The wild blue yonder...

So.  A few weeks ago, I overheard my children and my husband arguing.  I know it's hard to believe, but this actually happens fairly often in the Pierson household.

Little did I realize that when I was encouraging my kids to express themselves verbally that I would end up with people who have actual opinions inhabiting my home.  Opinions that they are not afraid to use.

We discuss everything around here from books to music, politics to comedy, and most topics in between.  We have lively debates that usually end peacefully and without tears.

Thus, recently overhearing heated discourse was not all that surprising.  What struck me as bothersome, however, was the fact that they were trying to decide who had to sit next to me on the flight that we will take to Florida for the holidays.  Not, I hasten to point out, who would have the privilege of sitting beside me, but who would have to sacrifice one for the sake of family unity and be within arms' reach of me while on a jetliner.

I am not ashamed to admit that I have long held a deeply rooted fear of flying.  I am not talking about a few jitters.  I am talking about bona fide panic attacks, blind groping in the dark for someone's hand to grasp as the plane careens down the runway and takes flight.  I am talking about a phobia that rears its head when I simply drive past an airport.

I am not generally a fearful person.  I'm not afraid of spiders, snakes or any other creepy crawlies.  Dark rooms and horror movies evoke no fear.  I can comfortably speak to a large group, and the sight of blood only causes me to review all of my first aid training.  I value bravery, and try to live it whenever possible.

Flying, though.  Ah, flying.  I hate flying with all my heart and soul.  I hate flying to the tune of "sure, that European vacation sounds great, but can't we drive?"

Listening to my family have this conversation, though, caused me to finally take some action.  I decided to consult a professional to get over my fears.

So I recently had a session with a zen-like therapist, who has a voice like liquid valium, and who is herself not afraid of flying.  She actually falls asleep as soon as the plane takes off.

"Imagine," she said at the beginning of our session, "you are walking down the ramp onto the plane.  You are taking your seat.  The plane begins to taxi down the runway.  How do you feel?"

"You mean apart from the fact that my throat is closing up and my heart rate is exceeding 250 beats per minute?"  I asked.

"Let's reframe this," she said quietly.  "Think about being in the air and enjoying how safe you are.  There are people whose job it is to watch JUST YOUR PLANE.  Think of how safe that is."

"You mean apart from the fact that only six inches of steel separate my flesh from plummeting to the earth below?"

"Let's try something different," she said, refusing to give up.  "Let's try some cleansing breaths.  Think of getting on the plane and how excited you'll be about your upcoming vacation.  Imagine looking out the window."

"Look out the window?  Are you crazy?"

My poor therapist.  I could see that her unflappable, zen-like style was becoming dangerously close be being flapped.

What finally got me over the hump, though, was my admission that I often dreamed about flying.  In my dreams,  I got on a plane and actually enjoyed it.

"That's exciting!" zen-like therapist exclaimed.  "Your subconscious is so ready to get over this fear."

This, more than anything else, suddenly made me feel more confident about my ability to conquer my terror.  So I have been practicing deep cleansing breaths, and re-framing my thoughts, and being the change I want to see.

I've also secretly gotten a prescription for Xanax.  Wish me luck!

I'm still here...

So.  I popped in to look at ye olde blogge and noticed that I have been very, very lazy.  Life has indeed been getting lived, and, in the process, I took off my writer's hat and donned several others.

I have not been abducted by aliens, unless you count spending 10 hours per day with 3, 4 and 5 year olds, which IS sometimes akin to an alien abduction. Without, of course, the internal prodding.

I hate reading blogs where people apologize for not writing more frequently, so I won't be doing that.

I do have several posts stewing around the sleep-deprived brain, begging to be written.   So, I'll be back soon.

In the meantime, consume large quantities of turkey, and don't skimp on the gravy.

Oh, and enjoy this picture of Toby in his Halloween costume.  Doesn't he look absolutely ashamed?  I would too if I had to wear a "Babe-raham Lincoln" hat, complete with a feather.  Poor dog.

The shower standoff...

