the box laughing hysterically at all the glittery junk. We saved whatever she wanted and held onto a few things for Lisa to look through. I saved one menorah that Lisa had created when she was about three years old. She had made it out of a wooden paint stirrer, metal bolts, and tons of glitter. We also saved some of the books. It felt great to finally see the bottom of that box. In April we’ll attack the Passover container.
Every year, even though I always look through every potato pancake recipe that appears in the paper, I never really vary how we make our latkes. There really isn’t that much you can change in a recipe whose basic ingredients are potatoes, eggs, salt and flour (and an onion for anyone with the slightest bit of taste, Shatz!) but this year I found an interesting twist. Evidently one grandmother soaked the grated potatoes in ice-water to ensure that the latkes came out really crispy. You see the crispy latke is the holy grail of potato pancake-dom so you always soak every bit of moisture out of the potato mixture before you fry it.
Intrigued I decided to try the cold water bath, though Mariel cast a dubious eye on the ice floating on top of our precious potatoes. Well they were dry all right, so dry that they almost wouldn’t stick together no matter how many eggs I added. Perhaps next year we’ll use a little less ice.
The kids’ present requests were different this year as well. The girls outdid themselves in practicality requesting socks, long underwear, a new computer to replace one that was dying and help with tuition. Where oh where did I go so…....right? That was my gift this year because all I really wanted was for our family to be grateful for what they already had--each other. May that always remain the same.
This year Chanukah has been the same, yet different. Usually the only thing that changes is the date. Since the Jewish calendar is a lunar one, the dates of all the Jewish holidays change from year to year. Somewhat like Goldilocks’ dilemma, sometimes they’re too early, sometimes too late, and sometimes just right. So there are years when Chanukah comes out at the end of December, or nicely in the middle of the month, and sometimes it appears at the end of November. One year when Lisa was in pre-school we celebrated Chanukah right after Thanksgiving. The kids had just finished learning about turkeys and Plymouth Rock when they began studying Judah Maccabee. Lisa came home and informed me that the pilgrims lit Chanukah menorahs. Sometimes it’s just way too early.
This year since the first night of Chanukah was on Friday night, Mariel excitedly told us that she would be able to come home. Her one problem was that her store manager had informed everyone that no one was allowed to take any vacation time until after Christmas. So she successfully called the employee-complaint hot line that her store had set up, to protest not being able to celebrate her holiday. She takes her Chanukah seriously!
Lisa called to tell me that she would be coming home Saturday night and asked if she could bring her boyfriend, Matt. That meant that we would have a nice full house. Knowing that my girls would be home for the week-end gave my spirits a much needed lift.
Like most people these days we’re watching our budget. This year though we wouldn’t be buying any flat-screen TV’s or vacation packages, I wanted to give the girls small gifts. That was how Chanukah was always traditionally celebrated--- with family, food and chocolate coins for playing the dreidel game. We have our own tradition when it comes to chocolate. Though I do buy milk chocolate chocolate coins to fill our plastic dreidels I also stock up on Godivas. That’s one thing I didn’t change.
I also fulfilled another family tradition. I bought too many boxes of Chanukah candles. Every year because we light several menorahs each night, I’m always sure that I’m going to run out so I buy extra candles. Then I come home to find that I already had fifty boxes in our Chanukah box in the attic. Every year I swear that I will not buy more candles and then every year I do. Some things never change.
This was the year that I finally emptied out the Chanukah box. I have too many heavy-duty plastic storage containers in the attic, two of which are dedicated to the trappings of Chanukah and Passover. They’re mostly filled with all of the holiday decorations that Lisa and Mariel had created in kindergarten and religious school. Our Chanukah container was crammed with colored posters, pasted collages, Judah Maccabees made out of various household items, and deidels. When the kids were little I would decorate the house like a crazy person. I hung banners and dreidels, flags and pictures. I also had plastic menorahs and latkes to stick on the windows ….. talk about tacky. I also created a display in the entry way that included stuffed Chanukah bears (don’t ask!) and menorahs. I hadn’t decorated for years but I couldn’t throw out anything those little hands had created. But this year was different.
Mariel and I went through the box laughing hysterically at all the glittery junk. We saved whatever she wanted and held onto a few things for Lisa to look through. I saved one menorah that Lisa had created when she was about three years old. She had made it out of a wooden paint stirrer, metal bolts, and tons of glitter. We also saved some of the books. It felt great to finally see the bottom of that box. In April we’ll attack the Passover container.
Every year, even though I always look through every potato pancake recipe that appears in the paper, I never really vary how we make our latkes. There really isn’t that much you can change in a recipe whose basic ingredients are potatoes, eggs, salt and flour (and an onion for anyone with the slightest bit of taste, Shatz!) but this year I found an interesting twist. Evidently one grandmother soaked the grated potatoes in ice-water to ensure that the latkes came out really crispy. You see the crispy latke is the holy grail of potato pancake-dom so you always soak every bit of moisture out of the potato mixture before you fry it.
Intrigued I decided to try the cold water bath, though Mariel cast a dubious eye on the ice floating on top of our precious potatoes. Well they were dry all right, so dry that they almost wouldn’t stick together no matter how many eggs I added. Perhaps next year we’ll use a little less ice.
The kids’ present requests were different this year as well. The girls outdid themselves in practicality requesting socks, long underwear, a new computer to replace one that was dying and help with tuition. Where oh where did I go so…....right? That was my gift this year because all I really wanted was for our family to be grateful for what they already had--each other. May that always remain the same.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
The Greatest Gift
The Greatest Gift
Lately I’ve begun feeling overwhelmed. There’s nothing I can really do about my situation right now so I walk around feeling helpless. I can’t even escape when I sleep. I either dream about driving a car whose steering and brakes are broken causing me to careen wildly, or I wander through streets that look familiar but are strange combinations of different cities that I’ve lived in. I walk and walk, always at night, and always finding that I have lost my way, my wallet and my phone. I don’t need a psychiatrist to tell me that I’m feeling out of control.
In the midst of all this I met a friend that I hadn’t seen in a while and began complaining about a cold that I thought I was catching. She answered that she couldn’t afford to get sick since her 22 year old daughter was going through chemotherapy rendering her immune system nonexistent. She went on to tell me that a few months ago her beautiful daughter had been diagnosed with breast cancer. My ridiculous complaints sat in my throat like ashes as she told me what she and her family had been going through since this horrible disease had moved into their lives. All I could do was listen and hold her hand and try not to cry.
I can’t stop thinking about her. I keep hoping that I will develop a sense of perspective that will shake me out of my fog. But someone else’s misfortune never makes yours lighter. In fact it makes you feel even worse since now, not only are you not feeling better, but you feel that you have no right to your silly problems. Adding guilt to a situation never improves it.
Work is partly responsible for my bad attitude. I spent last year in a honeymoon daze of euphoria. I even wrote a column about the community center family and how I was aching to become a trusted part of it. Last year I managed to get the school working, hiring good teachers and building trust among the students. It was a heady experience.
This year the first chips appeared. I had succeeded in becoming a part of the center family only to discover that it was in danger of imploding. Last year I had seen the brightly painted outside, this year I could trace the cracks. Everyone seems to be angry with everyone else. Trust and camaraderie are gone. And then because I’m a neutral party (or as my boss Mike calls me, Switzerland) everyone has been coming to me to complain. So once again I listen and nod my head saying little but getting sadder with each word.
I thought at least the school was doing well but then my class began changing. Whereas last year I had the same students all year, this year my class seems to turnover every week. Trying to teach a musical-chairs-class is not easy. You’re never sure who was there when you taught what and you’re always repeating yourself or leaving someone in the dark. Plus the class demographic has also changed. I’ve gone from teaching mostly middle aged women to young, restless men in their teens and twenties. These guys pick things up more quickly and get bored more easily. By the end of three hours I’m ready to crawl into bed.
And the cherry on top? My best teacher is leaving for a better job. Greg has taught GED for over 20 years. He is a master. I’ve posted the job for two weeks now but it isn’t easy finding one person who can teach top level literacy and math. Crying is beginning to look good to me right now.
My favorite day of the week has become Friday and not just because it’s my day off. A couple of months ago Steve told me that he was going to start cooking dinner one day a week. I was thrilled. We decided that Friday would be best since I spend my entire day running errands, and not having to cook dinner that day would be wonderful. So now he researches recipes on-line and I look forward to a new dish every week. It is heaven. Not having to do everything myself, to have someone offer help without my having to ask for it—is the greatest gift that anyone can receive.
And then I remember all the times that Mariel has walked the dog and vacuumed and baked, and when Lisa has cleaned and cooked and Steve has filled my car with gas, or fixed something that was broken, or picked up my library books and cleaning, and I realize that these are the gifts that I cherish and never forget—the unasked for blessings. These are what lift my heart. And then yesterday Mariel gave me a magnet that said: “I am fairly certain that given a cape and a nice tiara I could save the world.” She said that the minute she saw it she knew it was me. And suddenly a bit of the fog lifted.
I can’t save the world on my own. I need friends and family who happily give me their time and their love. I need whimsy and humor to keep me grounded and perhaps a cape to help me fly. And tomorrow I’m going to buy myself a tiara.
Lately I’ve begun feeling overwhelmed. There’s nothing I can really do about my situation right now so I walk around feeling helpless. I can’t even escape when I sleep. I either dream about driving a car whose steering and brakes are broken causing me to careen wildly, or I wander through streets that look familiar but are strange combinations of different cities that I’ve lived in. I walk and walk, always at night, and always finding that I have lost my way, my wallet and my phone. I don’t need a psychiatrist to tell me that I’m feeling out of control.
In the midst of all this I met a friend that I hadn’t seen in a while and began complaining about a cold that I thought I was catching. She answered that she couldn’t afford to get sick since her 22 year old daughter was going through chemotherapy rendering her immune system nonexistent. She went on to tell me that a few months ago her beautiful daughter had been diagnosed with breast cancer. My ridiculous complaints sat in my throat like ashes as she told me what she and her family had been going through since this horrible disease had moved into their lives. All I could do was listen and hold her hand and try not to cry.
I can’t stop thinking about her. I keep hoping that I will develop a sense of perspective that will shake me out of my fog. But someone else’s misfortune never makes yours lighter. In fact it makes you feel even worse since now, not only are you not feeling better, but you feel that you have no right to your silly problems. Adding guilt to a situation never improves it.
Work is partly responsible for my bad attitude. I spent last year in a honeymoon daze of euphoria. I even wrote a column about the community center family and how I was aching to become a trusted part of it. Last year I managed to get the school working, hiring good teachers and building trust among the students. It was a heady experience.
This year the first chips appeared. I had succeeded in becoming a part of the center family only to discover that it was in danger of imploding. Last year I had seen the brightly painted outside, this year I could trace the cracks. Everyone seems to be angry with everyone else. Trust and camaraderie are gone. And then because I’m a neutral party (or as my boss Mike calls me, Switzerland) everyone has been coming to me to complain. So once again I listen and nod my head saying little but getting sadder with each word.
I thought at least the school was doing well but then my class began changing. Whereas last year I had the same students all year, this year my class seems to turnover every week. Trying to teach a musical-chairs-class is not easy. You’re never sure who was there when you taught what and you’re always repeating yourself or leaving someone in the dark. Plus the class demographic has also changed. I’ve gone from teaching mostly middle aged women to young, restless men in their teens and twenties. These guys pick things up more quickly and get bored more easily. By the end of three hours I’m ready to crawl into bed.
And the cherry on top? My best teacher is leaving for a better job. Greg has taught GED for over 20 years. He is a master. I’ve posted the job for two weeks now but it isn’t easy finding one person who can teach top level literacy and math. Crying is beginning to look good to me right now.
My favorite day of the week has become Friday and not just because it’s my day off. A couple of months ago Steve told me that he was going to start cooking dinner one day a week. I was thrilled. We decided that Friday would be best since I spend my entire day running errands, and not having to cook dinner that day would be wonderful. So now he researches recipes on-line and I look forward to a new dish every week. It is heaven. Not having to do everything myself, to have someone offer help without my having to ask for it—is the greatest gift that anyone can receive.
And then I remember all the times that Mariel has walked the dog and vacuumed and baked, and when Lisa has cleaned and cooked and Steve has filled my car with gas, or fixed something that was broken, or picked up my library books and cleaning, and I realize that these are the gifts that I cherish and never forget—the unasked for blessings. These are what lift my heart. And then yesterday Mariel gave me a magnet that said: “I am fairly certain that given a cape and a nice tiara I could save the world.” She said that the minute she saw it she knew it was me. And suddenly a bit of the fog lifted.
I can’t save the world on my own. I need friends and family who happily give me their time and their love. I need whimsy and humor to keep me grounded and perhaps a cape to help me fly. And tomorrow I’m going to buy myself a tiara.
Saturday, December 5, 2009
A Cold By Any Other Name
A Cold By Any Other Name
It’s been one of those weeks where you start out tired and then go downhill from there. Friends look at you and ask if you’ve got the flu and even when you tell them that you’re just really tired, they still back away. That kind of week.
We never really had a chance to rest during Thanksgiving and then Steve caught a bad cold. I always know that he’s sick when he starts giving me air kisses. When he pecks me somewhere in the vicinity of a cheek I know that he’s trying not to give me what he’s caught. So even though we live in the same house, breathing the same air and sleeping in the same bed he’s sure that it’s the kiss that will surely get me. I hate air kissing my husband.
We’ve been washing our hands more than Lady Macbeth and have been wearing garlic around our necks and yet some nasty bug still managed to find Steve. And then on Sunday night I could feel my throat begin to feel funny. So I came home on Monday night, made dinner and got into bed obscenely early so that I could get enough rest to face the rest of the week.
There was one problem though. Though Steve usually snores, a combination of sleeping on his left side, taping those cute little butterfly-looking-thingies to his nose and an occasional shove from me usually solves the problem. But this time Steve’s sinuses were so clogged that his normal snoring escalated to a decibel level that requires people in the area to wear protective headgear. Those butterflies were absolutely useless and no amount of jabbing was going to get me any peace and quiet.
Add to that the fact that in between the snoring he was also coughing and you can understand why I was ready to cry. I jolted awake at the first nasal explosion and wracking cough, (snoring+coughing=snoughing?) saw that he was already on his left side and knew that this time even jabbing wouldn’t help. When I related this later to my friend, Kate she looked at me quizzically and asked, “And you didn’t just put a pillow over his face?”
No I didn’t have the heart although I knew that no female jury in the world would have convicted me.
I knew that I would have to do something desperate if I wanted to get any sleep. Suddenly I remembered that there were empty beds in my kids’ rooms that I could use so I took my pillow, blanket and alarm clock and headed off to sleep exile. I closed my door but I could still hear the rumbling, so I got up and closed his door as well. When I put the pillow over my head the snoring finally receded to a sleepable level. Of course by then I was so cranky that even Lisa’s ticking clock drove me nuts but I was not about to get out of bed again.
Eventually after tossing and turning like a pancake I managed to fall asleep. Then at 2:00 in the morning I was awakened by a coyote stampede in the house. Heart beating wildly I bolted out of bed when I suddenly realized that it was Snoopy alternately throwing himself against the bedroom door and clawing at it. He must have woken up and sensed that I was in Lisa’s bed. You see he’s not allowed in our bed but the kids invite him into theirs. So whenever there’s a warm body in either of their beds he feels entitled to a share of the mattress. I opened the door and he rushed into the room as if he was being chased by hyenas. He leapt into my bed and began his round and round settling in ritual.
“Hey!” I yelled at him. “Settle down and stay at the end of the bed or I’ll throw you out”. I so terrified the poor thing that he immediately dropped and was quiet for the rest of the night. I think I managed to fall asleep a half hour before the 5:00 alarm rang. It was going to be a long day.
When Shatz heard what my night had been like he decided that he would sleep downstairs until he felt better. I wanted to protest but I’m ashamed to say that I wanted a good night’s sleep even more. So that night Steve slept on the downstairs couch and I slept the sleep of the dead. It was wonderful. What is not so wonderful is that it’s been four nights now that I’ve been sleeping alone. Even Snoopy has left me, preferring to stay downstairs next to the couch where my poor husband manages to trip over him every night on the way to the bath room.
Every night I turn in early and wake up after a few hours to see that Steve’s side is still empty. Even though I know that he’s downstairs I’m still lonely. Every morning I ask him how he’s feeling in the hopes that he’ll return to our bed that night but he’s still snoughing. I hope he feels better soon because one night, snoughing or not, he’s going to wake up and find me on the other side of his couch. There’s just so much lonely sleep that a girl can stand.
It’s been one of those weeks where you start out tired and then go downhill from there. Friends look at you and ask if you’ve got the flu and even when you tell them that you’re just really tired, they still back away. That kind of week.
We never really had a chance to rest during Thanksgiving and then Steve caught a bad cold. I always know that he’s sick when he starts giving me air kisses. When he pecks me somewhere in the vicinity of a cheek I know that he’s trying not to give me what he’s caught. So even though we live in the same house, breathing the same air and sleeping in the same bed he’s sure that it’s the kiss that will surely get me. I hate air kissing my husband.
We’ve been washing our hands more than Lady Macbeth and have been wearing garlic around our necks and yet some nasty bug still managed to find Steve. And then on Sunday night I could feel my throat begin to feel funny. So I came home on Monday night, made dinner and got into bed obscenely early so that I could get enough rest to face the rest of the week.
There was one problem though. Though Steve usually snores, a combination of sleeping on his left side, taping those cute little butterfly-looking-thingies to his nose and an occasional shove from me usually solves the problem. But this time Steve’s sinuses were so clogged that his normal snoring escalated to a decibel level that requires people in the area to wear protective headgear. Those butterflies were absolutely useless and no amount of jabbing was going to get me any peace and quiet.
