Total Perspective Vortex
What really happened to Trillian? Theories abound, but you can see what she's really been up to on this blog. If you're looking for white mice, depressed robots, or the occasional Pan Galactic Gargleblaster you might be better served here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/hitchhikers/guide/.
Don't just sit there angry and ranting, do something constructive.
In the words of Patti Smith (all hail Sister Patti): People have the power.
Contact your elected officials.
Don't be passive = get involved = make a difference.
Words are cool.
The English language is complex, stupid, illogical, confounding, brilliant, beautiful, and fascinating.
Every now and then a word presents itself that typifies all the maddeningly gorgeousness of language. They're the words that give you pause for thought. "Who came up with that word? That's an interesting string of letters." Their beauty doesn't lie in their definition (although that can play a role). It's also not in their onomatopoeia, though that, too, can play a role. Their beauty is in the way their letters combine - the visual poetry of words - and/or the way they sound when spoken. We talk a lot about music we like to hear and art we like to see, so let's all hail the unsung heroes of communication, poetry and life: Words.
Here are some I like. (Not because of their definition.)
Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Smart Girls
(A Trillian de-composition, to the tune of Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys)
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Smart girls ain’t easy to love and they’re above playing games
And they’d rather read a book than subvert themselves
Kafka, Beethoven and foreign movies
And each night alone with her cat
And they won’t understand her and she won’t die young
She’ll probably just wither away
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
A smart girl loves creaky old libraries and lively debates
Exploring the world and art and witty reparteé
Men who don’t know her won’t like her and those who do
Sometimes won’t know how to take her
She’s rarely wrong but in desperation will play dumb
Because men hate that she’s always right
Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
Don’t let them do puzzles and read lots of books
Make ‘em be strippers and dancers and such
Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be smart girls
They’ll never find men and they’re always alone
Even though men claim they want brains
Life(?) of Trillian
Single/Zero
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Boo!
Man I love Halloween.
And thanks to really nasty weather Devil's Night wasn't horrible. There were some arsons. But not like in the past. Maybe it was due to the bad weather or maybe Detroit/Michigan was given a metaphoric blanket of forgiveness and sympathy this year. Whatever the case I'm hoping this is the new trend.
Too many people are living a scary nightmare every day other than Halloween. No job, no prospects, no money, no home...scary, scary stuff.
I watched Paranormal Activity and sat there thinking, "Hey, at least they have a house, a place to live, they're paying their mortgage. What's a little freaky paranormal activity in the house when you've got a job and can pay the mortgage?"
Unemployed isn't just a box to tick on forms, it's a life altering perspective.
My Halloween costume this year is a new spin on my costume from a few years ago. Remember my "You don't scare me. I've tried online dating." shirt? Yeah, well, I updated and CaféPressed a new one that reads: You can't scare me. I'm unemployed.
I wore it to see Paranormal Activity on Devil's Night, in a suburb of Detroit. I really missed a great marketing opportunity. I could have sold 100s of 'em. Unfortunately the target marketing demograph is, well, unemployed. And they don't have money. So, not exactly a money-making venture.
But it speaks to the horrific nature of how bad "things" are.
I feel "better" since leaving Chicago. Maybe it's my shaved legs and clean underwear. Maybe it's because I'm among so many of my kind: The Unemployed.
Like The Damned, we're a zombie-like bunch, wandering around, trying to change things, trying to get out of our situation, but facing realities, statistics and odds that would defeat anyone with a functioning brain.
I'm handing out candy at my mum's house tonight. Looking forward to that. Children are the hope for the future and all that. My mother wanted to give out extra goodies this year. Not just Snickers and M&Ms. We loaded up on those mini boxes of cereal to hand out with the candy. My mother has a sad but valid point: It may be the only "nutritious" breakfast some of those kids will have in weeks. I'm not sure how the cereal is going to go over with the kids, so I'm working out a delivery technique wherein the Snickers and M&Ms go in first and the cereal is kind of an extra bonus.
Could be an interesting night.
Happy haunting! I hope you all get loads of the good treats.
11:43 AM
Friday, October 30, 2009
Okay, okay, I get it. I staged an intervention with myself.
I got out of the condo and did something useful with myself. I'm helping my mother. It's sort of an out of the frying pan into the fire situation, trading one form of anxiety for another, but at least helping my mother get rid of a lifetime of stuff accumulated through a long, happy, marriage and three children and four grandchildren is doing something useful.
I washed and brushed my hair. I did laundry. I'm wearing clean underwear.
And yes, I shaved my legs. And my mother will make me eat something other than cookie dough and Diet Pepsi. And I'm out in the world, interacting with people. So yeah. It's good.
I'm giving away a lot more forgiveness and sympathy Snuggies® and that feels good - or at least helpful. You know, psychologically. I'm not a productive member of society in that I don't have a job, but, I'm doing what I can to contribute to the greater good. Handing out good will and compassion. Hey, it's the least I can do.
Matlock was on the train. A smartly dressed older man who, I kid you not, looked exactly like Matlock era Andy Griffith. Except instead of Andy’s gentle, kind, smiley, folksy wise sage demeanor, this guy was a jerk. Not a crotchety old man kind of jerk, not an “I’ve seen it all and been through a lot in my life and I’ve earned the right to spout off now and again” kind of jerk. Just a jerk. A run of the mill asshole. The sharp contrast of his congenial Matlock looks against his asshole attitude was a challenge for my forgiveness and sympathy Snuggie®. Sending a wish to the Universe for this guy was not easy.
I mean, where to start? What does he need? What sort of guidance and enlightenment could the Universe give him to help ease whatever’s causing his jerkitude? At this stage of his life if he hasn’t bothered to, or been inspired to realize that his anger and hostility might, just maybe, be self-inflicted, then is there really anything anyone, least of all me, can summon for him? I can give him the forgiveness and sympathy Snuggie®, no problem. Done. But what’s at the root of his jerkitude?
Usually, so far, anyway, it’s been pretty easy to ascertain what’s eating people, or at least what the Universe could help them with in getting past their negative behaviors. The woman at the grocery with the disheveled hair and clothes yelling and slapping her two bawling kids? Duh. She needs a decent night of sleep, a break from the kids and a strong does of patience. Hey, Universe, little help here for the woman on the verge of alienating her kids? A little patience, a little sleep, a little reminder that she wanted these children and that the bawling, grabby, snot-nosed beings are also her funny, cute, innocent, darling joys who require nothing but love, acceptance and guidance to appropriate behavior. Done. Forgiveness and sympathy Snuggie® in place, wish to the Universe sent, hope rendered. Job done.
See how easy that is? It takes like two minutes.
Accept. Forgive. Heal. Love. Peace. Duh. (I'm thinking about getting that tramp stamped somewhere on me. By the way.)
But this Matlock asshole? Yeah. That’s a tough one. I puzzled over that for a long time. When he got off the train at Kalamazoo I watched him jabbing his cane at a woman I assume was his daughter or daughter-in-law. She didn’t flinch. She’s obviously used to his assholiness. She obviously expected it. Eureka. Universe, help this guy’s family accept him and not hate him and give them the patience to deal with him. Maybe their kindness to him will in turn calm him, ease whatever emotional and/or physical pain is causing him to be such a jerk.
I wrapped an extra Snuggie® around him and cloaked the woman in one, too. She didn’t need forgiving but boy did she need sympathy.
I thought about how futile and insignificant my little wish to the Universe is to that woman and even the old jerk. The thing I really like about this is that no one will ever know I'm thinking nice things for them. Kindness of strangers and all that. It rocks, right? We'd all like to think people do that for us, right? But we all know it doesn't happen. Often. So I feel like I'm picking up the slack for the rest of society who are too busy or preoccupied to think about taking a minute to think nice things for strangers. Hey, I'm not working, what else am I gonna do? Mainly I just feel the world needs some attitude adjustment. Rather than get discouraged by mean, selfish, arrogant, angry, or uptight people why not give them what they obviously need? Forgiveness and sympathy? I mean, I can't actually, you know, take them to therapy and solve all their problems. But I can very easily control my reaction to them. The world attitude kettle is about to boil over, I know it, you know it. If my forgiveness and sympathy Snuggies® are relieving any of that pressure, well, you know, that's cool. If not, oh well. At least I'm trying.
I'm not expecting anything in return - karma points or a plea bargain when I find my soul sitting at a bar in Hell listening to ABBA - but a couple odd things have happened lately. I'm not sure how the karma thing works and I'm pretty sure if the whole God/Satan thing is real, Satan, like God, works in mysterious ways. I'm remaining scientifically agnostic but I'm trying, I mean, really, really trying, to be more spiritually hopeful. There've been a couple incidents since my dad died that defy logic and reason. I'm not ready to openly discuss them. But. You know. Let's just say I'm a lot more open to spiritual possibilities these days.
I'm not going around looking for clues or significance, and certainly not assigning significance to things are just coincidental. I'm not reading anything into anything. Fear not, while I'm more open to the concept of, well, you know... I'm not actively looking for meaning in everything - or anything for that matter. I've always said, always maintained that if God, Jesus, Buddah, whomever, wants to come into my life I'm fine with it. They're welcome any time. My door is agnostic, but it's accepting and compassionate to any supreme deity who doesn't condone violence and hatred, and that door has always been wide open. So far no one's come to visit. Okay, well, I mean, since my dad died there have been a couple incidents. But. I'm not talking about those yet. The spiritual jury is out on them. I need time to digest it wrap my feeble brain around them a bit more.
However. Since the whole forgiveness blanket idea hit, I have had a couple, you know, niceties happen to me. Nothing big or impressive or life changing. But certainly out of the ordinary for my life.
For instance....
Right after I bestowed forgiveness and sympathy to the Matlock guy and his family, it was 10:00 AM and I was jonesing for a Diet Pepsi. I vowed to at least cut back on the crap during the visit to my mother’s. She still does not approve of pop and doesn’t allow it at home. Even, especially, when the grandkids are visiting. She’s a good gran who spoils the grandkids rotten, but there are limits, standards, to maintain. She knows I’ve had pop, of course, and she knows the grandkids drink pop, but she doesn’t approve. We know she knows and we know she doesn’t approve, and she’s knows we know she knows and doesn’t approve so there’s lots of guilt. I love my mother and she has endured a lot thanks to me and my life(?) so I figure the least I can do is respect her feelings about pop.
Besides, since my dad died she’s been trying to get me to drink his booze. “There are a couple bottles of wine in the pantry, your dad’s, you might as well drink them.” “Why don’t you have a Scotch? That last bottle your dad opened is going bad, I bought some soda, you can dilute it.” When I visit and I take her to get groceries she rolls over to the liquor aisle and says, “What was that wine Dad and you liked? I’ll get you a bottle.”
When I visited my parents my dad always got an extra bottle or two of wine, he’d splurge on something “nice” for my visit. I knew he drank much cheaper wine when I wasn’t there and I know my visits were a handy excuse to get a better caliber of fermented grapes. But I also know he wanted to get something special for me, something nice, something good. I’m the only one of us three kids who enjoys wine and can distinguish between good and bad. Mainly thanks to my dad’s tutelage.
Sometimes he’d surprise me and pop open a bottle of champagne. I love the stuff. Love it. When I was about 11 he and my mother let me have a glass of champagne at a fancy hotel. It was Dom and it was like mother’s milk to me. After that, on rare, special occasions, my dad ordered me a glass of champagne or a Kir Royale. “The champagne isn’t great here, Lieutenant, the kir will sweeten it and cut the sting on your palate.”
