Fung-Shwa

I will admit that I am not a big fan of  mystical/New Age/Woo-woo stuff. I have, at various times in my life, suspended my disbelief long enough to check out aromatherapy, I Ching, herbal medicine, Tarot cards, flower remedies and Deepak Chopra’s ideas about eating according to ones body type.  I did like yoga, and will probably stick with that one (and I have a holistic vet), but otherwise I remain a staunch and resolute believer in Deal With It, Take an Aspirin, and If Your Body Type is “Bigger Than You Want,” Eat Less and Walk More. I would love to believe that sniffing a sprig of lavender and putting a big mirror next to the front door would make me relaxed and wealthy, but sadly I see no evidence that this is true. These are projects best supported by Xanax and windfall inheritances.

Last night as I sat transfixed by the many widget choices available on iGoogle (an activity known to my family as “working”) my dear husband took down the Christmas tree and put the furniture back in it’s customary arrangement. (This was an incredibly selfless and kind act undertaken with no upfront promise of sexual favors, and you may think that I shirked my duty; it might make you feel better to know that I am also in charge of deploying and tearing down my parents’ Christmas tree and decorations, so I am still on that particular hook).  Since I was toiling away in another room, deciding whether to install daily quotes from The Simpson’s or Jack Handy, Rob (the husband) made the daring decision to leave the sofa and chairs in their new “With Tree” locations. Admittedly, there aren’t that many ways to arrange furniture in a room that only has two whole walls, and necessarily focuses on the Ark of the Covenant television set located in the only logical spot.

When I surfaced, he asked how I liked “the Fung Shwa.” Since I believed that Fung Shwa was a French casserole made with truffles and duck confit, it took me a minute. “Oh,” I said with a figurative smack to my forehead, “you mean Feng Shui!” After thanking me graciously, as he often does, for taking the time to correct him, he allowed as how that was what he had meant.

“Well,” I responded, playing for time, “what do you think?” He shrugged.

“I can still see the TV from my chair, and I don’t have to move the couch back where it was.”

That, my friends, is a kind of Feng Shui I can believe in.

Anger

In my family of origin there were four people. Two “had tempers” and two were “martyr lip biters.” I fell into the latter category, and have spent much of my life genuinely astonished by displays of anger. I could not, did not understand, for example, how people could say terrible, painful, accusatory and (frequently) inaccurate things and later say that they had not meant those things because they had “said them in anger.” As far as I was concerned, if you said a thing it was said and could not be un-said, unless one was actually clinically incapacitated at the time of speaking. It was also true when I was growing up that we had a fairly genteel household. There was no rough and tumble pummeling or screaming at siblings; it just wasn’t permitted. My brother could ignore this ban if he was angry enough, but I couldn’t cross the line. I became a sulker, a stewer, a planner of elaborate plots I which I would die, and then everyone would be sorry that I wasn’t allowed to smack my little brother when he cheated at Battleship and then lied about it.

The flip side of being a lip-biting martyr is that, of course, you do get angry, you just don’t express it. I have long been a physical catalouge of unexpressed anger – tooth grinding, tension headaches, stress-related rashes, hair that falls out in clumps, and the odd panic attack. Ironically, if you asked five people who know me well (excluding my husband, who really does know me well) they would tell you that I am very calm, that I “take things in stride” and that I “handle things well.” The truth of the matter is, that until recently, I was “handling”things by suppressing and internalizing them to the point where I was literally falling apart.

I can get angry now, I’ve been working on it. I can almost express it, although I tend to get stuck in the realm of the passive-aggressive. Its tricky to go from St. Annie of Perpetual Calmness to a person who sometimes raises her voice, swears, or snipes. No one likes it much, it causes disruption, and its easier all around if I remain calm and smoothe things over. (Its really not terribly attractive behavior to yell and swear, but sometimes it is natural and human). I am now able to understand that I can argue back with someone who loves me, and that they still love me even if I disagree with them. I can talk politics with my husband, who is a member of the Other Party, and we will still be married and agree on most other things most of the time. I can spar with my mother (a member of the Tribe of Temper) and go out to lunch with her and adore cute babies as if nothing happened. It is a freeing thing, this ability to express anger when I feel it, and I am confident that my natural reserve and compassion will prevent me from becoming abusive or excessive in that expression. It still takes a great deal to make me angry, and I really can’t imagine devolving into a person who could commit acts of Road Rage, or hurl invectives at my child.

