Not So Routine Maintenance

Travel tip: when you're feeling down, head south.

It would have been easy for me to sink into a bit of a funk yesterday afternoon. Exhausted after what seemed like days of driving, I found myself wandering around a beautiful college campus with my daughter and her friend. Surrounded by fresh faced youth in sun dresses and pretty sandals, I trudged along in sensible ugly shoes that your average grandmother wouldn't wear out in public. Top that off with the email from a long forgotten dating site offering up a match -- a 55 year old man looking for women between the ages of 34 and 45 -- and let's just say it's a good thing I don't own a gun.

But sun dresses and fresh youthful faces and pretty sandals on bunion free feet notwithstanding, I had arrived in Nashville, a place filled with impossibly friendly people and an unfathomable helping of genuine good cheer. It's hard to believe these people are for real -- and I mean that in a good way. Maybe it's the overabundance of warmth and sunlight.

Soon after we settled into our hotel room, I called the front desk to tell them our shower wouldn't drain. "Oh nooooo," the woman who sounded as if she was prepubescent drawled. "Would it be all right if we sent maintenance up right away?" I was ashamed of myself; my immediate inclination was to respond with a snotty no, I'd prefer that you wait until next Tuesday, but thankfully I had the good sense to suppress it. She was not kidding. In two short sentences she had conveyed genuine concern, a genuine intent to help, and a politeness beyond anything I could fathom -- asking me if immediately was soon enough. I wanted to wrap this woman up and take her home with me, have her at my beck and call whenever some minor indignity was about to send me into a tailspin.

And she wasn't kidding about "right away." Don, the maintenance man, showed up within seconds, apologizing profusely about our shower issue and asking when we might be gone so he could pour in some stinky drain cleaner and not offend us with the odor. We actually passed him in the hallway on our way out, and he gave us vouchers for free breakfast, just because we couldn't shower. He didn't even seem to notice my sensible ugly shoes. And when we returned, we found some chocolate hammers on our pillows and notes apologizing yet again for the inconvenience. Seriously, out of this world.

So we were thinking life was pretty good in this place called Nashville as the three of us settled into bed with our Ben & Jerry's and decided to splurge on a movie. The television set warned us repeatedly that once we were charged we were charged, so we were a little dismayed when the charge went through and it turned out there was no sound. I called my friend at the front desk. Same woman, same drawl. "Oh nooooooooo!" The volume issue was apparently even more tragic than the standing water in the tub. "May I send an engineer right up?" An engineer? Wow! This place was ready for any emergency. I told her that would be wonderful.

Within seconds, Don (yes, Don, the maintenance man) showed up. We had left the door ajar for him so we wouldn't have to get out of bed in case it took a while for the engineer to arrive. Don seemed to not think it strange at all that the three of us were lying in bed with the covers pulled up to our chins while he fiddled with our remote. As if by magic, Don, the maintenance man turned engineer filled our room with the happy sound of a pay for view movie, and was quickly on his way, apologizing once more for any inconvenience and assuring us he would be close by should anything else go wrong. I had no doubt.

Top this off with all the other folks we've chatted with on the street and in restaurants, and the people in the lobby this morning who apologized to me when I had to wait for the coffee bar to open (at its normal time) and then refused to accept money from me for my grande coffee, and I really do feel as if I have traveled abroad. Maybe I have. Occasionally, I check the stats on my blog page to see who's reading. Well, I can't exactly see who, but I can see from where, at least by country. I get a kick out of it, and a bit of a warm and fuzzy on days when Japan shows up and I imagine my son taking a few minutes to catch up on my odd musings. There are a few steady readers in Saudi Arabia, and India, France, and the Ukraine are often well represented. A couple of weeks ago, a new country appeared: Jersey.

Seriously, Jersey. One reader, listed that particular day right after Singapore. Jersey has never seemed all that exotic to me, and I have crossed over to its shores many times without needing a passport. But I suppose some Americans might consider the state and its people to be a bit foreign, especially after getting to know Snooki and her crowd. I understand it now, how diverse our country can be, and I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Nashville listed as a country one day on my blog site. Or somewhere.

