Last week was a real bear. There was a Nor’easter storm that came through and, while I’m usually excited about the prospect of a rainy weekend (I call it “off the hook” weather), this one really took me by surprise. I guess, now that I’m a grownup, I have more at stake than I did in the past (when I lived in a condo sans a basement and a house with a musty attic and a roof I never saw).
Now that I’m married and living in a quasi-single house, I am prone to the things I’ve only seen happen to other people, as recounted on the local news: Flooded basements. Leaky roofs. Tears. Cherub-like women in house frocks and bad lipstick. Sirens. (Well, okay, maybe not sirens.)
Because, sure enough, the Sunday when the storm was at its peak, I heard the call of the wild come from my husband as he went into our finished basement to put a box into our freshly carpeted and organized storage closet.
“JILLLLLLLL!”
It reminded me of all the times I used to sneak food in the middle of the night when I was a child. With my mother fast asleep, 3 a.m. was like prime time. It was the eating hour, and I’d curl myself up in the bathroom (where the fan would hide my moaning) and satisfy my craving for chocolate with something other than the broiled dry fish, fruit, and raw broccoli my mother would allow me during the daylight.
Still, there was always the risk of being caught, which made it exciting (in some demented way that tells me I haven’t had enough therapy). And every once in a while, my mother did. Catch me, that is. Find evidence of my binge—say a vagrant cookie crumb or errant piece of cheese on the bathroom tile or counter. And she’d call me on it. She’d say:
“JILLLLLLLL!” Good times.
The memory comes flooding back to me as my husband screams like a woman in her 36th hour of labor.
I run down the stairs to find our new $500 Weider Pro Universal and two sofas awash in an in-ground swimming pool we didn’t order, replete with about one inch of dirty rain water. My ALDO flip flops squish on the carpet as I walk over to get a closer look.
“Oh dear, the carpet’s wet.”
“No kidding.” Dan looks frustrated.
“Well,” I throw my hands up. “Let’s just call someone to fix it and have dinner.” I am a Jewish girl, after all. We’re not equipped for these things.
“No time,” Dan grunts, now sweaty and wet from trying to wrestle the pipe to the sump pump as if it were an alligator trying to eat his leg. “Quick,” he motions to the section of the basement he uses as his music studio. “Start carrying all the electrical equipment out of here.”
I look over at the 400 pounds of amplifiers, microphones, and assorted stereo components, cords twisted around one another like Jamaican braids, and wonder if the water has put him in some sort of altered state. I have no idea how he expects me to haul those football-player-size speakers up the stairs. Besides, I’m eager to get to those vegetable pot stickers.
I open my mouth to tell him that “I’m just not up for a hernia tonight, honey,” when I notice the water now shooting out of the pump like a geyser. Dan is trying to hold it down with his body. But it’s like using the tip of a finger to plug a hole in the Titanic. And I find it difficult to watch him.
So, instead, I turn my head and figure that, unless I can figure out how to morph into Arnold Schwarzenegger within the next 30 seconds, we’ve got another problem. With that, I try to assess where the plugs buried under the now soaking carpet lead to (and how I’ll disarm them without electrocuting myself), Dan moves into action.
Before I know it, the geyser’s turned into a leaky faucet (I have no idea how he did it) and my husband’s shoving keyboards and guitars at me like they’re hot potatoes. He, on the other hand, starts balancing the heavier equipment on his shoulders like Carmen Miranda holding a 3,000 pound set of fruit baskets.
I must say, it was impressive.
Fortunately, none of his stuff was damaged (although a box of my favorite summer shoes didn’t fare as well, SHIT). Especially since our insurance company (Keystone, hello Keystone in Doylestown, YOU SUCK SUCK SUCK) refused to cover us because when the agent (who keeps applying our payments to somebody else’s account—IDIOT) “allegedly” offered us flood insurance or whatever it’s called, they say we turned it down.
“WHY WOULD WE DO THAT?” I scream into the phone. Not the best approach, in hindsight.
Anyway, after we spent the rest of our Sunday soaking up the news that we’d have to pay for the damage caused by mud water flowing through our basement like “namaste” at a yoga convention, I went upstairs to get Winnie, who was perched in front of the window in C’s room. Her usual spot.
That’s when I noticed a leak coming from the ceiling. It had formed the outline of a cloud in what looked like brown poop. I wondered if the $400 duvet cover was ruined but decided to not even go there. Because by then, I’d had enough.
Overwhelmed from the flood and too tired to tackle the roof, I go downstairs to pop in a frozen dinner. After all, hours had passed, we hadn’t eaten, and I’m on Jenny Craig. So I’m acutely and obsessively aware of when it’s time to eat.
I head to the kitchen and retrieve my vegetable potstickers (about 230 calories) and wonder whether we’ll have to trash the Berber carpet in the basement the people before us had installed. Not that I liked it anyway.
As I contemplate what to replace it with, I poke a few holes on the plastic protecting my frozen noodles, place it squarely in the center of the microwave, and hit “start.” I wait for the whirring sound that indicates its cooking, when instead, the entire unit goes black.
I start slamming at the digits, and the clear, end, and start buttons. Nothing happens. The thing is dead. Powerless. (How’s that for irony?) Slowly, my fear and panic escalate.
“DANNNNNN!” Now THIS is an emergency.
I hear a gurgling sound.
“DAN.” Nothing.
“HELP ME!” Still yelling. “FIRE? Help? Hello?”
More gurgling and then gushing.
As I stand there, holding the frozen potstickers, I decide we’ll eat later. Turns out, I am good in emergencies after all.
——————————
On a more positive note, Dan went to a preliminary hearing with you-might-know-who last Tuesday (after the flood and we ripped up all the carpets) to see if we could get to see C again. Ever.
I stayed home to stare in disbelief at the massive studio equipment now crammed in our living room and dining room—its chaos surpassing the hardwood floors and fancy paint job that was once the focal point of our beautiful new home.
It was a good way to distract myself from what Dan was doing—which was, hopefully, making progress. And not playing on the losing end of a pissing match.
