Quirk and Circumstances... |
Philosophy | March 14, 2010
I grew up in a house where my parents came at life from two very different directions; there were two languages, two sets of values and two sets of skills for moving through the world. One example of this is language one parent loved words the other hated them. My mom has always professed to hate them, yet she uses some of the most dramatic and visceral language of anyone I know. My dad loved them, I believe partly because he loved to read, and he loved the sound and music of language. He spent a lot of time in his head and the life they drew for him was substantially richer than our quarter acre lot on Long Island and his days as an ironworker. He would have loved to been a toastmaster I think but alas he had the social skills of a red eared box turtle. To be fair the red eared is the most gregarious and social of the box turtle set.
I can remember trying to leave parties with my dad, he would stand on the porch, in the driveway, or on the walk and say good bye for an hour. The poor host and hostess were exhausted by the time we could get him in the car. He just could not read people; he had been raised by wolves. He was brilliant but only in a formal education and book smart way. My mom is more street smart, intuitive and has some people skills. She has brilliant business sense but not much advanced education which makes her doubt formable ability. Too bad that they hadn’t appreciated what the other brought to the party and bottom line they were both a couple of major nuts. If you have ever read any of my writing you know the Pearhater did not fall far from that tree.
My mother’s language options are as bold and action oriented as she is, it is never an “odor” it is a “stench”, not a “cut” but a “gash”. Even n her attempt to get us to choke down orange juice at breakfast before school was based on the cautionary tale of sailors who got scurvy. I was the only 2nd grader that knew not only what the cause of scurvy was, but also the symptoms and treatment for it. My dad on the other hand used language as tool, he drew it as a weapon when you disappointed him and when he deemed you worthy he anointed you. He was precise and lethal. I have high school memories of conversations around the dinner table about words such as mellifluous, foible and tintinnabulation. During those moments my mom was long gone from the table banging pots at the sink.
My parents were opposites in many other ways as well. He was adventuresome about food; he loved to try the exotic and new but was not a risk taker in life. My mother was a risk taker and adventuresome in life but hated to try new foods. She could and does eat the same thing day in and day out. He was more of a planner and fear based where she is a fly by the seat of your pants, liar liar pants on fire type of woman. There was some dove tailing in their relationship, some challenging of stance, vision and knowledge. I can’t say if it worked for them or not, that is not my call. I can say it was a chaotic existence for my siblings and me.
I can see where that jumbled, jagged mix of their parts is blended in me in many ways. My love of language, both for the exaggerated as well as the fine crafted appears. I see the blend to where I fall on the IQ, EQ scales and my squirrelly high sense of intuition. As to adventure I crave it in everything from food to life across the board. I have been called fearless; however I don’t think that is true. It would be more accurate to say I posses an insatiable curiosity, and I work around the fear. Fear is a limitation, I don’t play well with limits, they just piss me off. I love the adrenaline that comes from a new experience and a steep learning curve. These days I rarely care about looking foolish, not knowing the answer or being vulnerable; I only care about what is true, what is real, what is learned, and how it feels.
As I get older the feeling part of that equation has blossomed which has been a delightful surprise. I have immersed myself in sensations of life, the skin to skin, the slow evolution of a brilliant pinot on my tongue, laughing so hard my body sings, the wet sand between my toes with the sound of the waves crashing. The love of words is still there, the thrill of an adventure is there, but now the appreciation of what is in the moment has given them the depth and richness that failure brings to success.
I now understand my folks better as well. My mother was the one to teach me the value of a road trip; a puddle is meant to be jumped in and even better was a jump in the ocean with your clothes on because the opportunity presented itself. I learned to be open to what the moment offers and how to play, and play hard. These days I play like it’s my job. My dad taught me to let what is unfold in its own time, like a fine scotch, a good story, and human frailty, and that each of those warms with the touch. Don’t get me wrong the wealth of knowledge and skills I derived from them does not take them out of nutdom, but it has helped balance the darkness. Balance was not a skill they possessed it’s one I am cultivating, hence the sour patch kids between workouts yesterday. Really it’s all about finding the center spot the one filled with sweet, rich, gooey goodness and getting every last drop.
Business | February 25, 2010
Years ago I worked in a call center for Apple Computer. My primary customers were technicians in the field who had problems fixing computer equipment. I was what you might call a “Master Technician” or expert the field used as a resource to help troubleshoot. I liked the job for the most part except for being tethered and having to pay attention to the stats, oh yea and watching your liquid intake was a must. Once in a blue moon the Customer Service call center was overrun with calls and needed us technicians as back up phone agents. That division talked to end users, customers, you know… angry people. Yikes. Anyone who works for a large company usually gets some kind of training working with people, communication skills, diffusing anger, etc. I got tons at Apple right down to learning about the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator which is a personality assessment tool; it measures people’s psychological preferences. This was a great tool because it showed me how I perceive and process information and make decisions. As interesting as this test was in terms of me it was fascinating to apply it to understand my coworkers, family, friends and oh yes those I let in my bed. Needless to say it has been a valuable skill in my tool bag over the years.