I know. I know. You may be thinking, “OMG!!! That’s horrible! You were just a child!!! What a horrible, horrible, irresponsible man!!! Where was child protective services?!! Your mother allowed this?? Does the name Drew Barrymore mean anything to you??? Were you in rehab by age 16??”
Simmer down. My parents, my dad especially, held the opinion that demystifying adult vices was a good way of preventing abuse of them. He’s the kind of dad who, when he caught my 14 year old brother stealing one of his cigarettes, went out and bought a pack of unfiltered Camels and made my brother smoke the entire pack at one go. My brother was violently sick for days and has never touched a cigarette since. As a very young wide-eyed preschooler observing all this I learned a valuable lesson, too. No allure, no temptation, no smoking. His methods may not have always been traditional, and often my mother looked on with concern that he was crossing a line, but, gotta hand it to the man, us kids survived to adulthood, earned college degrees, (until recently) maintained professional careers and generally lead healthy, lives without a need for rehab or addiction counseling.
Well. Apart from my new drinking problem. Diet Pepsi. Ugh. Yeah. I know. My parents didn’t allow me to drink pop but they pushed booze on me. Don’t ask me to explain. There is a difference; there is some logic there. We all know the health dangers of artificial sweeteners and caffeine. I kind of wish my parents had applied the same demystifying tactic to pop. Maybe if they’d let me drink it when I was a kid I wouldn’t have this drinking problem now. Kinda doubt it, though.
10 hours into the first day of my Diet Pepsi-free regime I was suffering withdrawal. Big time.
I wanted to stretch my legs and back, anyway, I reasoned, so I took a walk to the café car. I mean, you know, naturally. Where else was I going to walk? I was on a train. I had to go to the café car, right? It’s purely coincidental that they happen to have Diet Pepsi for purchase in the café car. And hey, they also have wine for purchase in the cafe car. If I really had a problem, a real drinking problem, I’d be downing train wine from Chicago to Ann Arbor. But no. All I wanted was a Diet Pepsi. (feel free to insert a Suicidal Tendencies sound bite here. “All I wanted was a Pepsi, just a Pepsi…” )
As the train rolled into Battle Creek I rolled into the café car. The café attendant was nowhere to be seen. The car was empty.
“Swut. Did I miss the announcement? Is it closed?”
I must have looked panicked because I felt a jovial pat on my shoulder. “Here I am, no worries. What would the pretty lady desire?” A man wearing an Amtrak café car uniform and a smile slid around me and behind the bar.
Okay. Let me take a minute to explain Amtrak to the uninitiated. Amtrak has fantastic employees. From the station attendants to the engineers to the conductors to the café car staff, my experiences (of which there are many, coast to coast and part of Canada) garners a 96% outstanding rating when it comes to Amtrak staff. Even their call center reps are nice and helpful. I kid you not.
And yes, I know, I know, someone out there will disagree and have a tale of horrible service, rude employees and a vow to never ride a train again. But. My experiences, at least where Amtrak staff is concerned, have always been exemplary. Professional, courteous, helpful, and, gulp, friendly.
It’s the friendly part that puts them in the exemplary category. They could be professional, courteous and helpful because it’s their job and their supervisors tell them they have to be that way. They are objective goals for which standards can be set and goals can be met.
But friendly? Friendly is subjective. And not necessary. If an employee is professional, courteous and helpful does it really matter if they’re friendly? Not so much. And you can’t teach friendly. People just are, or are not, friendly. And like I said, it’s subjective. And generally, I find Amtrak employees to be friendly. Nice people. I know a few airlines who would benefit greatly by having their attendants and agents spend a week riding the rails observing and learning from their transportation employee brethren.
So. The ‘pretty lady’ comment didn’t come as too much of a surprise. I mean, well, sort of a surprise, I don’t get called pretty lady very often. Even in the jovial, general greeting sense. I’m not the type of woman who evokes ‘pretty lady’ greetings.
I was thinking about this and I realized I haven’t been called pretty in something like 9 years. And that was just a basic pleasantry, a ‘pretty lady’ generic kind of comment. Ah well. Blog for another day, therapy for another breakdown.
‘Pretty lady’ made me think of other general comments guys, usually older men, usually bar tenders or wait staff or your friend’s dad. Ma’am, missy, cutie, sweetheart, babe, little lady…little lady. Geeze, has anyone ever called me little lady? My dad. When I was, in fact, little. Around the time I turned six I morphed from little lady to lieutenant. I guess I earned my stripes.
When I was a teenager my parents started calling me young lady when they were about to scold me or beseech me to examine my behavior. “Young lady, get in here right now.” “Young lady, you’ve got a lot of explaining to do about the hi-fi speaker.” “What is the meaning of this Algebra grade, young lady?” “And just where do you think you’re going dressed like that, young lady?” “Just who do you think you are, young lady?”
The latter were, of course, rhetoric questions. The only possible way to respond is with sarcasm and that’s never a good idea when you’re 15 and blasted the hi-fi woofer into submission via Clash at top volume the night before. A smart young lady affects a guilty, apologetic, submissive demeanor and heads straight to her room to reflect upon the error of her grievous ways, pray for forgiveness and guidance in reforming her life, and hopes she can reform fast enough to salvage her future.
Consequently to me, young lady packs a powerful disciplinary punch. Even when meant as a jovial greeting.
But. Pretty lady? Yeah, it’s been a long time. I was in Mexico a really, really long time ago, and the men on the streets used to holler out, “Pretty ladeee, pretty ladeee, roses?” (Or whatever they were selling.) It bugged me. I mean, I know they’re just trying to make a living, but attempting to tease money out of tourists by doling out “compliments” to any unMexian woman who walks by got on my nerves. To me it spoke to the financial oppression and hardships they faced, that they were forced into a sort of compliment slavery trying to hawk flowers, fake silver bracelets and Chiclets on the streets.
Yes. All that went through my mind when the Amtrak café attendant called me pretty lady. But, given that he’s an Amtrak employee, I knew it was just a friendly greeting. He was there and ready to serve me whatever my pretty lady heart desired off the menu.
“Is the Diet Pepsi in bottles or cans?” I asked, a little too desperately.
“Cans, I’m afraid. But they’re ice cold, I’ve been chilling them just for you since Hammond, Indiana.”
How’d he know I prefer bottles and abhor cans? How’d he know the only way I’d drink out of a can is if it’s chilled to sup-zero temperature?
Because he’s an Amtrak employee, that’s why.
I smiled, chuckled at his joke. “Ooooo, since Hammond? Wow. You’re good. Since you went to so much effort I’ll have two, please.”
“Thatta girl, I knew you were a woman of fine, discriminating taste.”
Okay. That cracked me up. I know, I need to get out more. But it >is funny. And typical of Amtrak employee friendliness and joviality.
I’d been trying to figure out who the guy reminded me of but I couldn’t place him. When he said that last quip it dawned on me that he looked exactly like John Oates circa 1985. Yes. John Oates of Hall and Oates. Circa 1985. Smaller stature, curly mullet, neatly groomed but bushy mustache and all. That’s a look I haven’t seen in real life for a while. I thought about asking the Universe to bestow this nice guy a favor and nudge him into updating his look. But he was totally rocking it. I think he digs his John Oates circa 1985 look. He seemed happy. Comfortable. Confident. So, you know. Yay him.
The down side to Amtrak is that food and beverages are pricey. Especially for us unemployed riders. But cans? One can would never satisfy my craving. Chilled to perfection or not, I was jonesing, bad, and one can would not be enough.
I reached into my pocket for money. All I had was a twenty. I handed it over and he gave me change back as if I’d only bought one pop.
“Ooops, here.” I handed him back money for the second pop.
“Nope,” he pushed it back at me. “On the house, or on the car, as the case may be.”
“Really? Thank you.” I’ve seen the café car attendants filling out inventory reports. I’ve spent enough time in café cars to know the attendants are required to account for everything they sell. I was pretty sure this guy was actually paying for my pop out of his own pocket. Maybe not, maybe there’s some lee-way café car attendants are given, a pretty lady allowance of some sort. And, after all, I reasoned, I am a frequent tracker, I’ve logged a lot of miles on Amtrak. The least they can do is give me a can of pop once every 10 years.
He thanked me. I smiled and said, “you’re welcome.”
This is where it gets weird and somewhat uncomfortable.
“Oh, yummy. Delicious.”
That’s him, not me savoring my Diet Pepsi.
Yes. He said, “Oh, yummy. Delicious.”
Uhhh. Huh? There was no one else there, he wasn’t looking at any of the food or beverages behind the counter. He was looking straight at me and smiling.
Sensing my confusion, apparently, he said, “Your smile. Yummy.”
I was flustered. I blushed. I kid you not, I was flustered.
“You have a very yummy smile. Very yummy,” he said, again.
…and now I was officially kind of creeped out.
“Oh. Um. Thank you. Thanks for the pop. Have a nice day.” I instinctively smiled, you know, how you do, even when you’re creeped out, because when you thank someone and bid them a nice day you smile. It’s just what you do. It makes the gratitude and good day wish official. If you don’t smile it’s just perfunctory manners, not genuine gratitude. If you’re going to thank someone, it swutting well better be genuine. Says me, anyway. So a smile is a required part of the sincerity of thanking someone. But in this case, the guy was getting all weird about my smile and giving him another one suddenly seemed like I was flirting back at him. Which made me blush even redder (cheeks were burning hot at this point) and feel more flustered and more creeped out.
I couldn’t get out of there fast enough and, I felt bad about that. What had he done? Nothing. He was just being nice to me. He was flirting, for sure, no doubt about it, but where's the harm in that? Men flirt all the time. Just not with me. I felt uncomfortable because of my own issues, not because the guy was genuinely creepy. "Yummy" is kind of a weird adjective to grab when you're complimenting a woman on her smile, especially if you happen to look exactly like John Oates circa 1985, but there's nothing mean or offensive about it.
Instead of slinking away I said to the Universe, "okay, help me out, here. Help me give this guy compassion." And, voila! I did something completely out of character. Like an out of body experience. I said, "You know, I had four years of orthodontia. Headgear, rubber bands, retainers, the whole bit. It was torture. So, compliments on my smile mean a lot to me. Thank you." Smile again.
I know. I know. I know! Breakthrough or what?!
He put his hands on the counter affecting a sort of braced and ready for action stance and did one of those, “mmm, mmm” smirks, the kind with the tongue clicking noise. He laughed and thanked my orthodontist for the good work. And said, “Very yummy.”
As I crossed into the dining car I heard him mutter, quietly, but obviously loud enough for me to hear, “Of all the gin joints in all the towns…”
Okay. I mean, kind of overkill with they yummy smile thing, but still. A man, a real man, an actual XY chromosomed man, was not only nice to me, he was flirting with me. That's unprecedented. I'm pretty sure it's the first time a guy has flirted with me in about 7 years. It was a little creepy, what with the repeated yummy smile thing, but still, I've been such a nonsexual entity for so long that I completely forgot how it feels to have someone express actual attraction to you. I mean, crimony, for a minute there I actually felt like a viable woman, a member of the breeding race. I felt, gulp, worthy.
Whoa.