And as it turns out, he wasn’t. To the contrary, we finally got to see C this past weekend for the first time in a long time. It was a great weekend and I’ll write more on it later, but it’s not the point of the rest of this post. What is the point is this:
After the flood, the leak, the microwave, the child custody battle, the slow and disastrous weight gain, the half-frozen Jenny Craig meal, and the diss by our insurance company, I got a phone call from my father.
“I’m taking mom to the hospital. She’s got pains in her side and back.”
Huh?
Suddenly, what flood, leak, malfunctioning microwave, misguided ex-wife, and useless homeowner’s policy? What freezer-burnt potstickers? What were those things again? And why do I care? Because when you hear you father say “I’m taking mom to the hospital,” suddenly, nothing else counts.
“Well, what’s wrong with her?”
“We don’t know.” He sounds cranky. Like she’s interrupting him halfway through his favorite episode of Seinfeld. (You know, the one with the bubble boy.)
“Well, what do you mean you don’t know?”
“We’re busy here getting ready. Mom’s in the shower. We’ll call you later.” He hangs up.
Suddenly, I feel sick. Like maybe I need to go too. I call back. My mother answers.
“I’m okay. Don’t worry. Might be appendix. We’ll call you after we see the doctor. Don’t worry. But we’ve got to go.” Click. She sounds like she’s on fire.
I hang up and remember a conversation Lorrie and I just had about her father. It seems last week, when I was in Chicago, the doctors found a lump on his kidney and for a few days, they worried it was a tumor. “Boy,” she said. “It’s amazing how your world just stops. How things just change in a second. How you go from clear to completely out of focus. I can’t handle it.”
Those words now haunt me. Fortunately for Irv (Lorrie’ father), it turned out to be something benign. Unfortunately, for me, however, I am now standing in Lorrie’s shoes—just one week after. Now, it’s my turn.
And even though we still didn’t know for sure that there was anything really wrong with my mother, I felt vulnerable. Alone and useless. Afraid. After all, I know, if not this time, there will come a next time, when the news will not be welcomed.
And I’m not ready for it. Not even close. Because no matter how old you are, you want your mother. It doesn’t matter that you’re at that age. That many of your friends are starting to lose their parents. That someday, our kids will be saying that about us. That we’ll be next. That if we’re lucky, and take care of ourselves, we’ll be them.
I look over at the clutter, still overwhelming our space, but no longer my brain. It had become meaningless. The amplifier could self destruct, dirt and particles and tiny little pieces of knobs and screws and plastic could cover the floor like an oversized pile of plastic throw up and it wouldn’t matter.
My mother is in the hospital. The earth has stopped rotating. Jill has stopped breathing.
The phone rings and it’s my father. “Mom’s in the emergency room, waiting to have a CAT scan.”
“In the emergency room? Why? Is it that bad?”
“Well, she’s in pain. So they want to find out what the problem is.”
“Where are you? At a concert?” I hear music and voices.
“I’m having lunch.”
“At the hospital?”
“No. Quiznos.”
“You’re at Quiznos and mom’s in the emergency room?”
“Yeah. So? What should I do? Sit and stare at her, while she drifts in and out of sleep from the medication? I’m hungry.”
“They gave her medication?”
“I think so. Something.”
“Should I go there? I’m going.” I look around at the manilla folders lining the floor of my office and start flipping them into a pile and tossing papers. “Where the heck are my shoes?”
“Jill, she doesn’t want anybody there. What are you going to do there?”
“I don’t know, Dad. Not have a barbeque chicken melt. I’ll tell you that much.”
“Huh?” I hear chewing.
“So let me get this straight. You can sit for five hours and wait for them to put brakes on your car, but you can’t wait with mom in the hospital?”
“She’s fine. I’ll call you back.” Click.
———————————
As it turns out, my mother spent three days at Holy Redeemer only to find out that she passed a kidney stone. Joyfully and gloriously anticlimactic. Hallelujah.
Lorrie, on the other hand, called me this morning to tell me that her father is still having pain and they want to go in for more tests. Her husband Frank’s father, who has Parkinson’s, fell over the weekend and broke his hip. At 80, they think he’ll never walk or leave the hospital again.
This time of life—middle age—can be so glorious. We’re so grownup. We don’t sweat the small stuff. We know how to stand up for what we want. We don’t want to save the world anymore, but we’re not ready to give up on it either. Or on doing our part.
We’re a little chubbier than we used to be, but much more okay with it than ever before. We’ll eat chocolate with a little less guilt, because we’re tired of depriving ourselves. After all, life is short. We welcome control top pantyhose, as long as we don’t have to wear them more than once a month. We’ll work out when we can and be proud of ourselves for staying awake past 10 o’clock. We don’t tweak out if we spend more than we should have at Nordstroms.
We’re mainly concerned with taking hormone replacement therapy, plucking or waxing, and turbo-saving for retirement.
Yet, at the same time, it can be an awful time. Because the seasons are changing. Our choices are dwindling and our parents, well, we realize they may not be around forever. The generations are cycling—and we’re moving up on the chain. We realize that we better take care of our business—any residual resentments or childhood issues—because someday not so far away, anymore, we won’t always have our parents to help us resolve them.
I think about the food I used to eat in the bathroom. And actually long for those moments, when my mother was young. And I was afraid she would find me.
———————————
Now that the crises of the past few weeks are either over or under control, I take a moment to consider what might come next. I hope, pray, and throw out an energy beam to whoever, that we get a few weeks of calm, followed by a gust of motivation to write that book. It’s gonna be a good book. A great book. And I want my parents around to see it.
Because if they’re not, I’ll be pissed. (You hear that Keystone. Pissed. You know what that looks like, don’t ya?)
Until next time.
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Last week was a real bear. There was a Nor’easter storm that came through and, while I’m usually excited about the prospect of a rainy weekend (I call it “off the hook” weather), this one really took me by surprise. I guess, now that I’m a grownup, I have more at stake than I did in the past (when I lived in a condo sans a basement and a house with a musty attic and a roof I never saw).

