Saturday, February 23, 2008
I secretly believe
That the universe won't let me win the lottery because it knows I would use some of the money to hire nannies and eventually send my kids to boarding school. I try to balance this by mentally promising to give a lot to charity.
Monday, February 18, 2008
How I Spent My Weekend, by Sassy Molassy
I kicked off the weekend by finishing off my March Lamplighter column about five minutes before leaving work on Friday, because it was due that day and I knew if I didn't finish it then, it would be late. Again. Speaking of which, I don't think I ever linked to my February column. February was the Cooper-Young businesses issue, so of course I wrote about my own former business, Mothersville, and all the fabulous things that Andria and Melissa are doing over there these days. And...apparently I'm not going to link you to it now, because their PDF just locked up Firefox three times in a row. Maybe later.
Friday night we were invited to take cocktail hour on the road to the Chez Click, where we enjoyed some delicious appetizers and wine, some sparkling conversation, mainly harmonious playing among the many children, and only a mostly-ignored little bit of "Across the Universe," which was only made more fun by Stacey's constant asking "Is there supposed to be a story line?"
Saturday morning I made breakfast for our family and then some before Big Daddy headed off to work. When will I stop making so many home fries, knowing I'm just going to eat them all? Damn you Chahula! The kids and I played outside for a while, since that is Genevieve's favorite place to be. When Somerset got out her bike, Genevieve started chanting "My bike! My bike!" until I brought out her tiny tricycle. When she got frustrated with that and I asked if she wanted me to push her in her little pink car, she replied adorably "Yes, please." This is how she answers all questions now. Except when her answer is "NO!" We sat on a quilt with Mr. Baby for a bit until Genevieve decided that he, too, wanted to drive the pink car. We strapped him in and set off down the street, to his great delight. He held onto the steering wheel like an old pro, at one point even resting his arm on the back of the seat. Smooth, Mr. Baby. Very smooth. Eventually I took the kids out to my folks' house, where they swapped their usual activity of watching "The Suite Life of Zach and Cody" until my eyeballs bleed for playing board games on Bud's computer. (Yes, they call my dad Bud, and yes, it was my idea that they do so.) Calvin is a natural at Mah Jong, as it turns out.
Sunday morning I woke up feeling like I needed to find the truck that hit me and throw myself under its wheels. Yes, it was time for round two of the dreaded stomach bug that has been making its way through our circle of friends and Genevieve's Montessori school. This time the, uh, "output" (thanks Stacey!) wasn't as violent, but I felt so, so much worse. Fortunately, our very good friend SAM was nice enough to come help BD corral the kids, and I slept until 2:00 p.m. Occasionally I'd drift toward consciousness, roll over, and think about turning on the TV or trying to read, but I never managed to do more than open my eyes for a few seconds before I was under again. Toward the end, Genevieve came in and went to sleep with me, and when we woke up, I was feeling a little better. By dinner time I was just a little shaky and weak, but my attempts to eat dinner weren't very fruitful. I really didn't get my appetite back until today, but unfortunately it's back with a vengeance. If I'm going to get the same evil bug twice, is it too much to ask that it put me under the 140 mark? Sheesh!
Friday night we were invited to take cocktail hour on the road to the Chez Click, where we enjoyed some delicious appetizers and wine, some sparkling conversation, mainly harmonious playing among the many children, and only a mostly-ignored little bit of "Across the Universe," which was only made more fun by Stacey's constant asking "Is there supposed to be a story line?"
Saturday morning I made breakfast for our family and then some before Big Daddy headed off to work. When will I stop making so many home fries, knowing I'm just going to eat them all? Damn you Chahula! The kids and I played outside for a while, since that is Genevieve's favorite place to be. When Somerset got out her bike, Genevieve started chanting "My bike! My bike!" until I brought out her tiny tricycle. When she got frustrated with that and I asked if she wanted me to push her in her little pink car, she replied adorably "Yes, please." This is how she answers all questions now. Except when her answer is "NO!" We sat on a quilt with Mr. Baby for a bit until Genevieve decided that he, too, wanted to drive the pink car. We strapped him in and set off down the street, to his great delight. He held onto the steering wheel like an old pro, at one point even resting his arm on the back of the seat. Smooth, Mr. Baby. Very smooth. Eventually I took the kids out to my folks' house, where they swapped their usual activity of watching "The Suite Life of Zach and Cody" until my eyeballs bleed for playing board games on Bud's computer. (Yes, they call my dad Bud, and yes, it was my idea that they do so.) Calvin is a natural at Mah Jong, as it turns out.
Sunday morning I woke up feeling like I needed to find the truck that hit me and throw myself under its wheels. Yes, it was time for round two of the dreaded stomach bug that has been making its way through our circle of friends and Genevieve's Montessori school. This time the, uh, "output" (thanks Stacey!) wasn't as violent, but I felt so, so much worse. Fortunately, our very good friend SAM was nice enough to come help BD corral the kids, and I slept until 2:00 p.m. Occasionally I'd drift toward consciousness, roll over, and think about turning on the TV or trying to read, but I never managed to do more than open my eyes for a few seconds before I was under again. Toward the end, Genevieve came in and went to sleep with me, and when we woke up, I was feeling a little better. By dinner time I was just a little shaky and weak, but my attempts to eat dinner weren't very fruitful. I really didn't get my appetite back until today, but unfortunately it's back with a vengeance. If I'm going to get the same evil bug twice, is it too much to ask that it put me under the 140 mark? Sheesh!
Monday, February 11, 2008
The Last List
I think I'll go back to my non-list posts for awhile, but I couldn't resist one last list. This one is for Uncle Toby.
The List of My Food Strangeness
1. I can not stand the sight, smell, or taste of mayonnaise. And that includes things that are allegedly not mayonnaise but really are the same nasty thing, like Miracle Whip.
2. I really would rather be punched in the face than take even the tiniest bite of most mayo-based foods, like tuna salad, cole slaw, chicken salad, etc. I consider this to be an actual phobia.
3. I dislike anything sweet and savory together. That means I don't like foods with the words "sweet and sour," "glazed," or "chutney" in the title. No fruit or sugar on meat. I cut the outside part off of honey baked ham. This rules about about 98% of most Chinese takeout, too. The only exception I can think of is cranberry sauce with turkey and dressing. I don't even like sweet-ish barbecue sauces. Sugar is for dessert only.
4. Eating fruit on an empty stomach makes me feel queasy. I need protein at every meal.
5. I do not snack, really. I have no interest in most portable foods. My house can be packed with chips and cookies for the kids' lunch boxes and I won't have the slightest urge to eat them. I want a full, cooked meal that is served hot and requires utensils every time I eat. I do like a good Italian sub, but preferably for lunch, not dinner.
6. If I never ate another piece of bread for as long as I lived, I'd barely miss it. If I eat something on bread or any kind of bun, I won't eat the end parts of the bread that are plain. I will not eat sliced white bread at all. It's too soft.
7. I have no interest in eating any candy that is not chocolate.
8. I have to have a bite of ice cream with each bite of cake. If I run out of ice cream, I just stop eating.
9. There is almost nothing you can do with a tomato or a pepper that I will not like (unless it involves mayonnaise).
10. I crave vinegary foods and have eaten entire jars of pickles and pepperoncini peppers in one sitting. In high school I had uncontrollable urges to drink vinegar on a regular basis. Twice I've correctly suspected I was pregnant after I craved and ate a big bowl of sliced pickles soaked in straight white vinegar that I added.
11. I consider scrambled eggs and hash browns as just vehicles for hot sauce, preferably Chahula.
12. I prefer for all my food to be wet, juicy, and saucy. Thus the bread thing.
13. I think the white meat of chicken is so dry as to almost be inedible, unless it is shredded and in broth or some type of soup or sauce. I like the thighs best.
14. I can't taste avocados.
15. I can't for the life of me understand the appeal of bagels and cream cheese. That is one thing that should be sweet, but isn't. I don't get it.
16. I don't like to bite into anything crunchy that has water coming out of it. This includes raw or noticeable onions in any food, celery, etc. Water chestnuts are like my worst nightmare! Coconut falls into this nasty texture category, although it also tastes like suntan oil. In a bad way.
17. I don't have any problem with "slimy" food textures, like mushrooms (although I don't like them raw). I do have a problem with things that are mushy but strangely dry, like lima beans and boiled egg yolks.
18. I like steak cooked just long enough to be brown on both sides and warm all the way through.
19. I was slow to warm up to sushi not because the raw fish thing bothered me, but because most of it just didn't taste like anything to me. A lot of it is way too bland.
20. If I could only eat one food for the rest of my life, it would either be cheesecake or my own spaghetti, I think.
The List of My Food Strangeness
1. I can not stand the sight, smell, or taste of mayonnaise. And that includes things that are allegedly not mayonnaise but really are the same nasty thing, like Miracle Whip.
2. I really would rather be punched in the face than take even the tiniest bite of most mayo-based foods, like tuna salad, cole slaw, chicken salad, etc. I consider this to be an actual phobia.
3. I dislike anything sweet and savory together. That means I don't like foods with the words "sweet and sour," "glazed," or "chutney" in the title. No fruit or sugar on meat. I cut the outside part off of honey baked ham. This rules about about 98% of most Chinese takeout, too. The only exception I can think of is cranberry sauce with turkey and dressing. I don't even like sweet-ish barbecue sauces. Sugar is for dessert only.
4. Eating fruit on an empty stomach makes me feel queasy. I need protein at every meal.
5. I do not snack, really. I have no interest in most portable foods. My house can be packed with chips and cookies for the kids' lunch boxes and I won't have the slightest urge to eat them. I want a full, cooked meal that is served hot and requires utensils every time I eat. I do like a good Italian sub, but preferably for lunch, not dinner.
