For Barb's Information

The prep begins the day before. You are told through pamphlet and phone calls to eat a liquid diet. Broth, fruit juices, water, flavored seltzer. But they add in ominous overtones, NOTHING with blue, purple or green dye in it. Or was it red dye? Well, whatever, so you drink your breakfast and lunch and think, well, this is no big deal. But then comes the drinking of the evil liquid. Six ounces poured into a large plastic cup, you add water to fill to the 16 ounce line and begin to drink. You were warned that it tastes like sea water, or some noxious chemical. To me it had a slight fake grape aftertaste. Of course, I really hate fake grape anything, so this was not a selling point to me. You are told to drink it all down then follow up with two sixteen ounce glasses of water. I finished the weird drink and felt full. But I still had 32 ounces of water to take in within an hour. I sat and sipped while reading, waiting for something to happen. But nothing did for a while. I decided I needed to move to sort of "get things going" so I began to walk around the house. Then I realized I had only had a little of the "follow up" water. I went in to get some more and tried gulping it down. But I still felt full. And the water made me feel fuller. I started sloshing around the house again. And then I had to get to the bathroom very quickly, where I stayed for the next two hours. It was okay in a way. I had my reading materials. I had my iPad to play games on. But every time I thought things were slowing down, and I moved to the room next to the bathroom, oops, I had to hotfoot it back to the bathroom again. I didn't feel queasy, or crampy. It was just sort of, well like someone had turned on a faucet and left it on. You wouldn't think a person who was on liquids all day could possibly have that much in them!

But then the worse part comes. Because you think things have finally slowed down enough to sit for a while when you realize it's time to take the next liquid dose of the mystery chemical! Another sixteen ounces. And this time it seemed harder to get it all down. The gag reflex was working, and even though the directions tell you that you have x amount of time to finish the drink, you REALLY, REALLY want to finish it as soon as possible because it's really starting to taste bad now.  And you still have to drink another 32ounces of water after this! You don't believe it's humanly possible to swallow this much liquid and aren't you all flushed out anyway? And the answer is no, you're not.  So it's back into the bathroom again for a few more hours and you are beginning to be cold and sleepy and you are pretty sure you are either going into shock or something when your body finally, finally, let's you drag yourself to the bed, where you fall into a fitful slumber, dreaming of bathrooms and endless glasses of water and the sound do the toilet paper roll running out of paper.

The morning comes. Your appointment is happily in the morning so you can get it over with quickly. You dress, visit the bathroom a couple of more times (hard to believe ther's anything left), and finally you ge to the surgical center and

EVERYONE is so nice. It's like they realize that the prep is so gross, they want to make up for it. You are whisked away for an IV, a quick consult with the anesthetist, and you find yourself in the operating room getting an injection to put you to sleep. When you awaken, you are full of gas, but that passes quickly. Then you are up, given cookies and soda and sent on your way with the information that since a polyp was found, you will be visiting in three years.

And, that Barb, is what to expect!

Late Night Melancholia

I really want to be asleep right now. I closed my eyes about an hour ago and they just opened and stayed that way. Heavy sigh. I got up. What's the use of trying to sleep when your mind is running, running, running. There are a million and one things to think about right now and they are crowding into the brain at alarming speed. However, I am shoving them to the side (or back or whichever lobe has room at the moment). And the reason is this: I just re-read my older brother's blog post from April. He celebrated the 6th anniversary of his blog with a jaunty playlist and some honest realizations.  I went on to read the comments because I didn't remember if I had commented and wanted to see what others wrote. And there was my other brother commenting in his insightful and wistful way. And I realized I missed them.

When you grow up and move away from family, you start to rework your priorities. Everyone knows this. and Everyone does it. You begin to carve out time for the spouse, the pets, the kids, the job, then the taking care of the house, then the taking care of the kids, then the cleaning of said house, then the maintenance of the car, then the maintenance of the marriage, then--hopefully--the maintenance of sanity by finding a small space to simply stop and breathe. And with all this rearranging of self and time and space, you suddenly notice that its been weeks--no, let's be honest, months since you've conversed with the people you used to live with 24/7. Now, if you don't happen to like your parents or your siblings, this could be freeing and indeed liberating. However, if, like me, you enjoy your family and find them comforting and good companions, this is the opposite of being free. You suddenly feel guilty for having a life outside of them. So you decide to reach out to them and find they are busy with their lives and they haven't gotten to that point yet of, oh, yeah, we haven't talked for a while, have we? So you back off and don't talk to them for even longer, because you don't want to whine or be a pest. It's not a happy place to be.

