lesson learned. really.

Last year, I posted about Aron Ralston, the man who lost his hand in a hiking accident. Well, he didn't lose it, exactly. He knew where it was because he had cut it off himself, but it was gone either way. I posted about how I had learned a lesson from his mistake, and I was going to do a better job of letting people know where I'd be hiking. And, for a while, I did. But like most lessons that you don't learn through personal experience, it didn't stick.

I've been hiking a lot since the weather changed, and I have been sloppy as can be about it...parking my car, strapping on my ipod, and heading alone into the hills. Or worse. No ipod, but a kid or three, with no cell phone, no first aid kit, and no note to let anyone know where we've gone. And, let us not forget: I am a trained Girl Scout leader. I would never do this with my troop but, somehow, with my own kids, I've been entirely laissez faire.

On Friday, I took Jonah, Emily, and Emily's friend Monica to the Nature Center. I have been eating a lot, and wanted some extra exercise. Plus, Jonah had been inside all morning, and needed some good old fashioned tuckering out. So we started on the red trail and then, rather than cutting over to the Jonah-friendly light blue trail like usual, we headed up the yellow trail. Now, I do the yellow trail myself all the time. It's about a mile and a half, gently rising and falling, only moderately challenging. I had confidence in Jonah's ability to handle it. But I forgot about the streams, which are narrow and not too full, even after the runoff, and which often have log bridges for crossing, but which sometimes have to be crossed by hopping from rock to rock. Jonah found those a bit unnerving, but he handled them with my help.

Then the girls found the treasure hunt. Someone had placed a series of ribbons on trees with pushpins. Ostensibly, the first person to find all of them would win a prize. The first pin was at the head of the green trail, which forks off from the yellow trail that we were hiking. I'd never hiked the green trail before, but the girls were really excited about looking for some of the ribbons, the day was beautiful, and Jonah was still going strong. So we headed off on the green trail, and walked and walked and walked. We found one ribbon and, by the time we got back to the yellow trail, we were tired, and glad to be near the end of the loop.

We had only one more stream to cross. Emily was showing me a way to pick across it, but Jonah was nervous and cranky and suddenly, trying to watch Emily and my own feet while simultaneously holding Jonah's hand and showing him where to step, I brought my foot down on a patch of slimy moss, and pitched into the stream, taking Jonah with me. I got wet; Jonah got wetter. He had bruised his knee; I had sliced a neat piece of flesh from the ball of my thumb and was bleeding, although not too badly.

I was about a half mile deep in the woods. Jonah was crying, but there was no one around to hear us. I could do nothing for my thumb but stick it in my mouth. I had no band-aid for me, no instant ice pack for him. Nothing. I managed to get us both up, carried him across the stream, and gently led us all back home.

Ultimately, we were fine but, all weekend, thinking about how much worse it could have been has been terrifying. What if he had hit his head? What if I had really cut myself badly?

I've dug out my old fanny pack, and I'll be keeping it in the car with some bandages, a tube of neosporin, my swiss army knife, a small bottle of water, and a cold pack inside. If I go alone, I'll let someone know where I am or, at least, leave a note in the car. If I take the kids and I'm the only adult, I'll be sure not to head that deep into the woods without a phone again.

Hiking is such a wonderful way to get some motion in my day and to spend time with the kids. I've been enjoying both the effort and the result, and going for longer and more challenging experiences, both alone and with my family. It's been easy to forget that, even on a marked trail close to home, it's not a danger-free endeavor.

From now on, I need to work harder at remembering.

news flash: temperature in hades drops alarmingly

Seriously, just when you think you've seen it all...just when you're sure you've got it all figured out...just when you kind of make a little bit of peace with the fucked-up-ed-ness that is your family life...

Your parents make it all weird again.

But this time -- hold on to your hats -- it was in a good way. The lead in is long, and boring if you're not part of my family, and barely worth telling. All you need to know is that there was a thing, and another thing, and someone did something, and someone didn't do something, and there was a lot of gossip and sniping and snarking to be had. My mom was in on it and I, of course, had called and told my dad. So now they were both shooting all they had at a shared target. I mean, it was the same mutual enemy as ever, but they both had pretty valid reasons for some fresh antipathy.

My dad called me to ask how the story ended, but I didn't know, so -- feeling flush with the excitement of seeing them both (together! at grandma's birthday! and grandchildren handoffs! amicable! chatty!) in Florida -- I conferenced in my mom. My dad, cheerfully impressed with the very 21st century technology of the whole thing, went with it and, next thing I knew, I was hosting a conference call with my mom and my dad for the next 53 minutes and 12 seconds. They talked to each other about the story and the players involved, and people's bad behavior, and other people, and, you know, fat people and homely people and poorly dressed people and, of course, the ever-popular Dead People.

And the rhythm of it all was so familiar to me, and so wonderful. It was like when you taste something that you haven't had for so long and, until you're eating it again, you've forgotten how much you love it. It was so great that, most of the time, I just listened. I didn't talk much at all. (shut up. it's true.)

I couldn't believe it, really. Fifteen years later, and things were, you know, normal. And different. But ok. They're both fine now, and it's not like all of their stuff never happened, or like the stuff at the end is forgotten, or maybe it's even not really forgiven, but just kind of over, and put away.

For a little while today, I had two parents at once. It was such a treasure, such a gift, such a decadent and unimaginable luxury. I am overwhelmed with gratitude -- to who? my dad? the universe? time, which really, I guess, does heal everything? -- just thinking about it.

hey, girlfriend!

Last night at about 9:45, Andrew came upstairs to find me crying in the family room. Not sniffling, mind you. Crying. Why? Who knows, exactly. Everything. But what brought it on, what often brings it on, was Sex and the City.

Andrew thinks it's bad for me, Sex and the City. Too much New York. Usually I watch, hooting, "Pascalou! Honey? Did you see?!? That's Pascalou she's in front of! Oh, I love Pascalou. Remember that time we went there for dinner?" Or, you know, something like that....bemoaning the loss of the cherry blossoms in springtime, decent restaurants, taxis, something to do.

Last night, though, it wasn't New York I was mourning. Or at least, I wasn't mourning it most.

I don't know exactly what happened. Charlotte had a miscarriage and Carrie went over, and her friends rallied around her. And I just so missed the time in my life when my friends were close by. The years when one friend was three blocks away and another just a cab ride across town. The years when we were married (phew!) but didn't ahve any kids. When our families were shoved so rudely to the periphery, when all we had was each other, and money, and time.

These women (registration required) have it. In spades. In Manhattan. Sadly, membership is closed. Unsurprisingly, I am contemplating offing one of them for her spot in the lineup.

Overachiever that I am (I am! My yoga instructor called me that yesterday! I think it's a good thing to be called, but I worry that she didn't mean it that way.) I want that medallion.

i had a friend, but he's gone now

Something came and took him away.

That ^^^ was as far as I got writing this entry this morning. Too many tears got in the way. But why today, of all days? No reason. Except that Bette Midler was singing on the Today Show.

See, once I had a friend named Mark. And I know that you all know that, but maybe someone will stumble by who doesn't, and really, what can I do for Mark any more, except to tell a stranger that he existed, and that he was wonderful, and that, of all the people who've ever been in my life, he loved me best? And I loved him best. It would have been perfect, except for the little thorn that was his sexuality. So we were friends. Best friends. Friends who loved each other.

Mark introduced me to a million things. Beaujolais nouveau. The gig line on my pants. Special K. Dojo. Teuscher chocolates. My self-esteem. My sexuality, if only in theory. Bette Midler.

And it all made sense. If Bette, loudmouth, short, buxom, Jewish Bette, was fabulous, then so was I. So was I.

Sometimes, when I see Bette Midler on tv, or when I listen (again!) to The Divine Miss M, we have an imaginary conversation, or at least an imaginary monologue. It goes kind of like this:

Wait! Wait! I'm so sorry! I know how rude and tacky it is to interrupt you. (These conversations inevitably take place at Barney's.) But I have to tell you. I have to tell you about my friend Mark. He loved you. And he loved me. And so I love you, too. But I miss him so much.

And the Divine Miss M, she knows right away that Mark died of AIDS. She asks me how long ago, and I tell her, and we hug and we cry.

Mark has been gone for nearly eight years now. I dream of him sometimes, and I think of him often. My friends know about Mark. They know that he existed, and that Jonah Mark is named for him. But it's Bette who knows how bad it is. She's the one who understands that the hole in my life still hasn't healed.

imagine

Imagine this: One day, in the middle of finding sneakers, drinking coffee, and feeding the kids their waffles, you absently give your husband a quick peck on the cheek and ask him to pick up some dog food on his way home from work.

Only, he never makes it to work, because, as he's sitting on the bus, reading the paper and thinking about how, maybe, if he's lucky, the kids will sleep through the night tonight and he'll get a bit, some crazy motherfucker from halfway around the world has decided that the best possible way to express his ongoing general dissatisfaction with the state of things is to set off a bomb and blow up some people he's never met.

And now you're a widow. And your kids are halfway to being orphans. And nothing will ever be the same again.

Then imagine this: the person with the keys to the armory decides that the best way to express his dissatisfaction with what's transpired is to send the soldiers to go blow up somebody else's husband. It might not be exactly the guy who set off the bomb but it's, you know, close enough.

And so on, and so on, and so on.

* * * * * * * *

You may say I'm a dreamer but, today, to honor London's dead, I'm going to imagine something else instead.

I hope I'm not the only one.

elsa, she-wolf of the mayfair

Ok...Elsa.

It's a mystery to me, and I'm not sure if it has to do with being old, or with just plain bad luck, but my grandparents' bad pool luck followed them. A few days after my Bat Mitzvah, they moved to Florida. Now, at this point, you should not be imagining some high-rise on Miami Beach. Think more like two buildings, each two stories high and about 20 apartments long, with a pool and a clubhouse (building with roof, card tables, small kitchen, male and female bathrooms with shower and sauna, and scary "library" of abandoned paperbacks) between them, in Hollywood. It wasn't seedy or anything, but it wasn't swank, either.

Every year, my parents took me and Lisa to visit, and the four of us spent something like seventeen days and sixteen nights sharing a two-bedroom apartment with my grandma, grandpa, and great grandmother. All day, every day, my dad played cards with the old men, my mom covered herself with baby oil and baked in the sun, and Lisa and I played together in the pool. We had to. There was no one else to play with, except for the year that Scott [last name removed and "Jerk Who Threatened Legal Action" inserted] of North Woodmere, Long Island showed up to visit his grandparents and taught me to smoke pot and dig Jim Morrisson while he was there. He was sweet, and wrote me long letters, and was the first guy who ever put his hand on my tit. I think he even came to visit in Buffalo once. Scott [last name removed and "Jerk Who Threatened Legal Action" inserted] of North Woodmere, Long Island, if you've googled yourself and ended up here, I hope the years have been good to you. [Well, I did, before he showed up and, without so much as a "hey, howya doin'?" threatened legal action. Now, you know, what the fuck ever.]