I am more than ready for day two in this southern paradise, a place where folks smile at you and like to see you smile back, where nobody seems to hold it against you that you're a woman in your mid-fifties and your feet hurt and you wear ugly and sensible shoes. I considered emailing the guy on the dating site, telling him the only sexy thing about him is the house he claims to own in Malibu. But really, why bother. I might just call Don the maintenance man turned engineer, Don the Renaissance man. Get myself a little bit of southern comfort. 

Staying (and Leaving) Power

I found myself stalking my own house yesterday. If stalking is a form of emotional warfare, then maybe that makes me my own worst enemy.

The first official showing was taking forever. I had returned from a morning spent talking to Chicago public high school students about careers, and I was exhausted. All I had wanted was to go home, change out of my respectable "career woman" attire, eat, and take a nap. But the cars parked outside my house let me know in no uncertain terms I was unwelcome; my house had been on the market for little more than twenty-four hours, and it no longer belonged to me. I wondered about who was inside, what kind of people had packed into the gray minivan in my driveway to pick up where I had left off. I sat across the street in the corporate parking lot watching my house, waiting for the interlopers to emerge. They did, eventually, a young family with four children. They stood outside for a while, taking in the details of the house that had been my home for almost twenty years, peering closely at the brick, kicking its tires. The house that had once lured me in, the home I have, for so long, taken for granted.

When my friend asked me recently to participate in a "Career Day" panel for high school students, I reprimanded him for mocking me. He insisted he was serious. "Which career would you like me to discuss?" I figured that would stump him. The very word career suggests longevity and success. A lifetime of achievement in a particular area. An area that commands a fat pay check, and even an occasional pat on the back. I defied him to identify a career in my life, something high school students might want to emulate. Something that proves I can stick with it.

My friend was a little bit stumped but he remained undeterred. "You're a writer. Talk about your career as a writer." He might as well have told me I should tell these kids I'm a stripper. There's not much difference really; I am equally trained and qualified for both. As if reading my mind, he added to the irony: "just emphasize education." It's not that I have anything against education; it just seems to me if you're going to tell a bunch of already cynical and lazy kids how important it is, all those letters after your name should probably bear some relevance to what you do.

As it turns out, I probably could have said I was a stripper, even offered up a little demonstration, and very few would have noticed. Well except maybe the occasional adult wandering in from the hallway to check on things. Most of the kids looked comatose; the ones who were conscious just looked annoyed. One girl announced that she hates every minute of every day at school. Ironically, she seemed more engaged than most, and she was perpetually smiling. I don't think she hates it at all; she's just waiting, each day, for something to knock her socks off. I get that.

By the time I arrived in the third classroom, I had bored myself to tears. Even my fellow panelists were starting to sound stale, and they were a lot more interesting than I am. For my final presentation, I decided to focus less on what I have done and what I know and more on what I had learned from the sleepy students in the prior two classes. One, clearly as baffled as I was about how someone who has flitted from one thing to another could possibly talk about something as permanent as a career, challenged me to explain my meandering path. "How do you know when you're done?" she had asked.

How did I ever know I was done, ready to move on to something else or, in some cases, nothing at all. Good question. My initial response seemed lame, at least to me. "When you're no longer doing the job the way you know you should be doing it." If that were true, attrition rates would be astronomical. The whole point of the learning curve is to get us to a place where we can do some things with our hands tied behind our backs, take shortcuts, do things by rote. Nobody leaves simply because they're no longer putting in the effort. I thought about my house. I would have been long gone had no longer doing the job the way you know you should be doing it been the standard.

I told the students in my third and final class about that question. I told them that, in business anyway, there are no awards for outlasting everyone else. Well, theoretically there are. There's always someone who gets called up for that thirty year pin. The guy who's been there longer than everyone else, watched many of the newbies come and then go and sometimes pass him by on the ladder. The guy who is an essential cog in the wheel by virtue of his attendance rather than his skill. I have never been that guy, never will be. But I've never left simply because things got too easy, or I got complacent. That would be silly. I told the students in that final class that you just know. Sometimes it's because you're no longer learning anything new and you need to move on. Sometimes it's because you know you just don't belong there anymore.

