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I Heard the Plunk of Hope This Week!
I love living in New York. I enjoy the seasons and like to feel the weather change. Variety is a friend to me. I’m not real big on extremes. It’s all about balance. So, after we were hit by our eighth snowstorm this Winter, I started to get a little wary. Actually, (like so many other moms, I’m sure) between the shoveling and baking on our already too many school days off, I’ve just about had it! But thankfully, it’s February and February, is like Wednesday. It’s the hump month of Winter. Get through February and Spring is like Friday, you can see the end in sight. It’s right around the corner! February is also fickle. It’s weather often provides a teaser to what lies ahead; Spring plays a game of peek-a-boo. That’s fine. I’ll take it because I am ready.
Like a snake that sheds it’s skin, I’m ready to rid myself of this winter’s dread, trying not to let it bog me down or suffocate me like I know it wants to. It’s hard not to just succumb. I need encouragement from the environment to hang in there! For me, Spring is a time of renewal and I have a lot of renewing to do! My life requires a complete overhaul and I want to get to it. In general, I’m not a procrastinator, so when the doldrums of Winter seem to be hanging on, putting Spring on the back burner, I tend to get a little antsy. Like everyone else, I’m eager to go outside with out the fear of freezing. I want to literally smell the roses again. Okay, I realize I may have to wait until May for that but there’s no harm in thinking ahead, is there?
Thankfully, this week I heard the plunk, plunk, plunking sound of sap dripping its way into those aluminum buckets hanging on the maple trees at the school I work in. It’s truly a sure sign of proof that Spring is indeed hovering in the air. It is the environment, clearly and loudly telling me,”Hang in there! We’re at the front door of brighter days!” After all, the sap only flows right before Spring, when the nights are cold and the days are warm.
Yes, I heard the plunking sound of sap this week! Oh, the sweet sound of the plunk! Now, I have hope.
After a few days of hope, gratitude will seep in and with gratitude, all things can be accomplished.
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I’m A “Bet-Nee” Wanna-Bee
A friend of mine is writing a book. It is a labor of love that she has been mulling over in her head now for the better part of 10-years. It also happens to be a fascinating story that is very near and dear to our hearts. She’s finally at a point in her life, where she has the time to focus and can sit down and write. A couple of weeks ago she asked me to go to Pearl River with her to interview a woman I know for her book.
At just over four feet tall and weighing in at about 105 lbs. Betty, is an absolute powerhouse. Her hair is short and a soft golden, auburn color. Her eyes are a sparkling blue. Her smile is slight but constant. At lunch, Betty is all go; non-stop chatter, breaking her beat only long enough to take a sip of her Pinot Grigio with ice. It takes her one-hour to drink one glass of wine and you can count on her drinking at least two, probably three. At 82, Betty is single. She likes her coffee “dark like her men” and is looking for “a rich man, with a bad cough and one foot in the grave.” I sat across from Betty, studying her, marveling at her quick wit and sharp memory.
She talked about her childhood and the various jobs she held at the Industrial Home (orphanage) that she grew up in, during the 1930s, in Ireland. Catholic nuns ran these homes with little love and no money and while thousands of girls, ages five and older were accepted into them, Betty’s case was unique. She was the only infant to be admitted into her “home”.
“I was the pet you know. They (the nuns) called me “Bet-Nee.” She told us proudly. “The other girls knew I was the pet so when they wanted something, like to wear long socks or play in the field, they would send me up to ask for it.”
After 3 1/2 hours of being mesmerized by Betty, I finally asked for the check. Upon its arrival and without hesitation, Betty grabbed it from the waiter. Slightly shocked, I watched in awe as my friend, who was sitting next to Betty, tried to wrestle the paper out of the tiny woman’s, tiny hand, unsuccessfully. (“She’s really strong!” my friend later told me.) Betty did not give up the check. My friend and I are a bit old school, and there is no way we would let an 82-year old woman pay for lunch so before she could get to her wallet, I handed the waiter my credit card along with a “look” that required no verbal explanation. He was off and Betty was pissed.
She admonished me, profusely.
I have no desire to upset an 82-year-old woman, so when she insisted we come back to her house for a minute before heading home, there was no back talk. We obliged. Once inside, she took us into a spare room and showed us a beautiful portrait of her parents that she has hanging on the wall. Her mother died shortly after she was born. Her father was too poor to care for her and with the help of his sister, brought Betty and her sister to the Industrial Home. After a few minutes of chatting, Betty disappeared into the hallway. A moment later she popped back into the bedroom carrying a short, pale blue, wool, winter coat.
“Here.” she said gently and handed me the coat, “I never wear it. It should fit you.”