Recently some people that I thought would always be there were suddenly not. One of them passed away and the other one is moving. I had a rush of feeling that nothing is permanent. No one is there for you all the time. And maybe I'm not quite as lovable as I hoped I was. It's a ridiculous train of thought since the world doesn't revolve around me, but my perception kept poking at me. And then I thought, wait, this isn't true. My family is permanent. My siblings and I really love each other and are there when we need to be. And so I dab my leaky eyes at midnight, thinking of my brothers and sister who I love very much. And hoping they know how much I think of them even when I'm up in the middle of the night, with way too much to think about.

The Name is Gom

I have two talented, wonderful children. I don't say this often enough. Or even loudly enough. They bring joy and laughter as well as heart bumping angst. Don't all children?

My oldest has a birthday today. I remember her early steps around the perimeter of the living room at Talking Stair Inn. She was so proud of her accomplishment. And we were so excited to have such a sunny, beautiful little girl. I remember our early walks, she stopping every few feet to admire a leaf, a dandelion, or a particularly interesting stick. We would, of course, have to bring the stick home with us to admire at a later time. There was quite a collection of them at the back door. I remember walking to the local elementary school, golden ringlets bobbing down the street, and attacking the swing set with fierce joy. She would belt the ABCs whilst reaching to the sky with those pink and white sneakers. I remember the smile on her face as I came to pick her up at Nursery School. I remember the frowning concentration of drawing and coloring at the little yellow table.

When I see her as a young woman now, it seems like those memories are a million years away. They happened to two other people, distinct from the two of us. But then she smiles joyfully at her accomplishments and I am whisked away to the time of sunny afternoons singing the ABC song holding a little hand, and a stick in the other, ringlets bobbing down the sidewalk.

Happy Birthday sweetie. Love you lots!

Ambivalent Mourning

A person I know died this week. Actually, that's inaccurate. Two people I know died. One is much beloved and his passing will leave a hole in my life for a while. But the other person, well, she's a little harder to define in terms of the space in my life where she used to be.

The woman who died, was in a plane crash. She was a dynamic sort of person. She was always moving. Walking, running, talking, doing, doing, doing. She could be annoying in her movement, if you were in her way, if you didn't move at the same pace, if you didn't see the next place to be was important. Bur I liked the courage of her convictions, even if they weren't mine. I appreciated her drive, even if I didn't have the same. And I did like her smile, which she gave out generously. But, I hadn't really seen her lately. I used to run into her in the local town and find out what she was up to. But when I heard of her death, I realized how long it had been since I actually saw her. She was a part of the landscape in our town. One of those people you just saw from time to time and updated the goings on when she stood still enough to talk. We knew each other better when our children were in the same preschool, although I think my youngest was a year older than hers. There was a fluctuating group of moms who congregated in the local cafe before picking up the kids and she was of that group. There were also a few of us who went to an exercise class before pick up time and she was definitely a part of that group as well. It's hard for me to believe I won't see her again. She was younger than me. It seems harder to swallow when someone younger than you dies so suddenly. There were still some things we had left to say to each other. There were still some memories to share. The weird thing is, if I were to send a sympathy card to her kids, they wouldn't have a clue who I was. It's hard to mourn someone you knew, who you talked to, but never really got to know at all. Bye, Marc.

Patriotic Tics

Every Memorial Day, the bubble "celebrates" or more likely honors those who have gone before us in the service to our country. They march down Main Street, they stop at the memorial placed on the high school grounds. There are a few speeches and a gun salute. Then everyone merrily goes on their way to a picnic or family barbecue and the wreath placed there is left to disintegrate unless someone thinks to remove it. I'm not complaining, really. It's a nice way to remember those who gave such sacrifice without overpowering the day itself. I don't get choked up with this memorial, I don't know if anyone does for that matter. Perhaps if I went somewhere in a grander scale, like say, Arlington cemetery in Virginia, I would be affected.