At the pool, there were rules. First and foremost on the list, as I recall it, was this:

BATHING CAPS MUST BE WORN BY LADIES AND LONG HAIRED MALES

My hair, you may recall, was short in my youth. This was in the days before latex and spandex, remember, and despite my fashionably Mia Farrowish 'do, I was subjected to the daily discomfort and indignity of a rubber bathing cap. For the record, Scott [last name removed and "Jerk Who Threatened Legal Action" inserted] of North Woodmere, Long Island, on the other hand, with hair to his shoulders, was not.

This rule was enforced most scrupulously by a bitch named Elsa.

Elsa was something of an anomaly in the world of the Mayfair Apartment Complex. Most of the tenants, owners and renters alike (a distiction akin to Brahmins and Untouchables in the Retirement Caste System of the Mayfair), were Jewish. There was the occasional Catholic (next best thing, doncha know) and, I suppose, I couple of Lutherans or something, but Elsa and her husband, whose name is lost to time, were....Germans. Like, from Germany! Shocking! Personally, even as a kid, I never had a problem with her because of her national origin. I had a problem with her because she was a bitch.

Every day, wearing a tremendous skirted bathing suit and a shower cap, Elsa came down to for her constitutional. Reminding us that we had to "vear zee basing capssss!" she would submerge in the pool and do a few teesny little lengths of sidestroke and a few teensy little lengths of Mrs. Whitelaw's breaststroke. Then she would get out and hassle us about the bathing caps -- "Zeese ahr zee roooolsssss!" Again. Just like Mrs. Whitelaw. Kids having fun in the sun and she has to go and stomp all the fuck over it. When Elsa showed up for a swim, it was time to dry off and write some postcards to the poor bastards back home.

I don't think anyone ever said "Nazi Cunt" when she was around, but I'll bet they thought it plenty.

Next up on the Florida Story Hit Parade: Clubhouse Bingo.

don't splash! you'll get my hair wet!

Here's a seasonal piece of advice from me to you: Don't be Mrs. Whitelaw.

Mrs. Whitelaw? Now what the fuck are you babbling about, Terry?

See...I was at the lake yesterday with Jonah. At 1 pm on a weekday, it was quite the Preschool Scene. Moms and kids. No Y chromosome over the age of 5 in the place. I was sitting in my chair, right at the shoreline, reading and watching Jonah play, when some little kid came up and poured water all over me. I yelped, but didn't really care, as it's been about 126 degrees in the shade here for the past week and I was frying, anyway. I kicked some water right back at him and smiled. But his mother came trotting over to dutifully apologize and I told her that it was no big, really ok, and I meant it.

Then I told her the story of Mrs. Whitelaw.

When Lisa and I were little, our grandparents lived about a mile away in an apartment complex. Their complex didn't have a pool but, for a small fee, residents were allowed to use the pool in the complex across the street and we spent long summer days there for years.

Mrs. Whitelaw owned the complex.

Like all kids, Lisa and I spent hours and hours jumping in and out of the pool, learning to dive, fetching things off the bottom, playing Marco Polo. We splashed about like a couple of seals and generated quite a little-kid racket.

Except when Mrs. Whitelaw came in for a dip.

Then, Lisa and I, and I guess the other children, if there were any around, were expected either to get out of the pool or to stand quietly to the side while Mrs. Whitelaw, hair done at the beauty parlor, immersed herself to the top of her chest and gently, slowly did some kind of modified hairdo-preserving fancy-lady breaststroke from one side to the other and back again. A couple of happy dopey little kids in gold lamé bathing suits with all the gold rubbed off the bottom from where we'd sit on the steps, enjoying a summer day in a pool, and all the joy came to a screeching halt when it was Mrs. Whitelaw's turn.

There was to be no splashing our other foolishness while Mrs. Whitelaw was in the pool.

The moral of this story is -- There's a moral, Terry? Yes. Shut up. -- Summer's fun. Kids are fun. Don't be such a tuned-out ipod-wearing book-reading sun-tanning old hag that you forget that. Get off your fucking chair and go play some Marco Polo and build a sand castle. Get loud. Get hot. Get wet. Get dirty. Don't be a buzzkill.

Or some bitch like me is going to be talking nasty about you 25 years after they plant you in the ground.

what are you so afraid of?

I had lunch at McDonald's yesterday. The works. Crispy Chicken Sandwich, fries, Coke. Large. I was at the playground with Jonah, and I knew that I didn't have any lunch packed with me for him, and that I wanted to go from the playground to the store to look for beach chairs, and that I'd have to feed him, so I figured I take him for a Happy Meal, but then I realized that I was hungry, too.

And you know what? I loved every single bite. I loved the sloppy mayo on the sandwich. I loved the fries, hot out of the hopper, hit with extra salt, and dunked in ketchup. I loved my sweet, sweet Coke, poured over so much ice that my frugal daddy would have fainted if he'd looked in my cup.

I think that it was the first time I'd actually eaten a meal there, not just taken the kids, since I don't know when...last summer? Then I had this weird internal monologue about how it was because I really believed McDonald's bad press...that I truly believed that this stuff would stop my heart in its tracks, and would make my ass grow to the size of a small Winnebago.

But then my internal monologist started asking weird questions that I couldn't answer:

Why do I feed it to my kids if I think it's so unhealthy?

and, better yet...

Why do I indulge my craving for McDonald's so very much less frequently than my craving for Marlboro Lights? Am I more scared of a fat ass than I am of lung cancer?

That last one's a kicker, ain't it?

black throated wind

So many things to say today. I thought about saving some for a dry day, but I ended up deciding to put it all out there today. First, I know I still don't have pictures, but the iris continue to amaze. The blossoms are apple-sized, and I just cannot believe that I managed to bring these miraculous things forth from the earth.

Between dance recital rehearsals, a project I'm working on for some camp friends, and finishing the brownie video in the wake of the great Tiger debacle, I'm pretty fried.

Last night was the annual Girl Scout Leader Recognition Dinner, and I am pleased and proud to tell you all that I was presented with an award as Outstanding Volunteer. It was a great treat to be honored by my peers for the projects outside the troop that I've worked on this year. I got a pin, a bouquet, and a round of applause. Also applause-worthy was the annual slideshow that I made for the dinner. I love making iMovie projects for things...people think I can do alchemy, and really it's just that I know how to use my Mac.

* * * * * * * *

Also on my mind today: Deep Throat. The person, not the movie. Unless you live under a rock, you know that a gentleman named Mark Felt, formerly the number two man at the Effa-Bee-Eye, has come forward,and it's all been confirmed by Woodward, Berstein, et al. I'm not even bothering with links. Just go to any major news site and the details will be there.

The thing that's been getting me riled up about all this is the talking heads from the Nixon administration. I know, I know. We already knew that we hated them. But I was watching the Today Show this morning, and there was Chuck Colson, calling Felt a snake. Me? I think he's a hero and a patriot. Colson went on to say, more or less, that witnessing a high level Justice Department emplyee break the confidence of the President was a sock to the system of all Americans. Um, as opposed to the President engaging in illegal activities? Pat Buchanan, whose name is surely on a special seat somewhere in an inner circle of Hell, not only echoed that sentiment, but went on to call Woodward and Bernstein "a pair of stenographers." It was surreal to think that I could live in the same land as these men, but be so completely far apart in perception and ideology. It made me sad to think of the gulf -- to realize that it's so wide that there is no place in the middle where we can meet.

It's a hard time for liberals in this country, harder, I think, than it was for conservatives under the Clinton administration. So many of us feel so desperate and so hopeless, and it's so demoralizing to think that for every one of us who is experiencing this political depression, there is a conservative who thinks that the direction this country is headed is just terrific....that the war is just, the President righteous and honorable, the and tone of life in America filled with optimism and joy. I don't know how we'll ever mobilize to get things back on track and I don't know who is out there to help the liberals see a beacon once again. Hillary Clinton isn't the right person and Barack Obama, my hope for the Democratic Party, is just too green to run in 2008.

Anyone want to run for President?

on the fence, on the go

I came across this article (registration required) on the New York Times website yesterday, and I've been fascinated ever since. There's a man who, in conjunction with his mother-in-law, is starting a community -- building a town from scratch, I think -- in rural South Dakota specifically for deaf people. Well, he says it's not specifically for deaf people, but a place where ASL will be the primary language and services will be designed with deaf people in mind. All businesses will be required to communicate with patrons in sign language, emergency vehicles will depend more on lights and less on sirens, etc.

There is a controversy about all of this within the deaf community...some people think it's revolutionary and terrific; others find it isolationist. I think it's both, I guess, and land on "if it works for them, and they're not bothering anyone..." People are coming from all over the world to live there, which leaves me idly wondering if they're Mormons. This seems like such a Mormony plan.

* * * * * * * *

My fence is unusually crowded today. Unlike Alan, I remain somewhat undecided about the whole Terri Schiavo mess. I think that the husband's motives are less clear than Alan thinks they are. Ultimately, I do agree with Alan about this much, though: Put it on paper. If, like me, and like Alan, you don't want to hang around once your brain is mush (seriously, I heard one report on Terri Schiavo yesterday that said that most of her brain is LIQUID. I am still shuddering.), say so on paper, not just to your partner in bed one night. Get yourself a Living Will, a Health Care Proxy, and a Durable Power of Attorney. If, on the other hand, you feel like Lisa does, and want to hang around as long as we can afford the electricity, say that on paper, too. Because, frankly, Lisa, if you don't, I'm shoving Adam into the circuit breaker accidentally on purpose.

* * * * * * * *

Life here at home has instantly resumed its normal hectic pace. But the good news is that the snow is melting and it's warm enough today to walk. With Spring, I'm trying to make a few small changes -- more vegetables, less reality tv, more reading, fewer cookies, more walking. I'll let you know how it goes.

One more thing about the walking -- it's time, once again, for me to sing the praises of my ipod. God, I love that thing. Even Emily knows that it's my favorite electronic toy. Did I tell you that she tried to tell Andrew that they should get me a new one for my birthday? But the funny part is her true motive: then she could have my old one! Anyway, it makes the walking not only painless, but totally enjoyable. I listen to music, I borrow cd's from the library and try new things, and I also borrow books on cd, rip them to my computer, and load them on the ipod. I listed to all of Angela's Ashes that way lst summer...me and the lilting accent of Frank McCourt, strolling through the woods. I have David Sedaris ready to accompany me this spring. Not the same, I know. The neighbors are going to think I've gone loony, walking and giggling.

Or maybe they do already.

heaven's gates

Sick of hearing me whine about how everything is better in New York? Tough. You want to know why tough? Because everything is better in New York and, if you don't know that, it's your problem, not mine.

But today, something is a lot better in New York. So much better that I feel like my heart just might break if I don't get to have a bit of it for myself. Central Park, the Central Park where I took my dogs to play, where I walked around the reservoir, listening to the City in the days before ipods, where I pushed Emily on the swings, where I walked hand in hand with my husband, showered by the cherry blossoms drifting off the trees of the bridle path, has been transformed. It's been made into art.