Now that I’m married and living in a quasi-single house, I am prone to the things I’ve only seen happen to other people, as recounted on the local news: Flooded basements. Leaky roofs. Tears. Cherub-like women in house frocks and bad lipstick. Sirens. (Well, okay, maybe not sirens.)

Because, sure enough, the Sunday when the storm was at its peak, I heard the call of the wild come from my husband as he went into our finished basement to put a box into our freshly carpeted and organized storage closet.

“JILLLLLLLL!”

It reminded me of all the times I used to sneak food in the middle of the night when I was a child. With my mother fast asleep, 3 a.m. was like prime time. It was the eating hour, and I’d curl myself up in the bathroom (where the fan would hide my moaning) and satisfy my craving for chocolate with something other than the broiled dry fish, fruit, and raw broccoli my mother would allow me during the daylight.

Still, there was always the risk of being caught, which made it exciting (in some demented way that tells me I haven’t had enough therapy). And every once in a while, my mother did. Catch me, that is. Find evidence of my binge—say a vagrant cookie crumb or errant piece of cheese on the bathroom tile or counter. And she’d call me on it. She’d say:

“JILLLLLLLL!” Good times.

The memory comes flooding back to me as my husband screams like a woman in her 36th hour of labor.

I run down the stairs to find our new $500 Weider Pro Universal and two sofas awash in an in-ground swimming pool we didn’t order, replete with about one inch of dirty rain water. My ALDO flip flops squish on the carpet as I walk over to get a closer look.

“Oh dear, the carpet’s wet.”

“No kidding.” Dan looks frustrated.

“Well,” I throw my hands up. “Let’s just call someone to fix it and have dinner.” I am a Jewish girl, after all. We’re not equipped for these things.

“No time,” Dan grunts, now sweaty and wet from trying to wrestle the pipe to the sump pump as if it were an alligator trying to eat his leg. “Quick,” he motions to the section of the basement he uses as his music studio. “Start carrying all the electrical equipment out of here.”

I look over at the 400 pounds of amplifiers, microphones, and assorted stereo components, cords twisted around one another like Jamaican braids, and wonder if the water has put him in some sort of altered state. I have no idea how he expects me to haul those football-player-size speakers up the stairs. Besides, I’m eager to get to those vegetable pot stickers.

I open my mouth to tell him that “I’m just not up for a hernia tonight, honey,” when I notice the water now shooting out of the pump like a geyser. Dan is trying to hold it down with his body. But it’s like using the tip of a finger to plug a hole in the Titanic. And I find it difficult to watch him.

So, instead, I turn my head and figure that, unless I can figure out how to morph into Arnold Schwarzenegger within the next 30 seconds, we’ve got another problem. With that, I try to assess where the plugs buried under the now soaking carpet lead to (and how I’ll disarm them without electrocuting myself), Dan moves into action.

Before I know it, the geyser’s turned into a leaky faucet (I have no idea how he did it) and my husband’s shoving keyboards and guitars at me like they’re hot potatoes. He, on the other hand, starts balancing the heavier equipment on his shoulders like Carmen Miranda holding a 3,000 pound set of fruit baskets.

I must say, it was impressive.

Fortunately, none of his stuff was damaged (although a box of my favorite summer shoes didn’t fare as well, SHIT). Especially since our insurance company (Keystone, hello Keystone in Doylestown, YOU SUCK SUCK SUCK) refused to cover us because when the agent (who keeps applying our payments to somebody else’s account—IDIOT) “allegedly” offered us flood insurance or whatever it’s called, they say we turned it down.

