Academic Regalia

We are having a perfectly lovely, long, lazy Memorial Day weekend.  The kids and I have been hiking and catching movies. We’ve been barbequing and swimming. The Professor walked in ceremonies with his graduating students on Saturday and Sunday. It is so hot and humid, even he was tempted to wear shorts under his black, heavy gown.  But both days he donned his dress pants.

“I think that’s the right thing to do, although no one would blame you for going naked underneath in this heat.”

“Yeah, I know, but I’d feel terrible if one of the old professors looked down and saw my bare ankles.”  There are some scholars here who have been teaching for decades and take the ceremonies very seriously.  Their regalia is so grand they rival even Dumbledore’s velvet robes.

As I drove to campus to drop him off for his second day of honor and torture, I saw some grads in sandals, no pants.  They looked silly.  They looked like boys who would rather be tapping a keg than participating in commencement.  I also saw plenty of young men in proper ankle-covering clothing and dress shoes.  They looked proud, like they had just accomplished something huge.

I know I am a sucker for pomp and circumstance.  It made me think about how when we watch the ceremonies honoring the military today, I won’t see our enlisted men and women wearing shorts or flip flops!  I don’t care how hot it is in Washington DC.  If you stop to think about the people that have dedicated their lives to the finest institutions in the world—our universities and our military--and the parents and kids that have sacrificed time, money, and even their lives, I think the least you can do is put some pants on.

Impersonating Someone Who Cares

We went hiking recently at one of the infamous Ithaca gorges.  As we came off the trail, our car was parked next to the only one in the lot surrounded by a bunch of teenagers.  They were drinking, showing off their underwear hanging out of their jeans, and arguing about who was going to drive.  I decided to make good use of everyone’s time.

I loaded my kids and dog into our car and then grabbed my registration and proof of insurance from the glove box.  I flashed it at the teenagers from a distance as I spoke really loudly.

“New York State Police.  I need to see some identification.”

They looked terrified, which is remarkable considering I was wearing Lululemon from head to toe.  All of the sudden they went from acting like little shits to picking up their empty beer cans and being really polite.

I looked directly at the wise guy behind the wheel, wearing his baseball cap sideways.

“Tell you what, if you can blow under a .08, I’ll forgive the fact that you’re a minor.”

He was mumbling and we both knew he wouldn’t be able to pull that off.  Thankfully the girl who had been bouncing around on his lap looked like she was sober, even if she was going to faint.

“Since I am off duty and have my kids with me, I will let you go if one of you can safely drive you all away from here.  Otherwise, I’m going to have to call this in.”

Do cops have iPhones?

After pretending to search my vehicle, I told them I didn't have a breathalyzer, and that all I was really concerned about was their, and everyone else on the road's, safety.  They seemed to regain color in their faces when they realized I was leaving.  I have no idea if I helped or not, but I saluted them as I drove off.

What does a 1,000 paper cranes look like?

In Japan, it is commonly said that folding 1,000 paper origami cranes makes a person's wish come true.

One of First Born Prince’s classmates folded 1,000 cranes and is now stringing them together.  She sent out a request to her community of friends and family to help her raise money for the people of Japan.  I couldn’t have been happier to whip out my checkbook to honor this creative, hard working, earnest attempt to do something beautiful and positive.

She probably doesn’t realize it, but not only is she doing something for Japan, she is helping herself and everyone who receives this humbling request.  It certainly turned my day around from flashes of annoyance and frustrations with petty problems to remembering all that is good and right with the world.

More than anything, I was given a chance to contribute to a worthwhile endeavor without having to suffer paper cuts.  If you are inspired, feel free to make a check out American Red Cross.

If you don’t do it for yourself, or Japan, do it for our own country—the tornado relief efforts are in full swing.  Giving, no matter how small, adds up through paper of all colors.

Bookish

“Mom!  It’s so unfair.”

“What’s that?"

“Just when we are moving back to San Diego, I am even more Ithaca-ish!”

“What do you mean, because you are wearing shorts and a t-shirt to school and it’s raining outside?”

