I never signed up for this...

You had me at hello

I still say it when I answer the phone.   I've been saying "hello" way too  long to stop now.  Even though I know who's calling.  I could say anything I want.   Only I don't.  I keep saying "hello."

That's when I pick up the phone.  Which is getting more sporadic and less automatic.  This is not just the case with me.  People skip the human and listen to the message.   If E. T. phoned home,  maybe no one would answer.

As amazing as it may be, and as much as I appreciate all the features of my Blackberry (most of which I don't know how to use), I'm not so sure I want to listen to music or watch TV or read books on my phone.  I want to talk.  And I think I'm starting to miss that part.

We don't call anymore.  We text.  We email.  We chat online.  And by the way, I'm not complaining.  Even though I AM complaining.  I avoid phones like anyone else: they feel slow;  out-dated.  If I hear my own kids on the phone, I barely recognize their voices.  LOL.    

While the phone advances keep going forward, I'm thinking I might try going backwards.  To reach out and touch someone a little more often than I've been doing. 

It's hopeless for me to keep up anyway.  Because I'm hopeless.  To me, applications will always be for jobs or colleges.   And I'll always be way behind the curve (although I'm informed enough to realize I just made a pun).  I don't have an iPhone yet;  although I have to admit I'm impressed with a phone that can listen to a few bars of music and Name That Tune.  But I'm way out of my league.  While I'm still stuck on hello---the iPhone is farting.

I wonder what Alexander Graham Bell would make of that one.

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A great day with the gynecologist

To get what happened today, you have to get where I'm coming from.

I was 45 years old.  I had two children.  I had breast cancer.  My prognosis was terrible.  I couldn't think of anything else.   24/7 doesn't even describe it.  I was obsessed.  Possessed.  Cancer invaded my brain just like it invaded my body. 

Only worse.  At least parts of my body didn't have it.  My entire brain was affected---every cell, every thought --I had a one-track mind.

I tried eveything to escape--yoga, meditation, guided imagery, music, nature walks.  Nothing worked.  When I discovered art a year after my diagnosis, I finally found some relief.

Painting for 5 minutes without thinking about cancer was a first step.

Eating a meal without chewing on cancer was a milestone.

Seeing a movie without cancer as the sub-plot was a breakthrough.

I never thought I'd get through a whole day without thinking about it.  But as the years went by, I discovered even that was possible.  

Cut to the gynecologist today.  (I've lost so many body parts you'd think I wouldn't even have to go anymore.) 

This isn't the gynecologist who delivered my children, or saw  me through cancer.  I've been seeing this doctor for maybe 5 years.  Today I'm in the stirrups waiting for my exam while she's flipping through my chart.   And she says, "So what was the year of your diagnosis?"

I pause.  "I can't remember if it was '94 or '95," I say.

 I CAN'T REMEMBER.  I have to think before I answer for sure: "'It was '95."

The doctor is as dumbfounded as I am.  The date of diagnosis is indelibly imprinted in the brain of a cancer patient.  "How great that is," she smiles.  "To think that you could forget."

I smile, too. It's quite a moment.

I float out of the gynecologist's office, basking in my resilience, and my ability to let go of cancer.  When suddenly I have a thought.

What if this is not a milestone in my cancer journey after all?  Maybe this is a different kind of milestone:  the onset of Alzheimer's.      

Rock the Rules

I didn't watch the Super Bowl but I did watch the halftime show.  And the Boss blew me away.

Watching him reminded me of a statistic that blew me away when I heard it the other day in a speech: 2/3 of ALL the people who have ever reached age 65, are alive right now.

That sure got my attention.  What a snapshot of the staggering shift in the population of the planet. 

Way more of us are getting older.  And what we consider "older" is changing, too.  In 1900 the average lifespan was 47 years.  Today it's 78.  With a bullet.

Which brings me back to Bruce.  The hero of halftime.  Boss of the Boomers.

Two weeks ago, he rocked for Barack.  Tonight once again, he rocked the world.

