Chee Whiz

So this morning I went to Qi  (pronounced "chee") Gong (pronounced "gong") at my local library. I was late (natch), so I drove 70 miles an hour, trying to keep my head from exploding as I pulled into the parking lot on three wheels.

Why was I late? My biggest concern was my outfit: what does Grasshopper wear to Tai Chi/Qigong? I settled on black pull-on pants and what I like to think is my non-old-person t-shirt but translates into something from the 80's. I hoped I looked like Gloria Estefan in her Miami Sound Machine days. 

Not to worry:  as I walked into the building, I noticed the other gals ahead of me: lots of  pull-on pants, lots of sweatshirts with kittens frolicking on the fronts. I was definitely feeling cooler, but my jog/skip to catch up lessened that feeling exponentially.

The room was filled with gray haired women, all of them already sitting on their chairs. I, who had been jog/skipping to get there on time, was breathing so freaking stressfully, I couldn't be calmed down by a Jedi Master, much less Mr. Myagi. ("Use head for something other than target, Daniel.") And because the room was dimly lit (to protect the "chi", I guess, or just to keep the kittens quiet), I was squinting while still of course trying to smile: let's face it, I looked completely crazed.

"Pull yourself together, Grasshopper", I said, hopefully to myself. I took a chair from the back and sat down. The scraping and squeaking of the chair was horrifying.

"It is time to quiet ourselves and become The Turtle" intoned our group leader. "Quietly heal your mind for six minutes."

Now, I don't know if you've ever actually sat. still. for six minutes, but it is a long, long ass amount of time. I peeked at the gal next to me; she looked asleep. I tried to quiet my mind, but it kept talking. I peeked at the gal in front of me: seriously, where did she get a shirt that ugly? There was a man to the left; I believe he had actually passed out. I tried to think kind thoughts. I couldn't do it. I thought about writing this blog; that seemed so shallow, to use this lovely situation to write a snarky, sarcastic blog...

"Open your eyes, and breathe, breathe deeply. Now that we have healed our minds, we are ready to heal our bodies."

I knew I was doomed. We stood up, and proceeded to go through the 5 Qigong something or others that control/make up/bounce off our bodies. What the heck? I couldn't concentrate. I had no concept or left hand over the right, palm up, palm down, turn left, inhale, exhale. Basically I just tried to look very, very serene. I tried to look like a very, very serene turtle.

I tried to remember if I passed a Starbucks on the way here. I knew suddenly that I'd be playing some Miami Sound Machine on the way home, or maybe even going way back to ABBA...Chee whiz! I knew I was more of a Dancing Queen than a Grasshopper!  

"You can dance, you can jive, havin' the time of your liiiiiife...
 See that girl, watch that scene, digging the Dancing Queen..."

Warren Piece

By the time I was 8 years old, I knew I sucked at Math. It was a fact, a part of me, like being a short, middle child, with a phobic fear of crickets. I abhorred math; to this day, I still have trouble with the 9 times table. I have to start at 9 x 5, and work my way up or down. (God help me if I ever forget what 9 x 5 is...it's 46, right?)

Next to the phrase "nest of crickets", the words "Word Problems", to this day, make me want to run screaming from the room; once, in 4th grade, I did just that, and hid in the coat room for an hour. Being such a stellar student, no one actually missed me; I just got hungry for lunch and came out, nonchalantly wearing my coat.

Remember Nancy Kerrigan after she got whacked in the knee by Tanya Harding, wailing on the floor: "WHHYYY??? WHHHHYYY??". That heart-rendering drama show was actually first enacted by me, during the Math portion of The Iowa Test in 1958, when I read these words: 

If a train leaves Paddington Station at 2:25 on Wednesday, going 125 miles per hour through dense fog, what time would it arrive in Petticoat Junction, 58 miles away?

"WHHHYYYY? WHHHYYY?" Followed closely by "WHO CARES???"

Now, my father was a "Math Person", and although I know he thought the sun rose and set with me, I also know that he could never understand why his middle child was so damn stupid in math. I'd stare at a problem he was trying to explain, and see fairies dancing with dachshunds. He looked in my eyes, and could see the fairies dancing. I smiled. The dachshunds were so cute!

Here's the thing, though: I was an excellent reader. Loved to read: reading was my thing, fairly genius ability at reading, I think.  My father knew this, and was very proud (probably relieved that his only daughter, with absolutely no skills in long division, wouldn't be left homeless and destitute after all, as it appeared she did know how to read.)

