"I bought a ring."
These words flashed up at me from my cell phone screen as I shut my phone off. I was in an airplane, coming home from my sister's funeral in another state. I had to shut my phone off--the plane was about to take off, so that's all I got to see and know for several hours.
But the significance of those four words was not lost on me. My heart, which had been through a lot lately, leaped with new emotions. A thrill went up my spine, and air left my lungs.
They meant that my oldest child, my firstborn son, the center of my heart since his birth, was about to take a life-altering step. One with significant ramifications, eternal consequences.
I sat huddled in my black clothes, hugging my black jacket to me, next to the dark window, imagining all sorts of new possibilities. In my mind, I could see the sparkle of the diamond, the light in my son's face as he had contemplated this move, my future daughter-in-law's luminous eyes.
It was the dead of winter.
On the first day of spring, exactly two months after my sister's tortured death by cancer, I watched one of my beloved nieces emerge from the temple in a lacy ivory dress with her cute new husband. Everything from her sunlit face to the long darkest-yet-brightest-yellow-possible (saffron, she called it) ribbon wrapped around her slim waist and trailing down the back of her dress said, "Spring is here." Here was the embodiment of new life and young love with endless possibilities.
On the way home from work today, I played a game with myself called, "What month does it look like?" Ahead of me were the gray granite mountains east of the city, frosted with ice and snow. Nearer by, lawns were partly green, partly brown. Trees, except for evergreens, were bare. At first glance, it wasn't clear. "Well," I reasoned, "it's definitely not July, June, or August." I then ruled out May and September. April? No. The green would be more pronounced. Pale leaves would be coming out in the trees. September? No, not with that much snow on the mountains. That left anything from October to March.
As I continued to drive, I peered furtively into gardens in the front of buildings, hoping for some sign that would tell me, definitively, the month. Two blocks went past, and then, just before turning into my driveway, I saw it--a tree puffing dark but full buds out along its branches. "March," I sighed with relief.
Not that I didn't already know that.
But, sometimes, in the midst of bleakness--of the season, or of life, or recession, or lost love or opportunity, it can be hard to see the buds coming out, promising newness and life.
Monday, March 22, 2010
Monday, March 8, 2010
Life Well Lived
I have just outlived my grandma.
She was a few days younger than I when she tragically died from an infection in the lining of her heart. Probably, a round of antibiotics would have cured her without a second thought. But this was before antibiotics. It was thirty years before I was even born. My mother was five. Instead, my grandmother spent a couple of years getting weaker and aging horrifically. In the last picture taken of her, she looks to be eighty--more than thirty years older than she really was.
Lying alone in a bedroom, she worsened and died, leaving eight children.
I realized a little while ago that she would have been surprised to be thought of as "Grandma." She wasn't anyone's grandma in her lifetime. (Neither am I yet.) None of her children was married. She had two grown daughters, ages 24 and 22, still living at home; a son, just turned 20, who was kicking around the idea of going on a church mission--mostly kicking it away, I think, until his mother actually died and he decided to do as she wished; another son who was almost 16; a daughter at the tricky age of thirteen-and-a-half; an eleven-year-old boy who would grow up to be tops in the field of endocrinology; and two little girls, eight and five.
She was just Lizzie, named Elizabeth for both of her pioneer grandmothers--one a black-silk-wearing elegant lady in a tragic marriage and the other a generous down-to-earth woman who had also been cut down early by poor health.
Really, given her short life span, I expected to outlive my grandmother, and I'm awfully glad that I have, given that I still have a passel of children to raise, as well.
I often wonder what she thought of as those months of illness encroached on and overcame her. I hope she was able to hang around, unseen, to continue to love and guide her young ones. I hope they could feel her love, sense her near, take comfort. But there is so little to know about that.
Only a two handfuls of photographs were taken of Lizzie in her lifetime. Her wedding portrait, 103 years old, hangs in my bedroom. In this, as in most of her other photographs, her gaze is steady, her expression somewhat serious. She does not look dour or stern. She is just being herself, not saying cheese for the camera. My mother always told me that I have her gray eyes, but when I look at the eyes in her photographs, I can't read them.
I wish I had known her. I wish I could read her expression, know what she thought, or thinks. Never knowing one's maternal grandmother is not usually any kind of a blessing (a near-curse that most of my own children share).
My own mother only knew her as a small child can know a parent--as a nurturer, a soft blankie, giver of food and hander-down of rules. My own five-year-old could hardly write an essay on my personality, thoughts, and experiences, I'm sure.
It seems that the things I know about my grandmother, Elizabeth, are things to admire--and traits I unfortunately do not share. She won prizes for her gardens, while plants coming under my care have been handed an undeserved death sentence. She shared such a close bond with her husband that the one time they mildly disagreed, my mother was shocked. I love my husband, but we have disagreed more than once. She was tall and trim. I am short and lost my waist the second I conceived my first child. Her children were unfailingly polite and loyal to each other. Mine boss and police each other. She wore long dresses every day of her life. I am in my nightgown by the time I've been home 90 seconds. She was an excellent seamstress and cook. I haven't had access to a sewing machine until my last birthday, and my husband likes to do almost all the cooking. Her small house was always clean. My children toss their empty cups onto the floor. At least, my baby does. She was ever industrious, raising her large family, tending her large yard, and helping with her small farm. I am often lazy and can't even imagine dealing with chickens.