But I will tell you what makes me full of patriotic pride. When I hear The Star Spangled Banner played somewhere other than a sporting event. When I hear Taps. When I do go the cemetery and visit my father's grave and am surrounded by all those little American flags someone puts on the grave sites. That's when I remember that I live in a country where I am free. I don't want to talk politics today, or sermonize about how democracy has been shot to hell and we're worse off than ever before. There are days I believe it. But today, with a small breeze rippling through the grave flags, and Taps still lingering on the air, no, I believe that America is beautiful and I give thanks to the Lord for the people who fought for the right for me to be able to say it out loud.

So thank you to all who served, living or dead. My heart swells with pride for the country we are so privileged to live in. Thank you for your dedication to that right to live free.

Life is Full of...Discuss

How can life be so full of goodness and exuberance and light one day and be so damned depressing the next? We spent a recent afternoon with family a little while ago. Lots of laughter, smiles, hugs and baby-adoring. A good afternoon for sure. This past week at work I have endured petty squabbles, gossip of the worst kind, and a boatload of self-doubt.

I want to rise above all that negativity and float amongst the fluffy clouds again. ButI have one more day before the weekend and it looks like another baffling, wearying, day do swimming up stream. I am sorry this post isn't helping the way I thought it might.

I'm going to bed. As Scarlett would say, "Tomorrow is another day."

A Rearranging of Self

So, here's the thing...I was looking for something on the small shelf next to the headboard of my bed. If you were to ask me what it was I was looking for I would be unable to tell you. Because a series of things took place that completely obliterated whatever it was.

I began to notice that there seemed to be a lot of dust accumulated on this shelf. Then I noticed the headboard, which has a shelf built into it was quite dusty as well. Granted I can't remember the last time I took a dusting to the bedroom, which I suppose is telling in itself. Anyway, on the shelf on the headboard I have placed books that I return to again and again. There is something about these particular books which calls to me at different times. There is a copy of The Once And Future King by T.H. White, there is a romance entitled, Slightly Dangerous by Mary Balogh and there are a number of books by Robert Fulghum. He writes so wonderfully and honest. And his writings are usually short pieces that, to tell you the truth, make me want to write just like him. So I'm standing there immobile looking at the dust on these tomes, when I remember a piece Fulghum wrote about dust. Something about it being made up of pieces of humans and meteorites. I loved that writing. So, instead of dusting off the books, I begin picking them up and, after blowing the dust onto the bedroom carpet, leaf through them to find the passage I'm thinking of. Along the way of course, I find those other writings of his that I so loved; the one about the ashes of a deceased being poured out a plane and coming right back in the aircraft; the one about the kid who raked his leaves; the one about the Mother of the Bride. I was totally engrossed and realized that it was about an hour later and I was supposed to be leaving to go somewhere! I put the books back on the dusty shelf and hurried on my way.

Just as I was sitting down to write this post I noticed the books again, not so dusty now as I had essentially dusted them when I was looking through them and thought, you know, I really should get out the dust cloth. Instead I've decided to post this and go back to look for that  writing about dust. It was really good. And I can always dust Saturday.

The Reality of Movies

This past weekend, hubby and I watched a movie about an author who reluctantly sold her rights to a book she wrote to a huge movie studio. It was based on the truth, but it wasn't totally the truth. Hubby shared that he read somewhere that the studio head, played by Tom Hanks (one of my very favorist actors of all time), was not shown smoking and this particular studio head smoked like a chimney. The article criticized the movie for this point. Really? That's what decided the "realness" of the movie for you? That the character portrayed on the big screen didn't puff away? The fact that the female character vascillated between memory and present tense didn't't bother you, but the lack of cigarettes did? Buddy, whoever you are, you need to get a life!

Movies, no matter how real we think they are, no matter how "stick to the facts" we say they are, are make believe. I reiterate for those who aren't sure they heard me. They are make believe. You can be sure that a plot twist or a juicy scandal would be inserted in even the blandest of true stories if the movie maker thought it would get you to buy a ticket. For heaven's sake, documentaries are even edited to give us more action! This is what makes going to the movies so much fun. Movies are ENTERTAINMENT. Their sole purpose is to take your mind off of whatever you are obsessing about at the moment and suspend reality.

Anyone who doesn't comprehend that, needs to rethink. And get on the boat to Fantasyland, which is the starting point for movies in the first place. Oh, and stub out your cigarette, you're in the theatre, buddy!

