Advice

If I were to make a list of things that make me nuts (beyond the misuse of the phrase “a whole nother”, the overuse of the air quotes, shoes just generally, and the word moist) two of the things that happened to me this evening would SURELY make the list. (Let’s be honest, my list is *way* longer than just those four things. But for the purposes of tonight’s short rant, I feel pretty comfortable ranking those as the four worthy of mentioning here.)

Tonight I was hit by the following: The drive-by facebook chat request* with someone you hardly know… AND (double whammy) unsolicited advice. And when said unsolicited (and wildly inappropriate) advice comes from said drive-by facebook chat request, well, it amplifies the irritation by about a billion-fold.

* You know what I’m talking about. When you’re sitting there, minding your own business, and someone you hardly know chimes in and wants to chat with you suddenly like you’re long lost best friends, when in actuality you barely remember how you know one another and for sure don’t really give two shakes as to “how the family’s doing.” You know this happens to you. Half of you are probably engaged in one right now, even as you try to read this blog. Just close it already. I promise, it doesn’t end well.

Let me start by saying this: I’m fairly sure that most of the people reading this blog are friends of mine. As far as I know, there are not many random folks that have just stumbled onto the blog and are reading along not knowing who I am (but if you are out there, drop me a note. I’d love to hear from you!) The good thing for my friends reading this particular entry is that they know me. And how I react. And how I have the complete inability to keep my face from showing every emotion I’m having at the exact moment I’m having it. It makes for hilarity most of the time. Unless of course, I’m trying to keep the others involved in the conversation clueless as to what I’m thinking. Then it just gets me into trouble. (A lot.)

Now given what I’ve just said above, it was a *damn* good thing that tonight’s atrocity was a drive-by facebook chat conversation filled with said unsolicited advice from a virtual stranger. Because I’m pretty sure, had we been in the same room with one another for this little gem, the puzzled, concerned, eyebrow-raising, pregnant pause (later, that will be a funny pun) connected to the blank stare of disbelief that I am POSTIVE flashed across my face would have been pretty telling. (Those who know me, know this face well. It’s the “Excuse me? Come again? What were you thinking right then when you just spoke?” face. My students know that one *for sure*.)

So there I was. Checking facebook. Getting ready to close up shop for the evening when someone that I had a friendly (not close, but friendly) working relationship with about 15 years ago chimes in with a hi. I shoulda just ignored it. But I threw caution to the wind and decided to respond. I was bored (and waiting for GLEE to come on). The conversation went a little something like this: (FB equals annoying facebook acquaintance. ME equals…well, me.)

FB: Hey, I saw your best friend last week. WOW is she pregnant.

(Note no nicety Hi-type intros here. Just right to the matter at hand.)

ME: Yes, yes, very pregnant. Due soon.

FB: How about you?

(Excuse me?)

ME: How about me…what?

FB: When are you gonna get pregnant? Or are you still off trying to find the right guy first?

(Why yes. I did in fact decide to go that route. Further. I’m sitting there staring at my facebook homepage…the one she has contacted me through..that has my status as “engaged” with J’s name next to it…and a big ol’ profile picture of me and J together.)

ME: Yeah, I’m pretty sure that I’ve found the right guy, being that I’m engaged and all.

(This is how close we are, by the way…so close she doesn’t know I’m engaged. Awesome.)

FB: Well, you gotta get on that. You need to get married quick!

(What, no congratulations?)

ME: Well, we’ll get married as soon as he gets back to the States. He’s “overseas” right now.

FB: Oh wow, that sucks for you.

ME: Yeah, it’s hard sometimes.

FB: No, I mean it sucks that you have to wait to get married. What about the babies?

(Blink…blink…blink…stunned silence….)

ME: What about the babies? Which babies are these?

FB: Well, the ones that you need to be having right now! You’re no spring chicken. You need to get pregnant soon or you won’t be able to anymore.

(Hole bitten through tongue from biting down to keep from saying extraordinarily mean things. Deep breath. Searching for appropriate response...)

ME: Yes, well, call me old-fashioned but we thought we might wait until we were married to do that whole kid thing.

FB: You know what your problem is? Your problem is that you waited too long to get married.

(I’m sorry did you say, my problem?)

FB: You’re gonna have to seriously get right on that baby making thing. You’re too old to wait very long to start having the babies.

(Start having the babies? The babies? Are you kidding me? Can’t I enjoy being engaged for just a hot second? And who does she think she is?!? Oh, by the way, insert HERE the incredulous face of “what were you just thinking right then?” of which I spoke above. And now you get my pregnant pause joke. I’m remarkably hilarious when being told how to live my life and that my baby-maker might not still be in working order.)