Add to that the fact that in between the snoring he was also coughing and you can understand why I was ready to cry. I jolted awake at the first nasal explosion and wracking cough, (snoring+coughing=snoughing?) saw that he was already on his left side and knew that this time even jabbing wouldn’t help. When I related this later to my friend, Kate she looked at me quizzically and asked, “And you didn’t just put a pillow over his face?”
No I didn’t have the heart although I knew that no female jury in the world would have convicted me.
I knew that I would have to do something desperate if I wanted to get any sleep. Suddenly I remembered that there were empty beds in my kids’ rooms that I could use so I took my pillow, blanket and alarm clock and headed off to sleep exile. I closed my door but I could still hear the rumbling, so I got up and closed his door as well. When I put the pillow over my head the snoring finally receded to a sleepable level. Of course by then I was so cranky that even Lisa’s ticking clock drove me nuts but I was not about to get out of bed again.
Eventually after tossing and turning like a pancake I managed to fall asleep. Then at 2:00 in the morning I was awakened by a coyote stampede in the house. Heart beating wildly I bolted out of bed when I suddenly realized that it was Snoopy alternately throwing himself against the bedroom door and clawing at it. He must have woken up and sensed that I was in Lisa’s bed. You see he’s not allowed in our bed but the kids invite him into theirs. So whenever there’s a warm body in either of their beds he feels entitled to a share of the mattress. I opened the door and he rushed into the room as if he was being chased by hyenas. He leapt into my bed and began his round and round settling in ritual.
“Hey!” I yelled at him. “Settle down and stay at the end of the bed or I’ll throw you out”. I so terrified the poor thing that he immediately dropped and was quiet for the rest of the night. I think I managed to fall asleep a half hour before the 5:00 alarm rang. It was going to be a long day.
When Shatz heard what my night had been like he decided that he would sleep downstairs until he felt better. I wanted to protest but I’m ashamed to say that I wanted a good night’s sleep even more. So that night Steve slept on the downstairs couch and I slept the sleep of the dead. It was wonderful. What is not so wonderful is that it’s been four nights now that I’ve been sleeping alone. Even Snoopy has left me, preferring to stay downstairs next to the couch where my poor husband manages to trip over him every night on the way to the bath room.
Every night I turn in early and wake up after a few hours to see that Steve’s side is still empty. Even though I know that he’s downstairs I’m still lonely. Every morning I ask him how he’s feeling in the hopes that he’ll return to our bed that night but he’s still snoughing. I hope he feels better soon because one night, snoughing or not, he’s going to wake up and find me on the other side of his couch. There’s just so much lonely sleep that a girl can stand.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Morning After Thanks
Morning-After Thanks
Lately for me the day after Thanksgiving has been the time when I count my blessings. Some people spend that Friday plunging into their holiday shopping while others dig out their leftover turkey recipes, but I spend the day thankful that I’ve gotten through my yearly tradition of Thanksgiving dinner nutties. And I thank my family for putting up with their crazy wife and mother.
We don’t have a huge celebration that involves scores of far flung family members flying in from Outer Mongolia. It’s just the four of us, five if you count the dog. It may be a small celebration but it’s our own--fraying tempers, experimental recipes, unmet dinner deadlines and all. Ever since the girls have become old enough to cook and bake it’s become a yearly tradition for mom to grouchily declare that next year we will definitely be eating in a restaurant!
When the girls were little I did all the cooking. The day was hectic but manageable. I would choose a dinner time then work my way backwards preparation-wise and, voila! Turkey was on the table at 3:00. But mix together two cooks, one baker and a mom who is not good at sharing a kitchen and the pot and mom boils over.
The irony of this is that we have a huge kitchen. But we only have one stove, one oven, a small amount of counter space and one cook who likes to experiment, so it can get nuts. Two years ago Lisa entered Schottenfeld folk lore when she took three hours to prepare a soup recipe. I think we ate at 8:00. Needless to say I became a tad distraught. I declared that from then on we would enjoy our Thanksgiving dinner at a neighborhood restaurant.
But then last year Lisa was in India during the holiday and the three of us rattled around that big kitchen rather forlornly. I swore that from now on no matter happened I would not lose it on Thanksgiving. So this year I told everyone that maybe we should simplify matters and consider take-out food. I even semi-jokingly suggested a Chinese restaurant.
To my surprise Lisa and Steve were very amenable to my suggestion and at first Mariel seemed to be as well. I began to look forward to a Thanksgiving spent lounging on the couch with a glass of champagne while digesting my hot and sour soup. And then I got an e-mail from Mariel asking rather plaintively if it would be possible to do take-out and mashed potatoes. And perhaps stuffing. And cranberries. And maybe some corn bread and apple pie. And of course asparagus. And then Lisa mentioned that she had this incredible baked root- vegetable recipe that was out of this world—and then I put my head down on my computer keyboard and sighed. The moo-shi pancakes were out--an old fashioned Thanksgiving it would be once again.
“Fine”, I told everyone. “But we would not over do it—there would be no three-hour, twenty-vegetable soup, no fruit chutney, and no muffins.”
“What about chocolate chip cookies and biscotti?” Mariel countered.
.
As I rested my head on my computer board I concentrated on the bottle of champagne that I would imbibe. I was just grateful that the girls were vegetarians so there would be no worrying if the turkey would be ready on time. What I was not grateful for was Steve’s attitude toward Lisa’s vegetables.
“What in the heck are root-vegetables?” he kept asking. “I don’t think that I’ve ever eaten a root-vegetable and I’m not sure I want to start now.”
“You’ve eaten carrots and beets,” I countered, “And somehow you’re still alive!”
The week began on a high note since Mariel came home on Monday evening. She was working the Friday after Thanksgiving so she made up for it by coming home early. I had to work till Wednesday but coming home at night to find a smiling daughter and dinner on the table was lovely. Then Lisa came home early and my home and heart were full.
We decided on an early 2:00 pm Thanksgiving dinner so that we could spend the afternoon playing our favorite game, Trivial Pursuit. Everyone was assigned their specialty: Mariel--baking, Lisa --veggies, me--stuffing, potatoes and salad, Snoopy--begging and Steve the washing up. We were doing great until we hit a snag when the cookies ran into assigned root-vegetable time and I almost forgot the potatoes. But a little slippage was to be expected, so dinner would now be at 2:30.
And then we were in the home stretch with only asparagus and cornbread to go and I blew it. I had forgotten to set the timer and before I knew it the asparagus was limp and the corn bread was burnt and I lost it and went into my restaurant rant. But Mariel, who was having a much more mature moment than her mother, literally told me to cut it out. So I poured myself some champagne and lit the candles on the table while Lisa scraped off the burnt corn bread topping.
And despite the absence of egg drop soup and the fact that the only turkeys that we saw were the ones that wandered into our yard that day, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving, root-vegetables and all. And I hope you did too.
Lately for me the day after Thanksgiving has been the time when I count my blessings. Some people spend that Friday plunging into their holiday shopping while others dig out their leftover turkey recipes, but I spend the day thankful that I’ve gotten through my yearly tradition of Thanksgiving dinner nutties. And I thank my family for putting up with their crazy wife and mother.
We don’t have a huge celebration that involves scores of far flung family members flying in from Outer Mongolia. It’s just the four of us, five if you count the dog. It may be a small celebration but it’s our own--fraying tempers, experimental recipes, unmet dinner deadlines and all. Ever since the girls have become old enough to cook and bake it’s become a yearly tradition for mom to grouchily declare that next year we will definitely be eating in a restaurant!
When the girls were little I did all the cooking. The day was hectic but manageable. I would choose a dinner time then work my way backwards preparation-wise and, voila! Turkey was on the table at 3:00. But mix together two cooks, one baker and a mom who is not good at sharing a kitchen and the pot and mom boils over.
The irony of this is that we have a huge kitchen. But we only have one stove, one oven, a small amount of counter space and one cook who likes to experiment, so it can get nuts. Two years ago Lisa entered Schottenfeld folk lore when she took three hours to prepare a soup recipe. I think we ate at 8:00. Needless to say I became a tad distraught. I declared that from then on we would enjoy our Thanksgiving dinner at a neighborhood restaurant.
But then last year Lisa was in India during the holiday and the three of us rattled around that big kitchen rather forlornly. I swore that from now on no matter happened I would not lose it on Thanksgiving. So this year I told everyone that maybe we should simplify matters and consider take-out food. I even semi-jokingly suggested a Chinese restaurant.
To my surprise Lisa and Steve were very amenable to my suggestion and at first Mariel seemed to be as well. I began to look forward to a Thanksgiving spent lounging on the couch with a glass of champagne while digesting my hot and sour soup. And then I got an e-mail from Mariel asking rather plaintively if it would be possible to do take-out and mashed potatoes. And perhaps stuffing. And cranberries. And maybe some corn bread and apple pie. And of course asparagus. And then Lisa mentioned that she had this incredible baked root- vegetable recipe that was out of this world—and then I put my head down on my computer keyboard and sighed. The moo-shi pancakes were out--an old fashioned Thanksgiving it would be once again.
“Fine”, I told everyone. “But we would not over do it—there would be no three-hour, twenty-vegetable soup, no fruit chutney, and no muffins.”
“What about chocolate chip cookies and biscotti?” Mariel countered.
.
As I rested my head on my computer board I concentrated on the bottle of champagne that I would imbibe. I was just grateful that the girls were vegetarians so there would be no worrying if the turkey would be ready on time. What I was not grateful for was Steve’s attitude toward Lisa’s vegetables.
“What in the heck are root-vegetables?” he kept asking. “I don’t think that I’ve ever eaten a root-vegetable and I’m not sure I want to start now.”
“You’ve eaten carrots and beets,” I countered, “And somehow you’re still alive!”
The week began on a high note since Mariel came home on Monday evening. She was working the Friday after Thanksgiving so she made up for it by coming home early. I had to work till Wednesday but coming home at night to find a smiling daughter and dinner on the table was lovely. Then Lisa came home early and my home and heart were full.
We decided on an early 2:00 pm Thanksgiving dinner so that we could spend the afternoon playing our favorite game, Trivial Pursuit. Everyone was assigned their specialty: Mariel--baking, Lisa --veggies, me--stuffing, potatoes and salad, Snoopy--begging and Steve the washing up. We were doing great until we hit a snag when the cookies ran into assigned root-vegetable time and I almost forgot the potatoes. But a little slippage was to be expected, so dinner would now be at 2:30.
And then we were in the home stretch with only asparagus and cornbread to go and I blew it. I had forgotten to set the timer and before I knew it the asparagus was limp and the corn bread was burnt and I lost it and went into my restaurant rant. But Mariel, who was having a much more mature moment than her mother, literally told me to cut it out. So I poured myself some champagne and lit the candles on the table while Lisa scraped off the burnt corn bread topping.
And despite the absence of egg drop soup and the fact that the only turkeys that we saw were the ones that wandered into our yard that day, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving, root-vegetables and all. And I hope you did too.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Undercover
Undercover
There was a time not so long ago when a woman could go out and buy plain underwear. Young women walked freely, smiling contentedly because they could slip into little nothings that fit under their clothes and not worry about “containment”. There was a time when women didn’t worry about, let alone use words like, enhancing-shaper or over-bra-bulge eraser.
Oh who am I kidding? Women have always worried about what is charmingly known as, unsightly bulges. From the moment they hit puberty they worry that some part of their body is hanging out where it should be hanging in. It usually begins in middle school gym class when everyone is changing in that communal hell known as a locker room. You’d be trying desperately to change into horrendous gym bloomers as quickly as possible without revealing anything while surreptitiously checking out if you were the first or last girl in the known middle school universe to be wearing a bra. Too early was awful, too late even worse, and somehow you always felt that you were one or the other.
I remember pleading with my mom to buy me a bra when I was in seventh grade. I had absolutely nothing to actually put into said bra but hopes and dreams, but no matter, I absolutely had to have one. Luckily my mom had a friend who owned a lingerie shop so off we went to get me fitted with a training bra. What exactly I was training I had no idea but I didn’t ask any questions.
I stood there uncomfortably while mom and her friend, Gertie discussed my endowments or rather the general lack of. Gertie sighed and pulled out what I believe was a triple A cup and told me to try it on. I took the precious article of clothing and disappeared into the dressing room so that no one could see me. Gertie, caring nothing for 12 year old angst, pushed the curtain aside, took one look at me and sighed again. I was definitely a challenge.
She told me to take the bra off then proceeded to sew two seams into the cups to make them even smaller. She gave it back to me with a third sigh. I tried it on and was ecstatic. Never mind that I and the bra were perfectly flat, the important thing was that underwear-wise I was a woman at last. I was beginning the long torturous road that all women tread in this crazy world where free women are considered dangerous.
Our grandmothers wore corsets to shape their figures, but somewhere along the way corsets took on a dissolute, sexual air since they pushed things up or down too suggestively. Girdles took over when it became unladylike to present too many curves to the world. Women had to be firmly locked into battle gear to be decent. Only “loose” women dared to walk around comfortably in their clothes. Everyone else wore industrial strength undergarments that left little room to breathe let alone wobble. I don’t think anyone has ever considered a girdle to be even remotely sexy.
And now after a blessedly free period in the sixties, we’re right back where we started only now we call it shape-wear and it’s no longer confined to our mothers. Now all of us feel that we have bulges that we have to straighten out. And since that means either punishing workouts outs, or starving, or going back in time to when we were kids, we’ve elected to hide them. And so shape-wear was born. I hold Oprah responsible. When this lady announces that something is good, her followers rush out to buy it at once, whether it’s a book or a washing machine. And so one day when she announced that the best thing to wear under your clothes was something called Spanx, this product became a girl’s best friend.
The inventor of Spanx underwear, Sara Blakely, says that it was the universal scourge of visible panty lines that inspired her to create her product. So it seems that in order to convince people that you are not wearing any underwear beneath your clothing you have to wear an incredibly constricting piece of underwear under your clothing. Is it me or is it raining oxymorons in here?
The internet is crawling with shape-wear. For a mere $31.00 there’s an arm slimmer that you wear under your blouse so that your triceps and biceps can go from flabby to tres chic in a flash. But then if you’re already wearing a long sleeved blouse who’s going to see the flab to begin with? You can also purchase something called an “over-bra” which cures underarm bulges, a power panty (don’t ask), a mid thigh smoother, (I keep thinking it comes with strawberries) a hide and sleek cami, hi-rise tights, and if you’re fed up with dealing with bits and pieces you can go for broke and order full fledged commando Kevlar armor—the body suit. This covers you from head to toe in spandex so that you’re essentially wearing a suit under your clothing ensuring that nothing will ever fall out and that you will never breathe again. Sort of like Scarlet O’Hara clinging to her bedpost for dear life as she’s being crammed into her corset by her maid, Mammie.
Iran does burquas we do shape-wear. Foot binding anyone?
There was a time not so long ago when a woman could go out and buy plain underwear. Young women walked freely, smiling contentedly because they could slip into little nothings that fit under their clothes and not worry about “containment”. There was a time when women didn’t worry about, let alone use words like, enhancing-shaper or over-bra-bulge eraser.
Oh who am I kidding? Women have always worried about what is charmingly known as, unsightly bulges. From the moment they hit puberty they worry that some part of their body is hanging out where it should be hanging in. It usually begins in middle school gym class when everyone is changing in that communal hell known as a locker room. You’d be trying desperately to change into horrendous gym bloomers as quickly as possible without revealing anything while surreptitiously checking out if you were the first or last girl in the known middle school universe to be wearing a bra. Too early was awful, too late even worse, and somehow you always felt that you were one or the other.
I remember pleading with my mom to buy me a bra when I was in seventh grade. I had absolutely nothing to actually put into said bra but hopes and dreams, but no matter, I absolutely had to have one. Luckily my mom had a friend who owned a lingerie shop so off we went to get me fitted with a training bra. What exactly I was training I had no idea but I didn’t ask any questions.
I stood there uncomfortably while mom and her friend, Gertie discussed my endowments or rather the general lack of. Gertie sighed and pulled out what I believe was a triple A cup and told me to try it on. I took the precious article of clothing and disappeared into the dressing room so that no one could see me. Gertie, caring nothing for 12 year old angst, pushed the curtain aside, took one look at me and sighed again. I was definitely a challenge.
She told me to take the bra off then proceeded to sew two seams into the cups to make them even smaller. She gave it back to me with a third sigh. I tried it on and was ecstatic. Never mind that I and the bra were perfectly flat, the important thing was that underwear-wise I was a woman at last. I was beginning the long torturous road that all women tread in this crazy world where free women are considered dangerous.
Our grandmothers wore corsets to shape their figures, but somewhere along the way corsets took on a dissolute, sexual air since they pushed things up or down too suggestively. Girdles took over when it became unladylike to present too many curves to the world. Women had to be firmly locked into battle gear to be decent. Only “loose” women dared to walk around comfortably in their clothes. Everyone else wore industrial strength undergarments that left little room to breathe let alone wobble. I don’t think anyone has ever considered a girdle to be even remotely sexy.
And now after a blessedly free period in the sixties, we’re right back where we started only now we call it shape-wear and it’s no longer confined to our mothers. Now all of us feel that we have bulges that we have to straighten out. And since that means either punishing workouts outs, or starving, or going back in time to when we were kids, we’ve elected to hide them. And so shape-wear was born. I hold Oprah responsible. When this lady announces that something is good, her followers rush out to buy it at once, whether it’s a book or a washing machine. And so one day when she announced that the best thing to wear under your clothes was something called Spanx, this product became a girl’s best friend.
