Not long ago, I made a startling discovery. I don’t need eyeshadow anymore. That’s right. I am at an age where the skin around my eyes pretty much matches the color of my eyeshadow. You probably think I’m exaggerating. Take a look.
Okay, which eye has the eyeshadow? Isn’t easy, is it?
Which doesn’t mean that I’ve stopped wearing eyeshadow. What if someone said, “Oh, I like your eyeshadow,” and I had to say, “Thanks. I’m not wearing any.” How embarrassing would that be? An awkward moment all around.
So I’m dealing with these changing appearance issues, and in the meantime, I know the time has come to update my profile picture – on this blog, on Facebook and anywhere else you need to slap a photo.
I like my old profile picture. I was three years younger then…
JUDY, CIRCA 2010
In the interest of full disclosure, however, you have to update these things once in a while; otherwise, you’re like those people on Facebook who put up a picture of their cat, or worse, a picture that’s 12 years old but you like it better than any of your recent, more telling photos because you were thinner then and life hadn’t etched permanent worry lines around your mouth. Man up, I say. These people are your “friends.” They know what you look like.
Confident in the knowledge that I don’t want to be THAT GUY, I got up yesterday morning (I look my best at dawn), put on a full complement of makeup and snapped approximately 54 self-photos in a futile attempt to find one that resembled the me of three years ago. A sampling:
REVIEWING PICTURES #1 TO #53.IS THAT A PIMPLE? I’M TOO OLD FOR THIS SHIT.DEFINITELY NOT.HONEST, BUT NO.SOMETHING IN MY EYE.A FACELIFT MAYBE?MILDLY AMUSED. SLIGHTLY BEMUSED. YUP, THAT’S IT.
If you guessed the right eye, you’re right.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
We sold Mama’s house yesterday. It took over a year to get it to a point where someone would take it. Everything seemed pretty okay to us right up until the time Mom died. She must have been the caulk holding it together.
We had to replace the brickwork on the chimney outside, which meant evicting a raccoon who had set up residence in there, no one really knows for how long. We just always thought the back room had a persistent musty odor. He didn’t want to go.
We found mold in the attic, and the roof was all spongy, so most of the top of the house had to be replaced. We put new flooring and counters in the kitchen and reglazed the bath fixtures. We yanked out the carpeting and tore down the dated wallpaper. We hauled things out, took what we wanted, gave a lot away, and trashed the rest.
The house is starkly empty now. No dining table where Mom sat every morning drinking coffee and reading the paper. No out-of-tune piano. No toys in the green room. No Anne Murray on the CD player. No spices under the cupboard or strawberry jam in the frig. No Mom.
We went over there on Sunday to say goodbye, my sister and I, our five daughters and a few related Johnny-come-latelies. We brought along a folding table and chairs and made some of the foods Mom used to make. Not the same as hers, mind you, but effort was expended. I made her one-of-a-kind fudge, which is touchy as hell; if you don’t pour it at the exact optimum moment, it’s either too soft or virtually unspreadable. She always got it right. Mine was on the soft side.
THESE PEOPLE WERE CLUELESS. I THINK THEY JUST CAME FOR THE FOOD.
We drank Fuzzy Navels and brandy-7s. The granddaughters recalled many a weekend spent there, eating buttered popcorn and homemade fudge on the sofa, watching “The Love Boat” and “Fantasy Island” and “The Benny Hill Show.” Mom loved Benny Hill. Someone pointed out that, in hindsight, maybe “Benny Hill” wasn’t the most appropriate television show for children. Too late. At bedtime the kids slept wherever, one on the sofa, another on the loveseat, someone sprawled on the floor; and the next morning, Grandma made them the kind of breakfast their mothers seldom did. Inevitably, come Sunday night, some child developed an illness of an uncertain but potentially fatal nature that precluded going to school Monday morning.
THESE PEOPLE USED TO BE ABLE TO SIT TOGETHER ON THIS STONE BENCH. NOW, NOT SO MUCH.
So that’s about it. We sat outside until it got dark, while the kids ran around the house in circles. We cleaned up and carted out the table and chairs. Gina left a nice note for the new homeowners and signed it “The Family of Luella.” Those who are inclined to shed tears did. We got in our cars, and we went home.
The people who bought it are real nice.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
I am having my house painted. I mean I am having my entire house painted, every room, every closet, every wall, every ceiling. And of course, once you commit to painting every room in the house, you notice all the other stuff that’s been irking you for the last twenty years, and hey, why not put those projects on the list too, until you realize you have kind of a big thing going on.