The world was different when Bruce Springsteen and I were kids.  No one could have imagined a 59-year old man as a rock star---unless they had rocks in their head.   We assumed when we reached age 59, any rocking would take place in a rocking chair. 

There were understood rules.  You started off in school learning the 3 R's--Reading, 'Riting,'Rithmetic.  You knew what to do and when to do it--get an education, get a job, get married, have a family.  When you got somewhere near 60, you'd be ready for a new set of 3 R's: Relax, Recede, Retire.

Somebody forgot to tell Bruce Springsteen that part.

He's about as far as you can get from retiring.  And the rest of our generation is no different--rewriting the rule book on retirement and refusing to go quietly into the sunset.  While Bruce rocks onstage, his fellow boomers do the same--whatever that means in their own lives.  Instead of winding down, many are starting up---in schools, new jobs, new careers.   

So thanks, Bruce Springsteen.  For providing a performance that was Super in every sense.  For proving we can all push the envelope of age.  For rocking the rules of what it means to grow older.

New Year's Eve Lament

I'm so over the whole New Year's Eve thing.  Which is one of the few good things about getting older.

When I was a kid, every New Year's Eve I'd watch my mother getting dressed up for a party, especially one night she wore a tight white satin dress with a shocking pink satin coat.  In the morning they would give us party hats and noisemakers and other souvenirs from the night before.  And I could hardly wait till I was old enough to go out someday in my own dazzling outfit for a glamorous New Year's Eve celebration.

I definitely had my chance to celebrate a lot of New Year's Eves.   By now, they're all water (and champagne) under the bridge.  For all the energy I put in towards having a date and how to celebrate and what would I wear, swear to god I can't picture a single one of my own outfits the way I remember my mother's.

As for the events, most of them are a blur.  The New Year's Eves that are most memorable are the disasters.  Like the night after a fancy dinner in Miami when the valet brought the car and my date opened my door and threw up on me.  Or the  New Year's Eve on a trip to Europe with my new husband, who at midnight was snoring while I sat in bed watching bowling on TV--in Portuguese.  Another hotel, in Hawaii, the year I was bald from cancer,  V was asleep and I greeted the New Year alone in the hallway outside our room, sobbing.  A few years later was the millenium New Years--when everyone was awake at midnight but we were stuck in a mob at City Walk in Los Angeles--me, the kids, my husband AND my ex-husband.    

Is there a lesson to be drawn here?  I'm not sure.  But I do know this. Whether V makes it to midnight or not,  I will be awake to greet 2009.  Without a party hat or noisemaker.  Wearing pajamas instead of a pink satin coat.    And after a lifetime of experience, I have learned this:  however you spend the night before, a great New Year's celebration means that you wake up in the morning on New Year's Day and you're still there to tell about it.

And by the way, I think there is a dire need for a better New Year's song than Auld Lang Syne. 

Happy New Year to all.

Under-Dressed vs. Over-Dressed: Which is Worse?

With all that's going on in the world, what could be more important to discuss?

That's what I thought.  And why this was a major conversation topic with friends over lunch. 

(If you're a guy, come back tomorrow.)

Of course this can be an issue on any occasion-- but it has special stress at this time of year when applied to holiday gatherings.

Being told what to wear doesn't make it easier.  Sometimes it's even harder.  I'm stumped by "California casual."  Even though I'm casual.  And I live in California.  What do  they call it in the other 49 states?

Meanwhile I'm already veering off the subject--of whether your personal fashion police would consider under-dressing or over-dressing a worse offense.

Even for a faithful reader of Style Magazine, there are no guidelines for this--unless you're a celebrity who can come dressed in anything and make everyone else automatically wrong.  Meaning anyone who muddles through life without a stylist.

I always subscribed to the "less is more" theory.  The one that recommends you look in the mirror before leaving the house and remove one accessory.  Something I never do, by the way. 

Under-dressing, I felt, projected an attitude of self confidence.  Even if I was faking. 

