Thoughts on a Boomer Life

Long, long ago and far away

2011-12-24T00:29:00.000-05:00

All right, friends - it's time to see how well the memory works. I recently got an email from a teacher pal with a long lists of things we should remember from the fifties and the sixties. Sadly, I did recall almost every single one of them, but I thought it might do me some good, in the cathartic sense of the word, to recall some more specific moments or items of my own.

First Kiss: Of course, everyone wants to remember this one, but frankly it was less than memorable. His initials were R.M. and I was about 13. I remember thinking - "all that fuss over this?"

First Date: My mom actually set me up on a "movie date" with a fellow first-grader, thinking it was incredibly cute. His mom went along with the plan, and the two of us were somewhere between confused and embarrassed. The two moms sat a few rows behind us in the theater. I haven't a clue what the movie was.

First Home: For some their first home was the one they eventually grew up in. My first house was actually a remodeled chicken coop outside Pittsburgh, PA. My parents bought half of a defunct chicken farm, and we got the half with the house on it. The only thing I remember about the house (we moved when I was 4) was the coating of ice we would get on the living room windows - on the interior. There were blankets hung over the windows to try to keep heat inside, but you could scrape a good 1/4" or so off the inside in mid-winter.
There was an episode of "Extreme Makeover - Home Edition once that rescued a family from living in a chicken coop. I vividly remember Ty Pennington yelling that no family, ever, should have to live in a chicken coop. I felt somehow cheated.

First Car: The first auto I ever drove was a green and white, 1956 Pontiac station wagon, with no power steering or brakes, or windows or anything else for that matter. It was a tank and I loved it. It was also my high school colors, so I was obligated to drive the cheerleaders to every football game. By the way, it was stolen three weeks after my parents bought it, and found in a town in the Adirondack region of upstate New York. We had just returned from a vacation in the mountains, and my Dad and I guess a friend had to drive all the way back up there to retrieve it. I'm sure it was worth it. The first car I ever owned was a 1965 Chevy Impala convertible, champagne in color, and I wish I still had it.

First drink: Well it probably wasn't the first, but it was certainly the first time I ever got really hammered. I was fifteen, and went with a bunch of friends up to the top of a hill outside our suburban New York town. At night when it was clear you could see the lights of the big city, and I guess we considered this a perfect view to get drunk by. I got totally fried, and then totally sick, on a blend of numerous remains from numerous household liquor cabinets. The next day I went to a wedding, and had to chuckle a bit at my parents' pride in the fact that I didn't watch to touch the champagne. (One of my current readers was with me that night - do you know who you are?)

First House: Yes, I have purposely skipped over a couple of "firsts", mostly because they aren't anybody's business. My first house as a married adult is the one I'm still living in, still with the same husband. It's 110 years old, and we are the first folks on the deed. Bought it from the descendants of the builder in 1975 - it had been a rental property until then. It was definitely a handyman's special. In the first two years we redid a lot of the plumbing, put in a new furnace, rebuilt the roof, did some major rewiring, painted everything, cleared and dug out the yard, fixed the front porch floor and railings, went through three or four gallons of spackle, built a new kitchen, and put storm windows all over the place. Most of that needs to be done again, after 36 years.

First baby: She showed up a couple of years into rebuilding the house, and put a screeching halt to most of that activity. She is now 34 and nicely settled into her own place with a very likable gent. I knew nothing about child rearing when she arrived, and she taught me plenty. What she left out, her little brother added after he was born, one and one-half years later. They have provided my greatest joys and my biggest worries, and I continue to adore them both.

First Grandchild: Nope! Not there yet. I guess I'll have to keep you waiting and I'll finish this another time!

It's that time of year!

2011-12-07T00:40:00.000-05:00

Yes! It's that time of year! The trees are almost bare, the temperature is falling (though not very far at the moment), and people everywhere are decorating their homes with tissues. Tissues? Huh?

Yes, doggone it - it's time for the first version of bubonic plague to hit the Philadelphia area, and my whole family has it. We are going through cold medicine, cough syrup and tissues like crazy. Even Costco can't keep up with the amounts needed to serve this group. And whose job is it to go to Costco tomorrow in the pouring rain and load up once more on sneezing, hacking and sniffling supplies? Mine, of course!

I also am under orders to get more soup, and I think it might be time to make a huge pot of chili. Maybe that way the germs can be scorched out of existence. I did concoct a huge pot of chicken/vegetable/pasta soup yesterday, but that has all disappeared along with the very garlicky bowl of hummus (made that this afternoon!) and just about every kind of cracker I might have on hand. The fruit juice supply is almost depleted, and I've run out of lemons for the many cups of tea being ingested. Oh, and I probably need tea bags.

This is one part of marriage and motherhood I have never completely understood. Why, when the ills of the universe have descended upon my household, am I the one selected by some higher power to take responsibility for feeding and soothing the rest of the brood? It never gets put to a vote. I have not seen a single show of hands, nor a ballot box. It all comes down to a severe case of "mom'l'doit" syndrome, and I have fallen for it hook, line and sinker.

If another member of my family has a sniffle, and I am running a fever of 110 and bleeding out both eyes, I will drag myself to the car and the pharmacy to see to it that enough tissues are available. The only break I can remember in the last 37+ years of this family's existence was last summer, and literal, when I broke my foot, had it in a cast, and wasn't allowed to drive. I was still somehow expected to create miraculous healing in my household, even though I couldn't leave the living room. I did make up a few chants just for the hell of it, but they consisted mostly of curse words.

Sadly, the foot healed remarkably well, and I soon was back to my existence as family healer. Frankly, for the level of trust my family hands to me, I am surprised the neighborhood hasn't started lining up at the front door. No, I know my little group - they won't tell anyone for fear of losing even a second of my dedicated services.
So, tonight I sit here, exhausted yet awake, listening to the choruses of coughing coming from the various bedrooms around me. I should be sleeping, but my clogged head won't yet allow it.

Tomorrow will bring one to two inches of rain, more coughing and blowing, lots of aches and pains, and a trip for Mom to the local "big box" store. The big boxes will be of Kleenex or Puffs, fruit juices (with and without arsenic!) and soup or chili supplies. At least I will be treated like some level of hero when I arrive home from my adventure, and when I'm done putting everything away and/or cooking up a storm, I will find a place to lie down, and stay put.

And then, with a healthy dose of blatant sarcasm, I will wish everyone a happy cold and flu season!

On the empty nest

2011-11-06T15:07:00.000-05:00

Nobody's home except me! This is a circumstance which up until recently was only fervently hoped for every once in a while, as I was cleaning up someone else's dishes, or finishing their laundry, or picking up extraneous crap from various perches. Now my husband works 100 miles to the north, arriving home only on weekends (and sometimes every other weekend), and my son, who rejoined the household in August, is currently about as far away as he could get without heading slightly back toward our domicile. He is in Australia.

I have discovered that I like cleaning up only my messes, and enjoy the total freedom of bedtimes, wake-up times, and meal times. I go out when I want to, where I want to go, and come back when I feel like it. I leave my keys where I want to leave them upon entering the house, and I can rest assured that they will be where I left them the next time I feel the need to drive somewhere. I put things away where I think they belong, and, miraculously, they are in the same place when I go looking for them again!

I also feel an incredible level of freedom when it comes to trash. My version of trash is not always anyone else's version of trash, and I currently have no one complaining when I toss a batch of old newspapers into the recycling. These newspapers might not be considered appropriate trash, because their crossword puzzles have not yet been completed. I am the crossword addict in the household, and if I deem a puzzle unnecessary, then I should have the final word on when it disappears. By the way, I have a huge book of crossword puzzles next to my bed, and when I finish that, I may feel differently.

I can hang things up where I want them to be, and be secure in the knowledge that my warmest jacket is right where I need it, and not buried under eight or ten jackets donated by contractors to my husband at various jobsites. It is very nice that construction people feel the need to reward project managers with warm clothing, but I have lost count of the donors, and therefore the number of jackets and/or hoodies. Did I mention that our 110-year-old house has very few closets? Our poor downtrodden coat rack sits by the front door, groaning with the weight of logo-laden winter wear. My stuff is somewhere underneath it all.

I can watch what I want to watch on TV. I can listen to music that I want to listen to. If I want to be on the internet for fifteen minutes or three hours I can do just that. I do not have to suffer through football games between universities I have never heard of, nor reruns of movies I did not care to see when they were initially released. There are no sounds of country or pop music wafting through my house, and I do not constantly hear about the latest "you tube" offerings.

However, when I wish to discuss a recent news event with someone, there is no one nearby. When I am greeted by a burned-out light in the cathedral ceiling of my family room, there is nobody willing to climb up a ladder and replace it. Large insects can rest assured they they will not be squashed while I am home by myself, as I prefer to leave the room where they live unoccupied. This also goes for small furry animals who like to make this house their home for the winter months. I will put out friendly traps, or even the occasional box of D-Con, but disposal is left up to the next person arriving home.

The things that go bump in the night will remain unexplored, and will tend to be the subject of my sleep-jarring obsessions. The electric bill will spike a bit, as this house when dark is far less friendly than this house with lots of lights left on all night. Other budgets might just be affected, too, as my ability to fix small household emergencies is pretty good, but the big stuff requires paid help. So far, since my husband started his job in New York, the furnace has needed repair, a major electric switch has decided not to work any more, and there is an issue in one bathroom that calls for replacement of the offending appliance.

Though I really hate to admit it, I am nowhere near as self-sufficient as I like to think I am. Though my time alone is enjoyable and peaceful, I admit to preferring the company of and conversation with at least one other human. Somebody had better come home soon, or the phone bill is going to go through the roof.

To avoid hypothermia

2011-10-23T17:08:00.001-04:00

It is officially cold outside. Last night the temperature hit the thirties. Today it is slightly above 60. I am officially freezing. As I have aged I have noticed distinct leanings toward low body temperature, or at least the inner certainty that I am slowly, as November creeps nearer, becoming a block of ice, only to be thawed out somewhere in late May.

This conclusion has now been reached, and along with it comes a considerable number of possible solutions to the permafrost that is slowly consuming me. For instance, I can simply turn up the heat in my house. This is deceptively simple, as my husband has now discovered his inner core of estrogen, and is too warm most of the time. Every time he walks past the thermostat he turns it down a couple of degrees. Actually this serves a dual purpose for him, as he also is what you might call thrifty.

This is the other problem with trying to depend on the furnace. It means depending on a reliable supply of heating oil, at approximately $4 per gallon. Our oil tank holds 250 gallons. That comes to $1,000 per fill. When I do the calculations, I also come to the conclusion that the thermostat needs to be turned down, maybe even off.

That leads me to the second option. Staying in bed. Last night I added a second blanket to the pile of heat-retaining covers that grace my bed. Should someone come looking for me late at night, I guarantee they would have a problem finding me among the layers of flannel and feathers. You would never know that in my daily life I am quite claustrophobic, as my nighttime regimen involves burying everything from the nose down. Staying under this batch of insulation is lovely, except for one thing. No, two things: I have to eat, and I have needs that take me to the family restroom. Neither is close by to the warmth of my bedclothes.

The third answer to my dilemma comes in the form of a sturdy old wood stove that sits in my living room fireplace. It cranks out an amazing level of heat, but takes maintenance and wood. The wood is kept outside; the stove in inside. Do you see a problem developing here? Once I have frozen all of my extremities during the trip to the woodpile, I can finally light the stove and curl up in a close-by chair, wrapped in yet another blanket and clutching a good book. All is well with the world until the inevitable calls of the wild show up - woodpile, kitchen or bathroom?

The necessary trips to the kitchen or bath bring me to the realization that I cannot carry twenty pounds or more of blanket along with me. Therefore, option number four. The exact moment that the calendar says October I happily bring out my collection of turtlenecks and sweaters. The bottom half of my anatomy is clad in jeans of various types all year, so I remain fairly comfortable up to the waist. The top half of me, however, is sorely in need of extra padding come late fall, so the turtleneck supply must be accessed.

Even the pile of turtlenecks and matching sweaters is not enough, sometimes, to counteract the icy temperatures of Thanksgiving through Easter, so the final solution has to rear its ugly head. I have thence chosen to share my secret with the world of blog readers. I wear long underwear.

It's ugly, it fits funny, and I sincerely hope I don't get into an accident so emergency room personnel will bear witness to my choice of fashion. It does, however, keep me warm. Inside, outside, getting wood, getting groceries. Everywhere I am invited I can show up unchilled and not in need of a quick thaw. No matter what the fashion police and Joan Rivers have to say about my choices, I will be cozy and comfortable instead of goose-bumped and shivering. Come on, winter, do your worst. I'm ready!

By the way, don't be surprised if you come to visit and find me wearing my extra layers, curled up next to the wood stove, and wrapped in a blanket. The only time I will complain about being too warm is in August.

On Writer's Block

2011-10-20T00:07:00.000-04:00

It's been a little more than a week since I announced to the universe that I was going to try to write something here every week. My intentions were good, but my will power is in crummy shape. I am blaming it on what we folks in the business like to call writers' block.

As is the case with any creative project that involves a piece of paper (or a computer screen), the sight of one of these blank areas is guaranteed to induce brain-freezing terror in the individual responsible for bringing it's planned contents to life. Just coming up with the first word is a panic-producing moment, especially if you have a tendency toward perfectionism. Let's see, should I start with "The" or "Those" or even "What?" Maybe "Where" or "When" would be more appropriate.

That seemed daunting until I realized that I had no idea at all what I used as the first word in this little piece. I could have started off with "Lightning" and I would have just as easily have forgotten it. That, of course, means I have to find a word with such power and presence that I couldn't possibly forget it. Maybe something unexpected like "Maudlin" or "Execrable." Even a shocker like "Death-defying" or "Oozing" might work. The problem inherent in those is figuring out what on earth to follow them with.

I keep being told by experts (in print, of course) that I should simply start writing about anything and the prose would start to flow naturally, creating a memorable piece with little effort after the first sentence. If I were to write something like that, the first word would absolutely have to be "Bull****."

I am also told that writers' block has little to do with the piece being written, but has much to do with the general well-being of the author. That may hold a bit of water, as I find when I have too much time on my hands I get stuck between projects, unable to move much on any of them. I have some crocheting to finish. There is a half-finished painting sitting on my easel. The vacuum cleaner has been plugged in to the dining room wall socket for about a week, and the spider web still sits in the corner of a close-by window. The hope is that by writing this little ditty, I can kick my behind into gear to get moving on the rest of my endeavors.

I'll let you know if that works. Right now I am doing something decisive. I'm going to bed. See you next week!

Has someone forgotten it's October?

2011-10-09T18:06:00.000-04:00

It's my favorite time of year, when the leaves are turning to brilliant shades of red, orange and yellow, the air has a cool snap to it, and the frost is on the pumpkins. Now I must qualify that statement. It is fall, which I love, but it's currently in the 80's, the leaves aren't doing a doggone thing, and the only item in the air is record levels of fall pollen and mold. I have a cough that sounds like it's coming from a rhinoceros, and it is accompanied by a constant runny nose and the occasional bout of uncontrollable sneezing. What has happened to October?

By the time Halloween rolls around, I fully expect too see trick-or treaters dressed as California beach bums, carrying their surfboards and wearing the latest in swimwear. No heavy Darth Vader costumes this year; it's way too warm. As for the obligatory pumpkins, many of them were decimated by the monsoon season we had during late August and early September. We had over 23 inches of rain, and pumpkins do not float well.

Any blooms that remain on my personal pumpkin vine are now being eaten by an extra-hungry woodchuck. He took up residence in my yard last year, and I never get to see him at a time when I can run out and scare him away from the blossoms. The result? I have one fake pumpkin to put on my porch this year, and it killed me to spend $15 on the dumb thing. The woodchuck will someday go into hibernation for the winter, but it is not happening any time soon. A thermometer that says 81 degrees does not signal "Time for snuggling up and sleeping." Rather it tells me, and evidently the local vermin, that it's time for a protracted last hurrah at the expense of my gardens.

At the expense of my physical comfort, there is a bumper crop of mosquitoes this fall, another leftover from the monsoons. One trip to the recycling bin (about ten feet from the back door) and I return to the house trailing a line of buzzing buddies, and sporting a minimum of a half-dozen itchy welts.

I recently got within a couple of feet of an extremely brazen rabbit, who looked at me carefully for a full minute, then ate a petunia. I admit it made me laugh, which only, I am sure, encouraged him further. Next it will be the zinnias. Oh, and speaking of zinnias, the combination of the rain, heat, and now unrelenting sunshine has created a monster in my zinnia patch. I have some sort of zinnia-beast which has grown to a height of about seven feet, and is hiding my beautiful new blue spruce from the passers-by. I am sure the radioactive spiders are next.

All I have to say is that when the month of October arrives, I am ready to stock the wood pile, rake up leaves, bring out the blankets, and get my stock of houseplants in off of my deck. Instead, this year, the houseplants will be enjoying the great outdoors for a while longer, growing more blooms and housing plenty of spiders. The blankets are still in the closet. I am resetting the air conditioning and wearing shorts.

Why we have a city of animals

2011-10-01T01:14:00.001-04:00

I'm glad I don't live in inner city Philadelphia. It's a beautiful place, but right now it's in big trouble. The level of violence, particularly shootings, is skyrocketing. In the last week, there have been eleven people shot in different parts of the city, including a two-year-old and a ten-year-old, and their 58-year-old grandmother. Those three were shot because some girls had a fight over a boy. The baby is still in the hospital, and still critical. The others have survived (some did not in other shootings), but at what cost?

I'm sure that lots of people in city government are having long conversations about the complex reasons why this is happening, but I can tell them one good solid way to stop it from continuing:

Put more effort into your schools, and do everything you can to lower the drop-out rate!

Philadelphia schools have had a drop-out rate of close to 50% for a long, long time, and the unemployment rate of young people who have dropped out is astronomical. When teens have no knowledge to use toward bettering their lives, and no income, the result is a desperate race to get what they can through any means possible. This includes stealing, dealing, and shooting people. When young males have no education to give them a sense of self-worth, they may decide that having a gun will make them feel powerful, manly. Using that gun becomes far too easy when there is no knowledge of other paths to manliness.

Having said that, the rate of pregnancies in the poorly-educated groups of teens is always high, as another way the boys in the crowd can feel like men is to be a father. Again, with no education to give them the knowledge of the responsibilities that fatherhood brings, they soon become absentee fathers, unsupporting mates, and at best poor role models. This can all be avoided, or at least diminished, when quality education is demanded for these children.

Philadelphia recently got taken to the cleaners by a woman who was charged with fixing whatever was wrong in the district's schools. She did, by most accounts, a terrible job. It cost the taxpayers nearly a million dollars to get rid of her, a million dollars that could have purchased books, art supplies, musical instruments, and more than a few teachers' salaries. I sincerely hope that an audit will be done of the district, so that whoever agreed to her hiring and then paying-off will be held accountable. Meanwhile, our school buildings are old and crumbling, there are no books in some classrooms, and teachers are afraid for their safety.

By the way, our new governor cut a huge amount from the money allocated for city schools, as well as slashing funds for state colleges. I can't help but feel like nobody gets it.

Gets what? The connection between successful education, for a minimum of 12 years, and an adult population that is able to find work, take care of themselves and their families, and who feel the need to be good citizens. When that education is lacking to the level it is in many inner city environments, we end up with a population of feral teens and young adults, existing on poor interpretations of animal instinct. If no one ever teaches peace, our only choices are different levels of war.

Please, Philadelphia, treat your children like your most important resource. Make sure they stay in school, and make absolutely sure that your schools are worth attending. It's very nice that we have a fifty-foot Claus Oldenburg paint brush statue on our Avenue of the Arts, but I'd rather see pencils and books and art supplies for the city's under served and under educated kids.

Bullying is not just for kids

2011-09-27T16:18:00.000-04:00

I just finished reading a fascinating article on teachers who are bullies. It showed how teacher preference or indifference to certain students can cause the same kind of lousy feelings in a student as bullying by a peer. It amazes me that this is seen as a surprising piece of information. I have two children, both of whom were subjected to bullying behaviors, not only from their fellow students, but from teachers, administrators, and even counselors. I am thrilled to see the amount of attention this subject is getting in national press, and sincerely hope that the result will be more schools where a zero-tolerance anti-bullying policy is reality.

I have seen, over and over, institutions whose unwritten policies promote the downgrading and belittling of students who are "different." These differences can take an incredible variety of forms, based purely on the worst part of an administrator's discomfort with students who may be"difficult" to teach. I know of children who have been called insulting names by a teacher, for an entire year. I know of a teacher who, more than once, slapped a female student in the face in front of an entire classroom. The student had disagreed with that teacher on an answer in a test, and had asked for help more often than the teacher saw as necessary.

A young lady in adaptive physical education spent her gym periods in a pool in a district building across the street from her high school. During one of her swim times, one of the gym teachers followed her up and down the pool as she did laps, calling her fat and lazy, and suggesting that the rest of her family was probably fat and lazy, too. She left the pool, got dressed in the locker room, and called home to tell her mother to "pick me up before I hurt somebody." For some reason the administration was never informed that she left school two hours early that day. I am not at all surprised.

I know of situations where special education students were called stupid by their teacher, where students who were seriously learning disabled were told by their counselor that they could probably get straight "A's" if they would just work harder. This was in the middle of a school-sponsored support group for students who felt they were being bullied because of their inabilities in standard classrooms..

I guess the answer to this insanity is more education, not only for the students, but also for the teachers and administrators. I spent a number of years as an actor/therapist, working with school districts where dysfunctional behavior was out of control, and where the student suicide rates were up. When students in these sessions were asked who their favorite person in the school was to talk to when they felt like they needed some support, the answer was almost universally the school custodian. Why are the janitors so popular? They don't judge; they just listen.

The ultimate answer to bullying is to educate all individuals on the sanctity and innate importance of every human life. People certainly don't have to like everyone else on the planet, but they do have to respect their rights to exist in peace and dignity. Too many of us learn to discriminate, judge, and even bully others from a very early age. It needs to stop.

Now what?