I can’t say why, after living with my home’s flaws for years, I chose this particular time to tackle them. I hate to think it might be because my subconscious knows I haven’t long for this world. (Time to get your affairs in order, spruce up the house before the kids have to put it on the market.) That’s how my mind works. That’s exactly how my mind works.
The painters arrive tomorrow. The first thing they’re doing is removing all the 1970s-era popcorn ceilings. It’s a fairly messy job and it means everything in the area where they’re working has to be moved out. Consequently, I have the contents of the guest bedroom, playroom and office squashed into my bedroom with the existing furniture. It looks like the Goodwill in there.
It was cleaning out the office that nearly did me in. I’ve been meaning to do it periodically for years. Now and then I’d make a half-hearted effort – maybe toss out some old bank statements – but nothing that made a dent in the ever-replenished stacks. Sometimes the only thing that works is the imminent arrival of workmen.
Which, if you’re still with me, is how we get to Drawer #3. That’s the bottom drawer of my file cabinet, where I tend to throw all the oddball stories I’ve run across, clipped, saved and forgotten over the years. Of course, much of Drawer #3 went into the recycling bin. But you’d be surprised, some of this stuff holds up remarkably well.
Like this letter that the Smithsonian’s Paleo-Anthropology Division sent to a man who kept mailing them objects he believed to be of enormous scientific value. (Originally published in the Minneapolis Star Tribune but undated. I’ve edited it down a lot.)
Dear Sir:
Thank you for your latest submission to the Institution, labeled ‘Hominid skull.’ We have given this specimen a careful and detailed examination and regret to inform you that we disagree with your theory that it represents ‘conclusive proof of the presence of Early Man 2 million years ago.’ Rather, it appears that what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the variety of Malibu Barbie.
Without going into too much detail, the specimen looks like the head of a Barbie doll that a dog has chewed on. Sadly, we must also deny your request that we approach the National Science Foundation’s Phylogeny Department with the concept of assigning your specimen the scientific name ‘Australopithecus spiffarino.’
The entire staff speculates daily on what you will happen upon next in your digs at the site you have discovered in your backyard. We are particularly interested in hearing your theories surrounding the juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex femur you recently discovered with the deceptive appearance of a rusty 9mm Sears Craftsman automotive wrench.
Harvey Rowe, Curator, Antiquities
•••••••••••
Photo: Google Images, ioffer.com
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
JILL WITH LADY LIBERTY. THIS IS AS CLOSE AS WE GOT BECAUSE WE THOUGHT RIDING THE FERRY WOULD MAKE US SICK. THE BIRD ADDS A NICE TOUCH, I THINK.
I was in New York City last week with daughter Jill, where I made a profound discovery. I have lived my entire life in the wrong place. It never felt quite right living here among the tall blondes, and now I know why. My people hie to the East, in the land of small brunettes who know better than to expect anything from people and wouldn’t dream of leaving the house without makeup.
The last trip I took was three years ago with daughter Jessica, when we went to the other coast, where people are mellow and we sat around a lot drinking wine. That was a nice, relaxing trip. This was a nice trip too, but not relaxing. You have to move fast if you want to see everything in New York. I distinctly remember spending three minutes in Grand Central Station, immersing ourselves in the ambience, before briskly moving on to see that big tree at Rockefeller Center. Check and check.
JILL AT ST. PATRICK’S CATHEDRAL. I LIT TWO CANDLES FOR MY MOM AND DAD FOR A DONATION OF $4. ONE OF THE CHEAPER THINGS YOU CAN DO IN NEW YORK.
You might want to check your credit card limit if you’re planning a trip to New York. The restaurants, the shows, the shopping. By the end of the week, I had given up any shred of restraint and was whipping out my Visa card like I was Sarah Jessica Parker.
We bought subway passes, thinking to save a few bucks on cabs, but we got disgusted after a few days and gave up. It isn’t that the people are weird or the subways dangerous; it’s that you can’t figure out where the hell you are when you get off and have to walk a block in the wrong direction before you figure it out. I don’t think the New Yorkians really want strangers on their subways, as they have opted for obscure neighborhood names on the platform signs in lieu of universally recognized directionals (N, S, E, W).
So we took a lot of taxis, and got to know a lot of cab drivers. Some mute, some chatty, all maniacs. There are traffic lanes, but driving in them is completely optional. The cops don’t care. Who are they going to stop? Everyone?
Let us hurry up as fast as we can, ladies, driving within inches of the cars on either side of us and then slamming on the brakes, because there is no way we’re going to make it around that sanitation truck and through the yellow light without taking out the guy riding his skateboard BETWEEN THE MOVING CARS. But you can try, can’t you.