The young family with four children liked my house. I could tell they did; I had wanted to zip over from my stalking post and tell them everything that was wrong with it. There's another young family rushing to see it today, afraid it's going to slip between their fingers before they can make an offer. Good news, I suppose, except I suddenly am plagued by doubt, uncertain that it is time for me to go. I am no longer complacent; I have spent a good chunk of time recently fixing up the old place, reacquainting myself with its spaces and the memories that lurk within. It's been anything but easy, but I was clearly the woman for the job. I have been there from the beginning, from the day we staked our claim and tossed our kids' Aladdin bath mats by the sinks in their bathroom. I have been there as the clothing in different sizes and the school notebooks and the trophies and all the other evidence of lives being lived has accumulated like dust bunnies in every nook and cranny. And I have sifted through it all, deciding what goes where, and what just goes. I know, intellectually at least, that my work in that house is done. There is little left for me to learn, nothing left to accumulate. I no longer belong there. The young family with four children has much to learn, but it is time for them -- or some other growing clan -- to take our place.

As much as I don't want to, I will probably stand watch again this morning, stalk my own house while some potential replacements wander through and determine whether they are the right ones for the job. I will leave with a heavy heart but I will know it was time to go. I won't necessarily like it, but I will know.

Fleurs de Lisa

The house goes on the market today, and I forgot to plant the flowers. Well, kind of forgot on purpose.

When my realtor reminded me I still have to do that, I nodded as if it was something I do all the time, plant flowers. I've had the big planters flanking my front door for at least seven years, and that's only because my neighbor dragged me by the ear one day to Home Depot. I remember being baffled. By the size of the pots, by the weight of the bags of soil, by the relatively poor selection of flowers that don't really need sun. Actually, I was kind of surprised that there were any flowers that don't need sun, but I hadn't really even contemplated that issue. Note to self: next time, purchase a house that faces south if you want to make a good first impression.

So today I will somehow need to figure out how to replace the weeds growing in my two neglected pots with colorful blooms that are able to thrive on something other than photosynthesis. Frankly, I'd rather go back on my extra tall and very precarious ladder to change lightbulbs. Oddly, I feel much more at home hanging on for dear life as I attempt to switch out fragile bits of glass than I do with my feet planted firmly on my stoop while I fill up perfectly innocuous looking pots. I think it's because I'm afraid the flowers won't look pretty; the colors might not blend exactly right, the petals might find themselves arranged in a haphazard mess. The lightbulbs are a no-brainer -- the base of each bulb matches up perfectly with a socket in the chandelier. The worst that can happen is I fall off the ladder and break my neck.

Ah, time to give myself a pep talk, infuse myself with confidence, dare to do what a kid raised in an apartment in Brooklyn is just not prepared to do. Yesterday somebody I barely know told me I should live life to the fullest, make every day count as if it were my last. Good advice, but easier said than done. Maybe I'll start slow, build up to the Home Depot expedition. Maybe I'll visit a Starbucks one town over today, expand my horizons a bit in a coffee house with a completely different configuration of couches and chairs. After that, maybe I'll get bagels from a different bagel joint. Who knows, maybe I'll even try cream cheese instead of butter. Then maybe I'll go sky diving. Like my father always told me, I can do anything I set my mind to. If I can master lightbulbs twenty feet up, change up my morning routine, and go skydiving I can certainly face the flowers.

And if my flowers end up looking as if they were air dropped into the pots by a plane in the midst of a hydraulic system failure, so be it. They'll fit right in. With the table in the foyer that I found perched on a curb in Mexico City one day. With the rooms painted in every color of the rainbow, and the family of carved wood coyotes that resides by the staircase. With the pictures on the wall that always seem to tip at odd angles, no matter how many times I adjust them. With all the relics and mementos of nineteen years of kids growing up and adults growing apart and together and apart again and people and pets  coming and going and life just charting its own wild and woolly course no matter how hard we all tried to arrange things just right.

Come to think of it, the light bulbs are an anomaly in a life and a house filled with square pegs and round holes. And I think the fun lies in keeping it that way. Time to face those planters, time to get my hands dirty.

Plot Points

All the talk about boomers customizing their coffins has stirred up what has been a life long and certainly morbid fascination with my own inevitable demise.

I have never wasted too much time worrying about the how or the when, the things beyond my control, although I admit I have put in a few silent requests:  no plane crashes, no taking me before I make sure my children are happy and settled (that may sound like a request for immortality, but I'm not seeking perfection), and please, God or whoever is in charge, do take me well before you even consider taking any of my offspring. I like to think I'm not asking for too much.