2011-06-26T00:26:00.001-04:00

OK, it's official. I have retired. Permanently. I know full well I said the same thing last January, and then went back and taught four more terms. Well now I'm done. I was lucky enough to have a spectacular group of very smart and motivated students for my final class, so that made it easier, and harder. Ambivalence is coursing through my veins.

Yes, I will miss my students terribly, but there are some very good reasons for me to separate from my place of employment for the last 16 years, for instance:

The school has just hired the fifth Dean of the Faculty I will have dealt with since I started. Each one has arrived with a whole new style of communication, set of standards, and agenda for change. My adaptability has waned considerably over the years, so I don't think I would be ready to cave in to a new set of rules and regulations. In fact, I would probably fight them tooth and nail.

I am officially tired. I still approach each 4-hour lecture class with the same approximate level of energy and expectation I always have. In fact, I approach them with far more confidence and comfort than I used to. However, at the end of those classes I sit down at my desk and truly do not want to get up. After a few minutes, when I do uncurl myself into a standing position, it is difficult and rather painful, leading to a series of loud groans. I don't mind this when I am getting up from the sofa at home, as there is usually nobody available to hear me. At school, however, the halls tend to echo.

My patience has begun to fade. I still try my very best to be accepting and non-judgmental with my students. However, I have found that no one person has enough relatives to account for the number of funerals some need to attend, and I will not dismiss a young female from class for the evening because she has broken a fingernail, or is having a bad hair day. If a student's cell phone rings in class, I will answer it, and try very hard to embarrass the individual for whom the call was intended as well as the caller.

I am getting less adept at fudging my way through administrative tasks. I have always hated grades, and did really do my best to grade fairly and equitably, but I think the process leaves a lot to be desired, and my school's new computerized grading system leaves little room for flexibility. It does not understand the awarding of an "A" to a student who tries incredibly hard, but is not as quantitatively successful as his or her peers. It also does not know what to do with grades entered for class participation levels, usually expressed as a plus, minus, or check sign. It will only accept numbers. One of my favorite classes to teach was Public Speaking, but I haven't a clue why one student should get an 86 on a speech, and another an 88. I know an "A" or "B" speech, however, when I see one.

There is a massive difference of opinion when it comes to classroom expectations between the owners and top administrators of a small private college and the teachers employed by them. Those who can do teach, and those who can't, administrate. Anyone who has been a teacher at any level has my permission to agree with this statement. I won't tell.

Yes, I will miss my students, but you must have noticed I didn't say I would stop teaching, just that I had retired from formal education. I have already signed myself up to teach a couple of classes at my town's local senior center, and am looking for other opportunities. I have four or five drawings on canvas and wooden objects that are thirsty for some paint, and my writing needs lots of exercise. So I may have retired from one type of classroom, but as for others? I'm just getting started.

So vacate, already!

2011-06-10T13:33:00.001-04:00

Here I sit, on the final day of my vacation, dreading the packing I will have to do tonight and the unpacking I will have to do tomorrow. When people plan their vacations, do they ever think of making sure their car will not be filled to the exploding point? Do they consider the possibility of packing only a few necessary items, or is it a rule of some sort that the amount you pack has some bearing on the amount of fun you will have while away? I seriously doubt it, but I do it anyway.

Every year I sit down and carefully make lists, planning exactly what I will need in the way of clothing, linens, food, medications, et al. Every year I bring too much, but forget something, and have to rush to the grocery store/drug store/ clothing store to fill in the inevitable blanks. We rent houses when we go on vacation, so I have to account for the things that I consider necessary and the original homeowner couldn't care less about. Like food.

This year it was a kitchen colander, or a strainer, as I had to explain to the non-English speaking young lady who helped me find one. She had been trying to tell me where the calendars were in a store devoted completely to the display and sale of thousands of varieties of plastic crap. I also needed a cutting board and a pizza cutter. I have lots of those things at home, but my landlord evidently doesn't strain pasta, cut up meat, or bake his own pizza. I found all of the items, for under $4.00. This is considered a victory.

Of course, now I have to decide whether to bring the new kitchen stuff home with me, or leave them so another renter can either destroy or swipe them. I swear that's what happened to the stuff I bought last year.
However, if I decide to cart home the new utensils, then I have to find room in the car and my kitchen when I get them back to my house.

A classic story from my family of origin involves a married couple of local professors (my Dad was a college administrator) who were coming to visit us one summer during a short vacation, and who showed up a day late. Their explanation was simple. The diagram that the husband had developed to pack their station wagon had not been successful, so they had to unpack everything and develop a new diagram. I have yet to decide if this was a good idea or just very strange. My family used to pack for vacation by stuffing a bunch of things into a bunch of bags, then stuffing the bags into the car. With any luck there would be enough room left for three kids and a large dog.

One year we bought a detachable luggage rack and piled everything on top of the car. We were about 100 miles into our trip when my brother noticed a suitcase in the middle of the road we had just traveled. Then another, then a couple of blankets. He mentioned this to my father, and we screeched to a halt and ran back a few hundred yards, retrieving our mangled vacation supplies. My current car has a roof rack. I have never used it.

History aside, I will struggle tonight to fit everything into suitcases and bags, then struggle tomorrow to load it all in, and then unload it one more time and put it away in its proper place, or somewhere close. Next year I know I will plan better.

The Reason Glamour Magazine has Never Called

2011-06-01T00:29:00.001-04:00

When I was born and raised, back in the 1950's and 1960's, women were supposed to be glamorous. In fact, my mother insisted that I spend a few miserable months in charm school somewhere in my early teens. I learned how to walk, how to speak without ever really expressing an opinion, how to tilt my pinky finger when drinking tea, and how to appear glamorous at all times. The only thing I remember from charm school was how to tell what fork to use first. The rest is a distant blur.

Maybe that is because I was never destined to be charming. It has taken me quite a few years to come to terms with this, but now that my 65th birthday is fast approaching, I can honestly say I don't give a rat's behind. There. Was that glamorous enough for you? It was for me. As I sit here in my jeans, sneakers and t-shirt in front of the computer, I am totally comfortable with my glamour-free status. Here is how I have arrived at that conclusion:

I am sitting in front of my computer with the air-conditioner going full tilt, and I am sweating like a pig. There is nothing delicate or feminine about the way I perspire. I am soaked, with drips leaking from my ears to my shoulders, and my face is a fully reflective surface. My hair is kinky and damp, and showing no visible signs of a style. Glamorous women somehow withstand excessive heat, with nothing better than a handkerchief to dab at their moist cheeks. I need a bath towel.

I am long enough past menopause to be sprouting a few testosterone-fueled and very dark hairs on my chin. Not enough to spend thousands on a laser treatment, but enough to pull out a razor every morning and get rid of them before I scratch someone while doling out a hug. They are in direct proportion to the long white hairs suddenly appearing in the middle of my eyebrows. I swear they grow in overnight, from nothing to an inch or two in length, and sticking straight out as opposed to up or sideways. The hair on my head, however, seems to be getting thinner with every haircut. None of this seems very glamorous to me.

Also, my waistline has disappeared. I was never one of those hourglass-shaped lovelies, but at least I could wear a belt without it disappearing between two distinct folds of pudginess. Now I cut the belt loops off of my coats and sweaters. Maybe folks will think it's the clothing that drapes without an indent, and not the body.

I can not wear high heels. I had a grand old time back in the 60's and the 70's with my platform shoes and 5-inch heels, but just looking at what is selling in shoe salons currently makes my arches ache. I have my wonderfully comfy sneakers, and three different colors of my favorite walking shoes. None of those colors is chartreuse. There are two pair of sandals I can wear, one flat and one with about a one-inch heel. Even that feels risky. My balance seems to have disappeared with my waistline. I used to walk like a model. Now it's more like a Model T.

Makeup does not work on this face. I spend far more than necessary at my local cosmetics counter, but my attempts to achieve a "smoky eye" look more like an eye that has been firmly punched. My rosy cheeks are more likely from rosacea than from the correct color of blush, and any attempts at contouring look like I'm preparing for a football game in bright sunlight. Mascara is out. It makes my eyes itch. And I was actually trained as a makeup artist.

At some point I thought over all of these facts, as well as a few more, and decided that being glamorous just wasn't in my cards. I had a few minutes in my twenties when I could turn heads by walking into a room, but now it's probably because I have tripped over something. I think my most important accomplishments have not been based on looking just so, but more on what directions I chose to look. I was lucky to discover early on that glamour was pretty boring stuff, and had very little impact on the human race as a whole.

It's not that I look forward to being a frump as I get older, but I sure look toward continuing to make one big positive dent after another in the lives around me. I can't always look in the mirror and like what I see, but I sure do like who I see.

Out with the old? Not so fast!

2011-05-28T16:10:00.002-04:00

I have recently received the same email from a number of friends and relatives, and feel the urge to respond with some thoughts of my own. The message was all about the things in our lives that we currently take for granted, and how they were most likely to become obsolete and even extinct. I can't say that I agree with all of the items on the list, though I do understand that the term "endangered species" might apply.

First of all is the Post Office. I understand that email has taken over the hand written letter. I still really like getting hand written letters. I get nice thank-you notes, formal invitations to events, and updates from friends and organizations I support. The post office is also the best and cheapest delivery form for packages. They cost about a third of what UPS charges to send stuff overseas, and their local delivery is much less expensive than the competition. I do hate the level of junk mail I regularly receive, but the recycled paper industry is doing well as a result. I see this cutting back, but not disappearing entirely.

Next is the check. Again, I do admit that I do 98% of my banking and bill paying online. However, when the local landscaper delivers a truckload of mulch to my back yard, I don't think she'd appreciate waiting for me to drive to the bank and get out enough cash to pay her. When my car gets fixed, it gets done extremely well by a local mechanic, who prefers not to accept credit cards. Again, he really appreciates that I can write him a check before he gives me back my car. And I really appreciate that I don't have to pay the 21% interest rate on a credit balance.

Third on the list is the newspaper. Have you read a newspaper online? It is a royal pain, the advertising gets in the way, and it is very hard to flip to the page with the article you were looking for. Until they get the interface right, I prefer my newspapers tossed on my lawn. They are also cheaper that way.

The book is going to disappear? Not likely. I do have a kindle, and I think it is terrific for reading books (primarily fiction) that I want to get through quickly and comfortably. However, my very favorite books are of art museum collections, Amish quilts, instructions in watercolors or Chinese brush painting, photographers displays, oil painting techniques, drawing workbooks, colored pencil illustrations, etc. There is no way these could be translated into screen-appropriate material, at least not without a considerable loss in color, context, or readers' joy.

The land-line telephone. I know lots of folks who do not have a land-line installed in their apartments. If it works for them, that's fine. It does not work for me. I live in an old neighborhood full of huge trees. These trees have a disturbing tendency to drop their limbs on electric lines. When we do not have power, and I have forgotten that my phone needs charging, I am up the proverbial creek. There have been times when our power has been out for two or more days. Use of the cell phone is those situations is great, but only until the charge runs out. Even the land-line portable phones don't work in those circumstances, so I am glad that on each floor we have a plugged into the wall, corded phone.

How anyone can think that music is going to disappear is beyond me. If all one listens to is the current pop fare (yuck!), maybe they would welcome the disappearance, but most of my friends and I prefer things like modern classical, jazz, esoteric rock, and other items that are continually growing and changing. Live music beats the daylights out of recordings, and if you look for really good music, you will find it thriving everywhere. If all you care to listen to is top 40, sorry!

As for the next item on the list, television, I have to assume this was written by someone who watches sitcoms and reality shows. When they go away, I will be celebrating. Well, okay, I do like "Big Bang Theory" and "So You Think You Can Dance", and am borderline addicted to "Project Runway." Notice that only one of those runs on one of the three major networks. Again I am far more likely to delve into cable fare, and I like to curl up on the sofa and watch, not on my computer screen, but on my TV. I like pay-per-view movies and the almost unlimited choices I have through my provider, and I do not want to watch anything on my cell phone!!!!

Possessions are the next to last expected to disappear. The loss of possessions listed in the email is almost exclusively in reference to computer gadgets, and I know people who love computer gadgets so much that they have way more than a reasonable share of possessions, just in that category. As for other things, we will still want kitchen appliances, furniture, art, clothing, air conditioners, candles, fuzzy towels and the occasional teddy bear. So much for possessions.

Finally the email bemoans the disappearance of personal privacy. As if this comes as a surprise to anyone. If you think you have privacy to lose, Google yourself. Also, I happen to live in a small town, where everybody knows everybody and watches out for them. Yeah, this is a loss of privacy, but I like knowing that if I have an emergency, there are 12 people ready to jump in and help. I don't know if I have ever had total privacy, nor that I would want it. People who are my friends like all of me, including the warts. Privacy may really mean loneliness.

Maybe I am just revealing my age, but I truly think things like books, music, newspapers and letters have a certain value that keeps them alive, even if it is in a small minority of the community. I am pleased if I am considered to be a part of that minority, and will continue my outdated habits that happily keep me there.

New Movie with old, uncomfortable theme

2011-03-17T00:27:00.000-04:00

I've started and stopped writing this about a dozen times in the last week or so, mostly because I wasn't sure of the direction it would take. Now, however, I find myself with some time and some clarity of thought, though the two do not always occur simultaneously, and the result will, I hope, make some sense.

A new movie has come out in the last week, and I will admit I honestly know nothing about it. I have not seen it, I have not read any reviews, and yet the theme of the film as I understand it is driving me absolutely nuts. It is the new version of "Red Riding Hood." It is one more film which, at its core, or at least the core of its most popular ads, has the combination of implied violence and sexuality firmly joined together. I thought we had put most of that behind us with the disappearance of the "Twilight" series, but no, we have one more growling, snarling beast and one more innocent maiden sent into a frenzy of sensuality at the touch of its steamy breath. Or at least that's the impression I get from the trailers that have been all over the TV for the past few days.

When the hell is Hollywood going to get the message that there is nothing even slightly sexy about violence directed at women?

With the advent of the Twilight movies and their bloodthirsty hero, emergency rooms all over this country found themselves dealing with ever-increasing numbers of young teens suffering from bite wounds. It seems that the young ladies, in particular, who were all soft and melting over Edward, were talking their boyfriends, or even sleepover buddies, into taking a good chomp to see if the passions would flow. The only thing flowing, sadly, turned out to be the supply of antibiotics needed to avoid serious infections.

What do you know - violent behavior, it turns out, really hurts!

All anyone has to do is ask a member of the female population if they have been the victim of violence, either verbal or physical. When you discover that an incredibly large number of them have, at some, point, been victimized, your next question should be "Gee, was it a turn-on?"

I can guarantee that, if you don't get asked to leave the area immediately, you will get a resounding "NO!" as your answer. There is nothing, I repeat, nothing, sexy about being belittled, humiliated, or battered. In case no one has read the expert opinions in law enforcement, let me fill you in with the facts regarding the ultimate in crimes against women, violent rape. In all of the psychological studies out there, it is not even considered to be about sex, but about power and the creation of helplessness.

It makes me heartsick to see the number of media outlets who still joke about these attacks, and state that "make-up sex" is the best sex of all. Soap operas, for example (and we all know how realistic they are), continually go out of their way to show intense fights between couples, followed by intense coupling. In reality, intense fights are usually followed by hospital visits or nights alone in a hotel or the car, as far away from the partner as one can get. Then they are followed by arrests and the issuance of orders of protection.

I guess the most important point I am trying to make is this: Somehow we continue to raise our daughters to believe that violent behavior is in some way proof that the boy (or man) in our lives really loves us. We are making an enormous mistake in supporting media stories that tie violence and sex together, and letting our girls think that Prince Charming is somehow related to the fire-breathing dragon.

As a long-ago victim of those beliefs, I would like to know when we are going to come to our senses and see these story lines as complete fiction, and not worthy of our attention.

Now I've gone and lost my temper...

2011-03-09T00:22:00.002-05:00

I have officially had it with the new governor of Pennsylvania, and he's only been in office for a few weeks. He's right up there with a couple of other governors you may have heard about lately. The new budget is out, and what's the first thing he has cut? EDUCATION! At the K-12 level, he has slashed a huge amount of each districts' annual income from the state, and in our fair city of Philadelphia, he has, among other cuts, dropped all funding for kindergarten. This in a school district that has close to a 50% dropout rate, and that has too many of its classrooms trying to function with no textbooks, no computers, no A/V equipment. Arts and music curricula will no doubt have to be eliminated, as will after-school activities. All the added latch-key kids will have the dear governor to thank for their time at home alone.

I'm waiting for the discussion of vouchers to show up. That will no doubt be one of the next steps. Because, after all, a $1,000 voucher will do ever so much good in helping local families send their children to private school. The last time I had to come up with private school tuition, which was in 1995, the cost was $12,000 per year per child. Would those who keep suggesting this idiotic "solution" please tell me where families are going to find the other $11,000? I know how we paid tuition: we re-mortgaged our house, drove cars with 150,000 miles on them, and furnished the living room with second-hand furniture at a total cost of $73.08. That doesn't count the rugs, which I trash-picked.

As for the college-age folks, they are also getting royally screwed. The budget has taken 50% out of the money for state colleges, like Penn State and Temple University. That means a tuition hike of around 20% for students who already are scraping the bottom of their families' financial barrels. I have to wonder how many perspective students will just give up trying to afford their dreams of a good college education.

Oh, and by the way, our new governor has firmly stated that there will be no corporate taxes for the natural gas drillers or other huge commercial ventures. That's okay, they'll probably go out of business eventually because they won't find any educated engineers, project managers, accountants, office managers, or administrators. His rationale is that he doesn't want them moving to other states to do business. Duh. How does he suggest they move the natural gas deposits to take them along? Maybe he's being advised by someone who went to a high school with cost-cutting firmly in place. Yeah, the one with no books and no after-school science club.

I have a suggestion for the political mavens of our fair state. The next time you go out looking for a candidate for office, put on your list of requirements the following: The individual will not have made any more than $50,000 per year for any of the previous ten years. That way you will get people running for office who really understand the kind of life most of us are living. Most of the state's residents are hard-working, middle class families who are struggling to put food on the table, gas in the car, and tuition payments in the bank. For the vast majority of these families, their best shot at an educated child is a good, well-equipped public school system. It has just been proposed that the chance every child deserves will be gutted.

Oh, and for those who think teachers are overpaid? I dare them to spend one week in the classroom. I have been a teacher for the last 19 years, and it is the toughest job you can imagine. That is, if you really care about educating your students, and most of the teachers I have known really do care. They take money out of their own pockets to equip their classrooms, make sure their students are well-fed and sometimes even warmly clothed. All of their time "off" is spent taking courses, correcting papers, developing classroom activities, reading possible textbooks, and finding ways to improve their own classroom performance. Anyone who has been in the trenches at any level, whether K-12 or college, can only react with horror and dismay at finding out that once again, the budget axe has fallen squarely on their shoulders. When the hell are we going to stop short-changing our young people and start making those who can afford it pay a bit more for all of our futures?

Dear Mr. Governor, you can't possibly have gotten it more wrong.

Me and my Bears

2011-01-31T00:13:00.000-05:00

I have always loved stuffed animals, of any kind. I was not a huge fan of dolls as a kid, but I have very fond memories of a big white stuffed poodle and a wonderfully squishy, flop-eared dog I named Poochie. As an adult, I have tried very hard to keep this passion in check, as I have seen what can happen when you tell your friends you collect something. For too many years I had a never-ending supply of hippos arriving on birthdays, Mothers' Day, Christmas, and any other time when one was found. I was fond of hippos at the time, but very particular about the ones I felt I needed around me at all times. Many have gone the way of the Garage Sale.

I have a few seals, and a manatee here and there, and some bunnies and mice (I do not include the real live ones we occasionally have as visitors). Once in a while I may come upon a dragon that catches my fancy, but I let no one know of these joys so that the numbers remain manageable. I have actually made some bears as baby gifts for friends and relatives, and for years I have featured bears in the illustrations for my annual Christmas Card. Only one or two bears, however, had come into my house to stay. That was until 1995.

It was my daughter's senior year in high school, and her school requires 40+ hours of community service during senior year for graduation (an idea I think should be copied everywhere!). She had been doing some volunteer work at a local nursing home, and helping out neighbors with projects, but wasn't really sure she was getting as much as she needed, both in hours and in appreciation for duties done. Then we were hit with a double disaster. The Oklahoma City bombing happened on a Wednesday, and that Friday she lost a friend in a car accident on the girl's way to school.

Saturday morning we were all just reeling, and she wondered aloud what we could possibly do to turn these horrible events into something positive. I'm not sure which one of us thought of it first, but an idea began to take shape. We would find a way to do something for the children in Oklahoma City, and do it in her friend's honor. By the end of that day the Oklahoma City Children's Comfort Project was born.

By that evening we had a donation of a dozen or more moving cartons from a local moving and storage company. We had ten drop-off sites set up, two newspaper articles written, and three TV stations scheduled to come to her school Monday morning for a story. We were going to collect as many new stuffed animals as we could, and deliver them to wherever the greatest need might be. Through the Mayor's office in Oklahoma City we learned that the police department had run out of it's "comfort bears" that sit in police cars in case a child might need a soft friend. We found out that a residential home for mentally-impaired young adults would love to have some comforting, and the mood at other day care facilities in the city would be lightened by the arrival of some stuffed travelers.

People all over our area jumped at the chance to do something to help, and within a few weeks we had well over 600 beautiful new stuffed animals to go to Oklahoma. UPS made sure they would get there by waiving almost all of their charges, and ten large moving cartons were soon on their way. The thank you letters we received helped my daughter tremendously in her grieving for her friend, but that was far from the only thing we got out of this adventure.

When given a chance to do something good, we found that people from all areas, and all walks of life couldn't wait to jump in and help. I got one phone call from a gal in a distant part of our nearby city that had collected around her neighborhood, and had three large trash bags full of bears. Could we come and get them please? You bet we could.

Even Russ Berrie, the owner of one of my favorite toy companies, got into the act by sending to my house two large cartons full of delightful, brand-new teddy bears, with soft tan fur and pale pink cheeks. They were beautiful, and I will be a fan of Russ toys for life.