IT’S CHRISTMAS TIME, SO THERE ARE A LOT OF CHARACTERS WALKING AROUND. YOU CAN TAKE THEIR PICTURE IF YOU TIP THEM.
We saw three Broadway shows in New York, which you can do for roughly the cost of a small pony. Just my opinion, of course, but the best of the three was Newsies, the most overrated was The Book of Mormon and the most disappointing was Chicago, only because someone thought casting Billy Ray Cyrus as Billy Flynn for a holiday run was a good idea.
But that’s okay. The older I get the more I think I’d better start wasting my money on some fun stuff. Does anyone really want to go to their grave thinking, “Thank God. I was able to leave every penny I had to the kids.”
CENTRAL PARK, NOVEMBER 2012
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
Thank God, Cosette’s birthday finally arrived. She turned five last week. For the last three months, I’ve received almost daily phone calls reminding me of her pressing need for more Thomas the Train engines, available in Aisle 2 at Target and if I wanted she would give me directions to the store.
The list was endless. Gordon, Henry, Rocky, James, Emily, Toby, Percy, Annie and Clarabel, Cranky the Crane, Donald and Douglas… “Have you got your pen, Grandma? I’ll wait.”
Of course, her birthday was all about Thomas. The cake, the plates, the decorations, the games. Somehow she ended up inviting every single child in her preschool. I think about 22 showed up; counting the tag-along siblings and cousins, there must have been over 30 kids. They all got little engineer hats and bandanas and, in an effort to maintain order, were divided into groups in the backyard and chugged from “station” to “station” by energetic helpers.
I was assigned to the face-painting station. I don’t ask for these jobs. They just turn up, along with the necessary tools and false encouragement. The boys all chose pictures of snakes and Spider-Man; the girls went for balloons, flowers and Hello Kitty. Unfortunately, the paints were more like crayons, which worked fine when they were sharp but quickly wore down and/or broke, so by the end, the snake was mostly just a green squiggle and Hello Kitty a white blob with a pink bow. They’re preschoolers. They didn’t care.
As for the other grandkids…
Toddler Bret bumped his head that morning and refused to get out of the armchair until he had received an acceptable amount of sympathy. He wouldn’t wear a hat or a bandana and had to adjust to the fact that, yes, there were a lot of presents and none of them were for him. He isn’t all that flexible.
Baby Lee didn’t get a hat or a bandana and slept through almost everything.
Christian helped the “little kids” at the makeshift obstacle course. He has turned into a sensitive, kind, helpful boy and I have no idea when it happened. His friend Gus was at the party too. I figured Gus was somebody’s big brother, but there’s no way to keep this stuff straight.
Grace was my assistant at the face-painting table, where she held the colors and the mirror and offered general instruction and encouragement to the clients.
Maria took a nap. She went to a football game the night before, followed by an all-night lock-in party at school marked by the usual controlled mayhem and little sleep. So now we’ve come to that.
We had a family birthday party after all the tots left, with more food, more cake, more presents. So basically just a full day of fun. I drove home and fell in bed about eight o’clock.
You’d think Cosette would have had enough locomotion for a while. She phoned me on Monday. Toddler Bret hadn’t given her a present yet, she said, so maybe I should take him to Target, as she was missing Cranky the Crane. I told her I’d think about it. She called me on Tuesday. Christmas is coming and she wanted to let me know: she doesn’t have Cranky, Spencer, Elizabeth, the Troublesome Trucks, Bertie the Bus, Bash and Dash, Harold and… “Are you writing this down, Grandma?”
BRING YOUR VISA CARD.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
My granddaughter Grace, who just turned seven, came over last Saturday to visit and spend the night. Gracie is sort of quiet and reserved, so it isn’t entirely clear how she ended up in the family. Even when she’s feeling giggly, it’s a subdued kind of giggly. No need to make a spectacle of yourself. There are plenty of others around to do that.
Grace and I did several subdued, tasteful things together. She designed a number of lovely outfits on the computer and printed them out. We played Cootie and she beat me twice, fair and square. She’s a Cootie master. We went out to eat and she found every word in the Wordfind on her placemat. (She’s only going into first grade but already can read words like marshmallow.) We mowed the grass and watered the pots.
I showed Grace my blog and asked her if she would like to write something. She said she would. Here it is.
I LOVE MY GRAMMA BECAUSE SHE LOVES ME SO MUCH SHE WILL LOVE ME NO ,MATTER WHAT.
MY NAME IS GRACE. MY BEST FREIEND IS GRACE
H. WE PLAY GAMS, TO GETHER.
ME AND MY GRAMMA ARE GOING TO TAK PICTURES OF NATURE.