“WHY WOULD WE DO THAT?” I scream into the phone. Not the best approach, in hindsight.

Anyway, after we spent the rest of our Sunday soaking up the news that we’d have to pay for the damage caused by mud water flowing through our basement like “namaste” at a yoga convention, I went upstairs to get Winnie, who was perched in front of the window in C’s room. Her usual spot.

That’s when I noticed a leak coming from the ceiling. It had formed the outline of a cloud in what looked like brown poop. I wondered if the $400 duvet cover was ruined but decided to not even go there. Because by then, I’d had enough.

Overwhelmed from the flood and too tired to tackle the roof, I go downstairs to pop in a frozen dinner. After all, hours had passed, we hadn’t eaten, and I’m on Jenny Craig. So I’m acutely and obsessively aware of when it’s time to eat.

I head to the kitchen and retrieve my vegetable potstickers (about 230 calories) and wonder whether we’ll have to trash the Berber carpet in the basement the people before us had installed. Not that I liked it anyway.

As I contemplate what to replace it with, I poke a few holes on the plastic protecting my frozen noodles, place it squarely in the center of the microwave, and hit “start.” I wait for the whirring sound that indicates its cooking, when instead, the entire unit goes black.

I start slamming at the digits, and the clear, end, and start buttons. Nothing happens. The thing is dead. Powerless. (How’s that for irony?) Slowly, my fear and panic escalate.

“DANNNNNN!” Now THIS is an emergency.

I hear a gurgling sound.

“DAN.” Nothing.

“HELP ME!” Still yelling. “FIRE? Help? Hello?”

More gurgling and then gushing.

As I stand there, holding the frozen potstickers, I decide we’ll eat later. Turns out, I am good in emergencies after all.

——————————

On a more positive note, Dan went to a preliminary hearing with you-might-know-who last Tuesday (after the flood and we ripped up all the carpets) to see if we could get to see C again. Ever.

I stayed home to stare in disbelief at the massive studio equipment now crammed in our living room and dining room—its chaos surpassing the hardwood floors and fancy paint job that was once the focal point of our beautiful new home.

It was a good way to distract myself from what Dan was doing—which was, hopefully, making progress. And not playing on the losing end of a pissing match.

And as it turns out, he wasn’t. To the contrary, we finally got to see C this past weekend for the first time in a long time. It was a great weekend and I’ll write more on it later, but it’s not the point of the rest of this post. What is the point is this:

After the flood, the leak, the microwave, the child custody battle, the slow and disastrous weight gain, the half-frozen Jenny Craig meal, and the diss by our insurance company, I got a phone call from my father.

“I’m taking mom to the hospital. She’s got pains in her side and back.”

Huh?

Suddenly, what flood, leak, malfunctioning microwave, misguided ex-wife, and useless homeowner’s policy? What freezer-burnt potstickers? What were those things again? And why do I care? Because when you hear you father say “I’m taking mom to the hospital,” suddenly, nothing else counts.

“Well, what’s wrong with her?”

“We don’t know.” He sounds cranky. Like she’s interrupting him halfway through his favorite episode of Seinfeld. (You know, the one with the bubble boy.)

“Well, what do you mean you don’t know?”

“We’re busy here getting ready. Mom’s in the shower. We’ll call you later.” He hangs up.

Suddenly, I feel sick. Like maybe I need to go too. I call back. My mother answers.

“I’m okay. Don’t worry. Might be appendix. We’ll call you after we see the doctor. Don’t worry. But we’ve got to go.” Click. She sounds like she’s on fire.

I hang up and remember a conversation Lorrie and I just had about her father. It seems last week, when I was in Chicago, the doctors found a lump on his kidney and for a few days, they worried it was a tumor. “Boy,” she said. “It’s amazing how your world just stops. How things just change in a second. How you go from clear to completely out of focus. I can’t handle it.”

Those words now haunt me. Fortunately for Irv (Lorrie’ father), it turned out to be something benign. Unfortunately, for me, however, I am now standing in Lorrie’s shoes—just one week after. Now, it’s my turn.

And even though we still didn’t know for sure that there was anything really wrong with my mother, I felt vulnerable. Alone and useless. Afraid. After all, I know, if not this time, there will come a next time, when the news will not be welcomed.

And I’m not ready for it. Not even close. Because no matter how old you are, you want your mother. It doesn’t matter that you’re at that age. That many of your friends are starting to lose their parents. That someday, our kids will be saying that about us. That we’ll be next. That if we’re lucky, and take care of ourselves, we’ll be them.

I look over at the clutter, still overwhelming our space, but no longer my brain. It had become meaningless. The amplifier could self destruct, dirt and particles and tiny little pieces of knobs and screws and plastic could cover the floor like an oversized pile of plastic throw up and it wouldn’t matter.

My mother is in the hospital. The earth has stopped rotating. Jill has stopped breathing.

The phone rings and it’s my father. “Mom’s in the emergency room, waiting to have a CAT scan.”

“In the emergency room? Why? Is it that bad?”

“Well, she’s in pain. So they want to find out what the problem is.”

“Where are you? At a concert?” I hear music and voices.

“I’m having lunch.”

“At the hospital?”