The inventor of Spanx underwear, Sara Blakely, says that it was the universal scourge of visible panty lines that inspired her to create her product. So it seems that in order to convince people that you are not wearing any underwear beneath your clothing you have to wear an incredibly constricting piece of underwear under your clothing. Is it me or is it raining oxymorons in here?
The internet is crawling with shape-wear. For a mere $31.00 there’s an arm slimmer that you wear under your blouse so that your triceps and biceps can go from flabby to tres chic in a flash. But then if you’re already wearing a long sleeved blouse who’s going to see the flab to begin with? You can also purchase something called an “over-bra” which cures underarm bulges, a power panty (don’t ask), a mid thigh smoother, (I keep thinking it comes with strawberries) a hide and sleek cami, hi-rise tights, and if you’re fed up with dealing with bits and pieces you can go for broke and order full fledged commando Kevlar armor—the body suit. This covers you from head to toe in spandex so that you’re essentially wearing a suit under your clothing ensuring that nothing will ever fall out and that you will never breathe again. Sort of like Scarlet O’Hara clinging to her bedpost for dear life as she’s being crammed into her corset by her maid, Mammie.
Iran does burquas we do shape-wear. Foot binding anyone?
Saturday, November 14, 2009
On the Street Where We Lived
On the Street Where We Lived
For years our family lived in two neighborhoods, ours and Big Birds, and there were times when the bird’s seemed more real than ours. I remember someone asking Lisa where she lived and she answered, “Sesame Street.” I knew exactly how she felt because there were lots of times when Big Bird’s place was a lot more fun than ours. There were never any meals to cook, rooms to clean, diapers to change—just songs to sing, letters to learn, numbers to count, and friends, lots of friends. Many were the times when I was ready to go to the post office and fill out a change of address card.
Although the world is celebrating Sesame Street’s 40th anniversary I was too old to watch it when it first came out in the 1960’s. But once Lisa was born it wasn’t long before we were sitting in front of the TV singing along with C is for Cookie! They tell me that Cookie Monster eats vegetables now but I can’t believe it.
We used to watch Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood as well. We enjoyed seeing the places that he visited—the mushroom mine, the ballet studio, the trumpet factory—but it was missing a certain pizzazz that only Sesame Street could deliver. With Mr. Rogers there were no hidden meanings. What you saw was what you got. But with Kermit et al, the double entendres ricocheted off the TV set like bullets. Lisa would wonder why mommy was laughing so hard but there was no way that I could explain it to her. She quickly got used to the fact that mommy laughed at weird stuff and continued to enjoy the music, the colors, the action. She didn’t need me to explain any of that.
The show’s cleverness took my breath away. Where else could you see Smokey Robinson being chased by a huge letter U?” Or hear puppet Beatles croon Letter B or enjoy muppet Cyndi Lauper jiving to Cereal Girl? Kermit’s manic direction of Forgetful Jones doing Oklahoma was a vowel masterpiece. The songs could be simple as Rubber Duckie or as hilarious as Dancing Myself to Sleep where boogying sheep throw the long suffering Bert out the bedroom window.
Two sweet songs that still make me cry are Ernie’s, I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon which captures the delight of traveling to far off places and then coming safely home and Kermit’s, It’s Not Easy Being Green, a timeless tribute to being different. And what could be more joyously exuberant than Ernie, Hoots the Owl and a host of celebrities jazzing to Put Down the Duckie, while celebrating music, dancing and life.
I think what amazed me was how involved we became in the lives of the people who lived on Sesame Street. I might have enjoyed visiting Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood but once I turned off the set I could have cared less about what King Friday or Queen Saturday were doing. But everyone on Sesame Street became family, both humans and puppets. I still remember feeling incredibly frustrated when no one would believe Big Bird about his friend Mr. Snuffleupagus. I would scream at Bob or Susan or Maria, “Just turn around for heavens sake he’s right behind you!” When they finally decided to allow the rest of the neighborhood see Snuffy I heaved a huge sigh of relief.
Though I enjoyed keeping up with the lives of Susan, Gordon, Oscar and Grover my favorite couple was Maria and Luis. I set up my video recorder to record the biggest event of the season, their wedding. The rest of the world might have gone crazy over Princess Dianna and Prince Charles but in our house the royal couple was Luis and Maria. We had watched them meet and get to know each other so being invited to their TV wedding seemed perfectly natural. Later on when they had a baby girl we felt like godparents.
Even though Sesame Street was on all morning and then later in the afternoon, Lisa loved the program so much that even watching six times a day wasn’t enough for her. I had to tape weeks of episodes so that she could watch them whenever she wanted. And when there was a song that she really loved she would yell out, “Again!” which meant that I would have to rewind and rewind and rewind the tape till she had enough. Of course that also meant that I was in trouble when she was watching a broadcast and not a tape. No matter how I tried I couldn’t make her understand the difference between a tape and the TV.
Luckily for us Sesame Street followed us to Israel in the form of, Rehov Sumsum or the girls would never have left home. They would watch Bert, Ernie and Big Bird speak Hebrew and never question it. Seeing Oscar the Grouch as an Israeli grump was an unforgettable experience.
Now the years have passed and things have changed. I’ve heard that Cookie Monster now eats vegetables, Mr. Hooper’s store is a bodega and Bert and Ernie don’t share a bedroom anymore. But even though we no longer visit the place where the air is sweet it’s comforting to know that all over the world children are still asking, “Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Sesame Street?”
For years our family lived in two neighborhoods, ours and Big Birds, and there were times when the bird’s seemed more real than ours. I remember someone asking Lisa where she lived and she answered, “Sesame Street.” I knew exactly how she felt because there were lots of times when Big Bird’s place was a lot more fun than ours. There were never any meals to cook, rooms to clean, diapers to change—just songs to sing, letters to learn, numbers to count, and friends, lots of friends. Many were the times when I was ready to go to the post office and fill out a change of address card.
Although the world is celebrating Sesame Street’s 40th anniversary I was too old to watch it when it first came out in the 1960’s. But once Lisa was born it wasn’t long before we were sitting in front of the TV singing along with C is for Cookie! They tell me that Cookie Monster eats vegetables now but I can’t believe it.
We used to watch Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood as well. We enjoyed seeing the places that he visited—the mushroom mine, the ballet studio, the trumpet factory—but it was missing a certain pizzazz that only Sesame Street could deliver. With Mr. Rogers there were no hidden meanings. What you saw was what you got. But with Kermit et al, the double entendres ricocheted off the TV set like bullets. Lisa would wonder why mommy was laughing so hard but there was no way that I could explain it to her. She quickly got used to the fact that mommy laughed at weird stuff and continued to enjoy the music, the colors, the action. She didn’t need me to explain any of that.
The show’s cleverness took my breath away. Where else could you see Smokey Robinson being chased by a huge letter U?” Or hear puppet Beatles croon Letter B or enjoy muppet Cyndi Lauper jiving to Cereal Girl? Kermit’s manic direction of Forgetful Jones doing Oklahoma was a vowel masterpiece. The songs could be simple as Rubber Duckie or as hilarious as Dancing Myself to Sleep where boogying sheep throw the long suffering Bert out the bedroom window.
Two sweet songs that still make me cry are Ernie’s, I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon which captures the delight of traveling to far off places and then coming safely home and Kermit’s, It’s Not Easy Being Green, a timeless tribute to being different. And what could be more joyously exuberant than Ernie, Hoots the Owl and a host of celebrities jazzing to Put Down the Duckie, while celebrating music, dancing and life.
I think what amazed me was how involved we became in the lives of the people who lived on Sesame Street. I might have enjoyed visiting Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood but once I turned off the set I could have cared less about what King Friday or Queen Saturday were doing. But everyone on Sesame Street became family, both humans and puppets. I still remember feeling incredibly frustrated when no one would believe Big Bird about his friend Mr. Snuffleupagus. I would scream at Bob or Susan or Maria, “Just turn around for heavens sake he’s right behind you!” When they finally decided to allow the rest of the neighborhood see Snuffy I heaved a huge sigh of relief.
Though I enjoyed keeping up with the lives of Susan, Gordon, Oscar and Grover my favorite couple was Maria and Luis. I set up my video recorder to record the biggest event of the season, their wedding. The rest of the world might have gone crazy over Princess Dianna and Prince Charles but in our house the royal couple was Luis and Maria. We had watched them meet and get to know each other so being invited to their TV wedding seemed perfectly natural. Later on when they had a baby girl we felt like godparents.
Even though Sesame Street was on all morning and then later in the afternoon, Lisa loved the program so much that even watching six times a day wasn’t enough for her. I had to tape weeks of episodes so that she could watch them whenever she wanted. And when there was a song that she really loved she would yell out, “Again!” which meant that I would have to rewind and rewind and rewind the tape till she had enough. Of course that also meant that I was in trouble when she was watching a broadcast and not a tape. No matter how I tried I couldn’t make her understand the difference between a tape and the TV.
Luckily for us Sesame Street followed us to Israel in the form of, Rehov Sumsum or the girls would never have left home. They would watch Bert, Ernie and Big Bird speak Hebrew and never question it. Seeing Oscar the Grouch as an Israeli grump was an unforgettable experience.
Now the years have passed and things have changed. I’ve heard that Cookie Monster now eats vegetables, Mr. Hooper’s store is a bodega and Bert and Ernie don’t share a bedroom anymore. But even though we no longer visit the place where the air is sweet it’s comforting to know that all over the world children are still asking, “Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Sesame Street?”
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Book Is Not a Four Letter Word
Book is Not a Four Letter Word
I gasped. I held my breath. And then I cried. All this within the space of a minute, over my morning coffee, while reading the newspaper, because I had just read that the headmaster of Cushing Academy prep school, Mr. James Tracy, had decided that his school,
after having amassed a collection of more than 20,000 books, had decided that they no longer needed a traditional library. The academy had decided to discard all their books and had already given away what stocked their sprawling stacks - the classics, novels, poetry, biographies, tomes on every subject from the humanities to the sciences. The future, they believe, is digital.
“When I look at books, I see an outdated technology, like scrolls before books,’’ said Tracy. “We’re not discouraging students from reading. We see this as a natural way to shape emerging trends and optimize technology.’’
The academy is spending $500,000 to create a “learning center’’. They are spending $42,000 on three large flat-screen TVs that will project data from the Internet and $20,000 on special laptop-friendly study carrels. Where the reference desk was, they are building a $50,000 coffee shop that will include a $12,000 cappuccino machine.
Can you get anything more natural than a flat screen TV or a $12,000 cappuccino machine? Henry Thoreau would be proud. Can’t you see him lounging near Walden’s Pond twiddling with his electronic Kindle reader adjusting the font size? Tell me am I crazy or is it the rest of the world?
I’m not a Luddite. I welcome technology’s improvements. I would just prefer that they not be forcibly thrust upon me so that I feel like I’ve been electronically violated. I do not understand how completely destroying a way of life to replace it with something new is natural. That is more like an urban renewal of the soul. Natural means evolving, slowly replacing the old bit by bit till you are not even aware of the transformation.
Tracy believes that his virtual library will be a model for the 21st century school. I pray not. It is interesting that while he has given away all of the school’s books his “office shelves remain lined with books.” But then I suppose a plastic box doesn’t look or feel as wonderful as a book made of paper and glue. That is part of the literary experience.
To be able to walk into a library or a book store and be held by the sight of rich colors, caught by the sensuous feel of thick paper and the very smell of the ink. To be able to approach a shelf and browse, leaf through pages, scan worlds. To be able to actually see the millions of books that men and women spent their lives creating. This sensual experience is part of reading.
Tracy claims that the books took up too much space. Yes they do! People, their thoughts, dreams, their lives take up space. You cannot put us all on the head of a very efficient pin. Like the lives they describe, books are messy. The walls of my house are lined with books. I’ve kept them from childhood, high school, college, friends. I still read what I wrote in the margins when I was 18 years old. I find notes, papers, pieces of my past, myself.
Years ago Steve bought me a set of Shakespeare’s plays. They weren’t new but lovingly used. I found the name of the original owner written in elegant script on the flyleaf, Hester E. Young, 1912. I found another inscription, Ray A Eucdern, 1910 plus a Valentine he received from his girlfriend, Margaret who was from Tabor, Iowa. I found French conjugations that he had written out on papers tucked between the pages of King Lear. These bits of the paper whisper hints of the past. I have yet to find anything tucked into a computer.
Being a foolish romantic about books, I find it ironic that Alexander Coyle, the chair of the history department at Cushing Academy, echoes my thoughts when he says that he sees libraries and their hallowed contents as secular cathedrals. And if every cathedral has a spiritual leader, for me it is Canton’s library director, Mark Lague.
I know that libraries must change to stay alive, that they can no longer be solely about books. Canton’s library has changed but thanks to Mark it has evolved, is still evolving, so that each return trip is not a shock but a homecoming. Mark did not feel the need to rip out every last book to transform our library into a vital community gathering place. He has shepherded us all into a new world where paper co-exists with machines.
“We used to be the keepers of knowledge,” he said. “Now we’ve had to re-invent ourselves and the way we are helpful to people.” And re-invent he has, but gently, paying attention to the way people interact with each other, with books and computers. Twenty five years as a library director has taught him the best ways to lead patrons and staff into the next century without having to completely destroy their past. James Tracy should take a page from Mark Lague’s library. And this Sunday when the Trustees, staff and friends of the library honor Mark we will all toast a man who understands that knowledge comes in many forms and that a traditional library can embrace them all.
I gasped. I held my breath. And then I cried. All this within the space of a minute, over my morning coffee, while reading the newspaper, because I had just read that the headmaster of Cushing Academy prep school, Mr. James Tracy, had decided that his school,
after having amassed a collection of more than 20,000 books, had decided that they no longer needed a traditional library. The academy had decided to discard all their books and had already given away what stocked their sprawling stacks - the classics, novels, poetry, biographies, tomes on every subject from the humanities to the sciences. The future, they believe, is digital.
“When I look at books, I see an outdated technology, like scrolls before books,’’ said Tracy. “We’re not discouraging students from reading. We see this as a natural way to shape emerging trends and optimize technology.’’
The academy is spending $500,000 to create a “learning center’’. They are spending $42,000 on three large flat-screen TVs that will project data from the Internet and $20,000 on special laptop-friendly study carrels. Where the reference desk was, they are building a $50,000 coffee shop that will include a $12,000 cappuccino machine.
Can you get anything more natural than a flat screen TV or a $12,000 cappuccino machine? Henry Thoreau would be proud. Can’t you see him lounging near Walden’s Pond twiddling with his electronic Kindle reader adjusting the font size? Tell me am I crazy or is it the rest of the world?
I’m not a Luddite. I welcome technology’s improvements. I would just prefer that they not be forcibly thrust upon me so that I feel like I’ve been electronically violated. I do not understand how completely destroying a way of life to replace it with something new is natural. That is more like an urban renewal of the soul. Natural means evolving, slowly replacing the old bit by bit till you are not even aware of the transformation.
Tracy believes that his virtual library will be a model for the 21st century school. I pray not. It is interesting that while he has given away all of the school’s books his “office shelves remain lined with books.” But then I suppose a plastic box doesn’t look or feel as wonderful as a book made of paper and glue. That is part of the literary experience.
To be able to walk into a library or a book store and be held by the sight of rich colors, caught by the sensuous feel of thick paper and the very smell of the ink. To be able to approach a shelf and browse, leaf through pages, scan worlds. To be able to actually see the millions of books that men and women spent their lives creating. This sensual experience is part of reading.
Tracy claims that the books took up too much space. Yes they do! People, their thoughts, dreams, their lives take up space. You cannot put us all on the head of a very efficient pin. Like the lives they describe, books are messy. The walls of my house are lined with books. I’ve kept them from childhood, high school, college, friends. I still read what I wrote in the margins when I was 18 years old. I find notes, papers, pieces of my past, myself.
Years ago Steve bought me a set of Shakespeare’s plays. They weren’t new but lovingly used. I found the name of the original owner written in elegant script on the flyleaf, Hester E. Young, 1912. I found another inscription, Ray A Eucdern, 1910 plus a Valentine he received from his girlfriend, Margaret who was from Tabor, Iowa. I found French conjugations that he had written out on papers tucked between the pages of King Lear. These bits of the paper whisper hints of the past. I have yet to find anything tucked into a computer.
Being a foolish romantic about books, I find it ironic that Alexander Coyle, the chair of the history department at Cushing Academy, echoes my thoughts when he says that he sees libraries and their hallowed contents as secular cathedrals. And if every cathedral has a spiritual leader, for me it is Canton’s library director, Mark Lague.
I know that libraries must change to stay alive, that they can no longer be solely about books. Canton’s library has changed but thanks to Mark it has evolved, is still evolving, so that each return trip is not a shock but a homecoming. Mark did not feel the need to rip out every last book to transform our library into a vital community gathering place. He has shepherded us all into a new world where paper co-exists with machines.
“We used to be the keepers of knowledge,” he said. “Now we’ve had to re-invent ourselves and the way we are helpful to people.” And re-invent he has, but gently, paying attention to the way people interact with each other, with books and computers. Twenty five years as a library director has taught him the best ways to lead patrons and staff into the next century without having to completely destroy their past. James Tracy should take a page from Mark Lague’s library. And this Sunday when the Trustees, staff and friends of the library honor Mark we will all toast a man who understands that knowledge comes in many forms and that a traditional library can embrace them all.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Out The Door
Out the Door
I was having a conversation with some friends at Trilogy Salon the other day, a conversation that men never have if they live to be 1000. Kerry and Lauren had complimented me on the straight leg jeans that I was wearing and so I immediately complained about them. Have you ever noticed that women can’t accept compliments? Tell them that you love what they’re wearing and their answer is, “Oh this old thing. I’ve had it in my closet since I was born.” Tell them that their hair looks great and they’ll tell you that they haven’t washed it since the French revolution.
