Christmas Tradition

Tonight our family went to Home for the Holidays at our club with our friends the Toms and the Peruns. It is an annual tradition for us to spend time together at Christmas. Even though we start by sitting as family units around the one large round table we quickly move seats. The mothers sit together, the girls sit together and the fathers with poor Drew, the only male child are thrown together.

For our girls it is the first down time they have had since they all just finished exams today. For the fathers it becomes a discussion about where the best new food and drink spots are that have opened recently and when the three of them can go visit them as a triumvirate. For the moms it is a lot of catching up since life has us pulled in different directions.

I took a picture of the girls by the Christmas tree tonight. I quickly was reminded of a trip we took to New York at Christmas time seven years ago. We talk often about that trip. To me it feels like it was just yesterday, probably because I still wear the same clothes. In fact while looking at the pictures I realized I just got the coat I wore on that trip dry-cleaned. The mother’s have not changed much.

But seeing our daughters go from nine or ten to sixteen and seventeen is a big change. Not only have they become adults and matured in looks, but the conversation has changed from mother’s telling them things, like which way is uptown and which is down to discussions and opinions about what is going on in the world.

Tonight during a conversation about kids the girls babysit for and the differences in behavior Carter said she was going to be a strict mother and not put up with any trouble. I turned to my friend Stephanie and said, “Well, she was trained by me.”

“Yeah, Mom. I can’t believe that every time I wanted candy or gum from a gumball machine you told me that it said it was broken.”

“Carter, it worked. I never had to give you candy.”

It was much easier back then. Santa was always watching. The store could be “out” of cookies. The vending machines could all be broken. I don’t care how little sleep you get in those early years of childrearing, it is easier then than it is when they are older. But I have to say that it is much more fun to have a conversation with your grown up child about philosophy, or literature or what is happening in the news.

The years go quickly, I hope in the next seven years we will still be gathering at Home for the Holidays dinners with our friends and our kids. The kids can get older, but us parents will stay just the way we have always been.

Elder Exams

As Carter was taking her second exam today in a week filled with exams I sat happily stitching with my needlepoint friends at my Local Needlepoint shop’s Christmas celebration. The table of food groaned under the weight of the ham biscuits and eggnog and requisite Christmas cookies. Three of the Stitcher’s Table Advisors were also celebrating December birthdays so we also had a Southern Pecan cake. I had thrown in the healthy eating towel last week and now am just enjoying the holiday like a normal person.

One of my friends Elizabeth said she was thankful that she never had to take another exam. Since all at the table could qualify for AARP we quickly agreed. Just as we were celebrating that small win for being old one member corrected us.

“No, I have one exam I still need to take,” Vickie said. “It’s the one they give you when you want to get into a retirement community.” One of the birthday girls, Ann, who is about my mother’s age agreed, “that is a much harder exam. You have to remember a list of five things they tell you about ten minutes after they told them to you.”

Suddenly fear overtook me. I am years away from a retirement home, but I already am not so good at remembering a list of things you just told me. Now if you want me to tell you the names of all my teachers in grade school I could do that in the blink of an eye, but not the five items Russ asked me to get at the grocery right before I left the house.

Exams have never been my thing and I thought once I left school I was free from the pressure of studying for them, but no… Apparently I have the next twenty five years to study if I ever want to pass a retirement home exam so that someone can wipe the drool from my face in my waning years I am going to have to start practicing memory tests now. Next time you see me ask me for this list of items to see how good my memory is: Scissors, ribbon, Bourbon, the Mississippi River and the color green.

If only the examiners would ask me what the winning Mah Jongg hands were, I could do that all day. Oh no, I’ve already forgotten what was in the list and I just wrote it.

Goodbye Mimi

When I was a very young child my Dad made a good friend while riding home on the train from NYC to Connecticut in the bar car every night. Eventually this ‘Train friend” became a real friend when he and his very beautiful wife invited my parents to a party at their house. One party lead to another and soon these real friends were bringing their little boy to our house for Christmas Eve dinner. Their names were Dick, Mimi and Rich Beatty.

Over the years we spent a lot of time with the Beatty’s, going to the same church, belonging to the same club, celebrating holidays together. I remember my parents coming back from a trip to Italy and saying that they even ran into Dick on the Spanish steps in Rome. When they developed the photos in their tiny Kodak Instamatic there was a picture of Dick Beatty in an action shot coming down the steps. He was there to shoot commercials, but he could have been the star of the ad from the picture my parents took.

Mimi was the hostess of the century. She could cook anything and always looked so fashionable in a Gucci Scarf and Hermes belt. When I was in eighth grade and Dick’s niece Anne needed a place to live, Mimi did not blink and eye about adding a teenage girl just a year older than Rich to their family. I would go to spend the night at their house a lot those years that Anne lived with the Beatty’s. Rich was like the brother I never had.

Mimi liked having girls around to talk girl things with. I was lucky enough to get to go on vacation to Nantucket in the summer with Mimi, Rich and Anne. I can’t remember who Rich brought as his friend, but I do remember loving the freedom to walk down to the wharf and scope out other teenagers hanging out.

I did not see the Beatty’s much when I was at boarding school or college since they had moved to Lake Forest, but then one day when I was out of college and living in Washington they showed up at a party at my parents house. They were all exactly the same, loving a good party. They stayed in our lives ever since. Rich eventually came to work with me and Russ and my Dad in London and then he and Russ started their own company together, CMG Partners.

Mimi and Dick moved to Southern Pines and opened a Bed and Breakfast called Knollwood House, where the entertaining continued. Four years ago Dick passed away and last week Mimi went to join him at that big party in heaven.

Russ and I went down to Southern Pines today for Mimi’s funeral. One of Rich’s best childhood friends, who was also a friend of mine, Larry was there from NYC. I had spent many a day hanging at the Beatty’s house with Larry and Rich while Mimi made us something yummy for dinner always perfectly dressed.

It is hard to believe that someone who has been in my life as a friend and a role model is gone. Outside of people who are related to me she probably has known me longer and better than most anyone else. It’s a real end of an era now that Dick and Mimi are gone. They are the last of the generation of real life Mad Men and wives. Rich, you are welcome to be in the Carter family now. We always have room for any Beatty’s.

Food Porn

Every once in a while I have a day that likens back to my roots of my pre-diet comedy blog writing days to what could only be called a Food Porn day. A tiger really can’t change their stripes and try as hard as I do to just eat healthy and exercise the month of December comes along and reminds me that I love food, I love feeding people and I love reading and watching things about food.

Working backwards in my day…I just came from Crooks Corner where chef Bill Smith and Vivian Howard from the Chef and the Farmer and star of the PBS series A Chef’s Life were having a preview of the TV show’s Christmas special which benefited the Food Bank. I was lucky enough to be an invited guest to represent the Food Bank in the small affair. Vivian was incredibly gracious to us by donating the proceeds from the evening to help feed people who probably have no idea who she is.

The guests got to dine on the same items that are featured in the Christmas special — corned ham, hopin’ john and ambrosia. Now I may be a North Carolina native, but obviously not far enough east because I was unfamiliar with corned ham. OMG, I think I have discovered what I am going to make my family for Christmas day dinner.

Before going to meet Vivian Howard I stopped in to visit my friend who had the operation. She was in great shape so I was not worried about her having to reheat the dinner I brought her. It was just good to see her up and smiling. I hope she recovers quickly so she can be back to playing with me soon.

The highlight of my day was my lunch for my needlepoint group, which I have renamed the Stitcher’s Table Advisors. I made business cards for each person that I used as our place cards. My needlepoint group love to discuss many things while stitching, from books, movies and TV shows we are enjoying to dogs and food, not necessarily in that order, thus the advisor title.

I had planned on making a healthy salad for lunch, but changed my menu after making pizzas for my luncheon last Friday. I am glad I did because nothing makes most people happier than the smell of seven kinds of melting cheese when they walk in the door. It was a Christmas celebration with the exchanging of gifts and so it warranted the serving of another Crack Pie. The advisors had not been privy to the addictive dessert before and no one left disappointed.

Knowing me as well as the Stitcher’s Table Advisors do they gifted me the most beautiful cookbook Plenty More from the famed Israeli chef and owner of the great London restaurants, Yotam Ottolenghi. Now, after eating way more than I should have today I get to settle into bed with a good book, one with pictures just the way I like, pictures of beautiful food.

Something’s Got to Give

It’s Christmas and no amount of advance preparation is going to enable me to get done everything I wanted to do in 2014. Today is our neighborhood luminary festival where all 800 houses are supposed to put our candles in white bags along the fronts of our properties. My friend Margaret Jones started this tradition here about four or five years ago and then up and moved to Minneapolis. In her honor we have carried on.

I ordered my luminary kit, which is a joke in itself since a “kit” is white bags and candles, early this year in anticipation of tonight. What I did not think about was that I was throwing three parties in six days; the last one being tomorrow and that Carter starts exams Tuesday. I also volunteered to bring a friend who had an operation dinner tomorrow as well as attend a Food Bank event. Let’s add to it that my extroverted self after going to a Christmas party last night and out to dinner could not go to sleep until 2:45 in the morning because I was looking at flights for spring break. I woke up late this morning, missed church and thought something’s got to give!