Needless to say my house looked like a bear convention. Though there were a few other animals and even a couple of rag dolls, bears were by far the chosen creatures. There is something about a soft, gentle-faced teddy bear looking at you and being hugged, that melts the heart of any but the most hardened folks. After that wonderful life-affirming experience with the snuggly fellows, I was hooked. I started seeing an occasional bear that just had a certain look to it, I guess wistful is the adjective I would use - a carefully crafted, soft and loving little friend who could not be ignored.

Yes, my friends and relatives know I collect bears, but they are smart enough to know I am fussy. My bears must have character and personality, and must look at you in way that asks for a special amount of loving. My house has them everywhere, and I appreciate my husband's tolerance. My son, in his late 20's at the time, even got me a Build-a-Bear gift certificate for Christmas one recent year, and came with me to help design the fuzzy fellow. That was the best part of the present!

So, after all that, I am what you would call a bear afficionado, even a bit of a bear freak. In fact, as a lover of bears and a lover of things artful, I am toying with the idea of taking this thing one step further. I am in the process of developing a series of bear-based prints, paintings, and illustrations to put into a line of art prints and/or stationery. I have the name copyrighted = "Nothing is UnBEARable".

I assume you will agree.

What's white and fluffy, cold and beautiful, and a pain in the neck to remove?

2011-01-23T16:13:00.001-05:00

Happy New Year everyone! According to the Farmers' Almanac, this winter is supposed to be mild and dry. Usually the Farmers' Almanac is better informed and makes better predictions than most, including the folks on the Weather Channel. This year, however, the weather guys win, hands down. At an average of two storms per week, we have had snow on the ground for the past two months, and it shows no sign of letting up.

Usually I like following weather patterns, and I do watch the Weather Channel occasionally, looking for some explanations of what the heck is going on in our part of the country, which is the northeast. This year I find myself purposely channel surfing past #119, the Weather Channel according to our local channel provider.There has been a pattern of lousy weather on Tuesdays going back to early November. Why do I pick Tuesdays to bellyache over? Because every Tuesday night since early November I have been teaching a course in a satellite campus of my college, 28 miles away.

Normally when it snows I like sitting quietly in my living room and watching the flakes gathering in my neighborhood. There is something about old homes, huge shade trees, and snow that is calming and quite beautiful. I actually enjoy bundling up and taking a silent stroll around my block, sometimes with a camera in my pocket, looking at the gentle white clouds forming along the streets and in the yards. The total silence is almost overwhelming, while everything around me becomes coated with a perfect creamy blanket. I have been known to flop down without notice and create a well-placed snow angel in the yard of a friend.

When my children were young, we used to create what we thought were the very best of snowmen, sometimes with a slightly bizarre twist. I remember in particular our "punk" snowman, complete with chains and a Mohawk hairdo. Snow has been fun and creative and challenging. There were years when the neighborhood kids built elaborate igloos, with passages in between where the perfect snowball fights could be planned and carried out. Forts of all shapes and sizes sprung up around the neighborhood, along with huge piles of shoveled snow whose purpose was solely for landing, after jumping as high as possible off the top of a fort, or a wall, or a picnic table left out for the winter.

Now I will admit to getting older and more cautious, appreciative of the beauty of a snowstorm, but full of concern when I have to travel through the barely plowed, slippery streets that come between me and my chosen employment. Yes, I am supposed to be retired, but like a moth to a flame, I am drawn to the promise of teaching just one more class. For some reason I cannot fathom, I chose a class this term at our satellite campus. Bad idea.

I love the students, mind you, and the class has been tremendous fun, but there is a weekly anxiety attack when I look at the weather forecast for each allotted Tuesday evening. I have looked with dread toward my 28-mile trek (each way!) up and down hills, around hairpin curves, and under arched overpasses with sharp turns at either opening. I have not hit anything yet, but as each Tuesday and its accompanying forecast looms, I imagine that this will be the week of sliding semis and fellow travelers with bald tires or no knowledge of winter driving techniques.

This Tuesday is the last of the term. The weather forecast has gone from snow, sleet, and freezing rain to mostly cloudy with either a rain/sleet storm or a whopping pile of snow to arrive later. Now, in fact, they are backing away from the most dire of Tuesday predictions, and my friends who will be teaching on Wednesday are in for a bit of trouble. No matter what, I will be on the road Tuesday night, teeth gritted and arms locked in position, with both hands firmly gripping the wheel. I hope the snow is beautiful, and I hope nobody needs to go out in it, and I sincerely hope it waits until Wednesday.

And next year I will not be purchasing the Farmers' Almanac

FIreplaces and Wood Stoves, what's not to love?

2010-11-10T00:27:00.000-05:00

Every house I have ever lived in has had a fireplace. At least the ones I remember. The remodeled chicken coop I lived in until I was 4 may not have had one, but then it was constructed out of pretty old and dry wood. It probably would have gone up like a match. All of the other ones, however, have been enhanced by the presence of a warm and glowing spot in the living room.

The fireplace had special importance attached to it when I was a kid. Every Sunday, or most of them, anyway, my dad would put a substantial piece of steak on a special grilling rack with a long handle, and he would work culinary magic over the fireplace logs. If we were really out to have a good time, we would cook either popcorn or marshmallows over them, too. The popcorn usually signaled a session of home-movie watching, while the marshmallows were just good sticky fun.

In high school I lived in a fabulous Victorian farmhouse with 12-foot ceilings and two fireplaces, back-to-back, in two joined parlors. Pocket doors separated the spaces, but I don't ever remember them being closed. At any given time in colder weather the fireplaces would be blazing away. This was partly for aesthetic enjoyment, but mostly because the big old place was almost impossible to heat. We would bundle up with a blanket or two and plunk ourselves down in front of the warmth, watching the crackling flames and feeling the heat on our faces. It was a gathering place out of necessity, but that didn't make our enjoyment any less measurable.

When I first started living on my own, I searched for apartments in old buildings, mostly to find an abode with a fireplace. In some of those apartments it would have been courting disaster if I had actually piled up some wood and found a match, but I enjoyed the possibility if not the reality. When my husband and I finally got down to some serious house-hunting, there was no way I would have even considered a home with no fireplace.

When we first found our wonderful old stone foursquare, built in 1900, we were delighted to see that it not only had a fireplace, but it had originally been a coal-burner, and had some beautiful cast iron grates and covers. They were great to look at, but we really enjoyed the open fireplace as a room-warmer. Once again I had settled in a great old house with little to no insulation. It wasn't too long before we found a fabulous used wood-and-coal burning stove to insert into our lovely fireplace and vent up the existing chimney. The flue has since been replaced.

When our children were babies I can remember a night in the middle of winter when we had no power for close to 24 hours. We set up lots of blankets and a sleeping bag or two and everybody slept on the living room floor in front of the stove. It was an adventure, but not necessarily one I'd like to repeat. I did love the coal aspect of the stove, however. One good load of coal would burn for up to 16 hours, keeping the whole house toasty. Of course, as I was the stay-at-home Mom, it was my job to stoke the thing, and shovel the coal, and empty the ashes. I felt like a pioneer of sorts.

That stove still sits, 30 years later, in my living room fireplace, and still is used (though only with wood nowadays) quite regularly in the winter. It does a great job of warming the front half of the house, and works nicely as a spot for a kettle of piping hot water for tea or just to add to the humidity. It has been cooked on once in a while, again when the power goes out. That still has a feeling of adventure to it, though I am happy it doesn't happen often.

Recently my husband and I have opened the conversation on retirement, and the downsizing that seems to go naturally along with it. I easily admit that our large house needs a lot of maintenance, and that we probably should look for something smaller and less difficult to care for. No matter where it is, or what style, or what age, there is one item I refuse to do without, and that is the fireplace. I do not, mind you, want one of those phoney-logged electric or gas fired things that are in so many newer homes. They look nice, but serve no purpose and have no aesthetic variety in their looks.

No, I want only the real thing, with a pile of wood outside and a stack in the living room. I will still enjoy crumpling up the old newspapers, putting on the kindling, and adding just the right logs at just the right time. Not only does a fireplace bring warmth and comfort, but it includes with it a big batch of family memories, and waits for more moments when gathering with long, skinny forks and a bowl of marshmallows is still very tempting.

Grown-Up Bullying

2010-10-28T23:29:00.000-04:00

There is a tremendous amount on the news and in talk shows lately about the epidemic of bullying going on in the United States today. The things that children are doing and saying to each other are horrifying, and yet we can't seem to put a finger on the causes of these horrible behaviors. Also, there is no shortage of people who will complain about the behaviors, but entirely too few who are willing to step in and put a stop to it when it is happening.

I have spent a lot of years studying and teaching psychology, and way too many years being the parent of a child who was bullied, almost to the point of suicide. I was lucky, I guess, in having the knowledge that my local school district would do nothing to help, so I quit wasting my time trying and transferred both of my children to a tiny private school, where there was zero tolerance for any form of bullying. It drained us financially, and got rid of any college funds we might have had, but we were rewarded with healthy kids who are doing well as adults. Thank you, scholarships and loans!

This essay, however, is not at all about the failings of our school systems, and the inability of adults to intervene when desperate help is needed. Those are problems being dealt with on an enormous scale right now, and I hope some corrective measures will develop as a result. What I find myself angry about at the moment is based on a psychological maxim that most adults have yet to learn - that children don't do as you say, they do what you do.

Now I will break one of my most basic rules in the design of this blog, and that is to never talk about politics. I am completely fed up with the way we "adults" practice politics in this country, and in the way the current candidates for office have run their campaign advertising designs into a bullying contest, may the meanest liar of them all be elected!

Where on earth do we get the idea that we must teach our children to treat each other with basic courtesy and understanding, even if we do not agree on some point or other, while at the same time we are name-calling and back-stabbing at our fellow adults in nonstop election TV ads, posters, radio spots, or speeches. This candidate calls his opponent an "ignorant airhead," while she fires back that he is a money-grubbing tax hog.

Another one insists that his opponent has misused public funds and lost thousands of jobs (Gee, it seems the economy had nothing to do with it - I wonder where he put them?). Then that ad is answered with the accusation of harboring aliens. Personally, I thought all of them had been corralled into Area 51.

I have heard more taunting, character assassination, name-calling and truth twisting in the last couple of months than I would expect in an average lifetime. The candidates have done a magnificent job of showing our young people that the one with the most capacity to bully is the one most likely to win. Every election season we make a big deal out of the problems with negative campaign ads, but every time that season rolls around again, we don't make it clear to our candidates that we won't tolerate that kind of behavior in the adults we are supposed to respect.

There are only a few days left in this election, and voting is already underway for this year's races. It may be too late to do anything about it this time. The next time there is an election, why don't we try something really radical - the first time we see a negative campaign ad, call the offices of the candidate running the ad and let his campaign workers know that you will not vote for that candidate unless he/she stops that kind of campaigning. Encourage everyone you know to do likewise. Tell them you don't care what the other guy did, you want to hear exactly what this candidate is going to do to make things better.

If an ad does slip through the radar and appear when the youngsters in your household are watching, take the time to let them know what a despicable thing it is to dump one's insecurity and small-mindedness on another human being instead of learning to deal with it in a positive and responsible fashion. Explain that only those with a very poor opinion of themselves try to belittle anyone else, to try to make themselves feel better.

Children are way smarter than we are. Without our bad behavior as an example, they might just learn to get along with one another instead of looking for any differences as a reason to bully. Political meanness is just as poor a behavior as schoolyard meanness. We all need to take a quick look in the mirror to see what types of grown-up activities we silently condone. Those are the behaviors the kids will learn to copy.

Leaves and cool breezes

2010-10-16T15:25:00.000-04:00

I love fall. It is probably my favorite season of the year. As soon as the temperature dips into the low 70's and 60's, I come alive. After this summer, when it was above 90 in Philadelphia for 53 days, it would be a relief to sit in the shade and have 80-degree breezes wafting over you. I can't remember a summer when I was less productive. Anything I could get done while sitting in an air-conditioned house on a nice, comfy sofa was all right with me.

I did crochet four baby blankets, for various new babies in our circle of friends and family. It did get warm, as they were in my lap while I was finishing them off, but at least I didn't have to move very much. I also worked on and finished three small paintings, so I guess I was more productive than I felt.

But now that is over, and now fall is beginning to set in. I have energy to get up and do stuff. That is, to do stuff that takes a certain amount of physical exertion. The paint cans will come out and I will finish the painting of walls and doorway that I started last fall in my sun room, which is also my front porch. When I am done there, I will head up the stairs and paint my bathroom, even tackling the sponge effects that I am determined to get on those walls. I am equally determined to not have to pay someone to do this.

The other stuff I have been doing is the best stuff for my mental well-being, and that is the task of throwing out. I recently found boxes in my garage labeled "Halloween," and knew that if I opened and inspected the contents I would find something to keep, but I did it anyway, throwing out two of the three boxes and their contents. For me that is a major victory, and one which will continue through other containers and their mystery contents until it gets too cold to spend time on the porch or in the garage.

On days when cabin fever sets in, and it does at least once a week, I am determined to get in my car and drive out into the country, looking for mountains, rivers, and lakes touched with yellow and gold and the deep green of evergreens. I am happy to have a nice new camera, so my internet friends will get a glimpse of fall in Pennsylvania, which can be pretty spectacular.

Fall is also a great time for walks. I am thoroughly annoyed that I have to deal with nerve damage in my legs, making it less than comfortable to go on any long treks. However, short walks and walks in the woodsy and lake-dotted areas not far from my home are still a possibility. I find myself wishing I had my wonderful Irish Setter that accompanied me through middle and high-school years, as she loved fall walks and playing in piles of leaves, looking for whatever live toy might be lurking.

The true sign that fall is setting in is the bringing inside of the first large canvas bag of firewood. My neighbor has a wood-lot way up in the mountains, and supplies us, for a fee, with perfectly aged oak logs, cut to match the interior measurements of my wood stove. Soon it will be stoked, kindled and lit, and the neighborhood will catch the scent of burning wood and household warmth. Then, of course, we have to think about winter.

Outside the Lines

2010-10-06T22:53:00.000-04:00

I seem to have been in one of my more philosophical moods today, actually for a few days. It is probably due to the cloudy and wet weather we keep having. I have also had the occasion to be in quite a few lines over the past week or so, which got me to wondering about them, and observing how different folks handle the process of being in line.

I have come to the conclusion that our lives are indeed made up of a series of lines, literal and theoretical. The most literal, right from the start, is that line which initially attaches you to your female parent, known as the umbilical cord. Even though it has been shown many times on TV and in educational films that either the physician or the midwife or the male parent makes a show out of severing that particular line, for some families it seems that the scissors never completely worked. I have had personal experience with individuals who are still firmly connected to their "original line." They are not considered well-adjusted.

We learn in preschool or kindergarten to wait in line, whether to get into the classroom, go for recess, get lunch, use the restrooms, or be dismissed for the day. This is also the first place we learn about another, paper-associated line. That would be the thick black line drawn around everything that exists for the application of color in art class. It is the line within which we must always keep our creativity, according to the art teacher. Some unknown disasters await the poor soul who dares to venture outside those lines with a wayward purple crayon or too-wet paintbrush.

Later in school the lines of people take on more significance. We line up for every activity with our best friends, or with friends we would like to acquire of the opposite sex. We line up at school dances: boys on one side and girls on the other, and most of them stay in those lines for the entire duration of the dance. At late-teen and later adult events we are introduced to "Line Dances," which seem to be specific for each song played by a knowledgeable DeeJay. There is always one person in these lines who has perfected each dance, and shows off that perfection with a real flair. The rest of the line is inevitably confused and conflicted, feeling out of line physically and emotionally.

As adults we are introduced to a few too many lines, from the movie theater to the drugstore to the sale at the department store, to the acquisition of groceries on a Saturday afternoon. Those lines are sacrosanct, with firm unwritten rules about maintaining the exact place one has in the line. Anyone choosing to invade any one of those lines is in for a battle.

A recent line I experienced was a reminder of an earlier time, when I had first stood in line at the Motor Vehicle Bureau and waited to take my driver's exam. I passed the first time I took it, so there should have been no anxiety about standing in that line again, but I felt the walls close in on me as I was waiting, not for a test, but to get my license renewed, and a new photo taken. Somewhere in another place I am certain there is someone who is pleased with the photo on their driver's license, but it has never been me.

I was in line this time, however, with an interesting group. I went to a small, out of the way office, thinking there would possibly be no line, but what I found instead was a group of six or seven folks waiting for new photos, all over 55 years of age. I haven't a clue why we all ended up together at the DMV on the same Tuesday afternoon, but we formed an instant friendship and told funny driving and photo stories for the twenty minutes or so I was there. I do know people my age who hate lines, and hate waiting, but I really think the majority of us are just pleased to have an opportunity to stand among friends, waiting for whatever is in store. The prevailing attitude is as follows: as long as we are stuck with it, we might as well make it enjoyable.

As for those other lines, the paper-based ones, I have to let you know that in the first formal drawing class I ever took, at a real art school, the instructor made a loud and definitive point that there was never, never, never a line around anything we might see in nature or the world around us, so he was not ever to see a line around any single object we might create in pencil, charcoal, pen and ink, or any other medium he could recall. The result of an outline was to be a failing grade.

This came as a shock and a relief to me. I was always the one with the wandering crayons, purple or otherwise, and I was thrilled to know that I was right in following the edges of my objects outside those claustrophobic lines. Needless to say, I got an "A" in that class!

I like to find morals in things, and by now you have probably figured out that most of my little meanderings here have some sort of point to them. This one is simple: when learning about lines as a child, the people lines are flexible, while the art lines are not. As an adult, the reverse is true: people lines are absolute and not to be tinkered with, but they can be fun if the right people are in them. Art lines, however, have all but disappeared, leaving a free-formed beauty to nature and our surroundings.

Something to mull over in your spare time, possibly while standing in line?

The Mushroom Factor

2010-09-30T22:52:00.000-04:00

I live in a house that was built in 1900. From 1900 to 1975 it was a rental, and had, I am sure, some very interesting tenants in it. We are the first actual owners on the deed, and as a result have needed to fix a never-ending list of problems with electricity, plumbing, walls, plaster ceilings, old ugly wallpaper, asbestos-wrapped pipe insulation, water seepage from under the basement, rebuilding a front porch, adding a family room, rebuilding the kitchen, twice. The list goes on forever.

There is one fact that I have discovered while renovating and repairing this great old house. That is that any given project will take approximately three times the expected amount of time to finish, and will cost up to ten times more money than estimated. This has been referred to as The Mushroom Factor, and is evidently a known part of owning an old house. Take, for instance, my dining room light fixture.

We had only been in the house for a couple of years when we decided to have our first fancy dinner party. Actually, my husband thought I was nuts right off the bat (did I mention I was pregnant?), so it was I who gathered my strength, planned a menu, and got the place cleaned and ready for company. As I was setting the dining room table the morning of the event, one of the light bulbs in the hanging fixture over my head went out. Okay, I thought, this is no big deal. I'll get a light bulb, climb on a chair, and fix it.

Well, the first thing I had to do was run to the hardware store and get some light bulbs, as we were out of the ones that matched the fixture. Then we had to move the table and most of what was on it to reach the light. As my husband (face it, we do need them for the menial chores) was changing the bulb, a bit of plaster plunked down from the ceiling onto the table. As a result, I climbed onto the table and tried to clear away any problem plaster that would potentially wreck my perfect table setting.

There was only one small glitch. The plaster in the ceiling surrounding the base of the light fixture was wet. Not soaking wet so you could see it from a hundred yards away, but damp enough to point to a problem leak somewhere on the second floor. At that point I took everything off of my table and pulled down all of the remaining soggy plaster. Then I went upstairs to see what was going on. I now had a three-foot in diameter hole in the dining room ceiling, and a similar amount of soggy plaster on the table.

It didn't take much searching on the second floor to discover that the drain pipe from the bathtub had a leak. To get to this leak it looked like we would have to pull up the tub, break through the concrete base under it, and figure out which section of pipe was about to be dripping on my party. So I called a plumber. He arrived quickly, but refused to touch anything wet until the electricity under it had been disconnected, so I called my electrician. By now it was after lunch time, and getting dangerously close to the appointed dinner hour.

It took the electrician only a moment to disconnect everything, and happily the plumber found the leaky joint without having to break up the entire bathroom floor. Before he left, I had the electrician hook up the light fixture once more. The ceiling, however, was still in the middle of my dining room table.

Believe it or not, the party was not cancelled. I still had the dinner guests arrive as scheduled. However, the style of the evening changed considerably. We had a lovely buffet set up on a couple of card tables in the living room, and we all ate on our laps. It's a good thing we have understanding friends, but then, most of them live in old houses, too.

There is, I guess, a moral to this story, and it comes in the form of a quiz:

Question: How many people does it take to change a light bulb in an old house?

Answer: The two owners, a plumber and assistant, an electrician, and eventually a plasterer and painter to complete the repairs on the ceiling. Mercifully, I have completely forgotten how much this all cost us.

By the way, I wouldn't trade my old house for anything. As of this November, we have been in it for 35 years. We have rebuilt most of it at some time or other, but the best things we have built are 35 years worth of memories.

Mom, you would like this

2010-09-23T23:53:00.000-04:00

In about five minutes it would have been my mother's 91st birthday. I have thought about her a lot this week, as I do every year in late September. She and I spent a lot of our lives trying to figure each other out, and disagreeing a majority of the time. This does not, however, mean we didn't love each other.

As I got older, and she got more mellow, we came together in pretty spectacular fashion. A strong friendship developed, and we had tremendous fun delving into artistic endeavors and intellectual discussions. One chat in particular that I remember had to do with the brain structures that could lead to a sense of humor, and how they could possibly develop. Yeah, deep stuff like that.

I am sure that everyone on this planet has a slightly different behavior style with his or her parents, and that in itself is quite wonderful. We have an infinite ability to adapt, it seems, and to develop a relationship that works best for us. For me this is probably best exemplified in the fact that I finally learned never to discuss politics or religion with my Dad!

Evidently neither did Mom. She admitted to me and my sister, after he had passed, that she had voted Democratic, or even Independent, in a number of presidential races, without ever mentioning it to anyone. Especially not the staunch Republican she was married to!