My gripe was that the fashion mavens have decided that this year all straight leg jeans have to be low rise, which means that they sit so low on the hips that they only fit people who have no body circumference. The rest of us can’t find jeans that fit properly unless we trash our 401K’s.
I bought the ones that I was wearing in a larger than usual size so that I’d have a prayer of getting them around my hips so of course they were too big. I thought I’d wear a shirt on top to hide the Hoover Dam gap between my waist line and my pants but that meant having to wear a belt to hold them up which created a bulge that stuck out through my sweater. Got that? If you’re a woman you do, if you’re a guy you stopped reading this two paragraphs ago as you ran from the room screaming.
Lauren and Kerry each offered solutions. Kerry told me where to find straight legs with a high waist that didn’t cost as much as a small country, but Lauren had a truly ingenious solution. “Get yourself an invisible belt,” she said.
Seeing the expression on my face she explained that it was a very thin, clear belt that held up your pants without showing through anything and without causing a bulge in the front. Genius! She also told me exactly where to get one and how much it cost. Now a man would never have known that.
Then our conversation meandered onto the subject of what women go through in order to get themselves out the door versus what men do. Men shave, brush their teeth, throw on a shirt, maybe a tie, pants, socks and shoes and they’re done, sometimes without even looking in the mirror. For a woman the morning begins to unravel the moment the hair dryer comes out. There are mornings when no matter how many times you dry, re-wet, re-dry, mousse, gel, whip and sauté your hair, there’s a clump that stands out at some unnatural angle or else refuses to pouf out a bit so that you look like a wet lemming on the way to the cliff. And then of course there are the rainy days when you could use a blowtorch but within three seconds you’ve got a head of corkscrew curls. For those of us with short hair, a hairnet is the only option thereby achieving that cool school-cafeteria-lady look.
Then you move on to make-up which means you have to look in the mirror. That’s where the trouble starts, especially for those of us who need to use mirrors that magnify 1,000 times since we’re blind without our glasses and we don’t want to look like old Mrs. Griswold who wears her lipstick artfully smeared above and below her lips and sometimes eyebrows.
This super mirror also reveals every wrinkle, every spot, every hair that definitely does not belong in the middle of your forehead. It’s such a pleasure to wake up each morning only to discover that you’ve developed yet another thing on your face that has to be hidden under industrial strength cover-up. You know you’re in trouble when you are no longer smearing it on with your finger but a trowel. And you’re not even out of the bathroom yet.
But eventually you do emerge to face your closet and the decision of what the hell are you going to wear? You ask yourself the vital questions: Is it cold outside? Is it stormy? Are locusts raining down from the heavens? (Locusts are really hell on hair) And the most important question, do you have anything in that God forsaken closet that doesn’t make you look like the Hindenburg on a bad day?
Then you suddenly remember that you have a brand new sweater and matching slacks in a cheery color and your mood lightens. But of course the sweater is too long for the pants because the pants have pleats and what were you thinking buying pants with pleats anyway? So you change the pants but the stockings aren’t the right color so off go the pants to change the stockings but the belt is too thick for the pant loops and what is that bulge in front??? (I really have to get that invisible belt) And the pants are long so you need heels but you don’t have heels the right color and the earrings are long and you need short ones for that collar and the jacket won’t fit over the sweater. So you begin the process again and by the time you finally have an outfit that works, it’s time for bed. In my next life I’m coming back as a man. Or maybe Mrs. Griswold.
I was having a conversation with some friends at Trilogy Salon the other day, a conversation that men never have if they live to be 1000. Kerry and Lauren had complimented me on the straight leg jeans that I was wearing and so I immediately complained about them. Have you ever noticed that women can’t accept compliments? Tell them that you love what they’re wearing and their answer is, “Oh this old thing. I’ve had it in my closet since I was born.” Tell them that their hair looks great and they’ll tell you that they haven’t washed it since the French revolution.
My gripe was that the fashion mavens have decided that this year all straight leg jeans have to be low rise, which means that they sit so low on the hips that they only fit people who have no body circumference. The rest of us can’t find jeans that fit properly unless we trash our 401K’s.
I bought the ones that I was wearing in a larger than usual size so that I’d have a prayer of getting them around my hips so of course they were too big. I thought I’d wear a shirt on top to hide the Hoover Dam gap between my waist line and my pants but that meant having to wear a belt to hold them up which created a bulge that stuck out through my sweater. Got that? If you’re a woman you do, if you’re a guy you stopped reading this two paragraphs ago as you ran from the room screaming.
Lauren and Kerry each offered solutions. Kerry told me where to find straight legs with a high waist that didn’t cost as much as a small country, but Lauren had a truly ingenious solution. “Get yourself an invisible belt,” she said.
Seeing the expression on my face she explained that it was a very thin, clear belt that held up your pants without showing through anything and without causing a bulge in the front. Genius! She also told me exactly where to get one and how much it cost. Now a man would never have known that.
Then our conversation meandered onto the subject of what women go through in order to get themselves out the door versus what men do. Men shave, brush their teeth, throw on a shirt, maybe a tie, pants, socks and shoes and they’re done, sometimes without even looking in the mirror. For a woman the morning begins to unravel the moment the hair dryer comes out. There are mornings when no matter how many times you dry, re-wet, re-dry, mousse, gel, whip and sauté your hair, there’s a clump that stands out at some unnatural angle or else refuses to pouf out a bit so that you look like a wet lemming on the way to the cliff. And then of course there are the rainy days when you could use a blowtorch but within three seconds you’ve got a head of corkscrew curls. For those of us with short hair, a hairnet is the only option thereby achieving that cool school-cafeteria-lady look.
Then you move on to make-up which means you have to look in the mirror. That’s where the trouble starts, especially for those of us who need to use mirrors that magnify 1,000 times since we’re blind without our glasses and we don’t want to look like old Mrs. Griswold who wears her lipstick artfully smeared above and below her lips and sometimes eyebrows.
This super mirror also reveals every wrinkle, every spot, every hair that definitely does not belong in the middle of your forehead. It’s such a pleasure to wake up each morning only to discover that you’ve developed yet another thing on your face that has to be hidden under industrial strength cover-up. You know you’re in trouble when you are no longer smearing it on with your finger but a trowel. And you’re not even out of the bathroom yet.
But eventually you do emerge to face your closet and the decision of what the hell are you going to wear? You ask yourself the vital questions: Is it cold outside? Is it stormy? Are locusts raining down from the heavens? (Locusts are really hell on hair) And the most important question, do you have anything in that God forsaken closet that doesn’t make you look like the Hindenburg on a bad day?
Then you suddenly remember that you have a brand new sweater and matching slacks in a cheery color and your mood lightens. But of course the sweater is too long for the pants because the pants have pleats and what were you thinking buying pants with pleats anyway? So you change the pants but the stockings aren’t the right color so off go the pants to change the stockings but the belt is too thick for the pant loops and what is that bulge in front??? (I really have to get that invisible belt) And the pants are long so you need heels but you don’t have heels the right color and the earrings are long and you need short ones for that collar and the jacket won’t fit over the sweater. So you begin the process again and by the time you finally have an outfit that works, it’s time for bed. In my next life I’m coming back as a man. Or maybe Mrs. Griswold.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Do You Have Five minutes?
Do You Have Five Minutes?
I’m a sucker for surveys. Not the surveys that you find in magazines that test whether you and your spouse are right for each other or whether your husband is still a romantic beast. Honestly, if after thirty years of marriage you need a survey to tell you if you and your spouse are compatible then you should get your head examined. And as for romance, anyone who puts the toilet seat down after thirty years is Cary Grant in my book.
It’s the surveys asking for my opinion of a company’s services that I can’t resist. They don’t have to offer me the possibility of a gift card or a trip to Bermuda. They have me at “Do you have five minutes?” It’s the possibility that my answers could affect whether or not they offer mango-passion-fruit-vodka yogurt in my local supermarket that intrigues me.
They used to do surveys over the phone that took days but I would still get sucked in. (I swear my kids went through puberty before one survey was over!) Once a disc jockey played song snippets then instructed me to tell him if I would turn the radio up, or change the station upon hearing it. I must have looked like a lunatic dancing on the phone while yelling, “Up, up, change, up!” but who cared it was fun.
And then there were the political surveys. I remember getting quite heated during a bottle bill survey. l like to think that I had a crucial part in enabling us all to stand in front of huge, clanking, recycling machines shoving bottles into their orifices even as the machine flashes its endearing message: machine experiencing indigestion please notify manager.
But now with the internet it’s a whole new world out there. No longer do we speak to real live people who lend a bit of fun to the experience. Now we have something called “Survey Monkey” to pick our brains. I wish someone would tell me why they chose that name. It gives me the impression that they don’t think very highly of my intellect. That they feel that if they put enough of us plus a few monkeys on typewriters we’ll eventually give them Hamlet.
Anyway web surveys tend to be rather short. I guess monkeys don’t have much of an attention span. But still I am selective. I only do surveys of products that I like and that offer coupons that I can print out at the end. So it’s a no-brainer that I’ll answer anything about Starbucks. I admit there are times when I begin to feel like the little animal that gets a pellet dropped into her bowl as a reward for performing correctly, but a free latte offsets that feeling nicely.
Last year I couldn’t resist a survey about the commuter rail. They hypnotized me with balloons and free bottled water. A few weeks later I was clicking little circles describing my daily commuter ride. Was the train crowded? Clean? Did the conductor call out the stops? Did the train have windows, seats, a floor? Was I enjoying the free champagne? I dutifully clicked my way through it though I have yet to see the champagne.
But lately I’ve begun doubting this whole survey business. A few months ago I agreed to become a T.J. Maxx “insider”. I was happy to help since I do quite a bit of shopping at “Le Maxx”, (accent on the second syllable please) and I didn’t mind giving them some advice.
For months I dutifully clicked my way through questions about my shopping preferences, when suddenly last month they asked me my opinion of their newly designed credit card. The choices they gave me were incredibly ugly and I told them so. After clicking on the “I-spit-on-your-design” bubble for the twentieth time (they always like to make absolutely sure that your answers are consistent) I was shocked to see something that I had never seen before. They were actually asking me to use words to tell them what was so bad about their designs. And boy did I tell them.
After that debacle I was sure that they would never send me a survey again, but I was wrong. This time they asked me about my pet.
“Aha,” I thought. “They’re thinking of adding pet stuff to their stores.”
So I was a good doobie, clicking on what I bought for the Snoopster, where I bought it, and most importantly, how often I bought it. I sensed that they might not like my answers since I consistently clicked the button that said I bought accessories every few years rather than every few minutes. I would not be the gold mine they were looking for. But it wasn’t until I hit the final question that I longed to tell them once again via words not bubbles, what I thought of their survey.
“Do you consider your pet’s welfare to be more important than your own?”
Since I was not able to use words I searched for the appropriate bubble—ah there it was the, “Are-you-people-out-of-your-frigging-minds??!!!” bubble.
I think I’m going to stop doing their surveys. I’m going to save my answers for the ultimate form that I’m sure the monkey will be sending me any day now, the “Survey, Survey”. I can see the first question now: “Just how often do you take these surveys anyway?”
I’m a sucker for surveys. Not the surveys that you find in magazines that test whether you and your spouse are right for each other or whether your husband is still a romantic beast. Honestly, if after thirty years of marriage you need a survey to tell you if you and your spouse are compatible then you should get your head examined. And as for romance, anyone who puts the toilet seat down after thirty years is Cary Grant in my book.
It’s the surveys asking for my opinion of a company’s services that I can’t resist. They don’t have to offer me the possibility of a gift card or a trip to Bermuda. They have me at “Do you have five minutes?” It’s the possibility that my answers could affect whether or not they offer mango-passion-fruit-vodka yogurt in my local supermarket that intrigues me.
They used to do surveys over the phone that took days but I would still get sucked in. (I swear my kids went through puberty before one survey was over!) Once a disc jockey played song snippets then instructed me to tell him if I would turn the radio up, or change the station upon hearing it. I must have looked like a lunatic dancing on the phone while yelling, “Up, up, change, up!” but who cared it was fun.
And then there were the political surveys. I remember getting quite heated during a bottle bill survey. l like to think that I had a crucial part in enabling us all to stand in front of huge, clanking, recycling machines shoving bottles into their orifices even as the machine flashes its endearing message: machine experiencing indigestion please notify manager.
But now with the internet it’s a whole new world out there. No longer do we speak to real live people who lend a bit of fun to the experience. Now we have something called “Survey Monkey” to pick our brains. I wish someone would tell me why they chose that name. It gives me the impression that they don’t think very highly of my intellect. That they feel that if they put enough of us plus a few monkeys on typewriters we’ll eventually give them Hamlet.
Anyway web surveys tend to be rather short. I guess monkeys don’t have much of an attention span. But still I am selective. I only do surveys of products that I like and that offer coupons that I can print out at the end. So it’s a no-brainer that I’ll answer anything about Starbucks. I admit there are times when I begin to feel like the little animal that gets a pellet dropped into her bowl as a reward for performing correctly, but a free latte offsets that feeling nicely.
Last year I couldn’t resist a survey about the commuter rail. They hypnotized me with balloons and free bottled water. A few weeks later I was clicking little circles describing my daily commuter ride. Was the train crowded? Clean? Did the conductor call out the stops? Did the train have windows, seats, a floor? Was I enjoying the free champagne? I dutifully clicked my way through it though I have yet to see the champagne.
But lately I’ve begun doubting this whole survey business. A few months ago I agreed to become a T.J. Maxx “insider”. I was happy to help since I do quite a bit of shopping at “Le Maxx”, (accent on the second syllable please) and I didn’t mind giving them some advice.
For months I dutifully clicked my way through questions about my shopping preferences, when suddenly last month they asked me my opinion of their newly designed credit card. The choices they gave me were incredibly ugly and I told them so. After clicking on the “I-spit-on-your-design” bubble for the twentieth time (they always like to make absolutely sure that your answers are consistent) I was shocked to see something that I had never seen before. They were actually asking me to use words to tell them what was so bad about their designs. And boy did I tell them.
After that debacle I was sure that they would never send me a survey again, but I was wrong. This time they asked me about my pet.
“Aha,” I thought. “They’re thinking of adding pet stuff to their stores.”
So I was a good doobie, clicking on what I bought for the Snoopster, where I bought it, and most importantly, how often I bought it. I sensed that they might not like my answers since I consistently clicked the button that said I bought accessories every few years rather than every few minutes. I would not be the gold mine they were looking for. But it wasn’t until I hit the final question that I longed to tell them once again via words not bubbles, what I thought of their survey.
“Do you consider your pet’s welfare to be more important than your own?”
Since I was not able to use words I searched for the appropriate bubble—ah there it was the, “Are-you-people-out-of-your-frigging-minds??!!!” bubble.
I think I’m going to stop doing their surveys. I’m going to save my answers for the ultimate form that I’m sure the monkey will be sending me any day now, the “Survey, Survey”. I can see the first question now: “Just how often do you take these surveys anyway?”
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Home Is Where the Doll Is
Home is Where the Doll Is
Enough is enough. No more period clothing, no more history books, and no more over priced “chatchkehs” (pieces of useless decoration) masquerading as history. It used to be that a doll was just meant to be cuddled, fed, diapered, and hugged. Sometimes they had names but they never came with manuals or biographies because somehow we were smart enough to know what to do with them without being told.
I had dolls that were nameless, a Ginny doll that came with a dog and Barbie dolls that came with fabulous wardrobes and the faint air of glamour that they wore. It wasn’t till later that Mattel got the idea of marketing Barbies with families, professions, and doctoral theses in order to sell more stuff. I guess there just wasn’t enough money in selling Barbie cars, showers, estates, and continents. But even then kids weren’t sold genealogies that they had to incorporate in their daydreams.
But it’s a whole new world now. I became aware of that when I gave birth to Lisa. I went home from the hospital with a baby, blankets, diapers, formula, and an American Girl Catalogue. It wasn’t till months later, when I had the time to read it, that I realized that it wasn’t a hospital publication. Apparently the American Girl Doll catalogue was as important to take home from the hospital as the baby.
For those of you who have been hibernating on Alpha Centauri let me explain. When American Girl dolls began there were three dolls representing different periods of American history: Colonial Felicity, Pioneer Kirsten and WWII Molly. Each doll came with accessories, but in addition each doll also came with an entire history, American history to be specific, and a set of books to document it. It seemed un-American to play with these dolls in any way that contradicted their stories. A kid’s imagination got lost in the back-story.
They were a great excuse to spend money. And spend you did since these dolls were so expensive that you needed to take out a mortgage to afford them. They cost $85 back then (now it’s up to $95) and that didn’t include the shoes or any of the other cute stuff that she was pictured with. For that you had to spend an extra $25.00.
Upon seeing the price I hurriedly tossed the catalogue into the trash. But that didn’t stop the American Girl syndicate from sending me a catalogue every month for years. Still, I thought I had been pretty cagey in hiding it from Lisa until one day I heard the dreaded words, “Mom, I want Felicity.”