Getting to The Foot of The Matter

I'm thinking about feet this evening. Mainly because mine are sore. For some reason they are aching. Well, everything is aching really. The workout at the gym was hard yesterday and so today I'm feeling every one of my years. But my feet are especially complaining. I didn't really do any exercises for my feet so I don't know what they're grousing about.

Feet are weird anyway. I mean if you really think about them, they are the only horizontal appendages you have. They keep you upright. But finding shoes for them is a problem. No, it's not because my feet are overly large or small or deformed in some way. They are just regular feet, I guess. No, the problem lies in my unwillingness to buy shoes. A lot of women I know love shoe shopping. My daughter is one of them. She has pairs of shoes that look to me exactly the same as some other pair, but she swears are completely different. I just don't get the whole shoe buying frenzy. I own two pairs of brown shoes and three pairs of black. I can never seem to get around to throwing away my old sneakers so I have more of these than anything else. They are under the bed with the dust bunnies. In fact, I think that's where the dust bunnies live! Who am I to throw some creature out of its habitat? And shoes that are comfortable? Well, they feel fine in the store walking up and down the aisle a few times. But when you come home and try to wear them to work? You wonder what you were thinking as your toes are squashed and your ankle bones are rubbed raw. I have found a place to get good shoes, but the price makes me go there only once every two years when I've saved enough to buy one pair. They are NOT designer shoes either. They look like shoes my grandmother wore. But they are comfortable both in the store and out. I own a couple pairs of sandals too. But my feet are usually cold, even in the summer, so they look brand new even though they are a couple of years old as wearing sandals with socks is just wrong. No matter who is wearing them.

So I'm sitting here with my feet up, wearing socks of course, and trying to decide which to wear tomorrow, the brown or the black. It's easier when you only have two choices!

Learning to fish

I just read a daily devotion that used this line, "Jesus taught us to fish from the other side of the boat." It is sticking to my mind and seem to be caught there.

I've noticed over the years that I don't always follow a linear path. My general approach to things seems to be "let's try this until it doesn't work anymore." This approach to just about anything has sometimes tripped me up. I've found out that a short cut exists where I would travel the long way for years. Someone would point out a way to do something that appeared so logical and astoundingly easy, that I would smack my head surprised that I hadn't thought of it myself. It seems to me that finding out that the fish are on the other side of the boat pretty much sums up what happens to me regularly. But the problem is , I don't recognize that I'm doing this until someone points it out to me. So I'm not exactly sure how to "break the cycle" if I'm not even aware I'm in one!

This will take some pondering. I'll let you know what I come up with.

The Front Steps

I've always been a step sitter. As a child at the old homestead, I recall sitting there watching bugs trundle across the cement sidewalk. I would watch how the trees whispered to each other in the summer breezes. We had two steps to the front door. They were brick, I think. The cement slab before the door didn't count as a step, just the steps themselves. They were warm in the summer. And even if the sun was bright in the winter they were kinda warm. I would watch the cars and trucks and kids on bikes go by, although it wasn't that busy of a street. I could watch my brother play cars or toss a football, then decide I would join him, if he let me, that is. Some days I would just sit there and watch the world go by for a long time, dreaming, wishing, puzzling for what seemed like hours.

When I grew up, the first house we owned had an enclosed porch. There were steps out front, but I don't recall having much time to sit then. Until we moved to the new house, I seemed to have kept indoors to sit and think. Of course we had a toddler to walk around with before too long and sitting seemed out of the question.

The house we moved to has five brick steps. The house was built in 1926 and the bricks on the facade and the steps look to be that old. As the children (yes, there were two by then), grew, they loved to step sit with their mom. We would watch the birds fly by and name them if we could. We watched the plants grow, felt the sun on our faces, waved to the neighbors. The cats would come and sit with me, getting a scratch behind the ears. Sometimes they would settle near me and watch the birds with more interest than I. When the children were in school, and before I was working, I would wander out on nice days before they came home and wait for them. They would come chattering down the street (or slouch sullenly during middle school years) and we would share a few moments looking at artwork or homework or talk about the doings of the day. Occasionally, I would wonder what it would feel like when they moved out, sitting here in the sun watching other kids come home.