“No. Quiznos.”

“You’re at Quiznos and mom’s in the emergency room?”

“Yeah. So? What should I do? Sit and stare at her, while she drifts in and out of sleep from the medication? I’m hungry.”

“They gave her medication?”

“I think so. Something.”

“Should I go there? I’m going.” I look around at the manilla folders lining the floor of my office and start flipping them into a pile and tossing papers. “Where the heck are my shoes?”

“Jill, she doesn’t want anybody there. What are you going to do there?”

“I don’t know, Dad. Not have a barbeque chicken melt. I’ll tell you that much.”

“Huh?” I hear chewing.

“So let me get this straight. You can sit for five hours and wait for them to put brakes on your car, but you can’t wait with mom in the hospital?”

“She’s fine. I’ll call you back.” Click.

———————————

As it turns out, my mother spent three days at Holy Redeemer only to find out that she passed a kidney stone. Joyfully and gloriously anticlimactic. Hallelujah.

Lorrie, on the other hand, called me this morning to tell me that her father is still having pain and they want to go in for more tests. Her husband Frank’s father, who has Parkinson’s, fell over the weekend and broke his hip. At 80, they think he’ll never walk or leave the hospital again.

This time of life—middle age—can be so glorious. We’re so grownup. We don’t sweat the small stuff. We know how to stand up for what we want. We don’t want to save the world anymore, but we’re not ready to give up on it either. Or on doing our part.

We’re a little chubbier than we used to be, but much more okay with it than ever before. We’ll eat chocolate with a little less guilt, because we’re tired of depriving ourselves. After all, life is short. We welcome control top pantyhose, as long as we don’t have to wear them more than once a month. We’ll work out when we can and be proud of ourselves for staying awake past 10 o’clock. We don’t tweak out if we spend more than we should have at Nordstroms.

We’re mainly concerned with taking hormone replacement therapy, plucking or waxing, and turbo-saving for retirement.

Yet, at the same time, it can be an awful time. Because the seasons are changing. Our choices are dwindling and our parents, well, we realize they may not be around forever. The generations are cycling—and we’re moving up on the chain. We realize that we better take care of our business—any residual resentments or childhood issues—because someday not so far away, anymore, we won’t always have our parents to help us resolve them.

I think about the food I used to eat in the bathroom. And actually long for those moments, when my mother was young. And I was afraid she would find me.
———————————
Now that the crises of the past few weeks are either over or under control, I take a moment to consider what might come next. I hope, pray, and throw out an energy beam to whoever, that we get a few weeks of calm, followed by a gust of motivation to write that book. It’s gonna be a good book. A great book. And I want my parents around to see it.

Because if they’re not, I’ll be pissed. (You hear that Keystone. Pissed. You know what that looks like, don’t ya?)