My only hope is that I am comparing her best to my worst. I have heard that she was unfailingly faithful, and stuck to her beliefs and principles despite the worst trials. I try to be like that. She has also been described as "a progressive woman" who drove a car when most women didn't and would go around the neighborhood picking up other women to take them to meetings. I would like to think I got a little of that from her, too.
But I am painfully aware that outliving her is a small accomplishment--done by default, mainly. She easily "outlived" me in many areas. What is the length of a life compared to the depth and breadth of it? Though she left her children motherless at vulnerable ages, she achieved remarkable success with them. Each grew to be a great, good person, a hard worker, a valuable contributor to society. She left a legacy of faith, honor, diligence, and production that I cannot match.
So this is my work: to live for the time I have left as well and as importantly as she did. To cultivate the kind of work ethic, kindness, beauty, truth, family success, and grit that live on in her long absence from the world, because what I can hold over her is nothing compared to what she holds over me.
She was a few days younger than I when she tragically died from an infection in the lining of her heart. Probably, a round of antibiotics would have cured her without a second thought. But this was before antibiotics. It was thirty years before I was even born. My mother was five. Instead, my grandmother spent a couple of years getting weaker and aging horrifically. In the last picture taken of her, she looks to be eighty--more than thirty years older than she really was.
Lying alone in a bedroom, she worsened and died, leaving eight children.
I realized a little while ago that she would have been surprised to be thought of as "Grandma." She wasn't anyone's grandma in her lifetime. (Neither am I yet.) None of her children was married. She had two grown daughters, ages 24 and 22, still living at home; a son, just turned 20, who was kicking around the idea of going on a church mission--mostly kicking it away, I think, until his mother actually died and he decided to do as she wished; another son who was almost 16; a daughter at the tricky age of thirteen-and-a-half; an eleven-year-old boy who would grow up to be tops in the field of endocrinology; and two little girls, eight and five.
She was just Lizzie, named Elizabeth for both of her pioneer grandmothers--one a black-silk-wearing elegant lady in a tragic marriage and the other a generous down-to-earth woman who had also been cut down early by poor health.
Really, given her short life span, I expected to outlive my grandmother, and I'm awfully glad that I have, given that I still have a passel of children to raise, as well.
I often wonder what she thought of as those months of illness encroached on and overcame her. I hope she was able to hang around, unseen, to continue to love and guide her young ones. I hope they could feel her love, sense her near, take comfort. But there is so little to know about that.
Only a two handfuls of photographs were taken of Lizzie in her lifetime. Her wedding portrait, 103 years old, hangs in my bedroom. In this, as in most of her other photographs, her gaze is steady, her expression somewhat serious. She does not look dour or stern. She is just being herself, not saying cheese for the camera. My mother always told me that I have her gray eyes, but when I look at the eyes in her photographs, I can't read them.
I wish I had known her. I wish I could read her expression, know what she thought, or thinks. Never knowing one's maternal grandmother is not usually any kind of a blessing (a near-curse that most of my own children share).
My own mother only knew her as a small child can know a parent--as a nurturer, a soft blankie, giver of food and hander-down of rules. My own five-year-old could hardly write an essay on my personality, thoughts, and experiences, I'm sure.
It seems that the things I know about my grandmother, Elizabeth, are things to admire--and traits I unfortunately do not share. She won prizes for her gardens, while plants coming under my care have been handed an undeserved death sentence. She shared such a close bond with her husband that the one time they mildly disagreed, my mother was shocked. I love my husband, but we have disagreed more than once. She was tall and trim. I am short and lost my waist the second I conceived my first child. Her children were unfailingly polite and loyal to each other. Mine boss and police each other. She wore long dresses every day of her life. I am in my nightgown by the time I've been home 90 seconds. She was an excellent seamstress and cook. I haven't had access to a sewing machine until my last birthday, and my husband likes to do almost all the cooking. Her small house was always clean. My children toss their empty cups onto the floor. At least, my baby does. She was ever industrious, raising her large family, tending her large yard, and helping with her small farm. I am often lazy and can't even imagine dealing with chickens.
My only hope is that I am comparing her best to my worst. I have heard that she was unfailingly faithful, and stuck to her beliefs and principles despite the worst trials. I try to be like that. She has also been described as "a progressive woman" who drove a car when most women didn't and would go around the neighborhood picking up other women to take them to meetings. I would like to think I got a little of that from her, too.