6. If I never ate another piece of bread for as long as I lived, I'd barely miss it. If I eat something on bread or any kind of bun, I won't eat the end parts of the bread that are plain. I will not eat sliced white bread at all. It's too soft.
7. I have no interest in eating any candy that is not chocolate.
8. I have to have a bite of ice cream with each bite of cake. If I run out of ice cream, I just stop eating.
9. There is almost nothing you can do with a tomato or a pepper that I will not like (unless it involves mayonnaise).
10. I crave vinegary foods and have eaten entire jars of pickles and pepperoncini peppers in one sitting. In high school I had uncontrollable urges to drink vinegar on a regular basis. Twice I've correctly suspected I was pregnant after I craved and ate a big bowl of sliced pickles soaked in straight white vinegar that I added.
11. I consider scrambled eggs and hash browns as just vehicles for hot sauce, preferably Chahula.
12. I prefer for all my food to be wet, juicy, and saucy. Thus the bread thing.
13. I think the white meat of chicken is so dry as to almost be inedible, unless it is shredded and in broth or some type of soup or sauce. I like the thighs best.
14. I can't taste avocados.
15. I can't for the life of me understand the appeal of bagels and cream cheese. That is one thing that should be sweet, but isn't. I don't get it.
16. I don't like to bite into anything crunchy that has water coming out of it. This includes raw or noticeable onions in any food, celery, etc. Water chestnuts are like my worst nightmare! Coconut falls into this nasty texture category, although it also tastes like suntan oil. In a bad way.
17. I don't have any problem with "slimy" food textures, like mushrooms (although I don't like them raw). I do have a problem with things that are mushy but strangely dry, like lima beans and boiled egg yolks.
18. I like steak cooked just long enough to be brown on both sides and warm all the way through.
19. I was slow to warm up to sushi not because the raw fish thing bothered me, but because most of it just didn't taste like anything to me. A lot of it is way too bland.
20. If I could only eat one food for the rest of my life, it would either be cheesecake or my own spaghetti, I think.
Monday, February 04, 2008
List of things I've had to learn the hard way in life
1. No matter how high I can get the swing going before I jump out, I will not be able to fly.
2. When the childhood belief in magic becomes the informed quest for information, the magic disappears.
3. "We must, we must, we must increase our bust" does not work.
4. Gaining forty pounds as an adult and having four children does, but somehow the victory is bitter-sweet.
5. Cantankerous hippie feminist though I may be, I love me some epidural.
6. I should never drink gin.
7. Red wine is like razorblades coming back up, and it still stains.
8. I can't be trusted to toast garlic bread under the broiler without burning it beyond all remedy.
9. I will probably never enjoy a British novel written before the 1990s.
10. The road to Hell really is paved with good intentions.
2. When the childhood belief in magic becomes the informed quest for information, the magic disappears.
3. "We must, we must, we must increase our bust" does not work.
4. Gaining forty pounds as an adult and having four children does, but somehow the victory is bitter-sweet.
5. Cantankerous hippie feminist though I may be, I love me some epidural.
6. I should never drink gin.
7. Red wine is like razorblades coming back up, and it still stains.
8. I can't be trusted to toast garlic bread under the broiler without burning it beyond all remedy.
9. I will probably never enjoy a British novel written before the 1990s.
10. The road to Hell really is paved with good intentions.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Back to the Lists
List of Things I Secretly Wish Were True
1. I secretly wish I were from Texas. That's right. Texas.
2. I secretly wish I were named Cassidy McCullough.
3. I secretly wish I had green eyes. Sometimes.
4. I secretly wish I liked opera.
5. I secretly wish I had ever been in a band.
6. I secretly wish that the universe still seemed as mysterious to me as it used to.
7. I secretly wish I could time travel just within my own life. Both ways.
1. I secretly wish I were from Texas. That's right. Texas.
2. I secretly wish I were named Cassidy McCullough.
3. I secretly wish I had green eyes. Sometimes.
4. I secretly wish I liked opera.
5. I secretly wish I had ever been in a band.
6. I secretly wish that the universe still seemed as mysterious to me as it used to.
7. I secretly wish I could time travel just within my own life. Both ways.
Monday, January 28, 2008
School Transfer Application Time
I'm fielding so many questions about the choice and optional transfer processes that I thought I'd go ahead and post the basics here.
I'll start with the Optional Schools transfer process, because it actually started this morning.
Picking up a "reservation ticket" this week guarantees you a specific place in line to turn in your child's transfer application. The earlier you get your ticket, the closer you are to the front of the line. You can get a ticket anytime between this morning at 6:00 a.m. until January 28th from 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. You can find more information about this process at the link above, and even more about the optional program and individual Optional schools here.
**Remember that the optional program at most schools does not start until first grade, so if you have a child entering kindergarten, what you need is a choice transfer (see below). The exceptions to this are Idlewild and Double Tree because these schools call themselves "all optional," which includes their kindergarten programs.
Parents may begin submitting optional school transfer applications at 6:30 a.m. on Friday, February 1 in the Memphis Board of Education auditorium at 2597 Avery. Please note that reservation tickets will be honored from 6:30 a.m. until noon that morning. All applicants, with or without tickets, are welcome to apply that day from 6:30 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. Applications will be received on a first come, first serve basis. However, all applications will be processed according to reservation ticket number order first. Those applicants without a ticket will be processed in order of receipt after ticketed applications are processed in numerical order.
For those of you with children who will be entering kindergarten next year, or those who want to apply to a school outside of your zoning but not for an optional program, you will need a choice transfer. The process is being done a little differently this year according to the MCS News Release this week:
The School Choice Fair, traditionally a single weekend event, has been replaced by School Choice Week, which will feature an Open House event at each school during the week of March 4 – 6, 2008. It is expected that this change will allow parents to better experience the actual learning environments of schools while it increases convenience for parents and schools. In addition, the dates of the Open Houses will tie in more closely to the district’s “choice period,” Open Enrollment.
Early sign-up for Open Enrollment will take place on March 11, with applications being accepted on March 26.
Lastly, even though this is not a matter of transferring or turning in applications, I want to remind those of you who have four-year-olds who will eventually attend a Memphis City School, you can get your child tested for CLUE now. The advantage of doing this is that the preschool CLUE test involves spatial reasoning and problem solving ability rather than reading, and the "gifted" certification is good through second grade. So even if your child does not attend a CLUE preschool program (like the one Somerset attended at Downtown, which was wonderful), they will still benefit for their first three years of school by being automatically enrolled in these fun enrichment classes as soon as possible at your particular school.
If you would like to have your preschooler tested, contact Dr. Tommy yelvington (information below). He will probably not be very nice to you on the phone and will question why you want to have your child tested this early, but he can suck it. Just let him know that you know the drill and he can just schedule you. The person who actually tests your child will be very nice, I promise. I suggest calling rather than emailing for a quicker response.
Dr. Tommie Yelvington
Lead Teacher, CLUE Program
e-mail: yelvingtontb@mcsk12.net
telephone: 901-416-0155
I'll start with the Optional Schools transfer process, because it actually started this morning.
Picking up a "reservation ticket" this week guarantees you a specific place in line to turn in your child's transfer application. The earlier you get your ticket, the closer you are to the front of the line. You can get a ticket anytime between this morning at 6:00 a.m. until January 28th from 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. You can find more information about this process at the link above, and even more about the optional program and individual Optional schools here.
**Remember that the optional program at most schools does not start until first grade, so if you have a child entering kindergarten, what you need is a choice transfer (see below). The exceptions to this are Idlewild and Double Tree because these schools call themselves "all optional," which includes their kindergarten programs.
Parents may begin submitting optional school transfer applications at 6:30 a.m. on Friday, February 1 in the Memphis Board of Education auditorium at 2597 Avery. Please note that reservation tickets will be honored from 6:30 a.m. until noon that morning. All applicants, with or without tickets, are welcome to apply that day from 6:30 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. Applications will be received on a first come, first serve basis. However, all applications will be processed according to reservation ticket number order first. Those applicants without a ticket will be processed in order of receipt after ticketed applications are processed in numerical order.
Parents must bring the following items when they apply:
- Completed application form
- A copy of the child’s most recent comprehensive report card
- Current nationally-normed or TCAP achievement test scores (if applicable)
- A copy of the child’s Social Security card
- Birth certificate for KK applicants to Double Tree & Idlewild only
Parents are strongly encouraged to stop by the Optional Schools office in Room 106 by Thursday, January 31 to confirm that their paperwork is complete. Office hours are from 7:30 a.m. - 4:45 p.m.
First preference for available optional transfers will go to qualified Memphis City resident siblings with brothers or sisters who are in satisfactory standing in the requested school at the beginning of the 2008-09 school year. City residents will also be given priority for the available spaces.
School Choice Week Coming March 4 – 6For those of you with children who will be entering kindergarten next year, or those who want to apply to a school outside of your zoning but not for an optional program, you will need a choice transfer. The process is being done a little differently this year according to the MCS News Release this week:
The School Choice Fair, traditionally a single weekend event, has been replaced by School Choice Week, which will feature an Open House event at each school during the week of March 4 – 6, 2008. It is expected that this change will allow parents to better experience the actual learning environments of schools while it increases convenience for parents and schools. In addition, the dates of the Open Houses will tie in more closely to the district’s “choice period,” Open Enrollment.
Early sign-up for Open Enrollment will take place on March 11, with applications being accepted on March 26.