Until next time.
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I’m sitting at Chicago O’Hare Airport, heading home after facilitating a class for Gatorade (one of my clients) and wondering what it is about being at the airport that makes everybody want to eat. I mean, I just had a huge sandwich, chips (which frankly, I didn’t need), a soda, a bottle of water, a pretzel, and since my gate is directly across the way from McDonald’s, I’m thinking that a chocolate shake would hit the spot right about now.
And I’m not alone. I mean, pretty much everybody I see is either eating or drinking something that, honestly, looks rather unhealthy (think fried chicken fingers, oily roast beef sandwiches, and chocolate-covered peanuts).
Is it because there are so many places to get food? Do you think McDonalds and Starbucks bribe tower operators with french fries and lattes so they’ll delay flights and trigger emotional eaters (like me) into a buying frenzy?
I mean, what gives?
I don’t know about you, but I’m thinking there are better and more productive ways to spend the time we’re forced to endure while waiting for our flights. Why aren’t there any, say, nail salons, or spa’s offering massages and facials at the airport? (I can see it now: C’mon in for the “orange alert special” where we aim to eliminate bad corns and callouses.)
Why are there no banks? Post offices? UPS stores? How about theaters or chain stores? Doctor’s offices and pharmacies, where I can get and then refill my Zyrtec prescription. What about a few mini-gyms, where people can take their anxiety out on a treadmill instead of flight attendants or, worse, fellow travelers?
It makes me mad. I mean, it would be uber helpful to mail a letter while I wait to board my flight. Deposit that Gap return check. Ship a package. Get a pap smear. Fix a chip on my pinky finger. Buy those paper clips I keep forgetting to get at Staples.
Maybe, just maybe, if I could bench press at the airport, I would have more toned triceps and a better attitude. Give this middle-aged woman a place to strengthen her bones. Her nailbeds. Her love handles.
GIVE ME SOMETHING TO DO OTHER THAN EAT.
Perhaps if we (okay, me) had some of these things, we wouldn’t be so damn bloated and agitated when we travel.
I’m just saying.
And now that a small child and his extended family have sat down next to me with a series of cheeseburgers, I’m off for a milkshake. The scent is just too much for my frontal cortex.
Besides, I’m only human.
——————————————–
Okay, so since my last post, Dan and I have been Secretized.
No, we have not been anointed with special cream, invited to any Salem witch ceremonies, or traveled to Tibet to meet with the Dalai Lama. (Although we do like animals.)
No, no, we read the book “The Secret.” We watched the movie. We listened to the DVDs. We’ve been on www.thesecret.com, www.thesecretsoupforyoursoul.com, and www.universeisus.com.
And now, we can recite the concepts as performance art.
I tell you, I’m making fun here, but the Secret really does rock. It’s all about the law of attraction and energy and that we’re not really cellulite and good boobs, and thick wavy hair, and neuroses, but a collection of millions of little pin-like atoms of energy (making this up now)that, once released into the atmosphere, find their way to like energy bringing it back to us (think you lose 15 pounds, you gain 20 back) so that we may benefit by achieving our wildest dreams. Or, done poorly, raise the devil from a sound sleep.
Either one.
How does it work? Well, you’ll have to read it for yourself to know for sure, but in my elementary interpretation, it states something like this:
I’m supposed to ask for stuff as if I’ve already gotten it and then believe down to my itty bitty little heartstrings that it will be harkened to me and, alas, I will be rich and thin and can stop coloring my hair because it will be naturally a glorious auburn and I’ll stop aging entirely. There will no longer be hair on my chin. And any book I write will automatically go up for auction with publishers.
Well, that’s an oversimplification, but I think it gives you the gist. And even though it sounds like I’m mocking the book, really, I’m not, because Dan and I really do believe that embracing it has made a difference in our lives. For example, I no longer wake up thinking, “Oh shit.”
Instead, I remember, that whatever I want is in reach. I just have to ask for it, believe I will have it, and then digest some sort of mind-altering substance (caffeine, heroin, Women’s Correctol) to complete the ritual.
Since we’re been practicing, my freelance work has picked up, my creativity feels to be at its peak, and Dan has even gotten to talk to C on the telephone, at least. (Something he’s not been able to do for the past four months.)
So, in that spirit, I’m on the phone with my mother one day (‘cause I’m long overdue for a mother story), when I decide to tell her about the Secret. After all, she and my dad have been a bit whiny lately and I think their negative energy is just coming back to them in the form of gas and clogged sinuses and, well, too many “That 70s Show” reruns.
I’m telling my mother that they both have to “change their frequencies”—put themselves on a new lighter and more positive set of energy beams. Show gratitude and love for all the good things and find a way to be happy. Even if my father has a bad golf game or my mother misses a day at Curves.
That if they do, the good things they put out will come back. I go on with a very inspired pep talk—as if I’m Donald Trump telling her how to set up a new savings account. And just as I’m recounting the merits of living in this newfound joyfulness, she responds with this:
“Do you know how dangerous belly fat is?”
“Mom, what does this have to do with the Secret?”
“Well, Oprah had those Secret folks on. And Dr. Oz is on right now. Have you ever seen Dr. Oz. He’s wonderful. And he talks about belly fat. Do you have belly fat? I think you do.”
How does the conversation always come back to my fat? HOW? HOW? (Calm down, Jill, remember, ask and you shall receive. GOD DAMN IT, THINK POSITIVELY.)
Although, I guess I shouldn’t feel bad. Because she really gives it to my poor father these days too. In fact, he tells me that just the other day, he and my mom were out for lunch when the waitress delivered his hamburger with a healthy serving of French fries.
So, he picks one up and aims it towards his mouth like a scud missile, when he stops just short of his lips to contemplate my mother’s reaction. Would she yell? Would she miss it if he moved quickly? Would she say, “Life is short, have as many as you want?” Would she lean over the table and give him the best kiss of their marriage? What would she do?
But she didn’t do any of this. Instead, she stood up, put on her coat, grabbed her pocketbook, and, in an irritated huff, said goodbye and walked out, leaving my poor and perplexed father sitting there holding a deep fried piece of potato.
No doubt, wondering what he had done to deserve it. (And therein lays the crux of my childhood. But I’m over it now, Mom, really. I LOVE YOU!!!)
————————————————–
I was supposed to fly home last night but, surprise, there was a snowstorm in April in Chicago and my flight was cancelled so they put me on this one, the next day. It was supposed to leave three hours ago. Now, I’m on the plane, and, without a lot of soda and candy to keep the masses satisfied, people are fidgety. The flight is full, carrying the residual from last night’s cancellations, and the pilot is speaking. I can barely understand him.
I’m cranky.
“Folks,” he says. Why do they always call us folks? Why not, “Oh mighty and loyal customers without whom I could not afford my mortgage…?” Or, why don’t they leave their ivory castles and come down through the aisles to talk to the people? Shake hands? Kiss babies? Face time goes a long way in business. Didn’t they learn that in flight school?
“We just heard from the control tower.” He sounds like he’s talking to us from under a foam pillow. “And uh…”
He’s stammering. Not good.
“…and so, the planes have to circle around several times, and well, it takes them off track…”
Just tell me: How long do I have pack this too-many pounds of potatoes into a two-pound seat?
“…and so, we are now scheduled for takeoff in two hours.”
TWO MORE HOURS? Just sitting here? That puts me at serious risk of blood clotting. Going out like David Bloom, embedded with the soldiers in Iraq, who died from a blood embolism. Or whatever.
“We just don’t like to fly in thunderstorms, so we’re grounded until control tower says it’s okay to get moving.”
Oh sure, thunderstorms. Lame. I mean, what do you sell here?
Once, an old boyfriend and I went to a Kentucky Fried Chicken and ordered all white meat. They said they were out. Kentucky Fried Chicken was out of chicken. So we said, “Hey, what do you sell here?” And then left, snickering.
As I think about whether I’ll ever get home, the flight attendant (stewardess) with too much eye makeup and a bad dye job asks me if I mind moving back two rows to the very last row. Where even though I’ll keep my window seat, I shouldn’t expect to find a window.
I immediately want to say, “You’re damn straight I mind.” But I hold off to hear the rest of her explanation, since my seatmates are quite eager to move. Friggin good Samaritans. They bug me. (If you’re reading, hi guys! )
“The little children are afraid and need to be by a window.”
I look over to find a mom, dad, and two teary toddlers standing there, looking at me as if they’re trapped in Barney’s jaw and I’m the only person who can yank them free. And then, method acting to hide my bitterness and resentment (this is my window seat, MINE MINE MINE), I say, “Sure. Yes, why not? Be happy to. My pleasure. Can’t wait.”
Little bastards. Maybe I’m clausterphobic? Did anyone ever stop to think of that? What are they going to do next, ask me to fly on the wing?
Boy, I’ll tell you what: If I miss Gray’s Anatomy because of thunderstorms, well, heads will ROLL.
That’s all I’m saying.
At least until next time.
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I’m sitting at Chicago O’Hare Airport, heading home after facilitating a class for Gatorade (one of my clients) and wondering what it is about being at the airport that makes everybody want to eat. I mean, I just had a huge sandwich, chips (which frankly, I didn’t need), a soda, a bottle of water, a pretzel, and since my gate is directly across the way from McDonald’s, I’m thinking that a chocolate shake would hit the spot right about now.