Whoa.
Seriously.
Whoa.
Stage an intervention, shave my legs, do my laundry, wear clean underwear, wash my hair, hand out some forgiveness and sympathy Snuggies® and look what happens?
Okay, sure, he was an Amtrak café car attendant who looks like John Oates circa 1985 and has an odd compliment vernacular, but that doesn't matter to me. It might matter to a lot of other women, but it doesn't matter to me. I've been riding high on that compliment ever since he gave it to me. Someone, someone, noticed me and bothered to compliment me. It's such a small, insignificant thing for most people. My friends get complimented and flirted with all the time - my married friends claim they hate it, that it's a rude nuisance, they're wearing wedding rings for crying out loud. But. I always wonder how they'd feel if the compliments and flirting stopped. I'm guessing they might start to feel not-so-great about themselves. It's natural to want to feel desired. We are programmed to breed. If we don't feel desired it brings our entire biological purpose into question. If we can't attract a mate we are effectively not viable, credible members of our species. Throw all the feel-good psychology you want at that, tell me that there's so much more that matters, important stuff like intelligence and sense of humor and kindness and on and on, but the bottom line is that if you can't attract a member of the opposite sex none of that matters. Unless you're Mother Teresa. And few of us are Mother Teresa. Most of us need to know we're desirable.
And now I know there's one man, one guy, who, at the very least, noticed and likes my smile.
Karma? God or Satan working in mysterious ways? A gift bestowed from the Universe. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. No good deed goes unpunished. But more to the illustrative point is that it only takes a few seconds and minimal effort to do something nice, something positive, to make a huge positive difference to someone else. Even, and I think especially, complete strangers.
12:25 PM
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
It's just a matter of perspective. Unemployed. Single. Sounds like a losing situation from all angles, right?
Yeah. It pretty much sucks.
But.
Just as I discovered there are positive aspects to being eternally single, I'm discovering there are plus sides to being unemployed, and, single and unemployed.
Sure, being unemployed makes me feel scared.
And sure, not getting any nibbles from employers, even the less reputable not-so-interesting ones, barely a "don't call us, we'll call you" response to all of my job applications makes me feel worthless.
Sure, being single makes me feel lonely.
And sure, not getting any interest from men, even the disgusting, not-so-interesting ones, barely a "let me buy you a drink and you can show me a good time" offer at low-lit, low-life dingy bars makes me feel repugnant.
But.
Looking on the bright side of the situation, I haven't had a reason, even societal convention, to shave my legs in weeks. Yep, I've gone through the first couple of prickly, itchy, uncomfortable 5:00 shadow days, the "wow, I really need to shave my legs" days, the "geeze, that's disgusting, how long can leg hair grow, anyway?" days, and now I'm in the "meh, whatever, who cares? what difference does it make?" days. I'm neither repulsed or concerned. When I need to shave my legs, I will. For now I look at my razor perched in the bathroom and give it a knowing smirk. "Whatever. Beckon all you want, until I have a viable reason to use you I'm going to ignore you." When I was merely single, as opposed to single and unemployed, I still felt compelled, bound by convention, to shave my legs. I was going to work for crying out loud.
No one wanted to see my homage to singledom, the obvious mark of a woman who hasn't had sex in months, maybe years, possibly this millennium, and has no prospects or hope for sex any time soon. Least of all me. Work, respectable appearance for coworkers and clients, was my "excuse" for keeping my legs neatly shorn.
But, deep down I knew it was just an excuse masking the last vestiges of hope that somehow, someday, some man would find me interesting enough to at least take me for a spin in the sheets. Keeping my legs sex-ready was a small concession to that deeply repressed hope.
Without the excuse of work I am left with no real reason to shave my legs, wear clean underwear, apply makeup or wash my hair. No man, no job, no reason to not let myself lapse into a state of hygienic chaos.
I still snap to hygienic attention when I am going out - somewhere farther than the mailbox. When I'm going to see people or boldly brave society-at-large, I deign myself to take a shower, wash my hair, put on clean underwear, wear real clothes and even don some mascara and lipstick. My life is falling apart, spiraling out of control, but by golly I still care enough to smile like I mean it and try to dupe my friends and family and society-at-large that everything's okay, I'm doing okay, there's no need to worry about me, nosiree, everything's fine, nothing to see here.
But unfortunately I don't go out that often lately so days and days go by unshowered and unmade-up. It's reaching the point where I feel like an addict trying to convince myself I can quit any time, I just don't need to quit right now so I'll keep using until I need to quit. "I can shower and clean up any time I want. I can, really. I will, when I want, I will. When I need to clean up and get dressed and brush my hair I'll do it." I have fewer occasions to bother, fewer occasions to need to kick the unhygienic habit. Fewer occasions to smile like I mean it these days.
At first I kept up my normal hygiene routines. Showers and hair washings every day, complete with leg and pit shaving. I even bothered to style my hair just about every day. Teeth brushed morning and night. Make-up, even if just an abbreviated dose, was applied every day. Fresh underwear, bra and clean clothes, real clothes, not comfy sweats and t-shirts, every day. Laundry was done on schedule. Dishes were washed. I even liked that I had time to keep a regular routine. I touted that I now had the time to eat real meals at regularly scheduled times. I liked that I could do my laundry during the week-days and could keep up with it and not let it pile out of control. I thought there was merit and virtue in the discipline I was applying to myself during my new unemployment.
Then the discipline started to wane. I relaxed my standards.
I'm now eating cookie dough and Diet Pepsi at 2 AM and calling it breakfast. Around 3 PM, or 2 PM, or 4 PM, I'll saunter into the kitchen and consider cooking something. Sometimes, on the 14 foot trek to the kitchen, I get all inspired and think about pulling out a cookbook and making a real meal. Instead I rummage around for whatever's fast and easy, usually Ramen noodles or toast and peanut butter. Washed down with Diet Pepsi. I call it dunch. Dinner/lunch.
Around 9 PM I wonder why I feel like crap and then think about the crap I put in my body. I vow to eat better and get rid of the Diet Pepsi. At the very least bake the cookies. 15 minutes later I'm studying the box of Triscuits, looking for signs of any nutritional value and convincing myself they're a good source of fiber.
Feeling nutritionally virtuous after a late dinner of Triscuits I justify splurging on cookies and Diet Pepsi. I vow to make oatmeal raisin cookies because they have a lot of nutritional value. I make the cookies but as Craig Ferguson does his "what did we learn tonight" closing sequence I don't bother to bake the cookies and instead wash down the cookie dough with another Diet Pepsi.
The worst part of all this is that I'm aware of what I'm doing, or not doing. I know exactly what I should, or should not be doing, even in the moment. I know I shouldn't drink Diet Pepsi. I know I should eat nutritionally balanced meals on an appropriate schedule. I know I should shower and shave my legs. I know I should get dressed in clean, regular clothes. I know I'd be mortified if anyone knew how I'm living, if anyone knew I wasn't showering except when I'm going to see people, if anyone knew that for five days in a row I didn't wear underwear because I ran out of clean pairs and didn't have the energy? desire? money? to do laundry. I know I should at least bake the cookies for crying out loud.
It's apathy born of depression, obviously. Duh.
But there's more to it than that. I do care. I really do. But I know I need to conserve money and letting the laundry pile up rather than doing smaller loads makes financial and environmental sense.
Besides, do I really need to wear underwear every day if I'm not leaving my home? Ditto dishes piled in the sink. Ditto hair washing.
It's all very bohemian. And scary.
Sure, I don't need to wear make-up every day, or style my hair, or even wear work-appropriate attire. I am just sitting around at home working on my job applications. And I was a little high maintenance, I suppose. My standards of personal appearance were a bit, well, high. Clean, pressed real clothes, always. Showered, legs and pits shaved bare every day, every day, no excpetions. Hair shampooed, conditioned and styled every day, no exceptions. Make-up applied before stepping foot out the door, a must. None of this was affected, it was just normal, healthy, respectable grooming. It's how I was raised. You just don't go around being sloppy. Period. It's about self-respect and dignity. It's just what you do.
But the whole hygiene thing catapults me into another league. I think it was the underwear thing that made me realize how far I've fallen. I've gradually weaned out the boyfriend appropriate underwear from my life. I keep a few pairs, you know, just in case Hell freezes over or there's a meteoric catastrophe that sends people into the streets to gaze heavenward at the oncoming assault and grabbing the first person they can find for one last fuck before the world comes to an end. (Which, by the way, is my most regular fantasy and the only hope I have to actually have sex before I die.)
Before I go out into the streets on the night of cosmic-Armageddon, my plan is to quickly rummage in the back of my underwear drawer for a pair of boyfriend-appropriate underwear and don them before heading out for indiscriminate sex and then to die. I figure if I'm going to have indiscriminate cosmic-Armageddon sex I don't want to be caught wearing white cotton sensible briefs verging on granny pants.
I'd prefer to be blasted into eternity wearing white cotton sensible briefs verging on granny pants because forever is a really long time and comfortable undies would be nice, but since I actually want to have indiscriminate cosmic-Armageddon sex I plan to stick to the plan of a quick change before heading out into the streets.
The only question up for debate is whether or not I take the time to shave my legs. I figure cosmic-Armageddon sex is fast and furious sex. Quick and feverish. The jeans probably won't need to fall below my knees. The guy just needs enough clearance for a few quick thrusts. At least that's how it plays out in my fantasies. So taking the time to shave my lower legs probably would just be wasting precious cosmic-Armageddon indiscriminate sex partner finding time.
He'll have to deal with an ungroomed snatch, though. One thing is certain: I've been single long enough to appreciate the liberation that emancipation from snatch waxing and shaving and tweezing gives a girl. And there's no going back. At least not in the event of cosmic-Armageddon. I am not going to take the time, in my last few hours of life, to groom my snatch into some Penthouse® centerfold ready pattern or worse, shave down to prepubescent bareness. Uh-uh. No way. No how. Not in my last few hours of life. I'll give-in to media-molded stereotyped male objectification and desire and throw on the uncomfortable black lace undies but I am not going to groom my snatch. Not in my last few hours on this mortal coil.
There are a lot of college aged and Puerto Rican girls in my neighborhood. You know how they are. I'm certain they'll be wearing boyfriend-ready undies. I don't want to be the only woman left standing alone on the eve of cosmic Armageddon. The guys will say, "I would have grabbed her (pointing at me) but I got a look at her undies and decided to grab this girl with the La Perla black lace thong, instead. I mean, what with it being my last fuck and all, why settle for the girl in sensible white cotton briefs when there's a black lace thong up for the taking just a block away? And besides, under those sensible white cotton briefs she had an ungroomed snatch."
Anyway. That's why I have a couple pairs of boyfriend-appropriate underwear shoved way back in the underwear drawer. A cosmic-Armageddon situation. I'm not holding out real hope for an actual boyfriend, a bona-fide need to wear uncomfortable underwear. A cosmic-Armageddon situation is more likely.
But here's the thing. That underwear is my laundry barometer. When my clean underwear supply is dwindling and I'm down to almost nothing but the boyfriend underwear, I know it's way past time to catch up with the laundry. The threat of having to wear the boyfriend-appropriate underwear is usually enough to motivate me to catch up with the laundry. I know it's there, lurking in the back corner of my underwear drawer, I know it's there in case of a laundry emergency (or cosmic-Armageddon) but it's more of a threat than a comfort. "Aaaack! Alert! Alert! You're dangerously close to having to wear that underwear! Alert! Alert! Do your laundry NOW!!!"