Lastly, even though this is not a matter of transferring or turning in applications, I want to remind those of you who have four-year-olds who will eventually attend a Memphis City School, you can get your child tested for CLUE now. The advantage of doing this is that the preschool CLUE test involves spatial reasoning and problem solving ability rather than reading, and the "gifted" certification is good through second grade. So even if your child does not attend a CLUE preschool program (like the one Somerset attended at Downtown, which was wonderful), they will still benefit for their first three years of school by being automatically enrolled in these fun enrichment classes as soon as possible at your particular school.
If you would like to have your preschooler tested, contact Dr. Tommy yelvington (information below). He will probably not be very nice to you on the phone and will question why you want to have your child tested this early, but he can suck it. Just let him know that you know the drill and he can just schedule you. The person who actually tests your child will be very nice, I promise. I suggest calling rather than emailing for a quicker response.
Dr. Tommie Yelvington
Lead Teacher, CLUE Program
e-mail: yelvingtontb@mcsk12.net
telephone: 901-416-0155
Once that's done, they may ask you to come to the closest elementary school to you, or you can go to their main office on Airways like we did, which is here:
Division of Exceptional Children
Memphis City Schools
Bond Building, 2930 Airways Blvd
Memphis, TN 38116-3844
Thursday, January 24, 2008
A List of Movies
I have to confess: while I enjoy movies, I don't think about them that much. Big Daddy is the true film aficionado in our family; I'm mainly just there for the popcorn and Cherry Coke at the theater or the snuggle under the covers when we rent. Not that I don't cry on cue when George Bailey realizes he really did have a wonderful life after all or dissolve into giggles every time I see Debra Winger with that pigeon glued to the side of her head. But when people start talking about directors and even some new actors by name, you'll usually hear me say "Who's that?" This is partly because I'm terrible with names, but also because I just don't see the point in remembering anything about these people. That said, there are a few movies that stand out in my mind for various reasons.
My Favorite Movies of All Time
1. It's a Wonderful Life*
2. The Philadelphia Story (1940 version with Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart)
* I used to think this was just my favorite Christmas movie, but no. It is in fact the best movie ever made.
Movie That May Also be an All-Time Favorite, but Seems Too Unlike the First Two to Go in the Same List
1. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Movies I Can't Not Watch Given the Chance
1. Peggy Sue Got Married (Love that dreamy Yeats-quoting beatnik!)
2. Steel Magnolias (Love a good cry!)
3. Forget Paris
4. Sixteen Candles
5. The Big Lebowski
Movie That made Me Cry for More Than an Hour Straight
1. Life is Beautiful
Movies That Were So Bad BD and I Left the Theater
1. Scenes From a Mall
2. I Love You to Death
Movies Every Other Person My Age Has Seen but I Have Not
1. Every Monty Python movie ever made*
2. Reality Bites
3. Mallrats
4. Any classic horror movie you can think of, probably
*I've seen bits and snatches of Monty Python movies, of course, but not one have I seen all the way through. All my M.P. quotes are second-hand, including the song from "Life of Brian."
My Favorite Movies of All Time
1. It's a Wonderful Life*
2. The Philadelphia Story (1940 version with Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart)
* I used to think this was just my favorite Christmas movie, but no. It is in fact the best movie ever made.
Movie That May Also be an All-Time Favorite, but Seems Too Unlike the First Two to Go in the Same List
1. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Movies I Can't Not Watch Given the Chance
1. Peggy Sue Got Married (Love that dreamy Yeats-quoting beatnik!)
2. Steel Magnolias (Love a good cry!)
3. Forget Paris
4. Sixteen Candles
5. The Big Lebowski
Movie That made Me Cry for More Than an Hour Straight
1. Life is Beautiful
Movies That Were So Bad BD and I Left the Theater
1. Scenes From a Mall
2. I Love You to Death
Movies Every Other Person My Age Has Seen but I Have Not
1. Every Monty Python movie ever made*
2. Reality Bites
3. Mallrats
4. Any classic horror movie you can think of, probably
*I've seen bits and snatches of Monty Python movies, of course, but not one have I seen all the way through. All my M.P. quotes are second-hand, including the song from "Life of Brian."
Friday, January 18, 2008
A List of Books
Here we go, my first attempt at listiness. Don't expect too much.
Books I Can Read Again and Again, and Have
Books I Can Read Again and Again, and Have
(This could probably also be considered a list of my all-time favorite books, except it seems crazy to me to try to make such a list since there are so many I still haven't read. It's also not necessarily in a permanently significant order. Just so you know.)
1. Fair and Tender Ladies, by Lee Smith
2. Tracks, by Louise Erdrich
3. Lolita, by Vladmir Nabakov
4. The English Patient, by Michael Ondaatje (the movie sucked compared to the book)
5. The Christmas Letters, by Lee Smith
6. The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath, by Sylvia Plath (edited by her piece-of-crap husband, the poet Ted Hughes)
7. Groom Falconer, by Norman Dubie
8. Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
9. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
10. Breakfast of Champions, by Kurt Vonnegut
11. God Bless You Mister Rosewater, by Kurt Vonnegut
12. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury
13. Franny and Zooey, by J.D. Salinger
8. Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
9. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
10. Breakfast of Champions, by Kurt Vonnegut
11. God Bless You Mister Rosewater, by Kurt Vonnegut
12. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury
13. Franny and Zooey, by J.D. Salinger
14. All of the Harry Potter books (see also: list of adolescent lit I love, below)
I know I'm forgetting something. There are many other books that I've read at least twice (several others by Vonnegut, Salinger, and Bradbury, other volumes of poetry from authors I haven't mentioned...). Also, I feel the need to mention that in the case of the first four novels, which I adore so completely, the authors have written almost nothing else that I like even half as much. I find that so disappointing.
Books I Enjoyed and Would Like to Read Again, but Have Not
1. One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
2. A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving
3. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffeneger
4. The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie
5. The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
6. Nowhere Else on Earth, by Josephine Humphreys
7. The House of the Spirits, by Isabelle Allende
8. The Red Tent, by Anita Diamant
Again, I know there are more. What is it about sitting down to say something that makes everything I wanted to say just fly right out of my head?
Parenting Books I Have Read Cover to Cover
1. None
Guilty Pleasure: Adolescent Fantasy/Sci-Fi I Eat Up Like Candy
1. The His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman
2. The Abhorsen trilogy by Garth Nix
3. The Twilight series by Stephenie Meyers
4. The Keys to the Kingdom series by Garth Nix (far inferior to the Abhorsens, but fun)
5. The Midnighters Trilogy by Scott Westerfeld
6. The Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld
7. The Artemis Fowl series by Eoin Colfer
8. And of course, the Harry Potter books, which I really do adore and will defend to the end.
I like to think I have an excuse for reading these books, since I do teach teenagers, but the truth is, I would read them anyway. These are the kinds of books I loved as a kid, but there weren't nearly as many of them then, and I really had no one to guide me in my book-a-day habit. Which is unfortunate, because it meant I read a lot of Sweet Valley High and Stephen King and V.C. Andrews, and later Sydney Sheldon and Jackie Collins (gasp!). My seventh grade English teacher helped set me on a better path by introducing me to C.S. Lewis and Madeline L'Engle, but it still took me awhile to learn what was worth reading and what wasn't. Hopefully I can at least provide my own children with good books to read, although I know I can't control their tastes. Joshua already shows a propensity for graphic novels, which is fine by me even though I can't seem to read them at all.
So here's where I fail with the entire concept of lists, because I now feel there should be a list of books I'd like to read, and one of books I liked fine but won't read again, and one of books I felt did not deserve their hype or just plain bit. It all feels so incomplete! But here it is. I'm going to force myself to stop now.
8. The Red Tent, by Anita Diamant
Again, I know there are more. What is it about sitting down to say something that makes everything I wanted to say just fly right out of my head?
Parenting Books I Have Read Cover to Cover
1. None
Guilty Pleasure: Adolescent Fantasy/Sci-Fi I Eat Up Like Candy
1. The His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman
2. The Abhorsen trilogy by Garth Nix
3. The Twilight series by Stephenie Meyers
4. The Keys to the Kingdom series by Garth Nix (far inferior to the Abhorsens, but fun)
5. The Midnighters Trilogy by Scott Westerfeld
6. The Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld
7. The Artemis Fowl series by Eoin Colfer
8. And of course, the Harry Potter books, which I really do adore and will defend to the end.
I like to think I have an excuse for reading these books, since I do teach teenagers, but the truth is, I would read them anyway. These are the kinds of books I loved as a kid, but there weren't nearly as many of them then, and I really had no one to guide me in my book-a-day habit. Which is unfortunate, because it meant I read a lot of Sweet Valley High and Stephen King and V.C. Andrews, and later Sydney Sheldon and Jackie Collins (gasp!). My seventh grade English teacher helped set me on a better path by introducing me to C.S. Lewis and Madeline L'Engle, but it still took me awhile to learn what was worth reading and what wasn't. Hopefully I can at least provide my own children with good books to read, although I know I can't control their tastes. Joshua already shows a propensity for graphic novels, which is fine by me even though I can't seem to read them at all.
So here's where I fail with the entire concept of lists, because I now feel there should be a list of books I'd like to read, and one of books I liked fine but won't read again, and one of books I felt did not deserve their hype or just plain bit. It all feels so incomplete! But here it is. I'm going to force myself to stop now.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
The List Makers
This may seem ironic after my last post, but I am not a maker of lists. Sure I can reel off more than a hundred things about me, me, me, but that's different. When I find myself in one of those conversations where I'm asked to come up with my top five desert-island albums (thanks, Hornby), or my ten all-time favorite books or movies or whatever, I never know what to say. I can probably come up with something, and you may have heard me do so, but the truth is that the items on those lists always feel wrong to me. Not false, exactly, but...incomplete. Not annotated. Improperly connected and aligned with their fellows.