But I am painfully aware that outliving her is a small accomplishment--done by default, mainly. She easily "outlived" me in many areas. What is the length of a life compared to the depth and breadth of it? Though she left her children motherless at vulnerable ages, she achieved remarkable success with them. Each grew to be a great, good person, a hard worker, a valuable contributor to society. She left a legacy of faith, honor, diligence, and production that I cannot match.
So this is my work: to live for the time I have left as well and as importantly as she did. To cultivate the kind of work ethic, kindness, beauty, truth, family success, and grit that live on in her long absence from the world, because what I can hold over her is nothing compared to what she holds over me.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Finally, Mitchell Exposed
So. Today, after seven years, the authorities involved finally said what I (and many others) could have told them from day one.
Brian David Mitchell can stand trial.
What Mitchell can't stand is: getting caught. Not being in control. Not being right. Not having a precious little girl to abuse. Not being worshiped. Being normal.
To which I say, too bad, who cares?
If Mitchell really believed he was a prophet sent by God to gather up sweet things as plural wives, he would have knocked on the front door and talked to Ms. Smart's father.
If Mitchell were really not responsible for his actions, he wouldn't have covered them.
If Mitchell were really unable to help with his own defense, he wouldn't be trying to help with it by disrupting court, which is his best idea for getting himself off the hook.
Mitchell is transparent to me. Without meaning to, while trying to pull the wool over people's eyes, he has left clues to his real self all along.
Don't ask me how I got experience reading social misfits, but trust me. The biggest expert on what he did and who he is, what he wants, what he's pulling--even what he really believes, already testified before leaving on her mission.
Brian David Mitchell can stand trial.
What Mitchell can't stand is: getting caught. Not being in control. Not being right. Not having a precious little girl to abuse. Not being worshiped. Being normal.
To which I say, too bad, who cares?
If Mitchell really believed he was a prophet sent by God to gather up sweet things as plural wives, he would have knocked on the front door and talked to Ms. Smart's father.
If Mitchell were really not responsible for his actions, he wouldn't have covered them.
If Mitchell were really unable to help with his own defense, he wouldn't be trying to help with it by disrupting court, which is his best idea for getting himself off the hook.
Mitchell is transparent to me. Without meaning to, while trying to pull the wool over people's eyes, he has left clues to his real self all along.
Don't ask me how I got experience reading social misfits, but trust me. The biggest expert on what he did and who he is, what he wants, what he's pulling--even what he really believes, already testified before leaving on her mission.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
I'll Take One of Those with a Side of Effort
I hate eating oranges.
I'm not saying that I hate oranges. Especially when the millions of tiny liquid balloons in each section are filled to nearly bursting with sweet-enough juice, and you feel your health soar just from getting some of that squirting into your mouth. But they are such a pain to eat that I rarely do. Even my Christmas orange--which should go into my stomach ahead of all the chocolate accompanying it in my stocking, if there is a mother's voice (Mom's or mine) anywhere in my head--sometimes gets overlooked until it rots.
I only have four things against oranges. You have to peel them. The skin is often so tough that a thumbnail gets pulled away from the skin enough to hurt for a couple of days and need to be band-aided back together tightly like a fresh tree grafting. They are surrounded by tough fiber, which, I know, is good for me. But still. And they are messy. I can never eat oranges without completely soaking my hands, and maybe my desk, because--let's face it--a paper towel is no protection from an orange. Often, they have seeds, which is a trial all its own.
Despite all of these very good, very true arguments, three days in a row this past week, I chose to eat an orange before eating anything else that day. (Did you note that, angels? That should make up for the past three Christmases.)
A health problem keeping me from working out in all ways but one (walking) for the past five months has made me lose a lot of ground, fitness-wise. (And made me gain a lot in another way that I really don't want to mention.) The past few weeks as I've worked to reclimb the fitness mountain I have been sliding down, I've made endurance and strength gains, but I haven't made progress in terms of the thing I don't want to mention.
I'm finally at the point where I can face the fact that I need to eat less, and smarter. And that food should be harder to eat than it is. Over the past eight weeks, I've busted my buttons to work up what I can burn off on an elliptical to 450 calories a day--still half of what I used to burn before I popped an artery. Yet, give me a frosted sweet roll, and I can easily down 450 calories in five minutes, with hardly any effort at all!
The easier something is to eat, the more likely we will reach for it. These days, an American can easily fill up every day without ever getting out a mixing bowl or turning on a stove.
A hundred years ago, you might eat a treat, but you would most likely first have to prepare it. Which didn't mean tearing open a box, adding water, and baking. It could have involved measuring out each single ingredient. Maybe even preparing the ingredients separately before adding them. Maybe even growing, grinding, shelling, churning, paring, chopping, hunting, gutting, plucking, picking, or kneading it. I finally realized more fully that nature intended us to burn a few calories before we can shovel any in.
This principle is not at all subtly illustrated by the movie WALL-E, where people spend their whole lives sitting down and shoveling in calories in the easiest way possible--drinking something that is all ready to drink. I know from experience that nothing flows down the throat more easily than a hot chocolate loaded with whipped cream. In this futuristic film, food has been processed to the point that it is completely unrecognizable and not dealt with by human hands, and humans have evolved to a huge water balloon shape and size and barely possess any bones anymore. Sad but true commentary, I find.