Anyone who works in Customer Service, works with the general populace-- or as my grandmother who was not known to be the nicest woman called them “the great unwashed”--has the patience of Job. People can be rude, ignorant, impatient, stubborn, and downright nasty. Face to face they can reign it in, sometimes, but when you add the layer of anonymity a phone gives them people feel more comfortable in “acting out”. So my experiences with customers as a bartender at weddings while in college, or waitressing in a bad Mexican restaurant did not even come close to what was flung at me when the overflow customer calls came. There was not enough money in the world to make me want to do that on a regular basis. Hey I am not a pansy; I started as a technician in the field in computer business. I was used to having angry folks in my face from the beginning when it was deemed my fault that their Mac Plus power supply burned out every six months. When I smiled and listened to them in person they calmed almost immediately. Listening was important and so was the fact that that smile was generally a foot taller than them holding a long screwdriver. Over the phone I was just a disembodied voice, I was the reason they could not log on, get to their life online, the reason that their electronic happiness had gone away. They were pissed.
That being said I have also been on the other side of the coin. That is where most of us have been. We have spent hours tangled in the branches of sadistic phone trees where there is no real answer, help or exit strategy. Companies have made it so difficult to actually make contact to a human being that when you do get there you explode all over them in frustration and rage. The only customer service folks who are easy to find are the ones who want you to buy things; plane tickets, clothes, gourmet food, anything a glossy catalog marketing team can imagine. If however the item is defective well good luck with that, that is a full time job in getting it rectified. You need to take a leave of absence from work, stop showering and interacting with anyone other then the phone tree or the muzak on your phone while you wait in purgatory for attention, not resolution. Resolution comes from the divine and is not easily doled out. God help you if you do not have your data with you when you get the body on the phone. If after you have typed your account number, address, phone, birth date, social security number, bank account number, highest level of education, number of green vegetables eaten the previous day, all done with a shaky hand driven by the troughs of coffee consumed while navigating the phone system and are missing something pertinent WaWaWa you go to the end of the line, thanks for playing. There is no good side of the phone to be on in Customer Service these days.
The newest wrinkle is that now many companies have outsourced this type of job overseas, to places like India. Here we are boosting those economies all the while inflicting verbal abuse on their inhabitants. I guess that is a fair trade, it’s hard to say. Most of the times I have had this customer experience it was fine: some small issues with cultural nuances and accents and large issues with company policy. The utterance “I’m sorry it’s company policy” is the new ‘Holy Grail’ for the phone agents. Sure you can get their manager on the phone who may give you a coffee mug or a 30% discount off another product that will be broken, the wrong size, or rancid before it’s time, but they can not fix your problem because fixing it would be against “company policy”. I don’t blame them, the call center folks; I don’t blame any one person. I am not happy however with any company that puts me the customer, at the bottom of the list when it comes to satisfaction and value. They create this mess with cost cutting measures along with improper training and policy to stay afloat. Bad call on their part. You put in me in a phone tree from hell or with someone who can not or will not help me when I get to them 15 hours after I initiate the call and I would rather drag my front teeth down a black board than buy your product again.
The best example of the inane company policy model I have heard played out was on a recent trip to Florida. My sister lives in New York and I live in San Diego. We meet in Florida at my mom’s for a visit once or twice a year. We time our flights so we share the expense of the taxi and do virtually no solo time with my crazy mother. It’s a win, win. Two weeks ago when we were there the north east was doing what it does in the winter, snow like crazy and twist up air travel. I was heading west, which was lovely for me. Chris my sister was not so lucky. Her trip home was canceled and she had to fly out the day after me. She toyed with the idea of riding with me to the airport and staying at a hotel close by. Financially it would have been almost a wash and it certainly would also have been a huge sanity boost. So she called the 800 number for the hotel she found online. Things were getting complicated during the call and finally after 5 minutes with the phone agent she said “forget it, cancel the reservations.” The woman said she would have to transfer her to another location and to please hold it might take 4-5 minutes. So Chris waits and gets her transfer. She explains she wants to cancel the reservation and why. The phone agent explains the cancellation policy is that Chris would have had to cancel on the 7th to not be charged. Chris explains that today is the 8th and she made the reservation 5 minutes ago for the 9th and that she would need a Time Machine in order to cancel the reservation before she made it. There was no laugher on the other end of the phone just dead silence. This is where the culture nuance could have helped. All the woman said was it was “company policy” and she had to charge her. After 30 minutes and another transfer to the actual Florida Hotel and its reservation manager all was solved. In total it was a 45 minute exercise in frustration.
“Sometimes” Chris said after it was all over and she had poured a large tumbler of wine, “I try to make small talk while they are trying to help me and I ask them where they are”.
“What do they say? Where are they?” I asked with my own large tumbler of wine.