When I was working I used to get dangerously close to the boyfriend-appropriate underpants event horizon. Working 10-12 hour days cuts into your free time, your laundry time. Work clothes can be dropped off at the dry cleaner, towels and sheets can "go a few extra days," but undies? Yeah. There's no denying the need to do laundry when it comes to underwear.
Except when you're unemployed. And single. I ran out of regular underwear, lowered myself to a few uncomfortable days in boyfriend-appropriate underwear, and still, still I couldn't be bothered to do my laundry.
Why? Why not just go down to the laundry room and do a load of laundry? What is the big deal? I've got nothing but time on my hands, I have the quarters, I have the detergent, there's no reason, no logical or illogical reason to not do a load of laundry.
And yet...and this speaks to the crux of the issue...there's no reason to do it, either.
I'm not the sort of girl who goes commando. But. I've been going commando. And no, it's not freeing, liberating or devilishly bad girl.
A friend invited me to go to a movie on the spur of the moment the other day. I turned her down because it meant that I would have to do laundry so that I would have underwear to wear when we went to the movie. Even though I now go commando in the confines of my condo I cannot go out in public a-la-commando. I mean, well, you know, at least not to a movie with a friend, anyway. In jeans. Ouch. Gross. Ouch.
Yep, I turned down an invite to get out for a few hours because I couldn't make myself do laundry. Apparently I prefer to stay home in the same dirty old t-shirt I've worn for five days and no underwear than do laundry, take a shower, brush my hair, get dressed and go to a movie with a friend.
It's symptomatic of my anxiety and despair. I know this and I feel stupid for not doing something about it. I mean, if I couldn't figure it out, if I didn't realize that it's a symptom of the psychology of unemployment, excuses could be made. But no excuses. I know what this all means. I know what's happening to me. And yet I just let it happen. Which is weird because I'm so not the victim type. I'm the self-responsible, self-reliant, put on your big girl panties and snap-out-of-it-and-deal-with-it type. Except my big girl panties are all in the laundry.
I don't know if unemployed people with significant others go through this laundry issue. I mean, the bare minimum you do for your partner is keep up with the laundry and clean underwear, right? No matter how depressed or forlorn or sad you feel about not having a job, out of respect for your partner you garner the wherewithal to keep clean underwear on hand and wear it, right?
And really, truly, if I get a call for a job interview (ha!) or have a reason to go out, in public, I will rally and do the laundry and don the underwear. It's become a sort of superstitious test of will for me. How long can I endure not wearing underwear? I'm not doing laundry until I have a darned good reason to wear underwear. So Universe, you better hurry up and get some interviews lined up for me.
The thing is, though, I suspect most unemployed people go through some form of hygienic breakdown. A few of my unemployed friends have confided to me that they have "let things 'slip' a little" in the hygiene and cleanliness aspects of their lives. Signs of depression and despair, of course, but there's a practical aspect to it: Saving money.
Most of my female friends who are unemployed start their skimping on unemployment budget by eliminating "good" make-up and skin care products. Drug store brands instead of the specialty brands. Unfortunately for one of my friends the switch to a cheaper moisturizer resulted in a horrible breakout and now a case of what appears to be Rosacea. It's bad and painful enough to warrant a trip to a dermatologist, but, oops, no job, no health insurance, no dermatologist so she's stuck with painful cheeks. What price unemployment? No one thinks about this kind of stuff. And sure, in the grand scheme it's ridiculous to even suggest that her skin problem is in league with, say, losing your home due to unemployment. But. It's the little things that chip away at you. And it really does hurt her. She's in a lot of pain.
There are plus sides, too. We can be mighty resourceful when required. One friend shampoos her hair every other day. She gives herself this "treat" by diluting her shampoo with water to extend the number of shampoos/bottle.
Frankie, an habitual snatch-waxer, confided that she hasn't waxed in months. Benjy, she says, is being a good sport about it. He's not complaining. They're "adjusting" to Frankie's more natural look and feel. At $75++, the once-essential monthly snatch wax has become an expensive frivolity. I laugh at the ridiculousness of this. There are people right here in a America who go days without eating and live in their cars or in shelters and Frankie's big concession to unemployment is going without snatch waxes. She's aware that she's hardly enduring a plight, she knows they're lucky that they have decent severance packages, a trust fund and some savings to live on until one of them can find a job. But nonetheless, ahem, "cut-backs" are necessary while they ride out days of unemployment. Sacrifices must be made. She's diluting her shampoo and skimping on make-up, too.
But I haven't broached the subject of laundry and underwear with my friends. I'm too embarrassed. And they all have boyfriends or husbands. They have reasons to do their laundry and wear underwear. They have significant others relying on them to at least try to keep up with their personal hygiene (Frankie's snatch-waxing notwithstanding).
Me? Yeah. Not so much. It's just me. If I wear the same t-shirt and no undies days in a row no one will ever know. If I don't shower or wash my hair, or even brush my hair for that matter, for days on end, no one will ever know or care. (I'm kind of afraid to take my hair out of the pony tail holder I folded the mats into a few days ago, I think I might be starting to form dreadlocks.) If I stink and look awful, like a sick, mangy alley-cat dying in a dumpster, no one will ever know. No one will ever get mad at me or break-up with me because of it. No one will ever care.
Having said that, it's not apathy. I do care. I guess. I dunno. Maybe not. I must not care, right? If I cared I would do the laundry, wear underwear, wash my hair, bake the cookie dough and at least bother to maintain some semblance of a healthy, normal, hygienic life, right? Yeah, I think so, too.
And yet, I do care. I do want clean clothes and underwear and clean, brushed hair, and a caffeine-free/artificial sweetener-free nutritionally balanced diet. I am troubled with my apparent lack of self-respect. I do care.
It's something else. Something other than apathy.
Laziness? Maybe. I don't consider myself to be a lazy person but then I've never had the opportunity to be lazy. Maybe I am a lazy person who's been too busy to realize I'm lazy. Kinda doubt it, I'm pretty self-motivated and ambitious. But then again, I've always had a job, a career, professional goals to fuel my motivation, so maybe I am lazy. Maybe all these years I've been a lazy person who was too busy to realize it.
Depression, I suppose, sure, of course I'm depressed. I've been unemployed for 12 weeks and I've had next-to-no interest from any employers. Of course I'm depressed. I'm single and unemployed and on the verge of going into foreclosure. Duh, of course I'm depressed.
Then again, though, apart from the obvious signs of depression, I still feel pretty darned positive. I'm still wrapping people in forgiveness and sympathy Snuggies®. I'm still feeling pretty darned happy about not having to deal with my former manager anymore, ever again in my life. I'm still feeling, you know, okay about the whole thing. I'm still on my hippie trip mantra. Accept. Forgive. Love. Heal. Peace. In that order.
So why, then, the lack of personal hygiene, balanced nutrition and laundry?
Dunno. Not a clue. I think it has something to do with being unemployed, being alone and feeling worthless in the main facets of life. No job, no man, nothing. I have nothing. Not even my health for crying out loud. (Do not get me started on my ongoing foot saga. We'll be here all night if I start talking about that.)
Then again, I have everything. And I know it. I have a great family and fabulous friends. I have oodles of support and concern. I may very well lose "everything" but I won't have lost anything of real value. My family and (a few of) my friends are showing sides of themselves, depths of compassion and care, to me that goes beyond all realm of conventional duty. A friend who is also unemployed offered to help me pay my mortgage. My mother keeps telling me to stop being so reliable and responsible to her, that I need to be more selfish. Another friend, thousands of miles away, used some connections, swallowed some pride and called in a few favors to get me free Pixies tickets. (Hey! A reason to do laundry, take a shower and wear underwear! Woo hoo! Levitate me!)
I have a blog and intelligent, funny, kind people people who, for some bizarre reason, read it. Somehow, some way, my idiotic ranty words find their way to the right people. Somehow, some way, those words resonate with those right people and voila! the Universe shrinks to a manageable size. (I haven't thanked Al Gore for the internet lately. So, thanks, Al.)
See what I mean? I'm losing everything but I haven't lost anything that matters. It's all very trite and clichéd, of course, but it is.
So why the hygiene? The food? The laundry? The underwear? Yeah. I dunno. It's something I can't articulate. I suspect it's tied into my lack of self-worth at the moment. But even that doesn't fully explain it. If I did my laundry, wore underwear, took a shower and washed my hair, baked the swutting cookies, I'd have a lot more self worth. And I know that. And yet (glancing at three bags of laundry spilling all over the bedroom), I can't make the move to doing the things I want to do, the things I know I need to do, the basic fundamentals of life like hygiene. If anyone, anyone saw me or even knew what's going on with me, all dirty and underwearless, I'd be mortified. Absolutely mortified. And yet...do I do anything about it? Take a 10 minute shower? Shave my legs? Or even just undo the matted pony tail and brush my hair? Do a load, just one load, of laundry? Bake the cookies?
Nope. I do not.
It may be like the shift in perspective I gained when I realized there are upsides to being chronically single. And yes, there are upsides to being single, even chronically single. No uncomfortable underwear. No snatch grooming. No annoying drone of football games blaring from the television every weekend and Monday night. No torturous obsessing over hip, butt and thigh size. No more tying hip, butt and thigh size into my credibility and value as a person. No boyfriend's dysfunctional family and childhood and dealing with the resulting issues. No hurt feelings. No trust betrayed.
Realizing being single means there's no chance of betrayal was a huge turning point for me. I take a lot of solace in that on long, lonely nights. "Sure being alone and lonely sucks and it hurts, but after all the betrayal I've endured in relationships, the pain they caused me, this is a pleasant afternoon at the beach in comparison."
It took me a long time to get to that point of rationalization. A lot of steps down a long path with several missteps onto other paths, but I got there.
Perhaps this is another walk down another path toward a point of realization and ultimately a way of forming it into a manageable rationalization. I'm not sure what hygiene could possibly have to do with managing the anxiety of unemployment, but, in many ways accepting unemployment is similar to accepting being single. Things got pretty ugly after the HWNMNBS breakup. I mean really ugly. But I had a job and responsibilities to that job to keep me doing my laundry and wearing underwear. Now, well, now that I don't have a job I'm just floundering, apparently going through some thing, some phase.
And I suppose that's the whole point. It's all just a series of phases. Some good, some bad, most of them mediocre. This phase, this underwearless, showerless, unbaked cookie, hairy leg phase is a weird one, a bad one, but certainly not a mediocre one. I'm trying to find solace in that. This phase sucks, but I'm not suffering from mediocrity.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Being unemployed sucks. Big time. Obviously. Goes without saying. But I just thought I'd say it anyway.
I've been going through most of the usual phases and mood swings that accompany a loss of this magnitude. Confusion. Fear. A lot of fear. I fear a lot. Helplessness. Hopelessness. Disconnection from society. Loneliness. Isolation. Despair. Fear, more fear. Zero self esteem. Most of the symptoms point to depression. I have periods, days go by, where I don't leave my condo, not even to retrieve the mail. I can't work up the, I dunno what, nerve? energy? desire? to make the elevator ride down to the mailbox. I suppose it's fear, again. Afraid of what will arrive in the mail.