Mostly I worry about where I will end up. My bones, that is, not my soul. (I prefer not to think about the latter, and when I do I look at the bright side. At least I won't be cold.) But as long as I have a say, whether I am wrapped in a tie-dye shroud or resting comfortably on a pink satin pillow I want to feel comfortable among my neighbors, know that if I were to knock on someone's lid I'd feel welcome. I want to know I'll be invited to the block parties, even if I am as anti social in death as I am in life and choose not to go.

Back in the day when my marriage to a Catholic appeared to be thriving, I worried occasionally (okay, more than occasionally) about how we would manage to be buried together. I just could never get sold on the cremation idea (it seems so final), so burial has always appeared to be the only viable option. Jewish cemeteries have rather stringent requirements -- even Jews have to prove they are worthy; a Catholic wouldn't stand a chance -- and I would prefer not to spend Christmastimes in eternity surrounded by poinsettias.Thankfully that is no longer a concern.

Apparently as long as I don't renounce my Jewishness I can still be guaranteed a spot at Beth David or its ilk. I'm assuming that means no tattoos, no shopping retail, and no blow jobs. Uh oh! I wonder if I'd get credit for two out of three. (I only shop retail). I know the tattoo rule has plenty of loopholes, and I've been told the blow job prohibition isn't absolute. Word has it the occasional foray into such shiksa pursuits is okay, as long as you don't enjoy it.  Hopefully my somewhat religious devotion to the periodic "friends and family" sales at Bloomingdales will override a lifetime of a sacrilegious propensity to pay retail prices, prove to the powers that be that deep down I am pure Jew.

Just in case, maybe I should put a little thought into coffin or shroud design; that way, even if I end up in a place festooned with poinsettias and gigantic crosses decorated with barbaric images of an emaciated man in a loin cloth, folks might be fooled into thinking I fit in. Maybe I could commission a modern day Madame Defarge, someone who is talented enough to knit a burial cloth bearing an image of a tall blond shiksa that would fit nicely over a set of pear shaped bones. Maybe Peter Max wants to try his aging painter's hand on my casket, ensure his immortality with some psychedelic coffin designs. Or maybe cremation isn't so bad; I can always have myself sprinkled over Bloomingdales.

I'm just not ready to give up retail. As the older boomers start dying off, I'm starting to panic. I need a back up plan.

Boom to Bust to Dust

Even if you could take it with you, why would you want to? 

The first round of baby boomers is coming of age -- old age that is. This massive generation spawned by the greatest generation and raised to view life on earth as its oyster will now start to die off in increasingly large numbers. As it turns out, all the years spent sweating off the fat in the gym and pretending to prefer fish broiled dry to a big juicy steak in restaurants and twisting ourselves into pretzel like poses just to connect with our deep spiritual selves do not make us immortal. But, as has been our policy from the beginning, we insist on having a say, on shaping the terms of our departure. 

It comes as no surprise, then, that folks in the business of making a buck off of death have begun to cater to the over the top desires of boomers headed six feet under. Urns shaped like motorcycle gas tanks, caskets shaped like vintage cars, lots of tie dye. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, the babies of the post war generation will descend to a final resting place that is as restless and rebellious as the unseen interiors of the deceptively neat houses of the Levittowns in which they were raised. And the McMansions they ended up in after they cut their hair and put away their bongs and traded free love for safe sex and lives that seemed eerily similar to the ones they fought so hard to reject all those years ago. 

Full circle. 

I've spent the better part of the past week cleaning the house my kids grew up in, getting it ready for sale. I am a late boomer, too young to have participated in the heady revolutions of the sixties but old enough to have reaped the dubious benefits of hippie discontent. They burned the rule books, we inherited the anarchy of not knowing what we were supposed to do, how we were supposed to live. The Vietnam War had ended, civil rights were firmly established (at least in this part of the world) and we came of age in an era marked more by apathy than noble causes. Bra burning is great, in theory, until you end up with a bunch of kids and realize that nothing else really matters, and it's a lot easier to get things done without worrying about scooping your post pregnancy boobs off the floor. 