I am now in the eldest generation of Moms in the family, along with my sister and sis-in-law, and we are all quite similar in our parenting styles. There are four Moms in the next generation, and more to come. I wonder if they will find some new literature that they will swear by in the rearing of their children. For my mother it was Dr. Spock (no, not the guy from Star Trek), and for me and my generation it was Hiam Ginott, Rudolf Dreikurs, and many others. We were smart enough to pick out the parts we agreed with in various theories, and toss out the rest with the disposable diapers.

There do seem to be a few universal truths that go along with being a mom, and as my kids are now into their thirties, I think I might just have enough experience to share a few of them with you:

1. No matter how old you or your children get, a part of you will always treat them like they are about to enter first grade.

2. No matter how much experience you have in any particular area, your children will still look it up on the internet after you have given your best advice.

3. There is always a day in your child's life where you will look at him or her and silently think, "I can't believe you are going to wear that!"

4. A child's hair grows more rapidly than that of adults. Therefore, when children decide to either to a) shave their heads, or b) dye their hair bright purple, it will grow out faster. It is important to remember this when viewing the new style for the first time.

5. Any daughter's skirt that is deemed an appropriate length by her mom will inevitably be hiked up a minimum of six inches the second that daughter is out of sight of the house. This is accomplished by rolling up the waistband so the daughter looks like she is wearing an inner tube under her sweater.

6. If a child arrives home after school with a black eye and a smile, it is best not to ask any questions. They will most likely be answered anyway by the principal when the office calls.

7. Any child who promises to forever and ever look after the needs of a pet is lying. This is not a purposeful thing, it just works out that way.

8. Most children will not take a) their special blanket, or b) their pacifier to college when they leave home for the dorms. This may be a difficult decision, but the odds are in favor of separation, anxiety or not.

9. Every child will have at least one serious relationship with a partner that you hate. Not mildly dislike, but hate. It is imperative that you keep your mouth shut or you may find yourself a mother-in-law to the creep.

10. If you learn to trust your children, they will become trustworthy. If you are constantly suspicious of their motives, they will go out of their way to prove you right. If you are not trustworthy, they will behave like you no matter what stern lectures they are given. If children know you can be trusted, you will find them telling you plenty of things you would probably be much happier not knowing.

11. In spite of all of your efforts, it is probable that your kids will grow up to be smart, kind, funny, hard-working and appreciative adults. You have official permission to ignore the amount of therapy needed for them to get that way. This therapy can either be for you or for them, or both, for that matter.

I am convinced that there isn't a more rewarding job in the world than being a mom. Maybe being a grandmom, but I haven't tried that one yet. For right now I have an endless supply of love available to both of my kids, and an ever stronger appreciation for the hard work my Mom did to help me and my brother and sister reach adulthood intact. Happy Birthday, Mom, and I miss you.

Eyebrows, love 'em or shave 'em off

2010-09-16T00:07:00.000-04:00

I was looking at a political ad this afternoon. Yes, it is that season, and I am already sick of the ads for various politicians, or against various politicians who are all evidently spawn of the devil. Negative ads make me furious. That, however, is not the point I am here to make. In this particular ad there is a likable enough gentleman who wants very much to be the next governor of our state. I have no problem with that, at least none that I know of yet.

My problem is that the whole time he was talking I couldn't take my eyes off of his eyebrows. They didn't match. One was sort of tapered and rather long, from the edge of his nose out to the side of his forehead, where one would think eyebrows would go. The other one looked sort of like someone had pinned a piece of carpeting to his face. No taper, no particular shape, just a lump of an eyebrow. I am certain he had some very important political-type things to say in his ad, but all I remember is those eyebrows.

I don't know when I started noticing eyebrows, but it must have been a very long time ago. Back in the late 1960's and early 1970's I went to art school in Chicago, and had an instructor whose eyebrows almost defied description. They sat on top of an astonishing amount of electric-blue eyeshadow, which of course made them stand out more than the usual amount, but she had decided that whatever brows she had been given by Mother Nature simply wouldn't do, and had shaved them off. The jet black, painted on variety that she had replaced the originals with had an arch that rivaled St. Louis, and were a full half-inch above the natural brow bone. This gave her the look of a startled circus clown. Not what she was going for, I am certain.

That was one of many fashion eras during which many women thought they could improve on the looks that nature had bestowed upon them, and a lot of eyebrows were shaved in the mad dash to paint incredibly skinny curves where nice, natural brows once adorned nice, natural faces. That is not to say that Mother Nature doesn't ever screw up. I have seen perfectly lovely girls with eyebrows a grizzly would be proud of.

Many years ago I worked as a representative for a well-known brand of cosmetics, and was one of those gals you see in department stores doing makeup on willing customers. It was a fun job, except for the lingering allergy to all perfume. One afternoon a mom came to me with an entirely miserable-faced young girl of about 13. The kid was adorable, but had a definite problem. She had what is kindly referred to as a "unibrow," one long hedge of en eyebrow, with no discernible break in the middle.

The poor kid was distraught, and that's where I came in. Up until that point her mother had been convinced that she was way too young to pluck her eyebrows. Happily, Mom asked me for my opinion. I gently explained that the hair would not grow back in twice as thick (old wives' tale), and that the resulting uptick in her daughter's self-confidence would be more than worth a couple of minutes of discomfort. I sat the teen in my magic chair, and in a short moment had cleaned up the mess. I gave her instructions on upkeep, and sent off a grinning youngster and very relieved mom.

A friend that I recently worked with sits at the opposite end of the spectrum. She has no eyebrows. I haven't a clue how they disappeared, but there is no sign of any hair growth above her eyes. The hair on her head seems fine, and is definitely her own, so the missing eyebrows are a mystery. I don't think she has eyelashes, either, so some sort of physical disorder has robbed her of her brows. That is not the problem. The problem is with me. I am too chicken to say quietly to her, "could you let me take just a moment and show you how to draw very natural looking eyebrows on your face?"

She has drawn her brows in a single wide line, one line for each brow, and it really is distracting. She is an attractive person with a wonderful personality, yet it drives me crazy knowing she could look so much better with just a minute of cosmetic education, and an education I am well qualified to provide. But, again, I am a coward. I am so afraid of hurting her feelings in some way that I guess I prefer for her to remain imperfect. Silly me.

As certain as I am that a sizable segment of the population needs instruction on eyebrow shaping and maintenance, I am just as certain that my intervention is probably unnecessary. In some cases it most likely would be entirely unwelcome. Therefore, I will keep my opinions of eyebrows to myself, and my offended aesthetic sense well hidden. If the worst thing my probable choice for governor has to deal with is an imbalance in his brow structure, this state might be in pretty good shape.

Victoria, keep your secret to yourself!

2010-09-09T00:03:00.000-04:00

I watched a horrifying Victoria's Secret ad a little while ago, and I am still mad. Picture, if you will, a group of underwear-clad lovelies talking about loving their bodies. They are all painfully thin, with ribs showing and gaunt faces. No one who truly loves their body would starve it down to boniness. While some other companies are making a valiant effort to come to terms with the bodies of real women, Victoria's Secret is steadfast in their insistence that beauty only exists in a size zero. Sadly, there are still a great number of women who have been trained throughout their lifetimes to believe this.

In this country it starts very young. I have read that a significant number of 9-year-olds report that they have already been on some kind of diet. There is still an alarming number of girls who suffer from bulimia and/or anorexia. The last statistic I read said that 20% will find their disease to be fatal.

For some reason we women have been well-trained to look for self-satisfaction in our exterior, when in reality it is the interior that should be well-crafted, finely honed, and educated to respect and even like itself.

Now I will switch to the first person. Me. I am a not-so-thin woman, who wears sizes 14 to 18, depending what part of my body is being covered. I spent many years of my life as a size 5, so I have been in both places and have developed a pretty good sense of what it's like to live in both worlds. As a size 5, the primary thing I discovered is that individuals of the opposite sex think it is open season on your figure. They also assume that a large part of your brain must be missing.

I vividly remember appearing as a model back then in a fashion and hair styling competition, with a gorgeously crafted hairdo and a slinky halter-top black jumpsuit. The other girls in the show were introduced by their names, then some complementary statement about their style. When I hit the stage, the only comment the announcer could come up with was that I was wearing the "new bra-less look." I am sure the judges couldn't have survived without that information.

I spent a large part of my life hearing about what a great body I had (as a swimmer and a dancer I was pretty athletic), but very little attention was given to the rest of me. Now that I am well into my sixties, the tables have definitely turned. Actually, they started turning when I was in my thirties. I have been very active politically and socially from my late teens to the present, and when I finally started to gain recognition for my writing, I started to realize how held back I had been by the standards of beauty of the times. Nobody had expected me to have the teeniest bit of intellect.

We have come a long way since the 60's, and women are finding their way into new and better lifestyles. The understanding is out there that we should love, honor and obey our bodies. Loving them means looking in the mirror at a few saggy items, scars, and an extra roll here or there, and being happy that this body has done well by you, taken you through some tough times as well as joyous ones. It deserves respect.

Honoring our bodies means keeping them active, feeding them properly with great, fresh food. It also means not kicking yourself around the block when you eat a jelly donut. Obeying your body means understanding what it needs and following through on achieving that goal. That body is the best judge of what is good for it, and when you feel a strong desire for an activity, an escape (Calgon is acceptable here), or a splurge, go get it! Even chocolate and red wine are allowable, just not as the mainstay of your nutritional intake.

I still see far too many women who believe in the artificial standards, however. They complain constantly about their weight, while forgetting to look at the rest of their unique selves. I know I have found that when my brain is well-fed with interesting information, I tend to automatically take better care of the rest of me. This is the teaching moment: We need to stop worrying about what the advertising media and their Photoshop and airbrushed and starved role-models seem to be dictating as a reachable goal. Friends, it is not going to happen!

Having given my lecture for the day, I will jump back into the advertising world with one two-part question: When the hell are they going to wise up and start looking at the beautiful women who populate this country, in all shapes and sizes? And when are they going to decide to appeal to our intelligence? I will never buy underwear from Victoria's Secret. I don't care what her secret is.

Keep on keepin' on

2010-08-29T00:00:00.000-04:00

I went to a birthday party today. Not for long, just to stop in for a bit and say "hello." Then a quiet ride home by myself through the country, giving me time for reflection. The birthday was a wonderful occasion, as it was a first birthday, a birthday number one for a charming young man who is the offspring of two of my daughter's friends. Many of her friends now have children, most of them less than two years old.

My family welcomed a new arrival this week, a little girl who joins a generation of little girls (with one little boy, also a year old, as the notable exception). I have a large number of great-nieces and one great nephew, most from a few months (or days!) to two years old. I am surrounded by babies.

As I mulled this over during the drive this afternoon, I started to think how incredibly hopeful these new babies can, and should, make us feel. As the media is busy loading us up with its version of the modern world, it amazes me that we still choose to bring new little people into it. If all we did was listen to the TV News, we would be convinced that our sole purpose on earth is to bludgeon, batter, belittle or betray each other, waging wars of words or ideas or weapons, hoping for some kind of meaningful "win."

Most of what we hear going on around us is interpreted by some pundit or other to be problematic. The economy is in a shambles, we are all addicted to sex, drugs, alcohol, or some X-rated internet site. Our marriages are said to be crummy, our family relationships falling apart, our generation gaps wider, and our chances for true communication slimmer than ever. This is far too pervasive for even Dr. Phil to fix.

Then why, I wonder, are we continuing to reproduce?

Maybe, just maybe, it is because we choose not to listen to the "experts," and instead to look around us and trust our instincts. Within my immediate world, and I am sure the surroundings of most people on this planet, I see diversity, acceptance, kindness, caring, humor, and a sense of responsibility toward the well-being of others. This is not a generational thing; it is a human thing.

As humans we tend, no matter what color, nationality, religious beliefs, abilities or disabilities we carry around with us, to want the same things. We want safety, a sense of belonging, someone in our lives who gives a damn about us, and the chance to prove that each of us can make a difference in the lives of others. Whether it is displayed in the truck full of food headed in the direction of those who might otherwise go hungry, or in the curious touch of one infant reaching out to understand another, we recognize our capacity to change things for the better.

Of course, the TV will continue to blare juicy details of the tiny number of humans who choose to behave badly, but we are wise enough to know they are in the extreme minority. Our behavior, the acts of a vast majority of the inhabitants of this planet, says we are better than that. We are giving ourselves a chance to continue to try to get things right.

So we keep on having babies.

Can you come out and play?

2010-08-17T00:04:00.000-04:00

In the last few weeks I have discovered that there are two very distinct types of people in this world, or at least in the northeastern section of the United States. There are people who look for opportunities to play, and those who avoid opening up to the game.

It's not like there is a specific game involved; it is just a convenient way to describe the openness of some people to an opportunity to connect in a spontaneous and humorous way to someone they do not know. Here are a few qualifying questions so you can see if you are ready for the game:

Do you smile at people on the street even if you do not know them?

Do you talk to salespeople, cab drivers, and restaurant servers? More than telling them what you want or where you would like to go?

If you overhear a story, or part of one, on an elevator or another public place, do you finish it in your head? Do you try out more than one ending?

When you go to the zoo, do you have discussions with some of the animals? Do they listen? Better yet, do they answer? If you have never gone to the zoo, you need not read past this point.

Do you ever have conversations with inanimate objects? Again, do they answer?

I am not suggesting that you need to behave in a way that would end with you wrapped up in a nice white sheet and carted off someplace. I just want to discover those who qualify to join in with spontaneous activities, and occasionally take them to another level.

For instance, I was in Burlington, Vermont a few days ago, sitting on a huge rock in the center of town, watching the many shoppers, diners and tourists who were enjoying a sunny afternoon on the outdoor mall. Sitting quietly by myself, I took notice of the folks who noticed me, and the vast majority who didn't. Not that I am ordinarily all that noticeable, but I did have a cast on my right leg, and it was painted to the hilt with flowers, birds, ants, a caterpillar and a goldfish pond. It was definitely noticeable.

Most of the people walking by did not look anywhere near my direction. They were focused on whatever they had to do, and nothing was to get in their way. There were also street musicians out in the sun, and these folks took no notice of them, either. Sad, as a couple of the musicians were really talented.

Then there was the group who looked, stared even, then looked away as though any real connection was terrifying. They were also kind of sad, and definitely not ready for a game.

The group that took a moment or two to ask about the cast, who had painted it, how did I hurt myself, was I going to keep it and how much longer did I have to wear it, they were almost ready to jump in. There was one girl, however, who got the game going.

She had a cast on her left leg, and it was purple. She was walking with a cane, and came right by my rock. She looked directly at me, and I looked directly at her. We both grinned, and the game was on. I jumped up and started to walk on her right, so that our casts were on the outside legs. Arm in arm, we limped our way down the next block, laughing and exchanging stories of our general clumsiness and how it had led to broken bones.

People backed away from the center of the street to let us through, and many of them looked like they wanted to join the parade. We both made it very clear that something had to be in a cast for them to be full members of our marching squad. We were absolutely in sync, not only in step with our opposite legged limping, but also in attitude and ability to stick to the same story, though we were making it up as we went.

Soon we got to the store where she planned to stop, and we bid each other goodbye, still giggling at our joint predicament. I have to mention here that we had very little in common. She was about 25, I am 64. She was much taller than I am, and had broken both bones in her lower left leg jumping over her dog as he decided to stand up. I stepped on a foot that was asleep, and snapped an outside bone on the right.

She was dressed conservatively, while I was in cropped jeans and a brightly printed t-shirt. It did not matter, as we were both delighted to find someone to play with.

A good friend of mine, who I had guessed was open to games, proved to me last night that she was more than ready. She and her husband and son joined my spouse and me at a local restaurant, sitting outdoors under a tent while it rained down around us. We were there not only for the food, which was excellent, but also to support another friend who was in a German band that was serenading us, quite loudly, while we ate and yelled across the table at each other.

The rain had stopped by the time we were done, and we headed out for the parking lot just as the band struck up with the familiar waltzing rhythms of "Edelweiss." I looked at her, she looked at me, and we immediately jumped into each other's arms and began to waltz our way to the car, under the confused gazes of our husbands and her son, though he looked like he might be ready to take part. By the way, my leg was still in the cast.

We now understand that each of us is open to play, and I look forward to our next gathering, as the gloves are off, the door has been opened, and the game is underway. It should be a blast.

How do you get to be in the game? All that is needed is openness, spontaneity, and a fearless desire to connect with others. When an opportunity to play presents itself, you need to leap in with both feet. It is almost certain that someone will be there to join you, giving you a joyful moment and a delightful memory. Play on!

A Few Simple Questions

2010-08-10T23:40:00.000-04:00

I have just been on a lovely vacation in the mountains of Upstate New York, relaxing and enjoying the incredible scenery. Places like that are fraught with one particular type of danger - they give you too much time to think. With all of that pondering time available to me, I tend to dwell on what seem to be universal questions without answers. Here are a few of the more vexing ones:

Why do people go on vacation to relax, and then spend every waking moment on some activity or other?

Why does the man who goes into spasms of delight over a 52" screen "Home Theater" television set feel it is equally important to purchase a 2" by 4" screen telephone to watch the same movies?

Why does anyone wear 5" heel, pointed-toe shoes? I studied ballet as a kid, and I know how much it hurts to walk on my toes.

I know I will sound old here, but what the heck does anyone see in Justin Bieber?

Does painting an "accent wall" in your living room mean that no one will notice the rest of the walls? Does that mean you don't need to paint them?

Why does it always cloud over on the nights when the news tells you to look for a special phenomenon in the sky? I missed all of the possible Northern Lights last week, and I will stay angry for a while.

Why are we so darned afraid of things we just don't understand? Wouldn't a little bit more education help here? And while we are on the subject of education:

Why do schools depend so heavily on standardized tests when there is no such thing as a standardized student?

Why do members of every generation think their children have lousy taste in music? Clothing? Art?

What ever happened to teaching manners?

Why is it illegal for me to damage the Mercedes (Lexus, Hummer, BMW, Cadillac) parked in the last Handicapped parking spot when as a result I have no place to park (I do have the required state tag)? All I want to do is write "not handicapped!!!" with a key on the driver's side door.

And finally:

Why do doctors not have to study nutrition in Medical School when everybody knows "you are what you eat"?

This list is to be continued as the author thinks some more.

Perfect Nails

2010-07-19T23:39:00.000-04:00

I once had a student come to me at the beginning of a class and complain long and loudly about the woman she had sat next to on the train.

"All she did, the whole ride, was file her nails and inspect them, then file them some more. They were long and dark red and she just had to have them perfect! She didn't talk to anybody, and she never even looked out the window. All she did was fuss over those perfect nails!"

I have wondered about the conversation every once in a while, and I wonder a bit more now that I am getting older. For some reason I spend way more time getting my nails to look good than I ever did when I was younger. It is possible there are getting to be more and more body parts that are way past the possibility of perfection, so the nails are a safer bet.

A couple of years ago I had an acquaintance tell me I had beautiful hands, and that lovely complement has stuck with me. That may also be a reason to pay a little more attention to those appendages, all the way to their fingertips. I have always liked the way a person's hands expressed his or her lifestyle, and I do like to think that my hands express the diverse and wonderful life I have been able to live.

I love hands that show hard work, that are calloused and gnarled and powerful. I also am fond of the long, lithe fingers of a professional ballerina. The perfect set of nails, for me, would not be dark red, but clean and natural in length and color. I might also mention that every time I go out of my way to do a full manicure on myself (I hate having them done professionally), within 24 hours I break one nail right down to the quick. Therefore the idea of perfect nails is one I have great difficulty achieving for more than a fleeting moment.

When I think of my student and her vehement distaste for the woman on the train, one woman I know keeps coming to mind. She was a therapist I worked with about 25 years ago. At that time she was in her early forties, an alcoholic in recovery for 13 years, and divorced. She had left her husband and her children to sink deeper into her addiction, and was dealing with the death of her teenage son in a car accident. The intersection where he died was one she had to pass every day to get to work.

In spite of all this, she was wise and funny and a tremendous role model in therapeutic techniques. She made sure she was dressed well and appropriately for all of our consulting appointments. She also made sure she asked me to please put away some cold medicine I had purchased for myself while on a three-day job in a distant town. We were sharing a hotel room, and I had developed a nasty cold. After thirteen years of sobriety, she could not tolerate the presence of a bottle (it didn't matter what kind) that contained alcohol. I immediately put it out of sight. She gave me a lesson in addiction I will never forget.

My point in so thoroughly describing this woman was that she had perfect nails. They were all the exact same length, about 1/4 inch beyond the tips of her fingers, immaculately polished and buffed to a spotless sheen. I don't think I had ever previously seen nails like that on anyone, so they were worthy of notice. I gave a lot of thought to those nails when I heard of the woman on the train, and a lot of thought to the life that my friend and co-worker had lived. It is possible that the train passenger was actually my friend, but even if she wasn't, she deserved sympathy for those perfect nails. They may well have been all she had.

The possibilities are almost limitless!

2010-07-10T23:16:00.000-04:00

For the first time in my life I am in a cast. I am thankful that it took me almost 64 years to break something, and I am assuming that it will be another 64 before it happens again. I have had bone density tests, and my bones are very strong. I just bent things in the wrong direction, added a lot of weight, and snap - OW!

At least that part is over with now, and the pain has subsided by quite a bit. Currently I am left with one very large and solid reminder that I broke a highly necessary bone in my right foot: a cast that reaches from the bottom of my toes to just underneath my knee, and is about nine inches in diameter. That kind of thing on a person's leg will draw comments.

It will especially draw comments due to the fact that I am busily decorating it with large numbers of flora and fauna, cartoon-style, and invitations are out to my many artistic friends to add to the design. It will be very bright, highly amusing, and probably a bit bizarre. Sadly, the story of the actual break is downright boring - I got out of bed and tried to walk on a leg that was totally asleep. The foot bent behind me, and the rest is history, painful history.

Once I hit the grocery store, the craft shop, and my health club the numbers of people asking "How did you break your foot?" are going to grow in geometric proportions, and that story just won't do. I have, for the first (and hopefully last) time the option to create the wildest story of all time explaining how my poor foot met its demise. The sky is the limit! In fact, the sky is also a good starting point.....