A list is a concise and linear thing. Linear and concise are two adjectives that do not describe the way my brain functions. If I had to describe what my thought pattern tends to look like, I'd compare it more to a spider's web, maybe, or a ring of paper snowflakes all cut from the same huge piece of paper. Ooh! Or one of those children's toys that looks like a compact ball until you pull on its sides and it expands to be a much larger globe of interconnected pieces, all hinged together and flexible. Definitely circular rather than linear.
This means that if you ask me what my top five desert-island albums are, I will immediately think of albums I've loved at different times in my life, and within each era there will be a network of songs that remind me of each other, and of places, and of people, and I will start thinking of all of those things in sort of a simultaneous flash. It could take me an hour to sort out that layered impression and explain to you my real answer, which is really not an answer to your question at all. So I usually just throw out some inaccurate and incomplete answer.
All that said, I do appreciate the beauty of a good list. I have no desire to, say, make lists of things I need to do in a given day, or lists of my personal goals for a given time period, or anything like that. I just don't work that way, although I can see how that could be useful. But other lists can be a kind of poetry. I was telling a friend the other day how I don't write poetry anymore because it involves sitting with an idea and distilling and distilling it down until it's almost nothing, and I just don't have time to do that anymore. But I do miss it, and lately I'm missing it more and more. I don't think there's anything harder to write than good poetry, and if I'm ever going to do it again, I fear I'm going to have to work up to it. It seems very possible to me that learning to make lists could be a step in that direction. So as a sort of exercise, and to push myself outside my usual modes of thinking and expressing myself, I'm going to try to make some lists and post them here in the coming days. My lists may not look like other lists, and I imagine they will be bulky and full of asides at first, but we'll see. Maybe I'll surprise myself, or, at the very least, maybe my list-making style will evolve as I work. You never can tell.
A list is a concise and linear thing. Linear and concise are two adjectives that do not describe the way my brain functions. If I had to describe what my thought pattern tends to look like, I'd compare it more to a spider's web, maybe, or a ring of paper snowflakes all cut from the same huge piece of paper. Ooh! Or one of those children's toys that looks like a compact ball until you pull on its sides and it expands to be a much larger globe of interconnected pieces, all hinged together and flexible. Definitely circular rather than linear.
This means that if you ask me what my top five desert-island albums are, I will immediately think of albums I've loved at different times in my life, and within each era there will be a network of songs that remind me of each other, and of places, and of people, and I will start thinking of all of those things in sort of a simultaneous flash. It could take me an hour to sort out that layered impression and explain to you my real answer, which is really not an answer to your question at all. So I usually just throw out some inaccurate and incomplete answer.
All that said, I do appreciate the beauty of a good list. I have no desire to, say, make lists of things I need to do in a given day, or lists of my personal goals for a given time period, or anything like that. I just don't work that way, although I can see how that could be useful. But other lists can be a kind of poetry. I was telling a friend the other day how I don't write poetry anymore because it involves sitting with an idea and distilling and distilling it down until it's almost nothing, and I just don't have time to do that anymore. But I do miss it, and lately I'm missing it more and more. I don't think there's anything harder to write than good poetry, and if I'm ever going to do it again, I fear I'm going to have to work up to it. It seems very possible to me that learning to make lists could be a step in that direction. So as a sort of exercise, and to push myself outside my usual modes of thinking and expressing myself, I'm going to try to make some lists and post them here in the coming days. My lists may not look like other lists, and I imagine they will be bulky and full of asides at first, but we'll see. Maybe I'll surprise myself, or, at the very least, maybe my list-making style will evolve as I work. You never can tell.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Hundreds of Things
Since I have so much free time in which there is nothing constructive I could be doing, I thought it would go back and re-read everyone's lists of 100 Things. Doing so made me realize three things:
1)My husband still amuses me, but that first kiss item may not be kosher,
2)Many of you (Stacey, Melissa, Chockleys) never wrote one, and
3)Some of you need to update your lists (for instance, I happen to know that a certain SAM has now been drunk more than three times). It also made me re-read my own list, update and alter it where I saw the need, and fill in a few of the "I can't think of anything to put on this list" items. I wonder if you can spot the changes.
And, just because 100 things are not enough when it comes to self-indulgent rambling, here are ten more things you may not know about me:
101. I once won a Tabasco-drinking contest (bored barmaid vs. bored waiter on a slow shift) by filling a bar jigger with the stuff, swishing it around in my mouth for thirty seconds, swallowing, and then doing all that again.
102. I'm a fairly good cook in a Mom kind of way, but I can't bake.
103. I'd put my lasagna up against anyone's, but my chili is inconsistent at best.
104. My natural yoga ability seems to impress my instructors on the rare occasion that I get to take a class.
105. As a little girl I dreamed of being a gymnast and believed for years that I was robbed of a promising career because my parents could not afford to keep me in lessons.
106. I was a Girl Scout for several years and loved it.
107. I can no longer stand the idea of joining any group, club, team, or organization.
108. Although I would join the ACLU if I weren't afraid that Jerry Falwell's disciples would one day use the fact of my membership to put me in a re-education camp. No meetings to go to.
109. I dislike nicknames and often refuse to use them because to do so makes me feel silly.
110. I'm thinking a lot about trying to write poetry again, but I'm afraid.
1)My husband still amuses me, but that first kiss item may not be kosher,
2)Many of you (Stacey, Melissa, Chockleys) never wrote one, and
3)Some of you need to update your lists (for instance, I happen to know that a certain SAM has now been drunk more than three times). It also made me re-read my own list, update and alter it where I saw the need, and fill in a few of the "I can't think of anything to put on this list" items. I wonder if you can spot the changes.
And, just because 100 things are not enough when it comes to self-indulgent rambling, here are ten more things you may not know about me:
101. I once won a Tabasco-drinking contest (bored barmaid vs. bored waiter on a slow shift) by filling a bar jigger with the stuff, swishing it around in my mouth for thirty seconds, swallowing, and then doing all that again.
102. I'm a fairly good cook in a Mom kind of way, but I can't bake.
103. I'd put my lasagna up against anyone's, but my chili is inconsistent at best.
104. My natural yoga ability seems to impress my instructors on the rare occasion that I get to take a class.
105. As a little girl I dreamed of being a gymnast and believed for years that I was robbed of a promising career because my parents could not afford to keep me in lessons.
106. I was a Girl Scout for several years and loved it.
107. I can no longer stand the idea of joining any group, club, team, or organization.
108. Although I would join the ACLU if I weren't afraid that Jerry Falwell's disciples would one day use the fact of my membership to put me in a re-education camp. No meetings to go to.
109. I dislike nicknames and often refuse to use them because to do so makes me feel silly.
110. I'm thinking a lot about trying to write poetry again, but I'm afraid.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Update
So yes, I have pinkeye. For the first time in my life, at 35 years old, I have the scourge of elementary school kids. In both eyes! How is that possible?
By the end of the day Tuesday, I knew I was going to have to go to the doctor. I got dinner cooking and waited for BD to get home, then drove a few blocks down Poplar to the minor medical place. I tried to make the most of my child-free quiet time in the waiting room by reading, but there was a lot of very loud election discussion on the TV hanging right above my head, and every few minutes my eyes would start to burn and I'd have to close them. That still wasn't too bad. I have a lot of good movies that I like to play in my head, an ability that has earned me the nickname "Putty" from BD.
Eventually I was called back, my blood pressure taken, my medical history briefly confirmed, and then I had to read an eye chart. My right eye started out this whole mess, but it was able to read most of the smallest line on the chart, while the left eye was stymied about four lines higher. It was hard to tell if this was because it's actually weaker, or if the oily film of goop covering it was just making everything blurry. I'm hoping it was the latter, because even though BD is always trying to get me to wear glasses since he thinks they're hot, I don't wanna. Anyway, I found it amusing when, in response to the question "What's bothering you today?" I pointed to my eyes and the young woman said "Ooh, what is that, pinkeye?" I just looked at her and said very flatly "Yeah, I don't know."
Eventually after some more reading and waiting, a doctor came in and confirmed that it was, indeed, pinkeye. He told me to use the drops he was going to prescribe, which I have been, and to stay home until at least Friday, which I did not. I stayed home Wednesday, which proved to be a wise decision in many ways. I woke up with big puffy bags under my squinty little red devil eyes and pretty much spent the day in bed. Other than the eyes I felt good, so I was able to enjoy having a day off. I couldn't bring myself to take two in a row, though. I try to save my sick days for the kids' illnesses and, more pleasantly, the occasional sanity-saving mid-day rendezvous with my beloved. Using a sick day for being actually sick just sucks.
By the end of the day Tuesday, I knew I was going to have to go to the doctor. I got dinner cooking and waited for BD to get home, then drove a few blocks down Poplar to the minor medical place. I tried to make the most of my child-free quiet time in the waiting room by reading, but there was a lot of very loud election discussion on the TV hanging right above my head, and every few minutes my eyes would start to burn and I'd have to close them. That still wasn't too bad. I have a lot of good movies that I like to play in my head, an ability that has earned me the nickname "Putty" from BD.
Eventually I was called back, my blood pressure taken, my medical history briefly confirmed, and then I had to read an eye chart. My right eye started out this whole mess, but it was able to read most of the smallest line on the chart, while the left eye was stymied about four lines higher. It was hard to tell if this was because it's actually weaker, or if the oily film of goop covering it was just making everything blurry. I'm hoping it was the latter, because even though BD is always trying to get me to wear glasses since he thinks they're hot, I don't wanna. Anyway, I found it amusing when, in response to the question "What's bothering you today?" I pointed to my eyes and the young woman said "Ooh, what is that, pinkeye?" I just looked at her and said very flatly "Yeah, I don't know."