I was stunned. I didn’t know what to do. Puzzled, I looked deep into Betty’s sparkling blue eyes for clarity and in that instant, she gave me, a “look” that required no verbal explanation. I was humbled.
I took the coat from Betty and thanked her, profusely.
My lesson was learned. Old school or not, I would not disrespect this gesture. I would not say “no” to Betty twice in one day or perhaps, ever again.
In short, Betty’s story about growing up in the Industrial Home was indeed a heartbreaking one to hear but she is not broken and there is no bitterness in her words. “We did the best we could with what we had.” she said. Her attitude is remarkable and so is she. And I can only hope and pray to be like her, one day.
So yeah, I’m a “Bet-Nee“ Wanna-Bee.
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Hello, Mother Ship? Please, Come Back! Pick Up Your Alien Child And Return My Son!
I have a boy. He’s twelve. I don’t write about him much or post too many pics of him because a) he does not want me to and b) I suspect the boy living in my house right now, is not really my son. My angel boy I believe, was abducted by the Mother Ship and an alien child has been left here in his place.
It became apparent about a year ago when I began to notice this strange being emerge from my little boy’s body. Not quite the butterfly blossoming from the cocoon process, more like it’s reversal. The first real hint I had that something was amiss was when I started to detect a rather foul odor coming from my son’s room.
What in God’s name could that be? I thought.
Not even dirty, sweaty socks could smell that bad and that smell, certainly couldn’t be coming from a human child! The next thing I knew, I was buying Axe’s Phoenix scent deodorant for an 11-year old! Who knew they put cologne in deodorant these days? OUT, is your basic Speed Stick. Then came the request for “boxers”. Boxers!? What was wrong with the super-hero briefs he’d been wearing all these years? Shortly after that, came the hair and I’m not talking about the hair on his head either. Honestly! I don’t think there is a single part of this alien child’s body that doesn’t have hair on it!
Excuse me, but I would like my baby’s smooth, silky, velvet-like skin back! Clearly, this hair ball sleeping in my boy’s bed is an impostor!
The alien child also comes with an attitude and has a frog stuck in his throat! He barely speaks English and when he does, it’s the same two words mumbled over and over again, “I dunno – I dunno”, regardless of the question being asked. Otherwise, I’m lucky if I get a grunt or a nod.
And another thing, I liked it quite better when my boy looked up to me. Literally. Not vice-versa. In the past 12-months this imposter has shot up nearly eight inches and grew a hearty set of abs! In clothing, he went from a size 14 boys to a men’s small! How is that possible? He’s twelve! Perhaps it has something to do with the amount of food he consumes. Six tacos in one sitting! Enough said.
“Hello, Mother Ship? Please, come back!
Pick up your alien child and return my angel boy!”
Sigh. Nothing has prepared me for this shocking occurrence. I thought that when it happened, it would be a gradual, peaceful thing. I thought I’d have more time to adjust and accept. I don’t even think there is a course I could take that could teach me what I need to know right now. I suppose there are books but quite frankly, after reading Alfie Kohen’s Unconditional Parenting, a few years ago, I was left rather traumatized. EVERYTHING he said NOT to do, I had been doing for 10 years. Let’s face it, there’s no undoing that kind of damage!
My Angel Boy
Thankfully, the eternal optimist in me has hope that one day I will see my angel boy again or at least an older variation of the one I miss so much. I have faith that the foundation he was reared upon will help him find his way back, when he’s ready, in-tact and unharmed from this awkward growth period. In the meantime, I realize that even the alien child sleeping in my son’s bed now, needs a mom to care for him, too. So, I will do my best to be patient with his sometimes odd and infuriating ways. And I will try to love him even when I feel like, well, strangling him, in the hopes that somewhere out there, there’s an alien mom on a Mother Ship doing the same for my angel boy.
Tell me, has your angel boy also been abducted by the Mother Ship?
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Sticks And Stones May Break My Bones But Names…Can Break My Heart!
“You know Mom, he’s lucky I didn’t squish him like a bug!”
That’s what my 9-year-old daughter came home saying the other day after spending an afternoon at a birthday party. The “he” who is lucky “she”, didn’t, squish him like a bug, is a 10-year old classmate who was also at the party. “He” is her pal, her chum, her friend. He is her partner at school when pairing needs to be done. He is also the boy who tried to hold her hand when the lights went out in a Star Lab dome, but that’s not why she wants to pummel him.