1. I was tandem skydiving and landed just below my partner so his foot came down on mine and broke it.

2. I was bungee jumping off the George Washington Bridge in New York City and I bounced back up so far that my foot hit the bottom of the inbound traffic lanes just as a tractor-trailer was passing, creating extra weight at the moment I touched.

3. I was visiting my favorite uncle in Florida when I went out to the canal behind his house. As I reached the dock, a mother and baby manatee jumped out of the water to avoid a wayward motorboat. I caught the baby in mid-air, but the mother landed on my foot.

4. I was on a motorcycle, still in Florida, being chased by a mob of angry alligators after I jumped a ramp over their favorite pond. I ran out of gas and one of them bit my foot.

5. I was dressed as a clown for a local charity children's party when I happened to honk my clown-horn at the one parent in the place who was terrified of clowns. She picked up the chair at her carefully and tastefully arranged luncheon table and threw it at me, where it landed on my foot.

6. I was hiking in the northern Rockies when the wind hit a huge redwood, knocking it down. It almost missed me, but the very tip of the trunk landed on my foot.

7. Same hike, same redwood, but this time an abominable snowman who had been hiding behind the tree saw me, saw I had a camera, and smacked my foot with a broken branch just as I was about to take his picture.

8. Same forest, same tree, same yeti, but this time he was being chased by a crew from National Geographic, jumped into my arms for safety, missed, and landed on my foot.

9. At a posh resort hotel near the Canadian border, went out on my balcony and was bombarded by a flock of Canadian Geese headed for their northern home. Fell off the balcony into the hotel pool, and landed untouched except for my foot. It hit the diving board on the way down.

10. I was asked to stand in for a member of Queen Elizabeth's palace guard, and after forty-five minutes of standing at attention holding my rifle, I dozed off. As I did, I loosened my grip on the rifle and it landed on my foot. Fifteen tourists got the photo, and it will be posted on the Internet any time now.

I think ten interesting versions are enough to do the trick. Anyone who wants to ask deserves a good story, and not the "getting out of bed" blather. If they care enough to need to know the horrid details, then I feel I owe them a tale worthy of their concern. Then maybe I'll let them sign the cast.

Yes, I know they're cute.....

2010-06-30T00:05:00.000-04:00

We have a family of rabbits in my back yard. I've seen at least one parent, maybe two that look pretty much identical, and three or four little ones. They are incredibly cute, and they are eating my flowers. I now truly know the meaning of the word ambivalent.

If I see the little babies out there, I stop everything and watch them. They are eating the dandelion leaves, plantain leaves and clover in the grass, with a little creeping charlie weed thrown in for dessert, so they can stay as long as they want. At the rate they reproduce, I figure they can beat out your average herd of goats in lawn care activities.

Then we get to the parents. I saw one of them heading for the flowers the other day, so I walked out on my back deck and decided to see how close I could get before he (or she) ran off. I slowly and quietly walked to within six feet of the animal, while it carefully watched my approach. Evidently I didn't seem very threatening, as it looked me right in the eye and turned and ate a petunia blossom, one of my favorite purple ones!

At that point I yelled something intelligent like, "Hey, you ate my flower!" and it did run off, but I am certain it was still chewing on its way across the yard. And smiling!

I should have known from experience that rabbits are masters at winning your heart, then eating everything they can get close to in the greenery department. There was a time when our family had rabbits as pets. Yes, we willingly let them into our lives!

We got two rabbits (our first mistake) from the local nature center, which assured me they were both female. One was a beautiful jet black with a white blaze on its ruff, and the other a salt-and-pepper brown with a black head. They were really beautiful animals, and I eagerly built them a nice, big outdoor hutch and put them both in.

What I didn't know, and what the nature center couldn't tell either, was that rabbits figure out what their genders are long before people can accurately discern them. We found this out a few weeks after they arrived when my daughter went out to feed them and discovered eight babies in the hutch. They were absolutely adorable with little pink ears no more than an inch long. Six were coal black like their mom (yes, she was really a girl), and the other two were silver and blonde. We kept those two, and I built two more hutches.

I also at this point built a plywood and chicken wire barrier across the middle of the original hutch, a non-verbal "no touching" order for the mom and dad. Dad ate his way through it, chicken wire and all, and they produced two more babies: one black and one brown. Those two we gave away, and I built hutch number four. Now the rule was "You can look at each other in your various hutches, but nobody is touching anybody!"

We really did have a wonderful time with them, and they lived for a good, long time. I would put up a circle of chicken wire in the yard, and plunk in a kid and a rabbit and let them play for an hour or so. Both kids and all four rabbits seemed happy with this arrangement.

I also discovered that the best garden fertilizer in the world is fresh hay riddled with rabbit poop. I piled in the hay under and in each hutch to keep them warm during the winter, and raked it into the vegetable gardens each spring. My vegetables were huge and very tasty.

The mom lived the longest, and finally went to sleep and didn't awaken at the ripe old bunny-age of eleven years. The moral is I still have a soft spot for rabbits.

So, when the wild ones enter my yard and make at bee-line for the petunias, I head outdoors and put out some carrot-tops or fresh lettuce for them, hoping to stave off the decimation of plants in the garden. I also let my weeds grow without concern, as I know that my friends in the bunny kingdom will not let them get too large. We have reached a gentleman's agreement. They will be fed, and I will keep most of my flowers.

I believe I get the best of this arrangement, as I get to watch the fun.

Next joke on me

2010-06-25T23:59:00.000-04:00

Some of the very best stories I have to tell are in the "most embarrassing moments" category, although I have to admit I found them pretty darned funny even when they happened. For instance:

Those of you who don't know me all that well may not be aware that I spent five years of my life in the entertainment industry. Back in the sixties, when the "laugh-In" show was king, and go-go clubs were popping up everywhere, and it was still illegal to bare it all (I am eternally grateful for that), I was a showgirl and sometime comedienne at a very fancy night club in Chicago. I learned a lot of my current people skills working in that place, and I learned a heck of a lot about myself.

The club I worked in most of that time was owned by two very proper Japanese gentlemen, who were always careful to maintain an appropriate and professional atmosphere. All of us in the show were cautious to do our very best at keeping the audience happy, while keeping ourselves safe. For those of you who are dying to know, there were no poles, and dancing on the bar or tables was strictly prohibited.

We had a substantial stage on which to do our thing, and a talented band to back us up. The live music gave us a lot of energy, even at the end of a night (usually about 4 a.m.). When we had a good audience, and the band was having fun, were were nothing short of spectacular.

One of the girls in the show was a fabulous, burlesque-style stripper named Vicki. A statuesque blonde with a dazzling smile, she could do more with a bunch of veils than anyone I've seen before or since. On the night in question, it was my job to follow Vicki, and throw a little comedy into what was a decent, but standard dance routine. She had been absolutely spectacular in her turn, and I was pumped and ready to go.

Ready to go in this club meant you had to get from the dressing room to the stage, which was no small feat. You had to go through a bunch of tables on a raised platform, down a few stairs, across the front of the full length of the bar, through a few more tables, up a couple of steps, and then start your routine. I was so ready to knock 'em dead that I literally ran the full distance.

It was when I made that last turn that things started to go wrong. Ignoring the steps, I leaped for the stage and caught the toe of my shoe on the very edge of the last step. With the full momentum of my lengthy gallop behind me, I went flat on my face and slid the full length of the stage on my belly.

Now here's where it gets interesting. I realized, very quickly, that I had a choice to make. I could lie there and start bawling, which would certainly be understood by those present as a reasonable alternative. I could stand up , brush myself off, and spend the next few minutes picking splinters out of my stomach. Neither of those options seemed particularly acceptable in the rules of showmanship.

What I did do, quickly but carefully, was lift up my head, smile at the very confused and anxious young man sitting next to the corner of the stage, and say, "I always like to start off with a bang!"

I honestly forget the rest of the show, but with that smile and comment I knew I had the audience on my side, and they were terrific from there on. It took my poor belly a bit longer to recover!

I think there is a life lesson in there somewhere. I have always been a glass-half-full, make-lemonade sort of person, and I would much rather laugh at something than sit and feel sorry for myself. I don't have any great insight into how I got that way; it just seems to have shown up on the list of my personality characteristics.

That's not, however, the only point. From that moment on I have thought carefully about what I present to the world around me, whether it be class content in a Sociology lecture, a therapy session for an adult addiction unit, or a corporate presentation. In any situation where life demands a performance, I am determined to start off with a bang.

So far it's working!

This Old House

2010-06-22T23:23:00.000-04:00

I am finding myself in the position of needing to seriously consider giving up my wonderful old house. We have lived in it for 35 years come November, and I am ready to admit that it is just too much to maintain, to care for on a day-to-day basis. It is three stories, with five bedrooms and over 3,000 square feet.

The history of our house is kind of fascinating, as it was built by the contractors that built close to a hundred stone houses, of many different sizes, in the town we call home. It was originally a company town, owned by a great big outfit that made, of all things, asbestos. Yep, we are a Superfund Site.

The houses are of different sizes and shapes according to the status of the employee that lived therein. There are a few very ornate, huge places on one street that were obviously the executive homes, then came the management or supervisors' homes, three floors high and 30 feet square, dotting streets all over town. Finally there are sections of large, somewhat ornate row homes, for the factory workers. All of them are way beyond any middle class homes being built today.

Ours is one of the middle-management houses, though actually owned and maintained as an income property by the builder instead of the company. For that reason, our house was rented from 1900, when it was built, to 1975 when we bought it. We are honestly the first owners on the deed.

We purchased the place as a handyman's special, and I truly think it still qualifies! In the first few years we were here, we put on a new roof, redid all of the plumbing (probably lead pipes wrapped in asbestos!), bought a new furnace, put in a sump pump, and started the rewiring of everything. Walls were falling down, ceilings had gaping holes in them, and there was 6" of water in the basement every time it rained.

My kitchen, in need of a current remodel, was originally almost non-existent. It consisted of four bare walls, each painted a different shade of yellow, one built-in storage cabinet, and a metal base with a one-piece ceramic sink and drainboard on it. When we were in fix-up mode my mother decided she would clean the kitchen floor, and she gave up after carrying out and dumping 42 buckets of almost black water. I built our first "real" kitchen, myself, out of Sears do-it-yourself cabinets, which I learned how to hang. I also cut the counter tops and laid the floor. Geez, I wish I had that kind of energy now!

We rebuilt many of the walls and went through buckets of spackle. Paint soaked right in to the old plaster, so many coats were needed. In my kids' rooms, I put up very strong vinyl-coated wallpaper, which is still there. I know I will have to remove it soon, and I also know that most of the walls will come down with it. Home Depot knows us on a first-name basis.

The exterior is all stone, beautiful old Pennsylvania fieldstone, quarried right near town, and lovingly mortared and stacked by a stalwart group of Italian stone masons, imported by the original asbestos company. It has stood for 110 years, and is not going anywhere.

The landscaping has been lovingly accomplished, with trees coming and going, and a carefully built collection of perennials forming a colorful blanket all summer long. My favorite tree is a forty-foot oak in the back corner of the yard, planted gently as an acorn by my five-year-old son. I moved it once, and spent a few years dutifully picking off some bugs that had invaded the leaves. My baby boy is now 32, and it will hurt to leave that tree behind.

Where the tree now sits used to be a ten-foot wide, two-foot-deep pit of sand, ringed by old tires, where the neighborhood kids all gathered and played. I dug it out and filled in the sand myself, all two tons of it! It was a lot of work, but for years I knew where all of the kids in the neighborhood were - in my back yard!

We made a major change to the interior about eight years ago, when we built a twenty-foot square family room onto the rear of the house. The back wall is full of windows, and the ceiling peaks at 11 feet. Happily I had studied architectural drafting in art school, so I was able to develop the plans myself. That room had been in my head for about ten years before then, so I had little trouble with the design. I now spend the major portion of my day doing something-or-other in that room.

There are, as I mentioned, five bedrooms in the house, which are now serving as repositories for the 35 years' worth of stuff we have accumulated. We are in need of a visit by the "Clean House" people. It's not as bad as the homes they show, but it wouldn't take long to get there. I am a collector of many lovely, meaningful things, and my husband collects junk. Of course, he would see the situation turned around.

That's the scariest part of looking at a smaller, cheaper home. What the heck will we do with the stuff? I am in the very slow process of sorting things out, and have managed to throw out more than I thought I could, but we have a long way to go. I was the executor of my parents' estate, and the one who cleaned out their house. I swear I will not leave anything like that for my kids to deal with!

Plans are to stay where we are now for another five years or so. I figure that's about how long it will take me to clean up and sort out our stuff. I sincerely hope that timeline doesn't get shortened, but my husband is in the construction industry, and there is not much going on in that industry right now.

I am mentally getting prepared for this whole process, and have even figured out an area where we could comfortably move, and a much newer house style that I would enjoy. That being said, I think it will take me at least five years to get ready in my heart to pack up and start elsewhere. The most important things for me to take? That's a no-brainer: the memories.

In the Realm of "Be Careful What You Ask For"

2010-06-15T02:00:00.000-04:00

I have a lovely friend who knits. She is actually the mother of one of my closest friends, and I guess by osmosis or some other process she has become my friend as well. She is in her mid-eighties, and, as I said, loves to knit. She makes wonderful pure cotton knitted washcloths and gives them out for use by her best buddies. I have been lucky enough to receive a number of them, and they are incredibly soft. Nobody else in my family can use them.

But I digress. A few of years ago I took her to a local book store for her birthday. It is something I like to do with friends, and something they seem to like as well. In this case, she picked out, for her present, a terrific book of knitting patterns, of everything from fancy sweaters and baby clothes to charming knitted animals.

As she refused to get the book as my gift unless I picked out something in it that she could make for me, I leafed through the stuffed animals and came across a very cute little duck. It was bright yellow with an orange bill and dangling orange feet, and I thought it would make a good addition to my collection of stuffed pals. The one thing I did not do was look at the pattern and see what size it actually was.

The whole time she was making it I kept hearing from her daughter that she was regularly cursing out the pattern she was working from, and how very difficult it had turned out to be. I couldn't imagine how a little (I figured maybe eight or ten inches tall) innocent duck could give her so much trouble. Then she finished it, in time for my birthday.

We met with her daughter and son-in-law, again in our favorite bookstore, and I was startled to see the size gift bag she carried. Then I dug into the bag and pulled out "Duckie," named after my favorite NCIS doctor (I am addicted to that series), or maybe because he was a duck. I had to laugh. Duckie was easily two feet tall, and a bright enough yellow to make up for the cloudy day outside. In addition to the brilliant lemon-hued body, his bill, legs and feet were the brightest orange yarn I had ever seen. All of that was topped off by two big black eyes, and somehow he seemed to be smiling. No, grinning!

I took Duckie home and gave him a place of honor atop a sofa in my family room. In spite of the amusement and occasional horror on the part of some visitors, he remains there, four years later. He has become a part of the family.

Oh, and to top things off, for Christmas that year my friend asked me what she could make for me, and I told her Duckie was cold sitting right in front of a bank of windows, so he needed a sweater. She dictated the measurements to take, and I gave her the numbers. By a few days after Christmas, Duckie was wearing a brilliant blue, green, and matching yellow ombre sweater, a perfect fit.

I am so very lucky to have the friends that I do, stuffed or otherwise! I don't know how many fellow adults would understand that I truly did want a silly yellow duck as a part of my home's decor, and that it was equally important that the duck be warm and comfortable in a custom-designed sweater. My best friends are those who easily come along on my little adventures, without ever asking why.

No, dementia has not set in, and I am not certifiable. I simply value the dedication to silliness in those closest to me. It is keeping us all smiling right along with Duckie.

P.S. - His best friend is a tiny bear dressed in a pink bunny suit. They are inseparable.

There's Something About Water

2010-06-12T21:03:00.000-04:00

I just returned to my lovely old (110 years old!) stone house in suburban Philadelphia, and am longing to get back in my car and spend another 2 hours driving right back to where we just spent a week vacationing. There is a quiet, all-residential island off of Atlantic City , NJ, and I've been lucky enough to find a delightful 3-bedroom ranch house for rent right on the bay side of this island. No, it's not an ocean view, but somehow the connection to some other land form, even if it's a couple of miles away, makes the island even more desirable. It's as though we could silently thumb our collective noses at the rest of the state, letting them know we want nothing to do with their hustle and bustle and noise.

A week is never long enough for me. I wish we could take long, drawn-out vacations, but I haven't hit the lottery yet, and must settle for what we can afford. It's obvious that other people think houses next to the water are something special, as the rental rates are steep, and the waiting lines long.

Happily, the only company we had all week was a flock of sea gulls, silently perching on some old wooden posts connected to the sagging dock next door. There was also an occasional egret and some other feathered friends I couldn't identify, but they all seemed perfectly comfortable sharing their favorite spot.

The tide came in and went out, changing the landscape in sometimes startling ways. The miles of marsh land covering much of the way across the bay would virtually disappear every dusk, with only tiny patches of greenery poking out of the still waters. By morning they would be back, almost coating the full distance between our lovely house and the rest of New Jersey. I wished I had the patience to watch the whole process, but I could only manage a glance every once in a while.

Other inhabitants include a large number of turtles, who occasionally decide to march from one side of the island to the other, creating no end of traffic problems for the humans. One waddled out in front of me this week, and I stopped my car, got out, picked it up, and carefully plunked it in the grass on the far side of the street so its journey could continue. I didn't realize I was being watched, but applause broke out as I finished my task, from a smiling elder gent who had been weeding his gardens. It was nice to be appreciated, both by the turtles and the locals!

I do love this island, but it is not my only vacation spot each year. The other favorite is a lake in upstate New York, in the Adirondack Mountains. We rent a wonderful house there, on the water, for a week later in the summer. The lake water has a completely different character to it, and is inhabited by ducks, loons, an occasional cormorant, and a bevy of misplaced seagulls. They arrived out of nowhere about twenty years ago, and never left. I like to wonder where they hide in February, when the ice on the lake is 8 or 9 inches thick!

There are also plenty of fish in the lake, where my husband's efforts from our dock on the island have led to little more than a few crabs grabbing his lure, only to let go as they leave the water. In the lake, you can stick a safety pin on the end of a string, bait it with a piece of corn or a Cheerio, and you will catch yourself a sunfish. I know, I have done it, at about age 6.

You honestly couldn't get two more diverse vacation spots, but the feature tying them together is the water. It's slow, deliberate rhythms, whether they be tidal or created by a passing wind, are soothing to the greatest depths of one's soul. A quiet cup of tea in the early morning shared with the rising sun and the barely audible slipping of the water in and out of the shore line can start the most difficult of days on a gentle, determined note. The closing of each day is made calmer and sweeter by that same sound and an always spectacular sunset, perfectly reflected in the water.

I have lived in many parts of the country, and have taken trips to many others, but there will always be a preference in my heart for a place where there is water. It could be stream or a pond, a lake or a bay or an ocean, but for the time I can spend on its shores, somehow, it will become mine.

Electronic Blues

2010-05-30T23:30:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow I will go to the cell phone store. I have been told I am due for an upgrade. This includes a new phone for free. I am dreading the visit.

What? Getting something for free that is newer than what I have now? Dread? I must have a screw loose somewhere, you might think. The dread comes not from what I have coming in the way of opportunity. It is solely because I will have to learn to use the darned thing.

Last year I got a similar message, and I went in to see what was available for me in the way of new and beautiful cell phones. Before I go too much further I need you to understand that I am not brand new to this portion of the electronics explosion. I have had portable phones since the early 1990's, when they were called "bag phones," weighed eight or nine pounds, and took up the same space in your car as a passenger.

I have had flip-phones, flat phones, and fancy phones. They have been delivered to me in blue, silver, multi-colors and black. I have avoided pink. I have taught my octogenarian parents how to use cell phones. My phones have been extremely complex in their capacity, and here is where the problem lies.

Last year when I went to get "upgraded," I was very clear in explaining to the clerk at the cell phone store what I did and did not want. My phone did not need to do the following:

A. Make movies

B. Take photographs. I have a very nice camera for those two items.

C. Translate what I say into fourteen different languages, including ancient Greek and Welsh. Almost everyone who speaks those is dead.

D. Automatically test my blood sugar. If I were diabetic I might appreciate this, but I am not.

E. Provide me with detailed road maps of the continent of Antarctica, in case I should want to go penguin filming, or something similar. I hate being cold.

F. Give me access to the fishing charts of the Atlantic seaboard. If I did fish, and I have not done so since I was 12, it would be in a lake or a stocked pond. I see no reason to go 15 miles off the coast of Newfoundland in search of the perfect tuna. My grocery store has them.

G. Access my email the second it is delivered to my inbox. I do not want to get all of my forwarded jokes dumped into my cell phone, which will alert me to their individual presence with an incredibly annoying ring tone. I wish to read them at my convenience and in silence, please!

H. Allow me to watch movies. Why anyone would grab the opportunity to view "Avatar" or "Midsummer Night's Dream" or any Bruce Willis classic on a 2" by 3" screen escapes me. I am a fan of Imax, not I-miniscule!

What I do want, ever so much, and what would make me happy, is the never-wavering capacity to make a phone call, from my phone to another phone. Don't tell me the subscriber I am trying to reach is being searched for. If it's my husband (and it usually is), he is probably playing a video game on his Blackberry, and you are allowed to interrupt that activity so he will receive the call! Needless to say, this capacity is not always available.

Oh, and quit telling me my new phone is free if I have to pay for it and wait 3 to 6 months for a gift card to come in the mail. If I have to pay for it, it is not free. The gift card is because of your guilt in charging me for all those $&*#&%!! applications I will never use, and is directly in proportion to the number of pages of directions I will have to decipher before getting to the incoming and outgoing calls. And by the way, I only need the book in one language.

Those of you whom I call regularly, you now know why you will not be hearing from me for the next few weeks. If you really need to talk, call me on my home phone. It never needs charging, and is always in the last place where I hung it up. It has a cord.

2010-05-29T00:01:00.000-04:00

I am currently sitting at a large, armoire-type piece of computer-holding, file cabinet, storage drawered, shelved furniture. It is substantial, and it is somewhat impressive. The impressive part is that I put it together myself, with instructions by IKEA.