But after the results of the Iowa Test came home, I needed to strengthen my status as Favorite Child, so I asked my father what book was the longest book he ever read; he told me, and I went directly to the library. I looked everywhere for this book, and finally went to the front desk, annoyed now because this search was severely cutting into my Nancy Drew and the Secret at Blackbird Pond reading time:

Me (petulantly, age 8): "I'm looking for a book, I think it's a biography, but I can't find it: can you please help me?" (Although petulant, I was also polite, this being the beginning of the "I have always relied on the kindness of strangers" phase of my life, as popularized by Scarlett O'Hara.)

Librarian (unimpressed, age 100): "What is the name of the book? Who is it about? " (Librarians obviously never used contractions when speaking, back in The Day.)

Me: "Warren Piece".

Librarian: "Never heard of it."

Now I knew this librarian chick had the Dewey Decimal System in her soul; she may even have had it tattooed somewhere on her body, she was Just. That. Good. So if she never heard of it, it just wasn't a freaking book. I told my father that later.

 "Dad!" (petulant doesn't even begin to cover it) "Warren Piece isn't the name of a real book, and WHHYYYY, WHHYYYY did you embarrass me like that?"

In response, I believe he sent me to my room to practice the 9 times table.

Hashtag: CrazyGoNuts

The world is full of Crazy, and any of us here on Earth is bound to step in Crazy at some point. I know I have. Here are two (very unrelated) examples of the kind of Crazy that gets the added descriptive title of CrazyGoNuts. You also might find these examples under this heading:
 Can You Top This? Honestly, I Don't Think You'll Be Able To.

The first example is something I recently saw while watching NOVA: the Nature Series, (and by that I mean The Voice: The Elimination Round.) The commercial came on, and there was Regular Old Ordinary Mom, playing a board game with her children. (Right there, you have to know that this Mom was suspect. The too-big smile, the wink at the child, the playing of a board game: she was obviously on leave from The Asylum for the day.) Then the announcer showed us the name of the game: Doggie Poo. Of course I was busy pouring myself another glass of wine when the damn commercial was on, so I missed the finer points of the game, but suffice it to say, the little plastic dog released a pellet of shit, I mean poo, and I'm not sure if that meant you won the game or lost the game, but everyone was having a really great time. (Hey: who wouldn't?!)

Mr. Webster, bless his alphabetical heart, has a word for this: scatology, the study of, or obsession with, excrement. Look it up. It's under "s", not "poo."

The second Crazy also deals with a bodily function. (Yes, I know some things should remain private: I'm just reporting on them.)  An acquaintance of mine recently met a wonderful man online. He was from Tunisia. She went over there, they were in love, they married, they came back to the U.S.A. All was happy happy joy joy. However, it came out in conversation, that Fred (no, of course it's not his real name; I think his real name is probably more Tunisianish, don't you?) had a hard time finding work in the States because his job back in Tunisia was "fertilizing the palm trees." What this actually meant was that he humped the palm trees until he, in Fred's own words, "spilled his manly juices on them."

Now, I'm not sure the fellas down at Scott's Weed 'N Feed know about that idea. They probably should go look at those palm trees in Tunisia; I bet they're happy little trees. I just hope someone's picking up all those Playboy Magazines at the base of each tree.

Hashtag: OMG.

Hashtag: You really can't top that, can you?

Social (In)Security

My husband Jeff and I recently had to go to our local Social Security office; needless to say, there really wasn't anything social about this call. We had been given information from another office that we weren't too sure about; the young woman who'd helped us there was not 100% clear. (Considering the fact that we were there because we are old, I thought she could have been more clear. )

Anyway, off we go to our local office to try to clarify this situation. A young man called our number. He, not for nothing, was wearing an old sweatshirt decorated with an eagle surrounded by feathers, and as he was as pasty-faced as I am, was NOT a Native American. He rather superciliously (for someone wearing a sweatshirt) informed us that we could not talk to him about it, we had to talk to our "original server", back in the other office. He gave us some information (that turned out to be wrong), and we left feeling very insecure, unsettled, and somewhat guilty for being so confused, a.k.a. stupid.