And I’m not alone. I mean, pretty much everybody I see is either eating or drinking something that, honestly, looks rather unhealthy (think fried chicken fingers, oily roast beef sandwiches, and chocolate-covered peanuts).

Is it because there are so many places to get food? Do you think McDonalds and Starbucks bribe tower operators with french fries and lattes so they’ll delay flights and trigger emotional eaters (like me) into a buying frenzy?

I mean, what gives?

I don’t know about you, but I’m thinking there are better and more productive ways to spend the time we’re forced to endure while waiting for our flights. Why aren’t there any, say, nail salons, or spa’s offering massages and facials at the airport? (I can see it now: C’mon in for the “orange alert special” where we aim to eliminate bad corns and callouses.)

Why are there no banks? Post offices? UPS stores? How about theaters or chain stores? Doctor’s offices and pharmacies, where I can get and then refill my Zyrtec prescription. What about a few mini-gyms, where people can take their anxiety out on a treadmill instead of flight attendants or, worse, fellow travelers?

It makes me mad. I mean, it would be uber helpful to mail a letter while I wait to board my flight. Deposit that Gap return check. Ship a package. Get a pap smear. Fix a chip on my pinky finger. Buy those paper clips I keep forgetting to get at Staples.

Maybe, just maybe, if I could bench press at the airport, I would have more toned triceps and a better attitude. Give this middle-aged woman a place to strengthen her bones. Her nailbeds. Her love handles.

GIVE ME SOMETHING TO DO OTHER THAN EAT.

Perhaps if we (okay, me) had some of these things, we wouldn’t be so damn bloated and agitated when we travel.

I’m just saying.

And now that a small child and his extended family have sat down next to me with a series of cheeseburgers, I’m off for a milkshake. The scent is just too much for my frontal cortex.

Besides, I’m only human.
——————————————–

Okay, so since my last post, Dan and I have been Secretized.

No, we have not been anointed with special cream, invited to any Salem witch ceremonies, or traveled to Tibet to meet with the Dalai Lama. (Although we do like animals.)

No, no, we read the book “The Secret.” We watched the movie. We listened to the DVDs. We’ve been on www.thesecret.com, www.thesecretsoupforyoursoul.com, and www.universeisus.com.

And now, we can recite the concepts as performance art.

I tell you, I’m making fun here, but the Secret really does rock. It’s all about the law of attraction and energy and that we’re not really cellulite and good boobs, and thick wavy hair, and neuroses, but a collection of millions of little pin-like atoms of energy (making this up now)that, once released into the atmosphere, find their way to like energy bringing it back to us (think you lose 15 pounds, you gain 20 back) so that we may benefit by achieving our wildest dreams. Or, done poorly, raise the devil from a sound sleep.

Either one.

How does it work? Well, you’ll have to read it for yourself to know for sure, but in my elementary interpretation, it states something like this:

I’m supposed to ask for stuff as if I’ve already gotten it and then believe down to my itty bitty little heartstrings that it will be harkened to me and, alas, I will be rich and thin and can stop coloring my hair because it will be naturally a glorious auburn and I’ll stop aging entirely. There will no longer be hair on my chin. And any book I write will automatically go up for auction with publishers.

Well, that’s an oversimplification, but I think it gives you the gist. And even though it sounds like I’m mocking the book, really, I’m not, because Dan and I really do believe that embracing it has made a difference in our lives. For example, I no longer wake up thinking, “Oh shit.”

