Lisa Wants The Floor

The New Road

2010-05-26T17:05:00.001-07:00

My daughter is being bullied at school. Today it’s her freckles and the shape of her face. Tomorrow it will be something else.

She gazes out the window on the ride home. I see her eyes fill up.

We live in a time when anything remotely different about you is like bloody water to sharks. They swarm. They attack. They leave you there to doubt your significance.

Despite all the anti-bullying campaigns all over the country, bullies seep out of every crevice in society.

Ally’s toothy grin has always filled up the room. She owns an aura of spring in radiant bloom. Her spirit is highly carbonated.

She was a baby who woke up happy, and has stayed that way for 11 years. Until now.

Until middle school, the bootcamp of K through 12. If you can make it here, you’ll make it anywhere, I think to myself.

A mother's instinct is to shield. Protect. Fight. I struggle with my inner Rocky Balboa. I feel compelled to act. To let it be known. Ally begs me not to for fear of retaliation.

Bullies are pervasive. Not exclusive to middle school. There is no demographic profile, no limit to age or education or occupation. They’re on every playground and in every corporation, in our government and in our churches. They exist on Facebook and Myspace and Club Penguin. And they reside in our families.

It begs the question: Haven’t we evolved beyond this? Why do we teach our young how to get ahead, but not how to get along?

How much longer can we say nothing and allow kids to suffer? What have we learned from Columbine and the countless acts of violence perpetrated by children and teens who have been bullied? How many kids can we afford to lose to suicide because we didn’t want to be called a rat?

Taking down the bullies is going to require a paradigm shift. A movement of individual acts. An achievement in courage and fortitude.

Each one of us is at a crossroads. We can either continue looking the other way or we can take a stand and carve a new road to a place where differences are respected and our children can feel good inside.

And stay that way.

2009-10-22T11:43:00.000-07:00

Although Halloween has not yet been crossed off the calendar, the Christmas marketing campaigns are now entrenched. They arrive in camouflage mode in summer. By early fall they are in full-scale bombardment.

Choked by the country’s economic nosedive, most parents are scrambling to deliver the array of presents their children have come to expect living in the material world. While visions of video games and new wardrobes dance in their kids’ heads, parents are holding onto theirs wondering where it’s all going to come from.

After all, we need more. We are a country of more. Most of us were raised on little. Yet the notion of attainment was a seed that was planted and fertilized well. We gave and continue to give television our full attention. And the advertisers have their way with us.

I'm just as guilty. I worked in advertising for years, writing copy for nondescript products, propping them up as exceptional when the company and I both knew they were mediocre at best.

As a kid, I was captivated by television. I can still sing the jingles from McDonald’s, Burger King, Coke, Pepsi, Roto-Rooter and Oscar Mayer (both weeners and bologna, mind you). Somehow, somewhere along the line, the thought that “happiness is derived from having more” became a part of my psyche.

The older I get, the more overwhelmed I feel by my stuff. Why are we Americans in a constant state of lack? Are we so empty inside that we need to grasp at something, anything, to fill the void?

Perhaps we just don't know how to be happy.

Apparently, the Danes do. They are considered the happiest people on Earth. Oprah set out to find out why.

“Less things, more life,” the smiling, statuesque woman explained as she Skyped into the show from Copenhagen.

The city apartment she shares with her husband and three children is shockingly small, yet behind every sleek white surface is an entire town of organization.

On Oprah’s recent visit to Denmark, she met with a group of women to discuss Danish culture. It’s one that focuses on values over money, they explained. Values like education and family and creativity. They choose careers that fulfill them, not based on how much money they will earn.

They are heavily and happily taxed. Yes, happily.

“We feel we get a lot for our taxes,” explained Stine. She described how taxes allow everyone to access health care and get a university education, and how that makes for a healthier society – physically and mentally.

I couldn’t stop thinking about this segment. Happy with less? Truly a foreign concept.

In Peter Walsh’s book, It’s All Too Much: An Easy Plan for Living A Richer Life With Less Stuff, he writes, “We are at the center of an orgy of consumption, and many are now seeing that this need to own so much comes with a heavy price: Kids so overstimulated by the sheer volume of stuff in their home that they lose their ability to concentrate and focus. Financial strain caused by misplaced bills or overpurchasing. Constant fighting because neither partner is prepared to let go of their possessions. The embarrassment of living in a house that long ago became more of a storage facility than a home.”

In the end, more stuff makes us feel smothered. It’s more to manage. More to care for. More to look at. More to distract. It closes in on us. It clutters not just our environment, but our minds. It blocks us from being the best we can be – as individuals and as families.

We intrinsically know that real happiness comes from the level of our connectedness. Yet we go against our true nature when we put our money in things that separate us.

Last Christmas/Hanukkah, my husband and I told the kids they would get a few presents, but what we really wanted to do was spend more time together. I was expecting to hear groans. Instead, their eyes lit up.

My daughter hugged me and whispered, “There’s nothing I like better than to be with you.”

This year, we will add to that by giving things away and carefully selecting each gift by its level of interaction required. Board games with four or more players are high on the list.

I am clear on my New Year’s resolution for 2010: Less things, more life.

The Wake-up Call

2009-08-31T11:43:00.000-07:00

I’ve been away from my blog for a good month now. Only, I wouldn’t consider it a good month.

On July 21, I was awakened by my son. Most mornings he wakes up talking and can be heard from any room in the house, his voice unusually deep for 12 years old.

This morning was different. He said nothing. He simply pulled on my arm.

It was earlier than usual. I splashed cold water on my face as he sat at the edge of my tub. As I turned to him, his gaze was distant. Before I could ask him what was wrong, his eyes rolled back. His body fell straight back into the tub and shook violently.

I knew right away this was a diabetic seizure. His first.

There I was. Overtaken by fear, thrust into action like an ER doctor with no training.

Don and Ally heard my screaming and raced to help. I fumbled with the glucagon shot, struggling to recall the one time I practiced with it. In that moment, time seemed to drag on, like trying to sprint through deep water. In and out I plunged the liquid into the vial, my hands shaking. Into Jack’s thigh it went easing the trembling in his limbs.

I rode in the ambulance and held him, sobbing as he fought to be set free from the straps that held him down. I was flooded with guilt. This was my fault.

After six years of staying up late to check him -- six years of living and breathing this unpredictable disease -- I fell asleep on the job. Literally.

I checked his glucometer. There was the evidence. He went to bed low, his blood glucose reading at 72. Without a snack to bring him back up.

How did I let this happen?

Just a few weeks before, I was among a group of parents listening to an endocrinologist speak frankly at diabetes camp. He said, “When I see one of my patients end up in ER, I know that someone was responsible for this. You cannot ever take a night off. You have to be on the job at all times.”

No one had ever issued such a warning. He was harsh, I thought, but he was right.

People say to me all the time, “You’re so strong.”

I want to say, “How would you be if this was your child?”

This is a sink-or-swim situation. You either educate yourself on the caring of your child with this disease or he could die. Those are the choices.

And here I was, educated about my son’s disease, and we still almost lost him. All it takes is one time. One moment of human frailty.

By the afternoon of the seizure, Jack was lucid and hungry and had little memory of the morning’s ordeal. I told him I’d make him whatever meal he wanted.

“I’ll have madras lentils, brown rice and a soy smoothie,” he said.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to go to Burger King and get you a Whopper?”

“Nope,” he said with a smile.

There was that smile. After the morning’s trauma and a brush with death, there it was the way the sun sometimes breaks through a stormy sky.

My eyes were wet with tears that whole week. He stopped to hug me and said, “Mom, it’s okay. I’m just so happy to be alive.”

The old sage that resides within my son comes through once again. Every day he shows me the power of resilience. The ability to shift your perspective from all that is wrong to all that is right. He knows he has all that a kid needs: an overabundance of love. And with that at your back, you carry on.

The Good List

2009-07-23T14:43:00.000-07:00

I’ve decided to be the assistant coach of my daughter’s soccer team this fall. My knowledge of the game is limited to which team has possession of the ball and when someone scores. What I bring to the table is four years on the sidelines reliving my cheerleading days, shouting, “Go, Ally!”

Let’s just say, these 11-year-olds will be teaching me a thing or two.

Tonight is the draft. I will attend fully prepared having studied the players like a gambling man examines his hand. My clipboard has the names categorized by ability and position. I am pumped up, my head spinning with plan A, plan B – whatever it takes to amass the best players. We are going to dominate that field, I’m thinking.

I asked Ally to review my picks.

She nodded.

“Mom,” she said, scanning the names, “Don’t pick all the good players.”

“Why?”

“Leave some for the other teams.”

I stared at her blankly.

“Some of the players I want on my team aren’t the best at soccer, but they’re really nice girls.”