And so now, I don't have to wonder anymore. The children have indeed moved on and out. Hubby and I have the place to ourselves. I still like to step sit, although it seems harder to get up from them now. I watch the neighbors children come home from school, I see the cat from down the street pause on the sidewalk in front of our house and watch me watching him. And I can still hear the trees whispering to each other in the breeze. Some things just don't change.

In the Still of the Night

I have returned from a trip to see my son. In some ways I wished I had never left. Because when you come home everything is pushed up on the calendar and you no longer have weeks in which to accomplish them. You have days, sometimes hours. And they are things you meant to do earlier. They are things you need to have done, in a timely fashion. But time is not and probably never will be your friend. And you face these things in the dead of night, while everyone else is blissfully snoring in their beds.

When the world is in slumber, I should be sleeping. But I'm making a list, then a sub list, then an even smaller sub list of what needs to be accomplished. I do not resent going to see my son. I resent the mess when I come home. And it seems night-time is the time to think about it. And wonder about what would happen if I missed this deadline or that on the horizon.

What is it about the night? I've spent a goodly portion of them sitting or half-reclining on the couch in the living room staring at the screen of the laptop or the iPad. Playing endless games of solitaire. Reading stupid books that I haven't really enjoyed just to get bored enough to fall off to sleep. When I was pregnant with my children, night was the time I paced the floors and wondered what kind of crazy person I was bringing a child into the world such as it is (or was about 30 years ago). And there are those nights when it might as well be the middle of the afternoon for how un-sleepy I have felt. Time drags when you can't sleep. I don't care what Einstein said, light at night slows down and there is no way an hour is just an hour.

I have spent a significant portion of nights finishing up really good books that I couldn't put down. Those are the nights when I finally stumble upstairs, bleary eyed but content that I figured out the plot before actually finishing the book.  There were occasionally books that freaked me out at night. When the boogey man definitely is waiting at the top of the stairs after I have turned off the lights to go up to the bedroom. A couple of them disconcerted me so much that sleeping never came until the dawn. I try to avoid them as I'm not pleasant when I don't get my 7 hours. With no sleep at all? Well, it's just not a good thing, trust me.

I've had more regrets, more sobering thoughts, more depression than at any other time when this part of the world is sleeping. I seem to be able to  enlarge and extrapolate troubles in the "dark watches". I become convinced that certain problems will never sort themselves out or certain unpleasantness will inevitably happen when faced with endless darkness (or at least about 10 hours of it). Sunlight seems to make me more rational. Starlight makes me a little crazy. I believe in magic more at night. I believe the impossible can and most likely does happen then. And when the sun comes up and proves me wrong, I shake my head at my foolishness until the sun goes down again and I wander the dark, looking for some light.

Moving to..What is that?

I decided recently, that I should begin an exercise program again. I had not done anything physical except walk for a long time. Lest you think I was a regular walking fiend, I walked only when the mood struck, which wasn't very often at all. I joined a gym in the same town we live in. I liked that its never an "open gym". You have to train with someone there. This is really good for me, asif I know someone is going to be there for me, I will make an effort to show up. I was never good with independent study at school either.

So here I am "suiting up" so to speak. I even bought new sneakers. The trainer is really nice. A good listener. She seems to know how far to push me and I remember now what aches and pains felt like when I exercised all those years ago. It's not a large space, so it keeps me from getting lost in a crowd. So far so good.

There is really only one thing I would complain about. It isn't really a big thing, but you see the music she plays? Well, let's just say it's not really my thing too much. Most of it just sounds like noise, but she apparently thinks it's motivating. I guess it could be. But I like music I recognize. Which is probably the kind of music that really isn't that great to work out to. Let's face it you really can't work up a sweat to Sinatra too much. So, maybe I'll learn to like whatever this stuff is she puts on. Or maybe I'll just switch off the hearing aids. And lip read. Sigh. I was never very good with change.

Sports as a Learning Experience, Discuss

I was reminded of something today regarding sports. But before I share the picture which was brought forward so clearly to my mind, I have to fill in some details. I like sports. I really like to watch pro baseball and football. I will occasionally watch basketball, ice hockey, even golf (though it usually has to be around the 16th hole or I turn the channel). I am not and probably never will be a rabid fan of any one sport, it just doesn't move me the way a book does. BUT when our kids were growing up, I knew it was important to play sports for lots of reasons. They learned how to use their bodies to do something besides watch television. They learned to be part of a team. They learned the rules of a game and how to conduct themselves when representing their town in traveling around local towns playing their sport of choice. When our kids were growing up, soccer had become all the rage. Parents were encouraging their kids to play when the kids could barely understand the concept of "kick the ball". Both of our children wanted and liked to play soccer. They were not star athletes by any means, but they consistently showed up and did their part. They were not picked to be part of the elitist traveling teams, but I didn't think this was tragic. They learned something from that as well, I like to think. Something along the lines of, "not everyone can be a superstar at everything." A good life lesson in my opinion.