I stuck to that philosophy until a Christmas party with parents I knew from years of sitting bundled up in the bleachers at high school football games.  Very down-to-earth people.  I waltz into the room in my jeans and thought I'd stumbled into Town and Country.   Blinded by the bling.  The worst part was that I like dressing up, and thus I lost a rare opportunity to actually wear some of the clothes that have accumulated for years in my closet.

Still that seemed better than being over-dressed.  I've done that too.  Too much sparkle doesn't cut it with the Birkenstock crowd.  At times like that I've felt like I was wearing a sign reading "Tacky...and Trying too hard."

My friends at lunch all had recent fashion faux pas.  One over-dressed at a Christmas party, one under-dressed at a funeral.  We couldn't agree which was worse.  What do you think?

(At this point in life I've figured out the easiest answer, especially during the holiday season: stay home.)

Math Problems

According to family lore, when I was four years old, my parents were leaving for a trip and asked what I wanted them to bring back for me.  I considered all my options-- a doll, a dress, a hula hoop--and I asked for an arithmetic book.  I know the story is true because I still remember the book and the little diagrams asking me to fill in the answers to the problems.  I loved it.

My passion for numbers persisted as I sailed through math in elementary school.  At Nautilus Junior High, I learned Algebra and Geometry from Mr. P.T. McClesky.  He was a totally bald, stern-looking, former marine with a limp from a war injury.  He scared a lot of kids but I adored him.  Underneath his gruff manner was a heart of gold and a brilliance for teaching.  He was a tough teacher, but he made math fun; every single day in class he made numbers come alive.  Although I remember being confused at times, somehow it all came together and I got all A's in math.  And it was my very favorite subject.

Little did I know that 9th grade would represent the absolute peak of my lifetime affinity or ability in math.  I'm not exactly sure what happened--but my early aptitude for math took a nosedive.  Once math moved from the concrete to the abstract, it was over for me.  I made it as far as Trigonometry, barely.  And since academic requirements were a lot more lax in those days, I got a degree from Yale without ever taking a math class after 11th grade.  Aside from one semester in high school, I never took Economics either.

 My father, who studied chemical engineering, sometimes helped me with my math homework in high school.  And I remember wondering how he could remember stuff like formulas more than 30 years later.  Unfortunately this aspect of the gene pool did not hold up well for my children.  The early years were fine, and in third grade, Daniel's teacher gave very creative math assignments to be done at home.  We'd go around the house looking for groups of 5 objects, or certain shapes; and I remember those times as bonding and fun.  But once Daniel got beyond third grade, I was useless.

My husband V refuses to believe I was ever a whiz at Algebra.  He is one of those people who can calculate things like compounding interest rates in his head---while I am stumped by anything  more complicated than the multiplication tables.  Especially now that Mr. McClesky is no longer around to explain it.

I'm equally lacking on the economy.  I get it when interest rates go up and down.  And I can follow the stock market.  But I'm confused by Freddie and Fannie;  constantly complaining to V that I don't understand the higher concepts of economic theory, such as the intricacies of what led to the current collapse of Wall Street.

I feel comforted knowing that there are people who do understand it.  Like Ron, who commented on my blog yesterday based on his experience in the financial world.  Like people who hold important jobs in the government who also understand this stuff.   Because I don't. 

It would be difficult for me to sound intelligent discussing the economy, and I would appear clueless and way over my head.  Even if I had top experts at my disposal --and even if I was reading from a prepared script.

Although I think I might have done a more credible job than the President of the United States did last night.

And now John McCain has a sudden urge to go to Washington and fix the economy.  He's almost as weak in economics as I am.  So  I'm thinking the person they could really use there is definitely not John McCain.  Or George W. Bush.  Who they really need is Mr. McClesky.

A Military Mother-in-law

Alli and Shane packed up their 5 blankets and 62 T-shirts at 5 a.m. today and headed home.  To their current home, which is a military base in El Paso, Texas.  And since I spent some time with soldiers this weekend and since the election will have so much impact on their lives, the military is on my mind today.