I have discovered over the 36 years of my marriage that any piece of furniture that arrives at my home in a large, flat box will be put together by only one member of the family, usually me. The other members are only allowed in an area beyond an approximate three-mile radius. The one who is putting the furniture together (me again) is allowed a full weekend to complete the project, during which he or she is also allowed an unlimited number of the following:

1. Stitches

2. Well-placed curse words, uttered with emphasis

3. Alcoholic beverages, to be ingested only after 90% of said furniture is completed

4. Trips to the hardware store to find a screw that almost matches the one you lost

5. Trips to the drug store for pain killers and bandages

6. Trips to neighbors' homes or yards for momentary consolation

7. Trips to the doctor for item #1

8. Loudly uttered congratulatory phrases from others upon completion of the project

With that in mind, let me tell you about putting together my computer desk, which is what it said it was on the box. The one that I saw at IKEA about four years ago was very nice, went with my old house and its furnishings, and couldn't, I thought, be all that hard to create. After all, I had constructed a couple of IKEA tables, and a few chairs. This should not be all that different.

In fact, I lied about the one box. It took two boxes to hold the pieces of computer desk which was to adorn my den, and a third box to contain all of the hardware components. The first two boxes were very large, and incredibly heavy. The third was small, and heavy. My first project was getting them from my car to the second floor of my house. Since all other family members had been banished for the duration of my "build," I was on my own.

Happily I had discovered the "Thump and Twirl" method of stepping a large box from the back of my car to my front porch. From there a bit of "Shove and Slide" technique got the vast weight up the steps and into the house. Going to the second floor next meant going up a two-step landing, a nine-step slant of about 45 degrees, another landing, and five more steps to the top. This necessitated a "Flop and Drag," followed by a "Shove and Grunt," back to a "Drag and Scream," and ending in a "Slam and Jam."

Then I took a nap.

After the respite, I opened the boxes and dug out the directions. I will say that IKEA directions are relatively easy to follow, at least when compared to some furnishing items I have received with directions that have obviously been book-translated from a far-eastern dialect or two. I have been told to "place the panel marked 'B' into the slot marked with an arrow (red) and tightly move into position over the panel marked 'C', holding while firmly placing screwdriver into screw marked 'M' and making tight."

This particular set of directions was a source of laughter for many months after the project was completed, mostly because none of the pieces were marked, and following the directions invariably led to an impromptu game of "Twister." When played alone, that game can get more than a little frustrating.

Back to my computer desk. My simple instructions included references to more than 35 pieces of laminated wood, and a plethora of screws, bolts, tracks, runners, protective grips, door magnets and hardware. If that wasn't daunting enough, the larger pieces which had to be flung and twirled with ease, or held straight up while a much smaller piece was firmly attached, weighed an average of 35 pounds.

The directions, which took up about 12 pages, included installation of three rolling shelves, for the keyboard, printer, and an odd contraption that held the keyboard shelf. All had to have tracks and rollers installed, and then they had to fit into each other and the huge outer cabinet that held them all. It took somewhere near 5 tries to install the first track, as I kept getting it upside down. I finally got it when I turned the directions right side up.

I made it through a file drawer (five sides and two tracks, plus two edge protectors for the drawer tops and two pieces of antiqued bronze drawer pulls), a regular drawer (same approximate number of parts), then the interior-shelved storage section. I finished with a flourish the three-way divided CD and paper storage shelves in the top section of the interior, then looked at the two 20-inch by 6-foot doors which were to be attached on the front of the computer section.

These were substantial, to be put in place to close up and protect the contents of my computer desk. They were also to be held approximately 10 inches off the floor while the various screws and magnets were properly attached. These doors have since found a happy home in the back of my den closet, where they will stay indefinitely. My cabinet is doorless, and I bet the contents have not felt the least bit threatened.

I do feel a certain sense of pride when I sit down at the thing, slide the keyboard out, and begin to hunt and peck my way through a new online adventure. I am fairly sure that everything is installed right side up, that the correct screws or bolts are holding together the correct parts, and that this is a computer desk of substance. It will not disintegrate any time soon.

I finished with no stitches, no need for the doctor (except maybe for some anti-anxiety meds), and no trips to the hardware store. I lost no pieces, damaged nothing, and was able to put it all together on my den floor, so the finale was simply to stand it up and put it in place. It took me one day, but I must add that I stayed up awfully late that night.

Thank you, IKEA, for your directions, that are almost easy to understand. I have no problem patting myself on the back for the lack (for the most part) of curses uttered during the project completion. The only alcohol necessary was a large glass of wine, lifted by me in honor of a job well done (nobody knows about the doors!).

I will note, however, that no big flat boxes have been delivered to my house since.

Needs no title!

2010-05-23T00:39:00.000-04:00

I love women. Not in the physical sense, though they are fun to look at. Not as a critic, looking over a wearer of the latest fashion, unless something about the fashion is really eye-catching, in a Lady Gaga-esque sort of way. None of that stuff is really important, when you get right down to it. And that's what women do after they reach a certain age: they get right down to it.

When I meet a brand-new possible friend (and that's the way I look at everyone these days), I have little use for the standard pleasantries. I am really no good at small talk, and that's the stuff our men-friends seem so good at discussing. How is the weather? Who won the big game? Can I borrow your lawn mower? How big was that fish? What was your last golf score? Men can spend a full weekend together and come home knowing nothing about each other.

Women, on the other hand, quickly learn about themselves and each other in a depth that sometimes startles me, but is always pleasing. Having said that, I will admit to the fact that the woman I met tonight I met because she was wearing a fabulous belt. All right, that is the standard "I like what you're wearing" opener, but it didn't stay there very long.

The friendship, which started at about 8:30 and lasted until approximately 9:15 (when I had to leave the event), took no time at all to delve into background - where did you grow up? - what era were you part of, and does it relate easily to mine? - Has your life been slow and stable, or has it been full of variety and change, as has mine? - How is life for you now? Are you comfortable, or is it a bit rocky?

It took no more than a minute to realize that compatibility was a given. I think that is because we eventually, and hopefully, reach a point in our lives where we are steady and confident in who we are as women, and as a result we no longer feel the need to compete. Instead, the desire to connect is far stronger, and the information and questions can go on for hours.

It was too bad that the event we shared held other responsibilities for both of us. I would like to have dug further into her history, asked the whats and whys of career choices and family, looked at tastes and dreams. I am sure our conversation could have gone on until midnight with neither of us becoming bored. Golf scores would never have come up.

Anyway, I hope she knows that she enriched my life with her presence, just for 45 minutes of information sharing. Women friends are invaluable, no matter how brief the friendship.

What to do

2010-05-22T16:20:00.000-04:00

It is a beautiful, cool, breezy spring day outside, and here I sit, curled up in front of my computer, enjoying the view from my den window. The wise thing to do, one would think, is to get outside and take a long, leisurely stroll through the wonderful old town we call home. Everything is in bloom at once from a warm, wet April, and the colors and scents fill the air - with pollen.

There's the rub. The leisurely stroll would go more like this:

Step out the front door and gaze at the fifteen or sixteen tall, old maple and oak trees that are coating the street, the cars, and the lawns with yellow powder that makes my eyes water and itch just thinking about them. Strolling among them means my eyes will shortly be closed and it will take a pair of pliers and a full bottle of Benadryl to get them to open again.

In the next block there is a tall wooden fence covered with honeysuckle vines, full of lovely white flowers with bright yellow centers and a perfume that can close my throat in a nanosecond. Maybe it's because I used to eat the flowers as a child. I'm trying to recall why that seemed like a good idea. For that matter, there were a lot of things I thought were good to eat at an early age that for me to ingest now would need the help of something hydraulic. Ah, childhood.

At the end of that block there is a charming pink rose bush. The flowers are tiny and delicate, the bush has reached enormous proportions. I am actually not allergic to roses, but for about 10 years now a colony of yellow jackets has decided to dig their nest directly under that particular bush. Have I mentioned I am allergic to insect stings?

As I walk I hear the whirring and buzzing of a nearby lawn mower, taking a combination of grass and pollen and tossing it wildly into the air, for all to breathe. I figure at this point it will take about two weeks for my nose to stop running. Now the red rash and itching have started as well. The rest of me keeps walking, but with renewed strength, and in the opposite direction. I must get home!

Two of the more friendly neighborhood pups are out to play. Their homes are between me and my destination, and they are very happy to see me. Their greeting takes the form of an awful lot of jumping and licking and sniffing and leaning against. You guessed it. I am allergic to dogs.

If I do make it back from my journey still standing and breathing, I then take the front steps to my porch, where there is a particular strain of tiny, black, jumping spiders. They make their homes in the nooks and crannies of my old flagstone and concrete steps. There is not enough Raid in the world to get rid of those pesky bugs.

I am basically Buddhist at heart, and am very careful not to harm any other living thing, but one of them bit me once and put me in the emergency room. I am sure my karma is ruined for at least the month, but out comes the spray and away go the spiders.

I will finally enter my place of safety, my lovely glass-enclosed front porch. There I can sit in my grandmother's wicker rocking chair and gaze at all of the natural beauty my neighborhood can hold. It is truly the reason we bought the house, 35 years ago. I wasn't allergic to anything back then.

Of course I already told you (in an earlier post) about the family of squirrels that took up residence in the porch roof. Did I mention the starlings? They had nests there for at least five years in a row, and the adorable chirping of the new baby birds turned way too quickly into a grating squawk that was anything but pleasant, and way too constant. Oh, and I am allergic to anything with feathers.

Now that I really think about it, when we had two feet of snow on the ground, none of these things were a problem. If you heard me complain the tiniest bit about the freezing cold and the impassable roads and the awful heating oil bills, I take it all back.

Ah-choo! Sniff. Scratch.

Oh what the heck, it is awfully pretty out.

In search of a little light.....

2010-05-18T23:00:00.000-04:00

There are really only two kinds of people in the world: those who turn on and leave on every available light in every room they enter, and those who cannot leave a room without switching those same lights off. Inevitably, in any given family of four, two of each characteristic will appear. This is a scientifically proven fact. It is also a scientifically proven fact that every marriage has in it at least one very nasty argument based upon the previous scientifically proven fact.

For instance, my husband came home from work today, while the sun was still up, walked in the front door and did the following:

1. Turned on the switch next to the door that controls the two wall sconce lights over the fireplace mantel. (This is next to a window - see reference to sun being up.)

2. Went to the first available table lamp, and turned it to the highest available illumination level so he could look to see if there were any messages on the answering machine. I must add here that the answering machine has a lighted number, which blinks, telling you if there are any messages. There were not. (This is next to a four-foot by six-foot window - note sun position.)

3. Approached the second table lamp, by the first window, and turned that on in case he wanted to come back and sit in his favorite chair and read. This chair is next to the fireplace. (Note previously mentioned sconces and window placement.)

4. Walked into the dining room and immediately turned on the switch controlling the chandelier over the table, where he might at some point put his laptop to complete some project or other, like the alphabetic filing of the day's "You-Tube" discoveries. This chandelier has five 60 watt bulbs. If you look past the chandelier out the dining room window, you can see that the sun is still approximately where it was 2-1/2 minutes ago when he arrived home.

5. Entered the family room and sat in his favorite location on the sofa, turning on the table lamp beside him. Opening his newspaper, he began to read, primarily by the light coming through the two large windows, side by side, directly behind the sofa.

By now I am sure you can see where this is going. I am the family member who opens the electric bill each month and writes out the check for a ridiculously large sum of money. Therefore, I am the one who regularly wanders through the house turning out lights. He might argue that he is the primary wage-earner in the household, which could, I suppose, give him the right to waste as much electricity as he likes.

I might counter that point with a suggestion that we use the money spent on creating migraine-inducing levels of brightness in our home to do something else, like take an Alaskan cruise. Besides, all of that light serves a dual purpose, creating not only a reading and/or computing atmosphere, but also one in which every speck of dust, fingerprint on a doorway, or smudge on the wall becomes spotlighted. The Alaskan cruise might have to give way to a cleaning service and a professional painter, unless I turn off the lights and leave the flaws in relative darkness.

It strikes me as a little odd that the behavior patterns have switched gender in the next generation. My daughter traces her path through the house by the level of artificial light she leaves behind, while my son has dutifully followed along, turning everything off. She swears she has to sleep in total darkness, yet leaves on the lights in the bathroom, den, and hallway she visits on her way to bed. My son turns everything off, so I can't find the bathroom at 3 in the morning.

Somewhere in all of this there has to be a middle ground, but I have yet to find it. I have also discovered that we who switch things off are also inevitably those who holler, "Could you please turn that down?" or ask, "Do you smell something funny?"

I am sure it is genetic, and just as sure that my daughter's boyfriend is an "off-switcher" and my son's girlfriend loves to have everything lit up. And so it goes...........

In Defense of Silliness

2010-05-15T00:07:00.000-04:00

A woman I admire has been in the news a lot lately. She is 88 years old and going full steam ahead. I met her once, at a book signing, and the one thing I said to her that I actually remember is how much I loved her ability to be silly, and not care a bit what anyone else thought of it. You may have guessed by now that the woman is Betty White.

I remember Betty all the way back to her days on Mary Tyler Moore and Password with Allen Ludden, her late husband. I always thought she had a particularly bright sparkle in her eyes, and I really enjoyed her nutty sense of humor. Over the years she became a role model, and one that I was to carry into all aspects of my life.

For almost 20 years I spent much of my time in front of a college classroom, teaching things like English Composition, Speech Communications, Psychology, Sociology, Human Relations, Leadership, Group Communications, Contemporary Issues, and, believe it or not, a group of courses in the specific computer programs relating to Graphic Arts, Typography, and Design Principles. Oh, and I designed and taught courses in Advertising Principles and Ad Campaigns.

Because I have led a completely insane life, and dug into so many different areas of interest, I am actually qualified to teach every one of those classes. Most of them I designed and wrote from scratch. I had one prerequisite for each classroom I entered: It had to be fun.

Since a lot of my classes were for evening school or taught in a Fine Arts curriculum, they were about four hours long. In that time frame, there was no way I could rattle off some horribly dry lecture or slide show narration and keep anyone interested, or even awake. My motto in front of a classroom full of mostly strangers was simple - If I'm not having fun, you're not learning anything.

I describe my classes as four hour long stand-up comedy routines. I would climb on desks, give students bags of children's blocks to build with, and tell many funny stories (most of which had something to do with the topic at hand). I drew cartoons on the board to illustrate points and let the class play "warmer - colder" to figure out how operant conditioning worked. I honestly think my face is practically wrinkle-free because I used it in clown-like fashion to amuse and inform students about my feelings on either some of my topics or some of their answers!

I taught more than one speech class to stand up in a line at the front of the room and practice, and learn, the basic five positions in classical ballet. Of course the Academic Dean always walked in on exercises like that one. He would just smile, shake his head, and leave. I allowed students in my speech class to demonstrate "dance moves for when you're drunk on Saturday night," how to make origami frogs, and the art of the six-foot-hoagie (which we then ate).

For Business English, we made up a pretend product. The only guidelines were that it had to be advertised on an infomercial after 2:00 AM, and that a B-list celebrity had to be the spokesperson. Then the students had to write two letters - one ordering the product, complete with how they were going to pay the three easy payments of $19.95 and in what size, color, or including what set of attachments they wanted it - and the other letter to inform the maker that something had gone terribly wrong with their thingamajig, and how they wanted the problem resolved. Yes, there were serious writing skills involved, but they loved doing it, as the product was utterly ridiculous.

I have brought into my classroom teddy bears, Barbie dolls, and jars of peanut butter. My lectures have involved pantomime, karate and blowing things up (at least we did that outdoors).

The owner of my school has never understood why I won't wear a business suit to class. You can't blow things up wearing a business suit.

I give long, challenging essay exams, with a liberal sprinkling of Hershey's Kisses, and broad hints if a question is not understood. I encourage students to use their books, notes, to call a friend or ask a stranger in the hall if they need help. I want them to know how to look for information, and I want them to actually learn it, not memorize nonsense bits for a fill-in-the-blanks series of questions.

I am sure there are many instructors I have worked with who think of me as more than a little strange. Good! That means the method to my madness is working. I have spent a number of years working with adolescent addiction groups, abused teens, and battered wives. I have had to learn many, many methods of detecting drug use or suicidal intentions. I have personally lived through domestic violence, an addicted ex-spouse, and the murder of a close friend. In all of this I have had the good fortune to discover that people learn and understand far better when they are smiling than they do when crying.

So thank you, Betty White, for letting me know that even the most serious of topics can have a funny side. Thank you for giving me permission to be incredibly silly in front of a group who needs to learn some very distressing information. Silliness has worked its magic, over and over again, where stern lectures would fall on purposely deaf ears.

I sincerely hope that when I reach 88, I can look back at my accomplishments in the classroom and in life, and laugh like crazy!

Homage to Art Linkletter

2010-05-12T00:36:00.000-04:00

Back when I was a young'un, I used to love to watch Art Linkletter on television. I especially liked his show "Kids Say the Darndest Things." He would line up some six-year-olds on his stage and ask them a series of questions, then sit back and let them work their magic. The replies were often priceless.

Having been a parent for over 33 years now, I have collected my own personal batch of kids' sayings, and of course I feel compelled to share a few of them with you.

One night, coming home from a meeting of some sort with my son, who was five or six at the time, we came upon a very large June bug in the middle of my front porch, belly up. He has never been much of an insect fan, but he tapped this one with his toe for a moment, then muttered, "Dead beetle." Backing away, he shook his head, stared quietly at the bug for a moment, and commented, "Must be John Lennon."

I think I realized at that point that this kid would grow up to have a wicked sense of humor, and he has.

My daughter is still coming up with quotable comments, but my favorite of hers was one afternoon, when she was about three, and I was busy changing little brother on the sofa. She appeared out of the back of the house, marched up to where I was sitting, placed her hand sternly on my knee, and intoned, "It's all right, Mom, I cleaned up the whole bathroom."

To this day I have no idea what was cleaned up. A quick check of the bathroom revealed kind of a lot of suds in a few areas, but nothing disastrous.

A later favorite of hers was a Mothers' Day card from maybe 1996, with a note telling me that she knew I was the kind of mother who would understand even if she moved a trailer with her husband and their thirteen kids into my back yard for a while. It was a lovely thought, even if she vastly overestimated my tolerance level. Happily, she has produced neither the husband nor the thirteen children. Whew!

The one thing I would caution you about when it comes to kids and their phrases is that they will forever remember and repeat anything dicey you are in the habit of saying, especially in times of stress. It took weeks for me to talk both of them out of repeating what I called that other driver after he ran a stop sign and smashed my headlight.

Some friends of mine had a difficult time with their daughter not speaking. By the time she was two she had been to every available specialist, and still had not said a word. All they heard from the professionals was that all of the equipment was in working order; she was just taking her time using it.

Then one morning her Mom had her in the back car seat, driving down one of the busiest streets in Central Philadelphia, and stuck in a traffic jam. Mom was torn between chewing out the driver who had just cut her off, and sharing some spicey verbiage with the red light ahead that refused to change. Suddenly, from the back of the car, came this little tiny voice,

"Look at all the goddam cars!"

Up until that point, I guess nothing had been important enough to mention! Those of you whose children are so far very quiet, be careful what you wish for. This kid hasn't shut up since. The last I heard she was in law school.

Of course, kids are great at one particular thing - they can win your heart in a second with a few choice phrases. A few months ago I had a chance to get together with five of my nieces and the eight children (7 girls, one boy!) they had between them. Their ages are between eight months and nine years, but the majority are toddlers. As I was saying my goodbyes for the afternoon, one of them, a two-year-old, ran across the floor and threw her arms around my knees. Looking up at me, she burst out with a heartfelt, "I love you!"

There is nothing else to say.

Ceremony

2010-05-08T14:19:00.000-04:00

Last night I attended my former employer's annual graduation ceremony. It is not long-winded, and the graduating class wasn't huge. Nobody went on forever about the opportunities awaiting everyone. We were not in a gigantic formal hall. Nobody famous received an honorary doctorate. It was still a spectacular success, reflecting the hard work and dedication of a group of incredible human beings, who overcame, in many cases, life circumstances that might have stopped stronger folks.

We met in an old, stone Lutheran church in the middle of a small, suburban town. Faculty and students gathered in the basement and created some chaos climbing into caps and gowns, getting group and individual photos taken care of, and having their flowers (in school colors, of course) pinned on each left lapel. As always, there are only one or two people capable of pinning the flowers correctly, so they will neither fall on the floor nor stab the wearer.

There is something inherently awkward in the design of academic "caps," which end up at a rakish angle, or creating an iconic halo, or dangling its tassel in one's eyes. There will never, I am sure, be a year where everyone's cap is just right, no one's flowers have fallen off, and no one is wearing flip-flops in the front row of the annual photograph.

This year was only the second in the history of the school where we were not at the ready to march at the allotted time. We were almost five minutes late. Our President is a stickler for time management, at least as it pertains to graduation. In other areas, not so much, but that can be discussed later.

We were actually ready to go at 7:04 and 30 seconds, heading upstairs in two lines, on two separate staircases, meeting at the top and heading down the aisle. I was given the honor of leading the faculty, and carrying the school's mace, being master of teachers. As the most recent retiree, I felt pretty special.

Ah, but then came the graduates, 103 of them, to be exact. There were more than that who had finished their programs, but some chose not to participate in the ceremony. I don't understand why.

It was a diverse group, from places like Ecuador, Sri Lanka, Sudan, the Dominican Republic, Peru, Cambodia and other parts of the world, as well as many towns local to the school. As a faculty member, I got to sit in the choir loft of the church, looking forward at the sea of bright blue caps and gowns in the front pews. Every year of the fifteen years I have taught at this school, I am awe-struck by the stories behind those graduates.

There is one this year who is fighting the AIDS virus, another in the throes of MS. One is a refugee from a terrible civil war in his home country, another haunted by the sight of soldiers tearing her grandmother from her family home and beating her in the back yard. One has an ex-husband so dangerous that the school has a standing order to call 911 if he is seen anywhere near the campus. Many are young, single mothers fighting for a better chance to care for their families.