I get a laugh out of myself. The clichés I'm experiencing are so typical they're comedic. Not that I think I'm above experiencing the phases and moods people go through during a loss, a job loss, but it's just funny when it happens to you and you're very aware of what you're going through. "Ahhhh, okay, so this is the 'don't take a shower for days on end phase.' Huh. Wow. I didn't think I'd succumb to that one. Well. Okay then. So much for my latent need for personal hygiene. Just goes to show, it can happen to anyone. I get it, now. Check that phase off the list."
I could rally against it all - I know people, some of my unemployed friends - who fight against the ubiquitous phases and moods. They refuse to lapse into the them. They say they're refusing to be a victim. They say they are not going to be defeated by it. That's all very nice and Joan of Arcky, and I, too, have moments of defiant refusal. But they're short-lived. I suspect my friends' never give up, never surrender attitudes are not constant, either. I suspect they have the same phases and moods as any other unemployed professional but they are trying very hard to convince themselves it's all a matter of attitude so they're doing their darnedest to fight the cliché behaviors and emotions. There's a nice bit of nobility, dignity, in that and hats off to them for at least trying to fight against it, or for at least trying to mask it, trying to kid themselves and everyone else.
Ironically, or, surprisingly, depending on your view of my alcohol intake, I haven't been drinking. Much. I kind of thought I might end up being one of those unemployed people who spends their days drinking. I have long wondered if my professional responsibilities were the only thing preventing me from drinking before noon. Turns out that's not the case at all. Which is one of the good things I've learned about myself. I'm not an alcoholic! I've had a few nights out with friends which have resulted in two or three drinks and nice little numbing of the pain, but I'm not reaching for alcohol on a regular or even semi-regular basis. Here I am with the "freedom" to drink every day and/or night of the week and I'm not interested in it. Remember when you first went to college and booze was everywhere and no parents or adults who know your parents were around? That freedom of fear mixed with the ready and easy availability was, literally, intoxicating. But after the novelty wore off it wasn't a big deal. "Drunk off my ass at 3:00 on a Wednesday afternoon? Yeah. Been there, tried that, not interested."
I'm proud to announce that this week I've taken a shower and washed my hair every day. And I made the trip to the mail box every day except one. Progress!
Or, well, maybe not. Two steps forward, two steps backward.
It's Halloween-time. Which means candy time. Which means easy access to my arch nemesis. Stronger than the lure of alcohol, the deceptively innocent evil foe who has stalked me all my life is weaving its seductive spell on me.
Refined sugar. Salve my wounds, oh sweet elixir.
In times of distress is there anything more satisfying, more deceptively innocent and culturally accepted than a dinner comprised of Twizzlers with a diet Pepsi chaser?
O, sweet salvation.
Oh. Yeah. I dunno when, maybe a few weeks ago, I took up the diet Pepsi habit. Which, I know, is fueling the sugar cravings and deep satisfaction obtained from cookie dough. I don't even remember when or how I came to imbibe that first diet Pepsi. I think it was after three nights of only two hours of sleep and I "needed" caffeine to stay awake. I can't stand coffee and I didn't have any caffeinated tea, and there, in line at Walgreen's was a conveniently placed fridge with ice-cold pop. Caffeine in a refreshingly cold and bubbly form, the staple of my late teen-age diet and college-anorexic years: Diet Pepsi.
Funny how I've mused over the possibility that if I didn't watch it I could have a drinking problem, but never once considered that the drinking problem I undeniably have is diet pop.
More alluring than booze and a lot more problematic because it's socially and culturally acceptable, I kicked the diet pop habit when I kicked anorexia in the ass. Every now and then, just every now and then, I'd indulge, but I vowed to keep it under control, just one, no refills, and then get right back on track the next day.
My parents never allowed me to drink pop except for Vernor's, which, in our house was medicinal. Served cold and warm, Vernor's is my mother's go-to home remedy. It cures everything. And, honestly? She has a valid point. When your stomach is unsettled nothing calms it like Vernor's. Baby fussing after a feeding? A couple sips of Vernor's and BURRRP!!! Happy baby. So, Vernor's didn't count as pop. But every other carbonated beverage was off limits. Coke, Pepsi, 7-Up, Sprite, none of it was allowed in our home. When I went to friends' houses where pop was allowed I felt too afraid to drink it. If a friend's mother offered me pop I looked upon it as being offered alcohol. I'd give a wide-eyed and proud "No thank you, ma'am," as if I'd just turned down a temptation of sin.
And then, one day, junior year of high school, I was at a Junior United Nations event (oh shut up, we all know I'm a dork) at a hotel. Some of the senior girls invited me to join them in their presentation prep group. They stopped at a pop machine and got diet Pepsis to fuel their insatiable desire to solve world issues right there at the Junior United Nations Forum, Regional Finals. A victory here would take us to the state finals and then, oh, then, dare we dream? We'd be off to nationals at the actual United Nations. (Oh shut up, we all know I'm a dork.)
I'd just been elected to represent the entire Scandinavian contingent (we didn't have enough kids interested in Junior UN to represent each country (go figure) so the smaller, less politically active countries were divided into regions). That election was a major coup. The kid who represented Scandinavia before me was ousted after being implicated in a chemistry lab scandal. Scandinavia was always represented by a senior student and my nomination and election caused quite the political stir. A junior representing Scandinavia? Why, why, it's, it's risky! It's unheard of! It could be Junior UN suicide! But there I was, rubbing shoulders with Junior UN elite: United Kingdom, Russia, Japan, China, Germany... this was huge.
Before that I represented the combined countries of Belgium and Luxembourg. (Oh shut up.) And that assignment was controversial. Not too many lower grade students got to represent any European country. But because I'd actually been to Belgium I was deemed "fit" to represent them even though I was only a sophomore. I had my eyes on Canada, but when I was feeling a little full of myself, a little drunk with power, in my wildest fantasies I imagined myself in the coveted United Kingdom representative spot. Skyrocketing to early glory repping Scandinavia in junior year put me one step closer to acting out that fantasy. (Oh shut up, we all know I'm a dork.)
The truth, I now know, was that our teacher-advisors and principal wanted to make the chemistry lab incident go away as quickly as possible. Punishment to the participants was swift and merciless. No extracurricular activities. Period. And to make a good show to the parents and school board they swiftly replaced the chemistry-lab deviants' places in student government and clubs with the most innocent, above-board, undeniably good kids they could find. Enter: Me. "And a child shall lead them..."
I didn't realize all that at the time. I just thought my history grades, interest in world affairs, unwavering zeal for the UN and Norwegian ancestry were what got me that coveted spot representing Scandinavia.
We had long night ahead of us. Our advisers gave us our study guides. We were armed with news magazines and history books. This was going to be a long night of studying and political strategizing. The senior girls loaded up on Diet Pepsi. They knew the restorative power and secrets of caffeine.
Oh yes, they were juicing.
I was a caffeine virgin.
You know where this is going.
A young girl thrown into a group of older, more aware, more savvy girls. A night spent in a hotel, away from home and watchful parental eyes. A Junior United Nations Regional Finals debate. A pop machine.
The senior girls loaded up with arms full of Diet Pepsi - two or three each.
I had long suspected a few of them were juicing. Meaghan Cartwright had always been a little chubby. She left junior year with a belly and a round face and returned senior year very, very fashionably thin. There were rumors of anorexia. Which, at our school, was a good thing. An anorexia rumor would instantly elevate a girl to heights of popularity unrivaled. If a girl was thin enough to incite anorexia rumors, the boys would want to date her and the girls would be envious. It was instant credibility, instant social clout, instant status. (I know. I know. Trust me, I know. I'm not saying I condone this. But. It existed, and sadly, still does. It is what it is. Blame the media. Blame the fashion industry.) For a member of the nerd-herd to attain that kind of status, an anorexia rumor, well, that was unprecedented.
I was still too naive and too much of a goodie-two-shoes to be impressed with the anorexia rumor. Instead I was worried about Meaghan. I liked her. She was smart and funny and was always nice to me, even though I was a grade behind her. I didn't want to believe that she had some sort of deep emotional wound or self-esteem issue that would cause her to suddenly become anorexic. I wanted her to be above caring about an unobtainable media-approved body. I wanted her to be free of body image slavery. If Meaghan could succumb to the pressure to be ridiculously thin than anyone could.
I wanted to fit in and I knew we had a long night of studying ahead of us so I was tempted by the lure of caffeinated social acceptance. But my parents didn't allow me to drink it. There must be a reason why, right? My parents' rules were always fair. If they didn't allow it there must be a darned good reason. So instead of taking my turn at the pop machine I jovially volunteered to get ice.*
When, a few hours later, I saw Meaghan scarf down an entire pizza I worried about bulimia. When it was clear she wasn't excusing herself to barf up the pizza and was, instead, voraciously digging through magazines for information on recent political issues in Italy (her country) my eyes fell on the three bottles of Diet Pepsi she drank. Diet Pepsi = lots of energy and skinny. Diet Pepsi good.
Close to midnight my energy was fading fast. I was exhausted. I felt like a stupid little kid because the other girls were still hopped up high on Junior UN Regional Finals enthusiasm and I could hardly keep my eyes open. I knew. I knew their secret. Caffeine. And lots of it.
The next morning Jesse Moran offered to make a Diet Pepsi run. I went with her - to get the ice. She had to hit two pop machines because one only had three Diet Pepsis and "we" would need a lot more than that to fuel our big day.
I was still tired. We stayed up until two in the morning and had to be ready to hit the deck at 8:30 AM. Four teen-aged girls + one bathroom = up by 6 AM.
When Jesse and I returned with the pop and ice I watched as the three girls transformed from bleary-eyed zombies with attitude to bright-eyed, sharp-minded, chirpy girls ready to take on the United Nations.
I knew I had to be alert and on my A-game for the debates that day.
So just like that, in an instant, I drank from Satan's cup.
My first reaction was a gag-reflex. That stuff was awful. Worse than the Drambuie my father let me taste. Worse than beets. It was disgusting. Vile. How could these girls so happily ingest bottle upon bottle of the stuff? I figured it was an acquired taste.
I was right. Two months later I was on a first name basis with our local 7-11 proprietor because I was using my lunch money to sneak two or three bottles a day before and after school. Yep. I skipped lunch so that I could have Diet Pepsi. All the girls did.
I think my parents knew but didn't want to admit to themselves that their daughter had a drinking problem, a habit. Surely not their daughter, not their baby, not their good girl. That Meaghan Cartwright girl, yeah, they could see that. Mrs. Cartwright was quite plump and Meaghan was headed in that direction. Mr. Cartwright was a high-energy guy who coached water polo and told off-color jokes. Meaghan seeking refuge from her mother's DNA and hope for her dad's high energy in diet pop seemed logical. But their daughter, their Trillian? No way. Not Trillian.
Not surprisingly, that's when the insomnia kicked into a higher gear. I'd never been a good sleeper but after I started the Diet Pepsi habit I was functioning, very well, thank you, on three-four hours per night. Instead of sleeping I read, I studied, I sketched, I wrote, I worried about not sleeping, I worried about my parents finding out I was drinking not only pop, but even worse, diet pop. I vowed to quit.
Each day I tried to quit, and each day I failed. I wanted it. By that time it was more than trying to fit in with a peer group. It was my cold, fizzy, caffeinated friend who was always there for me and never judged me.