I didn't want to go. I thought that, if I couldn't just be there, walking through the gates as I went about my errands, or as I was on my way home, if I had to travel to see them, that I didn't want to go at all.

Then I saw Sarah's pictures and I realized that I was wrong. Because, you know what? When I'm in New York, I am "just there." I do still know where I want to go and how to get there.

I don't live there anymore, but I'm a New Yorker, and those gates are mine as much as anyone's.

I talked to Andrew. If the weather doesn't turn frigid and blizzarding, we're going to try to get down to the City, or at least I'll try to get down with Emily, over vacation week. I'll keep you posted.

tree hugging

I've been thinking lately about the planet. I think it has something to do with yoga or the tsunami.

Here's the thought that stops me in my tracks: The planet, she has nothing but time.

She lives, but she doesn't think. She keeps going, one day at a time and, given enough time, can destroy all that we've built, or heal all that we've hurt. I had this very clear vision one day shortly after the tsunami. I had been thinking about the disaster, and about how terrible it all is, but how the planet really can't be held to blame. The planet doesn't even know we're here, let alone care. The planet just goes about its business, giving no more thought to us then we give to the dust mites under our fingernails or the flora in our guts.

So I was driving down the road, looking at a house with holiday lights and a tree and all that, and I saw it 100 or 200 years from now, abandoned and overgrown, the humans all gone, the planet reclaiming the space an inch at a time. And the vision wasn't troubling at all. Actually, it was comforting to think of the Earth as something so infinite and immortal, so enduring and patient, so healthy and capable.

We may all blow each other up someday but at an infinitesimal pace, moment by moment, bit by bit, acre by acre, continent by continent, changed but alive, the Earth will go on.

Goofy, I know. I sound like Alan (not that he's goofy! you know what I mean!). But it's what's been in my mind lately and, because it's my blog, I get to share.

wwewd? (what would earl warren do?)

I heard a fascinating story on NPR today, about two women who are dissolving a civil union that they had sought in the state of Vermont and fighting bitterly for custody of their young daughter. Essentially, the biological mother is seeking to nullify and deny the parenthood of the non-biological mother, saying that the other mother has no claim to the child and no rights of visitation. She has filed her suit in Virginia, which has been much more receptive to her case than the Vermont courts would likely have been. Proof that straight people have no monopoly on terrible behavior in a custody fight, the case, which has received two different decisions in the states involved, will appear before a higher court this year.

Better details than I can offer can be found here. Make sure you keep going until you get to the part where the hate-filled Bible-thumpers step in.

Someone, it seems to me, needs to point out to the "former lesbian" mother the sin that is hypocrisy. And I have nominated myself for the job. So, then, here is an open letter to Lisa Miller-Jenkins of Virginia and to all of my gay friends, even those I haven't met yet:

Dear Lisa:

Let's start with this: I am in favor of gay marriage. I think it is your right as an American and a human being. But you can't have it both ways. You can't step up and demand rights without being willing to take the resulting responsibilities and to accept a possible lump or two.

If straight people marry and have children, we are equal parents in the eyes of the law. If we marry and adopt children, we are equal parents in the eyes of the law. If we marry and engage the services of a sperm donor, egg donor, or surrogate mother, we are equal parents in the eyes of the law. And, if we believe in God, we believe that, in all of those situations, we are equal parents not only in the eyes of the law, but in the eyes of God as well.

You want to marry? Great. I'm all for it. But I'm also all for gay divorce. I'm all for your having to deal with the same messy breakups and custody issues that straight people endure. Gay marriage means gay alimony, gay custody agreements, and gay fights over wagon wheel coffee tables. The whole deal.

You don't get to break up, go through whatever kind of personal tranformation you undertook, and then discount your partner and your past. You don't get to say that she was just a friend, or that she was not an equal co-mother when you began your parenting adventure together. You don't get to revise someone else's past to fit your future.

Judge not, Lisa, for you are being judged. Read your bible more carefully, and not just the parts you like the best. See what it has to say about hypocrites. Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye (Matthew 7:5). Try not to turn your self-loathing outwardly toward a woman who loved you, a woman who continues leading a life that you were too cowardly to live, a woman who entered with you into a lifetime covenant and then expanded that covenant to include a child. Your child. Her child. Your child together.

You moved all the way to Vermont to make this bed, and I think you should have to lie in it just like the rest of us. Now, quit hogging the covers.

pick and click

Most days, like everyone else, I go blithely about my business and don't really think too much about, you know, Big Stuff.

Big Stuff like my husband doesn't beat me. Big Stuff like I have enough to eat. Big Stuff like my kids are vaccinated and I don't have to worry about them dying of polio or the measles or going blind from a lack of vitamin A. Big Stuff like there is no civil war ravaging my country and it's unlikely that an armed teen militia is going to break into my house and gang rape me tonight. Big Stuff like a goddam motherfucking wall of water didn't just wipe out my house and cholera is not about to kill my family.

I worry about, you know, Regular Stuff. Regular so-blessed-we-don't-even-know-how-blessed-we-are Rich Fat American stuff. What to have for dinner. Whether the walls in the new addition should be painted Quartzite or Buttercream. Where the nearest Starbucks is located, so I can pop in for a four dollar cup of coffee with extra whipped cream before heading off to yoga while my kids are busy increasing their literacy levels.

One of my resolutions for the coming year is to think more about the Big Stuff. The ugly stuff. The stuff that is life for people all over the world. And to do something about it. It's so easy now! You don't even have to write a check! Just pick a charity, find a website, and whip out your handy-dandy Rich Fat American credit card.

This week, while the deduction-getting is still good, give it a try, won't you? You can afford it!! Blow off your lattes. Drink drip. Turn those lattes into water in Sri Lanka or rice in Sudan or even into cans of soup for your local food pantry. Skip your smokes. Your lungs will thank you. Those Marlboro Lights can be magically transformed into mittens or blankets or a place to run.

Do it for me. If you've enjoyed reading my blog this year, and you want to do me a favor to show it, take a minute to pick and click. Do it for your kids. Love them by loving someone else's. Do it for your karma. All the leftovers you threw away this year because they didn't seem appealing anymore? You owe. Do it because it needs doing. Whatever. I don't really care why you do it, and neither do they. Pick your reason, pick your cause, pick your non-profit, and click for some good today.

does it make a sound?

I've been thinking this morning about the birthdays of the people we've loved and lost, about the anniversaries of people who have lost their love for each other, about how the dates continue to resonate long after the people are gone and the love has run cold, about how they don't lose their power just because we stop writing them on our calendars.

After Mark died, February 1 didn't become "the day that used to be Mark's birthday." It's still his birthday, even if he's not coming to the party. On that day, when I realize what day it is, wherever I am and whatever I'm doing, I raise an invisible glass and wish him well, wherever it is that he waits for me. Happily, as the years go by, I think of him more on his birthday than I do on the anniverary of his death. And, sometimes, I think of him on days in between. He comes to me fleetingly in the early morning hours, before I'm really awake, or sometimes when I'm dressed and looking in the mirror. And every few years, he comes to me in a vivid dream. I awake from these dreams feeling blissful, missing him less, not more. Feeling with him, not without him.

Last year, I realized on June 30 that it would have been my parents' 40th anniversary and, for just a minute, it knocked the wind out of me. Although they are both happy now with other people, it was overwhelming as I thought of how, without the hard left turn of their divorce more than ten years before, the map of my life would look very different, indeed.

I dreamed of my Uncle Mory this week. He died in February 1993, a few days before my birthday, just before I was engaged. The first World Trade Center bombing happened that week. I was in Buffalo, at the hospital all the time, and I watched the footage on silent televisions. Oddly, I also missed the second bombing, having moved to the suburbs only sixteen days earlier. If my dad reminds me, I light a yarzheit candle on the anniversary of his death, but I never fail to think of him, and his love for me, on his birthday, December 14.

My grandpa died only two days before Emily was born. My water broke as my family returned from his funeral. It was as if they passed each other on the escalators at Bloomindales and waved, him heading up, her heading down. Each year, as we light birthday candles and cut cake here, I spare a thought for my grandma, sitting alone in her apartment in Florida, still missing him, still crying.

I am thinking today about the dates that are engraved on all of our hearts, dates that we mark quietly and alone, invisibly, while carrying on with the mundane activities of our lives, as if they weren't happening at all. Deaths, divorces, miscarriages. Anniversaries of loss, of people who are no more, of things that never came to be. They are like trees falling in the forests of our hearts, at once thunderous and silent.

waste not

It's only 10 AM, and I've already spilled about three different things down the front of my shirt. Some days, I feel like I am not properly licensed to operate my body.

Anyway.

On my mind today is waste and value, and how relative it all is. This came up yesterday while I was sewing patches on Emily's Brownie vest. I accidentally pulled a lot more thread off of the spool than I meant to and, while I knew I could have just rewound it all, I didn't feel like bothering, and I clipped it off and threw it away. But a little voice in my head started talking to me about the worth of two feet of red thread.

If I were in Somalia, or Iraq, or Auschwitz, instead of in my kitchen, warm and dry and safe, what would two feet of red thread be worth then? Just because I am a rich woman in in the richest country on earth, does that give me the right to be profligate? Last week, when the peaches from the Wild Oats weren't as good as the ones from the Stop and Shop, was it really ok to throw them out and go buy more? Just because I can be wasteful, does that mean I am entitled to do so?

What are the ethics of waste?

Today, I am going to try to be more aware of my level of consumption...of food, of resources, of everything...and I'm going to see if I can allow that consciousness to have some kind of impact.

should I feel sorry for courtney love?

I dunno.

Word is that Courtney Love's recent hospitalization is the result of a miscarriage. (ed: Note the possible identity of the father. What's the matter? She couldn't get a date with Colin Farrell, and had to settle for the second-skankiest guy in Hollywood?) If true, this was the loss of a pregnancy that she first leaked to the press and then denied, all while chain smoking, and in the midst of a couple of drug-related court cases.

I hear that there are paparazzi photos of an "obviously distressed" Love being wheeled out of a building, or into a hospital, something, on a stretcher.

So I feel bad for her. Of course the loss of a wanted pregnancy is a nightmare for anyone to go through. While I had two fortunate spins of the karma wheel, I know so many women who have miscarried, and I understand that it's physically difficult and emotionally agonizing.

However, although it should be said that I am not on intimate terms with any substance abusers, most women I know, while not aiming for gustatational and nutritional perfection during their pregnancies, do make an effort to lay off the sauce a bit and maybe eat some spinach in honor of the little tadpole and its various needs.

Fortunately, as women in this country, we are under no obligation to continue with any pregnncy that we'd rather terminate. But, once we make the choice to continue with a pregnancy, have we entered into some kind of agreement with the little person-to-be who is renting space in our body? Ethically, do we then owe anything to the fetus, or can we just continue on our merry inebriated way?

It's on my mind today.