So, until we ran out of oranges at home, I peeled back my orange skins, dug through tough membranes with my fingernails to release seeds, soiled my fingers and desk, and chewed my way through more orange sections than I really wanted, to begin my feeding each day. Then stood up, walked to the sink, and washed off my hands, tasting orange juice in my mouth and feeling healthier already.
I'm not saying that I hate oranges. Especially when the millions of tiny liquid balloons in each section are filled to nearly bursting with sweet-enough juice, and you feel your health soar just from getting some of that squirting into your mouth. But they are such a pain to eat that I rarely do. Even my Christmas orange--which should go into my stomach ahead of all the chocolate accompanying it in my stocking, if there is a mother's voice (Mom's or mine) anywhere in my head--sometimes gets overlooked until it rots.
I only have four things against oranges. You have to peel them. The skin is often so tough that a thumbnail gets pulled away from the skin enough to hurt for a couple of days and need to be band-aided back together tightly like a fresh tree grafting. They are surrounded by tough fiber, which, I know, is good for me. But still. And they are messy. I can never eat oranges without completely soaking my hands, and maybe my desk, because--let's face it--a paper towel is no protection from an orange. Often, they have seeds, which is a trial all its own.
Despite all of these very good, very true arguments, three days in a row this past week, I chose to eat an orange before eating anything else that day. (Did you note that, angels? That should make up for the past three Christmases.)
A health problem keeping me from working out in all ways but one (walking) for the past five months has made me lose a lot of ground, fitness-wise. (And made me gain a lot in another way that I really don't want to mention.) The past few weeks as I've worked to reclimb the fitness mountain I have been sliding down, I've made endurance and strength gains, but I haven't made progress in terms of the thing I don't want to mention.
I'm finally at the point where I can face the fact that I need to eat less, and smarter. And that food should be harder to eat than it is. Over the past eight weeks, I've busted my buttons to work up what I can burn off on an elliptical to 450 calories a day--still half of what I used to burn before I popped an artery. Yet, give me a frosted sweet roll, and I can easily down 450 calories in five minutes, with hardly any effort at all!
The easier something is to eat, the more likely we will reach for it. These days, an American can easily fill up every day without ever getting out a mixing bowl or turning on a stove.
A hundred years ago, you might eat a treat, but you would most likely first have to prepare it. Which didn't mean tearing open a box, adding water, and baking. It could have involved measuring out each single ingredient. Maybe even preparing the ingredients separately before adding them. Maybe even growing, grinding, shelling, churning, paring, chopping, hunting, gutting, plucking, picking, or kneading it. I finally realized more fully that nature intended us to burn a few calories before we can shovel any in.
This principle is not at all subtly illustrated by the movie WALL-E, where people spend their whole lives sitting down and shoveling in calories in the easiest way possible--drinking something that is all ready to drink. I know from experience that nothing flows down the throat more easily than a hot chocolate loaded with whipped cream. In this futuristic film, food has been processed to the point that it is completely unrecognizable and not dealt with by human hands, and humans have evolved to a huge water balloon shape and size and barely possess any bones anymore. Sad but true commentary, I find.
So, until we ran out of oranges at home, I peeled back my orange skins, dug through tough membranes with my fingernails to release seeds, soiled my fingers and desk, and chewed my way through more orange sections than I really wanted, to begin my feeding each day. Then stood up, walked to the sink, and washed off my hands, tasting orange juice in my mouth and feeling healthier already.
Friday, February 19, 2010
The Picture Emerges
Recently, I rediscovered counted cross-stitching. My family stared in amazement as I began to bring a picture to life on a plain burlap canvas. It's not their fault they couldn't believe it--I haven't done counted cross-stitching for twenty years, and everything I did in the past, I gave away as presents. It's amazing how twenty years can go by like that.
Anyway, my artistic nine-year-old was most interested. Shyly, he sidled up to my bed as I drew my pattern and asked if I were going to sew right on the paper. I explained that it was just a pattern to follow when I actually sewed onto material.
He didn't get it.
When I did start stitching the words, he was back, interested in every step and encouraging me every fifteen minutes. "That's really starting to come together," he said thirty times over the course of the work.
Because of his curiosity, I showed him how I made the X's, how I always did the upper left to lower right stitch first, then the upper right to lower left stitch over it, to make it look uniform. He could see on his own that using slightly different shades deepened the realism of the flowers and how outlining them made them pop.
He stayed interested over the four weeks it took to complete the picture, asking what color I was doing next, and what color I was going to outline the yellow with. I modified what I'd heard is a carpenter's motto: measure twice, cut once, to count twice, stitch once.
Despite this, he got to watch me unpick my work several times.
"See?" I'd show him. "I was supposed to start this row here. But I got mixed up."