At this moment, I am angry at a friend, and working to sort it out in my head so that I can express my feelings without doing harm. It is one thing to raise my voice in the heat of an argument or to rise when I am baited, and quite another to be the sole angry party when one is feeling wronged and the other person is intentionally or negligently oblivious. If a tree falls in a forest and only I know that it was carelessly cut by someone and that it fell on my foot and broke it in two places, does it make a case for legitimate anger on my part when the guy with the axe walks around as if there was no problem?

I have to drive this train, if I want it to go anywhere, and I am not on ground as firm as that I travel with my family. I can feel my heart pound at the injustice I perceive, I can predict the itchy skin, the headache or the extraordinary fatigue that will result from tamping this down as if my feelings and reactions were ridiculous. But what if I’m wrong? What if I’m crazy, what if I’m over-dramatizing? What if this is a circumstance that nine out of ten other people would accept as “business as usual?” How does one ever know that she is justified in anger, short of a blatant injury like theft, dishonesty or unfaithfulness? When am I allowed to be angry? Who gives me permission?

I do not want to be one of those women who burns with righteous indignation because my child doesn’t get the lead in the school play, or writes to advice columnists when family members refuse to pay their share for an anniversary dinner. There is a line between projecting one’s own standards onto the world and being angry when those standards are not met, and being legitimately unhappy about being treated with disrespect or unkindness. I am so accustomed to believing that I am wrong all the time that I automatically question my anger and challenge myself to make a case, to prove that its acceptable for me to feel what I feel. I give myself tests: would Mary feel the same in this situation? Would Beth? If so, then its okay to be mad. If not, then I need to suck it up.

I guess I had always imagined that by the time I was somebody’s mother, I’d have all of this stuff down. Apparently there are growing pains into middle age, or wherever I am, and they are just as painful and confusing as they were when I was twelve and outgrowing my elementary school friends, or twenty two and pining for unavailable men. I’ll think, I’ll write, I’ll pray, and I’ll talk to people who provide sound counsel. (Well, honestly, I’ll also eat chocolate and watch “The O.C.” DVDs and fantasize the horrific humiliation of my tormentor). Then I’ll either find a way to express the anger that is threatening my equilibrium and peace, or I’ll acknowledge that I just don’t have it in me to stand up for myself and the kind of treatment I deserve as a human being. I think maybe I’ll just go buy the chocolate now.

Morals and Basketball

The children of attentive parents receive moral instruction early and often. Whether the context is religious or secular, conservative or liberal, a firm grounding in right and wrong is the first step in growing humans who give to charity and return lost wallets. We started Sam with simple lessons: it is wrong to take other peoples’ toys, wrong to hit Tyler with the See N’ Say, and necessary to “share” whether you want to or not. As he grew into wider social circles and spent more time away from us, it was necessary to teach general good citizenship, such as the inclusion of “yucky” people in groups. After ten years, though, I still worried that once he was out of my sight, he forgot everything he had learned. Little boys are not known for their gentility, and are easily persuaded to participate in anything that looks like fun, from throwing crayon missiles to stomping ants.

Arriving early for volunteer work in Sam’s classroom, I saw a group of fifth graders playing basketball. They were on a blacktop court with two serious looking hoops. Each team had four members, and there were seven boys and one girl in all. Sam didn’t see me, and I enjoyed the opportunity to watch him when he was absorbed in his “work,” running complicated passing drills, high-fiving his teammates when they made a basket, and pounding up and down the black tar until his face was red with exertion. I was impressed that he knew enough to suggest a “pick and roll,” and admired the fastidiousness with which free throws followed fouls. These ten year olds had made rules, and followed them with no referee beyond their mutually agreed-upon sense of right and wrong.

As I walked towards the fence surrounding the court, I heard my son speaking to a smallish boy in a red ski jacket. “Max, we have to have even teams, and we already have four and four, so you can’t be on a team, you have to be a coach.” Max, apparently preferring to be in on the action, planted himself firmly at the base of a basket and began to yell. “That’s not fair!” he spat.
“Its Sam’s ball and he makes the rules” said Andrew.
“Yeah,” added Marcy. “Plus it wouldn’t be fair if one team had five and one team had four.” Max showed no signs that he was persuaded by this logic.