The record scratches. In the midst of my plan of attack, my young girl reminds me that greed isn’t good. That sharing the bounty with others is the right thing to do. And more importantly, that judging people on their inner goodness, not necessarily their outer successes, is perhaps the higher road -- the road I’ve been talking a lot about, but not always walking on.

I rearrange my list and Ally gives me the names of the nice girls. And off I go.

Everything

2009-07-10T07:37:00.000-07:00

There are moments in life when someone says one line -- one line that completely realigns your thinking. So potent and flawless in its simplicity, the line comes to you as if spoken by God.

A few years ago, my babysitter came to watch the kids and brought her nephew along. He was new to California and his ability to communicate in English was surprising after just a few months of 10th grade.

Diego came to America in secrecy, his body stuffed into the hollowed-out space beneath the back seat of an old Toyota. Where he came from, wealth was a daily meal and a pair of shoes. His family worked most of his 15 years of life to gather the $4,000 border crossing fee. On the other side was his aunt, now a citizen, whose arms were waiting. On the other side was a life with possibilities.

Don and I said good-night to the kids and told them to be good for Marcella. As we were leaving, Jack pulled on Don’s arm.

“Can we go to the movies tomorrow, Dad?” he pleaded.

“Maybe next weekend. We have a lot to do tomorrow.”

“Like what? Why can’t we go?”

“Because we have a lot to do around our house.”

“Can we go to the toy store then?”

“No. We need to work on the house.”

“I don’t want to work on the house! Geez! It’s so unfair! Come on, Dad!”

“I’m not going to say it again. The answer is no.”

“I’ll have nothing to do! It will be so boring!”

Jack stomped away, marinating in the injustice. Don shook his head and looked at Diego.

“I don’t know why he acts like that.”

There was a long pause.

Softly, Diego said, “It’s because he has everything.”

There it was. Plain and simple.

But the line spoke to me as a statement well beyond the interaction with Jack.

It’s because we have everything. It’s about our advantage and their adversity. It’s about their destitution and our discontent.

I felt ashamed. Here we are. Americans with our big SUVs and cluttered houses and overflowing refrigerators. Here we are with our addictions and anti-depressants. With our firm grip on our kids’ overscheduled lives. With our heads immersed in technology and our disconnected families.

We live in the land of everything and yet we often feel nothing. It begs the question: How have we lost our way?

The line has stayed with me all these years. “It’s because he has everything.” It’s the voice in my head that warns me not to spoil. It’s the underlying guilt I feel when I whine about traffic or rude people or hot summers – all packaged as really big deals. It’s the line that resets my compass toward gratitude and simplicity.

In the book, The Blessing of a Skinned Knee, author Wendy Mogel, Ph.D., writes: “When horticulturists want to prepare hothouse plants for replanting outdoors, they subject them to stress to strengthen them. Gently and progressively deprived of food and water and exposed to greater extremes of heat and cold than they’ve been accustomed to, the plants grow stronger root systems and thicker stems.”

Most of us haven’t been exposed to many extremes. To what degree have our lives been padded? And to what degree do we pad the lives of our children? How will they grow “stronger root systems” if we red carpet their way and break their every fall?

My babysitter shares her home with her husband, three children and extended family. Diego and the grandparents sleep on couches. Their home is full yet immaculate and their children are A students, Diego included. But what I have always marveled over is the way this family radiates pure joy and celebrates its togetherness.

They have so little, yet so much. They tune into one another instead of Ipods or cell phones or computers. Front lawn tag is an almost nightly event in which everyone takes part. They work together to pool their resources, and they see America for all its glory and wonder and opportunity. Their struggle has given them a different lens. The little things in life – that we consider daily hardships -- aren’t even visible on their radar.

There is much to glean from people who have suffered. Maybe we can’t know how they feel or what they've been through, but we can learn from their example. We can pause, take a good look around and really see everything. And maybe in the process, we’ll remember that our land of plenty is a place and a state of mind never to be taken for granted again.

Recycle This

2009-05-17T14:10:00.001-07:00

My son, Jack, is the serious one in the family. Don’t know how I spawned a stone face from this pack of clowns, but I am forever on a mission to convert him to the cult of the ridiculous and sarcastic from which I was born.

Today he and his friend, Christian, barreled into the kitchen overflowing with giggles.

Jack: MOM! THERE IS A TOILET ON OUR FRONT LAWN!

Christian: Lisa, there IS!

Me: I know. Dad and I thought we could put it in the corner of the yard to make it convenient for you when you’re playing football with your friends.

Jack: MOM! You can’t do that! That is against the law!

Me: No. People do it all the time. We all have to use the toilet. This will save you time and keep all the kids out of our house.

Jack: I am NOT using that.

Christian: Me either.

Me: Okay then, I’ll make it into a seat. You guys can sit on it when you’re tired.

Jack: Mom, I won’t sit there. That would be so embarrassing.

Christian: Totally.

Me: Guys, we are a recycling family. You know that. So it’s either going to be a toilet, a nice seat for you to sit on or we’re going to put dirt in it and make it into a flower pot. I found a nice spot for it right under your bedroom window.

Jack: No WAY!

Me: Pick one.

Jack: I don’t WANT a toilet under my window! Put it under YOUR window.

Me: My room faces the back of the house. Then no one will see it.

Jack: No one WANTS to see a toilet in our yard.

Me: Pick one.

Jack: All rrrrright I’ll pick the flower pot.

Christian: Seriously, what are going to do with that toilet?

Me: Well, the other thought I had was to wait til the middle of the night and put it in someone else’s yard. Sort of like the Neighborhood of the Traveling Toilet. Whoever gets it will know it means that someone likes them. And then they can put it in someone else’s yard the next night. And so on.

Christian: I don’t think my parents will think it’s a good thing.

Me: No they will. They’ll like it. Trust me.

Jack: Mom, you could get arrested.

Me: Arrested for giving my neighbor a gift? I doubt the police officer is going to see it that way.

Jack: Mom, please don’t.

Me: All right. We can keep it.

Jack: Ya, but I don’t like any of the choices.

Me: Honey, this is the country. A toilet on our front lawn is cool. This will help us bond with people.

Jack: Mom, now I think you’re just kidding with me.

A Feeling of Home

2009-05-11T11:42:00.001-07:00

We’ve all heard the cliché, “Home is where the heart is.” But what if your heart doesn’t feel at home? For almost 19 years, I’ve lived in California. And if you ask me where home is, I would still tell you: Boston.

Anyone who knows Beantown like I know Beantown understands my love for the city. For me, it has little to do with the Red Sox or Patriots or Celtics. It has everything to do with Bostonians and who we are. It’s about the culture I left behind -- a culture of real people who talk funny. People who tell it like it is. People who practice sarcasm as much as their religion. People who say things like, “Put yeh shots on and get in the cah. We’re goin up noth to ride the hoss. It’s gonna be wicked fun."

It’s about people who are as salty as the air they breathe. It’s about generations of families who put up with the winters and each other because they can’t imagine being away from one another. Their lives overlap and intertwine.

It’s about neighbors who define “neighborly.” Growing up, I witnessed almost daily acts of kindness. It was natural for people to help each other shovel out their cars. On rainy days, someone in the neighborhood would collect the soggy kids trudging home. When our gardens overflowed with vegetables, we divided them up and left bags on our neighbors’ steps. When someone got sick, parents rallied to babysit and make extra meals and clean house.

What I miss is the sense of responsibility we had to each other. A commitment to our community.

So what’s not to love about California? There’s so much to brag about: almost year-round sunshine. Dry, warm days. Miles of untainted seashore flanked by sandy cliffs. Valleys polka-dotted with orange trees. Green and rocky mountains in the distance. Natural beauty in every direction.

It’s the transplants like me who have a measure of comparison. We realize after so many years that one cannot live on sunshine alone. Something is missing.

Marti Emerald, a local TV news reporter in San Diego, was quoted once about her take on Southern California culture. She called it a “social disconnect.” Aha! I thought. That describes it.

Too often, I have witnessed a lack of connection amongst people. Neighbors will drive straight into their garages, only to be seen when taking out the trash or retrieving the mail. Perhaps it is the absence of real connection that leads to a lack of accountability. No-shows and cancellations are a way of life. I’ve been to several kids’ birthday parties where we were the only ones singing happy birthday to a tearful child at the end of an almost empty table. I’ve seen teachers and community leaders with a skeleton staff of volunteers who take on more than they can handle.

For years I have lived my life looking back at the city I left behind. But everyone knows that when you spend your life in the rear view mirror, you never really see what’s right in front of you. I realized that if I wanted a sense of community here in San Diego, I would have to either find it or create it. So I started a playgroup when my kids were little. I created an online network for parents in Southern California. I give of my time to the local schools. I extend my hand at my kids’ games. I’ve become politically active. And I’ve gotten to know my neighbors.

Little by little, I am doing what I can to cultivate a community for my family. Because in the end, I realize that if you can’t be with the one you love, honey, love the one you’re with.

Girl Time

2009-05-05T11:49:00.000-07:00

Jack: Mom, I’m nervous about the state tests.

Me: Why?

Jack: I’m not good at language arts.

Me: That’s okay. You do so well in other areas. Besides, most people are not good in every subject.

Jack: I’m just glad you’re not one of those parents that gets mad about that. And you’re not trying to make me into someone I’m not.

Me: I wouldn’t do that. My father wanted me to be an athlete and I was anything but an athlete.

Yep, that was me in 1974 sitting down in right field, head facing the sky. I remember the ball flying over my head. I’d track it and marvel at the arc.

As if in slow motion, the team would plead with me like I had the last hamburger on earth and they wanted a bite. Parents would fume from the stands, hands in the air. I could hear them shouting things like, “Get UP!” and “GET it!” and “What is she DOING?” I never understood the urgency.

I’d eventually walk over and pick it up. By then, the first basewoman would rip it out of my hand and send it to home plate.

So rude.

Year after year, I begged my basketball coach to sit me on the bench. When he finally felt compelled to put me in, I’d stroll around the court making figure eights as the girls wove their way around me. Afterwards, I’d give the other team a big smile and a high five when we lost. That always got me Sportsman of the Year award. That was code for: The Girl Who Doesn’t Give A Crap If We Lose award.

I wanted to be a girl and look like a girl. During most of my childhood, my hair was cut in the shape of a helmet. My mother tried to convince me it was adorable.

“Mia Farrow and Goldie Hawn wear their hair that way, you know,” she’d say.

Truth was, my hair was a beast my mother couldn’t tame. I remember strangers telling my parents, “Your boys are so cute.”

Unlike the rest of my family, I was drawn to music and poetry and all-things girly. I wanted to play dress-up and wear high heels. I’d parade my grandmother’s wedding dress around the house with a yellow towel draped over my head. I thought it gave me that real, Christy Brinkley-long-blond-hair look. I'd glue my grandmother’s beads to my earlobes. I’d paint my lips a burgundy red. Anything to bring me back to the girl I was inside.

What I learned from those years is not that my father was a bad man for forcing me to play sports. He was and still is a man who just wanted to share his love of the game with me. What I came away with is that every person is born with his own inclinations that cannot be shaped or changed by others. We, as parents, can do our best to guide our children. But in the end, they will have their own dreams. Our job is to clear the path and cheer them on as they find their way.

Spring Cleaning

2009-04-18T14:31:00.000-07:00

What defines a good friendship? Like all relationships, there are those that are healthier than others. How do you know if a friendship is good for you?

I read once that the way to assess a friendship is to evaluate how you feel – physically and emotionally – right after you’ve spent time with someone. If you’re drained, resentful, defeated, hurt, or anything on the negative end of the spectrum, it might be time to look at the merits of the relationship.

Over the past two years, I’ve thought about where I am invested. Like any busy mom, carving out time away from my kids is difficult enough. Wasting time with the wrong people is futile.

With great thought and care, I conducted a spring cleaning. I took a look at each friend the way some people look at a shirt to determine whether it still fits, and plucked a few from my friendship wardrobe. I don’t mean to imply that this was a simple, overnight endeavor. It was anything but.

I’m one of those married types that loves and needs my girlfriends. As much as I adore my husband, I cannot survive on his level of relating. Our communication styles are two very different trains. I operate like one of those high-powered trams that make the ground shake. My husband, on the other hand, is one of those early model steam engines that take considerable time to reach its destination. When I sense that a thought is coming, I know to pause and wait. The thought is making its way around the mountain. It will get here any minute now.

What my husband wants from me is less talk. Less is more, he tells me. Bullet points are always appreciated. Background info, not necessary.

So this is why I need my girlfriends. My good friends and I have no problem filling time and space. We make those chicks on The View look afraid to speak up.

The process of ending my friendship with Christa (not her real name) took years. I couldn’t seem to let go yet I had no reason to hold on. I got to a place where I lost respect for myself. I became pathetic.

We had all the things that, from 30,000 feet, seem to make for a good friendship. We made each other laugh. We were always game for fun. Had similar issues with our kids. Same age, socio-economic background, political affiliation, and a love of travel and music and food. It took me a long time to see the cracks in the foundation.

I’ve often thought there are some friends that we shouldn’t get to know better. If we stayed on the surface, it would still be fun. Once you venture into anyone’s “basement,” you will undoubtedly find something you don’t like. And they will find something rusting in yours as well.

My problem is an inability to stay on the surface. I think it’s common for women; we yearn to connect. We want to know more about each other. But the knowing more has the potential to strengthen or weaken the bond.

There was something about Christa that always made me feel less than good when I drove away from her house. She had a broad circle of friends, neighbors that communed with each other almost daily and a social life that brimmed with concerts and parties and weekends away. But it wasn’t envy that got the best of me. It was the subtle nose-rubbing on her part. She knew many of my friends lived out of the area. She knew my neighbors recognize my car more than my face. She knew my weekends revolved around my kids’ sports and an occasional date with my husband. She knew.

Her phone rang incessantly. Taking that call was always important. I spent most of our gatherings waiting for her to hang up. When the phone wasn’t ringing, we were bumping into someone she knew. Someone she had to chat with while I waited.

Why she continued to seek my companionship is still a question mark in my head. But the bigger question is: why did I go along for the ride? For more than four years, we took our kids to the playground, the beach and amusement parks. We shared birthdays and spent weekends in San Francisco and Las Vegas.

One day, we made plans to meet at her community pool. The kids and I arrived at 12:30, the agreed-upon time. They splashed in the pool, asking every few minutes where they were. I reassured them they’d be there soon. At 1:00, she called to say she’d be there in a matter of minutes. At 2:15, my kids were chlorinated prunes and wanted to go home. They were wrapped in towels as she breezed through the gate.

I’m embarrassed to say that I ran to get her a chaise lounge.

She said, “Oh, don’t bother, I have work to do.”

“Work?”

“Ya, I have wine charms to put on these glasses that I bought for a party I’m going to.”

She sat behind me at a table making the charms while chatting to a man who lived a few doors down from her. I sat there seething with anger. What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I get up and go home? Why couldn’t I confront her?

I never said a word about it. She didn’t either.

I didn’t see her for almost a year after that. She didn’t seem to notice that I had pulled away.

There we were, one summer later sitting side-by-side at the beach. Our kids played merrily in the surf. We made small talk. Suddenly, an acquaintance of hers yelled to say hello from across the sand. Christa invited her to join us. The two of them chatted the afternoon away while I stared blankly at my magazine.

That was the last time I saw her. She called two months later. I didn’t return the call. Her Christmas card said, “Let’s get together soon!” No indication that she knew anything was wrong.

The silent, unresolved ending of our friendship revealed the truth about our connection. She didn’t care either way.

So what’s the take-away? I have learned to pay attention to how I feel in a friendship – especially in the beginning when the getting out is easier. My inner voice has always been my compass. The difference is, now I’m taking direction.

Teach Your Parents Well

2009-04-15T09:46:00.000-07:00

One morning this week, Jack’s hair dried in a wind-swept fashion that gave him a real mod look. Like a stage mom, I ran to fetch the gel to enhance the style. As I was tugging on the pointed wisps that fanned out against his cheek, Jack asked, “Why are you putting gel in my hair?”

Me: Because your hair looks very cool today. You look like Zac Efron.

Jack: Everyone has that look at school.

Me: I know, and it looks really cute on you.

Jack: Ya, but I don’t want to look like everybody else. I want to look like me. Don’t you want me to look like myself?

Me: Of course I do.

I stopped the primping and felt a lump in my throat. Since he was a toddler, my husband and I have been talking the talk:

“Be true to yourself.”
“Stand up for what you believe in even if it’s not popular.”
“Be an individual.”
“Listen to your own voice.”

There I was trying to bend him into the mold. And it wasn’t the first time.

Up until this year, I picked out his clothes every morning. I thought the horror of mismatched clothes would be perceived by school personnel as neglectful parenting.

One day he said, “I don’t like the clothes you pick for me. You always try to make me look fancy.”

Me: Fancy?

Jack: Ya. I want to wear t-shirts, not polo shirts. Just plain t-shirts. Is that okay?

What was I doing? Why was I robbing him of the opportunity to be himself?

When I was growing up, I perceived the world as a tunnel of thorns. Everything was personal. I realize now, most of it wasn't.

Jack, on the other hand, has comment repellent built into his skin. One day, some boys called out to him from a tree they were climbing.

“Hey Retard!”

Jack looked up.

“Ya, you, Retard!”

Jack: Ha! That is funny! [started laughing]

Boys: We’re talking about YOU!

Jack: I know. You are really funny! [continued to laugh]

Unable to bother to him, they moved on to taunt other kids.