There are some things you just never forget: getting an award, your first sleep-over, punching a fella in the mouth for asking you to marry him (in first grade!), the soft, warm lips of a shy boy’s sweet and gentle kiss during a game of spin-the-bottle and of course, the first time someone embarrasses you in front of a group of friends by calling you a “name“. For me, it was buoy. And in 4th grade, I didn’t have a clue. So in a naive and unsuspecting way, I asked the boy who had just referred to me as a “buoy”, what that was. “You know,” he said, “it’s that round thing that bounces up and down, bobbing in the water, a buoy!” That was followed by what seemed to me, to be a roar of group laughter. Painful. I forced a smile and walked away. I’m sure I could have flattened him but my heart had sunk to my knees and I was too hurt to react. Sadly, I never forgot that feeling.
Like her mom, my girl is made of hardy stock. She is strong, confident and independent. She’s out-going and adventurous. She loves to laugh. Also like her mom however, she happens to be very sensitive.
“He called me fat in front of all my friends at the party” she said. “He embarrassed me. We were laughing about who would make the best Pińata and he said, ‘Hannah would, cause she’s fat!’
My heart immediately sank and broke, for her.
“He’s lucky I didn’t squish him like a bug! And you know I could.” were the next words out of her mouth.
She’s right. She could.
“Well then,” I said, “maybe next time, you should.”
Okay, maybe that was wrong.
Sticks and stones may break my bones but names…..
Honestly, I would have preferred he threw the stone. That wound heals faster.
We spent a long time that evening discussing potential reasons why her friend might have said that about her. Insecurity. Bravado. Maybe he was trying to look “cool” in front of the other boys. Perhaps he didn’t mean it and it was just a poor choice of words. Most likely, he like, likes her. No matter how much we dissected it though, the result was always the same. She could get past the word. She knows she’s bigger and taller than the other kids in her class. She accepts that her body is changing, maturing. It’s the betrayal she is having a hard time reconciling with. He’s her friend.
It was after midnight when she came into my bedroom and crawled into bed with me that night. She snuggled up close and whispered, “Mommy, why did he do that? I thought he was my friend?” Cue the breaking heart again. She slept with me for the first time in years. And it was a big wake-up call to me as a parent and an adult, just how omnipotent words can be. Life is hard enough without us hurting each other with the things we say. And I’m reminded of how critical it is for me to set the example, practice kindness, show compassion and be forgiving.
Words may not be able to break a bone but they sure can break a heart. The flip-side of that is to know that words also have the great power to fill a heart! So in the end, my advice to Hannah was to have, an open heart.
We are after all, only human. We all make mistakes and good friendships are worth keeping. So, when the boy came to school the next day and said, “Hey, I was only kidding. I didn’t mean it that way. I can’t believe you thought I was serious!” That was all she needed to hear to buddy-up again and put it behind her.
Besides, she told him that if he EVER does that to her again, she is going to “SQUISH him– like a bug!”
Photo credit: Squashed Bug, Broken Heart
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My Edward
“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.” ~ Martin Luther King
You may not know where forward is going to lead you but you do know when you have to do something to help you move in that direction.
He came upon a winter’s night in late February, 2010. Actually, it was a winter’s day but the sentiment is the same. It was out of the blue. Unexpected. Fate. Meant to be. Sometimes, you don’t know what you need until you see it. And when I saw him standing there, as silly as it may sound, I knew I needed to have him. Love at first sight, if you will. Tall, dark and handsome yes, but more than that, he was CREEPY looking; an answer, albeit a slightly disturbing one, to a prayer I didn’t even realize I had. I also knew there were several other younger, prettier girls who were just as determined as I was (if not more-so) to have him. But honestly, somehow I just knew he would be coming home with me that day and he did.
My husband was appalled that I brought him into our home. But after what we had all just been through, I wasn’t concerned about his reaction. Frankly, I didn’t care. Edward was staying. My 12-year old son was embarrassed, “Oh, come on, Mom! Are you kidding me?!” he said, even though I knew he too, was oddly comforted by Edward’s presence in the same twisted way that I was. My 9-year old daughter was amused. A little creeped out but mostly amused. I know he’s raised more than an eyebrow or two in the neighborhood. That was after all, my intention. Although, not one person has actually had the nerve to ask me about him. Not that I would feel compelled or obligated to explain him if they did.
For nearly a year now, he has stood in the long, thin window at a side entrance to our house overseeing our driveway. Without moving, he looks in the direction of our neighbor’s house to our immediate left. The ones who we have lived next door to for 18-years. The neighbors who we share grass with and whose family room I can see right into from our kitchen window. The same ones whose 21-year old son terrorized my family for at least 6 months (that we know of) last year and who the court issued a 5-year Order of Potection against, for each member of my family, including my two children, but that’s another story for another day– maybe.
This, is about Edward. My Edward. My 6ft tall, cardboard cut-out of Edward Cullen; the teenage vampire from the Twilight series. I won him in a raffle at a local high school during intermission at a performance of Bye Bye Birdie. He was the prize all the young girls wanted but it was me who had the winning number and I knew it would be.