"That's a lot of counting," he commiserated.
As I worked over the hundreds of individual stitches, trying to do each one correctly, I found myself talking to my son about how each stitch is like each action in life. One stitch doesn't seem like much in the big picture, but for the end result to come out right, each needs to be done correctly. If I start doing some of it wrong, I could mess up a whole part of the picture.
I thought about how all the tiny actions of each day--washing the same kitchen counter over and over, folding the same clothes into the same drawers, reaching out a hand to take the sacrament each week, flossing your teeth--all contribute to a life well lived. When small things are taken care of, bigger things fall into place.
I talked to him about that being like repentance: you have to undo what you did wrong and try to do it right from then on. If you don't correct as you go along, bigger parts of your life could turn out wrong, or off, or not the same as they would have.
Then I thought about the pattern being like the scriptures and other gospel teachings. You are supposed to look at it in order to know what to do. If you don't look at it carefully and correctly, you find you're off on the wrong thing or in the wrong way. You could miss the boat, so to speak.
Often, when I am carefully following the pattern, the stitches I am making don't look right to me. Surely doing that curve way up there will make the "e" look funny, and I think I should be making stitches a row lower, or in some way different than the pattern. I just can't see how following the pattern is going to make things turn out right.
But when I'm done, it does look right, and I marvel at how fallible my own unaided eyes are, how silly my finished picture would look if I just used my own judgment and didn't trust the pattern.
That's how I know that doing things the scriptures teach us that seem counter-intuitive--like turning the other cheek, forgiving an enemy, keeping a commandment in a sticky situation--actually result in a better life picture than anything we could have done, simply looking at a blank canvas, on our own, and doing what seems best at the time.
Anyway, my artistic nine-year-old was most interested. Shyly, he sidled up to my bed as I drew my pattern and asked if I were going to sew right on the paper. I explained that it was just a pattern to follow when I actually sewed onto material.
He didn't get it.
When I did start stitching the words, he was back, interested in every step and encouraging me every fifteen minutes. "That's really starting to come together," he said thirty times over the course of the work.
Because of his curiosity, I showed him how I made the X's, how I always did the upper left to lower right stitch first, then the upper right to lower left stitch over it, to make it look uniform. He could see on his own that using slightly different shades deepened the realism of the flowers and how outlining them made them pop.
He stayed interested over the four weeks it took to complete the picture, asking what color I was doing next, and what color I was going to outline the yellow with. I modified what I'd heard is a carpenter's motto: measure twice, cut once, to count twice, stitch once.
Despite this, he got to watch me unpick my work several times.
"See?" I'd show him. "I was supposed to start this row here. But I got mixed up."
"That's a lot of counting," he commiserated.
As I worked over the hundreds of individual stitches, trying to do each one correctly, I found myself talking to my son about how each stitch is like each action in life. One stitch doesn't seem like much in the big picture, but for the end result to come out right, each needs to be done correctly. If I start doing some of it wrong, I could mess up a whole part of the picture.
I thought about how all the tiny actions of each day--washing the same kitchen counter over and over, folding the same clothes into the same drawers, reaching out a hand to take the sacrament each week, flossing your teeth--all contribute to a life well lived. When small things are taken care of, bigger things fall into place.
I talked to him about that being like repentance: you have to undo what you did wrong and try to do it right from then on. If you don't correct as you go along, bigger parts of your life could turn out wrong, or off, or not the same as they would have.
Then I thought about the pattern being like the scriptures and other gospel teachings. You are supposed to look at it in order to know what to do. If you don't look at it carefully and correctly, you find you're off on the wrong thing or in the wrong way. You could miss the boat, so to speak.
Often, when I am carefully following the pattern, the stitches I am making don't look right to me. Surely doing that curve way up there will make the "e" look funny, and I think I should be making stitches a row lower, or in some way different than the pattern. I just can't see how following the pattern is going to make things turn out right.
But when I'm done, it does look right, and I marvel at how fallible my own unaided eyes are, how silly my finished picture would look if I just used my own judgment and didn't trust the pattern.
That's how I know that doing things the scriptures teach us that seem counter-intuitive--like turning the other cheek, forgiving an enemy, keeping a commandment in a sticky situation--actually result in a better life picture than anything we could have done, simply looking at a blank canvas, on our own, and doing what seems best at the time.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Fun (or not) at the Gym
At the gym, I am the middle-aged woman wearing the frumpy maternity clothes that (thank goodness) don't fit me anymore.
I have some real workout clothes, but those don't fit me anymore, either. (Different reason.)
But I do stay within my own space.
I will never put my foot up practically on your machine in order to stretch, or show you my gym shoes, or whatever it is that those people who do that are doing.
I will never snort out into the air every 26 seconds whatever bits of moisture have accumulated in my left nostril. (I was impressed with her--she was running 8 miles per hour. But I was glad I was on the machine to her right.)