Despite her pathetic entreaties I refused to budge. There was no way in heaven that I was going to spend $85 on a doll. And hold out I did until one day, I don’t remember why, I finally gave in. I bought Felicity, her shoes, socks, hat, coat, ball gown, riding outfit, rocket ship—there was no end to it. It was like falling into quicksand. Lisa was ecstatic but I was angry about the cost of this doll and worried that soon Mariel would be asking for one too.
Sure enough before our bank account could recover Mariel was playing with Kirsten while I kept getting angrier at how much we were spending on these historical money pits. And as far as I could tell from listening to their play, the girls were treating them as they did all their other dolls and not enacting the revolutionary war or the westward trek. We had spent hundreds of dollars on fancy-shmantzy Barbies.
Lately American Girl dolls have become news in this house once more. Their doll of the year, Chrissa, has a good friend named Gwen who is homeless. A homeless doll that costs $95. Her back story is bleak. Her dad deserted her and her mom forcing them to live in their car and then a shelter. I think the only thing that saves this particular doll from being a complete rip-off is that she doesn’t come with all kinds of accessories like the other dolls. In fact many of the little girls and their mommies are wondering why. The American Girl web site printed these letters from moms:
Gwen didn’t come with much. I'm still hoping AG comes out with more for Gwen before the holidays.
I was rather disappointed by the lack of items for Gwen.
After all just imagine the accessories: A replica of the shelter that they have to leave every morning, the narrow cots they sleep on, and even a cart to carry all their belongings in.
AG claims that this will raise a little girl’s consciousness thereby helping the homeless. Wouldn’t it be better to simply donate the $95 to a homeless shelter? I can just imagine their next doll, an illegal immigrant who comes complete with her own ICE agents to round her family up and deport them. And of course you’d have to pay big bucks for the ultimate accessory: a green card.
What does American Girl have to say about all of this?
Our singular goal is to help girls find their inner star by becoming kind, compassionate, and loving people who make a positive and meaningful difference in the world around them.
And to make a bundle. Sorry. I guess my inner star is just being cynical.
Enough is enough. No more period clothing, no more history books, and no more over priced “chatchkehs” (pieces of useless decoration) masquerading as history. It used to be that a doll was just meant to be cuddled, fed, diapered, and hugged. Sometimes they had names but they never came with manuals or biographies because somehow we were smart enough to know what to do with them without being told.
I had dolls that were nameless, a Ginny doll that came with a dog and Barbie dolls that came with fabulous wardrobes and the faint air of glamour that they wore. It wasn’t till later that Mattel got the idea of marketing Barbies with families, professions, and doctoral theses in order to sell more stuff. I guess there just wasn’t enough money in selling Barbie cars, showers, estates, and continents. But even then kids weren’t sold genealogies that they had to incorporate in their daydreams.
But it’s a whole new world now. I became aware of that when I gave birth to Lisa. I went home from the hospital with a baby, blankets, diapers, formula, and an American Girl Catalogue. It wasn’t till months later, when I had the time to read it, that I realized that it wasn’t a hospital publication. Apparently the American Girl Doll catalogue was as important to take home from the hospital as the baby.
For those of you who have been hibernating on Alpha Centauri let me explain. When American Girl dolls began there were three dolls representing different periods of American history: Colonial Felicity, Pioneer Kirsten and WWII Molly. Each doll came with accessories, but in addition each doll also came with an entire history, American history to be specific, and a set of books to document it. It seemed un-American to play with these dolls in any way that contradicted their stories. A kid’s imagination got lost in the back-story.
They were a great excuse to spend money. And spend you did since these dolls were so expensive that you needed to take out a mortgage to afford them. They cost $85 back then (now it’s up to $95) and that didn’t include the shoes or any of the other cute stuff that she was pictured with. For that you had to spend an extra $25.00.
Upon seeing the price I hurriedly tossed the catalogue into the trash. But that didn’t stop the American Girl syndicate from sending me a catalogue every month for years. Still, I thought I had been pretty cagey in hiding it from Lisa until one day I heard the dreaded words, “Mom, I want Felicity.”
Despite her pathetic entreaties I refused to budge. There was no way in heaven that I was going to spend $85 on a doll. And hold out I did until one day, I don’t remember why, I finally gave in. I bought Felicity, her shoes, socks, hat, coat, ball gown, riding outfit, rocket ship—there was no end to it. It was like falling into quicksand. Lisa was ecstatic but I was angry about the cost of this doll and worried that soon Mariel would be asking for one too.
Sure enough before our bank account could recover Mariel was playing with Kirsten while I kept getting angrier at how much we were spending on these historical money pits. And as far as I could tell from listening to their play, the girls were treating them as they did all their other dolls and not enacting the revolutionary war or the westward trek. We had spent hundreds of dollars on fancy-shmantzy Barbies.
Lately American Girl dolls have become news in this house once more. Their doll of the year, Chrissa, has a good friend named Gwen who is homeless. A homeless doll that costs $95. Her back story is bleak. Her dad deserted her and her mom forcing them to live in their car and then a shelter. I think the only thing that saves this particular doll from being a complete rip-off is that she doesn’t come with all kinds of accessories like the other dolls. In fact many of the little girls and their mommies are wondering why. The American Girl web site printed these letters from moms:
Gwen didn’t come with much. I'm still hoping AG comes out with more for Gwen before the holidays.
I was rather disappointed by the lack of items for Gwen.
After all just imagine the accessories: A replica of the shelter that they have to leave every morning, the narrow cots they sleep on, and even a cart to carry all their belongings in.
AG claims that this will raise a little girl’s consciousness thereby helping the homeless. Wouldn’t it be better to simply donate the $95 to a homeless shelter? I can just imagine their next doll, an illegal immigrant who comes complete with her own ICE agents to round her family up and deport them. And of course you’d have to pay big bucks for the ultimate accessory: a green card.
What does American Girl have to say about all of this?
Our singular goal is to help girls find their inner star by becoming kind, compassionate, and loving people who make a positive and meaningful difference in the world around them.
And to make a bundle. Sorry. I guess my inner star is just being cynical.
Saturday, October 3, 2009
The Writing Life
The Writing Life
I’ve been writing for as long as I’ve been able to hold a pencil. Ideas would fill my head and I would race to get them on paper. It’s a gift, but sometimes I forget how lucky I am to have it. I’ve been thinking about writing lately thanks to a course that I took last week while attending a Directors’ conference for work. It was a simple course on how to teach writing. But those of us who have ever taught writing know that there is nothing simple about it.
About 25 of us sat around a table taking turns introducing ourselves. Though we all described ourselves as teachers or directors, few of us used the term, writer. I was one of the few. After the introductions were over our teacher asked us why or why not we considered ourselves to be writers.
A few points emerged. We believed that to earn the name, writer, a person had to be published or had to enjoy the act of creating through writing. But slowly other ideas began to emerge. We realized that we all wrote something, many things, every day: e-mails, grants, journals, blogs, letters, and on and on. One of the most interesting phrases that kept coming up was, “putting pen to paper.” I don’t know if it was because we were all old school or if being a writer was intrinsically tied in our minds to a quill and parchment. People were insistent on making the distinction between writing on a computer and writing with a pen and paper. It made me smile.
One person who had said earlier that he was not a writer revealed that he wrote a blog everyday. I blurted out, “So how can you say that you are not a writer?!”
“I don’t know,” he answered. “I guess maybe I am.”
After our discussion the one common point that remained was that to be a writer you had to enjoy the act itself. We let that realization stand on its wobbly doe legs and moved on. All but me. I believed that we were all writers and the enjoyment or discomfort of writing arose not from inborn talent but from the way we had been taught.
I was lucky. I had teachers who nurtured me, pushing me forward. I saw my poems published in school news papers and literary magazines and that encouraged me further. Later when my first article was printed in the Canton Citizen I thought I had died and gone to Shakespeare heaven. But once I started working for the Citizen my very wise editor taught me that being a writer meant accepting responsibility not only to the craft itself, but to the community. It meant taking on the role of bard, recorder of history. It’s been many years since Beth told me that and last week in the selfish rush of my life, I had forgotten it. And I almost didn’t pay homage to a wonderful lady who died too soon.
When I heard that Peggy Simons had died, I stood frozen, shocked. Though we hadn’t been close friends, I had known her as a warm, graceful, elegant woman during the times that I had been lucky enough to be in her company. The first time I saw her was at a library fund raiser being held at the Blue Hills Country Club to raise money for the library’s renovation.
A live auction was underway. A trip to Disney on Ice was up for bid and the competition was brisk. But the many bidders were no match for one very determined lady. I watched as she raised her number again and again, a smile on her face as if she knew that the prize was already hers. She was so beautiful that I couldn’t stop looking at her and I decided that I had to speak to her afterwards.
I asked her why she had wanted that prize so very much. She smiled as she answered me, “Why it’s for my grandchildren, of course. We’re going to have a wonderful time together.”
From then on no matter which event I was attending I could always spot Peggy immediately. I came to know her warm smile, her light laugh, the way she gave you her entire attention. I was enchanted. We met at AAUW gatherings, library events and the Audubon’s Visual Art Center galas. She never missed them. I still remember the first one that was held at the VAC. Peggy was one of the garden club volunteers who designed the floral masterpieces that graced the rooms. She was working on an arrangement that would sit below a huge autumn painting in the museum, when I came upon her the morning of the event. She sat on the floor gathering materials, looking like one of her grandchildren, so engrossed in her art and obviously enjoying it so much. And the last time I saw her was at a VAC gala. That is how I’ll remember her, always there to help a town institution, looking lovely, smiling, enjoying the people around her. Peggy I will miss you. And to think that in the mad dash of my life I almost didn’t craft the words to tell you good-bye.
It was Beth who gave me the gentle nudge. Beth who reminded me that the words may come silently while sitting in a lonely room but they should be released out loud to share, in joy.
I’ve been writing for as long as I’ve been able to hold a pencil. Ideas would fill my head and I would race to get them on paper. It’s a gift, but sometimes I forget how lucky I am to have it. I’ve been thinking about writing lately thanks to a course that I took last week while attending a Directors’ conference for work. It was a simple course on how to teach writing. But those of us who have ever taught writing know that there is nothing simple about it.
About 25 of us sat around a table taking turns introducing ourselves. Though we all described ourselves as teachers or directors, few of us used the term, writer. I was one of the few. After the introductions were over our teacher asked us why or why not we considered ourselves to be writers.
A few points emerged. We believed that to earn the name, writer, a person had to be published or had to enjoy the act of creating through writing. But slowly other ideas began to emerge. We realized that we all wrote something, many things, every day: e-mails, grants, journals, blogs, letters, and on and on. One of the most interesting phrases that kept coming up was, “putting pen to paper.” I don’t know if it was because we were all old school or if being a writer was intrinsically tied in our minds to a quill and parchment. People were insistent on making the distinction between writing on a computer and writing with a pen and paper. It made me smile.
One person who had said earlier that he was not a writer revealed that he wrote a blog everyday. I blurted out, “So how can you say that you are not a writer?!”
“I don’t know,” he answered. “I guess maybe I am.”
After our discussion the one common point that remained was that to be a writer you had to enjoy the act itself. We let that realization stand on its wobbly doe legs and moved on. All but me. I believed that we were all writers and the enjoyment or discomfort of writing arose not from inborn talent but from the way we had been taught.
I was lucky. I had teachers who nurtured me, pushing me forward. I saw my poems published in school news papers and literary magazines and that encouraged me further. Later when my first article was printed in the Canton Citizen I thought I had died and gone to Shakespeare heaven. But once I started working for the Citizen my very wise editor taught me that being a writer meant accepting responsibility not only to the craft itself, but to the community. It meant taking on the role of bard, recorder of history. It’s been many years since Beth told me that and last week in the selfish rush of my life, I had forgotten it. And I almost didn’t pay homage to a wonderful lady who died too soon.
When I heard that Peggy Simons had died, I stood frozen, shocked. Though we hadn’t been close friends, I had known her as a warm, graceful, elegant woman during the times that I had been lucky enough to be in her company. The first time I saw her was at a library fund raiser being held at the Blue Hills Country Club to raise money for the library’s renovation.
A live auction was underway. A trip to Disney on Ice was up for bid and the competition was brisk. But the many bidders were no match for one very determined lady. I watched as she raised her number again and again, a smile on her face as if she knew that the prize was already hers. She was so beautiful that I couldn’t stop looking at her and I decided that I had to speak to her afterwards.
I asked her why she had wanted that prize so very much. She smiled as she answered me, “Why it’s for my grandchildren, of course. We’re going to have a wonderful time together.”
From then on no matter which event I was attending I could always spot Peggy immediately. I came to know her warm smile, her light laugh, the way she gave you her entire attention. I was enchanted. We met at AAUW gatherings, library events and the Audubon’s Visual Art Center galas. She never missed them. I still remember the first one that was held at the VAC. Peggy was one of the garden club volunteers who designed the floral masterpieces that graced the rooms. She was working on an arrangement that would sit below a huge autumn painting in the museum, when I came upon her the morning of the event. She sat on the floor gathering materials, looking like one of her grandchildren, so engrossed in her art and obviously enjoying it so much. And the last time I saw her was at a VAC gala. That is how I’ll remember her, always there to help a town institution, looking lovely, smiling, enjoying the people around her. Peggy I will miss you. And to think that in the mad dash of my life I almost didn’t craft the words to tell you good-bye.
It was Beth who gave me the gentle nudge. Beth who reminded me that the words may come silently while sitting in a lonely room but they should be released out loud to share, in joy.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Boston Boot Camp
Boston Boot Camp
Our friends Mike and Mary came to visit us last week-end and I think we killed them. Steve and I planned a tour that looked good on paper but was a bit rough in reality. When we told our friends that Boston was a great walking city they responded, “Great! We love to walk. We’ve walked all over Europe!” So of course that was our cue to walk them to death. I think we forgot that we’re not sprightly young things any more.
We met our friends two years ago on a cruise to Nova Scotia. Originally Steve and I had planned to spend the week romantically tangled in each other’s arms and so we requested a table for two. That first evening after gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes for about five minutes we realized that it would be nice to have a few other people to talk with during dinner. So the next night we found ourselves at Mike and Mary’s table and within the next few hours, crazy as it sounds, we fell madly in love with each other. Friendship at first sight.
It helped that we were all on vacation with nothing to worry about but what drink to have with dinner and nothing to do but enjoy ourselves and talk long into the night. It’s rare to make friends later in life, even rarer for couples to make room in their lives for new people, especially when they don’t live around the corner. Mike and Mary are from Macon, Georgia so week-end dinner plans are not a possibility.
That first year we talked on the phone, e-mailed constantly and talked about the next summer. When Steve and I planned a vacation out West our first stop was Macon. We were nervous when we got off the plane in Atlanta but happily fell right into talking and laughing and realizing that we really did like each other. A lot. So this time around the only thing that we were worried about was how much we could cram into one week-end.
We made up two sets of plans, one for sunny and another for rainy weather. We prayed for sun because is there anything more beautiful than Boston when the sun is out, the breeze is gentle and the Charles stretches out like a diamond necklace? Our prayers were answered when we had the best weather of the summer. Mike and Mary came in on Friday afternoon and after an evening of stuffing ourselves with the amazing steaks that they had brought over in a cooler (Mike told the airlines that he was carrying a liver for a transplant!) and the requisite lobstah we told them our plans for the next day.
Saturday we began our trek at Boston Common, walked through the Public Garden lingering to watch the swan boats, then meandered down Newbury Street stopping for lunch at Stephanie’s. It wasn’t till after lunch that the real trek began. We showed off Copley Place and the Library then headed for Beacon Hill and the State House. It was while trudging up Charles Street that Mary commented, “Oh, now I see why it’s called Beacon HILL!”
We continued through to the Harbor Walk and Faneuil Hall where Mike and Steve went off for a refreshment stop. Mary and I sat on a bench watching a clown twisting balloons and debated whether or not to get an air brushed tattoo but were saved when Mike and Steve reappeared. We continued on to the North End where we planned to have an early dinner before heading home. Mary and I collapsed on a bench at the Paul Revere Mall while Steve and Mike strolled. I was thinking that I wasn’t sure that I was going to be able to get up again when Mary whispered, “Do you think that we could get a cab back to the car from here?”
I told her that we would definitely do that after dinner. But I hadn’t counted on the Saturday night crowds and my husband’s determination. We managed to get up and head out to our favorite restaurant only to see that it was already packed at 5:00 in the afternoon. After a hurried consultation we decided to eat at a restaurant close to home. When we told Steve about our cab idea he said, “Are you kidding, it’s a really short walk from here to the Common. We don’t need a taxi!”
At that point we should have hit him over the head and thrown him into a cab but we were too stupid with exhaustion to think straight so off we went following him like Quack, Mack and the rest of the ducklings. Over to Faneuil Hall, back to Beacon Hill and the State House, past the Parker and over the Common. By the time we collapsed in the car we were hysterical with exhaustion.
“Little did you know that you were coming to Schottenfeld Boot Camp!” I told our friends. “God, you’ll never visit us again after that trek!” Mary then confessed that yes, they had walked all over Europe but with lots of refreshment breaks. It’s just a miracle that Mike and Mary are still our friends after the great Boston death march. But we’ve learned our lesson. Next time when Steve assures us that it’s only a short hike to wherever, one of us will just quietly deck him.
Our friends Mike and Mary came to visit us last week-end and I think we killed them. Steve and I planned a tour that looked good on paper but was a bit rough in reality. When we told our friends that Boston was a great walking city they responded, “Great! We love to walk. We’ve walked all over Europe!” So of course that was our cue to walk them to death. I think we forgot that we’re not sprightly young things any more.