We went home, and we called our "original server". The message machine let us know that she was no longer "dealing with any cases unless your name starts with M through P". Since ours doesn't, we went back to our local office the very next day.

It was 9 A.M., and no one else was in the office except a Security Guard who, it's pretty fair to say, has seen his share of Big Macs, and Chief Raggedy-Ass Sweatshirt. He called our number, and we walked to his "office", which meant we sat in chairs facing him, with a sheet of glass protecting him from us. (A speaker was positioned in the glass so we could, in fact, communicate with him, although my husband continued to talk a little too loud; maybe he wasn't sure if the Chief spoke English or Lenni Lenape.)

We told him our sad story about not having a name that started with M through P, and he listened intently, blinking his eyes rather rapidly (I thought), then said "Well, I can't help you with your problem, because you have to make an appointment to discuss this."  I looked around the room; there was, still, no one else there. I raised my voice, and stated the obvious. There's. Nobody. Else. Here. I then used my sweetest smile, although Jeff told me later I had a rather pronounced facial tic going, and suggested "How's about you help us now, since there's no one else here?"

"No," he blinked, "you really have to have an appointment. It's the Rule."

Time stood still. I looked over at the Security Guard, who was watching the Today Show. The glass partition was an impediment, but I really thought I could find a way around it. I felt lightheaded; I wanted to revert to base, impolite behavior and call this kid a name, like Chief Whackjob, but I held my tongue. After a minute, he gave us our new appointment:

"You can come in tomorrow at 9 A.M."

I looked again at the Security Guard; he was pretty fat, and Matt Lauer and the Today Show Gang were being particularly enchanting... I knew I could get my hands around this kid's skinny neck before the Guard even got up from his chair. I stared at him, and in my most defiant, middle-income, retired lady manner  said,

"Seriously?"

I actually half rose in my chair. Jeff put one restraining hand on my knee; he was more in tune with the fact that the Security Guard also half rose in his chair, and was now much more interested in what I was doing than what Al Roker was doing. I sat back down: did Security Guards have a license to Bear Arms? Probably. Hey, if this idiotic, Native American Wannabe could make us come back in 24 hours to do the exact same thing he could do right the heck now, well, fatso over there could be packing something Smith and Wesson-ish, am I right?

But, there's a happy ending to this tale, and it is this: when we went back the next day, our appointment wasn't with Chief NumbNuts. Instead, a very knowledgeable and understanding woman helped us through the quagmire, and I even got a chance to tattle on the Chief, as he had indeed given us the wrong information. So there.

I had to resist the urge, on the way out, to walk by his "office"/glass partition and tell him to Number 1, get your facts straight, and #2, lose the eagle sweatshirt and wear a shirt and tie; you're a Public Servant, damn it. I had to resist because the Security Guard was now watching me constantly, with his hand resting on something, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't a Happy Meal.

Urologists, Podiatrists, Gynecologists, Oh My

As you get older, you find yourself seeing a variety of physicians, not because you want to, but because, well, you're old. You're falling apart. Things that used to work just fine are now...not. You find yourself using onomatopoetic words like creaking and popping; you hear yourself saying "My (fill in the blank) is KILLING me!" with great frequency. It kind of sucks.

So, I go to the doctor, and as I sit there waiting for him/her, I look around the room, carefully noticing the corners of the room and the baseboards to see if they're clean, because this is as important to me as that framed graduation announcement from Johns Hopkins or God forbid, some ridiculous school I never heard of (Wait, he only went THERE?). And then I start to wonder why this person chose this line of work in the first place.

I mean, on Choose Your Specialty Day at Doctor School, did he sit around and think, "Yeah, I'd like to look up people's asses all day..." or "Yeah, I think I can help all Womenkind by putting their feet up in stirrups and peering into their coochies..." and then there are the Foot Doctors...

Podiatrists, natch, had a foot fetish going for years, way before they got into Foot Doctor School. Otherwise, how do you explain someone willingly  touching, or should we just say it, wanting to fondle feet all day long? (And these are not "foot model" feet, by any means.) I can't even stand looking at my own feet, and don't even get me started on my husband's feet; he begged me to cut his toenails once, and I reminded him I had a pre-nup with this very clause.

It all makes for interesting thinking as you wait for whatever Specialty you need to see. It'll take your mind off the fact that the next person who comes into the room is going to look at parts of you that will never, ever see the sun shine: and this person actually chose to look there, over and over, for the rest of his life. Oh my.