I do not unpack a suitcase and two carry-ons onto one of the too-few treadmills at peak time and then go off to do who knows what for a half hour. By the way, I am glad we are finally done with the first couple of weeks in January when the parking lot and machines are filled by 5:00 a.m. with pretenders.
I will not assault your eyes by wearing a muscle shirt that would only fit me if I were eight feet tall. And I will not wear the same green muscle shirt that there can only be one of in the whole world every day in a row.
I will not lift weights too heavy for me, causing me to grunt, scream, or yelp, then throw the weights onto the ground. I do not want attention this much. In fact, at the gym, I don't want any attention at all. I cannot tell you how tempted I am to give the guys who do this some of the attention they crave. Only, my version would be to say, "You know, they make those weights adjustable so that you can lift only what you can handle."
I will not wear so little that I reveal ugly tattoos. Mostly because I don't have any. My flesh is failing to be beautiful fast enough on its own, thank you.
And I will not talk your ear off, whether or not you have an iPod.
I will not sing.
I am far too busy doing fractions in my head, figuring percentages, calculating how many calories I will be burning that day, and/or noticing each one of my children's birthdates and birth times go by on the clock. I may be weird in my own special way, but I will not bother you.
I will also not throw open the shower curtain on you when it is already closed. Somebody actually did that to me one time, and then I had to spend ten minutes apologizing to her, because, while asking her what she was doing, I said a bad word. Not a really bad word, just a mildly bad word, but still one I never say. Outside my head. Unless I'm discussing the afterlife.
The worst moment I had at the gym, though, I brought on myself.
At my gym, the showers are in the innermost recesses of a labyrinth, about a mile from the front (and only) door. One day, I must have been feeling pretty invincible after completing my 900 calories in record time or something, because after peeling off my sopping wet shirt, sports bra, socks, and pants, I grabbed my razor by the blades.
Far from invincible, I was spurting blood from the twin blade cuts on my fingers.
The bleeding was bad. Really bad. I held my fingers tightly with my other hand, hoping and praying that the bleeding would slow down and stop so I could shower and dress. There was to be no solution ahead of that, because I was a) completely naked and b) stinking like an aviary, and I could not just walk back out to the front desk to ask for a Band-Aid.
No, I had not brought my own Band-Aids. Good idea, though.
Which brings me to my list of the worst things to be without at the gym, assuming you came dressed for the gym and have to be dressed for work when leaving, like me. Just over a year ago, the gym around the corner from my house closed down. This was the first direct effect of the faltering economy on my life. My husband and I had had our own private economic crisis a couple of years before. We're such trend-setters.
So, I started going to a gym halfway between home and work, requiring me to pack up enough to get ready for work afterward. From personal experience, these are the fourteen worst things to forget to take to the gym:
14. Scrubbie. Not really a problem--just use your hands.
13. Razor. Just skip a day.
12. Band-Aid. See above.
11. Soap or shampoo. You can use the soap at the gym. When they have it. If you want to smell like a man, that is. If they don't supply any soap and you didn't bring any either, this moves to, oh, I'd say, number one.
10. Socks. No problem. Stop at Smith's on the way to work and buy some more. I bought a three-pack and stashed two of the pairs at work, so I'm all set now for the next two times.
9. Makeup. This would depend on how addicted you are to wearing it and how bad your complexion is that day. It might be a go-home-and-get-it thing.
8. Mousse and/or gel. I have never forgotten mousse or gel. Interesting, that.
7. Comb or brush. Not having a comb makes for a creative hairstyle, or part, at least. I can use my round brush for combing, but not for parting. If I forget my round brush, I can sort of use my comb to style my hair while drying it. Actually, not so much.
6. Blow dryer. My daughter and I used to share a blow dryer during the week, and there were times when she forgot to put it back in my gym bag after using it on a week night. When it broke down (probably from the stress), my husband and I both accidentally bought a new one, so now I have my own, and it stays in my gym bag. But when I did find myself without one, I turned up the nozzle on the hand dryer and dried my hair that way. It gave it kind of a funny Pippy Longstocking type of curl, but it got my hair dry.
5. Bra. No problem--except that you have to go home and get it and be late. No question there. Except for the day that, with the outfit I had on, I honestly couldn't tell as I scrutinized myself in the mirror while drying my hair. And I knew no client would see me that day. I would be holed up in my office by myself, anyway. Don't think too much about what I just said.
4. Shoes. You have to go back home for these. Unless you brought boots or some other substitute. Which I never have.
3. Shirt. I used my jacket to get out of the gym with. Then I wore my work sweater, zipped up, during the day. Fortunately, it looked okay with the skirt I had on. How did I forget my shirt? I had grabbed the shorts that go with that shirt instead of the shirt itself. So, I had shorts and a skirt, but no shirt. I considered wearing the shorts on my top part, but that consideration was short-lived.
2. Underwear is a go-home-and-get-it-and-be-late thing. Although someone at the gym told me she made her husband bring it to her at the gym. My husband and I don't have that kind of time.