And then…as quickly as she’d popped into my evening, away she went. She drops “the babies” on me and then says “Ok, gotta go. Good luck getting pregnant!”

No congratulations. No enjoy your wedding/ life/ time with your fiancé. Nope. Just “good luck getting pregnant.” As if this is the sole purpose of our lives together: Not love. Not companionship. Not friendship. Not sharing the years with family. Nope. It’s "THE BABIES!" (in my head, that's ringing like the title of a horror movie in an over-produced movie trailer.)

I’m not sure which part of this bothered me the most. (I mean, clearly there are several things to choose from here.) I think that beyond it just being rude and insensitive, and WAY overstepping the boundaries of our relationship, it tapped one of those inner fears that you don’t talk about at parties. Yes. I’m getting older. And yes, if J and I want to have kids (which we do) we don’t have years and years to wait around for that. It’s not like this isn’t something that I think about…my age…having children (which will heretofore NEVER be referred to as the babies, by the way). But come on lady. Seriously. I’ve got other fish to fry at the moment. Give me a break.

It was another surreal moment in my life (does this happen to other people or am I just one of the lucky ones here?) I’m trying to come up with some sort of standard, witty retort when this subject comes up (should anyone ever again be so forward and so rude.) But for now, dear readers, just consider this posting a cautionary tale (what have you learned…?) : When the facebook chat with your ex-boyfriend-from-middle-school’s-new-wife's-kid-sister pops up on your screen…just turn off the computer, and go watch GLEE. Somehow, that storyline will seem much more plausible than the conversation about to ensue.

Home

47 weeks left
5 pounds lost (over last two weeks, including illness)
12 pounds total
40 pounds left
16(ish) months until the wedding

I am a traveler. Actually, that’s putting it mildly. For someone whose job is not actually travel related, I’m on the road a ridiculous amount of time. (Anecdotal fact: Last year, I was on the road exactly as many days as I was in my house. That’s right. 182 traveling and 183 home. So, not exactly…but close.) Now yes. Some is job related for sure. I’m doing conferences and giving papers, and sitting through workshops (wishing I was absolutely anywhere else on the entire planet while simultaneously proving on the corner of a Powerpoint handout that *clearly* I have missed my calling as a Cubist artist.) But I am also happy to say that more than half of my travel is merely due to the fact that I have amazing and glorious friends who mostly live inside of 3 hours from me. And they have lovely lives that I crash into every once in a while. And they have amazing children that I can be the “Cool Auntie” to (favorite.job.ever).

Oh, and have I mentioned that J and I are involved in a long distance relationship? (Really? Not sure I hammered that into the brain a hundred or so times. Let me be clear, there is *exactly* 5 hours and 25 minutes between the two of us. Except for now. When there is 7000 miles. I digress.) So yeah. I travel. A lot. (Confession: I actually have a suitcase half-packed all the time with my travel set of toiletries, sewing kit, travel blow dryer, all of it. So if I need to be out the door in 20 minutes or less, half my packing is done already. Yup. True story.)

This weekend J and I were both traveling, though clearly on very different levels. I sit on an Alumni Board of Directors for a education institution for whom I had a long standing working career.

J got sent “out there” somewhere to do some repairs on “some things” and get “some training.” (Clearly, my catered affairs in business suits at the Center Pres’s house equates to his work….very similar to J’s “work in the field”, obviously.)*

*Point of reference. I hate when people over use the quotation marks. Mostly because In my head, I can picture them making the air quotes, which is completely annoying and 70% of the time used incorrectly. However, I use them above because this is how J talks to me. I have no idea where he is…what he’s doing. He’s just “out there working in the field doing the thing.” Direct quote. Correct usage. No air quotes. I’m done.

For me, traveling to this Institution for Board meetings is like coming home. We’re kind of a big family. There are more hugs than handshakes. There are more late nights around a fire telling stories of yore (“back when I was here…”) with a glass of wine-in-hand than there are suits and reports and Robert’s Rules moments. The shared experience is what makes it home. Sharing a love of a place we all happily refer to as such. And this time was no different. (I hugged; I drank wine; I told stories of my glory days. Done, done annnnnnnnd done.)

It got me thinking though about the word home, and what that means. How can this place…a place of work where I come to do serious business, so readily and easily take the “home” slot? The place was of course, of huge, life-altering significance to us all, and clearly we share that passion and find it important enough to fly back biannually to the capital city of the honorable state of Nowhere to prove it. But those experiences were *a lot* of years ago for most of us. The trip is costly. It’s tiresome. It’s crazy busy. Why do we do it? I suspected it had something to do with the fact that we do all refer to it in some language as our home.