We met our friends two years ago on a cruise to Nova Scotia. Originally Steve and I had planned to spend the week romantically tangled in each other’s arms and so we requested a table for two. That first evening after gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes for about five minutes we realized that it would be nice to have a few other people to talk with during dinner. So the next night we found ourselves at Mike and Mary’s table and within the next few hours, crazy as it sounds, we fell madly in love with each other. Friendship at first sight.
It helped that we were all on vacation with nothing to worry about but what drink to have with dinner and nothing to do but enjoy ourselves and talk long into the night. It’s rare to make friends later in life, even rarer for couples to make room in their lives for new people, especially when they don’t live around the corner. Mike and Mary are from Macon, Georgia so week-end dinner plans are not a possibility.
That first year we talked on the phone, e-mailed constantly and talked about the next summer. When Steve and I planned a vacation out West our first stop was Macon. We were nervous when we got off the plane in Atlanta but happily fell right into talking and laughing and realizing that we really did like each other. A lot. So this time around the only thing that we were worried about was how much we could cram into one week-end.
We made up two sets of plans, one for sunny and another for rainy weather. We prayed for sun because is there anything more beautiful than Boston when the sun is out, the breeze is gentle and the Charles stretches out like a diamond necklace? Our prayers were answered when we had the best weather of the summer. Mike and Mary came in on Friday afternoon and after an evening of stuffing ourselves with the amazing steaks that they had brought over in a cooler (Mike told the airlines that he was carrying a liver for a transplant!) and the requisite lobstah we told them our plans for the next day.
Saturday we began our trek at Boston Common, walked through the Public Garden lingering to watch the swan boats, then meandered down Newbury Street stopping for lunch at Stephanie’s. It wasn’t till after lunch that the real trek began. We showed off Copley Place and the Library then headed for Beacon Hill and the State House. It was while trudging up Charles Street that Mary commented, “Oh, now I see why it’s called Beacon HILL!”
We continued through to the Harbor Walk and Faneuil Hall where Mike and Steve went off for a refreshment stop. Mary and I sat on a bench watching a clown twisting balloons and debated whether or not to get an air brushed tattoo but were saved when Mike and Steve reappeared. We continued on to the North End where we planned to have an early dinner before heading home. Mary and I collapsed on a bench at the Paul Revere Mall while Steve and Mike strolled. I was thinking that I wasn’t sure that I was going to be able to get up again when Mary whispered, “Do you think that we could get a cab back to the car from here?”
I told her that we would definitely do that after dinner. But I hadn’t counted on the Saturday night crowds and my husband’s determination. We managed to get up and head out to our favorite restaurant only to see that it was already packed at 5:00 in the afternoon. After a hurried consultation we decided to eat at a restaurant close to home. When we told Steve about our cab idea he said, “Are you kidding, it’s a really short walk from here to the Common. We don’t need a taxi!”
At that point we should have hit him over the head and thrown him into a cab but we were too stupid with exhaustion to think straight so off we went following him like Quack, Mack and the rest of the ducklings. Over to Faneuil Hall, back to Beacon Hill and the State House, past the Parker and over the Common. By the time we collapsed in the car we were hysterical with exhaustion.
“Little did you know that you were coming to Schottenfeld Boot Camp!” I told our friends. “God, you’ll never visit us again after that trek!” Mary then confessed that yes, they had walked all over Europe but with lots of refreshment breaks. It’s just a miracle that Mike and Mary are still our friends after the great Boston death march. But we’ve learned our lesson. Next time when Steve assures us that it’s only a short hike to wherever, one of us will just quietly deck him.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Cable Confessions
Cable Confessions
Those of you who have been reading my column for a while and who still remember important things like the words to the theme song from the Mary Tyler Moore Show, may recall my family’s battle with cable. The battle was entirely on our side--Cable TV had no clue of the war that we were waging. For years we were happily one of the few cable hold-outs in the world. We figured that we already wasted too much time watching TV so why encourage the habit with better programming? And we were doing just fine until FIOS came along.
Once Verizon installed fiber optic cables on our street they offered us their version of Pandora’s box, called the FIOS package. Quite simply we would be paying less for their bundled, phone, internet and cable system than we were currently paying for just our phone and internet. It was an offer we couldn’t refuse.
Our new cable capabilities didn’t affect Steve because except for the occasional sports program he rarely watched TV but I was a sitting duck. My self control is non-existent when faced with potato chips, fresh bread and a beloved sitcom. Add to that the fact that I’m a person who has to finish anything they’ve started be it a book or a movie no matter how bad, and you have a recipe for an instant couch potato. Many is the time Steve has come into a room, looked at what I was watching and asked, “Why in the world are you watching that??” and my only answer is, “I have to know how it ends.”
I held out for a while. But then one day I came home from work exhausted and cautiously picked up the remote. I hesitated for a moment knowing what I was letting myself in for, then pushed the red button. What I really hate about cable TV is that no matter what time of day or night it is, if you keep pushing those damn buttons you will inevitably find something that will suck you in like a vacuum cleaner. Something will appeal to your potato brain and you will sit there like a deer in the headlights unable to look away.
And here is where the confession part comes in. Readers, if you want to retain any respect for me I suggest that you stop reading now. Because what I am about to reveal will shock you to the core. Of all the possible crap that I could have become addicted to, and despite my bonafide card-carrying membership in the Masterpiece Theater club, (or Misery Theater as Steve calls it) it’s the reality show genre that has hooked me. Yes, I am a reality show addict and I’m not proud of it. So sue me.
The programs that I can’t seem to stop watching belong to the self-improvement/ fashion category. The first one, America’s Next Top Model, I can blame on my daughter, Lisa, my enabler and co-watcher. A few years ago, after she had just graduated from Wesleyan, she found out via her alma mater grapevine that one of the women that had lived in her dorm was a finalist on the program. Neither one of us had ever heard of the show before but we thought it would be fun to see someone we actually knew on TV. So we found out when it was on and made a date to watch it together.
Originally created by super model, Tyra Banks, the show can now be seen in over a hundred and fifty countries by crazy people with nothing better to do, like me. Tyra Banks and her fashionista co-horts choose about 20 women from thousands of applicants, throw them into a gorgeous house for a couple of months and eliminate them one by one through modeling competitions. The last one standing becomes, you guessed it, America’s next top model. The upside of this show is Tyra Banks and her assistants who have a quirky sense of humor, and the gorgeous fashions. And if she is to be believed, Tyra is interested in fostering strong women who can break out of the typical cliché model mode. The downside is the incessant squabbling of these impossibly beautiful women who seem to have little more in their heads than the goal of becoming camera mannequins. So after all these weeks why am I still watching this drivel? Mine is not to reason why—I blame exhaustion and bad taste.
The other show that has me hooked is an import from Great Britain, How to Look Good Naked. In this show, the host chooses women with poor self body images (that would be most of us!) and spends six weeks convincing them that they’re gorgeous and all they need to prove it to themselves is an appropriate wardrobe. I love the premise. The show pictures women of every shape and size, teaches them what to wear to make the most of what they’ve got, and sends them out in the cruel, cruel world feeling like the supermodels that inhabit Tyra’s world. I desperately want to go shopping with the host.
So now you know my shameful secret--Cinderella reality shows. But before you laugh at my foibles, what are you watching when you think no one is looking? Somehow I don’t think it’s Death of a Salesman.
Those of you who have been reading my column for a while and who still remember important things like the words to the theme song from the Mary Tyler Moore Show, may recall my family’s battle with cable. The battle was entirely on our side--Cable TV had no clue of the war that we were waging. For years we were happily one of the few cable hold-outs in the world. We figured that we already wasted too much time watching TV so why encourage the habit with better programming? And we were doing just fine until FIOS came along.
Once Verizon installed fiber optic cables on our street they offered us their version of Pandora’s box, called the FIOS package. Quite simply we would be paying less for their bundled, phone, internet and cable system than we were currently paying for just our phone and internet. It was an offer we couldn’t refuse.
Our new cable capabilities didn’t affect Steve because except for the occasional sports program he rarely watched TV but I was a sitting duck. My self control is non-existent when faced with potato chips, fresh bread and a beloved sitcom. Add to that the fact that I’m a person who has to finish anything they’ve started be it a book or a movie no matter how bad, and you have a recipe for an instant couch potato. Many is the time Steve has come into a room, looked at what I was watching and asked, “Why in the world are you watching that??” and my only answer is, “I have to know how it ends.”
I held out for a while. But then one day I came home from work exhausted and cautiously picked up the remote. I hesitated for a moment knowing what I was letting myself in for, then pushed the red button. What I really hate about cable TV is that no matter what time of day or night it is, if you keep pushing those damn buttons you will inevitably find something that will suck you in like a vacuum cleaner. Something will appeal to your potato brain and you will sit there like a deer in the headlights unable to look away.
And here is where the confession part comes in. Readers, if you want to retain any respect for me I suggest that you stop reading now. Because what I am about to reveal will shock you to the core. Of all the possible crap that I could have become addicted to, and despite my bonafide card-carrying membership in the Masterpiece Theater club, (or Misery Theater as Steve calls it) it’s the reality show genre that has hooked me. Yes, I am a reality show addict and I’m not proud of it. So sue me.
The programs that I can’t seem to stop watching belong to the self-improvement/ fashion category. The first one, America’s Next Top Model, I can blame on my daughter, Lisa, my enabler and co-watcher. A few years ago, after she had just graduated from Wesleyan, she found out via her alma mater grapevine that one of the women that had lived in her dorm was a finalist on the program. Neither one of us had ever heard of the show before but we thought it would be fun to see someone we actually knew on TV. So we found out when it was on and made a date to watch it together.
Originally created by super model, Tyra Banks, the show can now be seen in over a hundred and fifty countries by crazy people with nothing better to do, like me. Tyra Banks and her fashionista co-horts choose about 20 women from thousands of applicants, throw them into a gorgeous house for a couple of months and eliminate them one by one through modeling competitions. The last one standing becomes, you guessed it, America’s next top model. The upside of this show is Tyra Banks and her assistants who have a quirky sense of humor, and the gorgeous fashions. And if she is to be believed, Tyra is interested in fostering strong women who can break out of the typical cliché model mode. The downside is the incessant squabbling of these impossibly beautiful women who seem to have little more in their heads than the goal of becoming camera mannequins. So after all these weeks why am I still watching this drivel? Mine is not to reason why—I blame exhaustion and bad taste.
The other show that has me hooked is an import from Great Britain, How to Look Good Naked. In this show, the host chooses women with poor self body images (that would be most of us!) and spends six weeks convincing them that they’re gorgeous and all they need to prove it to themselves is an appropriate wardrobe. I love the premise. The show pictures women of every shape and size, teaches them what to wear to make the most of what they’ve got, and sends them out in the cruel, cruel world feeling like the supermodels that inhabit Tyra’s world. I desperately want to go shopping with the host.
So now you know my shameful secret--Cinderella reality shows. But before you laugh at my foibles, what are you watching when you think no one is looking? Somehow I don’t think it’s Death of a Salesman.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Clean Sweep
Clean Sweep
Our good friends Mike and Mary are coming for a visit in a couple of weeks and suddenly the house is filthy. Okay so maybe it’s just looks that way to me. Realistically I know that Mike and Mary could care less if I polish up my dust bunnies—this is merely insanity on my part. What I’d really like to do is pull off a few minor improvements, like painting the house, replacing the carpeting and furniture and re-doing the kitchen and bathrooms, but that’s not going to happen anytime soon. So I’ve settled on the cleaning crazies.
Yesterday I started with the fridge. I scrubbed the shelves, shined the chrome, and blasted everything else with toxic chemicals. Afterwards I enjoyed the glow. Until I noticed how dirty the stove seemed in comparison.
Out came the steel wool and elbow grease. I’ve always hated this stove. When I bought it I thought that it looked wonderfully easy to clean. The oven whispered in my ear that it was self cleaning and that a mere lick of a sponge would take care of the rest. Unfortunately I ignored the evil snickering coming from the burners and laid down my credit card. It wasn’t until the appliance was delivered that I discovered what a major pain it was to clean--it had nooks and crannies that a blowtorch couldn’t reach. Mariel is the only one who actually enjoys tackling it when she’s in for a visit. Afterwards I don’t let anyone cook anything on it for at least a week.
Stove done, I thought that I deserved a rest until I noticed that the dishwasher looked dirtier than the dishes it was supposed to clean. And then the cabinets, the backsplash, the floor—everything looked like it should be immediately condemned. Maybe we could just move to a hotel for the week-end so Mike and Mary need never see this disaster that is my house. When I announced my brilliant idea to Steve, he just looked at me with the look that he reserves for all hopeless idiots that cross his path, and told me that somehow he didn’t think that our friends would notice anything but us.
It’s funny because when we visited them last summer, Mike and Mary were in the midst of renovating their house and apologizing for the mess, but all I could see was their welcoming smiles. Of course that doesn’t help me now since we stayed in their newly renovated, drop dead gorgeous guest room, and their accommodations here will be comparatively Spartan, though I think I can spring for a brand new bar of soap.
We live in a split ranch. The downstairs is a complete apartment which served as the perfect place for my parents to stay when they visited. Over the years it has also been wonderful to be able to extend invitations to friends to stay over whenever they wished. Because of that I’ve always kept the bedroom blissfully empty, fending off my family’s efforts to turn it into a storage room. That has held true since we moved in twenty years ago, but now it’s occupied by my husband. Steve is excitedly working on his own business and the downstairs bedroom has been transformed into his office. It’s perfect for him but not so perfect for guests. But he has promised me that he will quickly turn it back into a bedroom for our friends’ visit.
So after cleaning myself into a frenzy in the house, I moved on to the garage, because of course Mike and Mary will be spending so much time there! (I am truly nuts!) Out came the broom. I swept viciously while keeping up a constant grumbling about how dusty it was, how many spider webs there were, and how no one ever sweeps in here but me. I lifted the broom to move a bench then proceeded to get it stuck on something when I put it down again. I looked down to see that the broom was now firmly secured to what I realized was a sticky mouse trap that Steve had put down a few months ago. I tugged and pulled to no avail.
Without thinking, I decided to try and secure the trap to the floor so that I could get some leverage, and without thinking I used my foot. Now, of course my shoe was stuck. I began pulling like a mad woman at both the broom and my foot, simultaneously cursing and laughing to myself at the ridiculous predicament that I had gotten myself into. I believe I was channeling Lucy Ricardo. I hopped over to the garage door and began yelling for Steve, who came out, took one look at me and collapsed laughing.
“Okay, Okay I know I look ridiculous, just get me out of this!”
“Why didn’t you just take your shoe off?” he managed to sputter still holding his sides.
I looked at him, looked down and realized that perhaps, just perhaps I had been doing a bit too much cleaning. It’s really not good for your brain or your soul. So after Steve got me unstuck I went upstairs, poured myself a glass of wine, put my feet up and decided that Mike and Mary would love us even if our mouse traps were dusty. After all, that’s why we love them.
Our good friends Mike and Mary are coming for a visit in a couple of weeks and suddenly the house is filthy. Okay so maybe it’s just looks that way to me. Realistically I know that Mike and Mary could care less if I polish up my dust bunnies—this is merely insanity on my part. What I’d really like to do is pull off a few minor improvements, like painting the house, replacing the carpeting and furniture and re-doing the kitchen and bathrooms, but that’s not going to happen anytime soon. So I’ve settled on the cleaning crazies.
Yesterday I started with the fridge. I scrubbed the shelves, shined the chrome, and blasted everything else with toxic chemicals. Afterwards I enjoyed the glow. Until I noticed how dirty the stove seemed in comparison.
Out came the steel wool and elbow grease. I’ve always hated this stove. When I bought it I thought that it looked wonderfully easy to clean. The oven whispered in my ear that it was self cleaning and that a mere lick of a sponge would take care of the rest. Unfortunately I ignored the evil snickering coming from the burners and laid down my credit card. It wasn’t until the appliance was delivered that I discovered what a major pain it was to clean--it had nooks and crannies that a blowtorch couldn’t reach. Mariel is the only one who actually enjoys tackling it when she’s in for a visit. Afterwards I don’t let anyone cook anything on it for at least a week.
Stove done, I thought that I deserved a rest until I noticed that the dishwasher looked dirtier than the dishes it was supposed to clean. And then the cabinets, the backsplash, the floor—everything looked like it should be immediately condemned. Maybe we could just move to a hotel for the week-end so Mike and Mary need never see this disaster that is my house. When I announced my brilliant idea to Steve, he just looked at me with the look that he reserves for all hopeless idiots that cross his path, and told me that somehow he didn’t think that our friends would notice anything but us.
It’s funny because when we visited them last summer, Mike and Mary were in the midst of renovating their house and apologizing for the mess, but all I could see was their welcoming smiles. Of course that doesn’t help me now since we stayed in their newly renovated, drop dead gorgeous guest room, and their accommodations here will be comparatively Spartan, though I think I can spring for a brand new bar of soap.
We live in a split ranch. The downstairs is a complete apartment which served as the perfect place for my parents to stay when they visited. Over the years it has also been wonderful to be able to extend invitations to friends to stay over whenever they wished. Because of that I’ve always kept the bedroom blissfully empty, fending off my family’s efforts to turn it into a storage room. That has held true since we moved in twenty years ago, but now it’s occupied by my husband. Steve is excitedly working on his own business and the downstairs bedroom has been transformed into his office. It’s perfect for him but not so perfect for guests. But he has promised me that he will quickly turn it back into a bedroom for our friends’ visit.