1. Based on my experience, the number one worst thing to not have at the gym is: a towel. At my gym, there are no paper towels, so you can't even improvise. There's only one of those hand blower things, and it's down the hall and around the corner--approximately a block--from the showers. So there's no way I'm going to run down there and try to dry off in front of that. Maybe if I didn't have a seven-baby belly, I wouldn't be so modest, but, nah. Standing in the shower dripping wet, you have to do some really creative thinking when you find you have no towel if you ever want to get from there to dressed and walking past the dozens of people between you and the door. Twice, I used my coat because my workout clothes were soaked with sweat. Last time, I had only walked, so my pants were not soaked. I used them. But, believe me, toweling off with workout clothing is far from satisfactory, and I don't recommend it.
I have some real workout clothes, but those don't fit me anymore, either. (Different reason.)
But I do stay within my own space.
I will never put my foot up practically on your machine in order to stretch, or show you my gym shoes, or whatever it is that those people who do that are doing.
I will never snort out into the air every 26 seconds whatever bits of moisture have accumulated in my left nostril. (I was impressed with her--she was running 8 miles per hour. But I was glad I was on the machine to her right.)
I do not unpack a suitcase and two carry-ons onto one of the too-few treadmills at peak time and then go off to do who knows what for a half hour. By the way, I am glad we are finally done with the first couple of weeks in January when the parking lot and machines are filled by 5:00 a.m. with pretenders.
I will not assault your eyes by wearing a muscle shirt that would only fit me if I were eight feet tall. And I will not wear the same green muscle shirt that there can only be one of in the whole world every day in a row.
I will not lift weights too heavy for me, causing me to grunt, scream, or yelp, then throw the weights onto the ground. I do not want attention this much. In fact, at the gym, I don't want any attention at all. I cannot tell you how tempted I am to give the guys who do this some of the attention they crave. Only, my version would be to say, "You know, they make those weights adjustable so that you can lift only what you can handle."
I will not wear so little that I reveal ugly tattoos. Mostly because I don't have any. My flesh is failing to be beautiful fast enough on its own, thank you.
And I will not talk your ear off, whether or not you have an iPod.
I will not sing.
I am far too busy doing fractions in my head, figuring percentages, calculating how many calories I will be burning that day, and/or noticing each one of my children's birthdates and birth times go by on the clock. I may be weird in my own special way, but I will not bother you.
I will also not throw open the shower curtain on you when it is already closed. Somebody actually did that to me one time, and then I had to spend ten minutes apologizing to her, because, while asking her what she was doing, I said a bad word. Not a really bad word, just a mildly bad word, but still one I never say. Outside my head. Unless I'm discussing the afterlife.
The worst moment I had at the gym, though, I brought on myself.
At my gym, the showers are in the innermost recesses of a labyrinth, about a mile from the front (and only) door. One day, I must have been feeling pretty invincible after completing my 900 calories in record time or something, because after peeling off my sopping wet shirt, sports bra, socks, and pants, I grabbed my razor by the blades.
Far from invincible, I was spurting blood from the twin blade cuts on my fingers.
The bleeding was bad. Really bad. I held my fingers tightly with my other hand, hoping and praying that the bleeding would slow down and stop so I could shower and dress. There was to be no solution ahead of that, because I was a) completely naked and b) stinking like an aviary, and I could not just walk back out to the front desk to ask for a Band-Aid.
No, I had not brought my own Band-Aids. Good idea, though.
Which brings me to my list of the worst things to be without at the gym, assuming you came dressed for the gym and have to be dressed for work when leaving, like me. Just over a year ago, the gym around the corner from my house closed down. This was the first direct effect of the faltering economy on my life. My husband and I had had our own private economic crisis a couple of years before. We're such trend-setters.
So, I started going to a gym halfway between home and work, requiring me to pack up enough to get ready for work afterward. From personal experience, these are the fourteen worst things to forget to take to the gym:
14. Scrubbie. Not really a problem--just use your hands.
13. Razor. Just skip a day.
12. Band-Aid. See above.
11. Soap or shampoo. You can use the soap at the gym. When they have it. If you want to smell like a man, that is. If they don't supply any soap and you didn't bring any either, this moves to, oh, I'd say, number one.
10. Socks. No problem. Stop at Smith's on the way to work and buy some more. I bought a three-pack and stashed two of the pairs at work, so I'm all set now for the next two times.
9. Makeup. This would depend on how addicted you are to wearing it and how bad your complexion is that day. It might be a go-home-and-get-it thing.
8. Mousse and/or gel. I have never forgotten mousse or gel. Interesting, that.
7. Comb or brush. Not having a comb makes for a creative hairstyle, or part, at least. I can use my round brush for combing, but not for parting. If I forget my round brush, I can sort of use my comb to style my hair while drying it. Actually, not so much.
6. Blow dryer. My daughter and I used to share a blow dryer during the week, and there were times when she forgot to put it back in my gym bag after using it on a week night. When it broke down (probably from the stress), my husband and I both accidentally bought a new one, so now I have my own, and it stays in my gym bag. But when I did find myself without one, I turned up the nozzle on the hand dryer and dried my hair that way. It gave it kind of a funny Pippy Longstocking type of curl, but it got my hair dry.