Like many of my generation, I raised my children in late twentieth century Levittown style. Our closets and our basement is filled with untouched toys and unread books and piles of pictures of the American dream life -- vacations, weekend sports events, family celebrations. Our neat houses were bigger, the cars more streamlined, but the restlessness and rebelliousness were still very much there -- just hidden behind cheerful two story entrance halls. Like the idealized families of the sixties, we were as shaky and imperfect as our dryvit exteriors. Our children are savvy and cynical, and, for the most part, their biggest battle is an economic one; they know they are the first generation to come along that promises to be less successful than their parents. That is, of course, if you measure success by the size of your house in suburbia and the health of your bank account. 

As I go through our lifetime's worth of stuff, I agonize over what to keep and what to toss. So many pictures that I haven't looked at in years, pictures I would never have missed had I not been forced to clean up. So many books I never would have regretted not reading had I not had to empty the shelves. I couldn't let go of some of them, even though I will never crack their spines (nor would I have access to my daughter's old Kindle) It would be so much easier if the things would just leave automatically, just as the kids do when a certain number of years have passed. I can't take them with me, and I accept that. Why is it so hard for me to let go of all the stuff?

Time goes in circles, and it goes so quickly. My first boyfriend was actually from Levittown. We were voted cutest couple, Camp Berkshire, 1969. I decided to search for him on line, and I am pretty certain I found him. My age, has a sister with the same name as the one who set us up that summer long ago.  He lives in California, but, as far as I could tell from the aerial photograph, it could be anywhere. Levittown 2013. I resisted the temptation to contact him. Lord knows I don't need any more people thinking I'm nuts. Our relationship was short, relatively devoid of conversation unless his older sister was present. I have no pictures of us together, none even of him. Yet I've never let go of his name, and, no matter how many things I throw away, that is something I will take with me to the next house. Weird. 

Fifteen years from now, my half of the baby boomer generation will be the target market for the folks in the death business. I am guessing tie dye coffins and urns shaped like motorcycle gas tanks will be passe, and plain old pine boxes will be back in vogue. I wonder less about the box I will end up in and more about my epitaph. Though I came of age in the relatively apathetic seventies, I hope it will be something more inspiring than a shrug. Maybe it will be my blog.

I suppose I can take a few things with me. Some photographs maybe, or a favorite book. Or maybe just the memories, the things that are always there even though nobody else can see them.  

Not So Bright Eyed and Bushy Tailed

Like my friend's mom always said, even a blind squirrel can find an acorn every now and then.

Well I don't know if she always said it but I know she said it at least once, when he finally brought home a Jewish girl (one who could even read without moving her lips) after what seemed to be an endless and tormenting stream of tall skinny blond shiksas. (For the life of me I will never understand what men see in them!) Anyway I think about my friend's mom whenever I can't figure out what to do, which means I think about her a lot.

As modern and progressive and totally committed to my children's happiness and fulfillment no matter how miserable it makes me as I may be, I have to admit I kind of get the whole Jewish mother reaction to the tall blond shiksa. It's the age of  Facebook, for Pete's sake, where every private family gathering is memorialized on line so that everyone you've even considered knowing in your life knows pretty much everything about you. And, even worse, sees all your pictures. And no matter how much you try to stand next to ugly people in pictures so you'll look good, you have no control over what's out there, and you can't always count on cropping the bitch out, which means I'm not just going to look old but also short and chubby. Who needs that shit? Oh, how I long for a daughter in law shaped like a pear!

You just can't stop enlightenment though, so I'm bracing myself for the worst. Even venerable old food distributors like General Mills are succumbing to the pressure of open mindedness. Recently, it aired a Cheerios commercial featuring a multiracial family. Sure, there was a flood of nasty and disapproving comments from old fashioned folks who never got the memo about how the times are a'changin', but General Mills stood its ground, kept the ad. Even McDonald's has tested the waters outside the racial stereotyping box, recently airing a commercial featuring white guys only. Granted they weren't eating burgers and fries -- presumably, they had eaten a white guy meal, finger sandwiches maybe -- and they were only stopping for ice cream on the way to a quintessentially white guy visit to Vegas, but there wasn't a person of color in sight. Not even at the drive-through window. A new era for corporate America. They seem to be getting it right.

