Nervous Girl

Happy Slightly-Used-But-Still-in-Excellent-Condition Year!

And let us pretend that I didn't resolve to blog every single day I had access to a computer, shall we?

Actually, I didn't make any resolutions, per se, in the sense of writing down a list of habits I hope to break or acquire or accomplishments I hope to log. Instead, I'm looking to continue to advance on the goals I identified late last year, before my husband's hardware issue and the holidays derailed me: write, and hopefully earn my bread that way; feed my body good food and exercise it so it will be healthy; and have my home clean and organized enough so that I can welcome guests at any moment without embarrassment. But I am not resolving to do these things.

I dislike resolutions, because once they're broken, they're broken. You can patch them back together again, but I can see every time I look at them where I've clumsily taped them together. They start to seem not worth it: if I can't do it perfectly, why bother? And it's only taken me forty-something years to realize that I can't do it perfectly. I'll never do it perfectly. But I have to do something. It makes me too unhappy not to.

So I'll continue, I hope, to lurch forward: writing most days, eating mostly healthfully and exercising more than I used to, cleaning enough to make my house welcoming but not enough to feel like a drudge. I'll forgive myself in advance for the inevitable slip-ups. I'll not worry if I can't see every step of the way to the goal I hope to reach. I won't even worry if I can't completely identify the goal, as long as I can identify a generally correct direction in which to lurch. I'll do things that make sense to me. I will remember that I have sense, even if someone tries to convince me otherwise.

I'll make a lot of soup. Not because it necessarily advances any goals, but because I really like soup. I'll pray for people I dislike, because it really does seem to help unclench the tight little fist of my heart--and who knows but that it helps them become more likable? I'll stop saving my good underwear for an important occasion. I am reasonably sure I'll be able to buy more "good" underwear if needed. Also, I struggle to imagine the occasion for which I would be saving that good underwear. My husband sees my drawers almost every day. And any situation in which a wider audience sees me in my panties will probably have overriding components that render the condition of my underwear irrelevant: a public mental breakdown in which I strip down in the mall fountain, for example, or a nuclear attack in which my outer clothes are vaporized.

I will not attempt to eat collard greens ever again. I hate collard greens. Every several months I try them because they are good for me, or someone tells me I would love collard greens the way their grandmother prepares them. No. I am here to tell you that God's grandmother could prepare collard greens and I would not like them. Life is too short to waste shoveling collard greens past my lips. (I have not given up on kale, however).

All of which is a way of saying I'm hoping to be kinder to myself, and hopefully to others, too. And if I manage to accomplish that most of the time, it will be a very good year indeed. I wish the same for you. Let me know if you want some soup.

Twelve things to remember for your photo shoot

1. If you can't manage to get your kitchen cleaned for the professional photographer for the Big Fancy National Magazine, you may as well concede that your kitchen will never, ever, be clean. Stop pretending like you were just about to mop.
2. The spinach and feta omelet is not the best choice for breakfast prior to the photo shoot.
3. Step away from the horizontal striped sweater. Trust me. Go back and put on the solid color one in that nice flattering shade of coral. Good.
4. That's not your sweater blousing out around your waist. That is what is colloquially known as a "muffin top."
5. No, the dieting you did yesterday between noon and four wasn't particularly effective.
6. If you were ever in a sorority, even if it was 20 years ago, your head will automatically tilt to the right if anybody points a camera at you.
7. Only you, and not the photographer or his assistant, can hear your dead mother's voice telling you to stand up straight; this is why the photographer keeps telling you in vain to "relax."
8. It is very difficult to suck in one's cheeks, suck in one's gut, and smile simultaneously.
9. But not impossible.
10. However, you will look like you're in rigor mortis. Relax.
11. Magazine photographers make you sign a waiver saying you won't sue the magazine or photographer for anything having to do with the picture, including the national publication of your jowls and muffin top in a magazine some of your ex-boyfriends might read.
12. Remember to start diet at least 36 hours before any future photo shoots.

When Snacks Attack!

The title of this post is the title I jokingly gave to the Word file in which I saved an essay I had written about dealing with my daughter's peanut allergy. I wrote the essay with the intention of submitting it via e-mail to Newsweek's "My Turn" column. I wrote it, edited it, re-edited it, and submitted it all without leaving my chair, because I knew if I saved it and looked at it later, I'd never have the nerve to submit it.