So after cleaning myself into a frenzy in the house, I moved on to the garage, because of course Mike and Mary will be spending so much time there! (I am truly nuts!) Out came the broom. I swept viciously while keeping up a constant grumbling about how dusty it was, how many spider webs there were, and how no one ever sweeps in here but me. I lifted the broom to move a bench then proceeded to get it stuck on something when I put it down again. I looked down to see that the broom was now firmly secured to what I realized was a sticky mouse trap that Steve had put down a few months ago. I tugged and pulled to no avail.
Without thinking, I decided to try and secure the trap to the floor so that I could get some leverage, and without thinking I used my foot. Now, of course my shoe was stuck. I began pulling like a mad woman at both the broom and my foot, simultaneously cursing and laughing to myself at the ridiculous predicament that I had gotten myself into. I believe I was channeling Lucy Ricardo. I hopped over to the garage door and began yelling for Steve, who came out, took one look at me and collapsed laughing.
“Okay, Okay I know I look ridiculous, just get me out of this!”
“Why didn’t you just take your shoe off?” he managed to sputter still holding his sides.
I looked at him, looked down and realized that perhaps, just perhaps I had been doing a bit too much cleaning. It’s really not good for your brain or your soul. So after Steve got me unstuck I went upstairs, poured myself a glass of wine, put my feet up and decided that Mike and Mary would love us even if our mouse traps were dusty. After all, that’s why we love them.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Clipped Wings
Clipped Wings
My oldest daughter, Lisa, has been working as a summer camp counselor at the
Last week I headed into the city to have lunch with her at that famous chi-chi South End eatery—the Blackstone school cafeteria. After hearing Lisa’s horror stories about her group I’m not sure what I expected to see. Anything but the sweet little faces that looked at me so curiously wondering who this strange lady was who was lunching with their “Miss Lisa”. When Lisa told them that I was her mom, their jaws dropped open, “Really??!” they chorused not understanding the fact that counselors have moms.
“I don’t know,” she said to me. “They’re being really good today. I’m not sure what’s going on.” But then she remembered why they were being so angelic. That Friday they were going on their favorite field trip: an afternoon at a roller skating rink.
“It’s great having something to hold over their heads,” Lisa said. “If they act up I simply threaten them with not going to the rink and they stop instantly.” She was looking forward to the trip because she was sure that the kids would be having too much fun to get into trouble. I thought that one of the reasons that there wouldn’t be any problems is that most of the kids would have their hands full just staying upright. I know, because I’ve had the same problem.
Not when I was roller skating in my neighborhood though. All of us who grew up on the
Our skates were worn over our sneakers and their length and width were adjusted with a skate key. Everyone wore their key on a lanyard around their neck. They were indispensable and we wore them as badges of honor. I can still remember the concentration involved in getting the fit just right. Too loose and the skates would fly off your feet taking you with them, too tight and you couldn’t maneuver as well. But after buckling the leather straps just right and painstakingly adjusting the rest, you could fly the city streets. And that’s exactly what it felt like—flying. Those were freedoms that a kid could appreciate—speed, recklessness, daring.
Years later when Steve and I were first married we were walking along the
The owner fitted us and then explained the basics of turning and stopping, but I had no patience for him—after all I was a pro, I didn’t need his lessons. I just wanted to get out there, even though these shoe-skates felt different than my old ball bearings. But I was sure that I would be fine once I hit the streets. I eagerly stepped out the door and if it hadn’t been for Steve I would have immediately been sitting on my rear. Sure that it was only a fluke I started out again, only to almost fall on my face---again. What was going on here? Something was obviously wrong with these skates.
For the next hour, my childhood went down in flames. No matter what I tried I was always on the verge of falling. I had absolutely no control of those skates. I heard myself screaming, “Out of my way, out-of-control skater coming through!” to every kid, biker, jogger and baby carriage that I came upon, and on a Saturday along the Charles there were plenty of them. I was like Moses parting the sea. To my further humiliation Steve was doing just fine, so it was obviously not the skates but me.
Finally, almost in tears, I gave up.
“Enough! I want to take these skates back!” I yelled at Steve.
So back we went, the guy at the store asking us if everything was okay since we were back so soon. I just glared at him and gathered my battered pride as I huffed out of the store. Steve put his arm around me trying to console me for the loss of a childhood pleasure. I just sat there sadly realizing that I would have to find another way to fly.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Israeli Ramblings
Israeli Ramblings
Since leaving my Israeli home thirty three years ago I’ve always felt that I could return to live there whenever I chose. But in all my years of traveling there, this was the first summer that I suddenly felt that I couldn’t. It was a strange feeling and even stranger the moment I felt it. For years, even as life tossed out its usual detours, I had clung to the idea that I could always come back. But this year something had changed.
Returning was so comfortingly familiar, slipping into the well worn shoes of the sights, sounds and smells of my Middle Eastern home. And of course seeing mom again after the long months of separation was, as always, an oasis. After all the years every corner of mom’s apartment was home. Even the heat was part of the return ritual.
The beginning of the week wasn’t too bad. The days were bearable and the evenings comfortably cool for sleeping. Everyone told me how lucky I was to have missed the heat wave. I had to laugh. All of June, July, August and September is a heat wave, the soaring temperatures differing perhaps in a degree or two. But even a degree can make a difference as I was soon to remember, when the temperature began to climb along with the humidity and my crankiness.
It always scares me how susceptible I am to the weather, especially heat. I fell asleep hot and woke up hot looking forward to the moment when we would turn on the air conditioner. I drank cold water all day, inhaled ice and sometimes, when mom wasn’t looking, I would stick my head in the freezer.
But heat or no heat, you can’t sit in the house all day so mom and I would venture out in the morning to run errands and at night to try and catch a breeze somewhere. We met friends at blessedly air conditioned restaurants and tried strolling along the marina. I noticed that despite the 95 degree temperatures the women wore tight jeans. Their only concession to the heat was tank tops and sunglasses. I looked at them trying to figure out how they didn’t simply melt into a puddle of moisture on the sidewalk.
One morning I walked to the beach to gaze at the ocean then strolled along the main street checking to see which stores were still there and which had closed. I decided to pay my yearly call to the local department store, HaMashbir, to see if I could find a shirt. I usually don’t buy clothing in Israel because the prices are so outrageously high but I’d forgotten to pack a white blouse.
HaMashbir was having a sale so I headed to the women’s department hopeful that I might find something. I actually found a sleeveless t-shirt for forty Israeli shekels, about ten U.S. dollars, so I tried it on. Seeing that it fit, I asked a salesperson the price and she assured me that it was indeed just forty shekels. Then I checked the sale sign that was posted and it too boasted the same price. Feeling victorious I went to claim my prize.
The cashier asked me if I had a Hamashbir card and I told her that I didn’t. She looked at me as if I had two heads.
“Well would you like to apply for one?” she asked.
“No thank you,” I answered, “I don’t live in the country.”
“That has nothing to do with it, you can still get one!” she insisted.
Once again I refused then watched her ring up the shirt for eighty shekels.
“Wait a minute,” I told her, “That shirt is on sale.”
“Only if you have a card,” she retaliated. “It will only take a minute to get one right here.”
Oh for heavens sake. I gave in and said sure, whatever, then listened in astonishment as she told me that the card would cost me fifty shekels.
“Fifty shekels!!!! For a card?!”
“Of course,” she answered. “And it’s good for a whole year.”
“But I don’t live in the country so I wouldn’t be able to use the card!” I fairly screamed.
“So?” she countered. “But you’ll only be spending 40 shekels on the shirt.”
“But I wouldn’t be spending 40 shekels I would be spending 90 shekels on something that isn’t even worth it!”
By then, a crowd had gathered at the counter, everyone looking at me as if I were nuts. They understood the clerk’s logic perfectly well, so why couldn’t I? The icing on the cake was when the clerk asked me if I spoke any other language so that she could better explain this to me even though up until that point we had been conversing perfectly well in Hebrew.
It was at that moment, after telling her what she could do with the shirt and the card, that I realized that I could never live in Israel again. I could no longer understand the everyday logic that drove everyone. I felt like an American square peg in an Israeli round hole. My anger disappeared leaving me sad and nostalgic. In all the years that I had lived away I had grown away. And from now on I would be more tourist than citizen. And there wasn’t anything that I could do about it.
Since leaving my Israeli home thirty three years ago I’ve always felt that I could return to live there whenever I chose. But in all my years of traveling there, this was the first summer that I suddenly felt that I couldn’t. It was a strange feeling and even stranger the moment I felt it. For years, even as life tossed out its usual detours, I had clung to the idea that I could always come back. But this year something had changed.
Returning was so comfortingly familiar, slipping into the well worn shoes of the sights, sounds and smells of my Middle Eastern home. And of course seeing mom again after the long months of separation was, as always, an oasis. After all the years every corner of mom’s apartment was home. Even the heat was part of the return ritual.
The beginning of the week wasn’t too bad. The days were bearable and the evenings comfortably cool for sleeping. Everyone told me how lucky I was to have missed the heat wave. I had to laugh. All of June, July, August and September is a heat wave, the soaring temperatures differing perhaps in a degree or two. But even a degree can make a difference as I was soon to remember, when the temperature began to climb along with the humidity and my crankiness.
It always scares me how susceptible I am to the weather, especially heat. I fell asleep hot and woke up hot looking forward to the moment when we would turn on the air conditioner. I drank cold water all day, inhaled ice and sometimes, when mom wasn’t looking, I would stick my head in the freezer.
But heat or no heat, you can’t sit in the house all day so mom and I would venture out in the morning to run errands and at night to try and catch a breeze somewhere. We met friends at blessedly air conditioned restaurants and tried strolling along the marina. I noticed that despite the 95 degree temperatures the women wore tight jeans. Their only concession to the heat was tank tops and sunglasses. I looked at them trying to figure out how they didn’t simply melt into a puddle of moisture on the sidewalk.
One morning I walked to the beach to gaze at the ocean then strolled along the main street checking to see which stores were still there and which had closed. I decided to pay my yearly call to the local department store, HaMashbir, to see if I could find a shirt. I usually don’t buy clothing in Israel because the prices are so outrageously high but I’d forgotten to pack a white blouse.
HaMashbir was having a sale so I headed to the women’s department hopeful that I might find something. I actually found a sleeveless t-shirt for forty Israeli shekels, about ten U.S. dollars, so I tried it on. Seeing that it fit, I asked a salesperson the price and she assured me that it was indeed just forty shekels. Then I checked the sale sign that was posted and it too boasted the same price. Feeling victorious I went to claim my prize.
The cashier asked me if I had a Hamashbir card and I told her that I didn’t. She looked at me as if I had two heads.
“Well would you like to apply for one?” she asked.
“No thank you,” I answered, “I don’t live in the country.”
“That has nothing to do with it, you can still get one!” she insisted.
Once again I refused then watched her ring up the shirt for eighty shekels.
“Wait a minute,” I told her, “That shirt is on sale.”
“Only if you have a card,” she retaliated. “It will only take a minute to get one right here.”
Oh for heavens sake. I gave in and said sure, whatever, then listened in astonishment as she told me that the card would cost me fifty shekels.
“Fifty shekels!!!! For a card?!”
“Of course,” she answered. “And it’s good for a whole year.”
“But I don’t live in the country so I wouldn’t be able to use the card!” I fairly screamed.
“So?” she countered. “But you’ll only be spending 40 shekels on the shirt.”
“But I wouldn’t be spending 40 shekels I would be spending 90 shekels on something that isn’t even worth it!”
By then, a crowd had gathered at the counter, everyone looking at me as if I were nuts. They understood the clerk’s logic perfectly well, so why couldn’t I? The icing on the cake was when the clerk asked me if I spoke any other language so that she could better explain this to me even though up until that point we had been conversing perfectly well in Hebrew.
It was at that moment, after telling her what she could do with the shirt and the card, that I realized that I could never live in Israel again. I could no longer understand the everyday logic that drove everyone. I felt like an American square peg in an Israeli round hole. My anger disappeared leaving me sad and nostalgic. In all the years that I had lived away I had grown away. And from now on I would be more tourist than citizen. And there wasn’t anything that I could do about it.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Do You Know the Way to San Jose?
Do You Know the Way to San Jose?
I am so directionally challenged that if I were a lemming I couldn’t find my way off a cliff. People ask me which direction my house faces. “Why the street I tell them,” not entirely facetiously. Some folks are born with an internal compass that enables them to find their way out of the woods. I’m lucky that I find my way out of my house each morning. This is a failing that has been inherited by the Schottenfeld women—neither of my daughters excels directionally. When Mariel won a gorgeous compass as an award in Geology I was hysterical. She’s definitely going to need that.
My one redeeming directional feature is that once I’ve learned how to get somewhere I can find my way back again without breadcrumbs. It’s the initial trip that scares me. Thank God for my husband, Steve. He finds me directions and teaches me routes. Without him I would probably use a map to line the trunk of the car.
I thought my problems were finally solved when I bought myself a GPS. I pictured myself effortlessly following its directions, discovering new horizons, never being afraid of getting lost in the maze of Boston’s streets again. I was giddy with excitement. This is what Lewis and Clark must have felt like when they hired Sacagawea.
When the GPS arrived I drove the car out to the driveway so that the system could lock onto a satellite and I could begin to use this wondrous implement. I chose a soft woman’s voice as my navigator. She would be my traveling sister, leading me onward, never letting me get lost, choosing scenic byways and gently rolling hills. It was a nice fantasy while it lasted.
The first time I used it was on a route that I already knew. Mariel and I were running errands and I thought that it would be the perfect time to take the GPS out for a trial spin. The problem was that I was trying to read the map at the same time as I drove. Since I wasn’t wearing my reading glasses I was squinting like a nearsighted squirrel which resulted in a few near misses. Mariel yelled at me to keep my eyes on the road or she would rip the navigator off the windshield. I tried using it one more time, not much more successfully, and then left it sitting in its box, until I got a call from Lisa.
“Mom, I think I have the flu,” my poor daughter told me. “I feel so dizzy that I can’t get out of bed. Could you come tomorrow and take me to the doctor?”
“Of course,” I answered as any self-respecting mother would. “Can I bring you anything?”
“Well maybe some juice and some soup.”
“No problem,” I told her. “I’ll be there.”
Despite what I had told my daughter there was definitely a problem. I had never driven to her apartment in Somerville so I had no idea how to get there or for that matter how to get from her apartment to Beth Israel Hospital. I had my usual reaction to these kinds of situations: panic first then ask my long suffering husband to figure out how to get me from here to there and back again.
By the time he was done I had three sets of directions complete with maps and Powerpoint presentations, but just in case I decided to take the GPS for back up. You would think that I was traveling to Siberia. Luckily Lisa was feeling better so she could serve as my navigator. We work well as a team. She tells me where to go and I drive there. We agreed that the GPS added a certain charm to the whole adventure this time.
We had barely driven the few blocks to Mass Ave. when we had our first disagreement with Madame GPS. She insisted that we go left, but I was determined to go right and so I ignored her directions. When we reached Harvard Square the altercation escalated. Steve had instructed me to go down Massachusetts Avenue but Madame G. insisted on Memorial Drive. Each time I went one way, she insisted on another. Finally, after dealing with the crazy traffic and a GPS that was obviously experiencing PMS, I began to scream at the thing telling it what it could do with its directions and casting aspersions on its parenthood. Lisa was doubled up with laughter which was causing her to cough up a lung.
“What?!” I asked her. “You don’t sense the hostility that is emanating from this witch? What does she have against Mass Ave anyway? Lisa agreed that the voice coming from the plastic box did seem to be getting testier as I continued to ignore its directions. And then suddenly, ominously, it stopped altogether.
“Oh, oh,” Lisa said. “I think she’s seriously pissed off at us now.”
Well, we made it to the doctor and then back to Somerville and I even made it home. I agreed with Madame G’s directions so she seemed to calm down and by the end of the trip we were buddies. So who knows, maybe we’ll travel together again sometime. After all, she does seem to be a woman who knows where she’s going. And that’s more than I can say for myself.
I am so directionally challenged that if I were a lemming I couldn’t find my way off a cliff. People ask me which direction my house faces. “Why the street I tell them,” not entirely facetiously. Some folks are born with an internal compass that enables them to find their way out of the woods. I’m lucky that I find my way out of my house each morning. This is a failing that has been inherited by the Schottenfeld women—neither of my daughters excels directionally. When Mariel won a gorgeous compass as an award in Geology I was hysterical. She’s definitely going to need that.
My one redeeming directional feature is that once I’ve learned how to get somewhere I can find my way back again without breadcrumbs. It’s the initial trip that scares me. Thank God for my husband, Steve. He finds me directions and teaches me routes. Without him I would probably use a map to line the trunk of the car.
I thought my problems were finally solved when I bought myself a GPS. I pictured myself effortlessly following its directions, discovering new horizons, never being afraid of getting lost in the maze of Boston’s streets again. I was giddy with excitement. This is what Lewis and Clark must have felt like when they hired Sacagawea.
When the GPS arrived I drove the car out to the driveway so that the system could lock onto a satellite and I could begin to use this wondrous implement. I chose a soft woman’s voice as my navigator. She would be my traveling sister, leading me onward, never letting me get lost, choosing scenic byways and gently rolling hills. It was a nice fantasy while it lasted.
The first time I used it was on a route that I already knew. Mariel and I were running errands and I thought that it would be the perfect time to take the GPS out for a trial spin. The problem was that I was trying to read the map at the same time as I drove. Since I wasn’t wearing my reading glasses I was squinting like a nearsighted squirrel which resulted in a few near misses. Mariel yelled at me to keep my eyes on the road or she would rip the navigator off the windshield. I tried using it one more time, not much more successfully, and then left it sitting in its box, until I got a call from Lisa.