“Detroit”. She dead pans.
“No, really?”
“Yep, guess they are not supposed to say where they really are due to ‘company policy’. So then I ask them ‘How the weather in Detroit?’”
I started to laugh, “Are you are trying to trip them up or make them laugh?”
“Both” She said. Didn’t sound like either worked.
Well I suggested “After asking them about where they are, then what the weather in Detroit, or where ever … then try slipping in ‘How many cows are in the street?’”
She choked on her Cabernet when she laughed, but I could tell she was filing it away for another day.
Health & Wellbeing | January 30, 2010
Yep, I admit it I am a loser but not in the traditional sense, yea, yea, what a shock me not traditional who would have thunk it. Sitting here typing this very late blog I am less than 3lbs away from hitting my goal weight. I am, and have been a member, on and off, for the last 7-8 years, of Weight Watchers. I have mostly been on for the past 5 though with various degrees of success. There were times years prior I tried lots of diets and weight loss programs The Zone, Atkins, Weigh Watchers, Suzanne Sommer’s, and the Cabbage Soup or otherwise known as the “you can’t go out in public because you are a gas bag diet”.
I grew up in a house where my mom lived on and off on diets, that legacy was passed down. Though looking back at pictures I was slim most of my life and as I got older not more than 10-20 pounds over till I was put on a medication to help with my out of control migraines. Those meds and a lifestyle of stuffing my emotions got me up to what a defensive tackle for the Miami Dolphins weighs. I am a tall girl so I rounded out to the silhouette of the Michelin tire man, very unattractive. Not to mention the self loathing that accompanied the weight gain, the feelings of loss of control, and overall sadness only exacerbated the problem. Eventually I hit rock bottom around my 40th birthday. I realized if I managed to live another 40 years I did not want to be hauling the body I was sporting much less be making that ungodly groaning noise I was making just getting out of a low slung chair. This was not my beautiful life and it was up to me to go find it. The pain of existing in my skin was so great that introducing a healthy lifestyle was really the lesser of the two evils.
It has taken a long, long time. A long time to learn what works for me and not judge it. I hated exercise and finding things I could tolerate in the beginning and eventually love took almost a lifetime. Learning what foods made my body feel good, listening to it when I was satisfied with my meal and not keep eating until I feel stuffed like a Thanksgiving turkey. Weight Watchers ultimately gave me many tools, support and the philosophy that “it is not a diet, it’s a lifestyle” that worked for me. I do not do well when I deprive myself of anything. I am a creature who needs choice and variety. If I feel trapped I bolt. It’s a simple fight or flight thing for me: if I am told that I have to give up carbs for 3 weeks, then that is all I want, need and obsess on. I need the freedom to choose or feel as though I do. We always have a choice; even not choosing is a choice.
There have been two things that have come to light to get me all the way home here. The first was really learning, really understanding that my coping method of eating my emotions no longer served me. I learned to feel what I was feeling instead of stuff it down with food, whether the emotion was stress, anger, boredom, or happiness, didn’t matter. I never felt better after eating during those times only worse. So when I started to take walks in time of high and unmanageable emotional states, or write in my journal, or call someone to talk I felt better. I always felt better. These skills became my new coping mechanisms, my new tools in my self care tool bag. It didn’t mean I didn’t try food first in the beginning but I didn’t get relief I was seeking and by just walking out my door and around the block for 30 minutes I did. It took time; I wanted to keep going back to where I used to find comfort but no longer did. Finally I let it go and moved forward. I replaced a bad habit with a good one as the universe abhors a void.
The second thing I that got me this close is I just didn’t give up. I kept tweaking the food, my mood, the exercise, I failed over, and over, and over for years. I just kept getting back up and looking at what beliefs limited me, what mindset and habits were sabotaging me and addressed them. What can I say, I am one stubborn bitch. I was also fighting for my life, my mental and physical health. I knew that giving up was not an option I didn’t want to going back to that half life I was existing at prior to this. The pain in those mornings of looking in my closet and being ashamed to get dressed because I had run out of angles in the mirror I looked OK at. It hurt too much. So I kept t trying to get healthy, making small adjustments, small steps, meal by meal, mile by mile.
Three and half years ago I lost my youngest sister Amy to Leukemia. She was 36. She was diagnosed just at the point she was pulling her life together. She had fallen in love, was getting physically and mentally strong and healthy. Then she was diagnosed and dead within 6 months. Life can be very short. I swore after her death I would not only get healthy but wanted to honor her by honoring my body. I wanted to become athletic in a way I had never done before. I wanted to be the kind of athlete who moved with ease and grace. I wanted to be someone comfortable in their body, strong, confident and happy. None of these things I had ever been or dreamed I could be. It was pure fiction to me, ok science fiction… I put that marker in the sand and promptly forgot about it until late last spring. On a phone call with my trusty sidekick and BFF Marsue, she reminded me about that vow, that desire to become an athlete in some sense. She also pointed out I had done it. I had not exactly forgotten the desire to take it to that level of fitness, I had just been doing those small steps to get there and I forgot to look up to see I had arrived. I am happy to say the view is better than I could have dreamed.