Edward serves a purpose for me; an irrational one perhaps, but a purpose none the less. He “keeps an eye” on the house next door and the menacing boy who lives there. You can’t come in or out of my neighbor’s driveway (which is adjacent to ours) without seeing Edward in our window or more importantly, without him seeing you. He looks very real. Like the movie character, my cardboard cut-out has deep, dark, smoldering eyes; the kind that make you feel uneasy as though he is looking through you and not at you; like he’s judging you. The kind that say, ‘That’s right, I’m watching you, now — punk.’ He’s perfect. And he’s not going anywhere; not at least until I do.
He brings me comfort in a way that’s difficult to adequately verbalize. I don’t really expect people to understand. His presence helped me take those first few steps forward that I needed to take last February and since then, we’ve even managed to take Edward out and have a little fun with him from time to time.
You never know what life is going to bring you. Living life on life’s terms is not always easy and we all need to be comforted every once in a while, for whatever reason. Some people turn inward or to a friend or a pet. Others find solace in a bottle or in food. Me, I found a little bit of peace of mind in a cardboard cut-out with dark, smoldering, piercing eyes.
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Fly on the Wall
If nothing else, I know with a fair degree of certainty, that three days a week, I am going to smile. Actually, it’s more likely that I will literally Laugh-Out-Loud, probably several times during each of those three day’s and undoubtedly, I’ll get what I need to tweet something profoundly wise or funny (on another site). Three days a week I am a fly on the wall.
I work in a small, private, progressive school which is in a big, beautiful Victorian house. I am not a teacher. I work in the office, in the “Downstairs” part of the house where the “Downstairs” kids, who roam from room to room, are three and four years of age. Three days a week, I am privileged to be able to peek out and watch the wee ones introduce themselves, to themselves, through the beautifully ornate, floor to ceiling mirror embedded in the wall right outside the office. Even better, I hear things, like their outspoken curiosity, all day long. I’m the fly on the wall.
A few weeks ago a group of these pre-schoolers crowded around a “mystery” box. They looked at it, touched it, poked it. Finally, a three-year old girl exclaimed:
“Maybe there’s a little serk inside!” When a teacher asked what a serk was, she said, “I don’t know what that is but it’s fun to say!”
Often I overhear them making more sure-footed statements as in this sports commentary between two four-year old boys:
“Sometimes the Jets win and the Redskins tie cause they’re twisted together”, which was countered by, “Well, my favorite sport is …who gets to the finished line first.”
The office is next to a (single) child’s bathroom. No matter who or what gender the occupant is, that door is nearly always open. So when a three-year old girl peered in on a four-year old boy in the midst of peeing, there was this little exchange:
“What’s that?” she asked. “It’s a penis.” he replied matter-of-factly. Then he added just as matter-of-factly, “Only girls have bajamas.”
Priceless!
If it’s not a statement or a query, it’s an apology or an aspiration, like when a four-year old girl saw three older “Upstairs” kids running in the hallway, she remarked:
“Those Upstairs kids are crazy! When I am in the Upstairs here, I’m going to be crazy too!”
Or my new personal favorite, when one four-year old boy looked into the face of another rather astonished four-year old boy and said most sincerely:
“Sorry. I guess I should have asked first if it was okay to lick you.”
The noise level outside the office gets pretty high sometimes but it never bothers me and I never close the door. I love being the “fly on the wall”, listening, laughing and re-tweeting what I hear from the little people. They speak their truth, unabashed and with confidence.
They make me smile which makes it a whole lot easier to take the world on!
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Freaky Frieda and Her Wiener Dog, Heidi!
This is a (true) story I’ve told my kids a hundred times. They never tire from it and always want to hear it again and again….
My dad had a red Volkswagen bus when we were kids. The kind with a sliding door on one side. Every summer for many years we would pack up the bus on a Friday night and make the 14-hour trek from New York to South Carolina for our family vacation. (Think Little Miss Sunshine without the dead body and you have us pegged.) My Dad is from Germany and had older friends, also from Germany, in Carolina who we visited. Frankly, we were less than thrilled to be going to see them but happy I suppose, to be going anywhere.
Powell and Frieda. Powell didn’t say a lot. He pretty much ignored us, unless of course he needed help shelling shrimp. Then he’d waive us over in the backyard and simply point to a bucket of hundreds of shrimps he and my Dad had caught the night before. There we’d sit, shelling and de-veining shrimp for hours on end. A kid’s vacation dream. Frieda on the other hand was quite vociferous. Although she rarely spoke to us and when she did, it was in German, assuming we knew what she was saying. Her face was stern and wore a permanent frown. Her hair was black and shortly cropped. She had very pale skin which she highlighted with a deep red lipstick; a bit scary as I recall. She was rather stout and fond of wearing the same outfit every day; neatly ironed shorts with a button-up, sleeveless, white or yellow cotton blouse. This left the extra skin under her arms free to flap loosely in the wind whenever she got excited and raised her arms (which was often). We stayed at their house twice. After that, we rented. It was during our second visit that things came to a head and it was clear that Powell and Frieda’s tolerance for children was well, below sea level at best.