“Mom, I think I have the flu,” my poor daughter told me. “I feel so dizzy that I can’t get out of bed. Could you come tomorrow and take me to the doctor?”
“Of course,” I answered as any self-respecting mother would. “Can I bring you anything?”
“Well maybe some juice and some soup.”
“No problem,” I told her. “I’ll be there.”
Despite what I had told my daughter there was definitely a problem. I had never driven to her apartment in Somerville so I had no idea how to get there or for that matter how to get from her apartment to Beth Israel Hospital. I had my usual reaction to these kinds of situations: panic first then ask my long suffering husband to figure out how to get me from here to there and back again.
By the time he was done I had three sets of directions complete with maps and Powerpoint presentations, but just in case I decided to take the GPS for back up. You would think that I was traveling to Siberia. Luckily Lisa was feeling better so she could serve as my navigator. We work well as a team. She tells me where to go and I drive there. We agreed that the GPS added a certain charm to the whole adventure this time.
We had barely driven the few blocks to Mass Ave. when we had our first disagreement with Madame GPS. She insisted that we go left, but I was determined to go right and so I ignored her directions. When we reached Harvard Square the altercation escalated. Steve had instructed me to go down Massachusetts Avenue but Madame G. insisted on Memorial Drive. Each time I went one way, she insisted on another. Finally, after dealing with the crazy traffic and a GPS that was obviously experiencing PMS, I began to scream at the thing telling it what it could do with its directions and casting aspersions on its parenthood. Lisa was doubled up with laughter which was causing her to cough up a lung.
“What?!” I asked her. “You don’t sense the hostility that is emanating from this witch? What does she have against Mass Ave anyway? Lisa agreed that the voice coming from the plastic box did seem to be getting testier as I continued to ignore its directions. And then suddenly, ominously, it stopped altogether.
“Oh, oh,” Lisa said. “I think she’s seriously pissed off at us now.”
Well, we made it to the doctor and then back to Somerville and I even made it home. I agreed with Madame G’s directions so she seemed to calm down and by the end of the trip we were buddies. So who knows, maybe we’ll travel together again sometime. After all, she does seem to be a woman who knows where she’s going. And that’s more than I can say for myself.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Fractionally Challenged
Fractionally Challenged
Back in the days when dinosaurs walked the earth I learned about fractions. I didn’t have any major problems with them. They made sense, mostly, and I added and subtracted without too much strain on my part. But aside from occasionally cutting a pie to feed a group, I hadn’t thought about them since. I mean, who does? Percentages are concepts that you use everyday but fractions tend to stay shyly in the background of our lives. So when I learned that I would have to teach them this year I was worried. Understanding a subject does not equate to teaching it well. We’ve all had genius professors who couldn’t teach their way out of a paper bag.
I was determined that my class would truly understand the concept because I’ve learned, through painful experience, that learning by rote doesn’t prepare you for the unexpected and never teaches you to think. I began my lesson planning with one of the best math teachers I know, my husband, Steve. But even he wasn’t sure which approach to use since my students had very little math experience and most of it was bad. But luckily the next day I discovered the toys that were hiding in my classroom closet.
There was an entire collection of colorful, magnetic, fraction pies, strips, blocks and squares, all illustrating the various ways you could divide a whole. I played with them, experimenting with the different ways to take them apart and put them back together, and knew that they would be the key to helping my class understand fractions. I excitedly planned two weeks of lesson plans but when I told my class that we would begin studying fractions the next week they looked like deer caught in the headlights.
“Oh God, fractions!” Deanna wailed. “I hate fractions, they’re evil!”
I tried to assure her that we would go slowly and then I showed her the toys that we would be playing with, but she was still skeptical. Toys, shmoys, fractions had never been fun and no magnetic pies would make them fun now. It was then that I got the idea to bring am apple pie to the first class so we could divide and eat at the same time. I would make them understand this even if it meant gaining weight in the process!
The best laid plans. That Friday I received a phone call from my director telling me that the Blackstone school and center would be closed the next week due to swine flu. Now you know that you’re nuts when, instead of being ecstatic at the thought of an unexpected week’s paid vacation, you immediately go into cranky mode. It was a matter of timing. I kept thinking of all the things that I had to finish by the end of the year, the lost math lessons and the fact that I would just plain miss going to work. I was also not thrilled at having to call my entire school to tell them not to come in the next week but to be sure and come back the week after. I just knew that thanks to this enforced time-out I would lose all my students for the rest of the year.
And I was right. On Monday five people showed up for class. It didn’t help that we also had that Wednesday off (the infamous Bunker Hill holiday) and that Thursday was graduation. Everyone just assumed that school was out for the summer. I wanted to scream, but what’s a girl to do? I decided to teach the damn fractions to whoever came in and hope that a few hours of instruction would stick with them all summer. I am ever the optimist.
Surprisingly most of my class showed up. Though I hadn’t brought my pie I was stupid enough to tell them about it. They kept ribbing me about the dessert that I owed them throughout the lesson. I promised to bring one next year. Then I took out all my colorful playthings, took a deep breath and began. First we talked about what they knew or remembered about fractions and how they used them everyday without thinking about it. I explained that it was just another form of division and that no matter how many pieces you cut a pie into, it was still one pie when you put it back together again, just like Humpty Dumpty.
We moved magnetic strips around the board, drew pictures, folded paper, shaded squares, we did everything but eat pie. And then in the middle of the lesson the most wonderful moment of my teaching career happened. Deanna, a big smile on her face, blurted out, “This is fun!” I nearly cried. And thank goodness my, glass-is-half-empty-self did not push itself to the front of the class and say, “Yeah well it’s fun now but wait till we start adding and dividing these suckers!” I simply smiled and enjoyed the moment.
There are times in life when beyond all reason everything is truly perfect. And that day in a South End, GED classroom, it was. I just hope that I can hold onto it for the cold February mornings when everyone is tired, cranky and determined not to learn a thing. I’ll take it out, dust it off and sprinkle it around like teaching fairy dust. And then maybe we’ll have some pie.
Back in the days when dinosaurs walked the earth I learned about fractions. I didn’t have any major problems with them. They made sense, mostly, and I added and subtracted without too much strain on my part. But aside from occasionally cutting a pie to feed a group, I hadn’t thought about them since. I mean, who does? Percentages are concepts that you use everyday but fractions tend to stay shyly in the background of our lives. So when I learned that I would have to teach them this year I was worried. Understanding a subject does not equate to teaching it well. We’ve all had genius professors who couldn’t teach their way out of a paper bag.
I was determined that my class would truly understand the concept because I’ve learned, through painful experience, that learning by rote doesn’t prepare you for the unexpected and never teaches you to think. I began my lesson planning with one of the best math teachers I know, my husband, Steve. But even he wasn’t sure which approach to use since my students had very little math experience and most of it was bad. But luckily the next day I discovered the toys that were hiding in my classroom closet.
There was an entire collection of colorful, magnetic, fraction pies, strips, blocks and squares, all illustrating the various ways you could divide a whole. I played with them, experimenting with the different ways to take them apart and put them back together, and knew that they would be the key to helping my class understand fractions. I excitedly planned two weeks of lesson plans but when I told my class that we would begin studying fractions the next week they looked like deer caught in the headlights.
“Oh God, fractions!” Deanna wailed. “I hate fractions, they’re evil!”
I tried to assure her that we would go slowly and then I showed her the toys that we would be playing with, but she was still skeptical. Toys, shmoys, fractions had never been fun and no magnetic pies would make them fun now. It was then that I got the idea to bring am apple pie to the first class so we could divide and eat at the same time. I would make them understand this even if it meant gaining weight in the process!
The best laid plans. That Friday I received a phone call from my director telling me that the Blackstone school and center would be closed the next week due to swine flu. Now you know that you’re nuts when, instead of being ecstatic at the thought of an unexpected week’s paid vacation, you immediately go into cranky mode. It was a matter of timing. I kept thinking of all the things that I had to finish by the end of the year, the lost math lessons and the fact that I would just plain miss going to work. I was also not thrilled at having to call my entire school to tell them not to come in the next week but to be sure and come back the week after. I just knew that thanks to this enforced time-out I would lose all my students for the rest of the year.
And I was right. On Monday five people showed up for class. It didn’t help that we also had that Wednesday off (the infamous Bunker Hill holiday) and that Thursday was graduation. Everyone just assumed that school was out for the summer. I wanted to scream, but what’s a girl to do? I decided to teach the damn fractions to whoever came in and hope that a few hours of instruction would stick with them all summer. I am ever the optimist.
Surprisingly most of my class showed up. Though I hadn’t brought my pie I was stupid enough to tell them about it. They kept ribbing me about the dessert that I owed them throughout the lesson. I promised to bring one next year. Then I took out all my colorful playthings, took a deep breath and began. First we talked about what they knew or remembered about fractions and how they used them everyday without thinking about it. I explained that it was just another form of division and that no matter how many pieces you cut a pie into, it was still one pie when you put it back together again, just like Humpty Dumpty.
We moved magnetic strips around the board, drew pictures, folded paper, shaded squares, we did everything but eat pie. And then in the middle of the lesson the most wonderful moment of my teaching career happened. Deanna, a big smile on her face, blurted out, “This is fun!” I nearly cried. And thank goodness my, glass-is-half-empty-self did not push itself to the front of the class and say, “Yeah well it’s fun now but wait till we start adding and dividing these suckers!” I simply smiled and enjoyed the moment.
There are times in life when beyond all reason everything is truly perfect. And that day in a South End, GED classroom, it was. I just hope that I can hold onto it for the cold February mornings when everyone is tired, cranky and determined not to learn a thing. I’ll take it out, dust it off and sprinkle it around like teaching fairy dust. And then maybe we’ll have some pie.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Missing Filene's
Missing Filene’s
Bidding wars are big news around here lately. Two Boston institutions, The Globe and Filene’s Basement, are courting suitors to avoid sliding into oblivion. Though I was born in New York City I’ve lived here since 1976—long enough for me to feel like a native daughter and definitely long enough for these battles to feel personal. I can’t remember a morning that I did not read the Globe and as for Filene’s, well, it holds a special place in my transplanted, New England heart.
Steve and I were married in 1976. That summer my folks came to visit us in our North Shore apartment. Woburn was a bit of a shock for them. Mom and Dad had always gotten around by foot or public transportation and in Woburn that was a challenge. When they took a walk the neighbors would ask them what they were doing. No one walked in the suburbs—why bother when you’ve got a car? In desperation they asked us if there was any way for them to get into Boston by bus.
There actually was a T stop in front of our apartment complex and a schedule revealed that a bus came by about once an hour. That’s all my folks needed. The next day they were off. They came home that night telling us how they had walked around all day taking in the city sights. But the place that they enjoyed most was Filene’s Basement. They showed me a beautiful raincoat that they had bought for my dad and when they told me the price my jaw dropped. The next time they went, I went with them.
Dad, who was from Poland, pronounced Filene’s as “Fihlaine’s” and though at first I thought it was funny, I learned later that Filene’s was founded in 1881 by William Filene, a Jewish immigrant from Prussia who immigrated to Boston in 1848. I wondered if that wasn’t how Mr. Filene pronounced his name before the immigration officials changed it for him.
My first time in the Basement was love at first shop. The piles of stuff on the tables didn’t tempt me but I loved going through the racks. I also liked the fact that the clothing was not cheap seconds but good quality. That was due to the fact that Edward Filene had opened the automatic bargain annex, or basement, in 1908 as a way to sell excess, but still first class merchandise, from his upstairs department store. My dad’s tailor eye for fabric and workmanship helped me realize just how good the merchandise really was. And then there was the wonderful shopping moment when you looked at the ticket and saw the price. It was like hitting the lottery.
It took me a while though to get used to trying on clothes in the middle of the floor. The first time I saw a woman strip down to her underwear in the aisles I nearly passed out. But I caught on. I would wear leotards under my clothes on my shopping days and strip off with the best of them. I also learned to hold on to what I wanted.
One day as I was trying on a dress I put a skirt down next to me and before I could stand up a woman scooped it up and ran off with it. And even as I stood there flabbergasted another woman asked me if I was going to take the skirt that was draped over my arm or what? “I sure am!” I yelled at her, amazed at the predatory streak (and Boston accent) that had suddenly appeared. I didn’t even buy the skirt but I sure wasn’t going to give it to her! Then there were times when women would offer unsolicited fashion advice. You’d feel grateful until you realized that the reason she just told you that the skirt made you look fat was because she wanted it for herself. Ah the memories.
A large part of the pleasure of shopping the basement was that it was one-of-a-kind. It wasn’t a vanilla chain store that you could find in every mall in the U.S. It was crazy, unusual--each trip an adventure that you could regale your friends with later. Could you imagine a running-of-the-brides event at the GAP?
I know I’m prone to nostalgia but it saddens me that we lose originality each time another local business is bought out by a huge corporation. They call it progress. I call it laziness and a certain lack of courage. Why didn’t the Boston public protest Filene’s or Jordan Marsh’s closing like the resident’s of Chicago did when Marshall Field’s was closed in 2007? People there are still protesting. There is even a website, fieldsfanschicago.org, that organizes a boycott, leaflets, buttons, and publicizes polls taken by shoppers. Bostonians grieved for a bit but no one demanded that a piece of Boston’s history be revitalized. And now all we have is Macy’s. Is vanilla really our favorite flavor?
I’m tired of finding the same stores wherever I go. I travel to push myself out of my safe-zone. To find different, quirky, unique. And when I’m home I want to read my news with a Boston slant and shop stores that shout New England. I root for the Red Sox, pahk my cah and eat jimmies on my ice cream. That’s why I live here. I’m just not a Macy’s gal.
Bidding wars are big news around here lately. Two Boston institutions, The Globe and Filene’s Basement, are courting suitors to avoid sliding into oblivion. Though I was born in New York City I’ve lived here since 1976—long enough for me to feel like a native daughter and definitely long enough for these battles to feel personal. I can’t remember a morning that I did not read the Globe and as for Filene’s, well, it holds a special place in my transplanted, New England heart.
Steve and I were married in 1976. That summer my folks came to visit us in our North Shore apartment. Woburn was a bit of a shock for them. Mom and Dad had always gotten around by foot or public transportation and in Woburn that was a challenge. When they took a walk the neighbors would ask them what they were doing. No one walked in the suburbs—why bother when you’ve got a car? In desperation they asked us if there was any way for them to get into Boston by bus.
There actually was a T stop in front of our apartment complex and a schedule revealed that a bus came by about once an hour. That’s all my folks needed. The next day they were off. They came home that night telling us how they had walked around all day taking in the city sights. But the place that they enjoyed most was Filene’s Basement. They showed me a beautiful raincoat that they had bought for my dad and when they told me the price my jaw dropped. The next time they went, I went with them.
Dad, who was from Poland, pronounced Filene’s as “Fihlaine’s” and though at first I thought it was funny, I learned later that Filene’s was founded in 1881 by William Filene, a Jewish immigrant from Prussia who immigrated to Boston in 1848. I wondered if that wasn’t how Mr. Filene pronounced his name before the immigration officials changed it for him.
My first time in the Basement was love at first shop. The piles of stuff on the tables didn’t tempt me but I loved going through the racks. I also liked the fact that the clothing was not cheap seconds but good quality. That was due to the fact that Edward Filene had opened the automatic bargain annex, or basement, in 1908 as a way to sell excess, but still first class merchandise, from his upstairs department store. My dad’s tailor eye for fabric and workmanship helped me realize just how good the merchandise really was. And then there was the wonderful shopping moment when you looked at the ticket and saw the price. It was like hitting the lottery.
It took me a while though to get used to trying on clothes in the middle of the floor. The first time I saw a woman strip down to her underwear in the aisles I nearly passed out. But I caught on. I would wear leotards under my clothes on my shopping days and strip off with the best of them. I also learned to hold on to what I wanted.
One day as I was trying on a dress I put a skirt down next to me and before I could stand up a woman scooped it up and ran off with it. And even as I stood there flabbergasted another woman asked me if I was going to take the skirt that was draped over my arm or what? “I sure am!” I yelled at her, amazed at the predatory streak (and Boston accent) that had suddenly appeared. I didn’t even buy the skirt but I sure wasn’t going to give it to her! Then there were times when women would offer unsolicited fashion advice. You’d feel grateful until you realized that the reason she just told you that the skirt made you look fat was because she wanted it for herself. Ah the memories.
A large part of the pleasure of shopping the basement was that it was one-of-a-kind. It wasn’t a vanilla chain store that you could find in every mall in the U.S. It was crazy, unusual--each trip an adventure that you could regale your friends with later. Could you imagine a running-of-the-brides event at the GAP?
I know I’m prone to nostalgia but it saddens me that we lose originality each time another local business is bought out by a huge corporation. They call it progress. I call it laziness and a certain lack of courage. Why didn’t the Boston public protest Filene’s or Jordan Marsh’s closing like the resident’s of Chicago did when Marshall Field’s was closed in 2007? People there are still protesting. There is even a website, fieldsfanschicago.org, that organizes a boycott, leaflets, buttons, and publicizes polls taken by shoppers. Bostonians grieved for a bit but no one demanded that a piece of Boston’s history be revitalized. And now all we have is Macy’s. Is vanilla really our favorite flavor?
I’m tired of finding the same stores wherever I go. I travel to push myself out of my safe-zone. To find different, quirky, unique. And when I’m home I want to read my news with a Boston slant and shop stores that shout New England. I root for the Red Sox, pahk my cah and eat jimmies on my ice cream. That’s why I live here. I’m just not a Macy’s gal.
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