And they took it.

I hadn't told anyone about the submission, because the odds of getting published are pretty slim. That, and the fact that my phone has Caller ID, were the only things that convinced me I wasn't being punk'd when the editor from Newsweek called. I don't remember too much about the phone call, because my attention was focused on not sounding like a hick from the Midwest, which I am not. I am a hick from Western New York who happens to live in the Midwest.

I do remember her asking me if I was still interested in having the essay published, like maybe I would have decided, in the two months since its submission, that Newsweek is a little beneath me. I remember her telling me what Newsweek pays for these essays and restraining myself from telling her I'd have done it for free (which, now that I know there's money involved, I absolutely will NOT, because I'm greedy that way). I remember her saying something about four to six weeks (publication date? when she'll call me next? who can say for sure?). And I remember her saying that a photo editor or photographer would call me very soon, because they publish peoples' pictures next to these columns. Full-length pictures.

And a very nice man did call, making preliminary arrangements for the picture taking, which he suggested take place with my daughter in either a supermarket, reading labels, or in my kitchen trying to locate a clear spot on the counter amidst the debris preparing some food. I did have the presence of mind to ask him if he could Photoshop out the dirt. I forgot, however, to suggest that he save himself the trouble and just use a stock photo of Heidi Klum, since people are always mixing us up anyway.

I'm still flabbergasted about the whole thing (not about looking like Heidi Klum, I'm totally used to that). I'll post about what issue it's going to be in when I find out.

Rockabye, Sweet Baby James

My cat is gone.

Not gone, as in dead. At least I hope not. Just gone, collected in a trap by animal control, hopefully to be adopted.

Some of you remember James, the half-Persian kitten abandoned under my deck by his mom.  He was fluffy and beautiful, with piercing blue eyes, and he liked to catch and juggle blind baby moles for us. I think he secretly hoped we would get him a gig as a chef at Benihana, flipping shrimp from the grill into his hat.

I knew we couldn't adopt him (my husband said so). But Animal Control, the first time we called, said that if we had fed him, he was no longer a stray, and therefore not their problem. So we kept feeding him, until we could figure out what to do.

One day a bloody, bald patch appeared above James' eye. We thought he had gotten into a fight, until another patch appeared above his other eye, and then one on his neck. He was looking thinner. It was time to get him to a vet.

I secured a carrier for him, and made an appointment, inquiring as to the likely fees. I gulped when I heard them, but the cost of getting James treated was less than the cost of watching him suffer, so I swallowed the lump in my throat and said okay. But James was wary of the carrier, despite the smoked salmon aroma wafting from within. I couldn't get him to come within 20 feet of it, and I had to cancel the appointment. I asked the vet's receptionist for a Plan B, and she suggested Animal Control again. So I called.

This time, a kindly gentleman listened to my story and said that they would pick James up, get him treated, and if he had a good temperament, adopt him out. He said they couldn't provide me a trap, but as we talked, he heard the kids in the background and said it sounded like I had my hands full, so they would, they would bring a trap and set it.

Hungry James made some sort of contact with the trap that first night (I heard yowling and metal clanging) but didn't get inside. I looked out the back door to see him on the deck, looking at me reproachfully. The kids begged him through the screen to get in the trap, so a doctor could make him all better.  For two days, he would have none of it, but on the third day, he must have been hungry enough to take a stab at getting the food in the trap. When I found him, he was lying down in the trap, next to the empty Friskies can, resignedly awaiting his fate as it started to rain.

I propped a golf umbrella over the cage and called Animal Control. They showed up about an hour later. The van driver accepted without grace my offer of the nearly-full case of cat food and looked at me with contempt as I said goodbye to the cat and told him to be good, to be brave. The driver slung the trap into the van smelling of cat pee and he was gone.

I'm going to call Animal Control after the holiday to see if there's any disposition of James' treatment, and to request that they call me if they're unable to get him adopted. But for now, this is all the kids and I have left of the kitty:

Paging Dr. Starbucks, Refill, STAT!