Oh yes, we also drove to a little nearby lake and walked around, and Grace took lots of pictures, 134 to be exact. Here are some pictures she took of clouds. Because why not.
At the end of the day, Gracie and I blew up the airbed in the living room and watched a movie. And when the movie was over we went to sleep, because we were already in our bed!
Life is hard a fair amount of the time. We get sad and tired and overworked. Sometimes it seems like things will never sort themselves out, and we will never have a happy or restful thought again. Then it is good to have a grandchild like Grace around.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
It occurred to me recently that some very odd ideas pop into my head at times. It worries me a little. I start to speculate on what’s causing them – cells flickering out in my neocortex, say, or overloaded circuitry from having too many grandkids to worry about.
Usually it happens when I’m performing some mundane Chore of Daily Living, when I’d rather be somewhere else doing something else. Last Sunday I had to go to Target to pick up groceries and other sundries. As I walked in the door, I had a sudden urge to check out other shoppers’ carts. If someone had already picked up a lot of the things I needed, I reasoned, I could just casually grab their cart while they were thumping the melons and my job would be half done. Even if I was caught, they’d just mistake me for another distracted shopper. (Ha, ha, silly me! Why would I want your things?) And it isn’t really like stealing if they haven’t paid for the stuff yet, right? It’s just inconveniencing.
I didn’t do it, of course. I do have a conscience. “What would Jesus do?” I asked myself. Probably he wouldn’t walk away with someone else’s shopping cart at Target. Then again, Jesus could just pick up a loaf of Wonder Bread and a package of fish sticks and be good for a month.
When I got home from Target, I went out in the yard to kill weeds. I detest killing weeds, which is why they get away from me. Come August, the crabgrass arrives as if out of nowhere and spreads like the ebola virus. I was spraying away when I started to fantasize that I was an unfeeling killer, spraying poison gas as the weeds begged for mercy. “No, no! He’s just a baby!” the big weeds screamed, as I blasted a little guy just poking its head up. “She’s a bad ‘un,” the old-timers warned. “She’ll hunt ’em down, every last sprout.”
“That’s what you get!” I thought, spraying Ortho Weed B Gon with abandon. “Go live in the wild somewhere!” And don’t start writing me about the evils of lawn chemicals and the virtues of organic lawn care. I recycle. I drive a little economy car. My yard is a war zone and I need the hard stuff.
Where was I? Oh yes, odd notions. I don’t know, maybe everyone has crazy thoughts at times. I don’t think I’m abnormal or anything. I don’t dream about stabbing an old woman in her kitchen or anything. Well, just the one time.
•••••••••••
Photo: Google Images, houston.culturemap.com
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
You can call him Lee because that’s his name. He finally arrived, a big, chubby baby who couldn’t make up his mind whether to stay in or come out, sending his mother back and forth to the hospital like a wind-up doll and distressing the entire family for the past two weeks. I personally am exhausted.
As it happened, when the moment came, I ended up driving to the hospital with Cosette, just as she predicted several weeks ago. I don’t know how she knows these things. The neighbor guy came over to sit with Toddler Bret, who was already in bed. I was tired and anxious, of course, trying to find the hospital with a four-year-old who never stops chattering in the backseat. “That’s 36, Grandma, you go that way. That’s 3-5-W. There’s 280, Grandma, take that.” For the love of God, I thought, give me a break, Cosette!
Both siblings were beside themselves with excitement at bringing the baby home. He didn’t care. But then he probably doesn’t know they see him as a big, almost lifelike toy. Cosette has been honing her mothering skills for months.
He’s a good-natured baby, fortunately, and cute as a button. Doesn’t cry much. He’s already survived being poked in the eye by his brother. No tears but it did make him screw up his face. This is good. He should get used to it.
Welcome to the family, baby Lee. We love you very much.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
Toddler Bret had his second birthday this week. I think I can still call him Toddler Bret since he just entered the Twos, as evidenced by the minor meltdown at his birthday party yesterday. “Just leave him alone and he’ll stop,” his sister said. Which proved to be the case after everyone – grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins – studiously avoided looking at him and certainly made no attempt to engage him in speech.
What really brought him around was his mother’s suggestion that he open his gifts a little early. It was an amazing turnaround. His favorite present was a little remote-controlled dog from his 93-year-old great-grandma. It didn’t matter how many times the dog walked off the end of the coffee table, he found it hilarious every time.
He liked everything else after that… the Happy Birthday song and the cake and the candles, which he blew out all by himself because he’s a big boy now. Soon he will be a big brother to someone. We’ll see how that goes. Meanwhile, here’s a few thoughts from the last two years.