Russ is very busy with work and had been writing all weekend, Carter was off at a friend’s house studying and I realized that I had only been getting about half my steps all week. I was throwing in the luminary towel, sorry Margaret. It seemed like the right plan at two this afternoon. I did not have time to go get the sand, fill the 75 bags my frontage needs and put the candles in as well as clean it all up in the morning before my lunch.

I also have not done anything about a Christmas card and I really have no idea exactly what presents I have and for whom, just that my present hiding place is full of bags and boxes. At least nothing is wrapped so I can look at it and divide it up.

As I was making a homemade soup for my recovering friend I looked out the window and saw that my neighbor, who has historically but their luminaries out an hour after the whole thing starts, was doing it two hours early. My plan about what I am throwing in changed right then.

I went out and got the sand and did the whole lumen-freaking-deal. In the middle I decided Christmas cards are what’s going to give. I write a daily blog, who needs to get a card from me? If I did send it card here is what it would say, “Year went well, all still alive, no new pets, children, jobs or homes. Hope you have a happy holiday.”

I wish that what I could give up in these last ten days before Christmas was eating because I seem to be making more merry than I can stay ahead of, but then the season would just not feel as happy. If I am going to be a slacker I am going to do it full on. January is the time for deprivation and self-loathing.

Go Girl is Really a No, Girl

In the hunt to find meaningful Christmas gifts for a family who really has more than they need and nothing they want I search through the oddest of catalogues that seem to be appearing in my mailbox this month.

I am thankful that these small and odd retailers can’t afford to send catalogues more than once a year because it pains me to receive so much paper I normally just toss into my recycling. But as the pressure to find something original for my sisters and parents comes pushing down on me with each day of December ticking off I find that I am opening the pages with covers that read, “Gifts that make a difference,” or “Hundreds of unique gifts.”

Really how unique can the products be if they are offered in a catalogue? They can’t be one of a kind that is unless they are in the Neiman Marcus Christmas book. SO far I have not found one thing that I feel anyone in my family, let alone anyone that I even know needs. Really I am finding quite the opposite.

In a catalogue I received today with the headline “Sweet inspiration” I came across probably the most distasteful gift idea I have been presented with, the “GO GIRL.” I bet you would never think of giving this product to anyone, let alone buying it for yourself. If you have not figured out what in the world it possibly could be here is a hint, it was in a travel tool section. Still stumped?

Word for word here is the description… “No more acrobatic squatting! Woman can now go to the bathroom while standing. Constructed of washable medical-grade silicone. Includes storage tube, tissues and a bag. Reusable. Made in the U.S.A. $12.95.” Well thank god it was made in the USA. I would hate to push some foreign medical-grade silicone up against my girl parts so I could pee standing up.

Now my sister does travel to some sketchy parts of the world where I am certain the facilities are less than perfect, but hell if I am going to give her this as a gift. I love that it says “reusable.” If there is just a hole in the ground as a toilet do you think there is a sink with clean water to wash that thing off with? As far as I am concerned the “Go Girl” is a “No, Girl.”

So the search for a meaningful but slightly less personal gift continues. If I have to spend all my time sifting through things that are clearly this disgusting I am going to give up and give everybody a $100 dollar bill.

Blogging Has Made Me a Better Listener

The other day I had a meeting with someone I know fairly well and see semi-often. After the normal middle-aged woman greeting of hugs and air kisses we sat down and before I could ask her a question she said, “ I read your blog every day so I know everything that has been going on with you. Let me tell you EVERYTHING that is going on with ME.”

For the next thirty minutes she talked, almost without taking a breath. Although I was listening I got to counting how words I was able to interject in the way of questions, but mostly exclamations, like oohs, and ahhs. The total in the whole half an hour was twelve.

Before I knew it, our time together was up and she was off in a dash, practically in midsentence, but she had to run off to see her next victim, oh I mean friend. I stayed in my seat and enjoyed another glass of iced tea and thought about what I had just experienced. I like this woman, so it was not that I was not interested, but I think I had just experienced a live blog show.

Now I am a big time talker from way back when. When I was in school I used to say that my only talent was talking, I could not sing, was not really great at critical analysis, my reading comprehension was fair, scientific theories did not come easy to me, I had no athletic ability, but give me a topic, something I may or may not know anything about and I could talk about it convincingly. Given that history it is very unusual for me to just sit and listen for a big block of time and not get a chance to ask questions.

Here is the thing about writing a daily blog, people feel like they know everything that is going on with me. Of course, you are reading a story I write everyday. What I think this friend does not realize is that my blog is usually a snap shot of one small thing that happens in my day. People are free to read it if they want, but I don’t assume anyone is reading it religiously everyday and if it is boring you can just stop reading in the middle, and it will make no difference to your life.

The difference between the “Live Blog” I had just been enrolled into was I was captive. I could not stop “reading it.” As is the case in many one-way conversations I get into my mind started to wander. The major theme I came away with is that now that I write a blog I get to spend a lot more time listening to other people, but I am not as active a listener if the conversation is a data dump.

I actually learned quite a bit about how to be a better listener as well as a more generous talker in that one half an hour than I have in many years. Face-to-face human contact needs to be a give and take. Story time is for little children you are trying to put to sleep. The best conversations are between two people. I think that blogging has made me a better listener because by blogging about anything important to me I have already told that story and don’t feel the need to retell it in person. I wish I had learn to blog when I was younger, I probably would not have bored so many people with my story telling.

No New Tricks For This Old Dog

I wish that I had learned to caramelized pears when I was in nursery school. No, I was not allowed to use sharp knives or the oven when I was four and no, we probably never had any fresh pears when I was four, and no, no one had even heard of caramelized pears when I was four, but if I had learned then I would have actually learned how to do it right every time.

Caramelizing pears is not that difficult. You just thinly slice a pear and lay it on a cookie sheet sprayed with Pam and slowly bake it in the oven. I know this, I know how long it takes, I know how to do it on different temperatures and I even can tell how long based on the ripeness of the pear. The problem is that knowing it and paying attention to it while I am doing it are two different things.

I can’t tell you how often I forget I have a pan of pears in the oven and forget about them. The real problem is that by the time I can smell them they are over cooked, and not just a little brown, but black and inedible. Even if I set a timer, and I can hear you now saying, “Just set a timer.” I still make a mistake and leave them in the oven too long, or worse take Shay out for a walk and forget about them.

This would not be such a big deal if caramelized pears were not such a mainstay of my diet. My daily salad of arugula, pears, chicken and blue cheese is vital for keeping my weight in check. If I go up a couple of pounds I eat that salad twice a day and with Thanksgiving and the crack pie I made for the holiday showing up on the scale I must eat two salads a day on all the days I am not throwing a party or going to Afternoon tea.

Just looking ahead to my Christmas party calendar I may even have to cut out the blue cheese from the salads if I am going to survive the holiday eating. What does not help is that there is not enough time to prepare for or enjoy a party and get all my exercise in so something has to go. If I am to be at all in a presentable mood what cannot go is mush food so I have to make really good choices. Pears are vital to my good choices!

Walter Schalk School of Dance

Somehow I had a completely open day today, no meetings, no parties, no work. Some special god must have been looking out for me and not let me fill my calendar up with things that could wait until January. I used today to get things organized in my house for the holiday entertaining extravaganzas that are coming up.

Before any Christmas parties can happen I first have to celebrate Carter’s 16^th birthday, which is Sunday. How can it be that she is 16? I am thankful that she agreed to let me have a party for her at a restaurant. At least someone else can do the cooking. Not that I get to attend the party, just be at a table outside the party room.

I spent most of the day cleaning things, moving things around in my house and doing the fall chores I had let go, like planting bulbs and pulling up dead plants from my vegetable garden. The good news is that real housework is a real work out.

I finally got to the giant pile of white linen napkins that needed to be ironed. I stood at the ironing board in front of the TV and did a little dance while I ironed 65 small white squares. Heel, step, heel step. Suddenly I had a huge flash back to seventh grade. The ironing dance I was doing was called “the Fad.” I don’t know if it was a real dance or just one made up by the man who ran the cotillion like dancing school in my town, named Walter Schalk.

The Fad was a favorite dance of us Walter Schalk students back in the seventies. It was the only “modern” dance in the repertoire. Although I think I liked the jitterbug better, it was definitely not a dance any of us kids would do at “dances.”

As I got on the treadmill to write this afternoon I Goggled “Walter Schalk,” certain that he must be dead since he was so old when I was a kid, amazingly he is still alive and running The Walter Schalk school of dance based in Wilton. He has expanded from just Wilton and New Canaan to add Darien and Greenwich. I wonder if he still corals every 5^th grader, both girls and boys into the gym at the middle school on Monday nights and teaches them the same waltzes and Cha cha’s that he did when I was a kid?

I was going to say some tough things about him, but since he is still alive and I don’t want to get sued I will keep my opinion about him to myself. That should say enough.

I don’t think I can remember the whole “Fad” dance, but it certainly helped me get some steps in while I was ironing. I may not be a great dancer today thanks to Mr. Schalk, but at least I am able to keep a beat while doing something else.

The End of an Era

Carter’s love for all things horses started when she was two. She had a baby sitter who exercised horses at a lovely barn in town. Being a smart girl she learned to double dip by baby sitting for Carter and exercising horses at the same time. One of the sitter’s charges was a horse named Bob, who had an injury and could not take any weight above 50 pounds. Carter was the perfect rider.

Then Carter started riding in the summer at a barn near her grand parents farm. Mrs. Brown’s summer horse camp gave Carter a lot of experience taking care of horse and riding. The taking care part was almost her favorite part.

Eventually she wore me down by begging to find a barn at home so she could ride every week. When Carter was about seven she started going to Rolling Hills stables in Chapel Hill. It is quite a trek from our house, but every week and sometimes twice a week or more since then she has been going to Rolling Hills.

When Carter was ten her trainer Piper asked her if she wanted a job as a barn girl. Are you kidding? A job where she got to clean up after horses, who cares what she got paid. SO even though most barn girls had to be twelve, Carter, who was bigger and stronger than most girls three years older than her started working and riding.

Eventually she went from the junior barn girl to the senior and about four years ago she started working on Saturday mornings, which meant she was responsible to all the morning feedings and cleanings since Piper was not usually out at the barn at 8:00 in the morning.

This early morning Saturday job meant that some parent had to get up at 7:00 in order to get Carter to the barn a half an hour away. Carter was incredibly lucky that her sweet father, who never gets to sleep any day of the week, dutifully and willingly volunteered to do the one hour round trip there and back twice every Saturday.

No matter how much work he has, even when I say I am happy to do the driving, he says, “No, I’ll take her.” Carter and Russ have their Saturday rituals. Shay goes with them and the three of them stop into Bruggers to get bagels and Russ goes to Starbucks and gets his coffee. Even shay gets a bagel that she eats while riding on Russ’ lap.

Then around 1:00 Russ and Shay will get back in the car and make the trip back to the barn, stopping someplace to get lunch with Carter on the way home. Even though it takes up a good part of Russ’ day of rest he always does it with a smile.

Today, when Russ got home from picking Carter up form the barn he said with a sigh, “That was the last time I’ll ever take Carter to the barn.” She next Saturday Carter has an away basketball game in Charlotte and then the next Saturday she will have her drivers license, assuming she passes the test.

It was a sad day for Russ and even sadder for Shay. Those hours in the car are the biggest block of time he gets to spend with Carter alone. More learning, conversations and growing up probably happens on those Saturday mornings than any other time of the week.

I think that when Carter gets her drivers license I am going to have to find some errands I need her to run that involve carting her father around.

Baking Is the Gateway Drug of Cooking

I am a purely self taught cook. Yes, I learned a few things from my grandmother via my father, but outside of that I did not have anyone around who knew how to or liked to cook. Since I liked to eat, learning to throw together the limited ingredients I had at my disposal as a child into something better together than alone was an art I perfected.

I had only a couple of cookbooks in my childhood home. A 1956 edition of the Joy of Cooking, which was so out of date that every time a recipe called for baking powder the instructions on how to make it from scratch followed.   That thick cornflower blue volume was well worn by the time I was fourteen.

The other cookbooks were a set of Time Life Cookbooks by country, Like the Cuisine of Italy, or France. They were much more like travel logs than cook books. They spoke a language of chefs that was way over my childhood vocabulary, let alone full of ingredients that never darkened the door of my mother’s kitchen. The best part about them was they were full of full color pictures so I could get an idea of what a dish was supposed to look like. This was very helpful when I was preparing something out of the Joy of Cooking that might have had at best a line drawing of a whole chicken, but no clue as to what it was supposed to look like fried.

For me the gateway drug of cooking was baking. Like so many kids I first leaned to make things like cookies and brownies, mostly out of a desire for a dessert, which was always forbidden in our house. Understanding how to bake successfully, made cooking easy. Making a soup is much more forgiving than baking a cake, but what child wants to learn to cook soup?

I have been worried that Carter was going to grow up with very few cooking skills since she was more than content to eat my cooking. I have robbed her of the need to learn to cook by being too good a cook. Except that in the last few years I have rarely baked anything.

This past summer Carter got a bee in her bonnet to want to learn how to make a cake from scratch. It was a big success, but she discovered that it is a long process. Since she hardly ever has six free hours she has not repeated that task, but suddenly with a day off from school before Thanksgiving and the need for us to provide the desserts she has volunteered to bake something.

Now’s my chance to kick up her learning curve and throw something fairly complicated at her. I see being a skilled baker as a good prerequisite to taking chemistry. Once you understand the science behind baking you can be set free to create your own concoctions with a better chance at success.

Now I have tonight to convince her that making an apple pie layer cake will be fun and make her father very happy. Pray for me tomorrow. I will post a picture if we make it.

I Need a Basketball Spectator Diet Plan

Basketball season is kicking my butt and I have not even dribbled the ball once. Carter is playing varsity and the schedule is grueling. Late practices and even later games are throwing me off my normal routine. Dinner is not getting cooked, steps are not getting completed, laundry is pilling up and I am staying up later than ever.

Although I may not be getting my regular exercise I must be burning some kind of calories by being an uber spectator at the games. I know that wildly clapping is an actual exercise, but do you think that screaming, “Go DA,” at the top of my lungs burns any calories?

Tonight’s game girl’s against Voyager Academy was doubly exciting because Junior Liz Roberts reached her 1000^th point as a Durham Academy Varsity player. She did not disappoint the spectators by playing a fabulous game. The whole team contributed to the big win of 59-14.

By the end of the girl’s game I was ready to go home, but Carter wanted to stay to watch the boy’s game. What the hell, it was already so late and no dinner was going to get made anyway, I agreed to stay.

The boys game was a much closer and heart stopping game. The Voyager boys had a six foot ten inch player and a number of great three point shooters. I think I screamed until my stomach hurt during the close game. Sadly, the DA boys were behind at the end, but it was not due to trying their best.

I think that I now need to create a new basketball season diet plan because I can’t spend so much time sitting in the bleachers cheering as a form of exercise. I can’t wait until eight or nine at night to begin thinking about what to make for dinner. This late arrival home without a plan is causing me to make bad food choices in the name of exhaustive hunger.

If only I was allowed to pace the sidelines like a big time coach I would be in better shape, but alas I am just a mother and must stay in my place, only getting to stand and cheer at the appropriate moments. We have three months to go. I’m going to have to change, but I am going to have a great time watching the girl’s team and spending time with Carter watching the other games. I only have three short years left to do this and I am going to savor every moment.

Formal Day

Here it is 11:21 at night and I have my first free minute, literally of the whole day. I won’t get much of a post written since I am committed to blog everyday no matter what so this will be short, but I promise that tomorrow’s blog will be full of great stories.

Today was Carter’s fall formal. As is usually the case I got involved with organizing her friend group and their date’s dinner. Since the kids got to go off and have dinner together I had my annual parents of the formal kids dinner.

Pictures will have to do for this blog.

Salad – Stone Soup Style

A few weeks ago after our kids lost a classmate my friend Cooper called and said she thought it might be nice to have a ‘Mother’s lunch” before Thanksgiving. I volunteered my house, which is a no brainer for me since I have a few hundred years experience feeding thousands of people. But this lunch was little work for me because Cooper was bringing all the greens and enough bread to feed the 5,000. She invited the whole class of mothers to come and bring a salad topping.

About forty moms were able to make it. Apparently Fridays for lunch are doable even for many working Moms. We were sorry the others were not here, but had a great time with the group that showed up.

Nuts are the salad topping of choice because we had a huge variety and enough volume to keep all the squirrels in the neighborhood well fed through the winter. I made three different salad dressings from scratch and learned that balsamic vinaigrette is the most popular, followed by sesame ginger and trailing the pack by a long way was homemade ranch.

One of the things I love the most at class mother get togethers is to introduce mothers to each other whose children are good friends. The timing of this lunch was fortuitous because there is a formal dance tomorrow and mothers of sons were meeting mothers of their dates for the first time. It was great that they got to compare stories about what the plans were. Universally the mother’s of girls knew of the plans while the mother’s of sons did not always.

One boy’s mom asked that we have the next get together about two weeks before a dance so she could learn all the info in a more timely manor. I have a feeling a lot of corsages are being ordered this afternoon. It also was apparent that an app is needed so the kids can figure out who needs a date and who wants a date.

The one thing I am happy about is that I never have to find a date for the rest of my life. The stress is just overwhelming. If something ever happens to Russ I am going to be fine to spend the rest of my life alone. Of course I will still have my friends and in the end that is all I ever need.

Thanks to Cooper and Elizabeth for staying and cleaning up. The house is ready for the next party I am having tomorrow for the parents of the group of kids Carter is going to the formal with. Once the house is party ready I like to maximize it and do party’s back-to-back, especially since I don’t have to find a date!

Foot Weight Loss Could Cause Death

It’s cold here today, really cold.   I got up this morning from a too little sleep night. I had a lot on my calendar so I had carefully planned my every move so I could move seamlessly through the day. I got dressed in a really nice outfit since I was going to be visiting my friend Hannah at her new office for the first time and did not want her co-workers to think Hannah’s friends were low rent.

I put on a brand new pair of black pants I had just hemmed myself, a new white starched blouse, a new grey sweater and warm wool socks. I searched through the shoes on the floor of my closet looking for last year’s favorite black suedes. It was obvious that it is past the time that I need to pull my summer shoes out of my closet and store them for the winter. After digging through the mountain I found the pair I was looking for.

With just a few minutes on the clock to walk Shay Shay I put on my warmest shearling coat and a pair of gloves and marched my puppy out into the freezing cold. Even though I had a fairly thick pair of socks on I noticed that my feet were sliding around on the inside of my shoes. Please say it ain’t so, my feet had shrunk. I knew this was an issue for some of my summer shoes, but I turned a blind eye and added pads that helped keep my feet inside.

After Shay had done her business and I saw that I had just a few minutes left to get her inside fed and out the door I headed for home. As I was just about up to my walk way I noticed a man walking towards me and said hello as I stepped into a small indentation in the grass. I watched his face in horror as I fell out of my shoe and went sliding about ten feet across a huge mud puddle.

Shay broke free of me and the man asked if I was all right. “Please just grab my dog,” I said as I stood up covered in mud on every item of clothing I was wearing except my bra. That is right, mud was all over my shoes, socks, pants, shirt, sweater, gloves, coat and even my underpants. Of course this was the one-day I was dressed up and not in my jeans and ratty sweatshirt.

I was not hurt at all. Mud is very cushy. I ran into the house, stripped off my clothes at the front door so that I did not drag mud through the house. I forgot I had a glass door, so I hope that man had kept walking.

I ran to my bedroom and threw on a less desirable outfit, but more supportive shoes. After my morning appointment and lunch with Hannah I stopped in a shoe store to see about getting a new pair of warm black winter shoes. The clerk looked at me strangely when I asked if she could measure my foot. How could a 53-year-old woman not know her shoe size? Sure enough I was a whole number size smaller and two widths thinner. Not the place I want to be thinner.

Dreaming of Christmas Decorating When I Should Be Shopping For Gifts

My sister Janet is in China on business for a couple of weeks. She sent me a message saying that she just went into a huge factory filled as far as the eye could see with Christmas decorations, and she thought of me. I know that most people complain about Christmas decorations going up early, I understand it can make you crazy, but not me. I am already dreaming about decorating.

Yesterday I made Carter take something to the attic and she looked over in the Christmas section and came down with a big sigh, “Oh no, it’s almost time to get the boxes down.” I know she hates this time of year because the movement of the boxes and giant decorations down from the attic feels like Lewis and Clark crossing the great northwest. To that I remind her that she is related to Meriwether Lewis and “Merry is in his name.”

Russ was out in Palo Alto last week and texted me while he stood in front of a gift store that had a window full of Christmas ornaments asking if I wanted something. Nice thought. I know he was just looking for any help in the Christmas gift department. “No,” I said. That did not make him happy.

Here is the big problem. I am incredibly picky about Christmas stuff. It may feel like quantity is important based on how much I have, but it isn’t. Now it is about just the right things and they are really few and far between. Since I stitch needlepoint ornaments all year I am even more choosy than ever.

I cannot imagine there is one thing in that giant Chinese Christmas decoration factory I would want. Now if she was in a Swedish Christmas factory it might be another story. So sorry to my family there just isn’t much you can get me.

My dilemma is that I should be figuring out what I am going to be giving to people for Christmas, but somehow that does not start until my house feels like it’s own Santa’s workshop. I have already worked out my wrapping theme for the year, but I don’t have one thing to wrap yet.   I wish that everyone would just register for gifts and let me choose from a list they have predetermined they want…hint, hint, hint.

It is very unromantic and uninspired that I can’t figure out what to give people, but since I don’t want anything for myself I don’t look at things as desirable. Now I am sure that my family really wants a gift or two and will not be content to just look at my Christmas decorations and eat a good meal and say, “that was the best Christmas ever.”

This is the word out to anyone who thinks you are on my list, give me some ideas. If you don’t want to get a flannel nightgown for Christmas, and Dad I know you don’t, let me know what you do want. Mail me, or text me you send a letter to Santa via Westover road.

Holiday Entertaining Hiccups

Today I was looking at my calendar of up coming entertaining. I have a mother’s lunch, a formal dinner, a garden club lunch, a ladies lunch, Carter’s birthday, a company dinner and lunch, a school hot lunch and those are just a few I was working on planning today. There is nothing I like more than throwing parties, getting people together and entertaining and the holidays seem to offer more opportunities than I need.

My dilemma is what I eat and can have around the house is not the normal holiday fare. I love to make yummy food that everyone oohs and ahhs over, but is it Ok to forgo the fattening items and make healthier party food? Will people be disappointed or will they be thankful that I am not adding to their holiday weight gain?

I am able to withstand a perfect warm yeast roll at a party, but if it is leftover and sitting in a container on the counter my will power is greatly tested. Why is that? When it just comes out of the oven and is at it’s prime I can push back away from it, but give it a day or two of being leftover and it is hard for me to avoid craving it.

There is one answer and that is I could pack up all the leftovers and send them home with my guests. That way I can make an array of foods and just move the naughty ones out as the last friend is leaving the door, but is that fair to my friends? I hardly know anyone who wants to have an extra pie or cake sitting around.

Now I am racking my brain for healthy but delicious menus that I can make quickly since I seem to have a party every other day. What I need are some good make ahead items that I can pull out and serve on short notice. The bad thing is that my best healthy dishes require a lot of fresh vegetables and fruits and lots of chopping.

Long gone are the days when I could whip up a big batch of pasta carbonara or make a few big lasagnas. Even a honey-baked ham is out of the question. My guests are just going to have to be surprised. I think as long as I end with a good dessert and a fruit option for me no one will leave unhappy.

The Three Bears

I am an early to bed lover of famous proportions, especially when the weather turns cold and the dark comes early. Basically I think I am a bear who likes to hibernate through the winter and frolic in the summer. This pattern in a normal year is just fine since I pack in as much travel as possible starting at spring break and continuing until school starts back up and then I am happy to be a homebody while Carter is in school.

This year started out fine for me, but just as the real snuggle down time has come into season I am thrown off my game by my family’s activities. Since Carter has made the varsity basketball team, yet is still three weeks away from getting her drivers license I am responsible for picking her up after practice, which is sometimes after 7:30.

Russ has also been doing some work in California and in order to maximize his days has been taking the red eye home each Friday. This means that when he gets home at 6:30 on Saturday morning he needs to take a nap at some point.

Last night Carter had a 6:00 PM basketball game after a long school week. I was in the Cav-dome to cheer on the team at a time of day when I would normally be home in my nightgown. Of course cheering on the girls in their big win of 63-20 against the Charlotte Country Day girls was well worth staying up for. Carter wanted to stay for the first quarter of the boys’ game, but finally by 8:00 hunger won out and we went downtown for supper. It was close to ten by the time we got home and stayed up late looking at hotels for our spring break trip.

Although I was way off my sleep cycle going to bed close to midnight I thought I would be fine since I could sleep late. I should have known that my normal clock would take over and I was wide-awake at 6:00 AM and Russ met me with surprise as he walked in the door at 6:30.

I had to get Carter up and make her a real breakfast before her morning basketball game against the Ashville girls. I let Russ take a little nap while I took Carter over to school to get taped before the game. I rushed home to get Russ up and back to the gym where I felt as if I had never left. The girls after a great win just hours before rallied to beat Ashville something like 63-32.

By the time we left the gym at 1:30 I was exhausted. I had neither flown the red eye, nor played two basketball games, yet I desperately needed a nap. The cold and dark had to play into my need to hibernate. I was not alone. If someone had rung the doorbell at our house they would have encountered the three bears and one little pup all sleeping as if it were the middle of the night. It’s going to be a long winter at this pace.

Time Warp

When I was a kid and my grandmother wanted to tell me that something was going to take a long time she would describe it using the phrase, “As slow as Christmas.” I think back to how brilliant she was to be able to tap into what I, as a child could understand since nothing felt like it took forever to come along as much as Christmas, followed quickly by the last day of school and then your own birthday. I am about the same age now as my grandmother was then and I feel like Christmas is coming so fast and I am so unprepared. I don’t think I could get down to that child level so quickly.

As I get older the time does seem to speed up. There are only a few times in my life when I felt that time practically stood still, other than those childhood years waiting for Santa; waiting to hear about college acceptance felt like watching sand drop through the hour glass, but the pinch point was too small and waiting for the birth of my first and only child. Perhaps not sleeping comfortably makes one so fatigued that you feel time is standing still.

Perhaps anticipating when your mother-in-law leaves to go home can make the hours go more slowly. This is not something I know anything about since my mother-in-law only held that title for the first year of my marriage, God rest her soul. I also guess waiting for a loved one to recover from an illness can also be excruciatingly long hours.

Somehow the sad hours seem longer than the happy. I hate that life is going so fast, but I don’t want to wish for bad things so the time will feel drawn out. What I really want is to have childhood Christmas again. Something I don’t have to do much preparation for, except for being just good enough to make it onto the “good” list. No shopping or wrapping or trying to avoid the Christmas cookies.

I want to not be able to go to sleep because I am so excited for Christmas morning to come, rather than falling into bed dead tired from trying to pack too much into the day. I want to be so bored waiting for Christmas eve that I will blankly sit in front of Laurel and Hardy’s Babes in Toyland in black and white playing over and over again on channel 5 like I did every year of my childhood.

This year I want to feel what my Grandmother called,”as slow as Christmas” for a happy reason. No sadness to slow time down, just the anticipation of a wonderful day.

Special Shopping Times at The Grocery

Companies do lots of different promotions to get people into their stores. If you are a student you get a discount, if you are a senior you have a special day, if you belong to their loyalty program you have discount prices. Yes, all these things are in the name of marketing, and heaven forbid I say something negative about marketing. But sometimes the promotion for one group is a disincentive for another.

Today I had to run into the market and get just a few items. The first stop was at the apples. There I encountered a very elderly lady who had left her cart blocking the aisle with her purse unminded, mind you, and had walked down the apple aisle touching every piece of fruit as if feeling in Braille for the type she wanted. I knew that I just needed two granny smiths and waited patiently as she guarded the whole section like a pro-linebacker protecting the ball. Eventually she noticed that I was either waiting for an apple or to get my cart by her, neither, which I could do, in the current situation.

After the apples came the raspberries. There I encounter an elderly woman who was using the corner of the berry display to lean on while she adjusted an unmentionable article of clothing with no regard for being in public. Again I waited patiently. Eventually when her bosom, as my grandmother would call it, was in place she looked at me and said, “What are you looking at?” “The raspberries I am hoping to buy.”

I moved on to the cheese counter where a couple who had to have been married to each other for at least 60 years was fighting over feta or goat cheese. They must have had their readers on and not been able to see me waiting just to grab some blue.

As I tried to weave my cart through the aisles full of AARP members it dawned on me. It was senior discount Thursday. I guess that the area nursing home busses had brought all their residents to shop at ten in the morning so they had plenty of time to roam the store and clog up the check outs before they were due back at the home for lunch.

I know that one day I too am going to be one of these people and I can only imagine that inefficient shoppers will still bother me then even if I am one. I need to make a note to myself not to ever shop on senior day except during meal times.

As I finally got out of the store and pushed my purchases to my car in the cart I saw an older man I know from church. I said hello as he was going into the store and he asked if I had finished shopping. “Yes, I just need to return my cart.” I was sure that as an older man with excellent manners he might offer to take it since that was where he was heading. I was wrong. He just said, “have a nice day,” as he walked a step ahead of me into the store. So there isn’t even any chivalry on senior day.

Ode To The Stadium Seat

I’ve turned from a professional sitter to a semi-pro walker in the last year. After years of being great at sitting in one place content to barley move, I have done a 180 and now can hardly stand to sit anywhere for very long. A good thing you might say, but not when it comes to high school basketball season.

Today was Carter’s first scrimmage on varsity basketball, a big day in our house of non-varsity players. Since it was teacher conference day Carter and I got to spend the day shopping for the right orthotic insoles and new socks she needed. At last the time came to get her to the gym for taping and warm-ups. I went to the school track to get some steps in before the sitting session had to start.

At Carter’s urging I got the to gym early enough to watch the warm ups and get a chance to see the team in action before they met their first opponent. Sitting on bleachers without back support is not my favorite place to be. Luckily when I was rustling around the garage last week I found a folding stadium seat I bought for last years season, but never got to use thanks to meniscus surgery.

During the warm-ups I sat quietly in my seat finishing the sky portion of a zebra needlepoint without guilt since it was not the real play. Once the game started in earnest I put way my stitching to focus on supporting the team. The play was exciting and every member of the team got a chance on the floor.

It was all I could do to stay seated on my padded seat, both my human one and my foam one. Sitting for two hours without a walking break is almost next to impossible for me, but I did it. Not once did I get up and pace the sidelines. I am certain that would be frowned upon and I would be ejected from the gym and be a great embarrassment to my child.

It’s just the start of a long sitting season. I know I could not endure those backless bleachers long. Thank goodness for my stadium seat. I bet if I filled my car with them I could make quiet a profit by selling them at game halftimes. I can’t be the only old mother whose butt hurts sitting so long.

Daylight Savings Eating

I got on the scale this morning and I was up a couple of pounds. This kind of scale reading puts fear in my heart. I know all too well how easy it is for me to get off track and go in the wrong direction. It should be no surprise to me though.

Yesterday at Mah Jongg my friends shared their onion rings with me and I shared too much. I also had my fair share of the tiniest heath bars ever made. I know in my mind that even though they were the size of a postage stamp they really pack in the calories, and not just any calories the sugar type that throws my body into a fat holding tailspin.

Since I have so many tracking devices for my weight and exercise I looked back at my records and found that is was exactly this time in the last two years that I fell off the wagon and skipped up the scale. Granted Halloween happened at the same time in both of those years, but so did Day light savings time.

In my analytical examination of what I am doing wrong so I can correct myself sooner rather than later I realized that since we fell back I have been getting up earlier. Like five AM earlier, which am way more than the hour I gained last weekend. I also noticed that I am much more tired in the afternoons and have been reverting to mindless snacking to keep me awake. Somehow the snacking is working and I am staying up until my normal hour, making my waking time at least two hours more per day.

Something I subscribe to in the weight loss arena is that if I am asleep I am not eating. Thank goodness I never took Ambien and did the sleep eating routine. And like most regular humans if I am tired my defenses are down and I am more likely to eat something I have more or less given up in order to fit into my clothes.

You would think that by now my body would have adjusted to the time change, but the dark afternoons seem to have a hold on my grazing tendency. I also have not gotten all my steps this week. Life and death issues and my cooking requirements are to blame there, but life and death happen and I need to be able to work those into my routine.

Now that all this data has been gathered and the analyzing is done I am going to try and put the information to work to get me back on track. Actually I can’t just back on track, I have to do better than normal so I can drop the pounds I gained. I better do it fast because Thanksgiving is just two weeks away and I am already dreaming of forbidden stuffing.

The Benefits of the Yellow Line

Seems like it is pavement-repaving month around here. Every where I go I feel like I am waiting in long lines for my turn to drive on the one lane that is not either being ground down or recovered. Granted the roads that are being worked on are long over due for resurfacing, but did the state of North Carolina need to save all the projects for the a one month window?

For the last three days I have had to drive up and down Academy Road to bring soup to my friend Amy. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this particular byway, it is lovely tree lined thoroughfare with no streetlights. I am not sure exactly when the machines came through that ground off the old cracked up surface and sucked it into trucks, leaving a consistently nubby under layer, but no repaving has taken place for three days.

I don’t really mind driving on the less than smooth road during the day. The bump, bump, bumping is kind of hypnotic and the all black road with no painted lines with giant trees that stand like soldiers all along the route make it feel like I am in some German forest going to grandmother’s house like Hansel and Gretel.

The problem comes at night and now that day light savings time has come night is really in the afternoon. Today as I was winging my way to Amy’s with my Senegalese Chicken Stew in tow I realized that many of the drivers around me had no idea which side of the street belonged to them without the aid of the center yellow line. The lack of a white sideline did not help matters and the black macadam under layer could not be distinguished from the black shoulder of the side of the road.

Some cars quickly crowded into the center with great disregard for oncoming traffic, while others inched slowly along, hugging the outside edge. The one thing that was universal was the cars that went too fast also thought the road was one way and made no attempt to share, while the cars that went too slow could have gone four cars abreast on a two lane road. Apparently most drivers need a yellow line in order to know exactly what they are due.

Wouldn’t it be great if we had yellow lines on all parts of our lives guiding us to take just what we should have and not more than we need. I wish that all my meals had a yellow line. Judging what I should eat based on hunger has never really been a good indicator for me. My mind almost always thinks I should have more than my body actually can burn up. If only I had a plate with a yellow line that kept me eating only the right half of my food I probably would not need to walk so much.

I’m going to keep my eye out for other places the use of a yellow line might be beneficial. After driving for three days on the same road without one I am going to advocate that all roads have them because I am sure that a few side mirrors have met certain death on Academy Road this week.

Call Out For Kindness

Alice Roosevelt Longworth famously said, “If you don’t have something nice to say, come sit by me.” When I was young I subscribed whole-heartedly to that principle. Being tough and self-reliant was highly prized in my formidable years. I don’t think that anyone would describe me as kind when I was a teenager.

Today it was important that I made it to church since it was the last Sunday my friend and church business manager Barbara Fletcher was going to be there. She is retiring and moving to Alabama to live closer to her two granddaughters. I have known and adored Barbara for years having had the pleasure of working on committees with her for at least the last fourteen years. I will miss her, especially her thoughtful kindness.

As I sat in church my minister Chris told a story about what his grandfather who at the age of 93 lost his wife of sixty-nine years. His Grandfather was unsure of what he had to live for. One day Chris went to visit him and he Grandfather called him into the room and said, “I know what I am supposed to do now.” Chris leaned in waiting to hear the secret to life. “I’m just supposed to be nice to people.” His grandfather lived another twelve years and must have made lots of people happy with his kindness.

After church I got a big surprise when I had an unplanned visit with Megan Ketch who was Carter’s babysitter for five years and is like my bonus daughter. Megan is a successful actress living in NYC. We talked about the work she was doing and how the world is changing to embrace kindness as a measurement for success. She said to me that now the goal she tried to live by is to be just a little kinder than even she thought she could be.

As I was making soup for my friend who had been sick I noticed this thread of the importance of kindness running through my day. It dawned on me that I too have come to value kindness so much more than I did as a young person. Now I am not talking about sickly sweetness or insincerity, but just plain ‘ole thoughtfulness. Doing something for someone else with no expectations in return.

Now don’t get me wrong, if a person drives me crazy I am much less likely to go out of my way to do them a favor, but I am also less likely to be unkind. I feel as if the universe is giving me a sign to push kindness just a little bit further. Big disclaimer here, I’m not giving up edginess or if I am particularly hormonal all bets are off, but maybe, just maybe I will catch myself before I say something not so nice and just keep it to myself.

The Loss of Innocence

My heart is breaking for the Kirven family who lost their son this weekend. Helping Carter understand and get through this sudden and sad ending to her classmates life is not easy. It takes a long time to process and you never really get over it. The ending of an old person’s life is the expected order of things, but someone young is unsettling.

When I was a college sophomore I made wonderful friend with a freshman named Suzanne Farrell. She was bubbly and beautiful and always fun. Suzanne was from the town next to mine at home so I gave her rides home for vacations. At Christmas break after I left her at her house in New Canaan I found a notebook in the backseat of my yellow VW. Flipping the book open to the middle I found the lord’s prayer written out in Suzanne’s neat printing. I realized it was her journal and closed it, not wanting to intrude on her privacy. I called her and told her I had it.

We had sorority rush second semester at my school and Suzanne desperately wanted to be a Pi Phi like me. She and her friends would come to rush parties and meet all the sisters and after ask me if I thought she had a chance to get in. I was membership chairman and so I could not really answer her, but as her friend I would reassure her. Of course she got in and then she became my little sister.   I still can picture her with her long brown side ponytail tied with a big grosgrain ribbon bow in her wine and silver blue shirt at the ceremony where you got your big sister. It was a happy day for both of us.

That summer while I was living in Carlisle and Suzanne was back at home she was killed in a terrible accident with two other friends. I found out when one of my sorority sisters called me because she had heard about it on the radio. Then life became very blurry. I don’t remember driving myself home to Connecticut, but I do remember her mother giving all of Suzanne’s friends one of her hair ribbons to wear at the funeral.

While I sat in her church listening to the congregation recite the Lord’s Prayer I had a feeling of peace pass over me. I knew that Suzanne had a strong faith in God. I knew that my finding her journal and just by chance opening it to the page where she had written the Lord’s Prayer was no coincidence. Call it faith, karma or kismet, some higher power was looking out for me, letting me know things were going to be all right.

I was still sad that her life was too short and unfinished, but she brought great joy into the lives of the people who knew her. I chose to celebrate that joy and that I was lucky enough to know her. As time goes on I forget the names and the faces of more and more people I knew longer, but Suzanne Farrell and her positive outlook on the world still stays with me. Perhaps that was what she was here to do.

Walking Under Water

Yesterday very early in the morning I heard my text message ding. Since it was Sunday and my family was all sleeping safe and sound under our roof I did not wake up to read the message. A couple hours later when I rose I read the text from a friend. She was in the hospital and needed some advice and help. I was able to do both, but spent the day worried about her recovery.

Late last night just as I was about to doze off I heard the text sound on my phone. Russ had flown off to Minneapolis in the afternoon and given my mornings news I turned on my light and fumbled for my reading glasses to make sure both my husband and my friend were OK. That was when I learned the horrible news that a classmate of Carter’s since kindergarten had passed away.

There is no amount of preparation I could ever do to help me face this sad reality. I called three friends and got the story. I called Carter up to my room so I could tell her the news myself before the teen text machine sent the word out. I have never had to tell my child that anyone had passed away, let alone one of her contemporaries. After some hugs she left my room to talk with her friends.

It took about a half an hour and then my tear stained face daughter was back in my room asking if she could sleep with me. We lay in bed and talked late into the night, still somewhat numb and in disbelief.

Morning truth came too soon. Carter was able to sleep in since this was a planned day off from school. I got up but seemed to stumble about my day. This reality that a young man was not going to spend his next years with his classmates, friends and family was just now sinking in. My heart was breaking more and more for his parents. No one should lose a child. No children should lose a classmate. No teachers should lose a student. No friend should lose a friend.

I feel as if I am walking underwater. Every step I take I feel like there is a great weight pushing against me. Hug your children tonight and make sure they know you love them. Cherish the time together. We never know when a string that makes up the fabric of our community is going to be ripped away. Hold one another up, keep an eye out for those who are hurting. Offer them a shoulder or your hand.

Cheap Gas Makes Me Less Selfish

A couple weeks ago I pulled into a gas station and the price on the big sign by the road read “Regular $3.16.9” I thought that was a wonderful deal. I got out of my car and put the nozzle in the hole in the car and when I went to flip up the pump I noticed that the price on the actual pump was $3.06 and the ubiquitous 9/10 of a cent. Why don’t gas stations go ahead and do away with the 9/10ths? It might have made more sense when gas cost .15¢ a gallon, but now… I digress.

Today, Carter and I went to pick up her friend Ashley and out in the country of Chatham County we went by a gas station that had an electronic price sign and it read $89.70 for regular and .85¢ for diesel. Since we were in Carter’s diesel car she wanted to stop and fill up. We didn’t. Clearly the $89.70 was a mistake that was not helping get customers into their station. But one big price mistake made me feel like the low price was not to be believed.

Later this afternoon when I was driving my car I noticed the gas gauge was flashing on yellow to alert me to fill up. I pulled into one of my favorite Family Fare stations where the regular gas was $2.969. Glory be. I don’t remember the last time gas has been that cheep. I was still not through celebrating the $3.16.

I filled my tank, but was tempted to only go half way because the trend is clearly going down so I bet that by the time I use this tank up the price might be even cheaper. The total for filling my car was $30. I felt like I was in college, except that my Dad was not paying for my gas.

I just wish that I had a big trip to go on so I could do it more cheaply. It never fails that when gas prices are the highest I am taking my longest road trip. The summer that gas almost got to $5 a gallon Carter and I drove to the top of Michigan in my car that got 18 miles to the gallon. It was a scaring experience.

There is nothing else besides gas that I pay such close attention to the price on. Maybe only when limes went up so high this past winter, but other than that I do not follow prices down to the cent. In reality I don’t use that much gas, maybe ten gallons every three weeks, so a twenty-cent fluctuation makes no difference in my life. But it is all psychological. Somehow if gas is low I feel richer and if gas is high I am stingy. I can’t be alone in this.

If I feel like I have more money I am more generous to charities, waiters and waitresses and others who depend on my being magnanimous. This is crazy since I am not the revenue generator. I just hope this trend continues. I like feeling more flush and more unselfish at the same time. I may not actually be unselfish, but I hope if gas is cheap I am working that direction.

No Exercise Arts & Crafts

Exercise is not my first choice of daily activity, but if I were to rank what I do all day it would be the greatest time grabber after sleeping. I am not talking about big time exercising like “professional” athletes I know, but mostly walking. Now there is a lot of things I can do while walking since I have a stand up desk and treadmill. Things like writing this blog, paying bills, talking on the phone, folding laundry, playing words with friends all while watching TV at the same time. I even can do a little dancing while walking and listening to music. All that counts as exercising.

There are also things I can’t do while walking on the treadmill, like cooking, ironing, gardening and most arts and crafts projects I want to work on. If I really try I can needlepoint, but I have to walk so slowly and my dependence on strong reading glasses make stitching and walking dangerous. Since I have almost fallen the three inches off the treadmill while doing small intricate work I have given that up.

Today I realized that Christmas is coming up fast, faster than I can walk. Since December is practically all booked with entertaining and celebrating I need to complete all Christmas related projects before Thanksgiving. With all the eating opportunities between Thanksgiving and Christmas the exercise is not going to be allowed to drop a moment.

Today I tried to do the impossible, arts and crafts and a nine-mile walk in the same day. Well It was not impossible, but I did not get anything else done, no laundry, no cooking, nothing to help any family member, not even any playing with the dog. Russ has saved the day by taking Carter to the Duke Basketball Countdown to Craziness game tonight. They are sitting right on the floor in seats Russ got from a friend. I am relieved of guilt for doing arts and crafts all day and am able to finish my walking while they are at the game.

Unless there is some miracle where Russ gets more tickets to games for Carter I may have to give up sleep to get my Christmas arts and crafts done. That is unless I can think of some crafty exercises. This could be the next big thing, but I have not figured that out yet. Running with scissors has long been discouraged.

Day Off

Carter did not have school today. Although it had been on the school calendar since the beginning of time I somehow never put it on my calendar. I found out about it on Wednesday when Carter asked me if she and three friends could go to the fair Thursday after school. In what universe could she go to the fair on a school day? The one where she did not have school the next day. Oh.

Today turned out to be a fun day with my daughter. After getting her up earlier than she needed to because I mistakenly thought she had a hair appointment I made up for it by taking her to lunch and the movies. The movie was her idea. I thought she might want to go to a Rom/Com, usually the genre of her choice, but I was wrong. She chose a war movie, Fury.

Since the reviews online were good I agreed and off we went to sit mostly alone in the dark at one in the afternoon. I must agree with the reviewers. The first test for me was that I only fell asleep for a couple of minutes at the start of the film, but then was awake for the balance of the show. This is a miracle because if you put me in a warm dark room after having enjoyed a bowl of hot soup I am usually assured of taking a good long nap. I am very similar to an eighty-year old man. I guess that if you throw Brad Pitt up on the screen I revert back to being a young woman and am able to remain awake.

The movie was a tough look at a young man’s first week on the front as an artillery guy in a tank unit in Germany who has been together for the whole war. Carter was enthralled with the mechanics of war and had a lot of questions for me that I could not answer. She decided that she is interested in studying both the Great War and World War II in college. Maybe my lack of details was a good thing. If I had satisfied her curiosity she might not want to go deeper in study.

What she really liked was the relationships of the people in the war. It was not the battles, or the tactics, but the camaraderie. I think that she may want to study anthropology and sociology to really understand how teams and relationships work. As of right now I am not going to go that deep with her. I am just going to revel in the good day off we had together. I know these days are going to be fewer and farther in between.

Clean Plate Club

Tonight after my mother’s art show my parents took me and Russ to eat dinner at Revolution. It was a lovely to get to sit down and relax after standing up visiting with all the nice friends who came out to see my Mom and her art. It was actually nice to get to eat dinner with Russ who I have hardly seen in the last couple of weeks because he has been in California, Chicago, Nantucket and New York and I have been in Durham and well, at the fair.

The difference between Revolution food and the fair is dramatic. That delta was probably just as great as the difference between food in Danville too. So I think my parents had a good meal.

Since we were eating so late I was hungry, but did not want to order anything too heavy. I picked the golden beat salad and the Ahi Poke tuna. The waiter looked at me and told me I was ordering two salads. I nodded that I was in agreement with that and he gave me the look that said, “I just want you to understand what you are getting.”

I guess that waiters think most people are expecting either a hot meal for dinner or something larger than a salad, but this waiter could not read the invisible tattoo on my forehead that reads, “This person is only allowed to eat salads.” To me a treat is to eat a salad someone else made me.

The Ahi “Poke” salad came first and it was spectacular. I easily could eat one of those everyday for the rest of the year and been happy. The golden beat salad came next and it too was yummy, small, but yummy.

After I had eaten every last sliver of beet and grapefruit section my plate looked as if it had just come from the dishwasher it was so simonized. A bus boy came by the table and after looking at the empty dish asked me the most ridiculous question ever, “Are you done with that?”

I am never sure what else he thinks I might be doing with that plate after I have practically licked it clean. Maybe rather than asking me if I was done with it he could ask me how I liked it, but since there was nary a morsel left that question too seems unnecessary. If I have fulfilled the requirements for the clean plate club I think it is fine to just take my plate without asking me any superfluous questions. It kind of makes me feel bad that I did not leave a tiny lettuce leaf on the plate, but it was all so good and without many calories that I wanted to eat it all.

Next time a waiter asks if I am done with my empty plate I am going to say, “No, I think I would like to take it home.” I just want to see what he says.

My Inappropriate Response Was to Swear Out Loud

Tomorrow is my mother’s gallery open house at the Alizarin Gallery at 119W. Main St. Suite 200 in downtown Durham. The reception is from 6-8 and all are welcome. That means you!

Months ago when this show was planned my mother asked me if she could come and spend the night at my house after the reception. “Of course,” was my answer. It was a question she really did not even need to ask. My mother is not that old, but old enough that she should not drive an hour home in the dark, especially if she has had a glass of wine. All art shows go better with a glass of wine.

Today as I was going into an important meeting I got a voice mail message from my mother. In a deadpan voice this is what she said, “Dana, I fell down today and broke my wrist so your father is going to drive me to the show. Can he spend the night too and we go out to dinner after the show, or we just could drive home?”

Again, a question that she did not need to ask, of course my Dad can spend the night. He too should not drive home late at night in the dark. But what about your wrist? I have called both parents back and only gotten voice mail. This broken wrist information did not put me in the best mood.

As I entered the room for my meeting I was carrying my ubiquitous needlepoint bag. The leader of the meeting looked at me and in what was supposed to be a joking way said, “You are not allowed to needlepoint at this meeting. We have too much important stuff to cover.”

In front of other prominent members of the group I looked at the leader and loudly said, “Fuck You, No one tells me not to needlepoint.” Shocked would not be a strong enough word. Now I was not planning on needle pointing through the meeting, but I certainly don’t like being told what to do. My response was uncalled for and uncharacteristic because I usually would have had a wittier come back with no need to drop the F bomb.

I later apologized to the leader, who also happens to be a friend. I did not tell her about the message from my mother. I don’t think that I had put it together in my brain that I was really just reacting to my mother’s news. I feel like a more average response might have been to cry, but not to swear like a sailor. I wonder if I will ever grow up?

Stop The Political Babbling It’s Making Me Fat

Between the television and radio ads, phone calls, e-mails, face book posts and the junk mail I can’t seem to get away from political babbling. I know I am not unique, but this political back and forth fighting has gotten into my subconscious. I must have fallen asleep with the TV on last night because I had a dream that Thom Tillis with a giant head and tiny body was running down a gravel road chasing me while I was riding on the back of an ostrich.

OK you dream analyzers, what the hell does that mean? I wish I were an ostrich and could put my head in the sand until after the election is over. I know who I am voting for so there is no matter of slashing the opponent ads that will make me change my mind. I do feel like all this name-calling and bad mouthing is causing me to eat bad for me food.

I know it sounds lame to blame politicians for my weakness, but why not? They blame each other for everything else that is wrong with the world. When I was in college my favorite course was called “History Writing”. We had this little 100-page textbook called, “How to lie with statistics.” In this class we learned how to write history to tell the story we wanted to tell, the angle we already decided we wanted history to portray or the version of the story we wanted the world to adopt. Can you say propaganda? I think that if I did not go to a liberal arts school this course might have been called “Marketing 201.”

It is my feeling that all this public finger pointing and personal bashing is filling the air with a negativity that people try and overcome personally by eating, drinking and smoking too much. I think it would be a really interesting study to see if the population of North Carolina got fatter during the time leading up to this enormous election.

If we could prove that negative campaigning made people fatter we could stop politicians from running negative ads. No one wants to be the candidate that causes his or her potential constituents to gain weight. Everyone would want to vote for the person who made him or her thinner or at least did not make them try and drown out the bickering with food.

Just a few more weeks and we can go back to do nothing politicians being quiet about their lack of getting anything done. Imagine that I am looking forward to that day.

The Offensive Naked Roll

The other day while I was attending a party at a friend’s house I had to wait in line to use the powder room. When my turn came to enter the very beautiful and well appointed throne room I was greeted by a pleasant smell and soft lighting coming from an expensive candle and beautiful linen hand towels as well as paper guest finger tip towels for those who are resistant to use the cloth ones. A bowl of small soaps as well as a glass liquid soap dispenser sat on the vanity. Everything a guest could want was provided for.

Then, while seated I noticed that a new roll of toilet tissue, that’s what fancy ads call toilet paper, was perched sideways on the spent old roll still attached to the wall holder. In the trashcan directly below the toilet paper holder sat the paper that had recently covered the new roll.

My poor hostess I thought. She had gone to great lengths to get her house ready for so many guests. She had cleaned and cooked and lit candles and put out her best china and linens. She warmly greeted her friends at the door. Made introductions all around so that people could get to know new friends. She poured drinks and passed food.

Her one mistake was she had not hired a bathroom attendant who could check the facilities after each guest had visited them. She had no idea that she had invited someone who was too lazy to actually change the roll of toilet tissue. Someone who had either used the last bit of paper and left an empty roll for her next guest or had needed more paper and found the graciously left spare roll, but could not be bothered to pinch together the roll holder and remove the naked core and replace it with a new fresh roll of paper.

Appalled and embarrassed that while waiting in line I had seen two previous visitors come out and not one of them mentioned having trouble replacing the roll. What country had these people been raised in? Certainly not one where the user of the last square of paper or even close to the last square is obligated to actually replace the roll and not just rest it on the old one.