So, today, the lady I work with and I were discussing our sons and the sports they participated in. Her sons did karate for a while (she shared her terror of having one son race towards her as she held a block of wood to be annilated by his foot--as she dropped it and waited for the impact). And that's when I saw this picture in my mind. It has been dormant for a while, but it was so clear, I was transported just for a few moments.

Picture if you will, a tall, gangly young man in his freshman year of high school. He has played soccer since he was knee high to a grasshopper and it is the only sport he is interested in playing. He is not consumed with it, as some of his contemporaries are, he is simply interested. There are stellar players on the team, to be sure, but this is freshman year in a four year school and the school has a generous no-cut policy which means everyone who wants to play is suited up. The mother of this young man (me), is just happy he's out in the sunshine getting some fresh air. However, into the first few weeks of the season, it has become apparent that the coach is out to win at all costs. Therefore, the less than outstanding members of the team will not be playing in any game. They will be observing their team mates running up and down the field exhausting themselves, while the bench sitters get neck strain watching, but not participating in the action. I am appalled. And annoyed. And beyond livid when during one such game, played in the pouring rain, the bench sitters sat huddled together getting cold and wet while the super stars were wiped down with towels when they arrived gasping for air at this same bench. I did not intervene. My son learned any number of lessons that season. He also never played any sport in high school after that. And why would he? He was embarrassed enough that season, why go through that again?

He is accomplished and grown up now. He probably doesn't even remember the incident above. But I do. That coach's son attends the high school my son once attended and I wonder if he will be treated the same. Somehow I think not. And it's a curiosity to me why I still remember this so clearly after all these years. But remember it I do. Sports can be a good thing or a bad. Discuss among yourselves, but leave me out of it, thank you. I probably wouldn't be very objective.

Daffodils

It's been a long winter. This neck of the woods has been smothered in snow this year. Not blanketed, mind you. Inundated with it. Even little kids are rolling their eyes when someone suggests that another snow day could be in the offing. Most of the adults I know turn off the weather on the nightly news as the weather person gleefully announces another snow storm predicted. Enough we think, enough already.

So in the past few days the temperature has risen and the remaining small clumps of the white stuff has disappeared. The mountainous hills in the shopping center parking lots will no doubt be there until June. But the local turf is peeking through. I walked to my gym appointment this afternoon as it was finally not frigid. And I saw the slender stalks of daffodils pushing up through the ivy in the front yard. The second flower to come out in our area, crocuses being the first. They are one of my favorite flowers, daffodils. They announce Spring is coming. They are optimistic, daffodils are. They come up some years right through the icy crust of winter, defiantly shoving their yellow and white heads towards the weak sunlight. Their frilled crowns in the center seem almost trumpet-like. Make way! They broadcast. Make way for warmer days, more sun, fragrant air! It's hard to be grumpy with these things staring you in the face.

I bought some specialty daffodils from one of those catalog companies a couple of years ago. Some came up, but the squirrels enjoyed them more than I did, digging them up as a special treat I planted just for them. The regular yellow ones planted in the ivy by the people who lived here a few families back are the best. The squirrels either can't get to them because of the ivy or the newly planted ones are just so much easier to acquire, they ignore these. Whatever the reason, I feel so blessed that they come up so abundantly every year. And they are there now, not all the way up, still stretching skyward. But one morning I will look out and they will be there, nodding a benediction to Spring.

One Day Into The Next

It's sometimes amazing to me how quickly time goes by. My life of late is not filled with grand moments that make the days fly by. No, it's filled with the minutiae of the daily. Once the alarm goes off, I 'm off on the worn track in the carpet which takes me from the bed to the bathroom to the hall to the stairs to the kitchen to the back door, the car and work. Before I know it, the day is half done and I'm home eating lunch, then back to work to finish the day. A hiccup happens every couple of days when I go to the gym. But really, it's the same thing all the time. And the days roll by so fast that another month has been crossed off. I'm not a fan of this. I'd like more big moments, more grand happenings. Wait, let me qualify that--good things, please. No disease, no catastrophes, no funerals.