On one hand, I feel all "Poor Courtney Love." On the other hand, I feel like Tony Montana: Look at that, a junkie...Don't eat nothin', sleeps all day wit dem black chades on...Her womb is so polluted, I can't even have a fucking little baby wit'er!" Not that I want to have a baby with Courtney Love, but you know what I mean.

something just for me

I was thinking in the shower this morning about how I need a haircut, which got me thinking about the place I might try and how the logistics of a salon appointment will all be easier after September when Jonah's in school, which got me thinking about how the nail place is right near the hair place (hmmmm....), which got me thinking about my old nail place in New York, which got me thinking about how, one time, I was there, and there was this woman getting the "spa" manicure, which involved putting parrafin and hot mitts on her hands, and how, when I asked her about it, she described it as "something nice, just for me."

Anyway, what I was thinking then was that this very privileged and over-indulged Upper East Side woman, who likely had a nanny and a maid to take care of things while she was off at Lotte Berk, still probably spent a lot of time and money, regularly doing things that she really believed were vital because they were Just For Herself, and how did I feel about that? And the answer was: Bullshit.

I know that I come here periodically to whine about how busy and overextended I am, but you know what? I am also hyperaware that I am, more or less, a White Woman of Privilege and that, compared to the overwhelming majority of my sisters in this country and in the world, I've got it good. I have two healthy children, a beautiful home, a luxury car (ok, a new minivan. whatever), and a husband who doesn't beat me. And I don't work. I mean, I do, but every single day that I am not stuck in an office with the walls closing in on me and some hypercritical and perennially dissatisfied bitch looking over my shoulder is a treat. I am so much better at my current job than I ever was at any that came before, and I feel so much happier doing it, and that's what's Just For Me.

Even if my nails mostly look like crap.

born in the u.s.a.

The other day, I was talking to Andrew, and he was giving me the business about my recently discovered love of Bruce Springsteen. He said that it's pretty unusual for a person to adopt a band at this point in life. I'm not that old, for God's sake, but I do get his point. Anyway, I explained to him that there are only a few bands who have really touched me, and affected who I am, in any significant way. Crosby, Stills, and Nash taught me to Question Authority. The Grateful Dead, and my years as a Deadhead, taught me to share. And Bruce Springsteen has helped me realize that, even though I hate every other administration or so, I love this country. A lot.

I love potato salad, fireworks, the 4th of July, and Labor Day as it was originally intended, although I will admit to mixed feelings about Columbus Day.

I love that I can march in favor of reproductive rights, rant against prayer in public schools, and write to my congressional representatives in favor of gay marriage without fear of reprisal.

I love that I can have my very own website on which I can say that I think that George W. Bush is a mediocre human being and a crappy president, and that I am very much looking forward to a time when someone else is running the show, and that there's nothing he can do about it.

I love that I can wear what I please, drive a car, vote, and tell my husband to fuck off without having stones thrown at me in the public square.

I love that I can tell you that I am appalled that we are spending four billion dollars a month in Iraq (Where is that money coming from? Are we stealing it from ourselves? Are we borrowing it? And can you imagine how four billion dollars, just once, not even monthly, would change the face of AIDS research, or inner-city schools, or teen pregnancy prevention?) and that I can refuse to check off the box on my tax return to donate a dollar to CREEP, or whatever that is. I love that I can tell you that I think our budgetary priorities are significantly screwed up.

And today, thanks to a pointer from my dad (which is a strange transition in and of itself, but that's another entry), I love that I can tell you to check out this site, at which, thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, some Lone Gunman has gone to the trouble of showing us all what really happens when you send young kids with guns into someone else's backyard. (Be patient. I think he's getting a lot of traffic.)

The administration does not want you to see the pictures; mainstream media has been barred from publishing or broadcasting them. They claim that it's because to do so would be insensitive to the soldiers' families, but I'm guessing that they have an ulterior motive. I'm also guessing that there's a word for that kind of prohibition...ten letters, starts with a C.

Take a good look, folks. Those are photos of soldiers in coffins coming home, not pictures of festively decorated American food relief efforts on the way over. Keep them in mind in November.

dayenu

When it comes to the Jewish holidays, Passover is my favorite. Nothing else even comes close. It's like the Thanksgiving of the Hebrew calendar, at least if all you do is the seder and you skip the rest of the week.

For what reason I can't tell you, Passover is associated with more memories of my childhood, and the intact family that I once had, than any other holiday.

It makes me think of my late Uncle Mory handing me twenty dollar bills, later upgraded to hundreds, for finding the afikomen. It was because of him that I was in the hunt until well into graduate school.

It makes me think of my dad, taking the first bite of his annual hard boiled egg and potato in salt water and saying, dependably, "This is so good like this! Why don't we ever have potatoes this way during the year?"

It makes me think of my mother, who made me suffer the indignity of saying the four questions year after year, despite my status as not-youngest. (Note to you, Mom: I'll probably do the same thing to Emily, but at least I'm conflicted about it.) It makes me think of pointing to Lisa when my dad mentioned the Simple Son.

It makes me think of poor long-dead Jack Leventhal of Hollywood, Florida, who once drank glasses of vodka, instead of the glasses of wine prescribed in the Haggadah and ended the evening with a solo rendition of Chad Gad Ya (think Jewishy-sounding Gilbert and Sullivan) as a dirge, much like Mozart's Funeral Requiem. Poor Jack Leventhal. He's probably been dead almost 20 years, and my dad and sister and I still make fun of him every year around this time. It's like Mrs. Whitelaw and the pool, but I'll save that one for the summer.

Passover makes me think of my mother's kosher for passover brownies (the best!), the dough for matzah meal rolls cooling on the window sill, and Breakstone's whipped butter, unsalted. It makes me think of the purple glass plates that only came up from the basement once a year. It makes me think of my great-grandmother's homemade flourless noodles in chicken soup.

As much as anything, the thing that most symbolizes Passover to me is the Maxwell House Haggadah. Seriously, until I was about 25, I don't think I knew of another. We don't use it anymore, but I'm sure that I can still recite it by heart. I refer to its text often when I tell people how I feel as a full-time mother and homeowner. In the text, Rabbi Gamliel and his cohorts teach that there were not 10 plagues, but 250:

Rabbi Akiva says: How does one derive that every plague that God inflicted upon the Egyptians in Egypt was equal in intensity to five plagues? It is written: "He sent upon them his fierce anger, wrath, fury and trouble, a band of evil messengers."

Since each plague was comprised of 1)fierce anger 2)wrath 3)fury 4)trouble and 5) a band of evil messengers, they must have suffered fifty plagues in Egypt and two hundred and fifty at the Sea.

I patiently explain that, by this reasoning, I do not have only 2 children, but many more. Both children are crying at once, so it feels like at least four. I have a husband and a dog, that's four more. Two cars. An upstairs, a downstairs, a front yard, and a back yard. Four televisions, seven telephones between two lines, a low-maintenance Mac and a PC whose operator needs ongoing technical support.

That's at least 27 children right there, and sometimes they all need me at once.

Next year in Miami Beach.

what a country

This is goint to be longer than my usual posts, but it sufficiently important that I'm posting the whole thing so that no one misses it by virtue of not wanting to register for the site. Look at what your President had to say today:

Good morning.

Eight years ago, Congress passed and President Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage for purposes of federal law as the legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife.

The act passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 342-67 and the Senate by a vote of 85-14.

Those congressional votes, and the passage of similar defense-of- marriage laws in 38 states, express an overwhelming consensus in our country for protecting the institution of marriage.

In recent months, however, some activist judges and local officials have made an aggressive attempt to redefine marriage.

In Massachusetts, four judges on the highest court have indicated they will order the issuance of marriage licenses to applicants of the same gender in May of this year.

In San Francisco, city officials have issued thousands of marriage licenses to people of the same gender, contrary to the California Family Code. That code, which clearly defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman, was approved overwhelmingly by the voters of California.

A county in New Mexico has also issued marriage licenses to applicants of the same gender.

And unless action is taken, we can expect more arbitrary court decisions, more litigation, more defiance of the law by local officials, all of which adds to uncertainty.

After more than two centuries of American jurisprudence and millennia of human experience, a few judges and local authorities are presuming to change the most fundamental institution of civilization. Their actions have created confusion on an issue that requires clarity.

On a matter of such importance, the voice of the people must be heard. Activist courts have left the people with one recourse. If we're to prevent the meaning of marriage from being changed forever, our nation must enact a constitutional amendment to protect marriage in America. Decisive and democratic action is needed because attempts to redefine marriage in a single state or city could have serious consequences throughout the country.

The Constitution says that "full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts and records and judicial proceedings of every other state." Those who want to change the meaning of marriage will claim that this provision requires all states and cities to recognize same-sex marriages performed anywhere in America.

Congress attempted to address this problem in the Defense of Marriage Act by declaring that no state must accept another state's definition of marriage. My administration will vigorously defend this act of Congress.

Yet there is no assurance that the Defense of Marriage Act will not itself be struck down by activist courts. In that event, every state would be forced to recognize any relationship that judges in Boston or officials in San Francisco choose to call a marriage.

Furthermore, even if the Defense of Marriage Act is upheld, the law does not protect marriage within any state or city.

For all these reasons, the defense of marriage requires a constitutional amendment.

An amendment to the Constitution is never to be undertaken lightly. The amendment process has addressed many serious matters of national concern, and the preservation of marriage rises to this level of national importance.

The union of a man and woman is the most enduring human institution, honored and encouraged in all cultures and by every religious faith. Ages of experience have taught humanity that the commitment of a husband and wife to love and to serve one another promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society. Marriage cannot be severed from its cultural, religious and natural roots without weakening the good influence of society.

Government, by recognizing and protecting marriage, serves the interests of all.

Today, I call upon the Congress to promptly pass and to send to the states for ratification an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of a man and woman as husband and wife.

The amendment should fully protect marriage, while leaving the state legislatures free to make their own choices in defining legal arrangements other than marriage.

America's a free society which limits the role of government in the lives of our citizens. This commitment of freedom, however, does not require the redefinition of one of our most basic social institutions.

Our government should respect every person and protect the institution of marriage. There is no contradiction between these responsibilities.

We should also conduct this difficult debate in a matter worthy of our country, without bitterness or anger.

In all that lies ahead, let us match strong convictions with kindness and good will and decency.

Thank you very much.

I am horrified. Disgusted. Furious. It was as if I watched my President stand there and recommend a constitutional amendment banning miscegenation. I used to be under the impression that, in this country, at least in theory, all adults over the age of consent shared the same rights and that we did not afford privileges only to some.

Since I was in high school, I have shared my life and my love with gay people of both genders. I know in my heart that gay people in committed relationships are as "married" and Andrew and I are. But more than that, I don't understand what the government is doing protecting a religious institution.

I am going to write to my Senators and representative today, and I urge you to consider doing the same.

the sounds of a new wrinkle forming

I had an epiphany today and, frankly, it sucked.

Imagine this: there I was, sitting at my computer, ordering Alan's birthday present, and thinking to myself. "OK...his birthday is on the 23rd, so I should send this soon...hmmm...how old is he going to be this year?...OH MY GOD, HE'S TURNING 40."