We rolled in on a hot Saturday afternoon in mid-July to what appeared to be a birthday party reception. There were decorations, hats and even party blowers nicely arranged on the kitchen table in their small, immaculate home. When we asked whose birthday it was, Frieda flapped her arms in the air and replied excitedly, Heidi‘s! The thing about this, is that my older sister’s name is Heidi and her birthday is July 15th but just what had changed we wondered from the previous year when they pretty much ignored us? Children have a keen sense about adults who don’t like them and quite frankly we were suspect. Rightfully, so.
What was different we soon found out, was Heidi. Not our Heidi but their Heidi. Heidi it turned out was their new baby; a four-legged dachshund doxie baby but their baby or at least Frieda’s baby, none the less. Heidi was a wiener dog. And it was her birthday they were celebrating. We were okay with that, after all, a party is a party and quite frankly, the wiener dog provided a little hope for us. Maybe this vacation wouldn’t be so bad after all. WRONG! Unfortunately, not only was there no cake and no ice-cream at this party, there was absolutely no blowing of the blowers either and the next few days set the stage for a resentment build up of epic proportions against Heidi.
Heidi, Heidi, Heidi! Every other word out of Frieda’s mouth was about Heidi. “Look at Heidi. Where is Heidi? I wonder if Heidi is hungry?” Don’t play with, chase or scare Heidi. Don’t walk Heidi. Do not touch Heidi and for God sakes, don’t leave the door ajar or Heidi will run out of the house! As for Heidi, the spoiled little wiener dog, I swear she would start yelping like crazy if one of us even walked passed her, sending Frieda into a screaming, arm flapping, frenzy about how we were tormenting her poor, little Heidi. This domino-ed into my Dad yelling at us for upsetting Frieda, leaving us longing for the year before when Powell and Frieda just ignored us. By mid-week, we hated Heidi and Frieda even more. We were miserable and the only bright spot came when my parents announced we would be going to Myrtle Beach. Finally, some reprieve!
As cool as my dad’s VW bus was, it didn’t come with air conditioning and much to our dismay, Heidi the wiener dog was coming with us to Myrtle Beach. My dad and Powell sat up front. Mom and Frieda (with Heidi on her lap), in the middle seat, the human Heidi, myself and our younger brother, Peter were cramped together in the very back. Upon our departure, Frieda announced it was Heidi’s napping time and we were meant to be “quiet” while the dog slept for the hour’s ride. It was okay however, for Frieda to huff and puff and complain loudly about the heat for the first 30-minutes of our trip though and we watched the back of her head bob up and down wildly, while she waved her short stumpy fingers frantically in front of her face like a fan, sending sweat from her brow flying throughout the bus .
“Oh, mein Gott ist das so heiß!”
(Oh, my God it is so hot!) she repeated over and over again in German.
I’d say it was midway to Myrtle Beach when Frieda reached her boiling point– literally. Without warning she stopped waving and began to unbutton her yellow, sleeveless blouse. At first we weren’t sure what she was doing but once we saw her pass the garment up to Powell to hold, it was clear, the portly German woman in her late 50s who was sitting in front of us had just removed her blouse, completely! Seeing the thick white straps of her brazier alone, was enough to send us into an uncontrollable “snicker” as my mom would call it but when the now freaky Frieda turned around to see what all the ruckus was about, the reality of what she had done was just too much to hold in. And now, there was all kinds of moist, milky-white skin flapping in the air in front of us as we came face to face with the largest bosoms squeezed into the biggest, white-est, lacy-est, cross your heart bra, any six, eight and ten-year kids had ever seen! Needless to say, the frontal view sent us gasping for air as we tried to contain the “snickering” which quickly turned into pure unadulterated laughter. Even mom who at first put the “sshhh” finger up to her lips behind Frieda’s back was now turning a crimson red, desperately trying not to bust a gut with her own laughter. Frieda didn’t see the humor or anything wrong with removing her blouse in the car on a hot summer’s day.
Honestly, this bra doesn't give the visual we were exposed to as youngsters justice but it's close and you get the idea.