And therein lies the problem, in a way. Life does roll along for a while and things seem mundane, when suddenly they aren't anymore. So I guess for now, the alarm will go off and the cycle begins again. Until the next day, until the next day, until something happens.

The Thief in the Night

I spent a couple of nights at my sister's house recently. I luckily had some time to take off from work and I just wanted to get away from the smell of paint and wood stain (hubby is fixing up one of the bedrooms). It is almost always a nice retreat. She treats me so well, leaves me alone if I need it, talks if I don't want to, listens when I do. Their home is inhabited with my brother-in-law, a generous, super-intelligent, bookish sort and his dog. It is not and will never be her dog. She resented the animal from the moment it entered their living space and even though he has mellowed over time, she still resents him. Although, there are cracks in the grumbling lately. He will follow her up to her office occasionally and she will let him stay while she clacks away on the computer keys, figuring out ways to help people communicate.

I have never really had a problem with the dog. He was a little high strung at first, rambunctious and rowdy. He has an unnerving habit of "smiling" at you, curling back his lips to show you his canines. He doesn't growl when he does this. But I've never seen another dog do that without the growl and snap of jaws immediately following, so this expression usually stops me from petting him for a moment or two. Her husband thinks the dog is wonderful. He also assumes that he is smarter than he is, the dog not the man. Evidence to the contrary abound, but, my intelligent BIL just doesn't see it. One thing the dog used to do was grab things off horizontal surfaces and drag them under a coffee table in another room. There he would rip, shred and demolish whatever it was, mostly eating it at the same time. It didn't matter if it was edible or considered food. My sister despaired of ever deterring this  behavior, and in her husband's defense he didn't like it either (maybe because he lost a pair of sunglasses or two) They tried lots of things to make him stop:  squirting him with a foul smelling substance whenever he did this, yelling, whacking, and eventually just moving everything they thought he wouldn't be able to wrest from the surfaces to another place. Because he's older now, he doesn't do this with any regularity. He has taken this habit though to a different level. As an example, I was sitting on the couch reading. I had taken off my shoes and curled my feet under a throw to keep them warm. The dog came over for a pet or two, which I obliged, but I decided that I was done and commanded him to "go lie down." You don't say please to a dog, it confuses him, or at least this dog. Anyway, before shuffling off to lie down, he reached down, picked up one of my sneakers in his mouth and shuffled off with it in his mouth. Depositing it in front of him after laying down under the coffee table. He didn't maul the shoe. He simply put it down and looked up at me as I stood to retrieve it. I took the shoe back and placed it next to the mate, but he didn't come back for it. He just made his point.

In the morning the following day, I was getting myself ready to go downstairs and realized one of my slippers had vanished. It was next to my suitcase on the floor when I crawled off to bed the night before. I opened the door to the guest bedroom and saw the slipper next to the door. Sure enough, my sister told me the dog had entered the room while I was sleeping, picked up the slipper and taken it downstairs and placed it under the coffee table. Not mauled, not shredded or mutilated. Just placed there to be found the next morning. The next day I was packing to leave. I had placed my pajamas on top of my suitcase and gone into the bathroom to brush my teeth. I came back in the guest room and the bottom pants of the pjs were no where to be found. I walked downstairs to the coffee table and there in a lump were my pj pants. I appreciated his not ripping them or otherwise damaging them, they are one of my favorites. I marveled at his kleptomaniac tendencies and how they had evolved. No longer destructive, just sort of benign attention getting. I could live with that and evidently they are. After all he's still there, under the coffee table, looking out.

The Girl Within, The Woman Without

I had the opportunity to sit in on a discussion with some young ladies the other day. It was enlightening and yet not. Some things never change. Some dorky big guy guffaws his way through class making fun or putting down the feminine species. It's just a big joke to them. The put downs. But their comments can hurt. And what is truly amazing is that it doesn't dawn on these Neanderthals that these young ladies will remember the name calling and the dismissive snort far longer than they will remember doing it. They will remember and the guys better hope one of these smart, funny, savvy people doesn't become their boss, or well, let's just say payback is not always a pleasant thing.