A few weeks ago I was walking on the beach with a friend of mine and we were talking about our schedules for the week. I mentioned I had my Weight Watchers meeting the next morning and he stopped walking. He took my arm and spun me around to look at me incredulous and said “You don’t need to lose weight.” He turned me sideways and continued, “When you turn sideways you remind me of an Angelfish, you all but disappear except for those eyes.” I burst out laughing , not only was it one of the nicest things I had heard in a good long while it was hilarious to me to be compared with such a graceful creature. So within the next week or two I will hit goal. I will have lost a little over 90lbs which is essentially a prima ballerina from the Moscow Ballet Company. I have no doubt that I will hit goal, you see once I started connecting the dots to how my body worked, emotional hunger verse’s physical hunger, and strung all those small steps together I understood bone deep I was no longer my old story. I wasn’t holding on to the things that no longer served me. I was working on a new story, a new life and it has grown up around me on my journey. It seems in my new story I am something of an Angelfish with an incredibly beautiful life. I can’t wait to see what happens next!
Health & Wellbeing | December 13, 2009
It starts in November, I never know exactly when but always before Thanksgiving. My anticipation is great; the window of indulgence always too small, it lasts only till New Years. I know it’s best that way; to extend it in any way would put me in program. I have trouble maintaining for the holiday season as it is without a lot of compensating. And these days I am compensating all the time.
This year it was earlier than last, I started checking the store shelves in anticipation the first week of November and got nadda. So you can imagine my surprise that same week going into a Starbucks and seeing the sign that the read the eggnog lattes were back. Yes! I have a nog problem, I am a nogaholic. Not my term, a friend coined about me a few years ago when he had heard me order one too many times.
“I’ll have a Grande eggnog latte, heavy on the nog”.
I don’t know when my love affair began with the nog but I believe because of my love of all products of the cow, maybe forever. Please, a woman who picks milk as one of her three desert island foods, need I say more? As with all folks who have a deep thirst I can take it any which way as long as I get it. I try to start the season slowly so I am not running 5 miles a day to compensate for its gut spreading goodness. I start the season with soy, yes there is soy nog, and a light version at that. The purest will say this is a bastardization of all that is pure and merry and they would be right. They also are people who know what moderation is, the middle of the road sort of speak, I do not. I have a passing recognition of moderation as I careen from one side of the road to the other. That being the case I start with light soy nog for the first week or two and try to limit my lattes to once a week, though not always successfully. There have been times in my past when I didn’t limit my trips to Starbucks at all and gave the barista a nasty stalker scare. He didn’t know I was just there for the nog, poor lamb. So one eggnog latte a week keeps money in my pocket and me out of the court system, really a win-win my attorney assures me.
Typically I start my days with a little nog in my coffee, just as a pick me up. The nog helps smooth out the morning and get me in the right frame of mind for the day. Sometimes I might have a latte on the go or have a nog at lunch to celebrate the season. I don’t do this every day but there are so many holiday lunches, parties and pot lucks. Someone always has a little nog stowed away, and no it is not always me, sometimes there are more of us. It’s not like I don’t have rules about these things, I am in total control. What is important is I always wait till it gets dark for the nutmeg to come out. I use a whole nutmeg and grate it fresh every time, I got the nutmeg from a guy I with a small set up in midtown Manhattan. It cost a fortune but hey last time a friend bought it for me, granted he was the one to coin the phrase “nogaholic”. Yea, he thinks he is a funny guy but he’s a writer and you know how they are. Once in a blue moon I might add brandy or rum but really why use a mixer? It just dilutes the nog, that’s strictly “armature hour” my dad would say
By the 2nd week of the season I am no longer satisfied with the soy, what was delicious for its novelty and newness at the kick off no longer meets my needs. I am ready for the light eggnog. For the love of the cow I am satisfied for at least 2 to 3 weeks with light eggnog and try all the brands on the market in search for the perfect light. I do notice during this time my pants are getting tight, I am drinking a lot of coffee to get going in the morning and it is always very light from the nog. On the weekends I might add a little nutmeg to the coffee grounds to kick it up a notch. What can a bump hurt to the brew? I know the fully leaded is coming, the full fat nog with its creamy rich velvety sweetness that coats everything in its path with Christmas cheer. I stall as long as I can because I don’t ever go full fat till Christmas week. Leading up to that week I am wearing a lot more forgiving fabrics and styles. I have Omar the tent maker on speed dial for holiday party situations that might arise.
I was getting close to Christmas week and looking forward to the full splendor of my holiday cheer when I noticed what might be a fly in the ointment. I started walking past bakery windows and perusing stollen. As per Wikipedia for those of you who are not familiar with this seasonal treat.