I looked around nervously for a teacher, or a playground monitor to mediate. There was no one, and Max continued stand beneath the basket and fume while the game whirred back into life. I wondered whether I should intervene, and considered what approach would be fairest. First, there was the issue of disciplining other peoples’ children. Did I have to confine my remarks to Sam’s behavior? Should I tell Sam that they should rotate in and out so Max could have a turn? Could I tell Max that he had to accept the rules because he had joined the game late?

As I considered my options, a second girl ran up to Sam from another part of the playground. I saw him nod, and heard him yell to Max that he could play now; the teams would be even. Max stepped away from the basket, swiped at his eyes and nose with his sleeve, and walked over to join his designated team. With no help from me, the drama had ended. As if nothing had happened, Max went to work guarding the unnaturally tall Kevin, and his team cheered him as he blocked a jump shot. I did not need to impose rules or to act as a referee on that blacktop, because the fifth grade morning recess basketball league had created a solid, fair and enviable moral universe. Perhaps we could learn a few things from them.

My Old Hair

For women of a certain age, hair becomes an issue. When I was a child, my hair was cut into a blunt bob until I was old enough to beg for long hair. Despite my ineffectual use of a brush, it was a look that worked for me in elementary school. In high school, I affected the same Farrah Fawcett wings of hair worn by every other girl in my school, and during my years as a young professional woman I had a “Rachel.” In between, I flirted with layers, grew out layers, straightened, permed, highlighted, and bleached.

To my surprise, my hair is now getting old. It is turning not gray, but actually white, and this alien old lady hair is growing in at both temples and along my part. A Hair Care Professional has informed me that I have a number of options, including highlights to blend the gray, or all-over permanent color to cover the gray. (White hair, for some mysterious reason, is always referred to as “gray” in this context). Both of these choices involve large sums of money, standing appointments for maintenance, special color-preserving shampoos, and large-denomination Pottery Barn gift certificates at Christmas. They also involve the cycle of colored hair characterized by three days of too much color, two weeks of great color, and four weeks during which the color fades daily until it looks wrung out and drab. This last stage is, of course, followed by the shock of newly applied color, which makes one’s hair appear to be seven shades darker or two shades blonder than it was only hours earlier.

I liked the idea of hair color when it was fun, but I bitterly resent the notion that I “should” color it to obscure signs of advancing age. I admire women with beautiful gray or white hair, like Heloise or the model in the J.Jill catalogs whose beautiful, young faces contrast stunningly with their, long silver hair. The problem is that my hair isn’t silver, it is reddish brown with white bits at the temples and near the part. It looks very much like a bathtub with hideous rust stains. Currently, I color it with temporary color that washes out in twenty four shampoos, and leaves big dark stains on my pink bath towels. Every twenty four shampoos I reevaluate whether I should let it go white, have it professionally colored, or go another twenty four shampoos and see if I have a hair-related epiphany. So far, I have gotten as far as making and canceling two appointments at the salon, and buying one more box of temporary color.

Coupled with the issue of color, is one of length and style. My mother, a former Wellesley girl, has a number of rules regarding a woman’s appearance. Prohibitions include tattoos and piercings of any kind, “vulgar” amounts of gold jewelry, and long hair on women “of a certain age.” I believe myself to have passed that age about two years ago, but I cannot bring myself to get either the short, wash-and-wear “old lady” cut or, the longer and slightly fluffier variation, the “fat lady” cut. I am also avoiding the “suburban mommy cut,” which generally involves long layers that can be tucked behind the ears. I have had this cut in the past, and it actually looks pretty good, but makes me feel vaguely Stepford. Add beige highlights and a pair of khaki Capri pants and I’m interchangeable with every mom at the grocery store.
At the moment, my hair is growing past my shoulders, an awkward amalgam of ancient layers, split ends and seasonal frizz and curl. It is pretty much reddish brown. One day, I may see a magazine picture, or have a conversation, or see someone on the street, and be seized by the sudden, desperate need for a haircut and highlights. In the alternative, I may wake up one morning at peace with the decision to be permanently finished with coloring and “styling.” For now, I am looking a little suburban, a little Lady Godiva (although always fully dressed in public), and mostly confused.

The End of the “Ons:” Some Music, Maestro, Please!

 

Although I place a high value on feelings like compassion and gratitude, I think its gotten far too serious over here. I’ve had two days of not writing about food on my cooking blog, and a protracted period of not writing about anything vaguely amusing on my “fun” blog. Believe you me; I have enough serious thoughts, worries, neuroses and borderline psychoses to fill many pages, but today I want something light. Capricious. How often does a 45-year-old woman who doesn’t work in Vegas, on Broadway or in a kindergarten classroom get to be “capricious?”

I’ve been thinking about music lately, mostly in terms of its power to evoke memories and emotions. I was a musician for many years, so there are numerous classical works that bring specific times and situations to the surface of my consciousness. Because I have lived my entire life surrounded by popular music on radios, vinyl, CDs, MP3s and television, there is also a vast quantity of “popular” music that can instantly transport me to a 7th grade dance (“My Eyes Adored You”), riding the subway with my Walkman (They Might be Giants and REM), or my years of working retail (Mariah Carey singing Christmas carols).

I like many, many songs that are probably considered vacuous by others, including “My Sharona,” and “Black Betty,” but there are also songs that I. just. hate.. There are actually entire bands whose entire output could disappear with no effect on my life: The Eagles come to mind. Here, in no particular order, is a list of songs I hate. I notice that many of them are from the 70s, and many involve animals. If you love them, remember that there is no accounting for taste. If you hate them, give me the cyberspace knuckle bump and consider us soul mates.

1. “Muskrat Love” by The Captain and Tenille. They were so damned cute, and I love “Love Will Keep Us Together,” but this song is creepy and it just doesn’t make any sense. Why not moles or possums?
2. “A Horse with No Name” by America. I know lots of people like this, but I find it dull and pretentious. Symbolism should be subtle.
3. “Afternoon Delight” by The Starland Vocal Band. Okay, so we were in 8th grade, singing along to this song about people having sex in the afternoon? Eeeeeew.
4. “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” by Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond. So leave, already.
5. “Angel of the Morning” by Juice Newton. I don’t get it.
6. “Let ‘Em In” by Paul McCartney & Wings. This man wrote and sang some of my favorite songs in the history of music; I guess anyone can have a bad day.
7. “Baby I’m a Want You” by Bread. Perhaps he needs her to give him some instruction in grammar.
8. “Precious and Few” by Climax. Why?! Is she far away? Married? In quarantine?
   
9. “Delta Dawn” by Helen Reddy. Another case of “great artist, unfortunate song.” (I do kind of like the Tanya Tucker version, for some reason). This kind of maudlin, Miss Havesham theme seems to have been very popular around this time. (“Drusilla Penny,” “Eleanor Rigby,” et al).
   
10. “Touch Me in the Morning” by Diana Ross. Amazing, amazing voice, but again, who are we kidding. “Touch me in the morning/then just walk away” and its fine with her? See #5,above.
11. “Wildfire” by Michael Murphy. See #2, above.
    
12. “Reunited” by Peaches & Herb.
    
13. “You Light Up My Life” by Debby Boone.I will readily admit that this is a song that appeals to the weepy, crush-prone soul of an adolescent girl. Apparently, though, the song was about God not Robbie Benson. I personally think God prefers it sung by Patti Smith (seriously). I know I do.
14. “Sometimes When We Touch” by Dan Hill. This has a kind of creepy, intense, unhealthy relationship vibe. Is he saying that he loves her, or that he doesn’t? Don’t they ever just read the paper and eat bagels?
15. “Midnight at the Oasis” by Maria Muldaur. I don’t get it. Its basically “Afternoon Delight” in the desert.
16. “Loving You” by Minnie Ripperton. Beautiful voice, but then she, well, she screams and keeps on singing like nothing happened. Wierd.

I will admit that I originally had “Brand New Key” by Melanie on my list because I remember thinking it was dumb and annoying, but when I listened to it again, I found it kind of charming and funky.

On Gratitude

This is the time of year when Americans focus on all the things for which they are grateful, as part of Thanksgiving. I am always grateful for my family, the roof over my head, the good food I eat, my access to good medical care, the availability of meaningful work, free speech, and a whole set of less important (things like my stand mixer and my iPod).

I also have one big surge of gratititude every year for the young man who died and gave my mother years of life. About a week before Thanksgiving in 2002, my mother was on dialysis, and had been approved for a kidney transplant. Her kidney had failed several years earlier, as the result of poorly controlled hypertension, and she then began years of dyalisis which involved the insertion of a shunt, and thrice weekly sessions hooked up to the giant machine that cleaned her blood. She could no longer travel, she was often exhausted, and after a long life as a dynamic and involved person she felt useless and hobbled. She was on “the list,” but could not receive a transplant unless a donor was found who was a good match. My brother and I couldn’t donate because of our family history of hypertension and diabetes, which made it inadvisable for us to give up our own kidneys.

About a week before Thanksgiving that year, the “transplant beeper” went off, letting us know that a donor kidney had been found. In the middle of the night my father, mother and I drove the 60 miles to the hospital where the surgery would be prepared. We were greeted by the surgeon, my mother was wheeled off to be prepped, and my father and I settled in on hard plastic chairs for the night. Off and on during the night, I went to the the hospital’s chapel to pray for my mother, the surgeons and attendants, my father’s spirits, and the family of the donor, who we knew had been killed in an accident. The next morning we were allowed to see my mother, already more pink and less yellow than the day before. The surgeon was cautiously optimistic, and although she would miss Thanksgiving dinner at home, we would all have much to be grateful for.

We subsequently discovered that the donor had been a young man attending a local high school who had died in a motorcycle accident. As a mother, I cannot imagine the pain that the boy’s family endured then, or that they feel to this day. I imagine that this week is as sad and difficult for them as it is joyous for my family. I  hope that they know that by choosing to donate organs they gave many people the gift of years of loving their mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, parents and children. There is nothing “right” about losing a child on the brink of his adult life, but if there is anything good, it is that so many lives were saved by the loving choice that his family made during a time of tremendous pain and grief.

Have you signed an organ donor card?

On Compassion

 ”Compassion is the basis of morality.”
- Arthur Schopenhauer

About a week ago, our local paper ran a story about a 33-year-old woman who had just given birth to premature triplets, and was jobless, in debt, and living in a shelter. She was trained as a medical transcriptionist, and had worked, but  lost her job and her home before going into the hospital for a period of bed rest followed by the birth of her babies. Medicaid had paid for the hospital stay and the early care of the triplets, but there was clearly no family support (her own mother lives in the shelter with her and her children), and no support from the father of the triplets. It was the policy of the shelter to limit occupants to relatively brief stays, other area shelters were full, and it was unclear where the woman and her babies would go when their time at the shelter ran out.

My heart went out to this woman for a number of reasons. Aside from the fact that we are both woman, mothers, and human beings, her situation created a painful “there, but for the grace of God go I” moment for me.  At 34, I was also pregnant and unmarried, and ordered into the hospital for 7 weeks of bed rest.  This resulted in the loss of all of my ongoing legal cases because I was a solo practitioner and could not meet with clients or attend hearings from my hospital bed. The difference was that I was supported with great love by my parents, by the rest of my family, by my (now) husband, and by a network of friends and colleagues. I lost some time, I lost a job, I lost a lot of income, but I felt completely safe. I knew I had a place to go after my son was born, I knew I was going to be married as soon as I was allowed to stand up and get dressed, and I was constantly aware of a huge safety net that kept me from falling too far even though I had made a mistake. I felt compassion, rather than judgment, from everyone around me. I was well-educated, I had money in the bank, I had a “nice” family, and the father of my child was in and out of the hospital at least twice a day.

This woman had no safety net, and was on the edge of living on the streets because she made a decision, as I did, to bring an unplanned pregnancy to term because it felt like the right choice. Making that choice brought me a beautiful child, a hastening of the marriage that had already been planned, and the beginning of the best part of my life. It brought this woman, my doppleganger, poverty, anxiety, judgment and a complete lack of security at a time when all new mothers are overwhelmed and exhausted even if they have only one infant.

As one would expect, because of the story in the newspaper there was an outpouring of support. Money, baby clothes, and rent-free living situations are flowing freely at the moment, and it is my prayer that this will be enough to see the woman through a difficult time, and to get back on her feet.

There is also the response that I knew would be forthcoming; a response that is compassion-less, judgmental, vindictive and based on fear and stereotypes. To whit (from the newspaper): “[t]hose poor kids should be put up for adoption. Mommy has had sex with a stranger, is homeless. She has no clue how to raise kids let alone take care of herself.”

I am going to take a (metaphorical) deep breath, and thank God for my own great good fortune. Then I am going to remind myself, and anyone reading this, that we are all in this “life” thing together. I admit that it is hard to feel great sympathy for child predators, axe murderers, and certain other (arguably) evil types. In this instance, however, we are talking about a woman who made a mistake that many (including me) have made before her. She has been amply punished for that mistake, and as humans we have an obligation not to judge but to feel and express compassion towards her and her three babies and to help them move forward into a life with more security and greater potential.

Maybe this woman will make other mistakes. Maybe she won’t be Mother of the Year. Maybe she’ll do something(s) that you or I would find immoral, unpleasant or sinful. On the other hand, maybe she’ll love her children, raise them as well as she can, and try to do a little better every day.

We can’t know her future any more than we know our own, and we should not judge her dispassionately based on her past. We should wish her well, feel joy that her children are alive and healthy, extend a helping hand and treat her with compassion because she is one of us. Regardless of our own religious, political or ethical beliefs, we can’t be anything but human and flawed; we would all do well to remember that rather than trying to set ourselves apart as superior beings. There is only one of those, and I’m pretty sure He would expect us to treat her with compassion, too.

On Stress

           A while back, I drove into a woman backing out of her driveway. I apologized profusely, went home, cried, and later paid for the $937.00 worth of repairs. I confess that I was totally distracted at the moment of impact; I had not slept well, I had a toothache, and I was preoccupied with the PTA, my actual job, Christmas gifts and whether I had remembered to refill some prescriptions.

A week later, Sam was at a friend’s house, and due home for dinner at 5:30. At about that time, a thunderstorm blew through the neighborhood, and I called his friend’s mother to say that I would pick him up. Alyssa explained that she was happy to drive Sam home, but couldn’t find her car keys. Everyone was looking for them, and she couldn’t imagine where she had left them. When I arrived at her house to collect Sam, Alyssa sheepishly told me that the keys had been “found” in the ignition of her car.

The same week, I hosted one of those parties where someone is selling something. As the demonstrator began to talk about rubber-stamping, the phone rang. It was my friend Molly, saying that she still planned to come to the party, but had lost her wallet. She arrived an hour later, explaining that her whole family had hunted for the wallet (including driving back to the mall), that she had cancelled all of her credit cards, and that she had then discovered the wallet in her bedroom.

I am not a bad driver any more than Molly and Alyssa are careless people. As mothers, our heads are full of facts, plans, deadlines, food preferences, and worries. We can diary birthday parties, school concerts, family trips, half days, the administration of heartworm pills, and library due dates, but where do we keep track of which kind of juice bags are currently favored, which Junie B. Jones books we have already read and whether we already gave Bobby a Harry Potter Lego set for his birthday last year? If we work outside the home, there is another set of deadlines, impending crises, and priorities to be juggled, and probably another calendar. Its all in our heads, and there is just too much.

Even if we can manage our own lives and control the activities of the house in general, there are wild cards like husbands, and almost-teenagers. While many working men keep meticulous planners documenting meetings, deadlines, and client information, it is a rare husband who writes his plans on the “family” calendar. I am sufficiently clever to figure out that a flier welcoming us to “Monday Night Golf League” means I can write “Rob/Golf/5:30-8:30″ on the calendar for several consecutive Mondays, but I cannot guess which nights he intends to travel out of town. I cannot look at the school newsletter when it comes home on Fridays and guess which sports, school and community activities my son will attend, which are “lame,” and which are “lame” until he finds out that her friends are going. I cannot predict that, the day before the orchestra performance (in the dead of winter) the teacher will inform us that the boys are to wear “short-sleeved white shirts.” These episodes and schedule changes invariably involve meals planned for four and eaten by two, emergency trips to Target, tears, and un-budgeted cash flow.

Most of us do too many things. Anyone who is not “stressed” is inherently suspect, and I have witnessed and participated in numerous “stress-offs” in which women one-up each other (in the nicest possible way) about the demands of their children, jobs, husbands, and volunteer work. No one can sit down to dinner as a family, and no one has a free evening during the month of November. Keeping up with the Joneses has become a panic-inducing scramble of activities that “everybody” does on top of the necessary business of maintaining a home and family. Regular meals, doing homework, clean clothes, haircuts and dental checkups are necessary, but what about softball, Brownies, teaching Sunday school, or the neighborhood association?

It is impossible to enjoy a child’s soccer match while worrying about buying the wrapping paper for the gift for the birthday party after the game. Enjoyment requires relaxation and focus. If we could be mindful of where we were, and what we were actually doing, we would be less likely to lose our keys, our wallets, or our ability to concentrate on the activity at hand. These are not new ideas; there is a “voluntary simplicity” movement, and many books have been written about paring down our busy lives to the essentials. The problem is one of unilateral vs. bilateral disarmament: will my son be the one child who does not invite the whole class to his birthday party this year? Can I really tell my stepdaughter that she can’t make last-minute plans to go to Water World with her friends if it requires me to drive to an ATM, wash and dry her favorite shorts, and find someone else to watch her brother while I got my hair cut?

We probably can’t return to some vague, mythical “simpler time,” but we can de-escalate in small steps. We can say “no” to activities that require too much time or energy. We can refuse to sign up for every class, sport and enrichment activity that presents itself. Our children don’t have to whittle toys by lamplight for entertainment, but we can, through conversation and example, teach them to identify and pursue only the activities they truly enjoy.
This morning I sat briefly on my porch steps, turned my face up to the sun, and enjoyed the smell of my coffee. Every time a “to-do” came into my head, I erased it. It was hard work, but it was a start. Maybe, if we learn to do less and live in the present, we can all cut our “losses,” whether they are keys and wallets or moments of genuine peace and joy.

On Nostalgia

I still remember the night in 1979 when I looked out the window of the Oberlin Inn and watched snow fall on Tappan Square. I felt a peace, and a rightness about my audition for the Oberlin Conservatory earlier that day, and about the little college, the town, and the world in general. Unfortunately, when my acceptance letters arrived in the spring of 1980 I decided to attend a conservatory in Boston because it was more prestigious and had the cache of being East Coast as opposed to keeping me in the Midwest for another four years. As it turned out, it was a bad choice, and within two years I was fighting my way back into Oberlin not as a cello student at the Conservatory, but as an English major in the College.

Its not nearly as easy to transfer into a good school as it is to get in as a freshman, and its even harder when you want to pursue an academic degree and you have spent the past two years studying nothing but chord progressions and the evolution of the symphonic form. I was “summoned” to Oberlin for an interview based on the mixed feelings of the admissions panel about my prospects. The head of admissions told me that they were “on the fence” and would like me to go to Oberlin and persuade them that I was a good fit with the school notwithstanding my atrocious high school math grades and my recent history of picking The Wrong School. I took a day off from my job as a waitress, drove the four hours to Oberlin, and managed to convince the panel that I deserved the fresh start I so passionately wanted at the school with the town square, the Conservatory where I could still play my cello, and the fantastic English department.

Today, my husband called me from Oberlin. He is a travelling salesman, selling math and science textbooks to high schools and middle schools, and his territory includes Ohio. He had never seen my alma mater, and called to tell me he was in Oberlin, wondering “where the college was.” Since we live in a town with a gigantic, sprawling, state university, it is understandable that he failed to identify the small, compact college that emerges from the middle of country roads and cornfields like something out of a pop-up book. There are, I believe, dormitories at our local university that house the equivalent of Oberlin’s student body.

There aren’t many buildings at Oberlin College, but I lived, and learned and loved and cried and wrote and did a lot of growing up in most of them. I ate at Dascomb, played quartets in the Conservatory, dropped off papers in Rice, and learned to love Edith Wharton in Peters. I lived in a beautiful single room in Talcott, ditched fetal pig dissection in Kettering, read Northrup Frye in the “moon” chairs of Mudd Library, and ate blueberry whole wheat doughnuts with my roommate Joan in East Hall.

Every year I fell in love with one of my gay friends (First Larry who composed to the poems of Sylvia Plath, then Andrew who acted scenes with me for Shakespeare 301, then Jeff who played the viola in my quintet), and every year I realized that they were going to persist in their gaiety but were the dearest and most loving friends I could hope for. Every year I watched “Its a Wonderful Life” before going home for Christmas, and “The Graduate” before going home for the summer. When the time came to graduate, I was so despondent about leaving that I could not enjoy the lovely “Illumination” ceremony that takes place in Tappan Square the night before commencement. I was convinced that there was no other place that right for me, and that I would never really be happy again.

Its funny to see my beloved school through the eyes of my husband, who is willing to be persuaded because he loves me, but who sees only a small-ish group of buildings in the midst of the cornfields instead of the complex, charming, big world I have always described. “If Talcott’s on your right, then the Conservatory’s on your left,” I babbled to him excitedly “I lived there my last year! If you park in the Con lot you can get out and go to the Oberlin Co-Op, or you can drive out and see the Museum and where I took Art History classes.”

It was love at first sight for my school and me, it was my Camelot, and although I’m a little teary just at the moment thinking of a crisp fall day on Tappan Square with a weekend of Dreiser ahead of me, I feel tremendously blessed that there was such a time in my life. We should all be so lucky.

On Manners

I grew up in a family in which manners extended well beyond “please” and “thank you,” and the placement of one’s napkin on one’s lap. I answered the phone “Graham residence, Ann speaking” and said “excuse me” before I interrupted adult conversation. I was also expected to recognize adult conversation, and to refrain from interjecting my own opinions or anecdotes unless they were requested. I was never encouraged to believe that I had the same rights as adults in the household, and consistently taught to consider “the other person” in matters which ranged from from sitting through dull stories told by old people to expressing great joy upon receiving a(nother) knitted hat for Christmas.

My brother and I were not allowed to chew gum, yell or play loud music in the house, or to thump up and down the stairs. We wrote thank-you notes, ate what we were served as guests and held doors for people. My mother disapproved of containers (milk, catsup, salsa, soda bottles) on the table, and required that condiments be decanted, and we knew which forks and spoons were used for what purpose. We could sit through a concert or lecture without getting up to circulate, and we could eat at a nice restaurant without disturbing other diners. If we had to, we could sit still while the adults drank (endless) cups of coffee and discussed people we didn’t know. We were not allowed to use the words “fart” or “butt” or, in fact, to comment in any way about the passing of gas.

We were well-loved, thoroughly supported and doted upon; we were simply expected to behave well in most circumstances. The basic premise of our upbringing was that the opinions and activities of children are interesting mainly to those children and their immediate families, and that adults outside of that circle should not be discomfited in any way by our presence. Charmed and entertained, absolutely, but not disturbed or annoyed. In many instances we were being taught to be civil, compassionate members of society – to listen patiently, think of others and be grateful, gracious  and helpful.

In my present family, the precise rules of my early years are largely dismissed as archaic, artificial and repressive. My husband was raised on a rural farm with five other children, and while his parents both have lovely manners, they were lucky to keep napkins on laps and elbows off the table without concerning themselves with the vulgarity of gum chewing or inquiring as to who had “cut the cheese.” I believe I have taught my ten-year-old son to behave well in public and to consider the feelings of others, but his manners at home are sometimes appalling. He has the questionable gift of being able to adhere to all of my parents’ rules at their house, and then to slip back into ill-mannered sloth at home.

While some of the rules have fallen away at my house for reasons of expedience (my life is too short to decant catsup)  others are rejected on the basis that the rules were just plain weird to begin with. Gum was made to be chewed! Who wants bored kids sitting around fidgeting while adults try to talk? In addition, there is the ever-popular refrain “no one does that!” Apparently I am living in a door-slamming, gum-chewing universe where children are encouraged to recite the complete play-by-play of favorite Disney movies in the middle of adult conversations and announce every ingested bean and every resulting emission with great relish.

I have also been advised by both professional and lay analysts that the rules of my upbringing were a way of squelching my natural impulses and denying my true self, and that children must be free to express themselves, and simply “be.” If that means throwing a football in the house, or interrupting grandma’s monologue about her walking tour in Denmark, so be it.

In the context of my house, I am suffering from severe battle fatigue. I am told so often that my inclinations are snobbish and outdated, that I tend to suppress them unless I am fresh from an Austen novel or a Merchant-Ivory film. My son and stepdaughter slam doors, play loud music, and thump on the stairs with impunity. For now, I am trying to be satisfied with the fact that my childrens’ manners in the great world are decent (aside from their baffling inability to move napkins from tables onto laps), and that they are both essentially kind human beings. That should mean that the important lessons are being learned, and that we can work on refinements.

Secretly, though, I delight in accounts of well-mannered children carrying the torch of etiquette. I devour stories in the New York Times about children who are sent to special schools to learn how to behave at the dinner table, how to meet and speak with adults, and how to behave at the theater. I nearly wept tears of joy when I called an old friend and her daughter answered with the familiar “Smith residence, Alice speaking.” Call me repressive, old-fashioned, or simply “weird,” but I believe that manners are an embodiment of civilized society. I would hate to think that there is no longer any place for them in the world in which I live.