This is problematic for a couple of reasons. First of all, the present I'd selected can best be described as "some crap." I mean, it's fine crap, and he'll like it, but it's nothing special. Not Milestone Birthday Material, if you know what I mean. Sorry, Alan. I owe you a decent birthday meal and a bottle of wine when we're together. You can hold me to this.

But, more than the fact that I hadn't picked a great present, my problem was, and still is, this: if Alan can turn 40, so can I. He's turning 40 this year; Shelly's turning 40 this year; Sharon's turning 40 this year. Everyone. All of my good friends, except Julie, who is too young for her own good, will turn 40 in the coming 12-14 months. It's fairly horrifying.

We are not young anymore.

no bloom on this rose

I think that everyone has a favorite non-confrontational but controverial topic...one for pulling out at cocktail parties when you want to have a real conversation but not really piss anyone off. Not Israel and Palestinians or should we pull the troops out of Iraq. More like Dick York or Dick Sargent? Hookers or friendly gals? You know the stuff.

For the past several years, my topic of choice has been Pete Rose. Should he be reinstated? Fully or partially? Should he be admitted to the Hall of Fame? It makes for great animated conversation with strangers without really having to get to know anyone too personally.

For the record, here is my position on the topic:

Pete Rose can kiss my ass.

I think that the man is an old-school degenerate gambler. I think that he lied when accused and that he's still lying now, like a child who confesses only to the part of the misbehavior that he's been caught at, without fully owning up to the whole thing. "I didn't bet on baseball!"..."Well, ok, I did bet on baseball, but I didn't use inside information!"..."Well, I did use information, but I didn't do it from inside the clubhouse!"..."Well, I did place bets from inside the clubhouse using inside information, but I never bet on the Reds!"

It's just lies on top of lies on top of lies.

I think that Pete Rose did everything that he's been accused of, and probably more. Not sure? Read the Dowd report for yourself. They had him by the short hairs 14 years ago, and he knew it. That's why he took the deal. This week's whole media-friendly tearful apology is motivated by one thing: money.

I said to Andrew last night, "He just wants to get into the Hall of Fame," and Andrew, who knows more about this stuff than I ever will, said "No, he doesn't. He wants a job. He wants to manage. No one pays you for getting into the Hall of Fame. You get paid millions for managing. He wants full reinstatement."

I've never been a big Bud Selig fan, myself. Back when he was appointed by his fellow owners as then-interim Commissioner of Baseball during the strike, I felt that, as an owner, he couldn't possibly settle the strike impartially and that he's always been the owners' man, whether he put his ownership of his team in trust or not. But here he still is, interim no longer. Bud Selig's no Kenesaw Mountain Landis, no Bart Giamatti or even Fay Vincent, but it seems that we're stuck with him. I just hope that he has the sense to say to himself "Well, it can't be right for Joe Jackson to stay banned and out of the Hall of Fame, but for Pete Rose to get in."

I mean, that can't be right, can it?

The only compassion I can find in my heart for Pete Rose is this: the guy is like a character in a Greek tragedy, imparted with the gifts of the gods, but cursed by a fatal flaw, a desire so strong that it cannot be denied. For some, it's a desire for booze, or sex, or power, or wealth. For Pete Rose, it's the ponies. Or the gridiron. Or the baseball diamond. Or which elevator will get to the bottom first. It doesn't matter. I think he'll bet on anything. I think he'll hock whatever he needs to in order to feed his desire, and what he chose to hock, ultimately, was baseball.

There was one inviolable rule: no betting on baseball. But he couldn't stop himself. He had it all, and he pushed it all into the pot. For the life of me, I don't understand why anyone thinks he should get a do-over.

google sleuth

Because he loves me, and knows that there is little that I enjoy like my hometown Michael Jackson coverage, Andrew kindly brought me a copy of today's New York Post.

Never a publication to miss an opportunity to rehash what has already been reported in the British tabloids, the Post reports that, among the evidence seized during the raid at the Neverland Ranch were love letters to the boy now accusing Michael Jackson of molesting him. According to the Post, these letters were addressed to "Rubba." Gross, I know.

Well, you know me. Not content to settle for secondhand reportage, I tried to read the original Daily Telegraph article. Only there's some whole byzantine process to get to read their stuff, including a registration page that didn't support Safari. So I went a-googling. And I entered "rubba rubba." And I ended up at an Australian newspaper that had the whole story.

Here's where it gets interesting.

Remember that weird Martin Bashir documentary about Michael Jackson, where Jackson, sitting on the couch holding hands with a kid (who, as an aside, has cancer!), talks about sleeping in bed with children? Well, it turns out that the accuser is the same kid. You gotta love those wacky folks in the U.K. They'll print anything.

So, imagine, if it's true: Jackson befriends the kid, seduces him, and then has the temerity to get up in front of a camera and talk about the beauty of their relationship. Personally, I will go on record as saying that I think he is totally guilty, but that he doesn't think he is, like O.J., only different. I believe that Michael Jackson has in fact been molesting children for years, but he just sees it as part of their "special" relationship...that he's special, the child is special, and their love is special, and the rest of the world just doesn't understand.

And, finally, here's a coda to my tale of internet sleuthery...Andrew gets home, and, so proud of myself, I tell him my story, and he says, "oh, yeah. I read that somewhere." And you didn't think to mention it?!? "What?," he says, "Was I supposed to run home and tell you this?"

Yes, Honey, you were. What did you think I wanted to talk about? Istanbul?

not just criminal, but criminally stupid

Every once in a while comes a story in the news that just makes me shake my head and go "huh." The big flashy stories, like Lacy Peterson and the California recall hold my attention, but these smaller ones blow my mind.

Like, for example, the story in today's news about a man charged with impersonating a doctor. It seems that the gentleman in question castrated a transgendered woman, at her request, causing massive blood loss and a host of other problems. But here's the thing...He did the surgery on her dining room table.

And I'm reading this thinking, how holy-fucking-mother-of-god flat out stupid can a person be? Like, hey, Renée Richards...news flash! Most surgeons come with tables of their own. If he asks you to bring the leaves up from the basement while he's washing in the downstairs john, something just ain't right.

rock you like a hurricane

Sometimes I am awed by the things we can take for granted, just by virtue of living in one of the most technologically advanced nations on Earth...tampons, laser keratotomy, ice, remote control, pictures of hurricanes...

Ok, I know it's not so cool if, say, you happen to live in North Carolina, but, for the rest of us, how cool is this?

Thank the poor bastards stranded on the space station for that one.

nothing really wrong with me

I've been sick. It all started with the Indian food on Saturday night, which was great on the way in. But then Andrew woke me at about 1 in the morning -- apparently, he was trying to turn on the fan, but turned on the light in the process, so I went from being asleep to standing on the sun. At that point, between the Indian food and my should-have-been-expected anxiety at having contracted for all new family room furniture that afternoon, I didn't sleep again all night.

I managed to get up in the morning and go teach Sunday school, but I felt like crap and, the minute that my in-laws headed back to New York, I crawled into bed, where I spent most of the afternoon. I went downstairs at around 5, but Andrew had taken the kids out. I threw up and crawled back into bed.

A little later, Emily came tiptoeing in, bringing a paper plate with an apple and a cereal bar on it. I guess it was what she thought of as bland food, and she wanted to do what little she could to help.

And that's when I had my epiphany. See, I was sick, but there wasn't really anything wrong with me. But what a nightmare it would be to really be sick...to have your husband keep your kids out of the sickroom...to have the kids be afraid to see you...to be unable to hold them, tickle them, roughhouse with them, be part of their daily lives....

I don't know. Something clicked. And today, even though my stomach still hurts, I'm just glad for my health.

one of three thousand and sixteen

Is there anything else to write about today? For someone who, in her heart still considers herself a New Yorker, is there anything else to even think about today?

Carrying September 11 in my heart seems to get worse as time goes on, not better, and I have no idea why. Maybe it's having left New York, and missing it so much. Maybe it's having had another child. Maybe it has to do with the footage from which, despite my knowing better, I can't turn away. Each time I think I've seen the worst of it, I see something worse. It's like there is no worst of it. Yet I watch again and again, like it's my penance for having escaped the experience.

Last week, or maybe earlier this week, Andrew and I watched the last part of Ric Burns's documentary about New York City on PBS -- the segment about the World Trade Center. Yes, there were shots of the planes. And of the fires. And of the people jumping. And of the buildings falling.

But there was also something I'd never seen before. Someone I'd never seen before. Two years later, although I'd seen a lot, I hadn't seen the woman in the black pants and the white shirt. It's for her that I wrote today.

In the film, the interviewer talks to a man who tells us that, among the most horrible things to comtemplate about that terrible day is the fact that so many people survived the original impact, only to be trapped, fully conscious of their situation, knowing that they were likely to die, trying to reach out to their families one last time.

To punctuate his point, the filmmaker then cuts to a shot of the giant plane-sized hole in the North Tower. The fireball has subsided, but the fires are burning above. And there she is, at the very edge of the hole, standing with her hand on her hip, looking out at the City below. Standing there, a thousand feet in the air, peering over the edge where the wall had been only moments before, likely thinking to herself, "Well, what in the fuck am I going to do now?"

Surely she died on September 11, one of 3,016 who did. Not as an old lady in her bed, but as a young woman, a wife and mother maybe, toe to toe with the edge of the world and no way to get down.

Just as surely, there are broken-hearted people out there today who miss her. Maybe they saw that footage and know about her death. Maybe not. But they definitely know that she's gone. Just like that. In a blink. Maybe for them, like for me, it gets worse, not better, as time passes.

Today, I join them in their mourning. The loss of 3,016 people is an awful thing to contemplate. But it's just a number, a fact. The loss of one person, well, that's not awful or incomprehensible. It's painful and it's sad. For me, making today about grief instead of fear feels somehow like the only way to get through it with any meaning. I hope that you get through, too, in your own way.

Rest in peace, lady in the black pants and the white shirt.

who knows? maybe he knows.

I am thinking today, for not much reason, of my friend Mark. Most of you knew, or at least know of, Mark, but for those who are out of the loop, here's what you need to know:

I met mark on my first day of Latin I at NYU, in the fall of 1986. I was 21; he was 24 or so, and the most gorgeous man I'd ever known. The fact that he was not only gay, but gay and loving it in NYC in the late 80's didn't stop me (or him, I'd guess) from falling totally in love. That pesky sexual orientation thing did get in the way, but we got through it and managed to be the best of friends anyway.

And then, around 1989, he got HIV. He was fine until about 1996, and it was a long slow decline over the next two years. He died just after Christmas in 1998, without ever having been healthy enough to meet Emily, who was born a year before. I was in Florida and missed the funeral.

I miss him a lot, and think of him often. On rare, special nights, I dream of him, which always heralds the beginning of a great mood.

There are so many things I wish I could tell him...that I'm happy, that the World Trade Center was destroyed almost two years ago, that I had another baby, that the local news seems to do a story once a year on the very "new and dangerous" drug called Special K...