Instead, I remember, that whatever I want is in reach. I just have to ask for it, believe I will have it, and then digest some sort of mind-altering substance (caffeine, heroin, Women’s Correctol) to complete the ritual.

Since we’re been practicing, my freelance work has picked up, my creativity feels to be at its peak, and Dan has even gotten to talk to C on the telephone, at least. (Something he’s not been able to do for the past four months.)

So, in that spirit, I’m on the phone with my mother one day (‘cause I’m long overdue for a mother story), when I decide to tell her about the Secret. After all, she and my dad have been a bit whiny lately and I think their negative energy is just coming back to them in the form of gas and clogged sinuses and, well, too many “That 70s Show” reruns.

I’m telling my mother that they both have to “change their frequencies”—put themselves on a new lighter and more positive set of energy beams. Show gratitude and love for all the good things and find a way to be happy. Even if my father has a bad golf game or my mother misses a day at Curves.

That if they do, the good things they put out will come back. I go on with a very inspired pep talk—as if I’m Donald Trump telling her how to set up a new savings account. And just as I’m recounting the merits of living in this newfound joyfulness, she responds with this:

“Do you know how dangerous belly fat is?”

“Mom, what does this have to do with the Secret?”

“Well, Oprah had those Secret folks on. And Dr. Oz is on right now. Have you ever seen Dr. Oz. He’s wonderful. And he talks about belly fat. Do you have belly fat? I think you do.”

How does the conversation always come back to my fat? HOW? HOW? (Calm down, Jill, remember, ask and you shall receive. GOD DAMN IT, THINK POSITIVELY.)

Although, I guess I shouldn’t feel bad. Because she really gives it to my poor father these days too. In fact, he tells me that just the other day, he and my mom were out for lunch when the waitress delivered his hamburger with a healthy serving of French fries.

So, he picks one up and aims it towards his mouth like a scud missile, when he stops just short of his lips to contemplate my mother’s reaction. Would she yell? Would she miss it if he moved quickly? Would she say, “Life is short, have as many as you want?” Would she lean over the table and give him the best kiss of their marriage? What would she do?

But she didn’t do any of this. Instead, she stood up, put on her coat, grabbed her pocketbook, and, in an irritated huff, said goodbye and walked out, leaving my poor and perplexed father sitting there holding a deep fried piece of potato.

No doubt, wondering what he had done to deserve it. (And therein lays the crux of my childhood. But I’m over it now, Mom, really. I LOVE YOU!!!)

————————————————–

I was supposed to fly home last night but, surprise, there was a snowstorm in April in Chicago and my flight was cancelled so they put me on this one, the next day. It was supposed to leave three hours ago. Now, I’m on the plane, and, without a lot of soda and candy to keep the masses satisfied, people are fidgety. The flight is full, carrying the residual from last night’s cancellations, and the pilot is speaking. I can barely understand him.

I’m cranky.

“Folks,” he says. Why do they always call us folks? Why not, “Oh mighty and loyal customers without whom I could not afford my mortgage…?” Or, why don’t they leave their ivory castles and come down through the aisles to talk to the people? Shake hands? Kiss babies? Face time goes a long way in business. Didn’t they learn that in flight school?

“We just heard from the control tower.” He sounds like he’s talking to us from under a foam pillow. “And uh…”

He’s stammering. Not good.

“…and so, the planes have to circle around several times, and well, it takes them off track…”

Just tell me: How long do I have pack this too-many pounds of potatoes into a two-pound seat?

“…and so, we are now scheduled for takeoff in two hours.”

TWO MORE HOURS? Just sitting here? That puts me at serious risk of blood clotting. Going out like David Bloom, embedded with the soldiers in Iraq, who died from a blood embolism. Or whatever.

“We just don’t like to fly in thunderstorms, so we’re grounded until control tower says it’s okay to get moving.”

Oh sure, thunderstorms. Lame. I mean, what do you sell here?

Once, an old boyfriend and I went to a Kentucky Fried Chicken and ordered all white meat. They said they were out. Kentucky Fried Chicken was out of chicken. So we said, “Hey, what do you sell here?” And then left, snickering.

As I think about whether I’ll ever get home, the flight attendant (stewardess) with too much eye makeup and a bad dye job asks me if I mind moving back two rows to the very last row. Where even though I’ll keep my window seat, I shouldn’t expect to find a window.

I immediately want to say, “You’re damn straight I mind.” But I hold off to hear the rest of her explanation, since my seatmates are quite eager to move. Friggin good Samaritans. They bug me. (If you’re reading, hi guys! )

“The little children are afraid and need to be by a window.”

I look over to find a mom, dad, and two teary toddlers standing there, looking at me as if they’re trapped in Barney’s jaw and I’m the only person who can yank them free. And then, method acting to hide my bitterness and resentment (this is my window seat, MINE MINE MINE), I say, “Sure. Yes, why not? Be happy to. My pleasure. Can’t wait.”

Little bastards. Maybe I’m clausterphobic? Did anyone ever stop to think of that? What are they going to do next, ask me to fly on the wing?

Boy, I’ll tell you what: If I miss Gray’s Anatomy because of thunderstorms, well, heads will ROLL.

That’s all I’m saying.

At least until next time.
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