The new roll that sat sideways on the old roll was very large so it obviously had just recently been placed there. I seriously doubt that my hostess had set it up that way before the party started. And what if she had? Wouldn’t it have been kind of any guest who first encountered it that way to go to the trouble of fixing her paper by hanging it on the wall roll holder?

I know there can be some debate among the fussiest of house keepers about which way the roll should roll; either paper coming over the top or from behind, but not knowing which way a hostess likes her roll is no excuse for not spending the ten seconds it take to put the new paper on the roll. If I wasn’t such a lady I might have whispered in my hostess’ ear about this horrific situation, but I held back. Just be assured I removed the offending old core and replaced the fresh roll. Points in heaven for me.

Big Ass Weekend

Sunday night at last and I have survived my weekend from hell. Not only are the PSAT’s behind us, but so is the State Fair horse show. I know that my daughter loves it more than anything else she does all year, as much as I hate it. Getting up at an ungodly hour to get to the smelly barn to sit around and wait and wait and wait. Then to have her horse act up, cause anxiety to the humans and have a judge who we wish to never meet again.

In the end Carter was happy. A big championship ribbon was brought home and life lessons were learned. For me I got to spend some quality time with my child and the adults from her barn who I really like, but still I am glad this fair is behind us.

Behind should be the key word for the state fair horse show. As the children who are competing come dressed in their finest androgynous show clothes, all buttoned up in fancy jackets and starched shirts with rat catcher collars and jodhpurs and tall leather boots in the height of old English fashion they are quite the opposite of some of the mothers and trainers.

This year sparkly big ass butts were the grown up fashion of choice. I am not sure how many of these middle aged women had three way mirrors, but I think a little butt selfie in the dressing room to see how the jeans with rhinestone pockets and glittered flaps made their already spreading posteriors shine might be a good idea. Of course the skinny and younger ones could pull off the sparkle butt look, especially if they were from the “country”. But most of those Mamas need not make the sunshine reflect and magnify their backsides in such a blinding way.

One woman with particularly poor command of the queens English not only had “Hey guys, look at my giant ass” sparkle pockets on her jeans, but then had a shirt on advertising her “big ole racks” She had to hang her truck keys on her belt loop because her jeans were too tight to accommodate them on the inside. I have no idea who her child was, but all the girls who were in the ring she was watching were dressed in the epitome of perfect English riding attire. “Hey Mama, take some fashion lessons from your child.”

I have a whole year before I have to spend my weekend with these, shall I say, a color and a body part type women again. I hope that there is a more subtle type of jeans in fashion next year.

 I’m Whining to Myself

Since Russ is in Nantucket for a partner’s meeting and Carter had PSAT’s this morning there was no chance for sleeping late for me. Tomorrow will be another early morning for the long day at the State Fair horse show, my child’s favorite weekend of the year and my least favorite.

I am naturally a morning person, but I really like the idea of getting to sleep in if I want to, at least one day a week. Truth be told, even when I stay up late the night before I still wake up early, but knowing I could sleep late makes me happier. Somehow going to bed early is no replacement for getting to sleep late –psychologically. I am grumpy just thinking that it will be at least three weeks in a row before I get any opportunity to sleep past seven. Why is that?

Reality is that on Tuesday this week I got up at 4:30 just because. Tonight I can go to bed as soon as Carter gets back from the fair and that looks like it will be around nine. I got all my steps done today before the end of the Duke Football game at 3:45 and could have taken a nap, but I didn’t. I wasn’t actually tired, but thinking about no chance to sleep in makes me anticipate being tired.

Nobody else in my house complains of this, but me. Carter willing gets up every Saturday at seven in the morning and goes and mucks stalls and feeds horses. Russ does not sleep more than four hours most days and I never hear a peep out of him. This week he flew to California on a 6PM flight, arrived in Oakland at midnight, had to drive an hour and a half to his hotel and then get up at 5:30 in the morning for a conference call. No complaining, at least to me.

I am trying to put his all in perspective. I know it is healthier to sleep a regular pattern, which is really what I do. But the bratty side of me wants to have the option of a break. Maybe this is all a reaction to my not being able to go to Nantucket where I would have been allowed to sleep late, even though I know I would not have.

Whatever the reason, this is a first world problem, or not really a problem at all. So I will quit my whining now and go make food for the riders for the horse show tomorrow. At least I have found a way to get all the fattening food left over from parties out of my house. Another first world problem. At least I did not have to take PSAT’s this morning. Let’s really put things in perspective.

Proof of Semi-Maturity

When I was young my father used to say of me that I did not suffer fools well. He was an expert on this since his mother was of similar personality. Now she was an alcoholic so some of her shortness with idiots was liquor induced and mine was just pure impatience.

This tendency to be blunt is something my sisters really disliked. Once while waiting in a very long line to get on the only down escalator at Selfridges in London I was behind a woman who clearly had a fear of escalators. When her turn came she stood with her foot hovering over the descending steps watching them come and go, one by one without attempting to put her foot down and get to the next floor.

My sister stood with me as we waited behind the phobic. After at least ten treads came and went without any attempt to get on the escalator I did what I always did back then and intervened by loudly saying, “GO!” She did. It made my sister furious and embarrassed. “But she went,” was my defense.

Yesterday I had to take Carter to her barn to pack her tack for a horse show two hours before 30 people were showing up at my house for dinner. While Carter was doing her thing I ran to Trader Joes to buy the three last minute items I needed. As I pushed my arugula filled cart quickly towards the nut section I suddenly was surrounded by three tiny people pushing toddler size carts willy nilly with their mother carrying a fourth child.

The tiny ones with no shopping lists in hands and no real sense of urgency to move through the produce aisle stood like a battalion determined to keep me from getting past them. Although I said nothing, I must have had my “don’t suffer fools well face on.” I looked to the mother to solve my problem. Without any apology for allowing her children to go unsupervised she blamed me for the situation saying, “You should shop online if you don’t like children.”

Quick as a flash so many horrible and cutting responses flew through my brain, but I held back. I easily could have taken this mother down right in front of her children by saying, “I love children, I just hate mother’s who can’t control theirs.” But I didn’t. I could have even said something so over the children’s heads but so biting to the mother that they would not understand why she burst into tears in the car by saying, “Practicing childrearing is not improving for you with each additional child.” But I didn’t.

Instead I stood there patiently, bent down to eye level of the littlest cart pusher, smiled and said, “Look at what a good job you are doing.” With all my might I held back from standing up and looking at the mother and adding, “So much better than your mommy.”

Eventually the tiny ones figured out how to move away and the probably over stressed mother of four, maybe more at home, moved on. I grabbed the needed nuts flew to the checkout and was out the door.

It took every bit of strength I had to leave the store without making some come back, but I did. Just because I have a great response to someone does not mean I have to use it. I guess at fifty-three I am finally beginning to mature, but boy is it hard.

 Caterings In My Blood

One of the perks of marrying a woman who owns a catering business is that you can utilize her skills for throwing parties for the rest of your life. One of the perks of marrying a really smart and driven man is that you don’t have to be a caterer any more.

Catering was a side business I started in college. I lived off campus and one summer when I stayed in Carlisle to redo my new off campus house because it was an old house that needed painting, tiling and general deep cleaning I knew it was a job that would take all summer. Since painting my own house was a non-paying job I had many part time jobs to make up the difference in eating and not eating. Selling Electrolux vacuums door-to-door, college tour guide, and college catering office manager were just a few.

But when I was asked if I could cater my history professor’s daughter wedding personally and not through the school of course I said yes. How hard could it be? That wedding led to another and suddenly I was a caterer. Probably the best skills I ever developed in college. Even though I got a “real” job when I graduated I continued catering because the money was just too easy and the work was fun, as long as I liked my clients. The joy of a side business is you can pick and choose which jobs you take based on how much fun the people are.

A couple of months ago Russ asked me if I would have all his employees to our house for dinner during a team meeting of course I said yes. He passed the number one rule; I like the client. The number two rule is not an issue; make sure to make money on every job. Well, since the company is paying for the food I figure I owe Russ the labor for free; after all I have been on permanent vacation for about the last fifteen years.

But being out of the actual catering game means my skills are dull and I am without my best resources, they guys who used to work with me. I don’t have the same refrigeration capacity now as I did in the olden days. This means I could not do major shopping or prepping too far in advance. My hands are orange from peeling and chopping ten pounds of carrots. I have sauces and dressings made in advance, but all the major cooking is going to have to wait until tomorrow right before the party.

The biggest difference in catering now versus then is that I now have a child who takes precedence. So tonight when I came home from two back-to-back church meetings, rather than make the desserts I had to take care of a medical issue for my child. Timing everything for the party tomorrow night is going to be tricky since I have to pick Carter up from school and take her to the barn to get her stuff ready for the State Fair Horse show this weekend. Life was much easier when I was just balancing catering someone’s’ wedding with 250 guests and closing a million dollar mail opening machine order at the same time.