We’d just about calmed ourselves down when Dad pulled into one of Myrtle Beach’s parking lots. With miles of beach before us, Dad snaked in and out of endless rows of cars to find a space. Maybe it was the heat of the moment or the heat itself, the need for air after all that belly hurting laughter or perhaps it was just a kid being a kid but for reasons we’ve never cared to discuss, the moment Dad pulled into a space and brought the car to a stop, my little brother jumped out of his seat and opened the side door. What happened next is indelibly etched in my mind’s eye and I’m somehow able to replay the event in slow motion, moment by moment, which is truly a gift and leaves me forever grateful for it.
At the sound of the door sliding open, Heidi the wiener dog, bolted from freaky Frieda’s lap making the leap of her life for freedom and vanishing into the sea of cars, in the blink of an eye. Frieda, in absolute hysteria was next to take flight, leaving her blouse behind and frantically screaming “Heidi, come back! Heidi!” while chasing the yelping dog through row after row of cars. This buxom babe was bouncing all over the place in the parking lot, in her big, white, lacy, cross your heart bra for all to see! For just a moment, the three of us stood there by the open car door with wide eyes and dropped jaws, stunned by what we saw. Next went Powell, yelling in his thick German accent… “Vait! Frieda, stop! Come back! Vait! Vere are you going?” And finally, my Dad jumped out of his seat and ran after Powell who was running after Frieda, who was running after Heidi. Mom, (bless her) stayed back, unable to control herself as we all were by then, unable to control the howl of laughter that roared from the deepest, purest part of our happy souls.
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Dogs at Their Heels
As a kid growing up in Westchester, I lived in an apartment building on the fourth floor. No elevator. We played kickball in the backyard with the other kids who lived in the building. When the Good Humor ice-cream truck came by, we’d yell up to mom like banshees and if she had them, she would wrap a few quarters in plastic and throw them out the kitchen window. We had chores to do and did them. We didn’t get allowance. The word “no” was not an unfamiliar term. By age 12 we had jobs; babysitting, delivering newspapers or breaking down boxes and sweeping up scraps at the local butcher shop. We also had pen-pals who we hand-wrote letters to. We walked to school, the movie theaters, the mall and the beach– by ourselves. Our family of five shared one rotary phone, the kind that was attached to the wall and stayed there when we left the house. We also shared a lime green record player for our musical entertainment. Our first color TV was 19 inches. I didn’t have a computer and when I went to college, I borrowed a friend’s electric typewriter to write reports.
Behind our building was a trucking company where typically, seven or eight, 18-wheelers stood neatly parked, side by side. The only thing between us and the trucks was a simple 10, maybe 12 foot high chain link fence that was hardly a barrier, let alone a deterrent to kids with a mission. After hopping the fence, we would climb the truck beds, hoist each other up to the roof tops and jump, roof to roof down the line, just for fun. Next to the trucks was a sand and gravel yard separated by a similar fence and guarded by a team of 3 or 4 loose running dogs. Dobermans. It was a game, a quest, a challenge to quietly sneak over the fence, outwitting the dogs, climb to the top of a 15 foot mound of gravel and yell out at the top of our lungs, “I’m king of the mountain!” Of course, this immediately alerted the otherwise outwitted but now fiercely barking dogs to our location and sent us all on the run of our lives scrambling back over the fence in record time with the dogs growling and salivating at our heels. In hindsight, I’m truly amazed none of us ever got caught and chewed to bits as we feared we would. But then again, there was an unspoken code that had a “no child left behind” ethic to it among us. We helped each over the fence. I liken my childhood experiences to the day courses our kids now take at special facilities designed to teach them “trust and team building skills”. What a difference a couple of decades make.
My children live in the suburbs. My 9-year old is not allowed to leave our cul-de-sac. There are no sidewalks here. They are driven or take the bus to and from their school every day. They each have their own Gameboys, iPods, cell phones and laptops. They play their Wii games on our 54″ flat screen TV. My 12-year old son carries a pre-paid American Express picture ID card with at least $50.00 on it, in his pocket, in case of emergency. He’s never climbed a fence, let alone been chased by a crazy, barking dog regularly. He prefers to Facebook, Skype or text his friends rather than actually speak to them or meet them at the movies or a bowling alley.
I take responsibility for aiding in the provision of the latest and greatest for my kids. Doesn’t every generation strive to do better and give more to their children? Technological advancement is the key. Isn’t it? With answers literally at their fingertips, academically, my kids are already worlds ahead of me. It’s the life skills and their ability to cope that concerns me. After all, no one is immune to life’s inevitable disappointments, no matter how many gadgets they own. Sometimes I believe my childhood with less in it, may have left me better equipped to deal with life and all that comes with it than today’s youth. I didn’t need to absolutely have to have anything right now or fall prey to the instant gratification disease that so many of our young people now suffer from. I wanted things but I understood that “no” meant “no”, not maybe or tomorrow. I learned to accept that I couldn’t have everything or everything, my way. I have some intuitiveness and self-discipline as a result which has proved extremely valuable during some intensely difficult times in my life thus far. I worry that my kids are missing out on some invaluable, independent learning by not being able to roam as freely and learn to free themselves from a jam, on their own, as I did. I wonder how you can teach them these lessons without letting them or the dogs out. I hope that they will have what it takes to overcome life’s unexpected challenges; the real hard ones. I pray that they will be able to summon the courage and stamina they’ll need to help each other over the fence when the dogs are at their heels.