Today, I wish I could tell him that Bernadette Peters, who we loved so much back then just has not aged well. That she hasn't changed her look in all these years and that what worked when she was 35 is looking kind of tired at 50. She takes herself way, way too seriously. She's like Liza Minelli that way and, really, she could stand a touch of the Cher.

She should listen to her stylists a little harder, really.

it's the money, stupid

From today's New York Times

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7 — President Bush said tonight that he would ask Congress for $87 billion in emergency spending for military operations and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that Iraq had now become "the central front" in the campaign against terrorism.

In a nationally televised prime-time address, his first from the White House since he announced the bombing of Baghdad on March 19, Mr. Bush said defeating terrorists in Iraq "will take time, and require sacrifice," but he left open-ended how long United States troops would remain in Iraq and how much the conflict and occupation would ultimately cost.

I gotta say: this makes me sick. Stomach-hurts, feeling-faint, need-a-drink-of-water sick.

Aside from my original ambivalence about the war in Iraq, and aside from my ongoing lack of ambivalence about the President, let's just stop and ask ourselves not only where this money is coming from (my kids' college funds, eventually, I'm sure), but how $87,000,000,000 could change the world if we put it toward something like, say:

• finding a cure for AIDS, breast cancer, schizophrenia, or whatever disease is genetically threatening to prematurely end your life;


• early childhood education for kids living below the poverty line or, for that matter, raising the poverty line;


• eliminating the minimum wage altogether and putting a minimum living wage in its place;


• tearing down every public school over 50 years old and putting up brand new ones with a computer at every desk instead;


• making sure that everyone in this country goes to bed with a full belly tonight;


• finding safe long-term alternatives for fossil fuels, setting up effective recycling programs, or establishing a decent national railway system;


• free birth control for everyone, forever;


• whatever other bleeding-heart liberal cause floats your personal boat...just pick one.

I guess what I'm saying, ultimately, is this: Whether you're for the war or against the war for your own personal hawk/dove political reasons, how can we possibly send $87,000,000,000 (look at all those zeroes!!) to Iraq and have people starving to death at home?

broadcasting on the left side of the AM dial

So, as I've mentioned on the right hand side of the page, I'm reading Standing in the Rainbow, by Fannie Flagg. Truthfully, I don't like it very much. It's a series of dozens, or maybe hundreds, of short chapters, each from two to five pages, so nothing really has much of a chance to develop, about the people of Elmwood Springs, sometime just after World War II. Or maybe just before. I don't know for sure, really. I've read more than 100 pages, and I'm not even sure which state Elmwood Springs is in. It's that kind of book. It's no Fried Green Tomatoes, I can tell you that.

Here's the interesting part, though. Our main character, Dot Smith, is known far and wide as "Neighbor Dorothy," and she has her own little radio show. Every day at 9:30 am, she goes on the air for 30 minutes from her living room, sometimes in her robe, sponsored by Golden Flake Flour...

In the late 1920's and early 1930's, as more and more electric lines were strung down country roads to the farmhouses, the long, lonely days of isolated farmwives living far away from the nearest neighbors were suddenly filled with warm and friendly voices. They were the voices of other women coming into their homes via the radio. As early as 1924, women all over the Midwest known as "radio homemakers" began broadcasting, supplying the wives with new recipes, tips for raising children, household hints, gardening advice, local news, and entertainment, but most important, a daily visit from a good friend.

For some reason, that passage has really stuck in my head. I think it really speaks to me about the whole concept of online community...about echo, about blogs, and, about blogging. When I got to the part about how, after a major personal tragedy, Dot had taken to baking complusively to soothe her soul, I knew that we were kindred spirits somehow.

i am a good sport

One of the advantages of having Andrew go away for the summer, and there aren't all that many, is the complete absence of professional sports from my life. I do still read Rick Reilly's column on the way in from the mailbox each week, but that's about it.

Of course, Andrew will come home soon, and that will be the end of that, but there is good news.

First of all, the Mets suck rocks this year. That means no playoffs for them, and that means little if any post-season baseball for me.

Second, we are coming into football season and, if you ask me, football is the best of all the professional sports. Think about it:

• When nothing's happening, nothing's happening. It's time for a commercial and a bathroom break. Compare this to baseball where nothing happens for hours on end, but you have to pay attention anyway, because something could happen at any moment.


• You get plenty of notice when something is about to happen in a football game. They line up, they holler...all cues that it's time to stop gabbing and start watching for a minute...it's a perfect sport for people who, like me, want the television on all the time, but don't actually want to pay attention to it very often.


• Football gives you plenty of opportunity to grunt and groan in sympathy after big hits. This is fun.


• Sometimes there are really bad rock and roll spectacles and/or really good commercials involved.


• And, finally, the best part of professional football: it's not just entertainment, it's an opportunity for entertaining. You can put on a cute sweater, invite friends over, show off your best ever chili recipe, and make a day of it.

This is one of the things that I am looking forward to about the fall.

Bruce Springsteen at the new UConn football field (oh, please God, get me some floor seats) is the other.

counting blessings, my way

This is what it looks like to be mortified in front of an entire nation.

According to Sarah Ban Breathnach, we should find something to be grateful for in our lives each and every day. Today, I am grateful that I am not any of these women:

• Kathie Lee Gifford


• Hillary Clinton


• Jacqueline Kennedy


• Elizabeth Hurley


• Mrs. Wade "I have a wife and a Road Whore" Boggs, whatever her name is (was?)


• Mrs. Michael "Babysitter Fucker" Kennedy, whose name has also been lost to history


• Poor publically humiliated Vanessa Bryant, who has to hold a press conference to say of the dog she married, "Well, ok, Kobe fucked that hootchie bitch, but he's no rapist!"

I figure, if Andrew trades me in for a newer model, at least it won't be in the news and, today, for that I am grateful.

oh, deer me!

Just when I think I've seen it all, read it all, talked about it all...just when I think that I must have learned about the worst things that men can think up to do to women and the worst things that women can find themselves doing for money...just when I wonder if I am finally aware of the absolute depths to which humanity can sink, something comes along that makes me say to myself, "But wait! There's more!"

And, I figure, if I have to roll my eyes in disgust at the human race, you do, too. No reason why you should get a break, either. You want happy news? Go read some other blog today.

A recent post on echo had me following an unidentified link to a local tv news story that, as it turned out, came from Las Vegas. That alone should have suggested that I look away and yet, when I saw the headline, I couldn't.

So there I was, reading about a new form of entertainment in which "men" hunt naked women with paintballs. The women have to run through a course, trying to gather four flags, while the men shoot. If a woman emerges unscathed, she earns $2,500. If she's hit, it's only $1,000. As the participants pay $10,000 to play, once again, it's the pimps getting rich.

Worse, I couldn't help but follow the next link to see what their own website was all about.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Hunting for Bambi. View at your own risk.

It used to be that I figured, hunting-wise, well, I don't want to do it, but if you want to go shoot a deer and eat it all winter, no sin there. It was the men who participated in those canned hunts who I figured were going to Hell, and I figured they deserved it. Now I am reasonably certain that they'll need to move out of the HOV lane to make room for the Bambi Hunters.

Update, less than an hour later:

I am leaving this entry as a testament to my own gullability, stupidity, and bombastic ability, but, according to the prankbusters at Snopes, it seems I may have been had.

I = spacker. Mock away. Go ahead. I would.

the most pathetic girl in the world

Standing in the basement tonight, sorting the garbage, I finally, once and for all, identified my drug of choice. No, it's not the blessed grape or the holy bean. It's not even the sacred herb.

No, ladies and gentlemen, as I stood there putting my cardboard in one pile and my glass, metal, and plastic in another, wondering if the garbage man thought I was a good recycler, I figured it out:

approval.

minor league

Note this sentence from an article about Sharon Stone's imminent divorce:

Months later, Stone found herself laid up in the E.R. after suffering a minor brain hemorrhage.

I just want to say that, if you ask me, the only possible "minor" brain hemmorhage is someone else's.

religion for the rest of us

Not the Ten New Commandments, exactly...maybe just:

Ten New Thoughts About God, courtesy of Terry & Julie

1: GOD HATES LITTERBUGS.

2: GOD HATES YOU, NOT THE FAGS.

3: GOD COULDN'T CARE LESS ABOUT YOUR TOUCHDOWN/GRAMMY/OSCAR/EMMY/WHATEVER.

4. NOBODY KNOWS WHY THAT HAPPENED, NOT EVEN GOD.

5. GOD DID NOT BRING YOUR DAUGHTER HOME; THAT WAS THE COPS.

6. IF YOU WANT GOD TO KNOW THAT YOU ARE THANKFUL FOR YOUR DINNER, SHUT UP AND EAT WHILE IT'S HOT.

7. IT'S OK TO SKIP SERVICES; GOD KNOWS YOU NEED YOUR REST.

8. IT'S EATING THE ANIMALS THAT'S EVIL -- NOT WHICH ANIMALS YOU DECIDE TO EAT. (SEE ALSO BELOW)

9. IT'S OK TO BOIL THE LOBSTERS ALIVE; GOD KNOWS HOW GOOD THEY TASTE.

10. STOP HURTING THAT KID, NO MATTER WHY YOU'RE DOING IT. THAT'S THE ONE THING THAT'S GOING TO GET YOU IN TROUBLE FOR SURE.

goodbye, bra lady

It really is the end of an era, for New York, and for me. Selma Koch has died.

I last saw Mrs. Koch in March of this year. I was in New York for the weekend with Andrew. The kids were with my in-laws and Andrew had camp meetings all day. In a triumph of rare decadence, I had an entire day in Manhattan. Alone. With no one to tend to and no one waiting for me. I slept in a bit (as much as I can these days) and got dressed in a pair of jeans, black shirt, black boots, and my hot pink overcoat. In other words, in New York wear.

I filled my thermos with hot coffee and struck out.

My first stop was 47th Street, where a man who worked in a basement stall no bigger than 4 feet by 6 feet fixed my opal earrings for $10. I walked slowly by the windows, transfixed as always by the beauty of the stones and the incredible amount of money that exists on that one block.

Next, the uptown bus to the Sony Lincoln Square for an 11:15 am showing of The Pianist. I was sure I'd be the only one there, and I was. Sort of. I was the only one there under 60, but the place was pretty full -- at least 100 patrons.

After the movie, a quick snack, and then another uptown bus to my real destination: The Town Shop at 82nd and Broadway.

I hadn't been in a long time, since I bought the foundations (longline white satin stapless backless corselette, white hose, and a crinoline big enough make Godzilla look fluffy) to wear under my wedding dress. But my bras were old. Old enough that, on my way out, when I gave the one I'd come in wearing to the man at the register, he cracked, "You wouldn't rather I gave it to the Smithsonian?" I needed new bras and, two pregnancies later, these DD's weren't playing games. I needed professional assistance.

A nice woman brought me about 40 bras to try on, and we went through all of them. At one point, when I felt that the one I was trying was nice, but perhaps a bit too big on one side, she brought me out to Mrs. Koch, who was wearing a brown tweed suit, thick hose and coral lipstick, and sitting at her roll-top desk. It was clear that, 95 years old or not, she was in charge.