I loathe cleaning the shower.  The grout is getting old and the glass shower doors are etched with water stains that refuse to come out.  I have tried all kinds of tricks - from vinegar and baking soda to highly lethal cleaning agents that cause dizziness when inhaled.  I've purchased every scrubbing tool known to man, each time thinking that I have finally hit upon the magic solution.  Nothing so far has worked.

This frustration is furthered by the fact that to clean the shower, I have to get in the shower and take a shower.  Taking showers is not necessarily a bad thing, but I hate sweating while I am doing so.  There is something inherently wrong with this.

In our previous house, a 100 year old Victorian that I still miss with a passion, we had only one bathroom with an old fashioned bathtub/shower combination.  It took all of 10 minutes to get that shower clean, and I could easily accomplish a sparkling bathroom at least once a week.

But then, seduced by modern conveniences like more than one electrical outlet per room, we gave up on our Victorian doll and acquired this house.  This house has 3 1/2 baths.  I only clean 1 1/2 of them.  The other two are the domain of my children, and they are responsible for their cleanliness.  In fact, I don't clean their rooms either, which explains why I never enter them, and make sure that the doors are closed at all times.

Anyway, in my frustration with my dirty shower, I have been looking around for someone or something to blame, and have stumbled upon the greatest idea of all time.

It's Steve's fault.

Now, before you find the holes in this thinking, please be aware of the fact that in almost 29 years of marriage, Steve has never cleaned a bathroom.  Sure, he cooks and does laundry.  He never shied away from giving the kids a bath or changing diapers.  He does all of the car maintenance, outdoor work and will fix just about any broken appliance, computer or sticky drawer in our domicile.  He is a wizard with the vacuum, and does the weekly grocery shopping despite the constant complaint of our offspring that "there's no FOOD in this house."

In short, Steve is a pretty damn good wife.  I am lucky to have him.  But, in casting around to assess blame for the moldy shower doors, he was an easy target.

So I made a decision.  I would stop cleaning the shower.  In the spirit of oppressed workers everywhere, I would stage a strike.  My goal?  To ensure that he would eventually get tired of the mold and water stains, and do it himself.  He would, hopefully, do a better job than me.  Thus, the problem would be solved.

I made this mature decision based upon the wisdom 51 years of life have given me.  I took into account my Catholic school upbringing, my Montessori training, years of therapy and my belief that conflicts are best solved through communication and collaboration.  I also took into account the fact that not cleaning the shower would give me an extra hour or so for napping on Saturday afternoons.  I felt I could not lose.

Three weeks in, it occurred to me that my strategy was flawed.  The shower was no closer to being clean, and Steve had not evidenced one iota of awareness that I was on strike.  Or perhaps he had, and had chosen to ignore it.

So yesterday, I decided to confront the elephant in the room head-on.

"You know, I have stopped cleaning the shower," I said to him as we were brushing our teeth.

"I've noticed," he replied.

"It's just that it's so hard to get it clean.  I have to scrub the stains and I get all sweaty when I'm doing it.  I hate cleaning the shower.  I was thinking that, after all this time, you have NEVER cleaned a bathroom."

I felt a rant coming on having to do with the unfairness of being the only partner who gives a shit about the cleanliness of the shower.  I could actually feel my blood pressure starting to rise and I was aching for a fight.

I looked at his face.  When I am in such a mood, Steve has a habit of remaining calm and dispassionate.  He wisely waits for the storm to pass.  This may be why we are such a good pair.

"Do you want me to clean the shower?"

As I was considering my reply, I suddenly thought of our years together - years of indulging me, listening to me, supporting me, cheering for me.  And, with that, I came to a decision.

"No, I'll take care of it."

A little bit cool...

I think I've mentioned before that conversations with 19 year old sons are often one sided, at least in this corner of the world.  Said sons will often reply in mono syllables to any given question:

"How are you today?" chirps ever-hopeful mother.

"Uh," replies son.

"How is school?  How is work?  How is your girlfriend/best friend/latest art project?" proceeds mother.

"Uh," replies son.