All of these students have taken the plunge into higher education, not sure of themselves at first, but gaining in confidence as their knowledge grows. Last night we graduated paralegals, accountants, medical assistants, web and graphics designers, office managers, and specialists in criminal justice. We graduated young and not-so-young, all ready to dive in to new or expanding careers.

Sure, the ceremony is simple. The whole thing never takes more than an hour. Our guest speakers are warned to take no more than ten minutes. Once it's over, there is a mob scene headed back to the basement, this time including families. Joy is everywhere. I get to meet husbands and wives and children and moms and dads, and even a great aunt or two. All are bursting with pride at the new graduate in the family.

Yes, the ceremony is short, and the evening punctuated with an amazing and enjoyable amount of hugging and photos-with-my-favorite-teacher moments. There is not a lot of pomp and circumstance here, but the message is powerful. These grads may not remember much of what was said at the ceremony, but they are permanently reminded of what they have accomplished. To go from a faltering, nervous new student to a gleefully confident new grad in a few short years: that's worth celebrating!

By the way, I will probably go back in the fall to teach one course. I love being a part of this ceremony.

Witnessing a Miracle

2010-05-06T00:24:00.000-04:00

For about twelve years I wrote one or two human interest stories per week for a local newspaper publishing company. Each week I would be responsible for finding someone doing something fascinating, interviewing (and often photographing) him or her, and writing it all up for publication. There were weeks where I banged my head against the wall, trying to figure out who the heck I could find, and there were other weeks where little pieces of magic would just drop into my life.

Like Odetta. I won't use her last name, but she was an amazing lady. She was 84 years old when I met her, and had been in the United States for about three years. She was barely five feet tall, and couldn't have weighed more than 100 pounds. She was nearly on her way back to Romania when I heard about her, but a friend of hers called and told me I needed to meet her. The caller didn't say why, just that there was one heck of a story to be had.

So, intensely curious as I am, I met Odetta, her younger brother (in his sixties), another Romanian-American family, and a local family who lived about 2 miles from me. We gathered in a beautiful old stone house on farm land that contained a large pond full of geese, and the house had a wall of windows so you could watch the birds' antics. I would have moved in immediately, no invitation needed.

Anyway, there we sat, about eight of us, with me doing the listening and furiously taking notes, while an amazing story unfolded in multiple versions and about three different languages. Odetta spoke no English, but she found out I spoke a little French, and she was off, chatting away in complete fluency. I think I got most of what she had to say, so here goes:

A few years previous to when we met, she had received a disturbing letter from her brother, who had emigrated to the U.S. with his wife. Evidently, once they had established residency she had no use for him any more, and left him. He had written to his big sister in distress, feeling very abandoned and alone. Odetta, wanting desperately to help, started the papers in motion to come to the U.S. and help in any way she could.

She arrived in New York, and was terribly frightened of the hustle and bustle of the city. It didn't help her much that her eyesight was very poor, and she had trouble with directions. Her angry sister-in-law had told her she would be arrested for coming here, so when a friendly policeman took her arm to guide her through traffic, she panicked. She was eventually able to find her way to Philadelphia, and she and her brother were happily reunited.

Shortly after her arrival, Odetta and her brother were in a small local grocery store, and were overheard speaking Romanian by another family who had emigrated ten or twelve years before, and who befriended them immediately, actually having them give up the brother's apartment and move in. The friendship flourished, and the brother found new employment, a new apartment, and was doing a good job of getting his life together. At this point Odetta felt she could go home.

The family who had taken her in decided that they wanted to give her a proper going-away gift and set her up with a local optometrist to get a brand new pair of glasses. Things did not go well, and the optometrist told her (through her friends' translation) that she had advanced glaucoma and was very close to losing sight. It was determined that her left eye was irreparable, but the right eye could be saved if she had surgery immediately.

Here's where they story started to get complicated. The "adopting" family had a son with severe cerebral palsy, who attended a nearby university. He had a scribe, a young man who came to all of his classes with him and took his notes. Since the two had become quite good friends, the Romanian lad shared the story of this tiny lady and her vision emergency.

The scribe went home that evening and sat down with his father. "Dad," he explained, "do you think it would be all right if I called my sister and asked her husband, the ophthalmologist, what he thinks of the situation?"

Of course the ophthalmologist was interested, and arranged to see Odetta at his office very shortly thereafter. He agreed with the original diagnosis, and set her up for surgery, with all of his services free. The hospital agreed to admit her as a free patient, and in she went to repair her right eye. That part by itself is pretty remarkable, but it doesn't end there.

About two weeks after the surgery Odetta and her translation team (the second family) went back to the doctor's office for a post-surgical check-up. Through her friends' halting English she told the doctor that she was pretty sure she was seeing things with her left eye.

"No," was his reply, "we talked about the left eye and the fact that it couldn't be helped. It's the right eye you are seeing with."

She insisted that her left eye was at least perceiving lights and shadows, so he sat her down and tested it. Sure enough, the left eye, the hopeless one, was starting to see. Within six weeks after the surgery on her right eye, the left eye had all but healed itself. Her vision in both eyes was, with glasses, almost perfect. To this day her doctor swears he has no medical explanation for the returned vision in her left eye. It was, to him and all of his staff, nothing short of a miracle.

So, Odetta eventually went back home to Romania, but did so with new glasses and and a smile ear to ear. I met her a couple of weeks before she was due to leave the U.S., and I have never seen so much energy in such a tiny package, wearing a huge grin and newly styled pure white hair. The story came out in English, choppy Romanian, a good chunk of French, and a lot of waving of hands. The mix of people from different parts of the planet and different walks of life was fascinating, and through them the story made perfect sense.

This little lady was determined to help her brother. The second family was determined to help both of them. The young scribe and his family were determined to make a generous gesture of friendship to someone from a different part of the world, and somewhere in there was the perfect mix for a miracle.

As the reporter, I was challenged by the language differences, fascinated by the people involved, and thrilled that they had called on me to be a witness to it all. It still stands as my all-time favorite piece of news gathering. I can't imagine a better story.

Hair - 2010 Version

2010-05-01T20:52:00.000-04:00

No, I'm not talking about the Broadway Musical, although I was around for its first run. I'm talking about the spikey, or curly, or flat, or thinning, or multi-colored, or totally shaved stuff that comes out of the top of one's head. I know it comes out of other, maybe less desirable, places, but for right now I'd prefer to refer only to the hair on top, or that which used to be there.

By far I am not one of those women who is obsessed with her hair, but on this occasion I have something to celebrate. I have finally found a stylist I want to go back to, over and over again. I must say this very quietly, as the last person I said this about almost immediately moved to Costa Rica. I hope it wasn't to get away from my hair.

I am certain that most, if not all of you are at this point cheering silently for me in some manner. We have all had at least one nightmare experience at a hair salon. I may have been lucky enough to have more than one. In fact, it was many, many more. I do believe it goes all the way back to sophomore year in high school, when my mother (I like to think she meant well) took me to the only hair dresser in our little town, and told her to cut my hair, short.

Do you remember what Mia Farrow did to her hair after the legendary fight with Frank Sinatra? Well, mine was shorter than that - approximately one inch long, everywhere. It took me over ten years before I was ready to even trim it again, and then it was with a hair stylist I was dating. He knew the consequences of screwing it up, and was extremely careful to take off exactly the desired amount. He wasn't the only one who knew where the scissors were.

Now my hair is short, again. It happened somewhere around the time my second child, my son, turned old enough to grab large fists full of my waist-length tresses and yank, hard. He was one of those babies who liked to be carried around a lot, and I guess he figured my hair to be some type of handle he could hold for extra stability. His, not mine.

However, the moment I decided it was time to take the plunge, I quickly realized I was diving into something else: an enormous pool of infinitely variable skill-leveled and personality-clad artisans who ranged from gum-snapping twenty-somethings with magenta spikes on their heads to elder lasses whose perms had gone out some time in the 1950's. It was actually a gentleman who somehow talked me into a perm, about 25 years ago. He burned the entire front of my head, then tried to tell me it was the most current of styles. Only if one lived in the middle of an electrical power grid, and liked to step in puddles.

Another young lady opened up our first conversation by clipping a piece off of her index finger while starting to cut my hair. I might have brushed that off if she hadn't exclaimed, "Oh, I am always doing that!" Obviously she had chosen the wrong profession, and it showed in the lopsided cut I received. At least she was able to get the blood out of my oddly-shaped "do."

Then there was the gal who decided that I needed to be a blonde. I had started out as a blonde, from birth to about age three, but slowly became a rich brunette, tinged with auburn. Her decision came as I was visited by my first substantial batch of gray, which I was wearing as a badge of courage. She announced to me that she would be all ready to pick out a color for me the next time I came in. She is still waiting.

There seem to be a considerable number of stylists who love doing the most current cuts, like the Jennifer Aniston or the Courtney Cox, or the Cindy Lauper or Lady Gaga. It doesn't matter much who you are or what you would wear well, you will leave the salon with something trendy and completely inappropriate for your looks, age, or profession.

I got so fed up that once in a while I would put off my search and cut my own hair. I do have some experience, and know more than a little about techniques, but there is one problem: the back. Even if you can arrange twelve or thirteen mirrors in your bathroom so you can see your whole head, you can never get exactly the right angle of scissor precision, and the end result is far from perfect. At least I had the satisfaction of knowing I hadn't actually paid someone to make me look that bad.

After a sustained bout of self-pruning, I finally gave up and went to a salon nearby. I knew nothing about the place except that it was a few shops away from my favorite shoe store. It was nice, quiet, friendly, and full of women. Not girls, mind you - women! Many ages, many styles, but all of whom looked well groomed and happy. Nirvana!

My personal pick is a smart, attractive, easy-going young lady, young enough to not retire in six months, but old enough to know how to listen to a client. She actually does what I ask her to do - her own very talented version, of course, but it is still what I tell her I would like. I would have her bronzed and made into a monument of some sort, but she would probably have a tough time with the scissors.

If you are hoping for a name or number, dream on! For now, anyway, I like to think she's all mine.

Mornings and Me

2010-04-28T00:42:00.000-04:00

Look closely at the title of this little piece. This is the only time, probably in history, that you will see those words together in one place. I am not a morning person. Even when I was able to drag myself out of bed and get kids ready for school, and me into work by 8 a.m. or earlier, I was not a morning person. I may have been physically present at those venues, but mentally I was still very much tucked under my covers, enjoying the softness of my perfectly squishy foam pillow.

I can't really say I hate mornings, as I don't know that I've seen enough of them to make a sound judgement. A few times I have had to drive my daughter to work when she has needed to open her favorite exercise salon at 6. We have watched more than a few beautiful sunrises, seeing the sky get pink then the palest of blues and grays. It may be lovely, but it is fleeting, as I couldn't wait to get back home and back under those blankets.

I have worked evenings, or even nights, a good portion of my life, and really enjoy those moments late at night when everything around you is completely quiet. When the family is on vacation at a lake in the Adirondack Mountains, I like nothing more than going out on our dock at midnight or later, and watching the stars. It is meditation time, and I love the complete silence, broken only by the lapping of the water against the shore.

I was doing just that one night when some blithering idiot across the bay turned on his radio and blared Elvis at full volume. Had I a bazooka or rocket launcher available the radio and its owner would have been blown to smithereens. Not the kind of emotional mindset I was looking for. I bet he (notice the automatic gender identification) is a morning person. I am not fond of morning people. Having said that, I will sheepishly tell you that I married one.

I don't know why that happens, but in my acquaintances over the years this seems to be a pattern. The women come on with the lights, raring to go until two or three in the morning, while the men brag about getting up before sunrise, then are asleep on the sofa by 7:30 at night. Maybe these marriages last so long because the two of them really don't see each other much.

Night time is when I do my writing, my sketching, and my reading. It's when all around me is peaceful, and my head is the only thing running at full speed. I am somehow reassured by the wail of the freight train that rumbles through our little town at 3 a.m. It's not that I don't like the daylight. I do. It's just that I prefer daylight from, say, noon on instead of the moment the sun breaks over the horizon.

I have friends, and even relatives, who tell me how much fun they have getting up at 5 and running for an hour before they get ready for work. Bless their little early-bird hearts, but I will not join them in either activity. My body cannot respond to an early morning invitation to exercise. I can barely get my rear in gear for a workout at 4 or 5 p.m., and like to go swimming at my health club from 7 to 9 when all of those early folks are home and in bed.

I used to think that when I got older my body would get a bit more in sync with the rest of the world, and start responding to the schedule that the reasonable universe has set. Nope. I'm getting worse. If left to my own devices I would stay up until 3 or 4 in the morning, then sleep until close to noon. The rest of my family is not so crazy about this.

All right, so I miss out on breakfast and morning strolls and the first light of a new day and Good Morning America and even Rachel Ray. I miss early newspaper deliveries, morning coffee, and rushing out the door to catch the train, or hit the highway. By the time I get organized and fully functional, most of my neighborhood has had lunch. Part of me feels I may have missed something important.

However, the vast majority of me feels happiest curling up for a good night's sleep when there isn't much night left to take advantage of. That's what good curtains are for.

More sky stuff

2010-04-26T02:17:00.000-04:00

This story popped into my mind shortly after I had posted my last comments, and is actually less about sky, and more about doing the right thing.

Quite a few years ago I was consulting in a psychiatric hospital with the adolescent and adult addiction units. I was board certified in clinical psychodrama, which was what gave me permission to be there. I ran psychodrama therapy groups during the day for the adolescent residents, and in the evening for the adult patients and their families.

One of the things that took me the longest to learn while in training (500+ hours of clinical, in all) was that being spontaneous was as important as being prepared. When leading patients into therapeutic situations, the therapist had to be ready for anything, and had to trust in his or her head to come up with the right things at the right times. There was really not any script one could follow.

One particular cold, February night I had arrived at the hospital when it was already dark, and, again in a parking lot, took the time to take in the spectacularly clear night sky. This was in a relatively unpopulated part of the suburbs, so there was a minimum of background light, making the stars all the more brilliant. As I was (and still am), essentially, a sky nut, I knew a few of the constellations and found some familiar stars.

When I got into the room where we were to begin our session, I realized that there was a back door that led out onto an open stone patio behind the building. As families were visiting, many of them had jackets or heavy sweaters handy. I let my head take over, and told them about the beautiful night sky, then asked if they would like to see it. They were enthusiastic, so out we went!

The first couple of minutes on the patio were a jumble of emotions, with plenty of oooo's and ahhhh's making up the conversation. Then, quite suddenly, one of the patients yelled, "Look, there's Orion!" Everyone turned to look, and the excitement spread as they twisted their necks further and found the Big Dipper, the Little Dipper and the North Star. Someone even pointed out what could have been another galaxy.

I was more than a little confused by their considerable knowledge, until one of them, shivering with joy and the cold air, told me they had been on a field trip that afternoon, to the planetarium in Philadelphia. They were completely blown away by the fact that they were now seeing for real what they had been learning on the planetarium ceiling just a few hours before.

I had known nothing about their day's activities, and was moved almost to tears by the thrilled expressions on their faces as we finally went inside. We were chilled to the bone, but exhilarated. From that point on this evening was one of the most productive sessions we had.

The point of it all was their profound realization that they could feel those extraordinary feelings of delight and newness and satisfaction without any involvement with chemistry. They had re-discovered the "natural" high.

All of this because my head told me the right thing to do, and, of course it did have a little something to do with the sky...............

Just look up once in a while.....

2010-04-25T00:09:00.000-04:00

I was on my way into Costco the other day, head swimming with the list I had carefully left on my dining room table, thoroughly involved with the tasks ahead, when I was turned around by a mother and daughter walking in near me, both intent on their side of a heated argument. The girl couldn't have been more than nine or ten, but her Mom was reaming her out for something or other, threatening to leave her in the car (which she didn't) or take her home immediately (which she didn't). All she succeeded in doing was making the kid completely miserable.

This in itself was a shame, but the bigger shame was that the whole time the mother was screaming and the girl was cowering, if they had just looked up they would have seen one of the most bright and widest rainbows I have ever witnessed. From the parking lot you could see a huge expanse of open sky, and a fast downpour had just spent itself, so the colors were brilliant. An elder gent who was also nearby was looking at me, so I directed him to what I was watching. He, too, was awe-struck by the size of the arch and intensity of the hues.

I have had other experiences where I have looked at an incredible sunset, or a wild cloud formation, and had to gently grab the attention of others and show them the beauty they would otherwise have missed. They have all been appreciative. Nobody has ever yelled at me for pointing out an amazing sky. Yet, they would not have taken the moment to look up without prompting.

I was teaching a course one night, the last time we had a comet (was it Halle-Bop?) in the skies over the northeast. It was winter, so it was dark early, and the comet was easily seen, tail and all. I stopped in the parking lot and had a good, long stare before I went inside to share the news with my classroom. I was bubbling over with excitement, raving about the incredibly clear view, and not a single person in the class knew what I was talking about. Being the pushy broad that I am, I led them all outside, showed them the comet, and gave them some background on this particular sky phenomenon. They loved it.

Not a single one took the time to look up on their own.

One of my fondest memories with my kids and some of their friends was a meet-up at 3 a.m. at my house, to all pile into my van and travel to a nearby farm field, spread some blankets, and, huddled together for warmth, watch a spectacular shower of meteorites. There were only six or seven of us, but we were giddy with excitement, seeing at least a shooting star a minute, bright flashes in an otherwise black sky.

I am not certain when I became fully addicted to the sky. It may have been when I witnessed the aurora borealis, once in upstate New York, where it is a rare sight. I was about ten, and it became one of those "flashbulb" memories, staying with me in great detail. It may have been during my first airplane flight, when we got above the clouds and could watch all of the great cumulus towers forming beneath us. Actually, the fact that I knew they were cumulus clouds tells me it was before that.

I have recently become even more enamoured with atmospheric phenomena (sorry if you have to get out the dictionary), as my eyesight has gone through some substantial changes. In late 1999, my eye doctor discovered that I was developing very fast moving cataracts. Within a very few months after their discovery I had gone very nearly blind in my left eye, and the right one was close behind. I had them both operated on in 2000, with amazing results.

Since about third grade, I had to wear what most fondly refer to as "Coke bottle lenses" in my newly acquired eyeglasses. I was terribly nearsighted, and even with the glasses could not get my eyesight up to 20/20. Without the glasses I could see little beyond the tip of my nose.

When the cataracts started to develop, I just thought age was getting in the way of my vision, until I had the surgery on the first eye. The most frightening part of that surgery was then realizing how awful the sight was in the other eye, the one I had been depending on! You could stand in front of me and I literally could not make out the features in your face.

For those of you who are not familiar with the miracle that is modern cataract surgery, what the surgeon does is switch your eye's natural lens, which is hardening and clouding over, with a paper-thin, flexible replacement lens. You get your choice in lenses - you can see close-up, or far away. Since I had seen nothing but close-up for most of my life, I chose the distance lenses. All I can say is "WOW!!!"

My vision is now 20/20 in my left eye and 20/10 in the right one. For the first time in my life I can see all of the crispy edges on things like cloud formations. I can see what looks like a telescopic version of the full moon: all of the craters and "man" features. So I have to wear reading glasses - so what!!!

I guess this has something to do with my insistence that others take a minute and look at the scenes the sky has to offer. I know we are constantly told to stop and smell the roses, to take time to find the sea shells in the sandy beach, and wade into the cold, salty ocean. We are not to let the moss grow beneath our feet, to watch our step, to take the road less traveled. All I ask is that in the middle of all of that ground-based activity, we take a minute or two to look up. The beauty is overwhelming, the serenity and peace sorely needed.

A good sunset can melt away the most heated of arguments.

2010-04-23T16:54:00.000-04:00

I caught a small piece of news this afternoon that got me thinking, and then made me more than a little bit angry. Evidently Lane Bryant has filmed a new ad that will be aired some time during the broadcast of American Idol. American Idol, who is also showing ads for Victoria's Secret and Playtex during its air time, has said that the Lane Bryant ad is not as compatible with their "family" viewing audience as the others, so it will not be shown until the last segment of the program. I have seen the ad - CNN aired it today.

Essentially, it is an ad for a new line of very pretty Cacique underwear: bras and panties. It shows a young lady in these items, then getting dressed to go out with a comment about what is under your clothing being just as important as the outerwear. The model is absolutely gorgeous, and, no, she is not a size 0.

Lane Bryant claims that "Idol" is being discriminatory by airing the ad so late in the broadcast, while the Victoria's Secret ad and Playtex spots will be aired in the middle of the show. Recent Victoria's Secret ads that I have seen feature disturbingly scrawny models, in considerably more revealing undies. I don't know if it's a Fox TV image thing, or their extremely incorrect assumption that their viewing audience is mostly 14-year-old anorexics. They couldn't be more wrong!

My question is simple: When are we going to stop putting ideas into women's and girls' heads that they are of less value if they happen to carry about more physical weight? The advertising industry is actually making some effort, though small, to change the overall image of the women portrayed as beautiful. Dove products has committed itself to showing real women in its ads. Lane Bryant has conceived and produced a tasteful ad showing a very sexy, normal sized woman, and Fox is having a fit over it?

It might be interesting if all women who are upset at Fox's decision to show the the larger lady at a later (and less proportionately viewed) portion of its show, decided to let them know that they will not be viewing "Idol" unless the network issues an apology for its ignorance and agrees to show the ad in a more prominent piece of air space.

I certainly will be going on the Fox website and expressing my opinions. Anybody want to join me?

P.S. - I just learned that ABC has made a similar decision regarding airing the ad during "Dancing With the Stars." Thanks, folks for yet another slap in the face to the real women of your viewing audience.

How did they get so smart?

2010-04-22T00:22:00.000-04:00

Unlike many of my neighbors, I love squirrels. In the winter I put out two or three different batches of birdseed, in "squirrel-proof" feeders, and I put out a special mix of peanuts and other large seeds especially for the furry visitors. There is only one problem, the squirrel food usually lasts less than 24 hours, while the birdseed is out there for days. The squirrels know this.