"Mrs. K. she said, "What do you think? This one is her shadow boob, so she's worried about how the fabric is laying."

"It's not smooth," I said.

In a voice totally familiar to me from a terrific npr piece, Mrs. Koch relpied, "What do you want, Honey? It's not wallpaper, it's a brassiere!"

I took the bra.

Rest In Peace, Mrs. Koch.

say cheese

As I was making dinner for the kids tonight, I was reminded of an old Bill Cosby routine in which he tries to explain to his children that the kind, doting grandmother with whom they are so familiar simply is not the same woman who mothered him. She's old now, and determined to get into heaven.

Why was I thinking of this? Well, you see, I was making grilled cheese. I was lovingly buttering my bread, putting no fewer than four slices of cheese between them, and heating it all gently in a frying pan. This is just how my mom would make it for Emily if she were here.

When I first started eating grilled cheese prepared this way, it was a revelation.

The "Hinman Snack Bar" was the evening-only diner in my area of Binghamton's campus. At the snack bar, one could get a variety of greasy items...burgers, fries, and all that...but the finest item on the menu was undoubtedly the grilled cheese, made on thick slices of homemade (really! Sandy, who ran the snack bar, used to make it for us at home!) white bread with, I'm sure, white American Cheese Food Product and some kind of yellowish mystery fat.

Those sandwiches are why I added an entire pants size to my already ample figure during my freshman year.

Compare and contrast this with the "grilled cheese" sandwiches of my youth:

My mother would take two pieces of white bread, put one slice of yellow cheese on each, heat in the toaster oven until more or less melted, and slap it on a plate.

Like Bill says, now she wants to go to heaven.

martha, martha, martha

Let us discuss, for a moment, Martha Stewart. I find the poor girl to be terribly misunderstood.

Now let me say up front that I think she did commit the insider trading that the government is accusing her of. I think she broke the rules, and I think that she is totally unrepentant, much like Leona Helmsley, and that it's going to ber her hubris that does her in.

But that's not what we're talking about right now. What I'm wondering about is more why, when some people look at things like cookie scoops, they say "Martha!" with a certain eye-rolling derision. As if no sane person would ever go to such extremes. As if there is something wrong with a Quest for Perfection.

It seems to me that, as long as we can accept that it is, as they say (Remind me one day that I want to talk about my grandma and the ubiquitous, omnipotent "they." But anyway...), the journey and not the destination that counts, that Perfection isn't something one can actually achieve without a staff of thousands, but merely something to strive for, we can understand that point of Martha is simply to try to inspire us to do each task competently, gracefully, and beautifully. Then it seems to me that Martha is an inspiration and an icon of possibility, not a manifestation of our inadequacies.

I love Martha. There, I've said it.

I love how she gushes over produce and seems to settle for no less that the ripest berries and the tightest asparagus. So what if she grew them herself and all I can grow are weeds? I can still take that feeling to the market and summon it as I select my groceries.

I love how she believes that cakes should be evenly risen and free of crumbs. I can do that, more or less. And even if it's less, who cares? I can try.

Would people (note: not me...you know...people) know or care about things like thread counts or file labels or the quality of vanilla extract without Martha? I think fewer, certainly.

An interesting paradox, isn't she? A total control freak who got totally out of control.

I can't wait to see how it all plays out.

one-word answers

This morning, I asked my best friend this question:

If, for reasons unknown, you were to get one of those Japanese symbol tattoos, what one word would you want written on your body, summing you up forever?"

Interestingly, our answers were almost the same, but I'm not going to reveal them just yet.

But I put this question to the crowd, even the lurkers. What word would you choose?

and they wonder why i'm mad?

HATS I HAVE WORN TODAY

chauffeur
librarian
cook
chambermaid
electrician
gardener
social secretary
nanny
word processor/graphic designer
laundress
accountant

jacko in the sacko

All the hype has died down and it's not at all timely anymore, but I recently came across something that perfectly sums up my feelings about Michael Jackson and his alleged misdeeds. I've decided to post it today, despite its lack of cultural relevance, being about neither Saddam Hussein nor Jennifer Lopez.

For the record, I think Michael Jackson is both heartbreakingly damaged and hopelessly fucked up. On one hand, I think that he never really had much hope of anything even vaguely resembling a normal life, that he has a totally warped vision of himself, and that he is so isolated that he doesn't really understand the rules that the rest of the civilized world plays by. On the other hand, I think that, since he does live on Planet Earth, those rules do apply to him and that he is a sick twist.

Anyway, here's what Dennis Miller had to say about how Michael Jackson gets away with being a complete sexual freak, all the way back in the mid-90's:

And here's the ultimate insanity. Two star-struck parents of a preadolescent proudly pack their son off for long weekends at the Neverland Ranch, even though the only thinkg they know about their child's thrity-five year old confirmed bachelor host is that when he's not having elective facial surgery, he's grabbing his crotch more frequently than Lenny Dykstra in mid-August.

What were they thinking?

Well, I'll tell ya what they were thinking. They were thinking "the most famous person in the world is on the other side of that door, and if my child is the skeleton key that unlocks that door, well then, so be it."

Another celebrity perk, I guess.

and the winner is...

So I watched the Oscars last night. And, mostly, I enjoyed the show. I liked Steve Martin as host (the opening bit about who he'd slept with was hilarious), I liked watching the clothes (although, as I've said previously, it's not nearly as interesting as it used to be), and I liked hearing the speeches. I thought that Kirk Douglas was sweet and Michael Moore was inspiringly bad mannered.

Of course, I just flipped back and forth for the first couple of hours because of the Six Feet Under conflict, but what can you do? I did manage to see the extra large and ultra-radiant Catherine Zeta-Jones accept her award from Captain Bligh, so all was not lost.

And then, after Six Feet Under was over and I'd seen the previews of Brenda's Return, I caught the award for Best Actor. Now, I should tell you that I've had a little thing for Adrien Brody since Summer of Sam. And then, last week in New York, I actually went, all alone and at 11 AM, if you can believe the decadence, to see The Pianist, and I thought it was terrific...well written, well acted, and beautifully shot. So, I was rooting for Adrien Brody, and as surprised as anyone (including him and Halle Berry, from the looks of things!) to see him win. I was pleased for him and I thought that, after some initial goofiness, he acquitted himself well.

And then the evening went on, and an entire auditorium of theoretically enlightened, liberal, and priest-hating celebrities was thrilled to see Roman Polanski take home the award for Best Actor.

Here we are, back at another of those pesky moral gray areas.

Last night's audience cheered loudly enough to make sure Polanski could hear them in Paris, where he is living, unable to return to the United States without facing prison time for drugging and raping a 13 year old girl in 1977. Apparently, what Elia Kazan did was unforgivable, but what Roman Polanski did was not.

Also, compare and contrast, if you will, the crimes and punishments of Ira Einhorn and Roman Polanski.

Now, certainly, it must be argued that Einhorn is the worse of the two, having actually murdered Holly Maddux and stuffed her body in a trunk before he fled to France. Polanski didn't commit murder. According to the grand jury testimony, however, he did take nude photos of a girl barely into her teens, give her champagne and quaaludes and have sex with her against her will.

Einhorn was hunted, extradited, convicted and sentenced, as, of course, he should have been. Polanski, on the other hand, got an Academy Award and all the pains aux chocolats he can eat.

Surely, there must be a middle ground, and I would think that it's more than exile; it's excommunication. Yet it was obvous last night that Polanski was missed. The crowd was more sympathetic to his "tragedy" -- being unable return to Hollywood to accept his Oscar -- than to that of his victim.

Are we that able to compartmentalize our feelings about a person and they art they create? Should we separate the person and the art quite that far apart?

Interestingly, twenty-five years later, Polanski's victim, now the married mother of three, says that we should. In an op-ed piece in the Los Angeles Times, she says:

No one needs to worry about me.... Mr. Polanski and his film should be honored according to the quality of the work. I think that the academy members should vote for the movies they feel deserve it. Not for people they feel are popular.

And yet, despite her request, my choice to spend $10 to see the movie, and the undeniable quality of the film, I have a hard time wrapping my head around that.

in praise of sundays

What a relaxed day we're going to have around here. The kids slept until about 8, which was a nice treat. I got up and made some cranberry muffins and put in the wash while I watched CBS Sunday Morning, my favorite show of the week (kind of like All Things Considered on tv, if you've never seen it).

Still to come: grocery shopping, spring backyard poop and stick clean up, turkey burgers, Six Feet Under, and the Oscars, which are nowhere near as much fun since everyone hired a stylist.

a sad day in the sticks

I am sad to report the imminent demise of the our local dairy farm.

One of the wonderful things (and there aren't all that many, really) about life in town, is that we have a lot of small, family-owned farms within just a few minutes drive of our home. We can get ice cream, turkeys in season, all kinds of produce, eggs (well, until the feud with the egg people began, but that's another story), and more. And it used to be that we could get milk delivered fresh to our front porch once a week.

But today's delivery came with a note that the business will be closing gradually and that next week will be the last delivery date.

Milk delivery was wonderful, not only because the milk was fresh and delicious and free of hormones that are likely to cause my daughter to menstruate at 9 years old, but because I felt like the dairy people were somehow taking care of me. Add some eggs or half and half or cream cheese? No problem! Emily wants some chocolate milk? Terrific!

Yet another effort at small business, personalized service, and local agriculture gone under.

as my mother says, it beats the alternative

Consider this, from this week's New Yorker article on actress Frances McDormand:

Around this time, something else happened. She and Coen had applied to adopt a baby, and in 1995 he arrived: Pedro, six months old, from Paraguay. She became a doting mother. (She had sworn that she would never be a slave to a man, she said: "Now I'm a slave to my child. I hold out my hands and let him vomit in them." Also, the fact of having a child finally defined her, in her mind, as female. What maternity didn't do, aging did. When young men stop looking at you, this is a loss, but it is also a gain: you stop looking at yourself through their eyes. As she approached her forties, she decided, "Oh fuck it already. I'll just be. I just am."

And with that in mind, just being, I say: Happy birthday to me.

a little oprah is a dangerous thing

Benjamin Franklin once said "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

The question of liberty vs. safety came into play in my life today in a very tangible way and, really, I'm not sure which side of the fence I'm on.

Here's the situation:

I have this little tv in my kitchen, and I like to watch it while I do housework. Yesterday, both kids were (for once!) happily amusing themselves in the late afternoon, and I settled in for a little Oprah while I folded the laundry. Don't ask my why, because no good ever comes of this.

Anyway, the topic was sex offenders living among us. Next thing I knew, I was on the phone with the friendly Police Department, asking for a URL where I could take a look at Connecticut's registry, mandated by Megan's Law. The woman on the phone explained to me that I couldn't see it online, because of a recent court decision, but that I was welcome to come to town hall and have a look.

Well, I thought to myself, that's kind of extreme. I'll pass. But I had errands on the north end of town this morning and I figured, well, I'm only a mile away, let's just go see if the guy down the street is a child rapist or something. So Jonah and I stopped in.