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Christmas Magic
“Love is the transformative power that turns our brokenness into something beautiful.” Meg Casey
Taking the world on with a smile is no small task when you are trying to do it every day. Let’s face it; no one can be that cheerful, not even at this time of year. Oh, how I try though. Everyday I get up, make a conscious effort to smile and I tell myself, it’s going to be a good day. But as happy as the holidays can be, they are not always the easiest of times. They can get very stressful. This year they raced in like a roller coaster full of emotion, filling my head with memories that make my heart long for things that used to be or yearn for how I would like them to be. Sometimes I find myself feeling down. I don’t think I’m alone. I think many of us are affected by the season, in one way or another. It’s hard to pick yourself up and pull yourself out of the darkness. So when things start to get a little bleak, especially this time of year, I look for the magic.
The holiday season really is a time filled with hope and wonder. Possibilities abound and if you believe, it truly can be a magical time. I believe in Christmas magic and I believe you don’t even have to celebrate Christmas to find it. If you look for it, you will find it but you really have to be open to it. You have to want it, expect it and maybe even make it happen for someone else before it can happen to you. It’s like when it’s a cold, dreary December evening and you’re exhausted, feeling overwhelmed by what needs to be done and can’t imagine doing it. The phone rings and on the other end is a dear friend who you haven’t spoken to in two years for no other reason than life getting in the way. He makes your day in a big way. I guess you can look at it as just another phone call or you can see it as magical because it really did lift your heart and make you feel good when you really needed to. That’s magic, isn’t it?
Sometimes just knowing that someone you care about is out there thinking about you is all the magic you need to get through. It’s called love and if you keep your heart open, it will surely find its way into it.
Christmas magic is love and love has the power to turn something broken into something beautiful.
Now, that’s a gift.
Christmas Magic, you can give it and receive it.
I believe in it. Do you?
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Oh, Go Ahead and Cry For Me Argentina!
I am trying to recall the fateful infraction that made my mom go from being awesome to embarrassing when I was a kid. I can’t quite pinpoint the exact offense but I think I was around the age of 12 or 13. Sadly, I think the image change is all part of the natural process of separation and signifies the beginning of our break- away to independence. As a parent now, I’ve been careful to keep the public displays of affection toward my children to a minimum. It’s a conscious effort to prolong the process and hang on to the image of “awesome” for as long as I can. Well, it was anyway. It’s just another pipe dream now. The cruel truth is, nature stops for no one.
Perhaps, the natural process of aging and the separation process, go hand in hand. In the last year or so I’ve started to hear myself saying things like, “Excuse me, can you repeat that please?” or “Pardon me? I missed the beginning of that.” It’s bad enough when you are speaking in your native tongue to not hear everything but now imagine being in a foreign country, say Mexico for example, where I’ve been for the last 10 days and where they speak Spanish and I don’t. My kids do however and I’ve relied on them often to translate for me. Although, there is a certain level of comfortability that comes with visiting the same city for eight years in a row. You pick up words and phrases after a while and feel confident using them. Let’s face it, it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to understand simple things like “hola” or “gracias”. Heck, everyone knows that means “hello” and “thank-you” in Spanish. So, when the nice gentleman in the elevator, or the waiter, house keeper, hotel clerk, driver or merchant would kindly wish me a “good afternoon” in Spanish over the past week or so, I simply smiled, repeated back what I heard and went along my merry way, at first anyway.
After a few days however and many, many “good afternoon” exchanges, I began to notice bewildered looks, odd expressions, a smirk here and there and the most common; a blank look accompanied by a hollow smile, in return of these greetings. What?? Was there something stuck in my teeth? I didn’t get it. Not until my 12-year old son was with me one afternoon that is. As per usual, with a huge smile and an air of confidence, I kindly reciprocated a store merchant’s “good afternoon” with a very cheery, “Buenos Aires!” Again, the perplexed look and hollow smile was received in return. It wasn’t until we were out of ear shot and the store that my son turned to me with a look of pure mortification on his face and said, “Mom, what did you say to that guy?” “Buenos Aires. Why?” I replied. “Why did you say Beunos Aires?” he asked. After explaining I was just trying to be nice and insisting I knew what I was saying, after all I had been “Buenos Aires-ing” people all week now, he looked up at me with that ‘I am so embarrassed by you’ look in his eyes and said, “Oh, my God mom, come on! Buenos Aires is a city! That’s like someone saying good afternoon to you and you replying, ‘New York‘! They are saying Buenas Tardes not Buenos Aires!” (Apparently, the “t” in tardes is silent. Who knew? Obviously, not me.)