They begrudgingly let the birds have their chance at the seeds meant for them, until their personal tray is emptied. Then the acrobatics begin. I have one favorite squirrel who hangs upside-down on the side of the feeder, sometimes with one foot grasping the deck railing, one grabbing at a perch on the feeder, and the other two paws busily shoveling birdseed into his cheeks. I cannot figure out how he gets down from there without crashing onto the deck. The physics of his position are in no textbook I have ever seen.

I had one bird feeder for a while that settled onto the end of a tall post, hanging on it and turning in a slow circle depending on what was visiting it at the time. It didn't take the squirrels long to figure that one out. They would wrap themselves around it and go at one part of the contents, while protecting the rest so nothing with wings could get anywhere near it. Generosity is not part of their mind set.

This feeder was right outside our family room window, so I could watch from no more than a couple of feet away. One day my vigilance was rewarded, as a smallish squirrel battled his way along some very spindly Rose of Sharon branches, swaying back and forth and inching ever upward. It took him a couple of minutes to find branches that could support his weight, and I watched him, unseen, while he calculated his next move. Finally he made it, jumping onto the rim of the feeder and clinging to it as it began to spin around. In fact, it very slowly moved counter-clockwise until he was staring at me face to face.

Up until that point I had no idea a squirrel could say, "Oh, shit!" but I'm pretty sure he did, right before he leaped to the ground and sped away.

We also had, one year, the homeowners' nightmare of a family of squirrels moving into the roof of our porch, which is enclosed on the front of our old stone house. They found a way in the inch or so of open space between the side face of the roof and the side wall of the house, and set up their happy home, immediately beginning to reproduce. We weren't sure how many we had, but every once in a while we would go out the front door and see squirrel tails dangling down in the cracks between the porch ceiling and the stone side wall. I admit I thought this was awfully cute, but I'm not sure if anyone else in the family shared my views.

We did find the solution in a Have-A-Heart trap. I found the ideal bait to be a small plastic bowl filled with a blob of peanut butter sprinkled with sunflower seeds. I caught one or two per day until there were no more, and one by one delivered them a couple of miles away to a well-planted park, full of bushes and trees and picnickers. This was the Disney World of squirrel habitats, and I hope they appreciated the effort.

During that project, I discovered that these energetic members of the rodent family have distinctly different personalities. I would load the trap into the floor of my van, and try to pay attention to the road while the captured squirrel reacted to his (or her) predicament. Some were just mad as hell, chattering the entire trip and bouncing around in the cage. Others were more thoughtful, checking out their surroundings and sniffing the air. One actually chose his transport time to finish off the peanut butter, while a couple of others curled up and pretended to nap.

The only way we could keep them from returning to set up camp again was by filling in the space with chicken wire and concrete. That did work, so now the squirrels we see are not residents of the house, but the many old trees around the neighborhood. It is amazing to watch these fellows at work, finding food, sorting through it (yes, they are actually picky!) and alerting the rest of the family that a safe place to find eats is my back porch.

I have chased away a neighborhood cat, watched out for hawks, and tried to be sure that nothing else would get in their way. I don't mind the mess of seed that they regularly sprinkle onto the deck, as the birds then come in and clean that up. The larger seeds draw the mourning doves, cardinals and jays, while the smaller stuff is policed by the sparrows, chickadees, and finches.

Spring has arrived, so the feeders will be packed away soon for the summer. There is plenty of food and entertainment for all of the animals provided by Mother Nature, so I don't have to make my regular trips to the Home Depot and their seed department until September. I enjoy watching the natural habitat that is my back yard, but I will miss those incredibly wily, soft gray creatures and their antics.

I Should Have Known

2010-04-20T00:15:00.000-04:00

Back in the 1960's my mother had an item which was new to many, and which carried with it great prestige. She was the proud bearer of a credit card. This was before the era of Visa and MasterCard and many, many other big bank sponsored credit cards. This was a card to a very high end department store. Just the fact that you carried it in your purse meant you were of a certain social stature. (By the way, we weren't!)

She carried her card proudly in her wallet, and once in a while we would take the train into New York, have a stylish lunch around the fountains at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and waltz down 5th Avenue, fully intending to use, yes use, the credit card. We would window-shop at Tiffany's and Saks, Bergdorf's and Bloomingdales, but save our incredible buying power for the one and only Lord & Taylor 5th Avenue store. It was sale season.

Sale season at Lord & Taylor meant wonderful clothing at wonderful prices, and Mom was one heck of a shopper. She would check every item of interest on the clearance racks, looking for impeccable sewing skill, perfect pleats, plaids that matched at the seams. Nobody could find flaws in workmanship like my mother. In fact, her expertise has rubbed off on me, so that poorly made clothing items rarely make it into my closet.

But back to the credit card. She would purchase her loot with this magical hunk of plastic, lug it back to our suburban home, and dole it out to me and my sister (after her portion was carefully stored) with stern warnings about the fate that would befall us if so much as a ketchup drop made its way onto the front of one of these outfits. We knew this stuff was special.

Not that she ever purchased anything we couldn't afford. All bills got paid off at the end of the month, so there was never a finance charge associated with this card. Today most card companies find a way to charge you interest by the time you are less than a block from the point of purchase. In fact, I spent seven years of my life in Chicago, and I knew guys out there who would break your knees for less interest than most card companies charge today.

But I digress. The credit card spent most of its lonely existence in the back of Mom's wallet, mostly so her friends would get a glimpse of it as she took out her few dollars to pay for lunch. It was only used once or twice per year, and paid off as soon as we hit the front door to our home. Therefore, it was quite a shock when we received a bill in the mail from Lord & Taylor.

It was more of a shock when you consider that we had moved from suburban New York to a rural area near Syracuse, and therefore had not set foot in the store for close to a year. The biggest shock of all came when she opened the envelope, her hands shaking, to find a demand that she should pay the balance shown in full, $0.00.

After a good laugh and a showing of the bill to all family members, she tore it up and threw it out. You know what comes next, don't you? Right, another bill the following month, with an urgent note that this balance was close to thirty days overdue, and would she please pay the $0.00 immediately! This time it was still pretty funny, but she thoughtfully put a little note explaining the error into the return envelope and off it went.

Yes, you are correct. The following month she received a downright nasty letter informing her that her credit privileges could be revoked and her other creditors (she had none) were going to be notified of her lack of payment. To avoid financial disaster, she had to send them, by return mail, $0.00.

This was before the time when everything in billing departments was computerized. This was not a computer error! This had to be a real human being typing out the specifics of this bill and sending a new version every month with the same old balance due: $0.00. It was starting to get ridiculous. She sent off another letter explaining the situation, and forgot about it. How silly of her to try to thwart the billing office of such an important establishment!

By the time the fifth, and nastiest, letter arrived with the bill attached, she had just about given up, throwing her hands in the air and wondering allowed what she had to do to remedy this situation. My father, a creative sort, had the only answer - "Write them a check!"

So she did. Very carefully and in her very best handwriting, she made out a check to the billing offices of Lord & Taylor for the amount of $0.00. She then placed it in their fancy return envelope with the bill attached. Considering the circumstances, she was annoyed at having to spend money on a stamp, but she did want delivery to go off without a hitch. She placed it in the next days' mail and watched while the postman tucked it into his pouch. There would be no errors in delivering this check to its rightful owner.

She never heard from them again.

There is a moral to this. If one department store could go to that much trouble and expense to collect "nothing" from a customer, just think of the lengths more current creditors would go to to come after someone with a real balance! When I was sent my first card, I should have thought this over very carefully.................

Life's Little Roadblocks

2010-04-18T21:38:00.000-04:00

I had every intention of writing something light and humorous this evening. That is, until I got a note from someone I value as a friend. He is in his mid-twenties, a former student, and someone who lives with two opposing forces: an indomitable spirit, and Multiple Sclerosis. I have been sponsoring him for a couple of years now in a 100-mile bicycle race, from Philadelphia to Atlantic City. He is a dedicated dirt-biker, a hip-hip devotee, and incredibly talented artist. This year he may not be able to make the trip, as he is rapidly going blind.

My protective instincts are all fired up on his behalf, but there really is nothing I can do but be supportive. That is incredibly frustrating, as I am so very fond of this kid. I remember the first time he ever walked into one of my classrooms, pants dragging on the floor, baggy t-shirt, hat turned sideways. I thought to myself, "Oh, lord, how am I going to handle this one!"

I didn't have to worry for long. He became one of my best students, working incredibly hard to learn as much as he could. I still have a term paper he wrote for me one semester, for a Human Relations course. It was all about the inception and theory of the hip-hop culture, and he gave me one heck of an education in way more than the required four pages. He even included a CD he had made, a compilation of some of the best hip-hop artists and tunes, with lyrics included on separate pages so I could see what they were all about. It was an astonishing job, and I was very proud of him for his efforts.

Even when I did not have him in a class for a given term, I could count on him showing up at the door to my classroom, full of stories about his bike riding, or to show me some photos of artwork he was doing on commission - painting the gas tank of someone's beloved Harley Davidson. When I asked, as I always did, "How are you?" the answer was just as inevitable. "Best day of my life, Mrs. Williams!"

He is four years into his battle with MS. His parents have both passed away, and to my knowledge he has little family except a cousin, with whom he lives. He has built himself, however, a net work of friends that is as strong as a family, and he holds his head up high even as his eyes cloud over.

Tonight I am dedicating my thoughts to him, a young man of charm, energy, and wit, with solid integrity and an incredible attitude. Having been through cataract surgery on both eyes, and having looked at the world through clouds, I know a little of what he is feeling. If anyone can find a way through this, it will be this fellow.

To return a quote to him, "Love you, man!"

Too pooped to post

2010-04-18T00:48:00.000-04:00

See title.....seeya tomorrow!

On Collecting

2010-04-16T23:49:00.000-04:00

My husband and I are collectors. Of course, that leads me into the old adage: "He collects junk; I collect things of great value." If you asked him, I'm sure the words would be reversed. We are, however, getting to the point where we are doing some serious thinking about looking for a smaller house. Therefore, something's gotta give!

His collections fall into two categories - paper and musical instruments. He seems to have an aversion to naked flat surfaces. Surfaces that have just been cleaned are his particular obsession. Somewhere in his brain is an automatic command that tells him to fill the surface as quickly as possible, preferably with paper. It does not seem to matter what kind of paper, just as long as the flat surface is no longer visible. I have found important notices about our 401K mixed in with renewal notices for fishing magazines, which he doesn't get, and coupons for food we haven't purchased in 35 years.

As for the musical instruments, I hesitate to mention how many there are, but can easily say that a substantial musical group could play all available parts with our collection. We have drums, keyboards, a sax, a violin, a flute, a mandolin, a couple of acoustic guitars, more than a couple of electric guitars, two electric basses, and a didgeridoo. That is not counting the brass section, which is fully stocked.

He has some legitimate claim to the brass instruments, as he plays with three or four different musical organizations on any given week, ranging from a symphony orchestra to a drum and bugle corps. This excuses the collection of trumpets. As you have probably guessed, I see him on alternate Thursdays, when he comes home to spread paper around. As of today, it seems much of the paper is sheet music. We have enough sheet music to wallpaper a small hotel.

My collections are more varied, and, truth be told, probably take up more total space than his. I draw, I paint, and I crochet and do other crafty things, so I have the supplies which I need for current and future projects. Those future projects could extend into early 2057 and I would still not run out of things like colored pencils, sketchbooks, paintbrushes and yarn. I need one of our children to leave and take all belongings with him or her, so I can have a room for my artsy stuff. Chances are I might need slightly more than one room.

I also collect books. Hubby is constantly telling me I should get my library card, but there is one major problem. When you get your reading material from the library, they tend to want it back. I get very attached to my books, and love the bindings, the cover art, the smell of the paper. You will never find this reader in front of an IPad perusing the latest bestseller! I am far better off at Barnes&Noble, Borders, or even the book table at Costco.

Then there are the artworks created by someone other than myself. Of course I have to keep every single piece that either of my children has created. Some have actually been framed and hung up, but most of it is safely tucked away in plastic containers. Nobody I know would fault me for keeping those - they are truly valuable!

I also have some odd but endearing paintings by very distant relatives, that I, frankly, don't know what to do with. A couple of them are by some great uncle or other on my father's side, who lived in Maine, and must have had a special liking for sheep. These are very dark, dingy paintings, mostly of dark, dingy landscapes, but there is always a batch of sheep somewhere in the middle of the composition - you can tell because they are less dingy and sort of fluffy-looking. I might hang them up some day just to watch the reactions on visitors' faces.

Shall we look through the china collection? I have enough china to feed most of the population of Pennsylvania, should they ever want to come to dinner. It does not all match, but is in five or six different patterns, plus an odd flowered cup and saucer or two. I did pick out a nice set when we were first married, and I think I have either eight or twelve settings of that one. Then I have 24 settings plus serving pieces of my Mom's favorite, which I actually added to a number of years ago with a great thrift shop find. It must have slipped my mind that I would eventually be inheriting all of it!

Other sets are smaller (Whew!) and some are more casual, while some are way more elegant and valuable, or at least way more breakable! Then there are the every-day plates, bowls, and mugs, some of which match, and some of which never will. They were discontinued shortly after I got the first few pieces.

This is only the beginning. As you might have imagined by now, our home of 35 years is crammed with goodies. Pottery, gifts from former students, "decorative accessories." I am terrified that some day the host from "Hoarders" is going to call and tell me he has heard of us. No, we're not up to our eyeballs in trash, but it will take all of my mental fortitude and the physical strength of a more than the two of us to get this place "downsized."

I have a piece of advice for anyone who cares to listen. If you do collect something, DO NOT TELL ANYONE! A few years ago I made the mistake of telling a few people I was collecting teddy bears. You can take it from there......

This is just a test

2010-04-15T20:23:00.000-04:00

This afternoon I was driving along listening to the radio when a familiar voice and sound came on. "This is just a test," it said, followed by the very annoying beep we all know and love. It is reassuring that it is just a test, just a way to make sure that if there is an emergency we can all get information and reassurance that all will be well. At least, we can get it if we are tuned in to the right station. I'd hate to think I had a heavy metal CD in the player when all hell was breaking loose around me!

I have somehow decided to adopt that quote, and it has come in very handy over the years, as a reminder that the real emergency is not here yet. When life has handed me lemons, and some have been giant economy sized, I do not necessarily make lemonade. When lying in a hospital bed hooked up to antibiotics and a morphine pump because something or other went wrong during kidney surgery, I had no desire for lemonade.

I did have, however, the reminder in my head that "this was only a test," which is immediately followed by a steely resolve to do well on this one. Maybe not an "A", as I will admit to being inordinately fond of the morphine. Of course then the nurses informed me I was only using the pump, pushing the button, about a third as much as I was allowed to. I guess that deserves some extra credit.

When informed that the numbness accompanied by fire in my legs was the result of nerve damage, probably caused by a physician giving me way too much of a required thyroid medication, and that it was not going to improve, lemonade might have been nice, but it was not a total solution. Again, "this is just a test" reminded me that there could have been far worse outcomes, and that I had two options:

1. Bitch and moan all the time about how life and that damned doctor had done me wrong, bringing everyone I know down into the dumps with me.

2. Go ahead and be alive and mostly well, accepting that a few things I love, like long walks and the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, were no longer in my repertoire. Actually, I could probably go down the steps as long as I had something or someone to hold on to. I can now do the steps in front of my house, up and down, with no hand-hold and a bag of groceries on each arm - progress!

I firmly believe that option #1would have been far too easy to fall into. I have been pretty healthy for most of my life, and the last few years have been surprising and challenging. I do not, however, believe that it is any good for my body or soul to spend my waking time making everyone else miserable.

Option #2, to me, means I have passed the test. It took a long time and a lot of work, but I can somehow compartmentalize my numerous ills and put them aside for further consideration. I'm not ignoring anything, as self-care has to come before care for anyone else (remember in an airplane that you have to put on the oxygen mask first!), but the "just a test" reminders put things into perspective, and allow me to put them aside until I reach a moment where I just want to feel sorry for myself. Those moments usually don't last more than fifteen minutes or so, and they serve me well. I come out of them feeling much better. Hey, I'm entitled to just a little but of "poor me," aren't I?

Anyway, as the list of later-in-life roadblocks piles up, and I stare down in the morning at my trusty case of pills for this and that, carefully arranged so I don't forget anything, I have thankfully reached a point where I can shake my head and laugh. Whatever shows up next, and I am certain there will be something, I can journey into my head and remind my self that this, too, is only a test.

Somewhere in the "Why Me?" category....

2010-04-14T23:29:00.000-04:00

Now look. If I was to choose a point in time to travel back to, it would most likely not be when I was thirteen. So why, I ask, why does fate choose to hand me another batch of acne breakouts when I'm 63? It never fails. Every time I have to give an all-day seminar, speak to a women's group, teach a class, or do something where my general appearance is just a little extra- important, I get a huge, red bump right in the middle of that appearance.

I look in the mirror in the morning, much as I did today, and am greeted by not only my mother's face (that one definitely took some getting used to), but three or four extra added attractions. I seem to remember the voice of a dermatologist back in my late teens who pronounced my skin wonderfully clear, and assured me that the dreaded bumps would never return. Ha! What did he know! My current dermatologist seemed slightly gleeful when he announced that I did, indeed, have "Adult Acne."

Crap!

Today's batch not only caught me on my chin, right in the middle, but as an extra added attraction sprinkled my neck with the lovely crimson polka-dots. Normally, I would slip into something like a very sturdy turtleneck, but the temperature is supposed to hit 75 or so, which would not only leave me uncomfortably warm, but would add plenty of heat-related blotches to the mess. I would also have to super-glue the turtleneck to my chin line or spend the whole day yanking it up in order to feel properly disguised.

Just in case anyone out there thinks that women become less concerned with how they look after a certain age, let me inform you that nothing could be further from the truth. I will admit to enjoying the fact that I can practically live in jeans, that I do have a few old t-shirts that I will never throw out (many of them have my son's band logos on the front, and one says "think unique" on it), and that these feet will never see pointy-toed, five-inch stiletto heeled boots, but will instead exist in comfortable footwear. If anyone has a problem with those facts, they can simply learn to live with it.

My personality is also set in stone. I am intense, curious, humorous, sarcastic at times, politically active, hugely interested in the well-being of others, creative, and occasionally, pissed off. Those who know and love me have learned to accept the whole conglomeration. It took me a really long time to put it all together, and at this point I ain't changing for nobody!!!

However, I do know that I put a certain amount of time and effort into presenting myself well, even if I'm not leaving the house. I am not thrilled with the extra fifty pounds my children gave me - okay, I'm still blaming it on baby-weight, even though they are both in their thirties. I am not totally happy with the portions of me that suddenly have appeared six to ten inches below where they used to be. But, let me tell you, I do my best to put together a pretty good package when introducing myself to the world, even if some days the world is only the UPS guy.

I guess I must resign myself to regular visits to my local drugstore, where they carry the hypoallergenic cosmetic lines, and where a magical potion called "concealer" exists. Considering the ailments that I have pushed myself through, and the fun stuff that my friends have dealt with, needing a few dabs a day of skin-tinted goo isn't so bad after all.

When I'm done at the drugstore, maybe I'll go check out those boots............

Rainy Days and Tuesdays

2010-04-13T15:55:00.000-04:00

Is there a reason we get depressed on rainy days? Is there some chemical interaction with the prospect of getting wet that drags us into the depths of despair? I do remember one time back in the 1980's I was working part-time in the activities department of a local nursing home, and we had eleven straight days of steady rain. The residents started dropping like flies (no disrespect intended), and the listings of obituaries in the local papers grew to two or three times their normal size.

I'd hate to think that the sight of rain means we have to give up. In my favorite part of the world (so far), the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York, the rain brings with it a considerable amount of ethereal beauty. The clouds themselves divide and settle into the dips between mountains, and the waters of the many lakes turn a smooth-as-glass slate gray. I have taken photographs of this phenomenon, and you would swear the resulting prints are shot in black and white, but they are not. There are an infinite number of colors between blue and green and gray, but to see them you have to have a practiced eye and the desire to look very, very closely.

While others around me are sinking into nothingness, waiting for the spaces between drops to venture forth, I have learned to prefer walking in the rain. I'm not quite to Gene Kelly Land yet, but there is some fun to be had in waltzing through a gully-washer, even running through the puddles. It may be only as we get older that we can truly appreciate the joys of children. I used to let my kids go out in the summer rains and get soaked, muddy, and overcome with hysterical laughter. It took a long while for me to join them, but I am so glad for that regression!

Now when it rains, I leave my umbrella safely in my car or my house, and dash madly between chores, smiling like an idiot. Heck, it's only water, and it will eventually dry.

Since when are my thoughts noteworthy?

2010-04-13T01:01:00.000-04:00

Okay, gang, here we go. I am sure there are many of you who will look at the content here and think, "Who the hell cares about the ramblings of some old bat just because she was born in 1946?" If those are your feelings, you probably won't like much of anything I choose to say, so go find something else.

If the year 1946 means anything to you, it might be that it was the year for the first baby boomers to arrive. My folks used to swear that I was born nine months and fifteen minutes after my Dad arrived back from World War II. I always thought that was sort of cool, and a nice way of telling me that they actually "did it" on occasion. Like many youngsters, I assumed that it was only "done" three times in their history - once for each of us three kids.

Having said that, I assume that I am far from the only person to have been conceived and produced in such fashion, and on those dates. There were 64 of us in my high school graduating class, the biggest class the school had ever seen. In my other high school, the one I moved away from, there were another 300 or more in the Class of 1964. I bet there were a whole lot of other classes of 1964 in a whole lot of other schools. We will shortly be clogging the rolls of Social Security.

For that reason I think I am right in guessing that there are a whole bunch of you who have either lived a pretty fascinating life, or have observed or gossiped about someone else our age who has done so. I have been told often that my life resembles a good old "grade B" novel, but anyone reading it wouldn't believe it. I'm going to test that theory, and you are my audience. I don't care if you are in your 60's or in your teens. I think you will find some fun in my ramblings, and possibly even a lesson or two.

I will freely admit that I was an idiot when I was younger, and I am just as adamant in stating that I am not one now. Come along for the ride, and we may see just how that transition might have happened: