Confusion Falls

Poor old Aunt Pillowhead. She gets all funky around Christmastime.

Why?
Well, first of all, Perfect Man is Jewish and she's agnostic. That makes the act of buying and decorating a Christmas tree seem almost as odd as the singing of Christmas carols. Instead of "Angels We Have Heard On High," and "Little Town Of Bethlehem," I've been walking around singing "What's It All About, Alfie?" and "Things I Don't Understand." When you research the symbols and traditions of Christmas, you find it was originally a pagan holiday that the Christians co-opted to get people in line with their beliefs, which further complicates the chowder that is my thinking these days.

Secondly, since my kids only come to visit us every other Christmas, alternating with their dad, and Perfect Man's kids always celebrate Christmas with their mom and Hannukah with us, we don't even celebrate the holiday on the off years. But I still want to get gifts for the people I love and still like the idea of recognizing a season of love and peace and joy--I don't want to be a Scrooge--so I'm still half-plugged in. I'm not sure what the answer to all of this is but I don't think it's Festivus.

Lastly, it's just a nostalgic time. This time of year, it's impossible to not reflect on Christmasses past, my adult children who were once little fat bundles of unabridged and unchecked Christmas Everything: Wonder, Greed, Delight & Magic, who once decorated the tree, sang songs, watched the sky on Christmas Eve looking for Rudoph's nose, and woke me up at 5:00 on Christmas day, wearing footed pajamas and expressions of hysterical anticipation. Or even further back, when I was the child waking up at 5:00, and the feeling I had when looking at the blinking, candy cane-laden tree in the predawn light, the piles of presents that promised a new, perfect life, the guaranteed hours of happiness and goodwill that lay ahead. And that sharp, sweet smell of fresh pine needles. I love that smell.

But should I complain?* Of course not. I am married to a man I adore, who adores me back. My children are grown and healthy and happy. Instead of the tree and the presents and the carols, on Christmas morning we will be skiing in fresh beautiful snow at a gorgeous ski resort with all the other Jews, Buddhists, and agnostics who ski, where we will have spent the three previous days and nights. I am lucky. I am blessed, and I know this.

But I am still confused, and still nostalgic, and, if not exactly sad, still a little wistful. So, Season's Greetings from your befuddled, muddled old friend. And Happy New Year, too.

______

*One easy way to talk Jewish is to take a statement and put it into question form.

Examples:

1. "That is not a nice thing to do." becomes "Is that a nice thing to do?"
2. "He is not such a bright person." becomes "Is he such a bright person?"
3. "This holiday does not make sense to me" becomes "This is a holiday that is supposed to make sense to me?"

What I Love About Children

Last weekend, I took my Little Sister (I'm what they call a "Big" for Big Brothers Big Sisters) to a horse show. It was really fun and different, not something I would have ever chosen to do on my own.


And my Little loved it, just loved it.

But that's not what this post is about. This post is about something I overheard at the show that makes me laugh every time I remember it.

Behind us was a rather harried, very well-intentioned mom with several young kids in tow, including a little boy who was about four. The snippets of conversation I caught from them brought me back to my own life twenty years ago, when Brilliant & Kind and Hilarious & Gifted were young and impressionable. Every now and then, I'd get a wild hair that it was time to get out to do something fun as a family: No Saturday morning cartoons today! I'm going to be an Interesting and Involved Mom, and I'm going to take you to do something different, something stimulating, something many less fortunate children don't ever have the opportunity to do. I will expose you to something new, and you will become inspired in a new way about life!

Sometimes these outings provided great fun for everyone, but more often, someone in the group, for one reason or another, did not enjoy himself one tiny bit, and the day would unravel quickly and dramatically--best laid plans and all.

So I listened with empathy and compassion on this day to this mom, as she did her best to rally her troops. In an extra-animated, aren't-we-excited-to-be-at-this-very-cool-horse-show? voice, she explained in detail the merits and complexities of each rider and horse's routine and appearance, asking leading questions every now and then like "Isn't this amazing?" and "Aren't we having fun?" Between happy exchanges with my Little, I silently rooted for Mom, urging her kids to please, please, for her sake, just try to get at least a tiny little kick out of this?

And at first, they cooperated nicely, but after about forty minutes or so, it started getting old, and they started getting bored. Whiny requests for vendor food and beverage began to pepper the conversation. Siblings began to focus on and loudly point out what was annoying about each other. Mom pressed on admirably--deflecting, redirecting, so excited to see what was coming up next!! My heart went out to her.

And then, the dressage portion of the show began. The announcer, a folksy old cowboy with a winsome speaking style that wavered between frank and poetic, introduced a certain routine by heightening all of our expectations. "This is my very favorite routine in this portion of the show, ladies and gentlemen," he said. "You will never see anything so graceful in your life. Pay attention to how this rider has trained her horse to literally dance--moving sideways and forward at the same time. Please watch closely and enjoy fully what you are about to see, an amazing, beautiful floating gait."

"FLOATING GATE?" the little boy behind me yelled.

"Yes," distracted and hopeful Mom said, not quite getting his misunderstanding. "Watch now!"

"Where?" the little boy asked. "Where is it?"

"Right there!" the mom said. "Just watch the horse. Watch now."

"A floating gate!" the little boy said. "Cool!"

"Isn't it beautiful?" Mom said.

"But I don't see it!" the little boy said, getting kind of desperate. "I don't see the floating gate!"

"It's the way the horse is walking. That's the floating gait," Mom said. "See? Right there!"

I couldn't stand thinking about the inevitable crash that was coming, so I turned around and tapped the mom's leg gently. "I think he misunderstood--I think he thought he would see a gate--like a fence--floating in the air."

"Where is it, Mom?" said the little boy. "Where's the floating gate?"

And after she thanked me, mom, true to form, took the opportunity to enlighten and educate her terribly disappointed little son, explaining how a word can sometimes have more than one meaning, and what a homonym is, and what the announcer really meant by "floating gait."

I almost turned around to add a suggestion that their the next family outing could be to Japan, where they could see an actual floating gate at the Itsukushima Shrine.

But I thought better of it. She had enough to deal with. Bless her heart.

Soccer Tort

Saturday, Jeep Boy came home from soccer tryouts. He's played in the same elite club since he was four, and he'll be seventeen in two weeks. Thirteen years of two seasons a year, three or four practices a week, one to four games a weekend.

"How'd you do?" I asked him when he came loping into the living room, his long legs dragging to find their rhythm in that new, lanky gait.

"I'm quitting," he said. "I'm not going to do it anymore. I'm just not feeling it. It's not in me."

"Wow," I said. He'd been toying with the idea of quitting for a while, but I didn't think he'd actually do it. His mom's boyfriend is a former pro soccer player who runs the club Jeep Boy plays in. He committed to coaching Jeep Boy's team this season when Jeep Boy said he didn't like his other coach, and I imagine--well, I know--that in that house, there's more than a little pressure for Jeep Boy to fully dedicate himself to soccer, both as a sport and as a stepping stone to college. The fact that he has amazing natural ability probably makes it even more frustrating to both of them to have watched his interest wane over the last year.

"Well, you've been saying you haven't been so excited about it lately. How's it feel to make that decision?"

He smiled shyly. "Great," he said. "I feel like a weight is off my shoulders. I saw those other kids today who really want it, and who really try hard and take it so seriously. And I'm just not there with that."

"Then good for you," I said. "Good for you for doing what feels right to you."

He clapped his hands together, got up and went into the kitchen to tell his dad.

Perfect Man, of course, was perfect about it. "It's certainly not like you never gave it a shot, honey," he said. "You've been doing this almost your whole life. There are a lot of other things in the world to do, a lot of other ways you can have fun and stay strong."

"Mom thinks I'm just quitting because it got hard," Jeep Boy said. "But that's not it. I just don't want to do it anymore. I think she's disappointed in me."

"Hmm," Perfect Man said.