Which is pretty funny in itself.  That I'd be connected in any possible way to the military other than protesting against it.  Because being a military mother-in-law is definitely one of those things I never signed up for.

Before saying anything else, I need to state the facts:  I'm not an expert and have no official connection to the military other than through my daughter, who is married to a soldier.  None of my opinions reflect his opinions, or hers.  

As a military spouse, Alli  knows far more, and has shared a small slice of her experience.  I'm hoping she will share more, and soon---and prove that although she can't efficiently pack a suitcase, she has not inherited my habit of procrastination.  In the meantime, that leaves me.

I could tell you the numbers picked in the draft lottery which determined the future for boys I knew in college, but that was the extent of my military expertise until recently.  Although I didn't know much about it, I had very strong opinions, all negative, like so many who were shaped by the Vietnam war. 

People like me typically didn't have personal brushes with the military.  Since Alli married Shane, I've had a few years and a few opportunities to observe army life, and thought I'd share some of what I've learned--based on my very limited experience.

5 Things I've Learned About the Military:

1.  The military is not a monolith.  It's people.  And those people, much to my surprise, are not all rigid and aggressive and militaristic.  Some of them are peaceful, gentle, non-confrontational types.  Like Tom Hanks in Saving Private Ryan, rather than Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now.

2.  The military is a parallel universe.  It's part of our country, yet not part of it.  Military people are like us civilians, yet completely unlike the rest of us.  Military life operates on military time, in military lingo, and in military style.  It's a whole different world out there.

3.  Soldiers serve.  They may have joined up for the most mundane of reasons---money for college, job training, a dental plan.  Yet once they take that oath to protect and defend us, they serve with a higher purpose.  They believe in the things the rest of us ignore when we stand and wait impatiently for the national anthem to finish before the baseball game starts.  Soldiers look at the flag differently than we do.

4.  Soldiers are trained to obey orders.  They do what they're told.  They don't complain or whine about it.  Even when they're asked to go to Iraq.  It's part of the job.  They might not like George Bush but they do his dirty work.

5.  Soldiers are not treated well even by those who should know better.  This is true despite numbers 1-4.  Things are better than they were during and after Vietnam but this is still an embarrassment.  Soldiers are ridiculously underpaid and underappreciated.  Even though most Americans really want to support them, the life of military families is below the radar for most people.  They make sacrifices; we make gestures.

Despite what I've learned, and how proud I am of Shane and Alli, I admit that I wish Shane was not in the army.  I especially wish this if it turns out that our country elects John McCain. 

I have reasons for this, which I'll write more about soon.  For now I'll say that because of how the Bush administration has used (or even abused) the military, and because McCain is so closely associated  both with the military AND with the Bush administration, I think his actions need to be closely examined--because of what this says about his character and integrity.  Based on what I've learned, and remembering that this is purely MY opinion and not representative of Alli or Shane, I believe that  if Americans really care about those who are serving us, the best way to support them is to vote for Obama.

Surviving Presidential Politics

As a child of lifetime Democrats and a devoted John F. Kennedy worshipper, I developed an early and permanent distaste for Richard Nixon.  When he re-emerged onto the political scene, I vowed to friends that "I'm leaving the country if Nixon is elected."  When he did get elected in 1968, despite my threat to emigrate, I stayed in college and did what I could to get rid of Nixon. (that is me with friends at a Vietnam moratorium in Washington, DC) 

The first time I could vote in a presidential election was 1972, when Nixon was running for his second term.  I spent 5 months of my life volunteering for George McGovern and again, I talked about leaving the country.  I didn't know where I'd go; I just didn't think I could survive "four more years" of Richard Nixon.

He was re-elected by a landslide, and I did move.  But only from Boston to Miami, which even with a huge Cuban population, is still part of the United States.  And I didn't need to make it through four years since Nixon was gone after two years, thanks to Watergate. 