I was 5'11" and a late bloomer. I had barely a hint of boob and only slight curves of hips and butt. I was all arms and legs and shoulders.
Some tall girls are willowy. Some tall girls are statuesque. I was gawky. So the fact that I was losing a little weight wasn't obvious to most people. But then Summer arrived and that meant a lot of time at the pool, at the Lake and on boats. I should have been worried about my parents noticing I'd lost weight but instead I obsessed over how I was going to procure Diet Pepsi and hide it from my parents.
On my last day of school I arrived home to a big surprise. My mother took me to celebrate with a shopping trip. For Summer clothes. I'd morphed into a thrift-store shopper with what I thought was quite a snappy environmentally responsible style consisting of my brother's old jeans, sweatshirts and concert t-shirts mixed with retro goodies I found at the Salvation Army store and vintage stores. I clung to the illusion that I was above fashion and that I didn't care what the other girls at school wore. Well. I cared. But I couldn't care. I knew my parents would never, ever shell out money for designer jeans or expensive trendy clothes that I wouldn't be caught dead in after only a few wearings because they were no longer popular at school. My way of circumnavigating the whole perilous social realm of high school fashion was to plead disdain for conformity and proclaim environmental consciousness in the form of recycled clothes. I'd like to say I was an early adapter in the whole green movement, but the sad truth is that I did it only as a way to hide the fact that I wasn't cool enough to pull off the high school clothing trends. The environmental benefits were merely a by-product of the fact that my parents were practical. And saving every penny for my college education. My mother used to say, "Do you want expensive jeans that will be out of style in a month or do you want text-books for your college classes?"
So. To be greeted with a shopping trip was a huge stinking deal. I should have been excited but I was panic stricken. Shopping? For summer clothes? Today? Now? Oh no. Oh no. Shorts. T-shirts. BATHING SUITS!!!! She's going to see me, she's going to realize I've lost weight! She's going to find out I've been skipping lunch and drinking Diet Pepsi!!!
Somehow, some way, I got through that shopping trip. I didn't let her see me in the clothes we bought. I affected the best performance as a teen-ager embarrassed to be shopping with her mother that I could. "Moth-er, puhleeeze, I can try on clothes by myself!" "Mum, can I have a little privacy? I'm not a baby anymore." "No, I'm not coming out, I hate these shorts." I felt bad. I didn't really feel that way. I liked my mother. I wasn't embarrassed by her. I trusted her taste and her opinions. I didn't like behaving like a stupid typical teen-ager. But better that than to let her discover what I'd been doing for the past few months.
After that I stopped. Cold turkey. I just stopped drinking Diet Pepsi. The first few days were difficult, but once I got that monkey off my back I felt a lot better. By the time we went on Summer vacation I was caffeine-free and my ribs and hip bones were no longer jutting out from under layers of clothes.
Whew. I felt good, empowered. Happy. Proud of myself. I did it. I did it all by myself. I got myself into it and I got myself out of it. A real mark of maturity. A test on the road to adulthood and I passed. Sure, I caved into temptation but I triumphed over it, too.
Then I went to college.
By the time first semester mid-terms hit I was on a four-a-day minimum. I had a roommate who drank more than I did. I assuaged my shame and guilt by comparing my habit to hers. Yeah, I drank more than I should, but I was nowhere near as bad as my roommate who needed, yes, needed, at least two Diet Pepsis before she could even contemplate a shower much less classes. I wasn't that bad. I was fine. I could control it. I could quit any time. I knew I could. I quit before and I could quit again.
Yadda yadda yadda, anorexia, yadda yadda yadda, a new lease on life and health, yadda yadda yadda it's been a very, very long time since I've been an habitual Diet Pepsi drinker.
I can quit any time. I've done it before and I can do it again.
I am surprised what a slippery slope it is. One day pop wasn't on my mind at all, not even on the periphery, and the next I'm on a two or three a day habit. There's obvious psychology to it. I'm in a time of serious stress. My life has been turned upside down. Nothing makes sense and every buoy I had to hang onto to keep from drowning in my life is gone. With each passing day of unemployment I sink further under water.
And for some reason, some deep, latent psychological reason, I'm seeking solace in my old friend carbonated caffeine and artificial sweetener. I suppose it's because it takes me back to a time when I was under the delusion that I fit in, that I was accepted. Sure, I fit in with the nerd herd and girls with body image issues, but I fit in. I was accepted. And right now that's what I need most: Acceptance. Well. What I need most is a job, but what I need to get a job is to be accepted. I get a lot of rejection these days. I apply to jobs and make the calls to ever-farther-flung connections of connections, anyone, anyone who might know someone who might know someone who's in need of someone like me to fill a void in their company. And so far the unanimous response is: rejection.
It's worse than dating. When men reject me it's no big deal. I'm used to it. I expect it. I don't even try anymore. But. Job rejection is different. I realize I am not what men want in a date, a mate or even a one night stand. In a sea of desirable women I'm not a viable option. I understand that. But. When it comes to the job market, I am legit. Too legit to quit. I am a viable, skilled and experienced professional. I have career cred. I should be accepted. Employers should want me. So the rejection is tough to handle.
Lapsing into a pattern of behavior that "worked" for me when I needed to be accepted. It made me feel up! and sharp! and accepted! It helped me help take my Junior United Nations team to the state finals. It helped me get through several grueling 18-credit-hour semesters of college. It helped me be thin when my body finally caught up to my height and I sprouted boobs and hips. Huge boobs and hips. It helped me work 12 -14 hour days when I was trying to prove myself as a young professional upstart. It helped me stay awake through endless after-parties and rehearsals when I was dating Rock Star. It helped me manage transatlantic time differences and no time for breakfast mornings. Crazy, chaotic and ridiculous as all that sounds, I was happy during all of it. Really happy. Even when it all crashed I didn't regret a minute of it. Still don't. So. I suppose it's natural, obvious, that I would reach out for the one constant in all of that: A cold, carbonated, caffeinated, artificially sweetened friend.
*And thus began a lifetime of trying to stay good by making myself indispensable with a diversionary task. I once spent an entire semester of college avoiding a contact high from roommate's pot smoke by making a run for pizza, Doritos, Oreos and Slurpees. Not for me, for her. She'd be hungry, soon, and I'd have snacks for her. Why did I do this? Because I wanted to avoid the contact high yet I didn't want her to think I wasn't cool, or that I cared that she smoked weed. I didn't care, but I didn't want to be confined in a small space with her while she did it. I kept my chastity in tact at a party that could have ended very, very differently. There was this older guy I liked, he was an artist (natch), in a band (natch), tall and skinny (natch), sensitive (natch), a little broody (natch), sarcastically hilarious (natch) and was in possession of soulful eyes. There was this party. He was there. There was a lot of booze. Someone might have had a little too much to drink. That someone might have found herself in a bit over her hormonal head thanks to said booze and said guy. Fortunately I wasn't too drunk to remember that I wasn't really "ready" to have sex and I certainly did not want to lose my virginity to a guy who didn't even know my name on the back porch of a frat house. But how, how does a young girl, a young drunk girl, resist the lure of an artistic, broody, sensitive, guitar-playing, sarcastic guy with soulful eyes? And keep some semblance of credibility, at least enough to possibly garner her a date with said soulful-eyed guy? Easy! By diverting attention from a little-too-passionate kiss-gone-horizontal to birth control. "I'll go get a condom!" I far too enthusiastically offered and stepped out into the cold night air. Away from the intoxication of the booze and that guy, I sobered up enough to apprise the situation and leave the scene. I wanted to salvage a possibility with the guy, so I did return, eventually. I was condomless, of course, but diverted the attention from sex to something else all artistic, broody, sensitive, guitar-playing sarcastic guys enjoy as much as sex: Drugs. My stoner roommate was also at that party. When I saw her in the crowd I asked her for pot. She, remembering my altruistic munchie runs, happily obliged. I returned to the guy on the back porch and told him I couldn't score a condom but I did score something else. He rolled a couple joints, it became obvious that I was nowhere near cool enough, mature enough or pretty enough to be anywhere near him, and that was that. But the helpful diversion method saved me from the inevitable angst that would have followed had I had sex with him. And no, even now, I don't regret it. He did go on to play in a semi-famous band - one of those bands that never quite makes it, always the opener, never the main event types of bands. No regrets. Several years later the Universe threw me karma bones. One for not giving into booze soaked hormones: Rock Star. And other one for getting munchies for my roommate: She ended up in a really fantastic career that offers her ins for incredible music and art events and she's never forgotten me, always willing to share the wealth of fun her job offers her. Consequently to this day I maintain that the diversionary make-yourself-useful approach to peer pressure is a viable and even good plan.
6:59 AM
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
So, a Presbyterian, a confused agnostic and a Hindu walk into a Bris.
I wish that was the start of an off color joke.
It's not.
Yet again life imitates Seinfeldian art.
After three daughters, a miscarriage and a few unreproductive years my friends were blessed with a bouncing baby boy. The mother, my friend, spent the last four months of the pregnancy in bed per doctor's orders. The pregnancy wasn't deemed high risk, but, the kid was in a "compromising position" and so my friend was told to go home and go to bed for four months. With three young daughters to care for this was no easy task for her. I have to hand it to her husband, he really manned up and did a great job dealing with all things domestic and child-rearing during those four months. I have deeper respect and appreciation for him, now. He redeemed himself for some of his previous jerk-like behavior.
One positive aspect about my unemployment is that since I was laid-off for two of those four months I had time on my hands and could help while my friend was stuck in bed.
We've kind of drifted over the past five years. We see each other once, maybe twice a year. We communicate mainly by e-mail. She quit working after the arrival of daughter #2, they moved to the far flung suburbs and, well, we just didn't have a whole lot in common anymore. And she didn't have time for me, the single friend "all the way" in the city.
I understand. Three young children take up a lot of time and energy. I get it. And of my friends she was the least critical of me regarding my singleness. And she's never flaunted her husband's salary and the fact that she doesn't "have" to work at me. In fact she repeatedly confides that they struggle without her paycheck and that she'll have to go back to work once the kids are in school full time.
So when I found out about her bed-bound confinement I felt slightly more compassion than I would for some of my other mommy-land friends.
One of our mutual friends was on bed-rest during the last two months of her last pregnancy. She and her husband had one three-year-old child at the time. When the doctor confined her to bed for two months she went home, put the nanny on 24 hour live-in status (the nanny was already taking care of their three-year-old 8 hours/day...don't ask me why since the mother doesn't work...), hired a local chef-service to do their cooking and spent two months in bed shopping online. She already had weekly maid service. Oh, and she had her personal trainer come to the house to perform "low impact, no strain toning" on her. I think it was mainly massage. But I'm not sure what went on there and I don't want to know. Though she did look incredibly fit just a few weeks after her delivery, so, maybe there's some kind of magic low-impact bed-workout secret for wealthy mothers-to-be.
But for my recent four-months-in-bed friend there would be no nanny, no maid service, no chef service, no personal trainer for her. And since I wasn't working for the last two of her four months in bed I was able to help her and her husband. I was happy to help. I adore their girls and it was great to have something to do, some useful way to spend some of my days. And it was nice to reconnect with my friend.
Okay. So. The big day arrived and with minimal pain or effort out popped a healthy 8 pound boy. Yay.