When I picked him up, he recounted the story. I was ready to hug him and wipe his tears. But his voice was normal -- upbeat and unshaken.

Me: Why didn’t it bother you that they said that to you?

Jack: Because that’s what they think. It’s not what I think about myself.

These are the moments when the paradigm shifts. I realize I am the student and one of my greatest teachers is sitting right next to me in the front seat.

Dead Funny

2009-04-06T11:00:00.000-07:00

My son makes me laugh every day. But he isn’t trying to be funny. If anything, he’s dead serious most of the time, which makes him even funnier.

He’s been a diabetic since he was six. One day I was getting out his insulin and syringe. I handed him an alcohol pad.

Me: Hold this and don’t put it in your mouth.

Jack: Mom, children cannot drink alcohol. It’s against the law. Unless you’re from France.

Film Strip

2009-03-02T12:41:00.000-08:00

Image by Shutter Ferret via Flickr

There are some people who should just stay the hell away from all things photographic. I am the Grand Puba of that bunch. I make my very-Martha-Stewart-mother-in-law throw her French manicured hands in the air when she sees me reach for the camera. She knows it won’t end well.

All that will be evidenced on film will be random body parts. An ear. The scalp. An elbow. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong, but it’s clearly very wrong. It’s either an aiming problem or the fact that my children never stop moving.

What child, in this day and age, does not have an entire video and photo library dedicated to them? Oh, that would be my kids.

In my endless quest to document my children’s life, I ordered a gently used, but highly touted video camera from some guy on Ebay. A week later, camcorder in hand, I read the manual diligently.

Ally, only seven at the time, was leaning on my shoulder as I tested out the buttons. I hit something and suddenly up came a series of photos.

At first, they looked like cropped pictures of a naked baby. The belly was swollen and shiny. There was no head in the frame. Then I saw something very tiny dangling. Ah, it must be a baby boy.

Then we arrived at the close-up. It was definitely a male. Definitely over 40.

Ally: What IS that, Mom? It looks like a fruit basket.

Me: Yes, it does.

Ally: Why are there pictures on the camera?

Me: Oh, I think the man who sold it to me wanted to say, “Thank you for buying my camera.”

I felt compelled to write him and express my appreciation.

Dear Naked Torso Man,

I received the camera today. Such speedy delivery. Oh, and I found the photos you sent me. While I appreciate the sentiment, I’m more accustomed to receiving a note asking for Ebay feedback. My seven-year-old daughter got an eyeful as I scrolled through the photos. Thank you for giving me a reason to prematurely discuss crazy naked people with her. No offense, but you should reconsider your modeling career. There are some things that should never be captured on film.

Sincerely,
Sickened In San Diego

Super Blah Sunday

2009-01-30T19:48:00.000-08:00

Yawn, yawn. It’s Super Bowl Sunday this weekend and even if the Chargers or the Patriots were playing, I wouldn’t be remotely interested. I’ve been on the planet long enough for my brain to have grasped the concept of football if it was willing.

It is not.

Anytime someone tries to explain it to me, it’s as if a fist comes out of my head, sort of like Rock’em Sock’em Robots, and punches the information right in the face. You’d think with all that aggression I’d find the sport entertaining. But football is a language I don’t want to speak. I tried to sit through ten minutes of a game. More like ten minutes of torture.

All I saw was a mass of little critters in matching outfits crawling all over each other chasing a pineapple with no top. I will never be able to comprehend its ability to revert grown-ups into Trunk Monkeys in a matter of minutes.

This Sunday, my husband and son will join the masses. They’ll punch their fists. They’ll call the plays. They’ll blame the coach. They’ll stomp and bolt from their seats with indignation. They’ll high five and belly bump. They’ll stand like ice sculptures, frozen in time. I could put on a gorilla suit and swing from a rope crossing their line of sight. Jack wouldn't notice. Don would grunt at me to bring over more of those Macho Nachos.

I get a kick out of Superbowl Sunday. It’s a day that I can say anything and get away with it.

Me: Don, I cashed in your 401K because I wanted some bling-bling.

Don: Okay. This guy sucks. What a moron.

Me: By the way, I sold the house for half of what it’s worth because the people were so nice.

Don: Good deal. I cannot believe he just did that. What is he in Pop Warner?

Me: I want to move to Memphis to be closer to Elvis.

Don: Right. Oh My God. Who DOES that?

Me: Wants to be near Elvis?

Don: What? No, who can’t get the field goal?

Me: An idiot?

Don: That's right.

Me: I’ve also decided I want to be a man. Can I wear your underwear?

Don: Sure. Hey, can you get me another one of those Janet Jackson Breast Cupcakes?

If I’m forced to go to a party, I will make sure to step in front of the TV and purposely linger. It’s a lot of fun pretending not to know I’m blocking their view. I love when the men get all red and feisty, waving all crazy for me to get out of the way.

I also like to cheer wildly for a team that isn’t in the Superbowl.

“Go Patriots!!! Woohoo!!! You ROCK!!!” I holler.

You’d think someone pushed their panic buttons.

They fire back, “They’re NOT even PLAYING!!!”

I retort, “I KNOW THAT. I can cheer for them if I WANT.”

Truthfully, Super Bowl Sunday is entertaining for reasons that have nothing to do with football. For most women, we’d rather be shopping or drunk. Or both.

At parties, we like to gather and cluck about our husbands. This is the one day you can drink margeritas and let it all out. In fact, you can sit on your husband’s lap with a megaphone and announce to the crowd that he still likes to be tucked in at night, yells out, “MOMMY!” in his sleep and will only eat melon if it's balled. No one in the room will hear a thing. If you can get him to look at you, he’ll nod in agreement and then bark something back at the TV.

One year I went to the mall during the game and it was like stepping onto a studio lot where they have those fake streets and façade houses. Everyone was gone. The roads were barren. I walked into the mall wondering if it was really open and then noticed I was their only customer. Everyone was so nice to me. They made me realize how special I am.

This year, I’m going to put my Super Bowl Sunday to good use. I’m going to do something adventurous and meaningful. I’m just going to close my eyes and pick a spot on a map and go there.

Okay. I’m closing my eyes. Here I go.

Oh, look at that. I landed on the Queen for A Day Spa. I’ll feel so guilty having all that pampering -- my shakras balanced, finding out who I was in a past life, a mani-pedi and a seaweed-algae-fungus-mud wrap -- while my husband and kids are home without anyone to deliver the snacks. Then again, if I just drop a plate of pork in Don’s lap it will probably be Monday before he realizes I’m gone.

Happy Grunting!

An Exercise in Parenting

2009-01-23T12:52:00.000-08:00

As my kids get older, I often forget those early toddler years when the simplest tasks were seemingly insurmountable. I could not change my clothes without an audience pointing to body parts and demanding an explanation. Attempting to speak to another adult was futile and consisted of half-finished sentences and lots of peanut butter and tears smeared on my pants. I could never make an appointment on time because invariably, someone vomited on my way out the door. Grocery shopping was more a search and rescue mission as my two Lucans-raised-by-wolves climbed out of the cart and dashed off in different directions only to empty shelves and knock over displays. Those years were so teeming with minute-by-minute obstacles, it’s a wonder my kids are alive and that I still know my name.

Now that my kids are 10 and 11, I have to remind myself of how much easier life is. Don’t get me wrong: they have moved on to new ways to torture me, some of which I have written about in this blog. But at least now I can shower, change and use the bathroom in private. Most days, I can usually have a complete thought. I can get to places on time without puke on my shoe. And we can grocery shop while having meaningful discussion about why Hot Cheetos and Double Stuffed Oreos are not part of the four food groups.

Two of my New Year’s resolutions for 2009 are: 1. getting organized and 2. putting my health back on the list. I promised my husband I’d sift through old files and actually throw something away this time.

In my sifting, I came across an email I wrote to my mother back in 2000. My kids were two and three. I saved the email to read to them one day, to instill an appropriate level of guilt for all they put me through.

Here it is:

Hi Mum,

I decided I was going to work out upstairs this morning and take the kids up there with me. I figured, with three boxes of toys, I could ensure at least 30 minutes of sweat.

Did I just infer "time to myself"? Somebody slap me.

I gated the top of the stairs and got them situated: Ally on Legos, Jack on trains. Hopping onto the Stairmaster, I admired my brilliance. Why hadn’t I tried this before? Look at them, lost in their wonderland of imaginative play.

Into my second minute, all toys were abandoned. The kids were orbiting me. Ally had her arms out and was whining like a broken appliance. Jack had joined me on the steps of the Stairmaster and was holding onto the back of my shorts (underwear included) and pulling them down giving me a classy, refrigerator repairman look. Ally grabbed one of Don’s barbells. Before I could reach her, she dropped it on her foot causing her to emit a screech not unlike a fire alarm. I’m pretty sure I need new tubes in my ears.

After much hugging and redirection, the kids were engrossed in new toys and seemingly reaching a state of nirvana. I tiptoed back to the Stairmaster and resumed minute three. I lost myself in my book and one page later I was jolted by the sound of broken glass.

Jack was perched at the gate with his arms up in a SCORE!-like position. He had discovered the meaning of cause and effect. A proud smile took over his face. He looked at me to share the moment. Gulping fear, I inched my way over to the stairs. I looked down. Littered at the bottom was a vast array of hurled objects -- toys, books, pillows, sippy cups, toilet paper, my Thighmaster and a broken vase.

Witnessing my horror, Jack unleashed a machine-gun ripple of a laugh. Ally took a peek and joined him. This was toddler humor. I wasn’t feeling it.

I figured I burned a few hundred calories between the stress and cleaning up the shards of glass. I decided it was time for Plan B: the tent. If there’s one thing I know about kids, it’s that they all love to hide under things. It’s universal. I tied my best sheets together and erected a tent that Jeff Probst would have marveled over.

Back on the Stairmaster and into minute 7 of my workout, I heard nothing but silence. It was an unfamiliar, out-of-body experience. Two minutes later, I was on the verge of breaking a sweat and was thinking this tent thing was the key to my new buff self.

Suddenly, I heard a muffled scream. I dropped my book and ran. Jack had taken the tent and rolled Ally into a burrito. She was about to be mummified and was hollering beneath the layers of sheets. I started to panic as I unraveled her. She was crying and red and panting.

I decided I had to separate them. I put Ally in the bedroom with a stack of my In Style magazines, thinking to myself, “Read this and grow up already.” I brought Jack with me and tossed him some Consumer Reports hoping he’d be able to figure out which Belgian waffle maker was best. They seemed enthralled by their new reading material and I attempted to finish another minute of exercise.

Somewhere in that time frame, Jack had slithered away into the bedroom with Ally. I was too busy basking in the silence to notice. Rounding my 10th minute of stair climbing, I heard the terrifying sound of giggling.

Oh no.

Every mother knows that giggling means we-are-destroying-something-and-loving-every-minute-of-it. I rushed to the bedroom and upon opening the door, I saw a large green fitted sheet on the bed under which two heads were bobbing up and down. As I lifted up the edge, out popped two guilty faces covered in crumbs. All over the bed were mashed up animal crackers. They grinned at me with the we-weren’t-jumping-on-the-bed look.

After cleaning them up and vacuuming the bed, I decided that I don’t need a Stairmaster because my kids are the greatest workout of all. Exhausted, I grabbed my two little monkeys and we fell asleep on the couch.

Love,
Lisa

Shear Madness

2009-01-13T16:06:00.000-08:00

Let me preface this by saying that my son is in middle school. Those of you who’ve experienced this age in your children know that I’m witnessing an entirely new breed of defiance that I like to call "The Stone Age." They are no longer Play-Dough or putty in your hands. They are stone. Impervious to the sound of your voice.

Yesterday was another example of how Jack puts his own personal stamp on the ordinary.

Out of character, he called me from school.

Jack: Mom, why don’t you take me for a haircut this afternoon?

Me: [heart racing] Wow! That would be GREAT!

I speed-dialed my husband to share the news. The day we’ve been wishing, hoping and praying for was here. After 11 years, Jack was ready for a haircut.

Near the end of every month, he resembles Cousin It from the Addams Family. He is a boy with no eyes. Just a mop with a nose and mouth. Only seeing half of what's in front of him has always been enough.

The gymnastics required to get him into the hairdresser’s chair have been exhausting. I’ve tried reasoning, arguing, denying worldly goods and bribing (I’m not above that). It now comes down to extortion. He’s 11 and he gets it. Money is all that moves the mountain that he has become.

So to hear, “Why don’t you take me for a haircut this afternoon” was more honey than this bee could handle. I was verklempt. I dabbed my eyes with my hankie.

There we were in the waiting room. I was, for the first time, serene. After all, he chose to be there. I was even brazen enough to thumb through a People magazine. And then, like a scratched record, the music came to a screeching halt.

The stylist called, “Jack?”

I glanced over at him. He had his eyes closed and was slouched as far down in the chair as physically possible. His mouth was formed in a faint U-shape. I knew that shape. The prankster was in residence.

A large black woman named Larentha was waiting. Hand on her hip, eyebrows up, she repeated, “Jack?”

No answer from the subject. Not budging.

I leaned over and sweetly whispered to him that if he didn’t get his hinie off the chair and walk in her direction, that I would be throwing a mattress on the floor of the backyard shed and calling it his new home.

He sat there motionless, playing possum.

This is where martial law came in. I dragged him by the arm to the chair. He belted out, "YOU'RE HURTING ME!!!" The entire salon gave me the stink-eye like I was Hedda Nussbaum.

Upon arrival in the chair, he must have mistaken it for the Teacups at Knott's Berry Farm. He began spinning wildly while shaking his head like the rockers in Whitesnake. Larentha sighed, eyes rolling, in no mood. I could tell the wagging finger was coming any minute.

I reminded him that this was HIS idea to get a haircut and that if he didn't sit still I'd make him late for school the next day (late he will not be) and SpongeBob would be history and so would dessert and friends and TV and Wii and the light of day and he could eat plain bread and water like a prisoner in his new room, the shed.

Didn't care. Continued to spin.

Flushed with embarrassment, I explained that Jack is a diabetic and that this must be a result of a high or low blood sugar. I whipped out the test kit and attempted to grab his hand. I spent the next few minutes chasing his hand while he moved it up, down and all around, much like Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. I finally poked him and he wiggled his fingers rapidly so that I could not get the blood on the test strip. I finally got him in a half Nelson and found out his blood sugar was just fine. He was like my old dog Oliver when he didn’t want to go for a walk in the snow. He’d implant his hind legs in the ground. It wasn’t happening.

Everyone's eyes were fixed on us. I was sweating and I thought I was going to have an aneurysm.

Larentha told Jack to come with her to get his hair washed. He hollered, "WHY DO I HAVE TO GET MY HAIR WASHED??? I ALREADY WASHED IT TODAY!"

Oh no he di-int.

She gave me the one eyebrow. I was getting the hell out of there. She looked like she was about to punch him and then me.

Half hour later he emerged looking like a cross between Moe from the Three Stooges and Jim Carey in "Dumb & Dumber." No doubt it was payback. I told Larentha he looked fabulous, tipped her well and darted for the door.

Back home, I spent a half hour re-cutting the bowl, hoping to bring it into the 1980s. There's no way it will resemble anything from this century.

Jack looked at himself in the mirror and tried not to cry. I told him that's what you get when you piss off a hairdresser. I think he might just cooperate next time.

A Very Merry Christmas Photo

2008-12-24T10:12:00.000-08:00

Kids are strange. With every one, there is something that seems relatively simple that they WILL NOT do. In our house, it’s sit for a photo. You would think smiling for the camera would be painless, but it has morphed into a mountain I’m not sure I want to climb again after this Christmas.

My son hates the camera like most people hate my cooking, Barney, the hideous purple dinosaur, and fruitcake. He’d opt for all of those before he’d sit for a photo.

After last year’s ambush-and-chase photo session, this Christmas I pulled out my entire bag of tricks. First, I approached the subject gently with guilt.

Me: Hey Jack, you know how I promised you I wouldn’t cook on your birthday?

Jack: Ya.

Me: And you remember how I changed your sheets this month?

Jack: Uh-huh.

Me: Oh and remember how I didn’t ground you for a year when you picked up the other end of phone while I was interviewing someone and said, “Howdy, partner! This is Jack. Did you know my mother is wearing pajamas? Oh yes she is, the same ones from yesterday, people.”

Jack: Oh ya, that was soooo funny.

Me: Not really. And how about the fact that you got extra tofu last night? Doesn’t that count for something?

Jack: Why are you asking me all these questions?

Me: Well, how about you let me take the Christmas photo, as a way to thank me?

Jack: NO. I hate pictures.

Me: Come on, I’ll make it fun. I’ll tell you funny stories while we do it.

Jack: I’ve heard all your funny stories. STILL NO.

Me: I’ll do the pig face and make you laugh.

Jack: I’ve seen it. I’m 11. And STILL NO.

Me: Do you know how many relatives we have that are 3,000 miles away and never get to see you from year to year?

Jack: You can tell them all about me.

Me: What if there was money involved?

Jack: NO.

Me: Cold hard cash?

Jack: NO.

Me: Really? You don’t want money?

Jack: What are we talking about?

Me: (low-balling) Two bucks.

Jack: No deal.

Me: All right, three.

Jack: Higher.

Me: Four.

Jack: Higher.

Me: Five. Final offer.

Jack: Deal.

Wow, that was nothing. Fast forward through all the primping and staging, and my two, well-coiffed children are perched like China dolls in front of the Christmas tree.

Look at them. They’re smiling at each other. This will be cake.

Me: Okay, smile!

Click. Flash. Ally is looking at Jack. Jack is looking down.

Me: Let’s try that again.

Click. Flash. Ally’s smiling like a wax statue. Jack’s eyes are darting to the right in a scary, Chucky kind of way.

Me: This is not Halloween, people! Now look AT the camera. Not AWAY. Ready?

Click. Flash. The kids look at each other and giggle.

Click. Flash. Total mutiny. Jack tips his head back while Ally gives me an Elvis lipcurl.

Me: Okay! Apparently you want this to take all night! This could be over with and you could be off having fun. Look at the camera and just smile.

Click. Flash. Ally smiles sweetly while Jack puts his hand over his eyes.

Me: Jack! What are you doing?

Jack: I don’t like the flash.

Me: Well you need to like it for just one good photo and then it’s over. If you would just cooperate and EARN the five dollars I promised you, you wouldn’t have to look at the stupid flash anymore.

Ally: He gets FIVE dollars? What about me?

Me: You love the camera. If I start paying you to pose, I’ll go broke by this weekend. Now both of you, sit up straight and look happy.

Click. Flash. Ally’s brows are furrowed. Arms are folded. Jack is doing his ultra geek impression with the corners of his mouth turned in.

Me: Why can't you both just LOOK NORMAL?

Jack: What's NORMAL?

Click. Flash. Ally is sitting on Jack’s back cracking the imaginary rein and saying, “Ride’em cowboy!”

Me: LISTEN, YOU TWO. I GAVE UP MY CAREER TO STAY HOME AND MAKE SURE THAT EVERY NEED YOU HAVE GETS FILLED AND THIS IS WHAT I GET? I COULD SPEND THE DAY WITH ADULTS HAVING ADULT CONVERSATIONS AND WEARING COOL OUTFITS BUT NO. I'M HERE IN SWEAT PANTS WITH STAINS ON THEM FOR YOU. NOW SIT DOWN AND LOOK HAPPY!!!

Click. Flash. Ally is smiling with pain in her eyes. Jack is not in the frame.

Me: JACK, I CANNOT TAKE A PICTURE OF YOU WHEN YOU ARE BEHIND THE CHRISTMAS TREE.

Jack: Are we done yet? This is boring.

Ally: Ya, this is boring.

Me: Look at your mother! I AM NOW CRYING. Are you happy? These are real tears. Does this amuse you?

Ally: Nice going, Jack. You made her cry.

Jack: How did I do that?

Me: That’s it. You either smile or I’m leaving.

Ally: NO, MOM!

Jack: Where are you going? Can I come? Hey, can we get an ice cream?

Me: NO YOU CANNOT COME WITH ME. I HAVE HAD IT. [grabbing my bag and keys] I ASKED YOU TO DO A SIMPLE FAVOR FOR ME AND YOU CANNOT DO THAT FOR ME? YOU CANNOT SMILE? HOW HARD IS IT TO SMILE? DOES IT HURT YOU? DO YOU THINK THE CAMERA IS A GUN? WHAT ARE YOU AFRAID OF? WHY CAN’T YOU JUST SIT THERE AND ACT HAPPY?

Jack: Stop yelling, Mom! It’s just a stupid photo.

Me: Then if it’s just a stupid photo, then let’s just DO IT ALREADY!

Jack: Okay. Geez. I can’t believe how important this is to you. You love the photo more than us.

Me: You’re right. I want to marry the photo. Now look at me. You don’t even have to smile. No, not you, Ally. You need to smile. But Jack does not need to smile.

Jack: Why does she need to smile but not me?

Me: Because you have proven that you CANNOT or WILL NOT smile! I am letting you off the hook!

Jack: What hook?

Me: It’s just an expression. Now, please, just look up at the camera the way you look at me normally.

Jack: Mom, I have no idea how I look at you. For your information, I can’t see myself.

Me: For your information, all I’m saying is just look at the camera and DON’T smile.

Click. Flash. Jack is talking to Ally. His head is turned and his mouth is open.

Me: ONE MORE TIME. LET’S DO THIS BEFORE JANUARY.

Click. Flash. Ally is picture perfect. Jack is now looking at the camera [good!] with his mouth open [not good!].

Me: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, just do it for Nana. Do it for all the relatives who live so far away and miss you so much.

Jack: Mom, you are NOT sending this out to anyone but Nana and Grandma. That’s it.

Me: Rrrrright. Now here we go one last time.

Click. Flash.

Now that was easy.

‘Tis the Season to Prioritize

2008-11-16T10:43:00.000-08:00

Fire season is upon us once again in Southern California. While Montecito and Yorba Linda go up in flames, San Diegans brace for another one. Years of little rain make the land brittle and ripe. A casual cigarette tossed from a window is all it takes for the Santa Ana winds to have their way with us.

If you haven’t lived through the massive blaze and ensuing evacuation of entire cities, it is surreal from your TV set. There is no way to fully grasp the fear it instills in you.

On the ground, nothing is certain. Streets and freeways are blocked off leaving many desperately searching for a way out. The fire weaves an unpredictable path through neighborhoods leaving some houses unscathed, others leveled.

The aftermath is like something from an Armageddon movie. For days, you’re lost in a dry gray fog. Ash rains down and masks are worn for safety. Schools and businesses close. The mail goes undelivered. Bustling cities become barren ghost towns. Some families come home to celebrate their good fortune alongside families in ruins.

Our first experience with fire was five years ago. We awoke at 2:30 a.m. to pounding on our front door. It was our neighbor warning us that we had only seconds to get out. Fire trucks were racing by. Out our front window, the blaze engulfing 11 homes on the next street was four stories high and edging closer.

I shook my kids awake along with their two friends who were sleeping over, or so they thought. There was no preparation for this. There was no time to grab clothes or items of sentimental value or even food.

I reached for the one necessity: my son’s insulin kit. We piled into the two cars and suddenly it hit me. I had forgotten something very important.

“Hold on!” I yelled to my husband.

“We need to GO!” he yelled back, the car running.

I dashed in and put on my bra like a good Bostonian girl. The thought of bouncing around at time like this was unimaginable.

“What were you DOING in there?” he shouted as I came back with nothing in hand.

“I needed to get a BRA on!” I called to him.

“WHY!!!???” he cried.

“High beams!” I replied.

We all have our priorities in life. The next fire (in 2007), I was prepared. Bags were packed (fully stocked with Maidenform, I might add) as we saw the red line spreading across the mountain’s edge, knowing the fire was headed our way. Videos were taken for insurance purposes. Photos and family movies were in the trunk along with teddy bears and laptops and tax records.

Each time, we drove away taking one final look at our home knowing it might be the last time we saw it. What hits you in moments like this is an odd perception of two opposing ideas: the possibility of devastating loss and ultimate freedom.

The thought that you could lose your home and every detail of your life in a matter of minutes summons up the sadness associated with a death contrasted by a strange sense of freedom. To be unencumbered, almost “cleansed” of all the trappings of your life, is a feeling of rebirth. You take notice of all that you hold dear: your family, your friends, your life. Everything else is replaceable.

Well, except for a good bra.

A Simple Plan

2008-11-02T18:32:00.000-08:00

My husband is an excellent sleeper. I, on the other hand, have sleep envy. Don wouldn’t wake up if you stuck an apple in his mouth and put him on a spit over a roaring fire.

You could fold him into a Fed-Ex box and ship him to South America. He’d wake up two days later, unpack himself, grab a burrito and look around for a good place to take a nap.

He has only seen the first ten minutes of most of the movies that have been made in the last decade. Unless, of course, the movie was about things blowing up or hot chicks. But that’s a subject for another day.

My sleeping patterns have deteriorated since I had kids. I think I hear them yelling my name when they’re fast asleep. All night long, I hear every coyote wail and dog yip within a five mile radius. As the icemaker clunks in the kitchen and my coffee maker spits out water randomly, a jolt of fear courses through me. I’m suddenly convinced we need to do an exorcism on the house.

So I sat down one day and devised a simple plan to tackle my sleep issues once and for all.

Step 1: Buy a sound machine.

I bought one with 25 different sounds to block out the 25 different sounds I am subjected to all night long. No doubt, some of them could put you in a mental institution. Here are just a few that made me want to suck up someone with my vacuum cleaner:

* Rainforest. It’s for those of you who love the mellow repetitive sounds of crickets bleeping and frogs croaking “ribbit” all night long. Just kill me now.

* City. I’m sure there’s a huge demographic of mutants who can’t doze off to anything but the sweet sounds of honking horns, screeching brakes and people getting arrested. If that's you, lose my number.

* Ocean Waves. Not quite the beach I remember. It sounds more like my drunk neighbor crashing through the glass door thinking he’s at his house.

* Tugboats. Are you friggin kidding me? Can’t you just picture the dork session for this one?

Verle: Hey Norbert, we need one more sound for the machine.

Norbert: Ya, Verle. I’ve been mulling it over. When I was a kid my granny used to rock me to sleep to the sound of my grandaddy’s chain saw. I get all choked up now when I hear one.

Verle: You might be onto something. But for me to really cut some Z’s, I need me some tugboat. There’s nothing like a 10-ton vessel giving off a sonic boom to give me that float-away feeling.

Norbert (having a total geekasm): Now that is genius! This thing is going to FLY off the shelves.

Conclusion: I’m sticking to Rain, volume 7. No deviation.

Step 2: Legs can’t touch.

Long pants are a necessity, preferably cotton due to San Diego’s temperate climate. Flannel and velour are on hand in the event of a sudden glacier.

Between the legs (as the second line of defense) is a strap-on pillow (yes, it’s velcroed to my leg to ensure that the knees never knock. Ever. It’s a bit unwieldy when rolling from side to side – making sure it stays in place and that the pants don’t bunch. But well worth the effort. My husband says my flipping ordeal pulls the covers off him. I told him, “Oh, it’s all about you, you, you.”

Step 3: Arms must be at least slightly covered.

Never a tank or a spaghetti strap (I’m from Boston. Only “those girls” wear tank tops. I think you know who you are). Short sleeve t-shirt in the summer, preferably a men’s XXXLLL, mid-sleeve T in the fall (same size) and a zip-up fleece parka in the winter. I usually go for fuchsia because I’m always bringing the sexy back.

Step 4: Eye Mask.

Lately I’m blinded by darkness. I cannot sleep without a mask. And not just any mask. It has to be made of satin or cotton so that it will stay cool. And they must have the little pads right under your eyes to prevent any extra darkness from seeping in. If, God forbid, my mask finds its way to an unknown location, it’s all-night infomercial bonanza for me. By morning, I’ve bought myself a Ped Egg, a Bedazzler, Dr. Ho’s Muscle Massager, the Ab Rocker, the Steam Buggy, some Mighty Putty and the Rejuvenique Electrified Hockey Mask Facial Toner.

Step 5: Essential Oils.

Due to unusually small nostrils, I require eucalyptus and peppermint essential oils to be placed two dabs per nostril and two on my neck and chest for proper breathing technique.

Step 6: Mouth Guard.

And as mentioned in one of my earlier posts, I am a biter. I clench my teeth and chomp all night sort of the way my German shepherd use to bite the air when she saw a fly. I finally bought myself one of those fabulous mouth guards. It works great but unfortunately, turns all my “s” words into “sh” words.

My husband tried to tickle me one night and I said, “Shop that!”

He said, “What do you mean, shop?”

I said, “Go to shleep.”

He said, “You go to shleep.”

Step 7: Roll pillow.

After purchasing 17 dud pillows that either put me in a neck brace or gave me nightmares, I have discovered the bomb of the pillow community: Latex, people. And we’re not talking the NASA hard-as-my-banana-bread memory loaf. This is soft! This is bouncy! It’s mini trampoline for your head! I roll it at one end and put the roll at the back of my neck.

Step 8: Knees Up.

I begin with ten minutes on my back with my knees up. I’ve been doing this since high school, right around the time when I allowed portly cheerleaders to use my back as a launch pad. Hey, so what if I have permanent nerve damage, the important thing is we had so much spirit!

Step 9: Hands on hip bones.

For most of my life I’ve slept with my hands folded on my stomach. My mother used to say, “You look like a corpse in a casket when you sleep. It’s so cute!”

Nowadays the weight of my folded hands feels like a piano crushing my ribs. Therefore, I strategically place each hand on my hip bones to prevent the crushing.

Step 10: Declare a No Spoon Zone.

My husband knows not to ever venture past the midline of the bed to spoon at any time. That’s the law. I told him it’s not that I don’t feel real love for him on some occasions but that the intense heat from his body scorches my back and the weight of his arm shuts off my central nervous system.

When my simple plan is in place, I toss to the right, yank the covers off my husband and drift off to a warm and woozy place.

Now that was easy.

Lunatic Cringe

2008-10-07T11:22:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Why is it that when we’re doing something stupid, we have no sense of the stupidity? We have a blind certainty that whatever it is we’re doing, it’s good for us. We all have those cringe memories that make us want to erase, erase, erase. I probably have more than most people.

My mother said I’ve always been a little odd. As a child, I was like a time-share salesman in the pursuit of my latest ideas. At five, I left home to sell pies door-to-door, which involved crossing a freeway-like main street and masquerading as a “Girl Scout.” Problem was I had no pies. They were “future” pies -- pies for which you paid now and received “at a later date.” Somewhere I missed the part about Girl Scout “cookies” and was convinced they said pies. I came home proud of my pockets full of change to parents red-faced with worry.

In second grade, we were studying the southern states. I thought – hey! My cousin, Dawn-Adele, lives in Mississippi. Why not get “dismissed” from class and come back as my cousin Dawn-Adele? The teacher and the school secretary went along with the scam. At the office I changed into a short, dark wig, put on a different polyester pantsuit and went back to the class with a southern accent and a speech about my new “home state.” If the kids had tomatoes, I would have been standing there like Carrie covered in red. They teased me incessantly for years to come.

Every summer, my friend next door, Leslie, and I sat outside our neighbor’s chain link fence gazing in at them as they swam in their pool. I would shout to Leslie, “BOY AM I HOT!” Leslie would yell back, “I AM, TOO. I’M SWEATING.” Unable to enjoy their pool in private, Mrs. Boutelier would buckle, “Go get your swimsuits on and come swimming.”

I’d jump up and feign surprise, “Oh, look, I have my bathing suit on under my clothes!”

As if I didn’t torture them enough every summer, when I was in junior high, I begged my mother to ask Mrs. Boutelier if I could hold a boy/girl party in her basement. I liked the Boutelier’s basement better than ours, so to me, it was a natural question to ask. Theirs was “finished” whereas ours had cement walls and floors. Mrs. Boutelier went along with the plan and 20 some-odd 12 year-olds piled into her basement and played their first game of spin-the-bottle.

In high school I worked as the counter girl at the local dry cleaners. I marveled over the cashmere sweaters and puffy-sleeved blouses that came back as perfect as the day they were bought. Clothes were my drug of choice and I couldn’t be trusted around them. One night, giving into the addiction, I took a freshly-cleaned antique sweater off the rack and wore it to my friend’s party. It was a huge hit and I basked in the flurry of compliments. I’m pretty sure there was a mishap with some onion dip that night, but it wasn’t my fault. Because I had morals, I returned it to the cleaner’s around 1 a.m. and neatly hung it back on the rack for next-day pick-up.

I spent my four years of high school devoted to cheerleading. It was my religion. It never occurred to me that the prancing around, ponytail swinging, boobs jiggling, memorizing rhyming lines and robotic movements with stiff arms might make me look ridiculous. I let people climb on me and put dents in my neck. I behaved like a pogo stick every time some boy got a good pass. It didn’t hit me until college that cheerleading wasn’t quite the right ladder to the strong woman I wanted to be.

In college, I went with my boyfriend to a formal dinner-dance. I showed up at his parents’ house wearing a strapless satin dress so shiny it made you squint, earrings the size of a donut and hair in a mullet with electrified spikes shooting out the top of my head. Around my neck hung fifteen necklaces that made me look like a cross between a Christmas tree and Mrs. T. My entire body was so tan I could have made a belt. Sad part was, I thought I looked hot. I was sure of it. Even when my boyfriend’s mother gave me the what-the-hell-is-that look, I was certain she had social anxiety and trouble expressing joy.

In my roaring 20’s, my friend Leora and I turned crank phone calling into a sport. We routinely called our old boyfriends at 3 a.m. I would begin with a Lily-Tomlin-one-ringy-dingy voice: “Hello [old boyfriend’s name], this is Mrs. Trowbridge from the Thayer Public Library. I’m sorry to bother you at such a late hour but see, we’re doing inventory and apparently you have an overdue book. It’s called, ‘The Birds and The Bees by Dr. Ruth.’ Do you have the book?” They figured out it was me in very little time, so I had no choice but to ask the $10,000 question: “Are you still thinking about me?” I was surprised to hear that they weren’t. Not that I believed that.

When I turned 31, I went to London for 10 days to interview at three ad agencies. I was determined to live there. I had never traveled alone, and certainly never shut my mouth for that long. It was a daunting feat – more the shutting up part than the actual travel. I spent every day walking the city, alive with wonder. My stupidity kicked in around the ninth day. Coming out of a movie in Piccadilly Circus, a man with a Middle Eastern accent approached me.

“Excuse me, but are you Australian?” he asked.