Then Jimmy Carter was elected.  I was happy to stay in the country because by then I was working in television and I knew Jimmy Carter, and I liked him.

Around this time, I interviewed Ronald Reagan, and I remember wondering what kind of people were out there in California who would elect a movie star?  And being a governor was bad enough, but the idea of an actor as President of the United States?  We'd be the laughingstock of the world; how could the country survive such a thing?

Of course Reagan's presidency wasn't the disaster I imagined.  And the first George Bush didn't cause such strong feelings.  He didn't inspire me; but he didn't scare me.  And by now I was actually living in California, the state that likes to elect those Republican movie stars.

I had children by the time Clinton ran for President.  My daughter Alli was 8, already a devotee of presidential politics, and I remember taking her with me to vote for the first Democratic president in her lifetime. 

 And when I got cancer a few years later and thought I was going to die, I put on my wig and in the middle of chemotherapy I took Alli to a Democratic fundraiser, so she would have the memory of meeting President Clinton, the same way my father had taken me to see John Kennedy when I was Alli's age. 

I survived cancer.  But then I had to survive George W. Bush--like we all did.  And it was even worse than I expected.   In 2004,though I couldn't believe he would get re-elected, I was worried.  There was the war, talk of another draft, and one day I spoke to a friend who was seriously considering a move to New Zealand if Bush won again.  A few days later I saw a special discounted fare to New Zealand.  I'd never been there, and I bought tickets so Daniel and I could check it out during his high school spring break.  Just in case.

We loved New Zealand, but remained in the US, even though I didn't see how the country could possibly survive a second term with the worst president we've ever had.  He's leaving our country a mess--at home and abroad.  And even though there's still time for him to screw up something else, pretty soon he'll be gone.

Although I don't feel much better about the prospect of John McCain.  Not to mention my worry if McCain got elected and something happened to him--don't get me started, I refuse to mention her name. 

But I have learned a lot of lessons, after living through so many things I never signed up for.  And among those lessons Is to look back and realize I survived things I thought I could not survive.  Including cancer, and also including Richard Nixon and 8 years of George W. Bush.  I'm still here and so is the country.  Right now the United States is like someone who's just been through cancer: beat up and weak but still standing.

So even though I think this is the most important election of my lifetime, and even though I desperately hope Barack Obama will win it, and even though I feel right now he has an excellent chance to do that, I also believe that our country will survive either way. 

Although today I did check the expiration date on my passport.

Missed Opportunities: Then and Now

Thousands of Yale undergraduates developed a special appreciation for architecture because of one man: Professor Vincent Scully, who for 61 years taught a wildly popular course on the History of Architecture.  He was a charismatic lecturer who made his subject matter come alive so brilliantly that he received a standing ovation at the end of every class--and is considered probably the best lecturer Yale has ever seen.

Outside Yale, Scully is so renowned that he was awarded our country's highest honor for artists and arts patrons: the National Medal of Arts.  Truly the kind of professor most students get once in a lifetime, alumni still talk about how he influenced their appreciation for art, and pretty much everyone I knew at Yale took his course.

Except me.

I knew about it, of course.  And I'm sure somehow I could have fit him into my schedule.  But I never did.  And I can't really remember why--although I'm sure I had a reason that was important when I was 20.  Which is probably the best reason of all--that I was 20-- too young to know why I would want that course material embedded inside my brain.  So unlike thousands of Yale students over the years, I never heard Vincent Scully lecture--even though this incredibly rich experience was right there literally under my nose. 

I can't begin to describe how much I wish I had taken that course.  I still don't know much about architecture.  But I've learned enough to appreciate the work of probably America's greatest architect, Frank Lloyd Wright.  I've also seen his buildings, and read the current bestseller, Loving Frank, by Nancy Horan, about the love affair between Wright and his mistress, for whom he built the house most closely associated with his name: Taliesin.