“No, don’t you see this?”  He waves a knap sack around.

“Your back pack?”

“It’s a book bag!  I am totally into reading now!”

If you run into kids in Ithaca with down time, they typically are reading.  In doctors’ office waiting rooms, at sibling’s music lessons, at the airport.  In most other cities, the kids we know or see have iTouches or (yes, it’s true!) iPads they are pressing away on.  When we were at the airport in Florida last February, I noticed entire families had their heads bent over their hand helds.  I remember thinking I liked the days when kids fought with each other and moms had to embarrass themselves by yelling at them in public.

“Well, you can be the cool Ithaca kid and set a new trend in San Diego when we move back.”

“You mean carrying a book bag around?”

“Yeah, reading in your spare time.  It’s old school.  We’ll bring it back, like white t-shirts and Levi’s.”

He looked at me and just laughed as he lovingly nestled his new passion on his back.

Fairy Tale Blues

I just finished reading, “Fairy Tale Blues,” a story about a woman who took a six-month break from her marriage in order to save it.   It was a little cheesy, but hey, what do expect for a $1 in the sale bin at Borders?  Yawn. Don’t get me wrong, the woman was brave (sort of)—she walked out of the restaurant during their anniversary dinner celebration, got in her car, and drove off with no plan.  She ended up at the airport, and decided to just leave her ski-bum husband in Jackson Hole, Wyoming to go clear her head on the beaches of Florida.

She could do this because her sons were grown and already off to college, she had a great store manager to cover for her so she didn’t have to worry about her part in running their family sporting-goods store, and she was able to afford the airfare, and the hotel she subsequently checked herself into, and all the new clothes she had to buy when she got there because she hadn’t packed a thing…

That’s the part that really spoke to me.  I like to imagine myself in a CVS store in some strange town, picking out a new toothbrush.  Why this is so incredibly attractive to me begs to be examined.  Wouldn’t it be easier to just run out to the drug store and buy some new toiletries once in a while than leave my children and the man I have been with for twenty years wondering where on earth I went?  I think so.

That’s the thing about sabbaticals.  They aren’t easy to orchestrate.  Not everyone is in a position to take one. “Eat, Pray, Love” made me roll my eyes.  Please.  I kept thinking, “Who wouldn’t be a new woman after running around the globe, eating whatever the hell she wanted and sleeping with gorgeous foreigners?”

I think it’s safe to say we have all fantasized about taking off at one point or another.  If you haven’t, I’ll buy you lunch.  I have a friend who drove around with her packed suitcase in the trunk of her car for weeks but never actually went anywhere.  She just felt better knowing she had the option.  What’s tough is initiating change, of any kind.  Once you’re actually off and running, it gets easier and easier, until you can’t remember ever being afraid to go try something new.

Don’t worry, I am not thinking of leaving the Professor, First Born Prince, Charming Baby, Lucky Bastard even though he poops on my kitchen floor or Her Royal Majesty, although she did barf on the duvet cover I just washed and ironed myself!   We are wrapping up our sabbatical and now, as I am planning the move back to California, I need to steady myself for reentry.  Shopping for a new toothbrush sounds a lot more appealing right now.

Life Begins

One of my Dad's Fabulous Four Sisters

My father had four sisters.  He is gone now (passed away in 1991) but they are all alive and living in California, sprinkled from Napa Valley down to San Diego.  I’m really looking forward to visiting with them when we move back.  I could dedicate entire blogs to each of them and what they have taught me over the years.  The funniest one is Aunt J. who lives in L.A.  She paints portraits as a hobby, picking a photo most representative of her subject and then painting it in oils.  I remember admiring her self-portrait.

“This is great!”

“That was from the photo taken for my 40th birthday.”

“You look so pretty.”  (All of my aunts are knock-outs.)  “Why did you pick your 40^th?”

She laughed out loud.  “Because life really does begin at 40.”

“Really?”  I was in my thirties at the time and convinced it was all going down hill from there.