Good Lord, now it all made sense though! Okay, so people were wishing me a good afternoon and I was cheerfully replying with the name of a city in Argentina. Nice move mom. Now my 12-year old son (who has been showing signs of approaching that point of separation over the last several months as it is) won’t even go to the hotel lobby with me. Yes, it seems I’ve lost my “coolness”, at least for the next 5 or 6 years where he’s concerned anyway. Nature set its course and me and my slight loss of hearing were in it’s path. Inevitable.
So by all means, go ahead and cry for me Argentina and all the other parents who are in the same or soon to be same boat! But before you do, please tell me your “I used to be awesome until..” story. You know what they say, misery loves company and I know I can’t be alone on this one.
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The Low Down on the Pat Down
Our annual family adventure to Guadalajara, Mexico is never without incident. We travel with a minimum of twelve bags, more than half of which contain computer related equipment, including five laptops, two portable printers, a projector, a PA system and at least 40 PDA’s (mini computers). “We” are four people. Two of which are under the age of thirteen. If you are starting to get a rather bizarre mental image right now, you’re on the right track. My husband works at FIL, the largest Spanish language book fair in the world. He works for an American publisher, aiding librarians from all over the world choose books by zapping their ISBN numbers into one of his hand-held PDAs. He then downloads hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of orders back to the U.S. on the spot. The work is intense and requires every piece of equipment he brings. This makes it impossible for any bag he brings containing equipment to be “checked” for fear of loss or damage. We have been doing this for eight years now. My kids are old pros. They know the drill. No bag gets left behind! The PDA bag alone is worth about $10,000. At every stopping point a baggage count is conducted and at any point, when you come up one short, lets say the one holding the PDAs for example, there’s no time to be calm and think. Panic and hysteria set in immediately! But that was last year and while we eventually recovered the bag in Dallas, I am trying to erase that whole incident from my memory completely.
As you can imagine, getting there is the most stressful part of the trip. Going through Security is the biggest issue both ways, in both countries. We always get “pulled” to the side, for further scrutiny even though we carry a letter from the Mexican Consulate granting us permission to bring our electronics into Mexico. This year I was especially curious about all the hullabaloo surrounding the “body scan” vs. the “pat down“. I had heard that if you were “tapped” or the red light blinks when you pass under the metal detector, you were given a “choice”. Considering what happened to passenger John Tyner and his now famous warning “don’t touch my junk” to the TSA agent performing his pat down, I started mulling over which form of personal invasion I would prefer; radiation or an inappropriate squeeze. I was leaning toward the squeeze.
Honestly, I was expecting Cruella de Vil and was quite surprised at how pleasant TSA Agent Hurdley actually was as I passed underneath the metal detector at Newark Airport the day after Thanksgiving. In fact all of the agents we encountered at Newark were friendly and courteous. Agent Hurdley was even patient with my questions and didn’t seem bothered by my asking whether or not it was true that travelers were given the choice of a pat down vs. the body scan if stopped. So, here is the low down, in Newark anyway, according to Agent Hurdley, there is NO option. If the red light blinks while going under the metal detector, you get the pat down. Period.
Now, what about how close they actually come to touching your “junk”? Well, I witnessed two pat downs while putting my shoes back on and waiting for my family to come through (inevitably at least one of us gets separated from the rest during the “screening” process and I really don’t mind if it’s me). TSA Agent Johnson performed both pat downs and while I admit to wincing slightly at the “snapping” sound of Agent Johnson pulling his blue latex gloves onto his hands and despite the obvious awkward facial expressions on all parties involved, truth be told, no one’s “junk” was even close to being touched. One of the pat downs I witnessed was to my husband. In addition to the expected full bag search, this year he was treated to his first official pat down (which I am actually being suspected of having quietly requested but I won’t get into that now). In any case, I can attest to the fact that no “junk” was touched. And the body scan machine which looked quite impressive, wasn’t even being used that day.
So travelers relax. While you may not have a “choice” be comforted in knowing that at Newark Airport anyway, and with TSA Agent Johnson, your “junk”, at least for now, is safe. I know that’s not the case everywhere however, so please, tell me if you’ve had a different experience and what your thoughts are about all of this hullabaloo.
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Striving to live life on life's terms while taking the world on with a smile.
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Taking The World On With A Smile! 