The other thing I noticed is this:  although I am significantly older than these young ladies, we all had kind of an aura around us which was obviously learned from somewhere that we are not the power holders. We are the power seekers. We strive and strain and lurch our way to some goal feeling all the while that we have to be better, faster, more somehow, than our male counterparts. Why is this? Who taught us this? Where did this model come from. My mother, a product of the '50's mentality, had this as part and parcel of her upbringing, but I don't remember her beating it into me. I grew up with Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinheim and bra burning. I am woman, hear me roar, remember those words? We sang them with gusto. We believed them! Then we got older and it was harder to live up to those ideals and promises. We had careers but we may have stopped to raise kids, or we raised kids and kept the career and there we were being pulled so many different ways that we even forgot there was something we were striving to do! How did that happen? You can let someone have power over you, we were told, or we could show our own power and shove back. Are we shoving back? Not so's you can tell. The power still seems to be in someone else's court. And the bullying, blathering big guy with the big mouth is still leading. I don't like it, I don't like it at all. Something's got to change. We need a new Helen Reddy with a new anthem. Something to move these young ladies to go forward. Something we older women can get behind and push for them. What do we have? I don't know. I'm still looking around. And I'm not feeling hopeful at the moment.

Reading the Obits

It's Saturday morning and hubby and I are perusing the papers. He is reading the sports. I am reading the comics. Perhaps this is symbolic? I don't know, its just how it is. Anyway, after looking at the sports he goes on to look at the local happenings and then the world stage. I will go on to read the advice columns, the entertainment news and then on to the obituaries. I don't read them with hope of seeing someone there, honest! I read them for lots of reasons. I scan them first to see if any names pop out at me, people I know who have been very sick or I haven't seen for a long time. I look at the small section that lists people who are famous or at least seminally so, to see if I recognize their accomplishments. I don't study them and usually don't read any in depth unless there is a particularly long or flowery one. Sometimes it seems like the paper will group them into geographical regions, I'll see more on one side of the river than on the other some days. I never asked if this was the case, I'm not obsessed with obits, after all. Just curious. I could branch out at this point and begin to wonder what it was like when the deceased "crossed over", but that isn't the direction I wanted to go in today.

I saw a name I recognized today. I lived in a small town growing up. It bordered another small town, but this one boasted the area high school that my siblings and their friends and my husband and his siblings all went to. If you lived in either of these small towns you went to this high school. You dated people from this area and I know many people never left the area, settling permanently with their spouses to raise children who would also go to this high school. I took the road less traveled and attended the vocational school during my high school years. But the guys from the next town were the available guys to date, so even though I didn't go to school with them, I dated some of them. One of those guys lost in memory...his father passed away. I saw the name, read the obituary and was transported some 45 years back to a time when I knew the son. Knew his wavy brown hair and luscious chocolate brown eyes. Knew that when he smiled, there was a little dimple in his cheek. Knew the roguish twinkle in his eyes and knew NOT to be alone with him in the next room, tempting though it might be. How could one name bring all that back with such clarity? I have no idea. It's happened on more than one occasion. This guy and two of his other compatriots were part of a sphere of my adolescence that changed me from the young girl in elementary school to the young lady of high school. They didn't do anything special, there wasn't some breakthrough moment or some heart-rending tragedy which embedded these guys in my brain. They were just there, helping me without knowing it, to be part of growing up in a small town. I felt sorry for this guy I used to know. My own dad passed away about 25 years ago and it's not an easy thing to lose your father. Of course, being me, I thought I should send a card. But really? A card? From someone in this guys very distant past who probably wouldn't recognize the name even if I signed it with my maiden name. No, a card was a dumb idea. But I offered sympathy in my own way. By writing down my thoughts in this blog.

Sorry for your loss, Vince. Take care. It'll get better.

Winter Doldrums

The air is stale
With the perfumed air
Of poinsettias on the sill
They're drooping you see
From the past revelry
The holiday long been fulfilled.
The plants are distressed
As they peek through the mist
Of the fogged over windows
Of winter
Looking out in the night
 Of the last rays of light
Remembering highlights
Of summer.
The sigh of the plants
With the mistress's rants
The scorning of earlier lamplight
It's hard now to toil
For the scent of the soil
Buried so solid with snow.