“Yes, really.  I didn’t even know how to enjoy sex until I turned 40.”  My ears must have turned bright red.  While I didn’t want to picture my aunt and uncle discovering each other behind closed doors, I was interested in what she had to say.  I somehow thought there was a finite amount of pleasure to be had, most of it having already happened.  It was similar to my childhood notion that a wound had a finite amount of pain and all you had to do was press the pain out of the scrape until it was gone.  It’s no wonder I am not in the medical field.

The Professor contributed to my ill-founded fears by announcing how many nights we had left together if we both lived to be 80.  I had news for him, my grandparents did it well into their nineties.  I know this because my grandmother wrote me letters about it when I was in college.  I was shocked to see her perfect penmanship spelling out for me that she and Grandpa were enrolled in a class called, “Sex and the Ageing.”

My father also filled my head with more interesting news, explaining to me when I was on one of my trips home from school that he and my mother were having the time of their lives now that they had the house to themselves.  He winked at me and I suddenly saw the patio furniture in a very different light.

I realize this post is over sharing but I think it’s important to reassure each other that the twenty-somethings are not having all the fun.  Your family might not be as open as mine, so now that we’ve made it past the end of the world, let’s use our time wisely.  Wink.

Judgement Day

So, what if tomorrow really is the end of the world?  What are you planning to do today, tonight?  As much as I would love to take the end seriously, I don’t have time to call everyone I love and tell them how much they mean to me.  Although, with the time difference, it could work.  I am purging our house of stuff I don’t want to pack up and move back to California, and then taking my sons to the elementary school carnival this evening.  I am selling spirit wear t-shirts and working the ticket sales booth.  I’m really good at simple math.

This seems like a fine time to take stock of what’s important and what’s not.  Beyond family and friends, there isn’t much else that I worry about leaving behind and since I can’t pack any living thing except the dog and cat, I am focusing on the actual stuff I need to deal with.  I’ll spare you an ode to perfect wine glasses and rantings about the stinky odd-shaped bean bags I hate and limit it to these 10:

Important

1.     Photos

2.     Art

3.     Expressions of love the boys have given me over the years including but not limited to:  cards, paper flowers, macaroni necklaces

4.     Keepsake jewelry

5.     Excellent fitting clothes

Not Important

1.     Floral delivery vases

2.     Terrible books I was suckered into buying that I didn't read, nor ever will read

3.     Wonderful books I have read but not wonderful enough to ever read again

4.     Clothes that make me look fat

5.     Clothes that make me look like a man

Well, if I burn up tomorrow, please know that I love you and appreciate that we shared this one final blog entry together. 

"Hello, 911? I'm on fire."

I used to have a sign on my office door that read, “Poor planning on your part does not mean an emergency on mine.”  This was a total joke because I was part of a fast-paced advertising agency in Los Angeles and was managing a publicly traded retail account.  All bets were always off and I was usually running around like my hair was on fire.

None of that bothered me.  We would laugh until we cried and I loved working with edgy, smart people on challenging projects.  Until it did start to bother me and no matter how brilliant the people were, I was wandering around the office late at night mumbling to myself.  Because of my time there, I can spot burn out a mile away.  It isn’t bitchiness or booze, those vices spew freely from people in all sorts of positions. Fatigue and illness are my tells.  Towards the end, I had a sore throat most days and was popping antibiotics with double espresso chasers for my sinus infections.  I blamed it on the smog!  Never mind we had moved to San Francisco for my husband’s job and I was commuting back to L.A. every week.

The Professor finally convinced me to quit without having a new offer lined up so I could take it easy in between gigs.  I slept for a week straight and then took my time finding the next job.  I remember being nervous that I would come across as weak if I wasn’t employed.  I don’t do the hat-in-my-hand act very well.  I went on countless interviews, to probably every major ad agency in San Francisco.  I refused to look at tech accounts because one dot com maniac in our home was enough.  I was holding out for my true passion—I wanted another Fortune 500 consumer product.