“Stollen is a traditional German cake, usually eaten during the Christmas season, when called Weihnachtsstollen or Christstollen. A similar cake from the Dutch cuisine is called a Kerststol in Dutch while in Italian cuisine the Panettone also shows a likeness.”
I finally got my nerve up and went in and placed an order for one. It was a 3 day wait but it was a good bakery and I was sure it would be pretty high end stuff. Plus I was two weeks out from full fat nog and this would be nice with the light version till then. I picked up the stollen and had them cut it for me so I could individually wrap each slice in saran and double bag it to freeze it. I did this in hopes that I could go slow, just a little here and there. I wanted the cake to get me to the holiday. It was an attempt at staying to the middle of the road. I never had a chance. This stuff was full of butter, sugar, nuts and nirvana. I was working my microwave hard to keep up on the demand. I was even caught once or twice in public with powered sugar on my clothes and upper lip. But thankfully always by those close to me, people with discretion. I didn’t think a little stollen would hurt, what I have learned is like nog there is never enough.
As I sit here and write this my freezer is bare of baked goods. I have two jugs of Hungry Girl’s, a diet maven and recipe genius’s, lean rendition of eggnog in my refrigerator. I just needed a week to clean up before Christmas, to pull it together and get out of my sweat pants. I might have to reconsider my priorities during the holidays and choice of celebratory accouterment. I started talking to some people; they are pretty nice and very supportive. They are the ones that turned me onto the homemade light version recipes and resources. It’s a weekly group who made me take a hard look at things, things from my past, my choices, and my denial. What I know now is when I made that jump from nog to stollen, the hard stuff; it was a cry for help. With their guidance I saw my beloved nog for what it truly was, a crutch. I am not going to get on a soap box here; I know how that can be. I just wanted to own that I might have a problem, and more importantly that nog is a gateway drug.
Writing | November 29, 2009
I try to write one or two blogs every month and this one I will get in under the wire but I will get it in for November as promised and threatened. I have been writing on and off in some form for over 20 years. I have studied, avoided, loved and hated it for most of that time. I started many books, a few screen plays over those years but finished none until last year. In October 2008 I finished my first book; it was a memoir I started it in roughly 2001. It took seven years to write and more than that to live. It took a year to rewrite it over and over to make it as presentable as I could. I finished the rewriting process this past October in 2009. When the end of the month rolled around I saw November looming, I had just started a new business and had heard, new ventures take time to get rolling. I wanted to call myself forth in another way, push on a different frontier. So I remembered Nanowrimo is in November. What that stands for is National Novel Writing Month. Essentially it is a month long challenge to write a 50k, or more, fiction novel from start to finish from November 1st through November 30th. There is a website and community you sign up for and with and cheer each other on. Everyone commits to try to write a novel in 30 days of at least 50k, its nuts.
Two or three years ago one of my best friends and writing buddies did it. We have very different writing styles, as well as output, though there are some small overlaps. He is an engineer, I can talk to engineers. He is very analytical, clever and calculating. I can mostly spell those things, uh with spell check. When he writes he actually has an idea where he is heading, how to get there and how it all ends. I find this fascinating, because I never know till I read what has appeared on my screen. It’s a fly by the seat of my pants, crazy chase of thoughts like leaves in a courtyard. So my friend G signs up and does the math, something he loves, that he has to write a little over 1600 words a day and then some to hit 50k. Every single day he has to write at least that. He did it, it was painful, and he wanted to finish the story so many times but was no where near his 50k but he gutted it out. He had to learn to write sideways, and explore threads of thought and story to places he was not sure where they went. It made him anxious I think. He lost a lot of sleep because of that word count, in fact he messed up his sleep pattern for years, yes Virginia he is a delicate flower. Bottom line he won and hit the mark. As it was always was with him I learned a lot watching him, reading his work, and cheering him on. I thought long and hard about jumping out of what was an 8 year project into something like this. I thought about it for maybe ten whole minutes. I had no way of knowing the business I had just started would build quickly and I would juggle like a mad woman all month. But hey that’s how I roll…
I signed up on 10/30/09 with little to no idea what I would write. I only had a little better idea came the Sunday the 1st and I had started writing. I was two or three paragraphs in had an idea about the main character and some of her misadventures but by the close of Sunday I had written over my word count and knew the premise of the novel. Hell it was fiction which basically was lying and I have been doing that since I could talk. How hard could it be? Let me back up for a moment, when I started my memoir years ago a good writing day consisted of between 300-500 words. I kid you not. It was a slow and painful. Part of that was I was reliving some hellish times in my life and trying to be a true to my story. Memoir is very different stuff than fiction, as I said that is just telling tall tales pure and simple. In finishing that book I got to where I could write between 2-3 thousand words a day on a good day. Though I still needed large blocks of time to do it in. Sometimes I had to go back through journals to find threads, and it was labor intensive and a birth by any other name, which makes me glad I had my tubes tied.
What I found in writing this new book was I could write fast, it was fun, dialogue flowed like crazy. I just followed a bunch of people around in my head and reported what they did. I spent at lest 2-3 hours a day with these folks. It was stressful to work the time around clients and other responsibilities but I found I could write almost anywhere. I brought my lap top to the mechanics and knocked out 2k in 2 hours waiting on my car. He was fascinated, and so was I. I had just found out who killed the upstairs neighbor! The next morning I mentioned it in before yoga to a classmate, she thought I was talking real life. I was so involved with characters and story the lines were blurring. I had to explain that my neighbor was not killed last night it was character in a book I was writing She now puts her yoga mat across the studio from me. I have always had trouble with stories in my head, or on TV and my actual existence and getting those all mixed up. Which turns out is great for a writer but makes you a nut ball in every day existence. I am guessing I won’t get the eccentric tag till I’m older, now it’s just move away and don’t make eye contact.
The end result was I wrote a 51, 057 word novel in 27 days. I was stunned and very proud of myself. In the writing of it I never went back and reread or rewrote any of it, I just went forward. Which was a tip from the Nanowrimo site; I took it and ran with it. There is a lot to learn from that. I had wished my writing friend was around to talk to during this, share it with, cheer me on, but he is long gone. I guess I am not worth the trouble, what can I say? In trying to get my daily word count I had to go back to the keyboard even when I got stuck, when it didn’t work, when it was bad. I just kept going forward with the story. Then there were other times the writing flew and I was astounded that people were saying things that I had no idea where it was coming from or how it would tie in. By people, I mean characters. They were a troublesome lot with minds of their own and big mouths… kind of like me. So I had to respect that and let them be who they were. I gave them room to go sideways and stumble, even when it looked like sometimes they were messing things up. I had to let it go, which is hard for me especially when I don’t understand. After I finish this blog I have a monster rewrite on the novel. I know it will be more fun than the last one, easier, for many reasons. One of which is that I am much better at getting out of my way than I used to be.
Blogging | October 31, 2009
In mid August I found myself getting double takes as I sat at an outdoor café table. It could have been the three feet of bare leg that was dangling, the bright white tee shirt atop my cutoffs, the rich red hair standing out at crazy angles, or the huge martini in one hand and a smoldering cigar at my lips. Hard to say.
How I started my day was working my List of “100 Things to Eat and Drink in San Diego” like it was my job. The list is from Alice Q. Foodie’s blog and it’s brilliant. Being new to San Diego I have been exploring neighborhoods on my stomach with her list in hand. The list was becoming soft like thin cotton gingham and food stained. There were notes from waiters, waitresses and bar keeps on the back of places they loved. Can you tell I love food, I am a foodie. I work out every day so I can eat all kinds of lovely things. So this day I was exploring downtown there were a half dozen places on my list and I planned to have a course, a cocktail, just the item she recommended at each establishment. It would be a glorious day if my stomach held.
It was, I walked and ate for close to 8 hours wandering about, looking at kitsch and sampling gastronomic delicacies. I was also thinking about my sister Amy. It was a week past the 3 year anniversary of her death, she was 36 when she died. She died of leukemia and unfortunately for her my slacker stem cells just didn’t do the job. I had been trying to come up with a gesture, a token nod to the universe and her about her life and outrageous spirit when I passed a cigar bar. Now that is interesting I thought, looking back over my shoulder heading toward the eyebrow threading salon.
Ten years ago on a trip to Austin to visit Amy, we went to one of her local watering holes and I met her friend Lorelei a good ol’ Texas girl. We settled in on the back deck of the bar with our Shiner Bocks in the cool of the evening. As we relaxed Lorelei and Amy pulled out cigars. Amy was not a smoker, she didn’t ever smoke cigarettes to my knowledg. To see her prep a big fat cigar made me speechless. She and Lorelei grinned at each other and lit the tip. I cocked my head at Amy and she gave the only answer she could. “It’s the only 8 inches that never done me wrong”. With that we laughed and drank the night away, the tips of the cigars glowing red into the night.
Flash forward on my downtown eating adventure I had passed both a cigar shop/bar and a cigar café in my travels that day when it hits me. I have to man up and smoke one for Amy. I will need an extra large adult beverage for this to be possible but I can pull my skirt out of my back pocket and butch up. I find my way back to the cigar shop/bar. It has been years since I was in a smoky bar; I hadn’t missed it at all. I approached the guy at the counter and tell him I wanted to buy a cigar and he lead me to the vault, or the humidor hookey dokey. It was smoke free, ahhh. He asked me what I would like.
“I don’t smoke” I stammered “but I want to smoke a cigar in memory of my sister who died, she did smoke them”.
I choked up at the end, an unexpected and unwelcome emotion at that point in time. I am clueless about my inner workings most days and would like to keep it that way at least in public.