“No, I’m American. But my mother was born in Australia,” I said. Suddenly, “Ali” and I were walking and talking. After nine days of virtual silence, I was wild for conversation.

It was dinner time. He asked me to join him at a Spanish restaurant. Before I thought it through, I was drinking Sangria and answering a barrage of questions. He took pictures of me and asked the waiter to take one of the two of us. Flattery and sweet wine canceled my judgment. We moved to hear Flamenco guitarists in another room. People were dancing. Another man asked me to dance and as I accepted, I felt a hard tug on my arm.

“SIT down,” Ali demanded.

“No!” I said.

He grabbed me again and tried to pull me to the door. I yanked my arm away and ran to the restroom. A group of young Spanish women were applying lipstick. I asked for their help and they ushered me out of the restaurant in a large pack.

Now in my 40’s, I try to play it safe. Having kids makes most people’s winding path a little straighter. It certainly did mine. Someday I will tell my kids about the mistakes I made along the way. In the meantime, I will try to step back, as my mother did, as they make their own. I do believe that our lunatic cringe moments are there to teach us something our elders have been trying to impress upon us since we could walk: to think before we act. What a concept.

Biter On First

2008-10-03T14:24:00.000-07:00

We've all had moments when we could swear someone said something exactly the way we thought we heard it. Turns out, that's not what they said at all. I had a moment like that recently.

I went to get my teeth cleaned at a new dentist office. The hygienist was looking over my personal information and chart.

Her: So you live in the country?

Me: Yes.

Her: It’s nice there. I love the pumpkin patch.

Me: Oh, ya. I love that. (Can’t tear me away from the pumpkin patch!)

She pauses…scanning my chart.

Her: Hmm…I see here that you’re a biter?

Me: Yes.

(I clench my teeth every night.)

Her: That’s greeeaaaat.

Me: (Whaaaat?) Not really.

Her: Why -- you don’t like it?

Me: No. (And why would I like it?) It gives me headaches. I think I do it because I'm stressed.

Her: You do it from home?

Me: When I’m asleep mostly. Sometimes when I’m awake and don’t realize I’m doing it.

Her: In your sleep? How do you do that?

Me: I just bite down like this.

(I demonstrate the nightly bite)

Her: You do that when you’re writing?

Me: What? You asked me if I was a biter.

Her: No, I said, "writer."

Deep Thoughts...

2008-09-29T12:48:00.000-07:00

Son Jack: “What are those blue things in your ears, Dad?”

Husband Don: “Those are earplugs.”

Jack: “Why do you need those?”

Don: “To stay married.”

"Mom, what is the circumference of an elephant?" -- Jack, age 11

“Mom, Dad was buzzing his hair tonight and his hair was just getting shorter and shorter. I started yelling at him to stop but he wouldn’t. He doesn’t really look good in a bald hairdo. But don’t tell him I said that.”

-- Jack , 9/08

Hell is for Massages

2008-09-24T20:34:00.001-07:00

When I was 14, I got my first job as a waitress for a catering company. Hoisting fully-stacked trays of wedding dishes every weekend took its toll on my young frame. I spent years doing yoga, magnetic therapy and chiropractic.

In my 30’s, my back took further hits as a new mother of two very sweet and well behaved children I like to call “The Bull” and “The Wild Boar.” The level of noise they create rivals the entire Animal Planet network, even "Living with the Wolfman" and "Jessica The Hippo." Needless to say, I was really looking forward to escaping it all with massage.

In reflection, that first massage now qualifies as a sweaty flashback. Very much in charge was Halfrida, a beefy German woman who seemed to have an abundance of pent-up rage. She kept smacking her fist into her other hand before we got started, explaining that the only kind of massage she does is “deep tissue.” She emphasized the word “deep” with an intensity I’ve never experienced in the healing arts.

Ten minutes in and the “deep tissue” was more like a “removal of tissue.”

Lodging her knuckles into my neck, she mumbled, “Hmmm.”

Then she stopped.

I waited.

“Haff you been tested for da AIDS virus?”

“Yes, of course.” I hissed, her neck clamp cutting off my vocal cords.

“Well, your lymph nodes ahh inflamed. I’d get anudda test if I were you.”

I spent the rest of the massage planning my funeral and thinking it might be hastened by the flattening effect of the massage.

Several AIDS tests later and sporting a clean bill of health, I opted for “Earlene” at the chiropractor’s office. Earlene didn’t sound like a German name, and that alone made me feel safe. I was relieved to see her emaciated body in the doorway.

It wasn’t long into the kneading and compression when my feel-good moment was eclipsed by:

“I’m, like, getting married in a few weeks,” she reported.

“Congratulations.”
[Oh no. She’s talking. This was not in the brochure.]

“Ya, like, we met at this camp that my parents sent me to, you know, like,
for teens who don’t listen? Ya, it was, like, so military. So I saw this guy there, like, washing dishes in the cafeteria. So we, like, chatted and he was all, “Hey can I see your scar?”

[Who doesn’t love a good scar story?]

“So, like, he’s all, ‘What happened?’ and so I told him about the accident and how I was, like, driving my Grandma’s Buick and, like, texting, because I don’t like to keep people hanging. That’s not, like, who I am.

[Of course not. You were raised right.]

“So, like, I don’t remember seeing a construction sign and so, like, I drove off this, like, cliff-thing and landed in, like, a lake. That’s how I, like, cut my chin and got stitches. And you know what he said?”

“What?”
[Waiting for the gem.]

“He was all, ‘Hey, no judgment. It’s all good.’ And that was, like, the beginning of our romance.”

“Wow.”
[What’s not to love about a man who wants to know more about your chin?]

“And you know, he has, like, really big goals, you know what I mean? Like, he loves parrots and hopes to get a job, like, in a parrot store.”

“Mm-hmm.”
[Men and parrots? I’m there.]

“So, like, we’re planning our big day. And there are, like, boocoo decisions to make.”

“Mm-hmm.”
[The French would kill her for me.]

“You know, like flowers and booze and, like, should I smash the cake in his face or not. And since my grandmother’s Buick is in the lake, we can’t borrow that to take us, like, from the chapel to the reception. So we’re thinking of, like, riding our horses there. Then we thought, like, maybe all the guests could, like, come to the wedding on horses. Like a stampede, you know?”

“Mmm.”
[This is why deaf people look happy.]

Suddenly, she paused.

I felt my body decomposing.

She was gulping, refueling.

“But, like, I’m stumped on the food.”

[Just take me, Jesus. I’m ready to come home.]

“My dad wants us to have, like, red mullet or beef cheeks. Like, he loves that crap.”

The buzzer rang.

[I’ve come to the conclusion that Earlene could be used in law enforcement as a crime deterrent.]

“Sit up but, like, go slowly. You need to, like, wake up before you drive home.”

Wake up? Did she say, “wake up?”

Oh, I was awake all right. I was so awake I bit a hole in my lip and was about to call an attorney.

Years later, I flirted with the idea of massage again. Time has a sneaky way of making you forget mental torture. I told myself there would never be another Halfrida or Earlene. With that assumption, I made my appointment.

In walked Rodge with an eager smile and a bouncy gait. No men, I had said emphatically. This instantly evoked a host of neuroses I didn’t even know I had.

It was too late. I was naked under a sheet and Rodge was ready.

“So, have you had a massage before?”

“No.”

[I had a plan.]

“Do you live nearby?”

“No.”

“So…do you have kids?”

“No.”

“What kind of massage do you want? Do you like deep tissue?”

“No.” (Halfrida flashback comes forth with a vengeance.)

“A lighter touch?”

“No.”

“Are you warm enough?

“No.”

“Do you want me to turn up the heat?”

“No.”

Silence.

I drift.

Soft music.

I float.

My plan is a success!

No is the ticket!

I’m hearing the wind chimes.

I’m feeling the gentle breeze.

The record scratches.

“So…did you go to Comic Con this year?”

“No.”

“Oh, you missed a good one.”

[I can only imagine the thrill of grown men in Vulcan costumes]

“Mmm.”

“I go in character every year. There’s no other way to do it.”

[Yes, there is. You could stay home with people who are not insane.]

“Ya, last year I was a Cling-on. The year before I was Rebi, a former Borg drone. Then I was Worf another year.”

[Perhaps I’ll go next year as the homicidal massage therapy patient.]

“Okay…so I like to think of massage as a vehicle that will transport you out of your body.”

[I’d like to think of it that way, too. First you would need to shut your pie-hole.]

“So let’s count backwards. Ten, nine, eight…”

[This man does not know where Captain Kirk ends and he begins.]

“Now picture yourself blasting off. Seven, six, five, four…”

I spent the entire massage wanting to blast off out the door.

Three massages, three strikes. I bought myself one of those home massage chairs.

Best part about it: it doesn’t beat me into a pizza and it shuts the hell up.