A few months went by and I started to think maybe I was crazy for giving up a sweet job at a hot agency only to be out of work on my couch in another city.  I felt foolish and frumpy, but I was finally rested and healthy and wanted to get back to work.

Finally, a headhunter found me.  A marketing agency (walking distance from where we lived in downtown San Francisco) needed a high-energy Account Supervisor for their Visa U.S.A. account.  Thank God I had waited!  I almost took something that didn’t excite me but decided I wasn’t going to let fear or impatience boss me around.  Yeah, yeah, I know, easy for me to say, I had the wunderkid supporting me.  Seriously, though, whether you are alone, in a family, in a boom or recession, I still say, always remember who’s in charge.

Rogue's Harbor

I made it through five days without cheating on my cleanse.  Then I went out with the girls Friday night to a benefit for a local cancer help center.  The evening started out with a cocktail hour overlooking the lake and silent bidding for the fundraiser.  I was able to accomplish this part with club soda and a lime, no food.  Later, when we were all seated for the live auction, I stuck to fruits and veggies while everyone around me was eating tasty-looking treats from the famous Moosewood restaurant.  I know, impressive. 

After the event, a group of us headed over to Rogue’s Harbor, one of the coolest lake-area bars around.  I am sorry, but it is next to impossible to be in a place with great energy, music and group of friends, drinking and laughing, and sit there with a glass of water.  One little pinot grigio couldn't hurt. It's technically fruit.  Then I ordered a second and a plate of peel-and-eat shrimp. 

I felt sort of schnockered after the second glass and probably over-shared.  Wine brings out the best in me.  I woke up feeling hung over.  At first I was mad at myself for being weak and pathetic, but then I realized the hangover meant that the detox is working!  I was losing weight, but the headache was a sign that the diet must really be giving my insides a good scrubbing if those two regulation-pours of wine could do that. 

When I think about my cleanse as a trial run for being strong against old habits in La Jolla, I am glad I had my slip up. I didn't get my nickname, "Polyanna," for nothing.  It’s unrealistic to think I am going to move back and be able to maintain perfect balance in my life without stops and starts and figuring out what works and what doesn’t by trial and error.

As for my inability to resist cheap white wine….well, you can take the woman out of the honky-tonk bars, but...

Detox!

Today I am starting the “Fast Track” Detox Diet:  http://www.annlouise.com/23/diet-detox/13/  11 days of basically no fun. I have done her Fat Flush Plan before and had amazing results.  This is similar, but with a one-day fast in the middle.  I tried it a month ago but cheated (drank coffee and wine the whole time) so my results weren't as good.  I could tell it would be have been bionic if I stuck to it.

If I complete the cleanse properly, I can reboot my whole system—achieving more physical energy and mental clarity.  I’ve done it successfully a few times before and the lightness of being afterwards is worth every hurdle I have to throw my deprived body and agitated mind over.   This time there will be NO CHEATING.

I am hoping to rid myself of bad habits.  The plan gives you a seven-day “prequel” diet to prep your body for the one “fasting” day, followed by a three-day “sequel” to seal in all the health benefits.  The idea is to spend the fasting day journaling and reflecting, hopefully releasing old issues, making room for new goals and ideas.  I love how it makes me want to purge all of my literal closets and drawers, not just the figurative.  It’s like being on drugs, only legal and good for you.

On a bigger scale, my challenges ahead are many—moving back to southern California after two years in upstate New York, attempting to keep the Professor in the classroom more and boardroom less, and catapulting myself to the next chapter in my career (whatever that may look like).  The kids are a rolling set of normal growth patterns, so knock-wood, no big surprises there.

If we can keep the Ithaca lifestyle we have to come to appreciate and enjoy going in San Diego, where the weather is more my speed, I will have achieved the best of both worlds.  The kids are on board, but the Professor is skeptical.  Somehow I have it in my head that if I can master this cleanse, it will be a microcosm of what I am attempting to do with the rest of my life.  Wish me luck!

5th Grade Wisdom

We belong to a left-of-left groovy Congregation that the Professor found for us when we moved here.  Tired of feeling like we were part of an institution, we wanted to try a smaller, different environment for Hebrew School for the kids.