I received an email with photos of the boy just moments after his birth. A little too much information for my taste, but you know, the miracle of birth and all that.
Two days later I received, um, I'm not sure what to call it. An invitation, of sorts, to attend the baby's brit malah. I thought this was a private, sacred ritualistic thing reserved for family and maybe one or two very, and I mean very close friends. In spite of the time I spent with them the past few months I didn't consider myself to be close enough to them to include me in this sacred rite of passage. I figured they were just being polite because of all that I did for them the past few months. (Or maybe they were hoping I'd help look after the girls during the ceremony.) And, I dunno, I thought my agnosticism/Gentile birth excluded me from attending. I'm not up on Hebrew law, but the presence of a Gentile-by-birth-turned-agnostic-turned-confused at a sacred penis cutting seems somehow, well, wrong. I figured the "right" thing to do was to just, pardon the horrible pun, blow off the bris. They didn't really want me there and I certainly didn't want to be there. Right? I mean, don't those seem like logical assumptions?
Okay, well, within a few hours of the brit malah announcement I had emails from several friends. Who also received the brit malah "invitation." Some of my friends were all, "uh-uh. No way. We're not going." "Can you believe this? That custom is just disgusting, why would anyone invite people to witness it?" A lot of the men were very vocal in their refusal to attend, "those things make me really uncomfortable" was the overwhelming response from the husbands.
So then I felt bad for my friends, the new parents. Our mutual Gentile friends were behaving very Gentile. Okay, since I'm slagging them off anyway, I'll just come right out and say what I really think: Our mutual Catholic friends were behaving very uptight and superior.
In the end the only three of us who attended were the three non-Catholic Gentile friends. A Presbyterian woman, a Hindu man, and me, a lapsed Presby-Methodist-turned-agnostic-turned-confused woman. An unlikely but well-intentioned group determined to represent the kind, non-judgmental, love-all, accept all contingent of the Gentile population. With each passing email of disdain and contempt from our friends our "Hey, we don't do this in our religion and we don't really understand it, but that doesn't mean we think it's wrong. We refuse to mock that which we do not understand," stance became more adamant. After several days of increasingly intense email debate it became clear that the three of us would attend the brit malah. There would be no blowing off the bris.
Okay. So. What does one take to a bris? My rule of gift giving thumb is: If Hallmark makes a card for it and you're attending in person a gift of some sort is required. I trotted off to the Hallmark store, the biggest in the city, to see if they carried brit malah cards.
Okay. Dis is Chicago. A very Catholic-centric city. So maybe that's why the women working there a) didn't know what a brit malah is; and b) didn't know if Hallmark makes cards for one. When I explained what a bris is to them they were a) embarrassed; b) aghast; and c) certain that Hallmark would never, ever make a card for that. They suggested either a generic "new baby boy" card or, oddly, a Christening card.
They had loads of Christening/baptism cards. A whole huge section. Probably close to 50 or more cards for welcoming a new baby into the Catholic or protestant faith. Clearly, by my rule of gift-giving thumb, a gift, and a lavish one at that, is required for a Christening/Baptism.
One of the Hallmark ladies, I presume the manager, had an eureka moment as we were pawing through the religious card section. "What about a Bar Mitzvah card?"
Seriously? I mean, really, seriously? My response was to laugh, I thought she was joking. When I looked across the aisle and saw her proudly proffering a Bar Mitzvah card I realized she wasn't kidding. The woman was Hell-bent on selling me a card and the closest thing she could find was a Bar Mitzvah card. So dammit, she was going to sell the Hell out of that card. She was not going to let a customer leave her Hallmark store empty-handed. It's a Gold Crown Hallmark store. They have a reputation and standards to uphold. No occasion, event, life episode shall be cardless. That's the Hallmark ethos, the Hallmark way.
We finally settled on a generic "blessed event" card. I wasn't entirely comfortable with it because it looked kind of Gentile, but it was the only "blessed event" card without a cross or Jesus scripture on it, and after all their effort to help me find the perfect card I felt obligated to buy something.
After I left the store, blessed event card in hand, I pondered the blessed event. It is a blessed event, I guess, right? I mean, it's a big deal and it's religious so it must be a blessed event. But. I dunno. I'm not a guy and I'm not Jewish so I can't possibly really understand the circumcision thing, but is it kind of weird to consider the cutting of foreskin a blessed event? I mean, what's blessed about it?
I realize that's a loaded question and I'm admitting a very naive and ignorant point of view, but, um, I mean, where's the blessed in that event? I know. I know. Adam. Original sin. Completion of the male. Controlling animalistic passions. I know "why" in the ritualistic sense. I'm not that naive. I have two semesters of world religion and a semester of Bible-as-literature under my academic belt. I know just enough to be filled with confusion and questions and a deep desire for acceptance and respect for other peoples' religious beliefs and customs.
But the "blessed event" card nagged at me. Somehow it just didn't seem right. And the illustration of the baby kind of looked like a girl. It was supposed to be a generic blessed event baby but the Hallmark illustrator clearly was thinking "girl blessed event" the day they sketched up that card.
With four weddings behind me this year it's very likely there will be at least one or two blessed events on my near horizon so I stored the card away. This left me with two problems: 1) no card, Hallmark apparently doesn't make a bris card or at least one sold in Chicago, so, 2) is a gift required, and if so, what?
I was thinking a generic new baby gift. Safe. Appropriate. He is a new baby. But one of my Gentile bris going companions thought that a gift for the parents is more appropriate for a bris. She looked at it from a different perspective: We're congratulating them on having a boy-child.
Oh.
I hadn't thought of that angle.
What does one give to congratulate the birth of a boy-child? Season tickets to a sporting event? Power tools? A six-pack of beer?
We turned to the third bris going companion. Himself a man. But. A Hindu man. And a friend of the father of the baby in question. His take on the whole thing was even more spiritually skewed and confused than ours. He felt an offering to a God of some sort was in order, perhaps even a sacrifice. Failing that, at the very least food, lit candles, and a prayer of some significance.
He was trying to find a card, too. He took his search online. He was trying to find an appropriate prayer or poem. He came up empty. For him, all things sentimental lead to Ghandi. He found a few Ghandi quotes that were nice, generic, but nice.
Since our friends are on the secular side of Judaism we figured they'd be down with Ghandi. But we were also very aware that their families would be in attendance. And the husband, the father of the circumcisee, has parents who are very, very, very strict about their Judaism. They keep Kosher. They are not at all happy with what they deem as their son's lapse of faith.
From there the conversation took an inappropriate but humorous turn. What would be useful, a practical gift? Maybe a box of Band-aids? Gauze? Antibiotic cream? Condoms and some KY?
Among us we knew that Elijah is an important figure at the bris and so we set off to find Elijah-based prayers or scripture.
I didn't come up with much that I liked. What I realized is that there's apparently a need, a market, for bris cards, prayers, gifts, a Gentile go-to guide for what to do, what to say and what to give should they find themselves attending a bris.
I decided to buy a bottle of Kosher wine for the parents and cute little plush baseball rattle for the baby. And I would make my own card.
After a several hours and a few glasses of wine (Kosher, to get me in the spirit of the event) I still had next to nothing for the card.
"Thousands of years ago Adam made a bad decision; So today you pay for it with a circumcision. Mazel Tov. Love, Trillian."
"Today your blessed journey to manhood begins With prayers and wine and a snip of your foreskin. Mazel Tov. Love, Trillian"
"A sweet baby boy, so innocent and pure, Born into a world filled with tough decisions. Blessed is he whose choices are set and sure. Congratulations on your circumcision. Mazel Tov. Love, Trillian."
"Adam sinned with Eve and everything changed, God looked around the Garden of Eden and realized That things were not going as He arranged. So from then on every boy had to be circumcised.
Fear not, little man, it's all for the best. It might seem like a weird and cruel way for your life to begin, But life isn't easy, this is the first of many tests. Soon you'll learn the least among them is losing your foreskin. Mazel Tov. xo, Trillian."
"You won't believe me now, amidst the embarrassment and pain, But one day you'll thank your parents for the ritual brit malah. Your Gentile friends will envy the unfettered joy you gain, When you reveal the full Monty that'll make the chicks hollah. Mazel Tov. Trillian."
"Eight days old, time to learn to take it like a man, Today we snip your dick so you won't be damned. Congratulations on your circumcision. xo Trillian"
"Congratulations on your circumcision. You won't regret this painful decision. You'll learn, when you're older and desiring sin Chicks dig guys without foreskin. Mazel Tov, Trillian"
"Catholic, Protestant, Muslim, Lutheran, Pagan, Mormon, Muslim, Taoist, Buddhist, Wicca, Hindu. So many choices but your fate is is pre-ordained, With a snip of the foreskin you're among God's chosen few.
Congratulations on your circumcision. xo Trillian"
A Haiku for the new Jew "Sharp blade on soft flesh. Tears of pain and joy rain down. The Bris is complete."
"A new baby boy with a new baby penis, Congratulations on the event of your bris. xo love Trillian."
"Congratulations on the event of your bris, You're a man now, with a circumcised penis. No longer damned, you're among God's chosen few, You without foreskin, a circumcised Jew. Mazel Tov, xo Trillian"
You get the drift. I'm going straight to Hell. And Hallmark probably isn't a viable employment option for me. Nor is a Gentile go-to guide for things Jewish.
I settled on a very generic "Congratulations on your new baby boy, may his life be filled with peace, love and happiness."
That's okay, right? All safe and good intentioned, right? I mean, that's very interfaith and worldly wish, who could argue with any of those sentiments?
Whew. Okay.
Admittedly, obviously, I knew nothing about the ritual other than it's the ceremonial circumcision of a male child on his eighth day of life. I assumed it was performed by a rabbi or some official Jewish circumciser and I assumed there would be a lot of sacred Hebrew scripture reading and that would be that.
Boy did I underestimate the significance of the brit malah.
The three of us drove in from the city. We hit unexpected traffic so we were cutting it pretty close (pardon the unintended pun). We arrived at the last possible second. I didn't have a lot of time to take in the festive transformation before the ceremony began, but, the house was decorated, the living room furniture was removed and several rows of chairs were rented, several tables of food were spread throughout the living room, dining room and kitchen, bottles upon bottles of Kosher wine were on hand, and a big, fancy table/altar thing with a very heavily adorned basket was at the front of the room. There was a big fancy chair and I noticed that the large Warhol lithograph that usually occupied the wall space behind the big fancy new chair was no longer adorning the wall. I suppose a giant luridly colored graphic of the Brooklyn Bridge isn't the most appropriate backdrop for a religious ceremony, but then again...
Let me back up a minute. The Presbyterian and I spent the entire two hour trek to the suburbs wondering why they do this at the house and not at the Temple. Obviously we're very Christian-based Gentiles and we're used to our religious ceremonies taking place at a church with an altar and parking lot in place, all nice and convenient-like. When we finally arrived at our friends' house our point was punctuated by the fact that the street was lined with cars and we had to park three blocks from the house. We dressed up because we figured we were supposed to dress up so the Presbyterian and I were in heels and the Hindu was in slippery bottomed dress shoes. And it was chucking down rain. That tidy Christian church with it's convenient altar and parking lot doesn't sound like such a bad idea now, does it? And no chairs have to be rented and no furniture or wall decor has to be removed.