"OK.  Good.  Nice talking to you." concludes mother.  

I'm not complaining.  Really.  I know it is his job to separate from me at this point in his life.  I am OK with this.  Still, I find myself longing for more meaningful contact, if only once in a while.

Conversation with 24 year old daughters comes much more easily.  We have many common interests, and we both love to talk.  We share a love for reading, for movies, for music and for The Real Housewives of New Jersey.  We both appreciate the absurd and have little trouble laughing about it.  I love this part of our relationship, and am thankful that, through trial and error, kicking and screaming, we have reached this point in our lives.

But, back to said son.  A few weeks ago he asked me for a record player.  We owed him a birthday present - he's pretty tough to buy for.  His needs and wants are minimal, so instead of trying to shop for him, I usually let him pick out something that he wouldn't be able to afford himself.  This year, it was a record player.

I immediately connected with his choice.  I spent my teenage years a slave to music, and have a collection of records boxed up in the basement that were my life several years ago.  Truly.  My record collection is pretty awesome, if I do say so myself.  Coupled with the albums that Steve brought to the marriage, our records kick ass, if you don't mind the expression.

As a 16 year old, I had the best part-time job in the entire world.  I worked as a clerk in a record store.  I kept this job through college, if only as a means to buy more records at wholesale prices.  And I did keep buying.

I remember the day that I fell prey to the allure of records.

I was in the seventh grade.  I convinced my mother to buy me The Allman Brothers' Brothers and Sisters album from Wiebolt's department store.  This was my first grown-up record.  I chose it mostly because I liked the way the cover looked.

I still remember the elation I felt as I watched the clerk place the record in the now extinct, perfectly-album-sized paper bag that I would use to transport this treasure back to my house.  I almost didn't want to open it, wanting so much to just savor the moment.

But, open it I did,  slicing the shrink wrap with my fingernail to release the new record smell.

(I don't know if anyone else remembers how new records smelled, but I sure do.  There was nothing else in the world like it.  The only things that have come close are the heads of my new babies.)

Over the years, I perfected the art of new record ownership.  I never lost the reverence for that simple action of slicing open the shrink wrap.  I liked not knowing what awaited me inside the album.  Pictures of the band or some conceptual art work?  I always preferred pictures of the band, but was OK with pretty much anything.  The biggest bonus was to have lyrics on the dust jacket.  Liner notes put me over the moon.

I still remember that the very best record of all to open was the Beatles' White Album.  It had all of the above, and was a sacred part of my collection.  I bought a second copy of it when mine got so scratched that every song skipped, and the 8 x 10 glossies of John, Paul, George and Ringo got frayed and faded from being rehung so often on the walls of my teenaged room.

Anyway, I spent my teens and early twenties building my record collection until it numbered in the hundreds.  I was able to do this through my record store job.  During college, I was able to feed myself with my record collection because there was a store that gave you cash for used records, something I would do when I ran out of spending money.  My record collection was partly responsible for me meeting Steve.

"You have really cool records for a girl," was one of the ways he proclaimed his affection in our early years.

But life, as it happens, began to take precedence over record-collection-building.  I got married.  I got a job.  I had kids.  All of these things got in the way until...they stopped making records.  This was a black day in my life.

CD's and iTunes just don't work the same magic, and even though I have pretty much replicated my music collection (and then some) via these two mediums, I remain nostalgic for the vinyl experience.

So I was tickled when Trent, upon receipt of his new record player, asked if he could use some of our old albums.  I was even more tickled when I saw that he had made himself a huge stack of the things.  We talked about the merits of Talking Heads, Jimi Hendrix and the Pretenders.

I had forgotten that I had acquired an original copy of the Rolling Stones' Some Girls, before the pictures of famous actresses were removed due to some copyright snafu.  I was delighted to see it in his pile.

"Do you know about this?" I asked, holding up the cover.

"Yeah. That's probably worth some money.  Do you have any other ones like that?"  he responded.  There was reverence in his tone. 