So of course, I had to look it up, this word “home.” Anyone who knows me knows that I’m a sucker for language and etymology and so of course I looked up the word in the dictionary. (Yes. The dictionary. The real one. The big book propping open the door to your laundry room. Pull it out and give it a read sometime. It’s riveting.) The good ol’ dictionary tells me that the word stems from the Old English for “village” and that other iterations of the same root at work in other languages have it coming to mean something that falls into the “domicile-family-inhabit” spectrum of words.

I like thinking about the word as having all those multiple meanings, because I think that’s most often how we (A-murh-i-kins) tend to use it. A domicile. A place to inhabit. A place of family. A place of safety. In a game of tag, or hide and seek, or fill-in-the-blank-child’s-game, we come to learn that being on Home Base means that nothing can touch you. You are unshakable. You can’t lose.

I feel that way when I return for Board meetings. Invincible. Strong. Safe. Unshakeable. And surrounded by family. This is why that place is home to me, and why I (and many of my colleagues, I would wager to bet) come back. To feel safe again.

Reflecting on J being “out there doing the things with the project with some people” suddenly made me wish he was home. And yes, of course clearly I’m always wishing he was *here* home (HOME-home that is). But right now, I just wish he was at his home post. Home base is where no one can touch you. You’re safe. (it’s right there in the rules of the game.) And there are people around him there that are comfortable. Friendly. Take care of one another. Just like the family living in a home should.

I long for that for J. ( I have officially decided that I don’t much care for it when he travels.) For me, I feel like I merely left one home (my domicile) and journeyed to another home (my extended family). Safe. Secure. Supported. J, I fear, isn’t in the same boat right now.(Of course, maybe he is. Maybe his "travel" is a 5 mile drive. I will never know.)

We missed each other’s phone call yesterday. This is disappointing. I got a text later in the afternoon. All it said was this: “I suspect you’re still traveling. Please be safe. Let me know when you’re home. I love you.”

Back at ya, J.

Seinfeld moments

From time to time, I’m gonna have something to say that is completely unrelated to anything. I’m random like that occasionally. This post has nothing to do with diets. Or weddings. Or being an Army spouse. This is just funny.

One of my best friends in the whole world (that I have had for (yikes!) almost 20 years now) and I swear that our lives could be an episode of Seinfeld (a really really long obscure one.) There are things that happen to us that I totally believe are either ONLY revealed to he and I (good things happen to good people?) or that we are merely the only people observant enough to appreciate their brand of absurd. Our favorite saying has always been “you just can’t make this stuff up.”

In this spirit, I offer you three vignettes from the last 72 hours as illustrative points.

* * * * * *

So as indicated in my last post, I did a little stint recently in the Emergency Room. I’m fine talking about it now(at the time, it was very scary and painful, but seeing as all the docs say I’m totally fine, I don’t mind letting you in on the drama at this point.) What I thought to be appendicitis at the time I stumbled into the emergency room, turned out to be a very large burst ovarian cyst. Relax friends. I’m completely fine. This is totally normal, and nothing to worry about (so said the doctors and many dollars worth of tests…and don’t think I haven’t WebMD’ed it to death as well and consulted with my nurse best friend. I’m good. Promise.) It’s just really painful when it happens (like…a kidney stone…or a kangaroo boxing with your baby-maker.)

At any rate, after many tests and some good morphine shots, they determined that I was completely healthy and could go home. Now, because I drove myself to the hospital (yeah yeah yeah…I know. Berate me later for that. The line forms behind J.) and because of aforementioned narcotics, driving myself home whilst on a controlled substance would have equaled a big fat felony for me, and an equally big fat lawsuit for the hospital. So they called me a cab before releasing me.

Now you would think that a cab company that’s contracted with a hospital would be a reputable organization. Nay.

First off, the guy pulls up in a white stranger-danger van. You know, big, unmarked, few windows, all tinted. Yeah, the ones we’re told not to get into as children. (I was waiting for him to offer me candy.) The conversation went a little something like this:

“So, why you gotta leave your car here? Did you get a DUI?”

“No.” (If I got a DUI, why would my car be there?)

“I can call a buddy…he’ll meet us here. Follow us. Drive your car home. I’ll only charge you double the cab fare.”

“No thanks.” (At this point, I’m not totally sure I want even HIM knowing where I live, let alone him and a buddy.) He then launches into a story about how he does this for many many drunk people who can’t drive their cars home and need a lift. He makes sure to include how nice they think this is and how well they consequently tip him. I assure him this is not the case.

“So seriously, what were ya’ in for if not DUI? They only ever call me for DUI’s.” (It’s important, dear readers, you understand that he wasn’t actually pronouncing each letter like D-U-I. He felt compelled to continue calling it a “Dewey” like that we were in a fraternity together. I thought perhaps that HE deserved said “Dewey.”)

“I had a cyst burst. There was a lot of pain. They gave me morphine, and so I can’t drive.”