Tikkun v’Or is a warm, friendly group.  Our rabbi lives in Martha’s Vineyard and comes out six times a year.  The rest of the time the families, staff and volunteers keep the place going.

Charlie had a service project he was working on for the social action part of his class.  He was supposed to research an issue he felt was a problem and prepare a presentation on it.  Here are the questions he was to address:

What is the problem?

How did it become a problem?

What is the solution?

What can we do to help?

I asked him what he chose for his project.

“Blogging.”

I felt a wave of horror flush through me.  My poor child!  I had no idea my blogging was affecting him!  He feels it is a social crisis!

“Wow, I am very interested in seeing your presentation to learn more about it.”

“Okay, I’ll leave a copy of the PowerPoint on your computer for you.”

Last night I sat down to read how my hobby became a problem, what he thought the solution was and what he was planning to do to rally his class of fifth grade religious school students to help.

I see the file on my desktop.  “Logging.”

What?  I click it open.  There are a bunch of logs and trees and the first slide, “Logging and its Effects on the Rainforests."

I think I enjoyed reviewing that homework more than any other assignment in the history of my paranoid mothering career.

School's Back in Session

Pulling into the driveway after dropping the kids off at school this morning, I was ready to scream.  You’d think I’d be fixing myself a mimosa after two weeks of entertaining them non-stop (extended spring break, courtesy of yours truly).

It started off so well, too.  I got up early, made healthy breakfasts, fixed lunches and was ready to leave by 7:40 so we could walk to school—the first time since last fall, now that it had finally warmed up.

I was dressed, dog poop bags in hand.  That's when Charming Baby couldn't find his backpack or sweatshirt.  God bless him, he got the critical stuff—he had his lunch and reading homework, and every hair on his Justin Bieber-looking head in place.  I tried to be patient and decided I would drive them and spend the extra time helping him retrace his steps….Dad’s car, my car, his bedroom…

“Sam!  This is why you are supposed to hang them on the hooks, so you always know where your things are.”

The backpack was up in his room, still there from after a hiking trip over break.  Sweatshirt was M.I.A.  He ran around with the Professor a lot over the weekend so who knows where it was.

Finally at 7:53 (school bell rings at 8:00), I say, “Forget it, you’re wearing your fleece pullover.”  His eyes storm over and he won’t look at me.  It is now my fault he doesn’t have his favorite soft hoodie.

I see a pile of dog poop and a puddle of pee on my way to the car.

“Charlie, did you take Huck out last night before you went to bed?”

“No, sorry, I forgot.”

First Born Prince doesn’t forget.  He has a mind like a steel trap.  He was trying to use what his cute little brother has as a convenient excuse for poor choices.  I know he watched a movie last night and I guessed he was tired and decided to just go to bed, gambling on Huck’s ability to hold it in.

“You know it’s not fair to me or Huck.  Now I have a dirty floor to deal with and the poor dog feels bad because he knows it’s wrong to go in the house.”

I was ticked off and gritting my teeth.  I didn’t want my first good-bye after a fun spring break to be, “You’re gonna pay for this!” as I screeched off out of the school parking lot.  So I settled for, “We’ll discuss this later” in a very bitchy tone.

I came home and decided to write up some responsibility charts and make a list of consequences for behaviors that aren’t acceptable.  The consequences stumped me.  It seems there is very little maneuvering room, really.  No TV, early bedtime.  Big deal, they like to read.  Can’t take away books. I think that might be illegal.  It felt good to channel my frustration but also began the cycle of self-talk that is the very reason I am in this position.

Poor little guys.  First day back to school after two weeks.  I should go easy.

Wrong answer!  Buck up or you’ll be their personal valet for another 10 years!

I looked at my pathetic little summary of what was wrong (you didn’t practice guitar once over break!) and thought maybe I was crazy.

Perhaps I should dust off that guitar and leave First Born Prince at home to clean dog poop this afternoon while I go take his lesson.