Breaking medical news: TIME Magazine recently reported that drinking 4 cups of coffee a day reduces the risk of cirrhosis of the liver by 80%. And Reader's Digest referenced studies that suggest that drinking coffee may reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases.

What does this mean to us?

It means that if you've been drinking your coffee, you won't forget that we're scheduled to go out for a drink, your hands won't tremble and drop your drink when you get there, and you'll still have a liver left when you wake up under a barstool the next morning.

In related news: I fell asleep on the couch the other night and woke up to the most horrifying infomercial. I only watched for seconds, but it was clear they were selling some formulation to help cleanse one's bowels. The Medical Authority on the infomercial said that most people are carrying around inside them 5 to 22 pounds of toxic fecal matter, just lining that large intestine.

Got that, people? That roundness around your middle is not fat. It's SHIT! You are literally full of life-destroying, poisonous CRAP! Deadly, sickening POO!  What can be done? Who will save us, besides this Expensive Colonic Cleansing Treatment available only on late night TV?

Well, sure, if you want to eat a healthful, balanced diet rich in fruits and vegetables and high in fiber, maybe that would help some.  But don't forget your old friend coffee! Four life-giving cups a day of that blessed antioxidant brew, and you'll be 5 to 22 pounds lighter in no time.

Coffee. Is there anything it can't do?

Chicks Rule

Let's hear it for the girls....

The Dixie Chicks have a new album out, their first in three years, and several critics regard it as their best ever. I was a big fan of the Chicks long before they pissed off their country music base by saying at a concert in London, "Just so you know, we're ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas."  Now, I don't necessarily require that people agree with my views (unlike, apparently, the fans that started burning the Chicks' CDs), but I do appreciate people with the courage of their convictions. In the Chicks' case, that was making "Not Ready to Make Nice" the first single from their CD. Fans will probably demand that country music stations not play the disc, and the stations will probably oblige, and the Dixie Chicks' musical careers may tank permanently. But I hope not. Girls with balls big enough to say what they believe, no matter the cost to themselves, deserve success.

***

Confirming, for those of you who still had doubts as to what a geek I am: I watched most of the Scripps National Spelling Bee Finals on TV last night. Katherine Close, an eighth-grader from New Jersey, won, making her the first girl to win the Bee since 1999. The second-  and third-place finishers were girls, too.  Super smart middle school girls tearing up the network TV in prime time; now that's what I want my kids to be watching.

***

In related (but only tangentially) news, Dina, a little girl in Julian's class, was wearing a t-shirt that said, "Girls rule" at his class party yesterday. Almost in unison, the teacher, Mrs. W, and I said, "It's true, they really do."

Dina: Really?

Me:  Yes. Absolutely.

Dina: Why?

Mrs. W:  Because they have to do what we tell them. And they have to even more when they get older.

Dina: How come?

Mrs. W.: (some entirely appropriate and lighthearted explanation, which I didn't retain, because what I was thinking was: 'Because we control 100% of the p***y.')

***

And a lesson in body confidence: this morning Libby, who toddled into my bedroom while I was in the shower, was watching me get dressed. "Oh, Mommy," she gushed as I was stuffing myself into a ratty old bra, "I just love your pretty boobies."

Been There? Go There.

Lots of things I've been meaning to post about, and I will--tomorrow. Tonight I come bearing a message from Cooper and Emily over at Been There , who have asked me to spread the following message in order to help victims of Hurricane Katrina. If you have a blog, I invite you to link to them too. Cooper says:

Emily and I have just put up a post offering to serve as a clearinghouse for those who are opening their homes to victims of Katrina and those who would like to help by way of sending supplies, especially those needed by families, directly to the people offering shelter. Our goal is to have people who are willing to send what they can (gently used toys, clothing, formula, etc.) post what they are willing to send in the comments section on our site. Then we are asking all those who are taking in families who need some assistance to come to our site and link with the people who are offering what they need. Here is the post:

http://beenthere.typepad.com/been_there/2005/09/a_clearinghouse.html

If you have nothing to send directly to help those offering shelter to hurricane victims, but you have clean dry clothes on your back, and had dinner tonight, and will go to sleep in a warm bed under a sturdy roof, please consider making a cash donation through the American Red Cross , or another reputable organization.