We finally arrived, soaked and sore-footed, deposited our bottles, plural, of wine on a table with a lot of other bottles of wine and put our cards and gifts on the gift table. We took the last three seats in the back row of rented chairs. There were programs printed and placed on the chairs. (Like a church bulletin.) It listed the parents, the older sisters, the grandparents, the aunts, the uncles, the cousins, the, I kid you not, OB-GYN, and all the participants in the ceremony. That's when I realized this was to be an elaborate ceremony.
Within minutes of our arrival in walked an older woman carrying the new baby. This was the first most of us saw of the new baby and so we all craned our necks to see the kid. He was the star of the show, of course, but even more so than at a Christian baptism. At those ordeals people look at the baby, smile beatifically as if offering a prayer and think, "Awwww, how cute, what a sweet little baby. My, Susan isn't losing that pregnancy weight very quickly, is she? Hmmmm, I wonder if there will be cake in the fellowship hall after the service." At this event I got the feeling I wasn't the only one thinking, "Awwww, how cute, what a sweet little baby. Poor bugger, he has no clue what's about to happen to him. Should I smile beatifically? That hardly seems appropriate considering he's about to have the flesh cut off his penis...poor little guy..."
Christian upbringing made obvious in 3-2-1: All I could think about was Jesus' entry into Jerusalem and that the only thing missing was a donkey and palms for us to regale him. No, no, I am not comparing a circumcision to a crucifixion. I'm just saying, the overall tone and feeling of the entry of the kid into the room seemed a lot more anointed, a lot more auspicious than your average Christening. And I'm guessing that's because everyone there knows what's going to happen next. A painful procedure involving a penis. I mean, let's just have out with it. Where, in any other realm, would it be acceptable to proffer up a newborn's penis for mutilation while a bunch of adults watch? And then celebrate with food, wine and merriment? I mean, really, call me a naive, judgmental, ignorant Gentile, but this is just kind of weird. Remove the guy in the front of the room wearing obvious religious garb and you've got a solid case for child abuse. Seems to me if any skin is to be cut it should be done in the cold sterility and privacy of a hospital surgery room. And yet, eight days after a Jewish baby is born this is accepted and even regaled as a beautiful custom.
Okay.
Christian upbringing once again repressed. Many of the guests started saying Baruch Haba. I had to look that up after I got home. Because at the event I thought they were saying Brush Abba. Which immediately sent my mind wandering, trying to think of the most appropriate ABBA song. SOS? Fernando? Super Trouper? I realized that, thankfully, I don't know many ABBA songs, and yet, oddly, why don't I know more ABBA songs? Should I know more ABBA songs, if for no other reason than comedic irony purposes? I didn't know how to say Baruch Haba and I didn't think I should attempt to fake it. God probably wouldn't like me trying to fake some sacred greeting. "Pffft, typical gentile, always trying to fit in, always trying to be polite, never wanting to offend anyone and all the while offending the very people they're trying to not offend." So I just tried to think of the words to Super Trouper and smiled as beatifically as I could.
When the woman finally made it to the table/basket/chair she handed over the baby to my friend, the baby's mother, she in turn passed the kid to what I presume were grandparents, aunts, uncles, and finally an older man, I presume a grandfather of the baby to be snipped. The baby was placed in the elaborate basket and then the basket and baby were placed in the big fancy chair.
The grandfather lifted the baby's, um, "dress" and the kid's diaper was undone. The father of the baby and the religious guy, I later learned not a rabbi but a mohel, a circumciser specialist, started saying what I assume are prayers or blessings for the baby.
At this point the middle daughter, aged 5, and also the most outspoken and active of the three daughters, was having difficulty standing still and keeping quiet. She was very excited about the festivities surrounding her new younger brother. She'd been tugging at her mother's dress and whispering to her mother. As the father and mohel were mid-blessing she asked, out loud, loud enough so that the neighbors three houses down could hear her, what all of us Gentiles were thinking, "I said, when (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) are (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) they (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) going (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) to (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) cut (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) off (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) his (dramatic pause only five-year-olds can manage) wiener?"
Okay. How the heck am I supposed to not laugh at that? When in life am I going to be sitting in a room full of strangers with a naked baby sitting in a big fancy chair and a five-year-old asking, yelling, "When are they going to cut off his wiener?" Probably never again.
The three of us Gentiles in the back row were doing everything we could to not laugh. I mean everything. Because no one, not one other person in the room, seemed to think the little girl's query was in any way humorous. We three Gentiles seemed to be the only ones who thought it was hysterical. This is probably why we're not God's chosen. This is yet another reason why I'm going straight to Hell. If I believed in Hell, that is. The good news is that if there's a Hell it's now been confirmed that I'll know at least two people there, a Presbyterian and a Hindu.
The bad news is that we'll probably spend eternity listening to ABBA.
Everyone just ignored the outburst as if it didn't happen. That's some kind of spiritual higher plane. Or maybe that's normal behavior for a five-year-old at a bris. Maybe this happens all the time. Maybe that's even part of the ceremony.
Based on my friend's (the baby mama) crimson red cheeks I don't think that's the case.
Okay, finally, it was time to cut off the baby's wiener. I mean foreskin. The guy I presume was a grandfather held the baby's legs apart. The baby either knew something fishy was going on or he just doesn't like his legs being splayed apart and his manhood exposed to a bunch of strangers. Oh yes, we could see it. The baby was elevated in that basket on the chair, even in the back row there was a very clear view of, um, it. I wanted to look away. I really did. I didn't want to see "it" and I certainly did not want to see "it" mutilated.
I mean, I've seen the grown-up result of this process and I gotta say, given the choice I prefer circumcised over uncircumcised, and given that preference I suppose the adult thing to do would be to accept that this process has to happen and I should at least be aware of what men go through to become the "sort" of men I prefer. But I dunno. That seems like way too much information.
18 years from now I could be invited to this kid's high school graduation party. I think you know where I'm going with this. I really, really, really do not want to think about this day, this event, when the kid is 18 and heading off to college.
Gotta hand it to the mahel, he was quick. Blessedly quick. I was surprised they didn't use any sort of anesthetic, maybe some of that spray numbing stuff or a lotion or even a swab of something. Nope. He just went in and snipped away. Not only that, he did it with a flourish. All that was missing was a "Voila!" at the end.
And then I learned a few things about my Hindu friend. He's squeamish. Very squeamish. And he's not circumcised. I learned these things as grabbed his crotch, let out an audible "eeeah," the color left his face, and he fell into my lap. Still holding his crotch. Mama mia.
The people sitting across the aisle of rented chairs and in front of us looked to see what the commotion was.
The dark skinned Hindu guest was whiter than the fair-skinned Scottish Gentile guest seated next to him and he was in her lap, tongue hanging out and clenching his crotch. The fair skinned Gentile girl rubbed his shoulders and patted his head while the other Gentile woman got up to find water for the fainted Hindu.
Maybe our Catholic friends were right. Maybe this is a rude and savage custom. Maybe us Gentiles have no place here. Maybe we three got it all wrong. Maybe we never should have attempted to pay respect to our friends and their customs and their new baby. Maybe we should have just sent flowers.
The ceremony continued. The baby was handed to his mother. There were a lot of what I presume were prayers or blessings but I couldn't quite make out what exactly was being said or going on, what with a Hindu passed out in my lap and a wailing baby and all. The baby cried. A lot. Wine was given to all the people up at the "altar." Including the baby.
I mean, the poor little guy, geeze, what a nightmare. There he is, fresh out of confinement in the womb, first he's cut away from his mother and now this? And worse, in front of a room full of strangers? Eight days old and the kid already learned how unfair life is. I mean, couldn't they at least give the kid a local anesthetic? What would be the harm in that?
The Presbyterian quickly returned with water. And while the baby and his family imbibed on wine and the other guests said/sang some song/poem, my friend was revived, and, with him still holding his crotch and sweat pouring down his forehead we took the opportunity to excuse ourselves to the hallway in hopes that he could get himself together and get over the apparent shock of the whole thing.
Okay. I need to explain something about the Hindu in my lap. I don't really know him very well. He's a colleague of my friend's husband. Over the years we've attended the same parties at their house and a few times a group of us had drinks after work. He lives in the city and once he gave me a ride to a barbecue at our friends' house in the suburbs. We're friendly but we're not "close."
A little more background: He was born in India and raised in London. He's lived in Chicago via New York for over 20 years. Normally there's just slight hint of a British schooled Indian native accent to his voice. As he came-to a bit more he blurted out, in the most back-alley just-off-the-plane from Bombay cockney accent I've heard since my last trip to London, "What the bloody Hell?! They just bloody cut the thing?" He said it louder than the five-year-old's query about cutting off the wiener. I couldn't see into the living room, but given the sudden palpable tenseness in the air I sensed that a lot of eye rolling and daggers were being sent our way. Still in shock he said, "Savages! These people are savages! Why do you want it cut off anyway? What is the purpose of this? It works fine with the foreskin!"
Just so we're all clear on the über comedic aspect of this, imagine Apu from the Simpsons being voiced by an English guy imitating an Indian guy. Got that aural imagery? Okay, now, imagine that voice yelling, "Savages! These people are savages! Why do you want it cut off anyway? What is the purpose of this? It works fine with the foreskin!"
While he clenches his crotch and two women administer water and cold water soaked paper towels to his forehead.
All that Ghandi enlightenment flew straight out the window. So much for his Hindu higher plane of consciousness.
I'll grant you, it was pretty, well, savage. I guess. For wont of a better term. I don't even have one and for a minute there I was "tensed" up in empathetic pain. But the bigger problem is that this was our first bris. None of us have sons so we've never faced the whole circumcision issue head on. (I swear I typed that without realizing the pun until several minutes later.)
There was no doubt in my mind at that point that our Catholic friends were right. This was no place for prudish Gentiles or squeamish, uncircumcised Hindus.
It was still pouring rain outside but we led him out to the back deck anyway. We just wanted to get him as far away from the ceremony as quickly as possible. We stood out there a long time. A very, very long time. He cursed and yelled all the while doubled over in sympathetic pain. I stole a glance inside and saw that the party had begun. I figured we could make a break for it, a polite and discreet departure.
I found my friend, the mother of the baby and motioned that we were leaving. She came over to see if we were okay. "We" were okay, ish. She felt bad for our friend. "I thought you knew what happens. I should have explained it to you," she said to the squeamish uncircumcised Hindu.
"No, I knew, I knew. I just, didn't think it would be...so...so...abrupt."
Some of the male guests came over and jocularly patted him on the back.
"First bris, eh boy?"
"Snip snip!" (Motioning of scissors.)
"We can have the mehel take care of yours for you, while he's here might as well get that little problem of yours resolved!"
"Snip snip!"
One of the guys tried to offer an olive branch of understanding. "Don't your people circumcise?"
Okay.
At this point the Gentile women in the crowd got a little uncomfortable. We'd already learned waaaaaaay more than we wanted to know about this guy. And now mocking and cultural understanding of penises was going to be the topic of conversation? Enough. Enough already. This whole thing was spiraling out of hand and I felt bad for my friend, the new mother. This was her son's big day and the non-Jewish attendees were distracting the attention away from her son.
Inappropriate.
So we left.
Maybe we're immature. Maybe we're unenlightened. Maybe we're just really bad people. But. That being the case that is the first and last bris I will ever attend.
9:29 AM