The counter man found me a honey flavored cigar which is great for folks who don’t smoke. Evidently there is a market for non-cigar smokers who smoke cigars. Who would have thunk it? I paid for my stogie, he clipped the end and I took a pack of matches for the road after declining his offer to help me get lit. I needed a drink for that, thinking how hard can it be anyway I have seen it done in tons of old movies. Besides it was too smoky to stay in the bar and smoke it. I know that sounds crazy but if the shoe fits. I was determined to find my way back to the second place I saw which was an outdoor/indoor cigar smokery and libation establishment.
After a little while of wandering I found it and settled in after placing my order for a martini with three olives. Hey, three gin soaked olives are almost a serving of vegetables, and hell I might have two martinis’ which definitely takes it up to a near healthy meal! I had an ash tray at the ready and started the process of lighting a cigar on a windy afternoon. My cursing like a sailor at my first three attempts completed a lovely picture. What can I say I went to the Ernest Borgnine school of charm. Once lit or half assed lit as only one side was burning, the other, well not so much I called my trusty side kick Marsue in Denver for company on this journey. I sucked hard as the phone rang in Denver; finally I had gotten the whole damn end to light up. As Marsue picked up the phone the waiter delivered my martini and I thank him.
“Guess what I am doing?” I said looking down at my newly delivered drink.
Marsue gave some smart assed answer but it was lost on me as the waiter had delivered a Green Apple Martini with three olives. Yikes! I flagged him down and explained this cocktail was not only not what I ordered, it was also an abomination against all that is good and shaken not stirred. Marsue hears this interchange laughing and then I tell her where and what I am doing. She cracks a beer to help me celebrate Amy’s life, well lived however short.
I was trying to puff and talk but there were problems. One big one was me.
“Damn it’s gone out” I mumbled around the wet end stuck in my mouth.
“You have to keep working them so they stay lit” Marsue said. Is it any wonder why she is a perfect partner in crime?
Evidently cigars require more attention and up keep then my roommate Hector the Beta fish. I got the damned thing lit again after three more matches and was then vigilante about keeping it going as we talked. I noticed the double takes now from mostly men and as I was at the finish of my second Bombay martini made to icy perfection. I sighed and signaled for the check, I was also at the end of the honey cigar. The sun was starting to dip behind the building and it was time for me to walk off my cocktails and think. I said good-bye to Marsue and thanked her for the camaraderie. She is the kind of friend that comes along once in a lifetime if you are lucky. She is smart and sensitive always knows what to say and what times not to say it. I wish I had that skill, but I don’t.
I smelled like a bus station in the 1950’s minus the urine, I stank from smoke. I didn’t regret smoking the cigar at all, it was great fun. It was a little gaggy at first but hey I am sure Amy got a huge laugh over it. The things I do regret are the things I don’t do, things I am scared to try, never what I do. It turns out that is not uncommon, though most people might not realize it. People agonize over what they do and do badly. But in the end it seems according to the author and Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert in “Stumbling on Happiness” what we regret most are things we did not do. There are no guarantees in life; it is a short, slippery, full on roller coaster ride. Not too long ago I was talking to a young girl who was cutting my hair. She wanted to know how I moved from state to state and had so many different careers. She thought I was brave, adventuresome, and smart. I could be, I could also have ADHD, but mostly I told her I am comfortable making mistakes. I make them all the damn time. I would rather try something, dive in and make a fool of myself, get hurt by love, naivety or bad fashion choices than sit the ride out. Amy taught me lots of things, laughing is always a priority, the purple ice cream at Friendly’s is a damn tasty treat, looking ridiculous at any given moment is easy to achieve and easier to survive. Not living every day with whimsy, passion and an occasional good cigar is a crying shame.
Lifestyle & Culture | October 22, 2009
I’ve got a lot of theories. Some are based on observation of others, some are based on experiences. Others are based on equal parts intuition, bullshit and ego. This theory is based on the last one on the list.
I spend a lot of time walking, I love to walk. I walk to keep fit, when I am sad, angry, and even bored. I find it can reverse a downward spiral better than a double dip of mint chip. I walk to restaurants and bars especially in the evenings when I want to imbibe. So this puts me out and about San Diego 5, 6, 7 days a week walking some where. During my travels I generally get hellos from other travelers anything from verbal greetings, head nods to smiles of acknowledgement I am out there hoofing it too. What I also get on these walks on a regular basis, is a shout out from the male homeless community.
These gentlemen say things like…
“I love that red hair”
“Smile, beautiful”
“Girl, you got some strong legs on you”
“Hello my lovely”
These gentleman are never rude or nasty in their comments, it is quite the opposite. They are always respectful in their tone and demeanor. There is always a good natured open appreciation of the female form and garish hair color. There have even been times I have even been with my Ex and it has happened. He would just shake his head and laugh. It doesn’t seem to matter if I am accompanied or not, they just go ahead and give me the shout out. When I was younger and living in Manhattan things like this happened with construction workers, business me anything with a third leg, but those comments were overtly sexual, nasty and had a bad juju attached to them. This has none of that. This happens almost on a weekly basis and it made me start to think about my appeal to men. Being recently single, 48, and a 6 1” redhead, knowing my marketability helps me sleep at night. That and knowing that buying those push up bras were really an investment. But did my shout outs mean I only held appeal to the fringe?