Eventually after some more reading and waiting, a doctor came in and confirmed that it was, indeed, pinkeye. He told me to use the drops he was going to prescribe, which I have been, and to stay home until at least Friday, which I did not. I stayed home Wednesday, which proved to be a wise decision in many ways. I woke up with big puffy bags under my squinty little red devil eyes and pretty much spent the day in bed. Other than the eyes I felt good, so I was able to enjoy having a day off. I couldn't bring myself to take two in a row, though. I try to save my sick days for the kids' illnesses and, more pleasantly, the occasional sanity-saving mid-day rendezvous with my beloved. Using a sick day for being actually sick just sucks.
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
My Eyes! My Eyes!
This has been a tough winter for the Sassy family. And by tough, I mean that someone has been coughing, puking, oozing snot, or shivering with fever at almost all times for months, or at least it seems that way. If you've ever lived with six people and one bathroom, then you know what fear the thought of all six catching a stomach virus at once can strike in my heart. I always think of that scene in "The Divine Secrets of the YaYa Sisterhood" where Ashley Judd has all of her kids spewing from both ends all over the place. Once it's over, she puts on a coat over her nightgown, drives to the beach, and locks herself in a motel room for a few days. That seems about right.
Right now, both of my eyes are bright red and feel like they are coated with oil. I guess I'll have to drag ass to the minor medical down the street and sit there for an unreasonably long time just to get the antibiotic eye drops I already know that I need. And yes, I've tried the breast milk thing. After many clogged infant tear ducts cleared by a good squirt in the eye, I have resorted to filling a small medicine-dosing syringe with my own milk and dripping it into my eyes. It might help eventually, but I don't have that kind of time. That's why I never get sick--because I do not have time to be sick. It's just a big fat pain in my ass, really.
Right now, both of my eyes are bright red and feel like they are coated with oil. I guess I'll have to drag ass to the minor medical down the street and sit there for an unreasonably long time just to get the antibiotic eye drops I already know that I need. And yes, I've tried the breast milk thing. After many clogged infant tear ducts cleared by a good squirt in the eye, I have resorted to filling a small medicine-dosing syringe with my own milk and dripping it into my eyes. It might help eventually, but I don't have that kind of time. That's why I never get sick--because I do not have time to be sick. It's just a big fat pain in my ass, really.
Saturday, January 05, 2008
And...exhale!
For all of you who have been holding your breath every month since Genevieve was born, just waiting for me to call and say that I am yet again knocked up like a chubby cheerleader, you can now relax. As of 2:00 yesterday afternoon, a little progesterone-laden plastic sentry has set up camp in my uterus to make sure no one else moves in. Mirena, the goddess of artificial infertility, has granted BD five more years in which to get a vasectomy.
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Brand New Year
I know I haven't been around. I just did Christmas for four kids! And then went out of town! What do you people want from me? Anyway, that was like, last year. Get over it already.
You may not know this about me, but I love this time of year. The time of newness. I love the idea of a fresh start and of a chance to do things differently, and better, in a new year. Last year in January I kept driving past a homeless mission with a sign that said "New year, same old you," and every single time I had to fight the urge to pull over and go inside and yell at someone for being so cynical. "Same old you"? What kind of attitude is that?
You may think it's silly to believe that anything will be different just because we get new calendars, but it really isn't about the date. January first may not be inherently different from any other day, but then, no day is inherently anything, is it? Our days mean what we make them mean. Change can be hard even for those who love it, as I do. What's wrong with taking the least opportunity to get motivated and try to do a little better than we have been? I know that resolutions often peter out, but if they last a little while, and we get a little bit done, isn't that a good thing? I didn't stay consistent with my 2007 resolution to eat less, exercise, and lose weight, but I did see the year out weighing 22 pounds less than I did when it started, and a lot of that was pure New Year's motivation.
I didn't really come here to talk about the little resolutions like losing weight and being more productive at work, though. You know me; I'm all about what lies beneath. And New Year's thinking is no exception. So here it is...
I would not say that I'm a defensive person, and in fact I strive not to be. I pride myself on a willingness to apologize when I need to and on the ability to be honest about my own faults, both with myself and with other people. But still, I protect myself a lot in other ways. Ways that are harder for me to talk about. And I don't want to do that. I want to trust people even though I know that people usually shouldn't be trusted. I want to allow myself to be vulnerable because I know that by shielding myself from emotional injury, I also put layers of numbness between myself and joy. I'm capable of feeling deeply, but I'm equally capable of not feeling much at all. And I'm choosing not to choose that now.
I will declare vehemently to whoever will listen that I don't ever want to make choices about my life based on fear, and in many areas of my life, I think I hold to that. But in less conscious ways, I think I've become afraid of not staying on an even emotional keel, and that fear does affect my life in subtle ways. Like so many things that become clear to me as I get older, I'm starting to see that what was once a positive and stabilizing instinct has become a hindrance and an unnecessary crutch, and I need to let go of it. So that's my Big Goal for this fresh, new year. To open myself to emotional experience. To live and love fearlessly, without trying to think ahead thirty-seven steps to the inevitable end and where that end will find me. I know that all these things pass away. We all know that. Let me feel them while they're here.
You may not know this about me, but I love this time of year. The time of newness. I love the idea of a fresh start and of a chance to do things differently, and better, in a new year. Last year in January I kept driving past a homeless mission with a sign that said "New year, same old you," and every single time I had to fight the urge to pull over and go inside and yell at someone for being so cynical. "Same old you"? What kind of attitude is that?
You may think it's silly to believe that anything will be different just because we get new calendars, but it really isn't about the date. January first may not be inherently different from any other day, but then, no day is inherently anything, is it? Our days mean what we make them mean. Change can be hard even for those who love it, as I do. What's wrong with taking the least opportunity to get motivated and try to do a little better than we have been? I know that resolutions often peter out, but if they last a little while, and we get a little bit done, isn't that a good thing? I didn't stay consistent with my 2007 resolution to eat less, exercise, and lose weight, but I did see the year out weighing 22 pounds less than I did when it started, and a lot of that was pure New Year's motivation.
I didn't really come here to talk about the little resolutions like losing weight and being more productive at work, though. You know me; I'm all about what lies beneath. And New Year's thinking is no exception. So here it is...
I would not say that I'm a defensive person, and in fact I strive not to be. I pride myself on a willingness to apologize when I need to and on the ability to be honest about my own faults, both with myself and with other people. But still, I protect myself a lot in other ways. Ways that are harder for me to talk about. And I don't want to do that. I want to trust people even though I know that people usually shouldn't be trusted. I want to allow myself to be vulnerable because I know that by shielding myself from emotional injury, I also put layers of numbness between myself and joy. I'm capable of feeling deeply, but I'm equally capable of not feeling much at all. And I'm choosing not to choose that now.
I will declare vehemently to whoever will listen that I don't ever want to make choices about my life based on fear, and in many areas of my life, I think I hold to that. But in less conscious ways, I think I've become afraid of not staying on an even emotional keel, and that fear does affect my life in subtle ways. Like so many things that become clear to me as I get older, I'm starting to see that what was once a positive and stabilizing instinct has become a hindrance and an unnecessary crutch, and I need to let go of it. So that's my Big Goal for this fresh, new year. To open myself to emotional experience. To live and love fearlessly, without trying to think ahead thirty-seven steps to the inevitable end and where that end will find me. I know that all these things pass away. We all know that. Let me feel them while they're here.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
The Seventh Circle of Hell
My parents recently moved waaay out almost to Arlington. For those who don't live here, that's a rural area that is being turned into yet another suburb of Memphis in our ever-reaching quest to have the worst suburban sprawl of any city in America. Anyway, it's also past the hellish traffic nightmare that is the Wolfchase area in Cordova. And since I was at my parents' house with the kids Saturday, and since my parents are willing to watch said kids for free, and since I had completed exactly zero percent of my Christmas shopping, I descended into shopping hell.
I am not a shopper. I know that you know this if you've ever seen me wear a black shirt and olive or khaki pants or jeans five days out of the week. If I were thin and rich I might like to shop. Maybe. But as things stand, I hate it. However, I like Christmas enough, and I shop infrequently enough, that I can sometimes enjoy Christmas shopping. Crowds don't really bother me much, I enjoy picking out gifts for the relatively few people I have to buy for, and I like me a slice of mall pizza from time to time.
Unfortunately, Wolfchase Mall ten days before Christmas quickly overcame my feeble attempt to let the Christmas spirit override my shop-a-phobia. So. Many. People. The main problem with that kind of volume is that it makes everything take so horribly long. I walked into Victoria's Secret, saw at least four lines comprised of at least fifteen people each, and walked right back out. It wasn't as bad in Macy's, and I did manage to get started on my Secret Santa present for Stacey there, but I also spent a lot of time wandering around aimlessly looking for things that are allegedly sold at that store, but which no employee had ever seen.
Eventually I gave up on Macy's and went out into the mall proper. One look at the lines in the food court told me that my slice of mall pizza was not to be. I didn't want to leave the kids for an excessively-long time, and I just don't have a lot of patience for lines. I told myself that my waistline would thank me and moved on in search of stripey knee socks for Stacey. This search led me into Hot Topic. This is a store into which no 35-year-old mother of four has ever walked. A boy I would put at about 14 shot me with a laser gun as I walked in he door. When I ignored him, his friends erupted into cries of "Ha! She thinks you're a big dork!" I asked the sales girl with multiple facial piercings if they sold striped or printed knee socks or tights, and she directed me to a display of trashy-looking Merry Widows, garter belts, and bustiers with some stockings, tights, and socks underneath. I picked out two pairs of socks and made my way to the register only to recognize the cashier as a student from the school where I teach. Suffice it to say that I was glad I had limited my selections from that area of the store!