Only guess what?

After I spoke to a few people, who spoke to a few other people, The second in command, came out to where Jonah and I were standing. He apologized, and told me that he couldn't show me the registry. He said that, if I had concerns about a specific resident, we could talk about that, but that, per the Court's ruling, the registry itself is unavailable for public browsing, even at the station. Showing it to me would violate the privacy of the men whose names were listed.

Complicated, no?

One one hand, many people, myself included, believe that pedophilia is not just a kink, but an aberration that, like some addictions, may be overcome minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, but never cured. Never removed. Never really gone. For the pedophile, it is an ongoing struggle not to give in to those temptations, not to succumb to those desires. Believing that, one can then believe that, even after release from prison, these men pose a danger to our children. It follows that parents have a right to know about their presence in order to take steps to minimize the risk of exposure.

On the other hand, our entire penal system is theoretically predicated on the idea that prison time is a rehabilitative experience (Oz notwithstanding) and that, after serving a sentence, a person has paid his debt to society and is free to start over with a clean slate and live his life in peace, with the same freedom from government intrusion that the rest of us enjoy.

Whose rights take precedence?

Do I take a stand in support of civil liberties or the safety of my children? I work hard to keep my children near me...to know where they are, whether we're playing in the park or walking through the grocery store. I take active and concrete steps to keep them protected. But what about when they're out of my sight? What about when they are at other people's houses? What if seeing a registry could keep me from sending Emily on a playdate to the home of a friend whose parent was a convicted pedophile?

This question is now in front of the Supreme Court. Arguments were made on November 13, but no decision has yet been handed down.

It will be interesting to watch, in these days of racial profiling, Republicans, and highly publicized crimes against children, which way the wind blows.

purple prose

What is it about purple, anyway?

Over the years, I have known any number of people, usually young women, who were, well, excessively attracted to all things purple, in all its various shades. They wear it, they paint their rooms in it, they surround themselves in it.

A brief hunt gives us web pages that these folks have put up offering purple graphics, pictures of their favorite purple things, a club for purple aficionados, a (God help me) purple mermaid gazing into the water, and, um, purple pleasures.

But why is it that no one feels this way about red, blue, yellow, or green?

Practicing my html? Why do you ask?

retouch this, jackasses

I was in Stockbridge last week and, desperate for something to read, I picked up a copy of Harper's Bazaar, which I would normally avoid like the plague. The woman on the cover was beautiful, of course, but completely unrecognizable as actress Kate Winslet.

A little conversation and a little internet research later, it became clear that there has been a spate of Kate Winslet Photoshopping going on. Apparenly, the lovely Miss Kate has been doing a lot of interviewing and posing, promoting her new film The Life of David Gale.

Here is a picture of the actress at the 2002 Oscars. Note the lovely curves.

On the other hand, here is a picture from the January issue of the British edition of GQ.

Want to know what Kate Winslet herself has to say about this?

"The re-touching is excessive. I do not look like that and, more importantly, I don't desire to look like that. It's a little distressing this is magazine policy -- all magazines. It's very important to me that the majority of the readers who buy these magazines are between the ages of 16 and 35 and a lot are at the younger end of the spectrum at a time when a woman is very physically aware of herself.

I'm very aware, because I did it myself, that young women look at publications like that and see a woman looking beautiful, looking sexy and in their mind looking perfect. Therefore these women strive to look like this idea of perfection.

But it isn't real. People's legs are simply not that smooth. Everyone has a lump somewhere or they have knobbly knees.

I can tell you that they've reduced the size of my legs by about a third. For my money it looked pretty good the way it was taken. I felt quite proud of the fact that I stood in a pair of tights.

It's not that I'm upset or crying into my milkshake -- but it's just a little alarming that sometimes they choose to retouch photographs to an extent that I personally don't agree with.

I want to be clear that I haven't suddenly lost 13kg. I'm exactly the same weight, size and everything as when I went to the Academy Awards last March.

What is sexy? All I know from the men I've ever spoken to is that they like girls to have an arse on them, so why is it that women think in order to be adored they have to be thin? I just don't understand that way of thinking.

I'm certainly not a sex symbol who doesn't eat."

Good for you, Kate.

on novocaine

Emily and I went to the dentist this morning. I wore my usual uniform (jeans, formerly black t-shirt, red shoes). She wore her pocketbook and a tiara. She has no cavities. I have three spots that "require attention," meaning I am due for two sealants and a filling. Great.

When I was a kid, the family dentist was a childhood friend of my father's named Irwin Cheskin. He worked out of an office that was part of his home, somewhere on Niagara Falls Boulevard. I guess he needed to make room for teeth or something because, one day, I was informed that I needed to go see Dr. Cheskin to have eight of my baby teeth, molars mostly, removed. My dad took me.

Dr. Cheskin put me in the chair and told me to close my eyes. He said that he was going to pinch my gums really really hard but that, when he was done, I wouldn't feel anything and it wouldn't hurt to have the teeth removed. So I did, and I guess that's when he shot me with the novocaine. Then he left the room for a while, presumably to do something else while it took effect.

My dad was sitting in a chair in the corner, reading a magazine. A particularly titillating issue of National Geographic? I don't know. Anyway, I was fascinated by the way that Dr. Cheskin's magic pinch was working.

"Look, Dad! I can bite my lip, and I don't even feel it!" I said.

"Uh huh," he said, with barely a glance my way.

This scene repeated itself several times until Dr. Cheskin came back into the room, looked at the blood pouring down my chin, and freaked out. After some clean up work, he proceeded with the extraction.

My final memory of that day is of me, standing in Dr. Cheskin's kitchen, my mouth stuffed to overflow with gauze pads, as Dr. Cheskin's bespectacled son came in with a fully set up chess board and asked me if I wanted to play. For some mysterious reason, I said yes, and spent the next little while at the kitchen table, biting gauze, looking at the Treasure Chest ring on my finger, and trying to say "Check."

terry at 15

Nine Songs That Seemed SO MEANINGFUL When I Was 15,
in no particular order:

Time in a Bottle, Jim Croce
Color My World, Chicago
Father and Son, Cat Stevens
If, Bread
You've Got a Friend, James Taylor
Circle Game, Joni Mitchell
Cat's in the Cradle, Harry Chapin
Part of the Plan, Dan Fogelberg
Cathedral, Crosby, Stills & Nash

I had this friend, Kraus, from Rochester. We spent a lot of weekends together because it was the early 80's, and people could still put their kids on Greyhound buses without worrying about perverts and serial killers making off with them.

lived in a funky old house with her mother and her much younger sister, who could do this weird corkscrew thing with her tongue. Her parents were divorced. 's father, a vet, lived in a trailer. Once, we spent the weekend at his house. He tried to teach me to waterski, but it was impossible with my glasses on, and even more impossible with them off. In his kitchen, I sliced my thumb while trying to cut a brick of cheddar cheese to make a sandwich. He wanted to put a stitch in it, but there was no way I was letting a horse doctor and his needle near my precious flesh. I still have the scar.

Much to my envy, could play guitar really well. She had this big loose-leaf notebook with hundreds of song lyrics and chords, patiently and meticulously copied in her own tidy handwriting, and she could play them all. She took requests, which was cool. She had a 12-string, which was even cooler. She was a huge fan of John Denver, Rocky Horror, and my friend Ophir.

also dated Eric Mercer. Weirdly, Eric Mercer's sister Michelle ended up living on my floor in Binghamton. She was the first person I ever saw take off a bra without removing her shirt. Neat trick, that.

Meanwhile, this train of thought inspired me. I decided to stalk do a google search on my friend , and I sent her email tonight. I'll let you know if she writes back.

you know i worry

My mother in law has this weird neurosis. She is worried about Peter Riegert. Probably if she even knew when The Sopranos was on, she'd know that she doesn't really have to worry about his career anymore. But she doesn't and, for years now, she's been worried. He was so hot for a while...he did Local Hero and Crossing Delancey and then there was some failed CBS series and then, as far as she knows, nothing. So she worries.

Me, I'm worried about James Gandolfini.

Last week, we rented The Man Who Wasn't There (five word review: ok, but no Blood Simple). James Gandolfini played a small role, an adulterous husband with a vicious streak. He was fine, but it made me worry.

I worry that, when The Sopranos finishes its run after the coming season, he's never going to work again. A gangster movie here and there, maybe the occasional heist film, ok. But, unless they find him some kind of My Cousin Vinny Redux, he's done for. He can't ever play against Meg Ryan, that's for sure. Every time he kissed her, I'd be waiting for him to pick her up by the throat and slam her against a wall.

Wouldn't you?

ellen levin got a life sentence

Robert Chambers left prison today, a "free man." With a little luck, he will spend the days after today in the way that he has spent most of his days until now...drug-addicted, broke, and the subject of whispers and innuendo everywhere he goes.

In case you're not sure who Robert Chambers is, let me bring you up to speed. In August, 1986, only weeks after the beginning of my life in Manhattan, Robert Chambers left a bar called Dorrian's Red Hand at 84th and 2nd with Jennifer Levin. That they went from there to Central Park is not debated. What happened after they got there is.

According to Chambers, his all-the-money-in-the-world-ain't-going-to- buy-him-out-of-Hell defense attorney, and the screaming cover of the New York Post, they engaged in "rough" sex and he accidentally killed Jennifer Levin in a fit of pain when she squeezed his balls a bit too hard. Oopsie-daisy.

According to then ADA Diane Fairstein and a host of experts, Chambers, a sociopathic misfit if ever there was one, took Jennifer Levin to the Park, strangled her for kicks, and then sat on a wall behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art and watched as her body was discovered and removed.

He served every day of his sentence in prison (I don't know where he served, but surely hope it was Em City) and spent three years in solitary confinement because he had a hard time coloring in the lines.

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

This was the first City-Wide Drama to occur during my years in New York, followed by tales of rampaging in Howard Beach, wilding in Central Park, Donald and Marla and the best sex she ever had, Amy Fisher, and the Bride of Jackostein. It was the kind of story that some people read about in the Times and others follow in the Post.

I'll leave it to you to decide for yourself which I am.

a superpower I'd like to have

the ability to aerobically metabolize cheese.

and another thing...

I have tried the whole "journaling" thing -- there's a verb invented by retailers, if ever there was one -- and it just doesn't work for me. I mean, what is the point of spending money on a fancy Kate's Paperie journal and a Montblanc pen, just to tell myself what I think? I already know what I think. It's so much more satisfying to tell everyone else what I think.

oooh! I made italics! I am practically a real geek now! Note to self: must see Wizard about getting chops.

I Think I'm Gonna Like It Here

I feel like I've had some kind of epiphany. If I manage to stick with it, this blog thing could be just what I need.

A million times a day, I have some random thought that feels like it needs to be birthed. Just having it is not enough...I need to SHARE. So some poor unsuspecting friend or relation gets stuck hearing (like yesterday) my musings on the miracle of the mango or some such. (good alliteration, no?)

I can hear my phone bill going down already.