December 31, 2009
The most exciting news I got over the holidays is that grandchild No. 5 is on the way. Gina and Bret like to surprise me with this kind of thing. When she was pregnant with Cosette, they gave me a bunch of photos to look at, including one of the dog next to a sign that said, “I’m going to be a big sister.” I thought they were getting another dog, which seemed odd, but not for them.
You’d think they’d learn to give it to me straight, but no. This time they gave me a jar of spaghetti sauce for Christmas. I thought maybe it was homemade. It wasn’t. Then I thought, “What a stupid gift.” Finally, someone yelled, “She’s prego!” There are no Hallmark moments in our family.
September 8, 2010
I babysat for Cosette and Baby Bret Sunday night while their parents went to Stillwater for a good night’s rest. It’s hard to make it through the night at their house, mainly because Baby Bret has some baby reflux thing going on, which is seldom bad enough to wake him up but enough so he complains in his sleep.
The complaints are hard to describe, but they’re enough to set off the super-sensitive baby monitor sitting on the nightstand next to your head. As a result, you’re in his room roughly every half-hour, because maybe he really is awake and needs something. You never know and you never will until you get up and check. I sort of gave up on sleeping after a while, which is why I was washing dishes at 3:30 in the morning.
December 30, 2010
I watched Cosette and Baby Bret last night. He’s a pretty easygoing baby, especially if you carry him around without stopping. I guess he’s hungry a lot, because I’ve never known a baby so determined to suck your face. Which is hard to avoid when you are, as I say, carrying him around nonstop. As soon as his little face gets next to yours, he’s sucking your cheek or your chin or your eye socket. It feels weird. It is weird.
Also, he never stops talking. I call it talking because I don’t know what it is. It’s loud and comes from down in his throat somewhere. Along with Cosette’s never-ending dialogue, it’s noisy at their house. I would be very surprised if that changed in the new year.
January 28, 2011
I’m babysitting for six-month-old Baby Bret tonight while the rest of the family goes ice skating. Haven’t seen him for a while, but I imagine he’s as chubby as ever, and since he obviously can’t propel himself anywhere, I’ll have to lug him around. It isn’t going to help my back, which is still achy from last Saturday night when I slept with ten-year-old Maria, who will sleep smack dab in the middle of the mattress and good luck trying to move her.
He’s a cheerful little guy though, Baby Bret that is, as long as you keep him fed. Which I do whether it’s feeding time or not. My job, I believe, is to keep them happy by whatever means necessary and let their parents deal with it later. It is free babysitting after all, by someone who really loves your kid and doesn’t care what time you come home. Not surprisingly, parents find this very appealing. I figure they can deal with a kid who’s a little off his schedule.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
Maria
I went to Maria’s softball game this week. This is her first year playing fastpitch, and I’m thinking she may want to work on her self-confidence in the batter’s box. She appears as likely to wait for the walk as to swing at any given pitch. Not a bad strategy actually, and one I can relate to, but connecting bat and ball seems sort of core to the game. On the other hand, the girl can run once she gets on base.
Christian
Christian, who turned eight this week, is feeling miffed that his march to adulthood hasn’t equated to something more than bigger sneakers. As he told his mother, doggone it, he is old enough for the 12-inch sub at Subway now.
Grace
Grace was at Maria’s softball game, although she wasn’t exactly in thrall of the action on the field and as a result spent a good part of the time capturing the local color with my camera. Which is how I end up with photos like this of some random bald guy…
and the now ubiquitous, but always riveting shot of Gracie’s feet…
Cosette
Cosette spent the week fixating on her birthday, still three months away but why wait till the last minute. It was the subject of numerous phone calls, with instructions on finding Thomas the Tank Engine toys (Aisle 2 at Target), the theme for her cake (Thomas the Tank Engine), and where to park when I get to the party (not in the street but in the driveway next to the neighbors’ flowers, Daddy will show me where).
Bret Jr.
Toddler Bret remains as exuberant as ever. Recently he conked me in the head with a cookie. (I know it shouldn’t hurt, but it did.) We were at a birthday party where they passed out big hard cookies in plastic bags, an open invitation to reckless cookie swinging and I should know better than to bend down to talk to a toddler in those circumstances. It wasn’t as painful as the time Toddler Christian broke my nose, or even the time Toddler Maria clobbered me with a hair brush, but it smarted. So don’t go giving toddlers potentially harmful cookies in plastic bags. Just don’t.
A small bird has built a small nest in the ivy growing up a pillar outside my front door, and now I can’t get up on a ladder to pull the wayward ivy off the house without risking being pecked in the eye. And so it goes.
••••••••••• Subscribe to this blog under Email Subscription in the right column.
Grandma Kissed A Sailor 