“Wow! Good for you!”

(Excuse me?)

“That’s like your body saying “Screw you hospital!” Way to stick it to the man!!”

(Am I still high?)

“I mean, if they’d have had to go in there and remove that thing, in a surgery or something, it would have cost you tons of money and made big bucks for those doctors! Your body just did it the natural way. It might have really hurt and been potentially dangerous and all, but YOU said to hell with the system. Right on!”

Right on, indeed.

* * * * * *

After having been couch-ridden for the better part of the weekend, I realized that the laundry I had put off for quite awhile now had finally hit a somewhat critical point (i.e. no workout clothes left, dress slacks for work definitely all worn more than once, nothing to pack for my business trip this upcoming weekend…and yeah, down to the questionable unders.) And so I suited up yesterday and gathered my 5 (yes 5) loads of laundry for my local Laundromat. (Hear me now, believe me later: my next place of residence, I WILL have laundry IN my house.)

Now, I could just stop the story here, because anyone who does laundry at the Laundromat on a regular basis pretty much knows how this story ends. But in I walk, and there is a flurry of activity.Actaully, it was a flurry of one. One crazy looking lady, all kinds of frazzled. There were three other people there, arms crossed, brows furrowed, eyes rolling. This is not the scene you want when you walk into the Laundry.

“It’s no use,” one of the other patrons sighs disgustedly. “She’s using all of them.”

All of them? All 24 washers? Are you kidding me?

“I had a basement flood. I had to rush to save everything. I couldn’t let it ruin my summer patio furniture covers! There’s no sign that says I can’t do this!” she screamed defensively as she rushed to add softener to her loads.

Ok, first off. It’s patio furniture. It’s outside. It’s gonna get wet. Unless the basement flood was of sewage, or paint, or, I don’t know…Kool Aid possibly, I feel like the patio furniture covers are gonna make it. Second. Does there REALLY need to be a sign up somewhere that says “while other people are around, please refrain from using all 24 washers simultaneously for yourself?” I’m gonna go ahead and think that somewhere between manners and common sense, one would consider that an unwritten rule.

And not to be stereotypical, but she was EXACTLY the person you’re imagining in your head right now- the one you *really* don't want to be trapped with in a laundry: Downward slope of middle age, loud, a little stinky, and needing to leave every two minutes for a smoke ( I *really* wanted her name to be Mabel.) Two kids with her. Screaming. Totally running wild. And she just kept yelling at them (because obviously this is the best way to get them to respond.) Between yells, she was praising her 8 year old for helping fold (her name was Michelle. I know this, because she yelled her name about 600 times) and was screaming more at her 4ish year old boy for not helping (his name was Jonathan. And he was FOUR. You're supposed to crawl around on the floor playing under tables when you're four and bored. Right? What did she expect him to do? Help fold the sheets? Ridiculous.) And if I heard the phrase "wait until I tell your father how you've been acting!" once, I heard it a hundred times. It was a circus.

But what really became a circus is what I will heretofore refer to as the “2010 Running of the Dryers.”

When one of her loads came out of the 50 pound drum washer, I combined and threw in a couple of my loads just to get things started (nothing really got clean, by the way.) By the time this was done washing I knew I had to find a dryer before she could get all of her clothes into all of the dryers (there are fewer dryers in this laundry than washers. I’ll let someone else talk about why that math is wrong.) I walked around the Laundromat. I sized up her loads. Mine was going to beat her next load done…but only by about a minute. I had to act fast.

If ever is there is an Olympic sport created for laundry transfer, which includes moving carts, sliding over sorting tables, and leaping small children on the floor, whilst separating your delicates, you want me on your team. I’m gonna leave it at that. Let's just say this. That smug look upon my face? Yeah, I totally earned it.

* * * * * *

Ring ring ring ring. It’s J. I’m shopping at Walmart (don’t judge me.) It is well beyond the time of day he normally calls and, I realize it is the middle of the night where he is. Slightly flustered, not expecting a call at this hour, I dash into the closest, uninhabited aisle I can find so as to not be *that* guy (the annoying one that talks on his cell phone, loudly, in public, at the Walmart. You know who I’m talking about.)

“Hi baybay. Whatcha doing? Isn’t it the middle of the night there?”

“Yeah, I’m working hard. Doing stuff with the thing on the project.” (I’m not being vague, this is how J talks to me while on the international satellite telephone being monitored by half the world.) “What are you doing?”

“I’m in The Mart of Walls.” I pause to look around. “And remarkably, right now, I’m staring at a product called butt paste.”

Silence. Inhale of deep breath. Pregnant pause. And then more silence.

“Think the satellites listening to us right now can pick up on tasteless joke restraint?”

More silence.

“I love you.”