5. Bra. No problem--except that you have to go home and get it and be late. No question there. Except for the day that, with the outfit I had on, I honestly couldn't tell as I scrutinized myself in the mirror while drying my hair. And I knew no client would see me that day. I would be holed up in my office by myself, anyway. Don't think too much about what I just said.
4. Shoes. You have to go back home for these. Unless you brought boots or some other substitute. Which I never have.
3. Shirt. I used my jacket to get out of the gym with. Then I wore my work sweater, zipped up, during the day. Fortunately, it looked okay with the skirt I had on. How did I forget my shirt? I had grabbed the shorts that go with that shirt instead of the shirt itself. So, I had shorts and a skirt, but no shirt. I considered wearing the shorts on my top part, but that consideration was short-lived.
2. Underwear is a go-home-and-get-it-and-be-late thing. Although someone at the gym told me she made her husband bring it to her at the gym. My husband and I don't have that kind of time.
1. Based on my experience, the number one worst thing to not have at the gym is: a towel. At my gym, there are no paper towels, so you can't even improvise. There's only one of those hand blower things, and it's down the hall and around the corner--approximately a block--from the showers. So there's no way I'm going to run down there and try to dry off in front of that. Maybe if I didn't have a seven-baby belly, I wouldn't be so modest, but, nah. Standing in the shower dripping wet, you have to do some really creative thinking when you find you have no towel if you ever want to get from there to dressed and walking past the dozens of people between you and the door. Twice, I used my coat because my workout clothes were soaked with sweat. Last time, I had only walked, so my pants were not soaked. I used them. But, believe me, toweling off with workout clothing is far from satisfactory, and I don't recommend it.
Friday, January 15, 2010
I Hear a Song Coming On. . .
At my suggestion, my son gave us a set of new cordless phones for Christmas. Half of the number segments on our old phone's LCD screen had burned out, so you couldn't tell who was calling on the caller ID, and you certainly couldn't get people's numbers and call them back. Our area code looked like 571, which would be Virginia, where we know no one, so we couldn't even tell if it was a local number. There were a lot of static and interference on the old phone, too. I could somehow hear my toddler in his high chair echoing through the phone better than I could hear the caller.
I like the new phones. Really. Even though the sexy disembodied voice that came with the phone set to announce who is calling doesn't know how to pronounce anyone's name, and her guesses are not even close. The replacement was very much needed.
The thing i didn't know at first is that the new phones don't ring. They play a song. It's not a tune I recognize, so I can't sing along.
This seems to be the new way of the world. No longer do we have buzzers, bells, and beeps, we hear songs. My cell phone plays a song when it rings. My new home phone plays a song when it rings. Even my new dryer plays a song.
The problem is keeping all these songs straight. I don't know words to any of the tunes, or that might help.
The beeps, rings, and buzzes of yesteryear, I would recognize immediately. When you're simply minding your own business and a song starts playing in your vicinity, it can be slightly disorienting.
Imagine. Last night while I was in bed, my dryer was running and I was expecting a call on my home phone, when my cell phone started ringing.
I sat up, stupidly thinking, "I hear music." I jumped out of bed, trying through my sleepiness to analyze the tune I was hearing. It didn't sound like my dryer. It was a minute before I a) realized through the process of elimination that it must be my cell phone, and b) found my cell phone.
I suppose I should try to get used to the idea that inanimate objects all around me will randomly start singing at me. And pray that there's never a time in my future life when every gadget I own is programmed to play the same tune.
I like the new phones. Really. Even though the sexy disembodied voice that came with the phone set to announce who is calling doesn't know how to pronounce anyone's name, and her guesses are not even close. The replacement was very much needed.
The thing i didn't know at first is that the new phones don't ring. They play a song. It's not a tune I recognize, so I can't sing along.
This seems to be the new way of the world. No longer do we have buzzers, bells, and beeps, we hear songs. My cell phone plays a song when it rings. My new home phone plays a song when it rings. Even my new dryer plays a song.
The problem is keeping all these songs straight. I don't know words to any of the tunes, or that might help.
The beeps, rings, and buzzes of yesteryear, I would recognize immediately. When you're simply minding your own business and a song starts playing in your vicinity, it can be slightly disorienting.
Imagine. Last night while I was in bed, my dryer was running and I was expecting a call on my home phone, when my cell phone started ringing.
I sat up, stupidly thinking, "I hear music." I jumped out of bed, trying through my sleepiness to analyze the tune I was hearing. It didn't sound like my dryer. It was a minute before I a) realized through the process of elimination that it must be my cell phone, and b) found my cell phone.
I suppose I should try to get used to the idea that inanimate objects all around me will randomly start singing at me. And pray that there's never a time in my future life when every gadget I own is programmed to play the same tune.
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