Eventually I made it out to the parking lot with very little to show for the two hours I'd spent inside. After a few minutes of searching for my car (minivan, whatever), I entered the serpentine line of vehicles that snaked in and out of rows and around the entire circumference of the giant mall. As I sat, the Admiral (husband to SAM) and their daughter Miss M walked by and paused to laugh at me for being stuck in the impossible snarl. I offered them a ride to their car, but the Admiral later informed me that even though they were parked a ways away, they left the parking lot before I did.
My adventures then took me across the road to Toys-R-Us, but honestly, I don't think you can handle the full account of that experience. Suffice it to say that I found far less than half of what I was looking for and once abandoned my cart in a huff and headed for the door, but then went back for it when I saw that the lines were relatively short and that I had spent almost four hours shopping with very, very little to show for it.
Next year I'm going to have to try out this interweb shopping that everyone is talking about.
I am not a shopper. I know that you know this if you've ever seen me wear a black shirt and olive or khaki pants or jeans five days out of the week. If I were thin and rich I might like to shop. Maybe. But as things stand, I hate it. However, I like Christmas enough, and I shop infrequently enough, that I can sometimes enjoy Christmas shopping. Crowds don't really bother me much, I enjoy picking out gifts for the relatively few people I have to buy for, and I like me a slice of mall pizza from time to time.
Unfortunately, Wolfchase Mall ten days before Christmas quickly overcame my feeble attempt to let the Christmas spirit override my shop-a-phobia. So. Many. People. The main problem with that kind of volume is that it makes everything take so horribly long. I walked into Victoria's Secret, saw at least four lines comprised of at least fifteen people each, and walked right back out. It wasn't as bad in Macy's, and I did manage to get started on my Secret Santa present for Stacey there, but I also spent a lot of time wandering around aimlessly looking for things that are allegedly sold at that store, but which no employee had ever seen.
Eventually I gave up on Macy's and went out into the mall proper. One look at the lines in the food court told me that my slice of mall pizza was not to be. I didn't want to leave the kids for an excessively-long time, and I just don't have a lot of patience for lines. I told myself that my waistline would thank me and moved on in search of stripey knee socks for Stacey. This search led me into Hot Topic. This is a store into which no 35-year-old mother of four has ever walked. A boy I would put at about 14 shot me with a laser gun as I walked in he door. When I ignored him, his friends erupted into cries of "Ha! She thinks you're a big dork!" I asked the sales girl with multiple facial piercings if they sold striped or printed knee socks or tights, and she directed me to a display of trashy-looking Merry Widows, garter belts, and bustiers with some stockings, tights, and socks underneath. I picked out two pairs of socks and made my way to the register only to recognize the cashier as a student from the school where I teach. Suffice it to say that I was glad I had limited my selections from that area of the store!
Eventually I made it out to the parking lot with very little to show for the two hours I'd spent inside. After a few minutes of searching for my car (minivan, whatever), I entered the serpentine line of vehicles that snaked in and out of rows and around the entire circumference of the giant mall. As I sat, the Admiral (husband to SAM) and their daughter Miss M walked by and paused to laugh at me for being stuck in the impossible snarl. I offered them a ride to their car, but the Admiral later informed me that even though they were parked a ways away, they left the parking lot before I did.
My adventures then took me across the road to Toys-R-Us, but honestly, I don't think you can handle the full account of that experience. Suffice it to say that I found far less than half of what I was looking for and once abandoned my cart in a huff and headed for the door, but then went back for it when I saw that the lines were relatively short and that I had spent almost four hours shopping with very, very little to show for it.
Next year I'm going to have to try out this interweb shopping that everyone is talking about.
Friday, December 07, 2007
In Other Formats...
My December Lamplighter column is now up. Page four.
Come to think of it, I never posted the link to my November column. It's there in the archives. It's about cocktail hour and I kinda like it, so read it if you have the time. Pretty please.
Come to think of it, I never posted the link to my November column. It's there in the archives. It's about cocktail hour and I kinda like it, so read it if you have the time. Pretty please.
Friday, November 30, 2007
Kroghetto
Now that Genevieve has moved from her babysitter on an island in the middle of the Mississippi to a Montessori school in midtown, my afternoon pickup routine has changed as well. Part of the new arrangement involves a block of open time between 2:30, when I am allowed to leave work, and 3:15, when the older kids are dismissed from school, since the baby is now the last stop instead of the first. That 45 minutes may not seem like much to you, but to me it means time to run an errand or two without four kids in tow. After the holidays I plan to use it to (gasp!) exercise a few times a week.
Yesterday, I used my precious child-free time to get the few groceries I needed for cocktail hour tonight. A few times I've made a mad dash from work to the midtown Schnuck's, which is not far but in the opposite direction from the way I need to go to pick the kids up. And if you've ever met me in person, there's a good chance I managed to slip in a rant about how much I loathe and despise every single thing about that store. Even if we met for, like, five minutes. Because that's how much I hate it. So yesterday it dawned on me that there is a closer grocery store: the Crazy Kroger at Poplar and Cleveland. That's right. Kroghetto.
For those of you not from Memphis, let me give you just a few pieces of information about this Kroger and its location.
1. Prostitutes work Cleveland in the daytime. Ones that should really only be seen at night. Without the benefit of streetlights.
2. A few years ago, my Dad's business contracted to redo the bathrooms in this Kroger. When they pulled out the panels from the dropped ceiling, they were hit with a rain of food wrappers placed there by junkies who steal food and take it into the bathroom of Cleveland Kroger to eat it.
I could go on, but I think you get the picture. In the past year or so, I chanced to visit this Kroger a couple of times, with all four kids, to grab lunch supplies for us before heading over to my parents' nearby (temporary) midtown abode. I went with a "get in, get what you need, and get out alive" mentality, but even so, I sensed a realization hovering around the edges of my consciousness. And yesterday, with time to walk the aisles unfettered by bolting toddlers or begging kindergartners, it hit me full on: I like the Crazy Kroger. There, I said it!
As I walked in the front doors, I found myself in a produce section very similar to the one in Poplar Plaza Kroger, which is where I grudgingly spend about $700 a month on food. Except for two things. Wait, three things. It was cleaner, less crowded, and there was the cutest little floor display that comprised three bins. Guess what was in the bins. Go on, guess! You'll never guess. In the first one were little cans of Vienna Sausages. In the middle one were bottles of $.49 Kroger brand hot sauce. And in the third were Ramen Noodles. I can't really explain it, but that display filled me with a sense of comfort. And I don't even like Vienna Sausages! I think it was just the thought that someone who runs that store was in touch enough with the client base to put together a display that could have borne a sign reading "You don't have to starve even if you are broke as hell." It kind of reminded me of shopping at the midtown Pig back in my college apartment days, when $45 was an extravagant amount to spend on a week's worth of groceries.
I continued on through the store with that warm, secure feeling, looking around me and marveling at how truly clean the store really was. And it was so empty of people! The things I hate so much about Schnuck's are that it is tiny, extremely crowded, and organized like blind chimpanzees chose where each item should go. This Kroger was big, clean, well-laid out, and at that hour of the day, devoid of Patty-the-daytime-hookers and junkies and just about anyone else. It was the perfect grocery store!
As I checked myself out at the U-Scan machine, the attendant let another customer know that she did in fact have a little change left on her EBT card after paying for her stuff. "That's alright, " she called out cheerfully, "that's another meal. You could find you something over there for that l'il bit of change." I think I may start doing all my shopping over there. Seriously.
Yesterday, I used my precious child-free time to get the few groceries I needed for cocktail hour tonight. A few times I've made a mad dash from work to the midtown Schnuck's, which is not far but in the opposite direction from the way I need to go to pick the kids up. And if you've ever met me in person, there's a good chance I managed to slip in a rant about how much I loathe and despise every single thing about that store. Even if we met for, like, five minutes. Because that's how much I hate it. So yesterday it dawned on me that there is a closer grocery store: the Crazy Kroger at Poplar and Cleveland. That's right. Kroghetto.
For those of you not from Memphis, let me give you just a few pieces of information about this Kroger and its location.
1. Prostitutes work Cleveland in the daytime. Ones that should really only be seen at night. Without the benefit of streetlights.
2. A few years ago, my Dad's business contracted to redo the bathrooms in this Kroger. When they pulled out the panels from the dropped ceiling, they were hit with a rain of food wrappers placed there by junkies who steal food and take it into the bathroom of Cleveland Kroger to eat it.
I could go on, but I think you get the picture. In the past year or so, I chanced to visit this Kroger a couple of times, with all four kids, to grab lunch supplies for us before heading over to my parents' nearby (temporary) midtown abode. I went with a "get in, get what you need, and get out alive" mentality, but even so, I sensed a realization hovering around the edges of my consciousness. And yesterday, with time to walk the aisles unfettered by bolting toddlers or begging kindergartners, it hit me full on: I like the Crazy Kroger. There, I said it!
As I walked in the front doors, I found myself in a produce section very similar to the one in Poplar Plaza Kroger, which is where I grudgingly spend about $700 a month on food. Except for two things. Wait, three things. It was cleaner, less crowded, and there was the cutest little floor display that comprised three bins. Guess what was in the bins. Go on, guess! You'll never guess. In the first one were little cans of Vienna Sausages. In the middle one were bottles of $.49 Kroger brand hot sauce. And in the third were Ramen Noodles. I can't really explain it, but that display filled me with a sense of comfort. And I don't even like Vienna Sausages! I think it was just the thought that someone who runs that store was in touch enough with the client base to put together a display that could have borne a sign reading "You don't have to starve even if you are broke as hell." It kind of reminded me of shopping at the midtown Pig back in my college apartment days, when $45 was an extravagant amount to spend on a week's worth of groceries.