Getting it right, just like the blind squirrel that finds an acorn. Frankly, I'm not so impressed. Not with the squirrel anyway. The playing field isn't anywhere near level; animals are way ahead of us humans when it comes to finding elusive acorns, because they don't waste too much time thinking. Instinct goes a long way. Manny the blind puggle is a perfect example. The other day, out on our morning stroll, he amazed me as he always does by navigating curbs and finding trees on which to pee without missing a beat. I, on the other hand, distracted momentarily by a text, walked face first into a tree. I was thinking about how I might walk into something, but I never saw it coming.

Manny has been dealt some cruel blows – his best friend died and he lost his eyesight within the span of one week – but if there is a silver lining in his playbook it's pure animal instinct. I'm pretty sure there's not a thought passing through his wrinkly little head, but somehow he manages to avoid obstacles and choose a clear path every time. I'm taking a page from his playbook, even though he still doesn't understand that he can't chase the squirrel up a tree. With all paws on the ground, my money's on Manny.

As for me finding the acorn, I'm golden with Manny on my team. All he needs to do is distract the squirrel....

Those Were the Days

I was about twelve years old when "All in the Family" helped usher in the seventies and provide us with a bright spot in what was otherwise a pretty ugly decade. It was an offbeat sitcom, a weekly glimpse into working class American life that changed television for the better. At least until the advent of reality TV.

My mom had heard about the show before it aired, and anticipated it with a bit of guilty delight. She would whisper about it to my father, disappear into her bedroom for a half hour and laugh out loud behind the safety of her closed door. She never told me I couldn't watch; she just assumed it would be a bit over my head. But her laughter was intriguing. Within a few weeks, "All in the Family" became a family affair. We watched, together, as Archie and Edith Bunker brought their exaggerated version of life in the seventies into our living room. We marveled at Archie's audacity, at Edith's naivete, at the dysfunction that seemed to fuel their devotion to each other. It was reality TV, the good kind.

Jean Stapleton, the actress who created Edith Bunker and, over the course of nine years, turned her into one of the most iconic characters on television, died the other day at the age of ninety. I did a bit of math; somewhere in the middle of the show's run, Edith was the same age I am now. Funny, I always thought she was ancient. Hardly. Edith, like the actress who portrayed her, was a master of subtle deception. Like Jean Stapleton, whose screechy and dissonant rendition of the opening song belied her professional training as a vocalist, Edith was anything but the "dingbat" Archie called her every week. She may have "dummied up" more often than not, but when push came to shove, Edith never allowed herself to be silenced, no matter how many times Archie admonished her to stifle herself. Beneath the pasty bewilderment on her face and the perennial dowdy house dress, Edith was strong, courageous, and downright brilliant.

I learned a lot from Edith. For starters, she taught me to always pick my battles. She seldom lost her temper, remained quiet and calm no matter how persistent Archie was at pushing her buttons. He demanded, he demeaned, he dismissed. But when he crossed the line -- devaluing womens' work in the home, for example -- there was no stopping Edith, certainly no shutting her up. Her escalating rant in the episode during which she demanded to be paid for thirty years of household toil was priceless, leaving all of us feeling as depleted and beaten as Archie looked when he suddenly raised his eyebrows in stunned defeat.

In almost every episode, Edith found a way to speak up, however softly, for the ones whom Archie put down. As much as she had Archie's number, she did not lecture. Instead, she chipped away at him in small ways. When she thought he needed to experience a bit of change, she handed him his beer on a different side. When she needed to be heard and he told her he didn't want to hear one more mention of "cling peaches,"  she kept talking, clamping her lips together each time "cling peaches" came up and belting out with glee the "in heavy syrup" part, which Archie had neglected to include on his list of prohibitions. She was the Norma Rae of her own living room, a moral compass for those of us who remained silent even though we were lucky enough to not have an "Archie" telling us to stifle ourselves. Had she not been tied down by the apron strings so common to women of her generation, Edith would have been as strong and as fiercely independent as the daughter she managed to raise.

When the person whose life Archie saves confesses to Edith that he is a "female impersonator," Edith reveals a level of insight few of us can boast. "Oh. Ain't that smart. Who better to impersonate a female than a woman?" She sure got that right. Nobody understood the nuances better than Edith.

Maybe the pendulum will swing back one day, back to the days of real reality TV. Back when life wasn't all that much stranger than fiction.