Creepy, but God bless. You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din...no matter what crummy school you went to, you rock.

Showers: Wedding and Baby

As far as parties go, I don't think there's anything more boring than a Baby Shower or Wedding Shower.
This whole tradition has morphed into written invitations, renting a venue, catering the gig, and of course, buying the gift:  it's kind of crazy. Hallmark set the Standard years ago: let's use this momentous occasion to eek out as much cash as we can, in the name of Love.

Don't get me wrong. I think it's lovely to give someone a gift when he/she is getting married or having a baby. But why do large groups of women have to be corralled into a restaurant or someone's too small living room, and watch for what seems like a freaking eternity while the guest of honor opens every single present? And you can't tell me that everyone's not thinking the same thing: is my gift big/cool/unique enough, compared to all those others? 

And when that many women (and let's face it, it's almost exclusively women, because women have always been the Gatherers, while the Hunters are obviously allowed to stay home, hunting for TV shows) get together in one room, other comparisons are palpable. Oh come on, you don't think other women are looking you over to see what you're wearing, how high your heels are, and why in God's name you are wearing your hair like that...

Get serious. I've seen The Glance, and so have you. The quick uptoyourheadthendowntoyourshoes glance that lasts a nano second. The visual equivalent of an airport metal detector, or the pat down in Women's Prison. (Maybe I'm overly sensitive because at the last shower I attended, my 97 year old aunt leaned over and whispered, "We're the only ones in the room with gray hair". Or maybe I've just binge watched too many episodes of Orange is the New Black.)

But I digress.

So yes, people should get gifts when they get married, or have babies: they are certainly Gift Appropriate Occasions, as they both mark happy days and sleepless nights: major lifestyle changes. But come on: just give them the gift already! Have a party, too, if you want, but don't make us sit there while you open every stinkin gift. Play music, serve lots of wine, and we won't get bored, we'll have loads of fun.

And if we get The Glance, we'll give it right the hell back.

Marriage Vows: Promises or Guidelines?

Everyone knows that Marriage Vows are archaic; that’s why so many people embarrass themselves by trying to write their own. (Hey, maybe if we reword this, and throw in this romantic/New Age/Dr. Seussical poem, it’ll seem less of a promise, more of just a Guideline...)

Please.

It doesn’t matter what you write, what you say, or what you do or do not promise. When push comes to shove, and by push comes to shove I mean when one of you gets a stomach bug that sticks around for way, way, way longer than 24 hours, will the Lovelight still shine in your eyes?

                       “Till Death, or Bodily Fluids, Do Us Part.”

And how about camping? Come on: women who say they like camping are freaking lying through their teeth. If He wanted us to camp, why did God tell Howard Johnson to create motels and serve up an awesome hot dog that we all know wasn’t cooked on a Coleman Stove?

I mean, if you are a nomad, living in the desert, and you have a tent, that’s fine. But I’ll never, ever promise to vacation in something made of canvas, or on wheels: for me, RV stands for Really Vicious, because that’s what I’ll become if forced to vacation in one.

Right now, my cousin and her husband are on a two month trip in an RV, with a living space that measures about 9 feet by 20 feet.  With an 80 pound black lab. They truly are an extremely fun, intelligent, and adventurous couple: their dog is also very fun. But for me, spending that amount of time, in that small of a space with my Beloved, would be like, seriously, Dante’s 10th circle of hell.

                      “Til Death, or You Buy a Coleman Stove, Do Us Part.”

Ok, call me jaded. Call me anti-wedding poetry, call me a Camping Hater. Call me whatever the hell you want, just know this: I think those vows really are just guidelines, with plenty of room for interpretation, and by interpretation, I mean when horrible things happen, what is really meant by   “obey”? (I love you, yes, but while you’re puking, I’m going to TJ Maxx: clean up after yourself, OK?)

So during your wedding ceremony, when it’s time for the Vows, how about you cross your fingers behind all that white tulle you’ve got on, and instead of saying “I do”,  shrug and say ... “Yeah, I guess so...”

Music will play, people will cry: I’ll be crying, because I cry at every wedding, even strangers’ weddings on TV; Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major plays, and I’m sobbing.

If I find out you’re going camping on your honeymoon, I’ll cry even harder. And you can bet that somewhere in heaven, Howard Johnson is crying too.