I continued on through the store with that warm, secure feeling, looking around me and marveling at how truly clean the store really was. And it was so empty of people! The things I hate so much about Schnuck's are that it is tiny, extremely crowded, and organized like blind chimpanzees chose where each item should go. This Kroger was big, clean, well-laid out, and at that hour of the day, devoid of Patty-the-daytime-hookers and junkies and just about anyone else. It was the perfect grocery store!
As I checked myself out at the U-Scan machine, the attendant let another customer know that she did in fact have a little change left on her EBT card after paying for her stuff. "That's alright, " she called out cheerfully, "that's another meal. You could find you something over there for that l'il bit of change." I think I may start doing all my shopping over there. Seriously.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
The Sharpest Crayon
We just returned home from our mostly-annual Thanksgiving trip to Georgia to see the most immediate portion of BD's enormous Italian maternal family. On the way there, we stopped at our usual McDonald's with the giant playland just this side of Birmingham, Alabama, to let the kids take a break from puking into plastic grocery bags and also stretch their legs and throw away some food.
While waiting in line, we found ourselves behind three honest-to-goodness teenage farm boys. As they talked and joked with each other, I marveled at their almost-unintelligible Alabama drawl. I hear all kinds of Southern accents right here in Memphis, from the ultra-urban to the suburban to the transplanted Louisianans, but this was a whole other, extra-special kind of country accent. And just as I caught myself thinking snide thoughts about how ignorant they sounded, one of the boys flashed his calloused, blackened-though-scrubbed palms, and jokingly said that next time they all worked together, he was going to pretend not to know how to do anything as the others had done. One of his friends turned his equally grubby hands palms-up and protested that he had done his fair share. So, I thought, Miss Smarty Pants, these boys work. They know how to do things. And what do you know?
This thought threaded itself like a ribbon through the remainder of our meal. It was there when I took Somerset to the one-seater family bathroom and watched her sit on the rim of the toilet without noticing that the seat was flipped up, and when she stood in front of the hand dryer with her hands up and wondered aloud "How does it turn on?" in spite of the doorknob-sized, shiny silver button, and when she could not figure out how to open the door, and again back at the table when the box containing her chicken nuggets buckled slightly at the back, making it refuse to stay open and causing her to wail in dismay. It was there when we noticed that Joshua was running around the playland in only one sock, and when he admitted that he'd left the house that way because he couldn't find a matching pair, even though a giant brand-new package of socks was sitting right there in his sock drawer when he got dressed that morning.
All this prompted me to wonder what the hell is wrong with my children. They do well in school; two of them are even in the gifted program! Our house is full of books and art supplies and empty of cable cartoons and video games. I couldn't help compare my supposedly-brainy kids to those supposedly-ignorant farm boys, and wonder who would come out on top in the end. But then I started remembering things about myself as a child. Things like walking upstairs to wash my hands for dinner but brushing my teeth instead because I'd forgotten, in an instant, what I was supposed to be doing. Things like my Mom calling me "the absent-minded professor" and my dad's less patient responses to my mindless goofiness. And I thought, you know, I do OK. I'm not the most organized, together person on the planet, but I'm not the least, either. I hold down a respectable job, keep a reasonable grip on my household (with much pitching in by BD, of course), keep my kids dressed and fed and in school. I function.
Sure, there are things I don't know how to do that I really believe I should. I think it's sheer folly that most Americans have no skills when it comes to growing, making, or building things that meet our most basic needs for survival, and I'm not much better than most. I feel that I should know these things and that I should teach them to my children. So that's something to work on. That's a more constructive way of looking at it, I think, than just shaking my head at the baffling cluelessness of my children, or, worse yet, losing patience with them. They're only little kids, after all. Just like I was once.
While waiting in line, we found ourselves behind three honest-to-goodness teenage farm boys. As they talked and joked with each other, I marveled at their almost-unintelligible Alabama drawl. I hear all kinds of Southern accents right here in Memphis, from the ultra-urban to the suburban to the transplanted Louisianans, but this was a whole other, extra-special kind of country accent. And just as I caught myself thinking snide thoughts about how ignorant they sounded, one of the boys flashed his calloused, blackened-though-scrubbed palms, and jokingly said that next time they all worked together, he was going to pretend not to know how to do anything as the others had done. One of his friends turned his equally grubby hands palms-up and protested that he had done his fair share. So, I thought, Miss Smarty Pants, these boys work. They know how to do things. And what do you know?
This thought threaded itself like a ribbon through the remainder of our meal. It was there when I took Somerset to the one-seater family bathroom and watched her sit on the rim of the toilet without noticing that the seat was flipped up, and when she stood in front of the hand dryer with her hands up and wondered aloud "How does it turn on?" in spite of the doorknob-sized, shiny silver button, and when she could not figure out how to open the door, and again back at the table when the box containing her chicken nuggets buckled slightly at the back, making it refuse to stay open and causing her to wail in dismay. It was there when we noticed that Joshua was running around the playland in only one sock, and when he admitted that he'd left the house that way because he couldn't find a matching pair, even though a giant brand-new package of socks was sitting right there in his sock drawer when he got dressed that morning.
All this prompted me to wonder what the hell is wrong with my children. They do well in school; two of them are even in the gifted program! Our house is full of books and art supplies and empty of cable cartoons and video games. I couldn't help compare my supposedly-brainy kids to those supposedly-ignorant farm boys, and wonder who would come out on top in the end. But then I started remembering things about myself as a child. Things like walking upstairs to wash my hands for dinner but brushing my teeth instead because I'd forgotten, in an instant, what I was supposed to be doing. Things like my Mom calling me "the absent-minded professor" and my dad's less patient responses to my mindless goofiness. And I thought, you know, I do OK. I'm not the most organized, together person on the planet, but I'm not the least, either. I hold down a respectable job, keep a reasonable grip on my household (with much pitching in by BD, of course), keep my kids dressed and fed and in school. I function.
Sure, there are things I don't know how to do that I really believe I should. I think it's sheer folly that most Americans have no skills when it comes to growing, making, or building things that meet our most basic needs for survival, and I'm not much better than most. I feel that I should know these things and that I should teach them to my children. So that's something to work on. That's a more constructive way of looking at it, I think, than just shaking my head at the baffling cluelessness of my children, or, worse yet, losing patience with them. They're only little kids, after all. Just like I was once.
Monday, November 19, 2007
One Day At a Time, Baby Steps, and Other Cliches
I have said it before, and I'll say it again: I don't believe there are many experiences, at least in Western culture, more hellish than the first year of parenting the first baby. Yeah, yeah, the baby is precious and cute, and of course you love the baby and would not change your decision to become a parent for anything in the world. Whatever. Most of it still sucks.
Wait, let me narrow that down. What I'm really talking about is the decision to become a mother. I don't know what it's like for the average Dad that first year, but you'd be hard pressed to convince me that it's as hard for them to adjust as it is for mothers. Let me not pretend this is about all parents. It's about mothers, and motherhood, and the impossibility of the whole entire deal.
I know someone who is really struggling with this whole adjustment issue right now. She's struggling with sleep deprivation and information overload and guilt and self-questioning and unsolicited advice and feelings of inadequacy and feelings, I would imagine, of "holy shit, what have I done to my life?" I believe that she feels anxious and possibly depressed and it is impossible for her not to believe, right now, that this is all her fault. That it's not supposed to be this hard. That other women do this every day, and better than she can ever hope to. And she's had a string of bad luck and other circumstances that have just intensified all of those feelings. And we don't know each other that well, so I don't claim to understand everything she's feeling or dealing with, but I think I have an inkling. And like all the other well-meaning, misguided Mothers On The Internet, I want to be able to help, and make her feel better, and offer her some magical solution to all the problems she's facing. But I know I can't do that.
Believing that there is one right way, or that there is a magical solution that will make everything work the way it's "supposed to" is the fastest way to insanity. Every baby is different. Every parent is different. The combinations are infinite, and even within each parent/child combo, time brings variation in the needs of each party. If I had to put my finger on the thing that makes that first hellish year of parenting so hellish indeed, I would tend to put it on the belief that we should not "give in" or surrender to the fact that we are parents now, our lives are never going to be the same, we are never going to be the same, and we have to fight parenthood and the changes it brings tooth and nail. Because parents are boring, aren't they? And maybe we need to believe that our regularly scheduled lives will be back after these messages from the very pissed-off baby. But they won't. They just won't. And for me, at least, accepting that and moving forward with my new life, my life as a mother, was the only thing I could do if I wanted to survive. I can't help but suspect that this is true for everyone. Because that's how that works, right? A little experience goes straight to our heads.
If I were going to speak directly to this struggling friend, here is what I would say: The things you are dealing with are every bit as shitty as they seem to you. They are real. But they are not unique to you. You are not the worst mother ever, nor are you the only mother you know right at this very moment who feels that she does not know what she's doing. We all feel like that. It may be delayed for some of us, that feeling, but it comes to us all sometime in the first year or two. I would say that I understand the temptation to seek out information and hope that the magical answer is out there if only you read one more book or article or website or forum, but you have to stop. Seriously. You can't keep doing that to yourself, and it's not going to help. It's just not. There is no answer that anyone else can give you. I could tell you that sleeping with my baby and sleeping right through feedings worked great for me. Our other friend could tell you that Ferberizing and religiously sticking to the crib worked great for her. It doesn't matter. I'm not you. She's not you. Our babies are not your baby.