I started to watch and notice more eye contact with what looked to be clean, employed, and sober gentleman. Sometimes there was a head nod or a smile in the produce aisle, even some small talk. All the contact with these guys was subtle in fact I was unaware of it till I started to look for it. I was seeing trending, this was good. But what did it mean? I needed more data, I had a hunch but more extensive samples needed to be gathered. I needed to expand the scope of my study plain and simple. Having the tall bald guy chat me up in yoga by asking me “if I was wearing heels” at the water fountain was not going to be statistically significant.
My scope expanded on the trolley to La Mesa, public transportation can do that for you. I once took the bus downtown one Saturday to give it a try and it garnered me a blog, well mostly because there was an incident. If you can call a physical altercation with a mentally and physically handicapped octogenarian an incident, so be it. Ok, back to the trolley, Le Mesa was having an Oktoberfest and taking the trolley was a responsible way to enjoy adult beverages and brats along with being green while not having to drive under the influence of German Cuisine. I did my research like all good OCD girls as to where to find nearest station, fare, etc, and took off for uncharted territories.
I found the station, got my ticket with not too many gyrations and hopped aboard when the trolley when it pulled in. Across from me sat down a nattily dressed young man who smiled and began chatting immediately. He revealed some gang guys tried to talk to him on the way to the train but he ignored them. I nodded and smiled. He then paused, took a long look at me and said.
“Are you rich?”
“No, I’m unemployed”
“You look very nice”
“I use a lot of soap and water”
I knew what had happened as this unfolded. I had expanded my scope in an unexpected way.
“Do you have a boyfriend?” he continued.
“Yes” I lied.
One of the lies I tell on a consistent basis because it seems kinder than the alternative.
“Can I be your boyfriend too?” He asked expectantly.
“No, I only have one at a time, but thanks”.
The conversation dwindled after that as it should. I knew where he was coming from, and sadly it was a group home. When he started to speak about the gang bangers I had an idea about this young man, but the boyfriend offer was much unexpected. Ok I had now added mentally challenged to men who I appeal to along with the men of the streets, the great unwashed. My theory was starting to come together. It wasn’t pretty, but it had strong legs too it seemed. Oh yea my appeal on the fringe was heating up!
The Oktoberfest was uneventful which is fine. I walked around, looked at the harvest art, leather crafts, cheap jewelry, kitchen gadgets all the while avoiding the offers for aluminum siding, real wood kitchen cabinets and water delivery from the hawkers. I had my brat, my German beer; a chocolate covered strawberry and hopped back on the trolley for San Diego. Riding back I thought about what the morning’s proposal had given me, I was thinking these groups might be the tip of the iceberg. They had things in common that were obvious.
As I got closer to my stop the train got emptier and emptier. At the edge of town two guys in their 30’s bounded aboard all smiles. They saw me and smiled bigger.
“Hello there, how are you today?” one of the guys asked.
“So far, so good” I respond unfolding from my seat as it is close to my stop.
The one guy stopped agape looking up at me, swaying slightly.
“Wow, you’re tall” he beams and slurs just a tad.
“Yes” I say.
His friend chimes in “tall and beautiful!”
I smile, nod and disembark
Ah yes a third demographic has been heard from; drunk men have joined the ranks of my admirers. What they have given me is my proof to the first part of my theory. All these groups of men, my admirers, have no social filters, no editors in their heads; they blurt exactly what they are thinking. Bless their hearts. So whether it is homeless, mentally challenged, or drunk, these guys see me and react. And frankly that reaction is they love me. My theory is these non-filter guys are the tip of the iceberg, my appeal is wider. They are the uncontrolled group, so to speak. I have a friend who just got asked out by a 22 year old blind guy, she is twice his age. He was impetuous at their meeting in a gallery even after she told him she how old she was, and he still called her a few days later to ask her out. She is running her own parallel study it seems. So the last part of my theory where it comes down to bullshit and ego is these uncontrolled groups are just the canary in the coal mine. I believe I am attracting more than the fringe but they are the only ones being so obvious I am picking up on it. Unfortunately I am fairly oblivious to most things happening outside my tiny little skull. So unless a guy is shouting his adoration, asking me out, or telling me I’m a doll, they are off my radar. So to all those poor sods out there being subtle forget it, until you crash your cart into me in the supermarket and tell me I have beautiful eyes or ask me out for coffee none of us is getting any. As to those push up bras, well there will be no return on investment is all I can say, damn.
I am a former Readiness Engineer, Project/Program Manager, Sign Master, Special Investigator and current School Counselor and Life Coach.
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