"But what she thinks doesn't matter," Jeep Boy said.

"Not in this case, it doesn't," Perfect Man said. "This is your decision."

"Yeah," Jeep Boy said, and then, trying out something completely uncharacteristic, he said,
"Screw what she thinks."

"Hey now," Perfect Man said, with perfect reproach. "None of that."

So this is a whole new episode in Jeep Boy's life. He's choosing to remove himself from a sport and a culture that has identified him since he was in pre-school. But bigger than that, this is the very first time I have seen him do something despite his mother's disapproval, and make a decision just for himself. This next year will be so interesting and so different. I wonder where he's headed. I hope it's someplace really good, and I hope there's something I can do along the way to help him get there.

Little Olga and the Towel

On Wednesday, I fell in love with a kooky, kooky old lady. I have since chosen her as my role model.

I was showering after my swim, in the big open showers at the rec center, and she entered. She was in her late 60's, early 70's, with a perfectly coiffed straw-colored hairdo, wearing a thick gold rope necklace, and nothing else. She narrowed her eyes at me and watched me lathering up with my scrunchie scrubber, took two steps toward me, and held out a greyish, worn out cloth. "Feel this," she demanded, in a thick German accent.

I wasn't sure I wanted to feel anyone's anything while standing naked in the shower, but she had such a commanding air about her, I obeyed.

"It's a schcrubbie, like yours," she said. "But FLAT. See?" She stretched it out and showed me it was a rectangular shape. "So I can schcrub my back, like THIS!" Then she did an exuberant, exaggerated "scrub-my-own-back" dance, elbows pointed straight up, knees bent, boobs flopping from side to side, looking at me happily. Then she suddenly stopped and said, sadly, "But it's old. And I don't know where to get a new one."

I was absolutely charmed. How did she do it? I wanted every ounce of her unselfconscious, trusting joyousness. I wanted it as my very own.

"Well," I said. "I have one of those at home. "Still in the package. So I can find out the company that makes it and leave you the information. Maybe you can order them online."

"You DO that for me," she said. "And I will cook you something delicious."

"I do like food," I said, helpfully.

"I am a good cook!" she said. "My name is Olgita. You leave the information for me at the front desk--they know me there. On Friday?"

It did not surprise me one bit that they knew Olgita at the front desk. "Yes," I said. "And I'll leave a list of my ten favorite things to eat, too, so you can make one of them for me."

"Oh, ho, HO!" she laughed, pointing at me. "I like you. Yes, I do!"

Man. I like her, too. Very, very much.

Buddha Redux

It's been months since the Orange Robe Episode, and nothing Buddha-related has come up in conversation around Aunt Pillowhead's house since.

But on Sunday, while out running errands, I spied a red resin laughing Buddha in the window of an antique/junk store. The little guy called to me, "Buy me for Hammerhead!" he said. So I did.

Hammerhead's reaction, when I gave it to him, took me totally by surprise.

He cupped his hands to receive it, then held and gazed at it like a father cradling his firstborn baby. "My own Buddha!" he said. "I never thought I'd have my own Buddha!"

On Monday morning, he took it with him to school, to show his friends and keep in his locker. His plan is to rub the tummy for good luck every morning, especially before tests. He held it in his hands through the entire ride there, rubbing the tummy and turning it over and over. "I used to go to Vietnamese restaurants and see the Buddha and be so jealous. But now I don't have to be jealous, because I have my own Buddha," he said. "It's so cool. It's so awesome. Man. I can't believe I have my own Buddha. It's really heavy. Will it break if I drop it? I hope I don't drop it. What happens if you drop a Buddha? Is it bad luck? Man! I can't believe it, it's so cool to have my OWN Buddha."

I couldn't really believe how much he liked it. I thought he'd be amused and maybe a little charmed, but I had no idea he'd be so overwhelmed. "I'm so glad you like it so much, Hon," I said, and I startled him. I think he forgot I was there, driving the car. He looked at me with surprise, and then looked back down at his own Buddha, smiled, and shook his head. We rode the rest of the way in happy silence. It was good.

It's Time To Get Over Ourselves

Hey, Stepmothers,


Can we talk?

And I don't mean about our selfish, difficult ex-wife, our petulant/ ungrateful/neurotic/troubled/needy/manipulative stepchildren, or our half tuned-in husband either. And most of all, I don't mean about us, and how we struggle to deal with it all, and how our sacrifices, contributions, and efforts go unrewarded, unacknowledged, and uncelebrated. I don't want to talk about how amazing we are and how hard we work and how lonely it gets sometimes. Because the truth is, it's all starting to get really boring.

Stepmothers, it's time to get over ourselves.

What did we think would happen when we married this man and inserted ourselves between him and his children?

And how did we ever forget what it feels like to be a child, to need to love our biological parents fiercely and unquestioningly, and how weird and scary it felt when someone tried to step into either of their shoes, even temporarily? How did we ever forget that one adult--that teacher, that relative, that babysitter--who took over and resented us, who didn't understand our feelings, and who stridently mandated our respect and admiration? And most of all, how in the world did we forget how much worse it was when this person thought she was so smart, funny, pretty, hip, and perfect, that if we didn't agree, there had to be something wrong with us? It makes my stomach hurt to think about it.

The thing is, it's not about us, Stepmothers. It's about our stepchildren. It's about what has been taken away from them because of their parents' divorce, what they need now, and the things we might be able to do to soften, comfort, and lessen their trauma while folding them into their new life with us.

Our stepchildren have no obligation to us. Anything we get from them is extra and hard-won. We are not in a reciprocal relationship, we are in a relationship of service. So let's get our egos out of it, stop whining, and get back to work. Let's turn to our friends, family, job, husband for devotion, comfort, and reassurance. Let's stop demanding it of these poor kids.

It's not that I don't want to read our blogs, Stepmothers. It's that I want to read less about how fabulous we are and more about our fabulous stepchildren. Who are they? What do they wish for, how are we working to understand them? Above all, how are we helping them to reassemble their senses of self, their feelings of power, success, and security, now that their lives have come apart? Now THAT would be interesting. That would be helpful. That would tell them that we really love their father, that we honor their place in our life, and that, more than anything, we are up for the responsibility of doing our part to create a happy home for everyone. Okay?

Tell you what. I'll go first:

Excellent related Modern Love piece in last Sunday's NYT.

Don't Make It Bad

Here’s something fun to imagine:


There are two sisters, one young and beautiful, one a little older, and, let’s just say...handsome. All of their lives, these sisters have viewed each other through a kind of filter, focusing more on how the other should be more like them than what they actually love about each other. Which turns out to be a lot.

Okay, so imagine this: last weekend, these sisters meet in a large American metropolis (one that maybe people in South Africa, or Iraq, or Asia might be able to locate on a map, but not many US Americans, because they don’t have maps, as such—if you don't get this reference, go to youtube, you will either thank or curse me, I promise) and they have a breakthrough, which results in an amazing bonding experience. For the first time in their lives, these two women just enjoy each other. They don’t think “I wish you were more...” or “I think you should be less..” or "Why do you always have to...", they just have fun together.

And in this wave of goodwill and newfound acceptance, they decide to go do some karaoke together.

For those of you who have not yet done karaoke, here are some tips:

#1. It doesn’t matter if you can sing or not. What matters is that you pick a song the crowd likes.

#2. Picking a song the crowd likes involves scoping out the crowd and gauging their basic demographic, plus their response to the songs others are karaoke-ing. For example, if the crowd is enjoying and singing along with fast, hip-hop songs, and you want to please the crowd, choose a fast, hip-hop song.

#3. “Hey Jude” is not a fast, hip-hop song.

#4. You and your companion karaoke-er may own expensive purses full of valuables. You may not want to leave them unattended at your table as you go up to sing a duet of “Hey Jude” together. This will not change the fact that if you are two white women in your 40’s, carrying your purses up to the stage can not, and will not, look cool, or, in any other way, appeal to a crowd of a certain demographic.

#5. The key of a song is very important (dare I say “key?”) in how well it will be sung by a given singer or singers. In other words, if you and your karaoke partner are sopranos, you will both suck when singing a song in a basso profundo key. You will sound like female impersonators. You will desperately cling to each other when you realize how bad you sound. You will not enjoy the feeling.

#6. “Hey Jude” has a lot of “na na na na” choruses, and if you suck at the first one, you will most probably suck at the sixteenth one. Prepare for that.

#7. When trying to liven up the sixteenth “na na na na” chorus which you have sucked at so far, bursting out into Paul McCartney’s background riff of “hey joooday joodayJOODAYJOODAYJOODAYJOOODAAAY!” will probably not inspire the crowd to respond with encouraging cheers. Instead, they will probably blink quietly. This will make you very, very uncomfortable.

#8. When you realize that singing a duet in this unnaturally low voice with a same-sex fellow karaoke-er may cause the blinking, silent crowd to think you are lesbian lovers, explaining between choruses of “na na na na” that “We’re SISTERS!” is awkward. Don’t do it. They don’t care. They just want you to take your expensive purses full of valuables and get the hell off the stage so they can start having fun again.

#9. When “Hey Jude” is over with, please the crowd for the first time since your turn began. Do this by running, not walking, to the nearest exit. Run, run, run! Go, go, go!

#10. If you ignore all of the above advice and choose “Hey Jude” as your song at a karaoke bar, and all of the above happens to you, for the rest of your life you will not be able to hear that beautiful song without cringing and laughing. Can you live with that? If so, then be my guest! Go for it! And good luck!

Hitting the Tree

When Hilarious & Gifted, my youngest son, was learning to ride a bike, we set him up in our back yard, which was long, wide, and grassy, and had one tree growing in its southeast quadrant. Our plan was to let him learn and fall where the grass was soft and there were no obstacles to hurt him, except for that one tree, which was so easy to avoid.

And which, for some reason, he kept crashing into.

We started him in the northeast corner, and pushed him towards the southwest. He pedaled furiously, eying the tree with excitement and dread, all the while heading directly towards it, as though it were pulling him like a magnet. And bang! he crashed, and bang! he fell.

We tried the northwest corner, pushing him southwest. Bang! and bang! again. Due south, due center, due east, due west--no direction or destination made a difference; the tree called to him and he collided with it every single time. Brilliant & Kind, his amused and frustrated older brother, tried coaching him ("Don't look at the tree!" "Stop before you hit the tree!") to no avail. Finally we gave up, and Hilarious & Gifted took his bike out to the hard, unforgiving street, teeming with cars, cats, and ruthless neighbor children, got on and rode away. It was impossible to understand.

So, too, is it impossible to understand that whenever I am in any situation where decorum is required, I develop a kind of spontaneous Tourette's Syndrome, and find myself violating the very taboo (usually a simple, understandable taboo) that had been clearly outlined in advance. I either blurt out something inappropriate, call someone important by the wrong name, or knock over something fragile or permeable with an unnecessary, emotive gesture. Like hitting that one tree in the yard, the fear of doing the wrong thing is what causes me to do the wrong thing, every single time.

Which is why, when Perfect Man and I were invited to his cousin's wedding--a lavish, Modern Orthodox Jewish wedding in New York City--I apologized to him in advance.

"I will embarrass you," I said. "I'll kiss someone I'm not supposed to touch, or dance during some somber chant, get the giggles during the ceremony, or something. It makes me sad to think about how sorry you will be that you brought me."

"Honey, you'll be fine," he said, "There will be a lot of other people there who don't understand the tenets of Modern Orthodox Judaism. Honestly, there's a lot of stuff about it I don't know myself. Just relax, and have fun, and everything will be fine." Then he added, "Also, maybe just don't talk or move while we're there." It was supposed to be a joke, but I think he was serious.

Anyway, last weekend, we went. The event took place in a big, beautiful riverfront hall. Perfect Man guided me into a room where the bride was, beautiful and elegant, sitting in a chair in the center of the floor. Her mother stood next to her.

"The bride's in here," he said, handing me a scotch to help me relax. "And the groom's in another room. They haven't seen each other for a week. You can't kiss the groom. Don't touch the groom. I don't even know if you should talk to the groom. Probably, you shouldn't. I think during the ceremony, we're seated on separate sides of the room. One side for men, other side for women. You stay on the women's side."

"Got it." I said, slurring slightly, because my scotch was gone already. "The women's side."

"You're doing great!" Perfect Man said, handing me another scotch.

The room was filled with gorgeously adorned women in gossamer and Gucci. I kept my mind busy by counting the number of Christian Louboutin shoes I saw, until I counted the same silver snake skin pair twice, lost track, and gave up.

Then Perfect Man's sister and brother came over to chat with us. They were kind and considerate about my shiksa anxiety, assuring me over and over again that I was doing great. "Just keep your eye on the nearest exit," Perfect Man's brother said jokingly. "And if something goes wrong, head for it."

And then, a burst of sound from a double door, and the crowd parted. A line of men in suits--presumably the groom's closest friends and family--came through the room, marching, clapping and singing, with the groom being carried along in their stream. They were bringing him to see his bride. I couldn't see exactly what happened when they stopped at her chair; I think he lifted her veil to confirm it was her. Then they all turned and began to march out again, clapping, singing, and passing by us on the way out the door.

And that's when Perfect Man and his brother decided their active participation was required. With a look of alert determination on their faces, they dutifully hopped in at the end of the line, clapping and marching, their yarmulkes bobbing in time. Perfect Man's sister and I immediately noticed that no other men in the room were joining in this way. "What the hell are those two doing?" we asked each other, and I took a step to tell them I didn't think they were supposed be in this march. But before I could say anything, Perfect Man turned and shook his finger at me, saying with stern authority, "Men Only! No Women!" Then he turned away again and marched out the door.

I looked at his sister and the two of us started laughing so hard we were crying. I was so relieved to not be the ridiculous one, and it was so entertaining to see someone else being the ridiculous one, the emotional release was extraordinary. And all of a sudden, it hit me: if all of my social faux pas over the last four decades have provided even a fraction of this kind of relief and amusement to others, then the discomfort and humiliation I have suffered along the way has been more than worth it. What a great feeling, to be so completely released from remorse and regret!

And I would have given a hundred dollars to see what happened when the groom and his closest friends and family got back to their room and there were these two guys no one knew standing there at the end of the line, these two guys who, as they slowly began realizing that they had misjudged the situation, were maybe winding down their clapping a little, maybe turning their march into more of a shuffle, and maybe, just maybe, both starting to look for the nearest exit.

What Were You Eating Under There?

New underwear. Don't you just love it? When you wear it, all day long you have this feeling that down to the last detail, you are just the right amount of snazzy.


Anyway, today I was out shopping for shoes for a wedding we're going to this weekend, and I remembered that Hammerhead's low on underwear, so I picked up three packs of his favorite: cotton knit boxer briefs.

He is so happy. It was so easy.

Bend It Like Beckham

Two weeks ago, Jeep Boy was out with his friends. He called here, at about 10:00, and asked Perfect Man if he could get his ear pierced.

As I said, it was ten (pm), so Perfect Man had been asleep for well over two hours. (He falls over like a redwood at 7:30, give or take five minutes.) And being awakened from a deep sleep by his son with such an unexpected request made him a little cranky.

"NO!" he yelled into the phone, and then "hung it back up" by putting the receiver upside down on his stomach. Then he fell back asleep.

The next morning, when Jeep Boy demanded an explanation for the denial, Perfect Man told him that he was against piercings of ears and other bodily mutilations, and besides that, such a move would require the approval of both parents, and would not be something he could just do on a whim like that.

So two nights ago, (the boys were at her house at the time) Blood Runs Cold called Perfect Man and complained that Jeep Boy had gone out and gotten his ear pierced without her permission, and that when she confronted him, he said that his father had said he could. Perfect Man explained the gaps in truth and accuracy. Now not only was she angry with Jeep Boy, Perfect Man was also angry with Jeep Boy.

I don't think an ear piercing is a big deal, myself. I also think the attitude about it from both parents is a little sexist: if Jeep Boy were a girl, I think he'd have both ears pierced by now, and what's the difference? However, I DO think lying is a big deal, and deceitful manipulation is a big deal, and when shit like this goes down, there's this weird thing that Blood Runs Cold does that I don't understand at all: she gets behind the action. She has an "Oh well. It's done. Let's forget all the trouble and have a little party!" attitude that I honestly don't understand.

Jeep Boy did something he didn't have permission to do. When confronted by his mother, he lied and said his father gave him permission. That's not okay. Shouldn't there be a consequence when a young man who has just started driving, who will be traveling down a long road with many possible wrong turns ahead, defies and lies? Yes, there should. And apparently, Blood Runs Cold thinks so, too, and she handed him one: When Jeep Boy came back to our house yesterday, there was a 1/2 carat diamond flashing in his swollen, punctured lobe. "Is that real?" I asked him. "Yeah," he said, smiling. "My mom gave it to me."

What Keeps Me Young

This craigslist posting made my day today:
________

Fat lazy bastard selling awesome smith machine - $750


I have a huge 7' tall 6'wide 4' deep olympic cage machine with pullup station butterfly pull up and down type things that ripped my @#%*ing rotator cuff 2 years ago and matching adjustable bench w/leg lift and alot of weights and other %$#& you can really hurt yourself on it's approx. 10 years old I bought it from another fat lazy bastard 4 years ago it's huge so you can hang alot of clothes and stuff on it after you hurt yourself too i have for 2 years or so put up with this monster taking up space i definitely need thinking about a large buffet table or beer brewing outfit to get me in shape the shape i have chosen is round so please hurry $ 750 for all obo

The Highest Form of Flattery

Okay, here's a good one:

I'm driving Hammerhead and three of his buddies who have spent the night to the skate park.

It's been an awesome 24 hours. Cheerful, funny friends have established an atmosphere of high energy and appreciation in our home. Fresh blood in the house brings out the best in me, and I am having a grand old time. With the four boys in the car, on a safe and low-traffic side road, I even drive crazy for a few minutes. "Whoa!" the boys all laugh. "Ow!" one of them says, "I bonked my head!"

"Yeah?" Hammerhead asks. "Does your face hurt?"

"No" the friend answers.

"Well, it's killing me*! he says. All boys erupt into laughter.

"Huh," I think to myself, but say not a word.

Seconds later, we pass an odd, enormous sculpture of an anchor which was erected in the park near our house four years ago.

"Dudes," Hammerhead says, "Check out the funky-ass anchor.**"

"Weird!" they all say.


"Huh," I think again. "Well, I'll be a monkey's uncle..."
__________

* One of Aunt Pillowhead's favorite jokes, best used when someone (Hammerhead) has just complained of an ache, pain, or any other kind of general discomfort in the cranial area. This pointed yet irresistibly winsome rejoinder has never once elicited even a smile from my long-suffering stepson, who instead consistently complains of its "unfunniness," terming it "the worst of all of [your] horrible jokes."


** Whenever Aunt Pillowhead drives by this odd, artistic non-sequitor (daily), she expresses her confusion over the city's decision to mark an arid, waterless flatland with a huge anchor by saying, "Check out the funky-ass anchor." Which invariably causes Hammerhead to slap his own face with frustration and ask me why I have to say that "every single time we pass the stupid thing."

What I Don't Know

I swam competitively in high school.
My coach, whose intense dislike of me was matched only by my intense dislike of the sport, consistently entered me in the three events that least depended on ability--including, and most tortuously, the 500 free. I was a slow, apologetic swimmer, and the 500 free was a throwaway event that no one invested any interest in or athletes in. There were never more than three swimmers entered in the 500--the star swimmers were saved for the shorter sprints, where their performances made a notable difference--so even when I came in last, I still earned a point for the team. (3 points for first place, 2 for second, and 1 for third.) And how much could that one point matter?

I really can't tell you how much I hated swimming. It gave me nightmares. And then one day, one of those nightmares came true: after a season-end meet, which we lost by one point, and in which I placed third in the 500 free, a hateful and ignorant teammate, a twin who oozed inhumanity (imagine Anne Coulter as a 17 year-old) screamed at me on the bus all the way back to our school. I'll never forget it: "We LOST because of you. You're LAZY, you're NO GOOD, you DON'T EVEN TRY!!! If you had gone just a little faster, you would have come in SECOND, and we would have at least TIED, but you won't go fast, will you? It's not because you CAN'T, it's because you WON'T. You're LAZY and you don't CARE ABOUT YOUR TEAM and YOU DON'T EVEN TRY!!! You're never even TIRED after you swim, ARE YOU???? ARE YOU???"

After I graduated from high school, I vowed that unless my life depended on it, I would never, ever, ever, ever, ever swim more than 25 yards in one day again in my life.

I kept that vow until three years ago, when I was talked into the Danskin triathlon by some co-workers.

Long story short, I've been swimming ever since--1.5 miles three days a week. And here's the weird part: I love it. Turns out the experience is a lot different when you don't hate the people who make you do it, or feel ashamed by what you're not capable of contributing.

Anyway, last Wednesday, this young woman who'd been swimming in the lane next to me came up to me in the dressing room afterwards and said, "You're a really strong swimmer!" And it wasn't one of those qualified compliments, either, you know--the "for your age" or "considering you're missing a limb" or "compared to a brain-damaged cormorant" kind of thing. The reason I know this is because, somewhat miraculously, in the last three years, I actually have become a pretty strong swimmer. I know my stroke is efficient, I know my flip turns are quiet and quick, I know my arms have gotten strong, and I know--weirdly--my speed increases exponentially after the first 40 lengths. But still, when an almost-half-my-age woman complimented me this way, it made me feel great, really great. And that's why, two days later, when a super-fit, super-fast woman about my age was swimming in the lane next to me and literally going twice my speed, I was not as discouraged as I might have been otherwise. And after our swim, when we were both in the shower, I wanted to share my admiration for her. You know, what made me feel great would probably make her feel great, too, so why not Play It Forward? I was a little intimidated, though. She looked like a professional triathlete and had a serious, closed, expression on her face. And I tend to think that women who are so fit, so capable, and so serious like this don't need gushy compliments from relatively slow and apologetic swimmers like me.

But still. Sometimes a gushy compliment can make someone's day. And if you can make someone's day, you should make someone's day, right? So I went for it. While I was shampooing, I turned to her and told her that I was amazed by her speed and that it was inspiring to swim next to her, and I asked her if she was a triathete. She smiled a reluctant, tight smile and told me she had been before her daughter was born, but didn't race any more.

I pushed on. How old is your daughter? Four, she said, offering no enthusiasm or energy. What a fun age, I said.

She looked up at me. Do you have children? she asked. I do, I said, but they're grown. I have a 28 year old and a 24 year old son, and my oldest is married, so I've got a daughter-in-law, too. And I have two stepsons who are 16 and 13.

I have a 16 year old stepson, too, she said.

Now we were getting somewhere! Here's what we had in common! We could share stories about 16 year-old stepsons, about driver's licenses and girls and teenage malaise.

Oh, I said, hoping to break into her closed psyche somehow, to make her laugh, make her connect with me. How often is he with you?

He's not, she said. Not at all. Not anymore. My husband--his father--died. I'm a widow. So my stepson is not with me at all any more.

And it took my breath away.

I told her I was so sorry, of course. I told her how sad that must be, and how I couldn't imagine what her loss must be like, and she looked at me evenly and said, You're right. You can't. You can't imagine what it is like until it happens to you. I used to think I knew what this meant. And I try to focus on what I have, she said. I try to be grateful. But life throws some awful shit at you sometimes.

And I didn't know what else to say. So we stood there next to each other for a few more minutes in silence, this woman with her perfect body and perfect stroke, consumed with her perfect sadness, and me.

The Bust & The Butt

Two very interesting things happened today.

1. Jeep Boy got busted by Perfect Man, and

2. Hammerhead asked me to look at his butt.

1. Jeep Boy Got Busted by Perfect Man

Jeep Boy got his driver's license last week. In the state where we live, there is a law that newly-licensed teenagers cannot drive with peers in the car for six months after they get their licenses. The only passengers allowed in the car with a newly-licensed teen are family members. Needless to say, this law, and the consequences of breaking it (which include up to a fifty dollar fine, 8-24 hours of community service, possible revoking of license, and a commensurate increase in insurance costs) have been discussed at length in our home.

Well, due to a confluence of unexpected events, right after Jeep Boy left for work this morning, Perfect Man, instead of I, drove Hammerhead to his skate camp. And en route to the skate park, Perfect Man spied two of Jeep Boy's buddies with their lunch boxes and cell phones, standing on the street around the corner from our house, obviously waiting to be picked up and given an illegal but fun ride to work. Perhaps their wires crossed and Jeep Boy was looking for them on the wrong corner--who knows? In any case, Perfect Man got to them first. You see, Jeep Boy had just recommended these two friends to his boss, they'd both been hired, and this was their first day. When they saw Perfect Man, they looked very surprised and very afraid. As well they should have! Perfect Man called Jeep Boy on his cell phone, told him to come right home, and took away car privileges for an undetermined length of time.

Oh, I am so glad it was Perfect Man who caught the miscreants and not me. It is so much better to be the silent observer in this situation.

Poor Perfect Man. Yesterday was his birthday and today his present is this: You Have A 16 Year Old Son!!!!

I have been holed up for the most of the day, keeping a low profile. And not half an hour ago,


2. Hammerhead Asked Me To Look At His Butt

"Would you please look at my butt?" he said, coming in my office covered with grime and sweat.

"Well," I said. "I would love to."

He pulled down his pants and showed me a very red right butt cheek marked by a very red straight line, where he landed on the end of his board when it got stuck in the coping, standing upright, during a failed jump.

"Ouch," I said.

Which satisfied him completely.

Short Clips

This is a picture from "Slovenly Peter," a book that captivated and horrified me when I was a little girl. I read it with one eye closed.

Its subtitle is something like "Cheerful Stories to Make Good Little Boys and Girls Laugh," which is a cruel distortion of what it actually is, and what it actually made good little boys and girls do.

This picture is from a story called "Little Suck-a-Thumb," who is taught a lesson when his mother goes out and warns him not to suck his thumb while she's gone, or this guy with big scissors would come and chop them off. He doesn't listen, she leaves, and he sucks his thumb.

And then, the guy with the big scissors comes in and chops off his thumbs, just like she told him he would, moving with such eager purpose he's lost his hat in the rush to mutilate the poor kid. (Check out the blood dripping on the floor--that was the part that really got me.)

I hadn't thought about this book for a long, long, time, until this weekend when I had to trim the nails of my beloved, 110-lb, two-year old chocolate lab, Not A Mean Bone In His Body.

At first we were doing great. I'd give him a piece of chicken every time he let me take his paw and clip a nail. He looked at me with the combination of pure trust, pure gratitude, and pure adoration that has led me to love him so much it's embarrassing. And then, I got to the "little toe" and he jerked a bit and I snipped too close. And it bled, and bled, and bled. I almost passed out.

He didn't yelp, didn't seem to even mind much, except ten minutes later when I wrapped it in cotton and put a sock on his foot, taping it around his leg to keep it secure and keep him from tracking blood all over the house. That he didn't like, and he walked around like an angry, humiliated canine Charlie Chaplin. I felt so ashamed I couldn't look him in the eye for about an hour. How could I have injured a helpless, sweet creature who depends on me to be kind and keep him safe?

How the heck did this happen? I grew up and became not one, but two monsters I feared as a child! Wicked Stepmother. Guy With Scissors. What's next?

I'm OK, You're OK

Last month, Perfect Man and I visited my brother, his wife, and their three boys: Cutie #1, Cutie #2, and Cutie #3. The three Cuties are adorable--smart, funny, and extremely entertainable. (Aunt Pillowhead is a big hit with the seven-and-under crowd.)

And while we were there, this thing happened with Cutie #2 that I haven't been able to stop thinking about. Cutie #2 is four, and his six-year-old brother, Cutie #1, was showing me his class picture from kindergarten and "introducing" me to all of his friends. Cutie #2 didn't have a class picture, but he goes to pre-school and has classmates he wanted me to "meet" as well, so he ran off and then came back with a wooden alphabet puzzle. He took all the letters that started the name of someone in his class out of the puzzle and arranged them in a group on the floor to "introduce" me to everyone. Letter by letter, he'd pick them up and say, "This is Amelia," or Ann, Adam, Brandon, Cory, etc. I was just mesmerized with his thought process--he was so consumed with the details of his solution, and so careful to get everyone right. When he got to K, he told me it was Kevin, who is a bully who spits on him sometimes. I took the K from him and said to it, very earnestly, "Kevin, you may not spit on my sweet nephew. Promise me you will never do that again." Cutie #2's eyes lit up and he said, "He says he will still spit on me sometimes!" so I said, "Well, I'm sorry, but that won't do." And I took Cutie #2's hand, and we walked outside with the K, and we put it in a corner of the garden. And, firmly but not unkindly, I said to the K, "Kevin, you will just have to sit out here by yourself until you can promise to be civil and respectful to my darling nephew." Cutie #2 was in hysterics by then, jumping up and down and laughing and saying, "I don't think he's paying attention to you!" And I said, "Well, let's just give him some time to think about his actions and be by himself." We went back inside and I told Cutie #2 that he could decide when he wanted to bring Kevin back in the house--if he wanted to make him stay out there all night, he could. If he wanted to try to go talk some sense into him in an hour or so, he could do that, too. It was up to him. Cutie #2 said he was going to make Kevin sit out there in the freezing night all night long to teach him a lesson. I told him that was fine with me.

After dinner, Cutie #2 suddenly announced that he had to go outside and bring Kevin back in before it got too cold, that he had been out there long enough. He went and got the K and then carefully put it back in the puzzle with all the other letters, and then he put the puzzle away. I read him and his cute brothers a story, and they all went to bed.

So what I'm wondering is: why can't we all be as pure and kind and ingenious as four-year-olds?

The Scream

Oh.

my.

god.


Hammerhead's brother got his first car two nights ago. For now, let's just set aside the way I struggle when I compare my stepsons' abundant possessions with the scraps and bits I was able to provide my own boys when they were teenagers. That's as old an issue around here as the poisonous bile that sticks in my throat whenever I spend too much time thinking about Blood Runs Cold.

Also, let's not even talk about the difference between having been raised a (Whatever It Is You Want, You Don't Deserve It And Shame On You For Even Thinking You Did) Catholic, like I was, compared with a (Of Course You Should Have That Beautiful Thing That You Already Have Four Of At Home! You Are Worth So Much More Than Even That!) Jew like Perfect Man.
But, tedious as they are, both of those pre-existing factors bear mention, because, like fleas on an old yellow farm dog, they are always there. And they bite and their bites itch like a mo' fo,' and that can influence behavior.

So Hammerhead's brother got a car, with gift money from Perfect Man's parents he's been saving for ten years, plus money he's saved from his summer jobs this year and last, plus money Perfect Man and I (but not Blood Runs Cold, because she "can't afford it") have chipped in. And it's a nicer car than I would have ever been able to help either of my kids buy, if I had ever helped my kids buy a car. And I'm a little conflicted about it.

BUT, for now, let's just talk about last night, when Hammerhead's brother--who shall from this point forward be known as Jeep Boy--was driving us all out to dinner in this new, 1999 blue Jeep. He was bursting with excitement and wonder at the view through the windshield, the new horizon of manhood that now lay before him, and exhilarated to be seen behind the wheel of that fine car. This was the way he's has wanted to be seen for so long: an independent, capable, completely grown adult. A child no more. And it was all actually happening.

Maybe that's what distracted him from using his goddamn brain, causing him to nearly kill all four of us.

Well, that's an exaggeration. Aunt Pillowhead has been known to exaggerate once or twice. What actually happened was this: Jeep Boy was driving west on a two-lane, east/west street. The taqueria that was our destination was on the south side of the street. We were on the north side. Jeep Boy spotted an open parking spot on the south side of the street, and began turning the Jeep into it. And by "turning the Jeep into it" I mean crossing the street into oncoming traffic and attempting to parallel park, with the car facing the opposite direction of every other car that was parked on that side of the road.

At first, I thought Jeep Boy was trying to pull a U turn, but as soon as I realized that he had every intention of continuing his westerly-facing direction, and that he intended to parallel park the Jeep this way, facing the west on an eastbound street, and as soon as I saw the line of cars coming at us head on as we sat there like four fat flightless birds strapped in a big blue boat, I asked him this question:

"JEEP BOY! WHAT THE FUCK???!!!" in a loud, high-pitched tone of voice.

I don't know what was going on with Perfect Man, who was sitting speechless in the front passenger seat. I think both he and Hammerhead had been stunned into silence by shared wonderment--it was as though Jeep Boy had been abducted by aliens and replaced with a defective look-alike--a blind, stupid one who couldn't drive worth a shit--and they couldn't believe their eyes.

"What?" Jeep Boy asked, whipping around to look at me, totally terrified.

Finally, Perfect Man came to. "This isn't a one-way street, Jeep Boy," he said with inexplicable calm.

"I know!" Jeep Boy said.

"You can't park facing this direction on this side of the street," Perfect Man said.

"Why not?" Jeep Boy asked, shaken and confused.

"BECAUSE IT'S AGAINST THE LAW!!!" I screamed from the back seat.

Perfect Man looked at me with a meaningful expression. The meaning it was full of was 'screaming things from the back seat is not helpful.'

The cars that faced us were gathering in number, blocked from their passage and stopped in the middle of the street, yet no one was honking. I personally think this is because they were enjoying themselves so much. All the drivers were thinking, "Holy Moly! This is frickin' awesome! I never get to see anything this frickin' bizarre!"

Ten minutes later, after we'd gotten out of that situation, and after Perfect Man had gotten Jeep Boy's coloring back to a healthy, peachy pink by telling him a "funny" story about how I'd screamed the exact same thing to my youngest son Hilarious & Gifted eight years ago, when Perfect Man was teaching him how to drive a standard and he went right through a red light, Jeep Boy smiled sheepishly.

"I honestly didn't know you couldn't park like that," he said. "I really didn't."

Oh, my god. There are so many, many things he doesn't know about driving a car, let alone life. How will he stay safe and well in the process of finding out? How did any of us?

Is This A Good Time?

Poor Hammerhead. He got his braces today.

I picked him up from the orthodontist and he was sweetly subdued, effortfully cheerful, trying to be brave.

I realized as we were driving home that three years ago, I'd picked his brother up from the same orthodontist when he got his braces, too, and he'd had the same stunned and plaintive demeanor. He was starving, and I made the mistake of taking him to a deli and buying him plain slices of turkey and cheese. I thought it would be soft enough for him to manage, but he couldn't chew them, and he got sad and frustrated, teary-eyed and silent.

Hammerhead was also starving today, so I took him straight to his favorite smoothie place and got him his favorite smoothie. He thanked me and sipped it on the way home, alternating his comments of how good it tasted with comments of appreciation for the "free" electric toothbrush his orthodontist had presented him.

Inspired by the abundant good will in the car, I decided to take it to the next level. In my opinion, nothing eases physical discomfort better than humor, so to distract Hammerhead from his pain, I asked him if he knew when a good time to go to the dentist was. He said, "No."

"Two-thirty," I said. "Get it? Tooth hurty?"

"Aunt Pillowhead," he groaned. "I'm not in the mood."

"Hammerhead," I said. "You're never in the mood for my hilarious jokes. And that is hard to live with."

"Your jokes are never hilarious," he said. "That's hard to live with, too. And oh my GOD! My mouth hurts so much! I just wish I would go into a coma for a week!"

"What a coincidence!" I said. "I also just wish you would go into a coma for a week!"

Hammerhead laughed in spite of himself.

What a funny thing, to be present and depended upon in such little landmark events in these boys' lives. And what an education I am getting. Along with learning what is best to feed stepsons whose mouths have recently been bound with steel, I think I'm also learning to not want more than what is there, to do my best with the little patch of land I have. Like those lovingly tended, tiny little gardens you sometimes see in front of barren, humble homes, or flowers that find a way to grow in the cracks of sidewalks--the point is not to wish for more beauty, but to create it where you can, even when you thought there was no room, or that it wouldn't make a difference.

Like buying smoothies and telling bad jokes on a ride home from the orthodontist, for example. For some reason, I think I'll remember it for a long time. I wonder if Hammerhead will, too.

Dinner Time!

I've been thinking about dinner at our house.

It's a complicated affair, which too often does not result in anything Norman Rockwell-like. To wit:

• Hammerhead: Loves anything that used to have a mother. Hates cheese. Loves potatoes, will eat broccoli, otherwise hates vegetables, especially the reviled tomato. Is very annoyed by his brother.
  
  
• Hammerhead's brother: Loves cheese. Enjoys meat without skin or bones, cooked medium well. Hates anything that grew in the ground. Will not touch anything green, or anything that has touched anything green, or anything that has seeds or nuts or other suspicious texture in it. Is very annoyed by Hammerhead.
  
  
• Aunt Pillowhead: Loves everything, but is a vegetarian. At dinnertime, often experiences an end-of-day urge to teach Hammerhead and his brother a thing or two about life.
  
  
• Perfect Man: Adventurous eater and culinary grad, perfectionist and unfailing optimist who clings to the stubborn belief that if he cooks four separate delicious meals for us, his most beloved in the world, we will sit down together and have happy dinnertime harmony. (Lovingly prepared meal=domestic bliss.)

But the problem is, by the time he's shopped (fresh for every meal), chopped, cooked and served these four separate dinners, he is exhausted, cranky, and disappointed, either by the way something didn't turn out, or by someone's bad attitude. Or because he's called us to the table four times and we haven't come until the fifth time, because of skateboarding (Hammerhead), ESPN (Hammerhead's brother), or the mind-lubricating, limb-slowing combination of a glass of red wine and internet Scrabble (yours truly).

Aunt Pillowhead! you think. Why don't you cook dinner every now and again, and help out the poor guy? After all, he IS perfect. Doesn't he deserve a break?

I have tried this, but it doesn't work. Perfect Man is adamant that dinnertime is his territory, his contribution, his ritual. He doesn't even want help prepping, but for the occasional washing of the greens, because people get in the way.


And so he does it his way, which does work pretty well sometimes. But too often, we sit with a beautiful dinner, teens who quibble, a damn-it-I-need-to-be-heard!-stepmother, and a sad, quiet dad.

Something needs to be done. Is it family meeting time?

Pasta and Dissent

It started so innocently.

We were eating the delicious dinner that Perfect Man had spent so much time preparing--pasta with fresh mozzarella and meatballs for the boys, greens with goat cheese, heirloom tomatoes, Nicoise olives and avocado for me. Hammerhead asked me to please drive him to school on Thursday so he could bring his skateboard. I usually drop him at his bus stop (it's closer to where I drop his brother off at high school), but skateboards are prohibited on school buses, and Thursday he wants to bring his board because it's the last day of school and he's spending the night with a friend and he wants to skate with his friend.

"One time," Hammerhead said, "I was just bringing a board--no trucks, just a board--and the driver said, 'What's that?' and I said, "It's just a board but no trucks,' and he STILL made me take it home. He's an asshole."

"That's kind of harsh," I said.

"Everyone thinks he's an asshole," Hammerhead went on. "My friend Anna said 'Bye' to him one day and he just stared at her. So she said, 'Asshole!' to him while she was getting off the bus."

The boys laughed. Aunt Pillowhead's hackles went up.

"Maybe he didn't respond because he can't tell if kids are really being nice to him or mocking him," I said. "It must be a really hard job."

"He signed up for it," Hammerhead's brother said, matter-of-factly, shrugging off my attempt to illuminate the challenges a person who drives a busload of insolent middle-schoolers around daily might face.

And I thought, What are you, some kind of little Republican? Because you've enjoyed a life of privilege and options, you think that every other person on this planet has the same smorgasbord of choices, choices based on wants and whims, not needs and necessity?

But what I said was, "He may have signed up for it, but you don't know why. You don't know what it's like to have to take the first job you can get just so you can pay the bills, feed your family, feed yourself. And you don't know what it's like to drive a busload of middle-schoolers around every day."

Hammerhead's brother shrugged. "Whatever," he said. "I know I'm right."

And then Perfect Man, slumped with disappointment, having worked so hard to create a repast that would inspire goodwill and conviviality, spoke to Hammerhead's brother, saying something like, "Talk to us again when you have the creds to back what you're saying. You don't have any idea what it's like to work for a living."

Hammerhead's brother shrugged again.

And because I haven't learned to just put another forkful of food in my mouth and move on, I said this: "What I'm saying, [Hammerhead's Brother], is that some people are not educated and so they have fewer options. And some people are educated but they have immediate needs and crises--a dying elderly parent, children to feed--and they have to do what they have to do to take care of those crises. And so to say about someone who has a difficult job, 'He signed up for it,' sounds kind of insensitive to me. It might not be the case that when it came to finding a job, that bus driver picked the job he thought he'd love the most. And to call him an 'asshole' because he enforces the rules sounds disrespectful to me."

Well, by that time, dinner was pretty much over, and not because it had been eaten up. Hammerhead's brother, who fully hated me at this point, smiled a little smile and said a sarcastic, "Okay!" while Perfect Man tapped my leg, a desperate, Morse-like code for "PLEASE DO NOT OFFER SOCIOLOGY LESSON NOW. NOW IS FOR EATING PASTA AND TALKING ABOUT SPORTS. REMINDER: KID IS TEENAGER. YOU CANNOT MAKE HIM CARE." And Hammerhead, delighted to be the "Good One" for a change, cheerfully commented that many people today are indeed oppressed in ways we cannot know.

If I were the mom, this wouldn't have been sad, at least not for me. I would have continued the conversation, full speed ahead, whether it was wanted or not. Until the child had seen the world the way the world should be seen. Mother's job: To Shape Character.

But I'm the stepmom, and so it was kind of sad. I hit the barrier, the wall where the conversation stops. For stepmothers, it's about the service you provide. Save your perspective for when it's asked for. (And honey, don't hold your breath.)

Being a stepmother is, in some ways, a whole lot like being a bus driver. Your job is to facilitate a journey for some kids who'd be having a whole lot more fun if you weren't there. You must keep them safe, toe the line, and enforce the rules, all the while accepting the fact that for a lot of the time, no matter what you say or do not say, you will be seen as an asshole.

Not that I'm complaining. After all, I signed up for it.

Waaaah!

There's no excuse for feeling sorry for yourself, unless you are
1. a baby who doesn't know better, or
2. a very flawed woman who DOES know better, but does it anyway, because you are so very flawed

And I'm a baby. And today, I am feeling really sorry for myself, even though I have nothing to feel sorry about. I have two beautiful sons, one beautiful daughter-in-law, one beautiful husband, one beautiful chocolate lab, one fairly attractive cat, and two beautiful stepsons who happen to have a beautiful mother who is in Germany right now, having flown there business class to spend ten days at an elite horse show, which worked out with her schedule just fine (since we were willing to keep the boys an extra five days), on account of the fact that she DOESN'T HAVE A JOB and DOESN'T WORK and therefore DOESN'T HAVE A SCHEDULE.

Ay, yi, yi. It is so useless and so petty and so small and so unproductive to feel resentful of this thing, this imbalance of lifestyle. But sometimes, I really, really do. I wish I were more like the heroes I admire, Gandhi and Mark Twain. I wish I were better at discipline and serenity and off-beat folksy humor. But the bottom line is, it gets me. There are so many other people I would like to be giving money to, so many other causes I would like to support, yet I have no choice, and so I support A Life Of Leisure For Blood Runs Cold While We Work Our Fingers To The Bone And Many Others, So Much More Deserving, Do Without, and this is the way it is.

It wouldn't be so bad except that we are 5oK in debt due to six years of really unfair alimony payments and continued child support that have ultimately afforded her this luxury. Also, that on the day before Mother's Day, Blood Runs Cold's boyfriend, Studmuffin, drove both the boys to our house in the middle of the day so they could get some money to buy her a Mother's Day gift. Now tell me, is that whacked or what? We are put in the position of either saying, "Of course we will give you money to honor your loving mother on Mother's Day!" or "Dudes. Seriously. Tell Studmuffin to give you some of his own money, or mow her neighbor's lawn and earn some, or make a card or something. But don't ask us to pay for your mom's gift, okay? And next time, think before you ask us such a stupid question."

Still simmering a bit over that one. But of course, Perfect Man chose the former course of action, because he loves his boys so much, and sees all of this crap as the minutia it really is, and wants his boys to grow up loving both his parents and experiencing as little conflict as possible. He is better than Gandhi, and better than Mark Twain. He is my real hero, and I love him with all my heart.

And Now, A Word From Our Sponsor

I hate TV

AND

I love TV



That's hard to reconcile. When I'm in an easy mood, a mood that begs to turn on, tune in, and drop out, when I want to reward a long day of arduous computation, reckoning, negotiation and summarization with a big fat stupid night of Feet Up/Blank Stare, TV is awesome.

But when I'm in a busy mood, thinking about what needs to be done and how much of it there is to do, and someone else is sitting in front of the TV, slack-jawed and dormant, TV is the worst, most repugnant symbol of everything that's wrong with the world today.

And today, Hammerhead and his brother, at exactly 4:05 pm, as soon as I got them home from school and when I had so much more to do before I could call it a day, sat down in front of the TV and turned on "The Sopranos" (via On Demand). And you know what? Aunt Pillowhead don't play that.

According to Aunt Pillowhead, TV should not be on before 5:30. (And if you SHOULD turn it on at 5:30, you can watch Antiques Roadshow or MacNeil Lehrer, and that's all.)

So I made them turn it off. They looked at me as though I were crazy and mean. "Why?" they asked in unison.

"You know why," I said with the stepmotherly authority I have bestowed upon myself. "It's just not okay to watch TV at this hour, before you've done your homework, when it's still light outside."

"I don't have any homework," Hammerhead's brother snarled. "And it's raining."

"Oh, well!" I sang as I turned the vile contraption off, so it could rest up for later, when, at some arbitrary point in time, I will love and worship it with heart and soul.

They trudged off to their rooms and closed their doors. Later I made them a snack of leftover spaghetti and they shoveled it into their mouths with little or no comment. (And I'd even grated fresh Parmesan Reggiano on it! Go figure!)

I am crazy. And I am mean. But only until 5:30 pm. And then, with the flip of a switch, the click of a button, and the shift of an on again/off again attitude, I become sane and nice again. Like magic!

10 Things I Don't Recommend

1. Be about 47 years old.
2. Fall down the stairs and get a huge, ugly bruise on your huge, ugly butt.
3. Three days later, go to the rec center and swim some laps.
4. After your swim, shower off in the public shower. Start off wearing your suit, and then, when you're pretty sure no one else is coming, take your suit off.
5. When three really young, really fit, really pretty young women with three cute babies on their three skinny hips which show no visible signs of trauma come out of nowhere and begin showering next to you, smile at them awkwardly.
6. Decide to be "wacky" and announce: "You're probably all wondering about this horrible bruise on my butt. Well, I'll tell you: I fell down the stairs! Whoo-hoo! Was that ever dumb! And now look at this baby! Did you ever see anything like it?" Show them your butt.
7. Watch as they politely examine your butt, murmuring sympathetically.
8. Laugh. Clear your throat. Hum a little tune.
9. Listen to the simple, quiet sound of water running. Notice the babies are staring at you with consternation.
10. Decide your hair really doesn't need to be conditioned today and get the hell out of there.


Your friend,

(Older and wiser) Aunt Pillowhead

I Fall Down, Go "Boom!"

Aunt Pillowhead fell down the stairs last night.

It looked just like the photo on the left, but for a few minor details. Namely, Aunt Pillowhead:

• Is not twenty-something, but older than that
• Was not in an evening dress, but ratty PJs
• Was not feet down/head up, but head down/feet up
• Wore her hair not swept back from her brow, elegant and shiny, but more dandelion-esque and a little on the dry side
  
• Was not experiencing the event in classic black and white, but in modern living color
• Looked less as though she were fleeing her sinister beau and more like she was running down to her office to get her purse
• Was not on a formal, dramatic, curved staircase made of marble, but five carpeted steps that go from the kitchen to the downstairs
  
• Was not looking wistfully off to her left, but (with a quite surprised expression) straight up at the ceiling
• Did not have her hand on the banister
  
• Was not wearing shoes

And today Aunt Pillowhead has a bruise the size of Milwaukee on her left butt cheek. And it makes her sad and cranky. It also makes sitting, a usually painless activity, really uncomfortable.

And she's keeping her distance from anyone who might just set her off tonight.

Wheeee!

Harrowing ride, full circle. I am always a little amazed when it happens this way, and it always does.

Last night, while I was watching my favorite guilty indulgence, "What Not To Wear"...

("Oh, Aunt Pillowhead," you say. "How could you? Why, just two posts ago you were faulting Blood Runs Cold for her need to judge and feel superior to others, and now you tell me that you LIKE watching two meticulously put-together fashionistas pounce on some poor unsuspecting woman with no sense of style, humiliate her by making her look at videotape of herself looking really bad, force her to throw away all of her ugly, tired, ill-fitting, dated clothing, and then make her over in their own image? You're kidding, right?")

...um, as I was saying, I was watching this show and then Hammerhead came in...

Okay, hang on there. Wait just one minute. You know what? It's not about watching them humiliate her. I like that show because I identify with the fashionistas AND the victim. And I'm telling you, that victim likes the attention and advice, once she gets over being shamed in front of all her friends on national television. And look how much more confident, beautiful, and snazzy she looks afterwards, with the possible exception of a few not-so-great haircuts and one or two times when the make-up just didn't look right. It's a Cinderella thing--the diamond from coal thing, and I'm a sucker for that stuff. Plus, they give her $5,000. That's a wad of dough, not to be sneezed at.

Anyway, Hammerhead came in. "Aunt Pillowhead," he said. "I learned this new card game that I know you'll love. Want to play it?

"Sure," I said. "Just as soon as I see what they're going to do with this poor lady's hair."

"How long?" he asked.

"Ten minutes, tops," I said.

Hammerhead sat on the floor next to me to watch, absently shuffling the deck. "I don't like that hairstyle on her. She looked better before."

"Yeah," I said. "That fake red color is a little shocking. And I'm not crazy about the bangs, either. But it's a good outfit she's got on."

"Can you play now?" he asked.

"Yep."

And we did. Fifteen games of "Llamas!" which was very fun. I won two games. Loser had to kiss the bottom of winner's bare foot, which was my idea and disgusting, but which I knew would delight him, and it did, when I had to kiss his stinky little paws. And I didn't make him kiss mine. (Scary! Old Lady Foot!) We laughed a lot, and I realized (again) that no matter how high up or low down we go, he and I, I need to remember to come back to the center as quickly as I can, so he can find me there when he wants to.

Laughing Buddha

Last night, Hammerhead had his "I Am A Famous Person In History" presentation at his middle school, with the rest of his seventh grade class.

He forgot his orange robe, accidentally left it at home, so he had to be Buddha in a skater tee shirt, jeans, and a pair of new Nike shoes. I wasn't there, but Perfect Man said he did pretty well, all things considered. Also, that Nefertiti was awesome.

The Other Shoe Falls

Ahh, Part 2. Whenever I have a fight with Hammerhead, there's a Part 2. I know it will happen, but I don't know exactly when. It's lurking up there, waiting until things are calm and we are all unawares, and then it swoops down and attacks, hoping for a quick, easy mouthful of my soft, bruised flesh. (Or, to be more precise, of Perfect Man's soft, bruised flesh, but that always hurts me more than it hurts him, I'm pretty sure.)
Part 2 stars Hammerhead's mother, Blood Runs Cold, a tall, beautiful, mean as hell 20 watt bulb. She rides her horse every day, owns a cute little house and a brand-new Audi, takes trips to Europe, Aspen, Florida, and California, courtesy of Perfect Man's generous settlement and our painful alimony payments, which THANK GOD finally stopped two years ago, hasn't held a job in 20 years, does not know how to have a conversation that involves an exchange of information, with both talking AND listening, and so has severed every friendship she has ever had, sometimes more than once. And yet Blood Runs Cold feels completely qualified to stand in judgment of everyone around her, up to, including, and especially me, poor old Aunt Pillowhead.
Of course it's easy to resent the ex-wife and mother of your husband's children, especially when she's tall, beautiful, mean, dumb, and doesn't have to work because you do. Some of this is automatically built into the deal, I acknowledge.
But what's really, really hard to live with is her enabling role in Hammerhead and his brother's struggles to adapt to and navigate the challenge of living in two households, each with different rules, expectations, and routines. During my battle with Hammerhead the other night, he locked himself in his room and called her, crying, saying he hated me and hated it here, which is awful enough to know in and of itself. What makes it more awful is the way she encourages and promotes it. I know it must be very, very hard to be the mother who gets the call from the child in tears who begs to be rescued from the house of hell. I really can't imagine how I might have responded to it if I'd had to deal with that dynamic when my own boys were young. BUT, I'm pretty sure I would not have responded with forty-minute phone calls to my ex-husband three days later (ie: today) outlining all of the ways we are mishandling Hammerhead, all of the things we are doing wrong, and all of the things we should do. Because I think that even in a worried, emotional, and angry state, I would know that that's not where you can make a positive, healthy difference for your kids. Even if Perfect Man and I esteemed Blood Runs Cold's opinion about what good communication and parenting involved, even if we thought that her perspective and opinion of what goes on in this house and how it could be improved had merit, and even if we took every action she recommended, we would probably not be able to affect the kind of change Hammerhead really wants and needs. Because what Hammerhead and his brother both really want and need is what we all want and need: to feel clear, powerful, independent, safe, in control, and capable, no matter where we are, no matter what situation we find ourselves in. Hammerhead's bravado is intensified by his feeling that unless he is in his mother's close proximity, he is undefined and unsafe, and his brother experiences this even more acutely--he is nearly seventeen and has profound separation anxiety when he is away from her, to the point of being unable to spend the night with friends and take trips with his elite soccer team when they play out of state. Her choice to create dependence and neediness in her teenage boys may make her feel important, validated, and superior, but it's having the opposite effect on them. And that's frustrating and sad to see.