Listen to me. You are a good mother. You love your baby and you have done everything that could possibly be expected of you. You would not expect yourself or anyone you know to walk into any other new situation and instinctively know exactly what to do at every given moment in order to achieve the most desirable result. Would you? This thing that you've signed up for? It's really, really hard. It's the hardest thing you've ever done. That's not going to change, probably. The difficulties will take on new shapes as time passes, but they won't really get easier. In fact, they will make you look back at this time, later, and laugh at yourself. What can change, and what has to, is the way you deal with the hard parts. You have to stop beating yourself up. You have to stop believing that everyone else is more qualified to mother your child than you are. You have to find a way to step back a little bit, center yourself as much as you can manage, and just accept that you are doing the best that you can. There is no reason at all for you to believe that if you were doing things differently, things would be different. That logic applies in other situations, but not this one. Love your baby. Love yourself. Get both of you up and dressed and fed every day. Get both of you in bed every night, one way or another, and eke out whatever precious sleep you can manage, and in the morning know that you are one night closer to this part of it being over. Trust me on this one thing: that is all you can do. Really. Accept that this will suck, and then one day, when you've forgotten to think about how much it sucks, you'll realize that it has stopped.
Wait, let me narrow that down. What I'm really talking about is the decision to become a mother. I don't know what it's like for the average Dad that first year, but you'd be hard pressed to convince me that it's as hard for them to adjust as it is for mothers. Let me not pretend this is about all parents. It's about mothers, and motherhood, and the impossibility of the whole entire deal.
I know someone who is really struggling with this whole adjustment issue right now. She's struggling with sleep deprivation and information overload and guilt and self-questioning and unsolicited advice and feelings of inadequacy and feelings, I would imagine, of "holy shit, what have I done to my life?" I believe that she feels anxious and possibly depressed and it is impossible for her not to believe, right now, that this is all her fault. That it's not supposed to be this hard. That other women do this every day, and better than she can ever hope to. And she's had a string of bad luck and other circumstances that have just intensified all of those feelings. And we don't know each other that well, so I don't claim to understand everything she's feeling or dealing with, but I think I have an inkling. And like all the other well-meaning, misguided Mothers On The Internet, I want to be able to help, and make her feel better, and offer her some magical solution to all the problems she's facing. But I know I can't do that.
Believing that there is one right way, or that there is a magical solution that will make everything work the way it's "supposed to" is the fastest way to insanity. Every baby is different. Every parent is different. The combinations are infinite, and even within each parent/child combo, time brings variation in the needs of each party. If I had to put my finger on the thing that makes that first hellish year of parenting so hellish indeed, I would tend to put it on the belief that we should not "give in" or surrender to the fact that we are parents now, our lives are never going to be the same, we are never going to be the same, and we have to fight parenthood and the changes it brings tooth and nail. Because parents are boring, aren't they? And maybe we need to believe that our regularly scheduled lives will be back after these messages from the very pissed-off baby. But they won't. They just won't. And for me, at least, accepting that and moving forward with my new life, my life as a mother, was the only thing I could do if I wanted to survive. I can't help but suspect that this is true for everyone. Because that's how that works, right? A little experience goes straight to our heads.
If I were going to speak directly to this struggling friend, here is what I would say: The things you are dealing with are every bit as shitty as they seem to you. They are real. But they are not unique to you. You are not the worst mother ever, nor are you the only mother you know right at this very moment who feels that she does not know what she's doing. We all feel like that. It may be delayed for some of us, that feeling, but it comes to us all sometime in the first year or two. I would say that I understand the temptation to seek out information and hope that the magical answer is out there if only you read one more book or article or website or forum, but you have to stop. Seriously. You can't keep doing that to yourself, and it's not going to help. It's just not. There is no answer that anyone else can give you. I could tell you that sleeping with my baby and sleeping right through feedings worked great for me. Our other friend could tell you that Ferberizing and religiously sticking to the crib worked great for her. It doesn't matter. I'm not you. She's not you. Our babies are not your baby.
Listen to me. You are a good mother. You love your baby and you have done everything that could possibly be expected of you. You would not expect yourself or anyone you know to walk into any other new situation and instinctively know exactly what to do at every given moment in order to achieve the most desirable result. Would you? This thing that you've signed up for? It's really, really hard. It's the hardest thing you've ever done. That's not going to change, probably. The difficulties will take on new shapes as time passes, but they won't really get easier. In fact, they will make you look back at this time, later, and laugh at yourself. What can change, and what has to, is the way you deal with the hard parts. You have to stop beating yourself up. You have to stop believing that everyone else is more qualified to mother your child than you are. You have to find a way to step back a little bit, center yourself as much as you can manage, and just accept that you are doing the best that you can. There is no reason at all for you to believe that if you were doing things differently, things would be different. That logic applies in other situations, but not this one. Love your baby. Love yourself. Get both of you up and dressed and fed every day. Get both of you in bed every night, one way or another, and eke out whatever precious sleep you can manage, and in the morning know that you are one night closer to this part of it being over. Trust me on this one thing: that is all you can do. Really. Accept that this will suck, and then one day, when you've forgotten to think about how much it sucks, you'll realize that it has stopped.
Monday, October 29, 2007
Declaration
I have a tendency to think about things in a way and to an extent that I think is probably not normal. ("She thinks is probably not normal?" I can hear some of you already. Yeah, yeah.) I can't help but analyze ideas and the words used to express them. Part of that is just my nature, and part of it is because of my attempts at work to find a way to help my students crack open a seemingly incomprehensible text and find meaning. And then, to a certain extent, it's because of my not-normal tendencies, and my attempts to figure out how I actually think and why it's not really like the way a lot of other people think (see how that works?). Don't get me wrong--I'm not trying to make myself out as some misunderstood great mind. I'm mostly acknowledging that yes, I know I'm hard to make sense of and, as a result, hard for some people to get along with. But hey, at least I talk about everything that pops into my head!
But that's not my purpose here. It's actually just that I've been thinking about something for a while, and trying to solidify a particular idea, and I feel like I'm closer to doing that now than I ever have been. So of course, being me, I have to talk about it.
Because I'm not religious, or even spiritual in any recognizable way, I've spent a lot of time thinking about the basis for morality; in general, for everyone, but also my own in particular. And really, at times I have found it very tempting to believe that nothing matters. Not in an angry, rationalizing-my-own-wrong-doings kind of way, but in a coldly rational way, because of course I know that "things fade" and "alternatives exclude." In other words, we have a finite number of options available to us, choosing them limits us even further, and none of the choices we make will lead to anything lasting anyway. I know that's a depressing set of ideas to a lot of people, but not to me, and that's too long a conversation to have here. Nor is it the thing I wanted to say right now, which is this:
I have decided that there are only two real things in the world: human happiness, and human suffering. And that everything we do contributes to one or the other, and sometimes both, though not usually in equal measure. I'm not talking about superficial degrees of happiness and suffering. The best way I can explain it is, not surprisingly, through a parenting-related example. As a parent, when I say I want my children to be happy, that doesn't mean I want them to have every material thing or even every experience that they desire, and likewise, I don't think they really suffer when they don't get everything they want. I hope that my children feel safe and loved and wanted and understood, that their basic needs are met so that they are free to spend time and energy on things like creativity and learning and love. I hope they have a sense of belonging, of place and family, and that their lives will afford them more joy than sorrow. And I think that's all the happiness that any of us can hope for. So then the lack of any or most of those things I just listed is what I mean by suffering; a constant striving to meet the most basic physical and emotional needs.
And if I know that, as I feel, finally, that I do, then that belief has to be the basis for my morality. In each thing that I do, I have to try to create more happiness than suffering, and when possible, to transform the latter into the former. Knowing that is the easy part. The hard part, I think, is always being able to tell the two apart.
But that's not my purpose here. It's actually just that I've been thinking about something for a while, and trying to solidify a particular idea, and I feel like I'm closer to doing that now than I ever have been. So of course, being me, I have to talk about it.
Because I'm not religious, or even spiritual in any recognizable way, I've spent a lot of time thinking about the basis for morality; in general, for everyone, but also my own in particular. And really, at times I have found it very tempting to believe that nothing matters. Not in an angry, rationalizing-my-own-wrong-doings kind of way, but in a coldly rational way, because of course I know that "things fade" and "alternatives exclude." In other words, we have a finite number of options available to us, choosing them limits us even further, and none of the choices we make will lead to anything lasting anyway. I know that's a depressing set of ideas to a lot of people, but not to me, and that's too long a conversation to have here. Nor is it the thing I wanted to say right now, which is this:
I have decided that there are only two real things in the world: human happiness, and human suffering. And that everything we do contributes to one or the other, and sometimes both, though not usually in equal measure. I'm not talking about superficial degrees of happiness and suffering. The best way I can explain it is, not surprisingly, through a parenting-related example. As a parent, when I say I want my children to be happy, that doesn't mean I want them to have every material thing or even every experience that they desire, and likewise, I don't think they really suffer when they don't get everything they want. I hope that my children feel safe and loved and wanted and understood, that their basic needs are met so that they are free to spend time and energy on things like creativity and learning and love. I hope they have a sense of belonging, of place and family, and that their lives will afford them more joy than sorrow. And I think that's all the happiness that any of us can hope for. So then the lack of any or most of those things I just listed is what I mean by suffering; a constant striving to meet the most basic physical and emotional needs.
And if I know that, as I feel, finally, that I do, then that belief has to be the basis for my morality. In each thing that I do, I have to try to create more happiness than suffering, and when possible, to transform the latter into the former. Knowing that is the easy part. The hard part, I think, is always being able to tell the two apart.
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