So when I knew I'd be with my son Daniel last week in Madison, Wisconsin, only an hour from Taliesin, I felt the pull to spend a day in the world of Frank Lloyd Wright.  Despite my usual tendency to procrastinate, I made this plan weeks in advance. Although I did procrastinate on the book, Loving Frank, which I finished reading at 3 a.m. the night before visiting Taliesin.

A few days ago, I walked through the buildings and grounds that comprise Taliesin, immersed in the life and story of the genius who was such a giant in his field (although not a giant in stature based on the height of the ceilings in his home).  Standing inside the school he designed in 1902, it seemed impossible to imagine how Wright could so confidently and dramatically have the vision to break out of the box that defined the art of his age. 

Before the trip, I told Daniel about Wright and his life, and ordered an extra ticket, thinking Taliesin would be a great educational experience.  But while I was up late reading, Daniel was up late,too.  And he was too tired to join me--choosing to close his eyes rather than open his mind.  Which is exactly the same choice I made at his age--when I passed up the opportunity of having Vincent Scully teach me about architecture. 

I learned my lesson.  And I also learned not to expect my kids to know more than I did at their age--about architecture, or about life.  So I didn't press Daniel to change his mind or force him to come with me.  I didn't tell him the story of how I regret not taking the course.  Because I know--as wise as he is-- he won't get that message.  Not now.  Someday I am guessing he will wish he made that trip to Taliesin.  But apparently we are both late bloomers, who learn to appreciate things such as architecture only later in life.

Bargain Shopping

I often hear parents complain about kids who seem to think the definition of infinity is the balance in their parents' checkbook.  I've never had that issue with my kids, both of whom are ridiculously thrifty---possibly because they've been trained by the master: not me; their father. (I will admit he also gave me an education on finding good deals during the years we were married.)  So when I went a few days ago to help my son set up his first apartment, I came prepared for some major bargain shopping.

Like Daniel, who experimented in our kitchen this summer, his two roommates are also looking forward to cooking their own meals.  And unlike the boys I knew in college whose apartments were furnished mostly with cinderblocks and dirty dishes, these guys seem to care what their living quarters look like.  (What I want to know is: where were the men like this back when I was looking for husband material??) 

Besides decorating, and cooking from scratch, all three of them want to do this as cheaply as possible--to save their parents as much money as possible.  (Yes, there really are kids like this in the United States of America.) And I am a living witness as proof that you can equip an entire apartment for less than half the cost of a Williams Sonoma cappuccino machine.

It helps that they inherited a free TV set that someone gave away last semester.  It helps that they're not too proud to scavenge around in thrift shops.  And for the rest, instead of "Abracadabra", the magic word is "WalMart."

For my part, shopping with big strong boys means the heaviest thing I have to lift is my wallet.  And no heavy wallet-lifting since they are such bargain hunters.  So for me this is a win/win situation and I enjoy every minute.  And as we shop, I can't help remembering bargains I made in the past--which make it possible for me to enjoy this experience in the present.  My bargains were not in money, but in time. 

When Daniel, my younger child, was just starting first grade in a new school, I was diagnosed with cancer, and I was certain I was going to die.  Children were allowed to participate in the school play beginning in third grade.  As I sobbed through the entire performance of "The Music Man", I remember making a silent bargain with whoever was listening:  "Please, please, let me live until he's in third grade--so at least I can see him in a play."

By third grade, after watching Daniel perform in the chorus of "The Sound of Music," I made a new bargain:  "Anything---just let me make it to middle school." 

In his first year of middle school, Daniel starred in "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat".    And now plays weren't enough anymore.  I used more bargaining chips.  "All I want is to see him start high school.  Then I'll be satisfied." 

But of course I wasn't.  I wanted more; I wanted to live longer, long enough to see him graduate from high school.  And start college.

Which is how I made it to this latest milestone I never expected to see--his first apartment.  Each new experience brings so much joy, so much gratitude, that I'm careful not to ask for too much.  Because I'm still making bargains with the universe-- and I've been given so much more than I bargained for.