It took me a moment to shake off the shock I felt when I realized that he had spoken actual sentences to me.  I regaled him with stories of how I would always buy the first release of an album because I worked in a record store.  He showed me some of the records he'd just purchased, and provided mini-reviews.  It seems that for audiophiles, vinyl is making a comeback. I watched the record player needle revolve around that heavenly piece of black plastic, and I got a little choked up.

Maybe we have a few things in common after all.

The view from someday...

Steve and I just treated ourselves to a mini-vacation by spending a few days at a Lake Geneva resort, where self-indulgence is not only accepted, but encouraged.

For instance, the resort features a great pool deck where you can park yourself in a padded lounge chair and have cute tropical drinks and lunch brought directly to you.  In fact, we sampled enough of the bar menu to ring up an $80 tab in just a few hours.

I am not really practiced in the art of being served and pampered, but I always manage to rise to the occasion if necessary.  Thus, we whiled away hours and hours sipping, munching and napping.  The biggest decisions we encountered involved when to eat dinner (we weren't, after all, doing anything non-sedentary, so working up an appetite was a challenge), where to eat dinner and what to eat for dinner.

The contrast between these empty-nest vacations and the trips we took when the kids were younger was remarkable.  Anyone with small children will be able to relate to this.

A trip to the beach involved packing a huge canvas bag with every item one could imagine needing, including sunscreen, snacks, drinks, clothes, goggles, towels and enough sand and inflatable toys to open a beach side shop.  Appetites were easily developed from schlepping this bag, along with an umbrella and chairs, from the hot blacktop parking lot to a spot just close enough to the water to be able to see the kids, but just far away enough to prevent random acts of splashing.

The day would enfold like this:  unpack the bag, take off the shoes, get a snack because someone was surely hungry by now.  Apply sunscreen, set out chairs and umbrella and hike to the concession stand because the kids had noticed that there was ice cream.  Build a sandcastle, dip into the water and drag everyone to the bathroom, stopping for some popcorn on the way back. 

Sometimes, these exertions would tire the kids out enough that they would stay on one place for, I don't know, 20 or 30 minutes.  Steve and I would take turns, one parent "relaxing" while the other parent stood sentinel to make sure no one drowned or picked up dead fish.  I would devour whatever book I had hastily tossed into the beach bag, sometimes managing a grand total of 10 pages before it was my turn to be responsible.  I longed for the day when I could enjoy the beach uninterrupted by the pressing needs of others.

We'd leave the beach just when the kids were about to hit the melt-down stage.  The trip back to the car seemed to double or triple in length, and no one wanted to carry a thing.  If we were lucky, very, very lucky, they would fall asleep in the car and complaints about being hot, sandy and sticky would be mercifully silenced for a while.

I thought of these vacations often as we lounged by the pool.  I watched other families who had just begun the process of vacationing with small children as they went through a similar process. 

The funniest thing?  I found myself longing for a toddler to sit with in the shallow water.  I actually wanted to change a diaper on a beach towel, and attempt to tighten a six year old's goggles without resorting to cussing.  Indeed.

I hope that life brings us back around again to days at the pool with small children.  They'll be our grandchildren, of course, and I will find great joy in watching them while my own kids struggle to read 10 pages and drink their way through the bar menu.  Someday...

The broken thing...

I have come to believe that life keeps sending lessons my way until I have learned them.

Sometimes, the lessons are gentle, and easily mastered.  For instance, a few summers ago I learned that when making a right hand turn into traffic, it is best not to float into the left hand lane.  Other cars have a tendency to hit you when you do that.

That lesson earned me a brand new fender and a traffic ticket.  Oh, and an increase in our insurance premiums.  But it was gentle nonetheless - simple cause and effect - and I began to drive more carefully.

Other lessons fall upon us like the two ton anvil that never fails to brain Wile E. Coyote.

The recent wounding of Debbie provided just such a lesson for me.

 As I sat in the vet's office, waiting for them to finish stitching up Debbie,  I wondered how I would be able to care for a being made so fragile and helpless by circumstance.  Was I up to the task?  Would I be able to look at my pet and forgive myself for what I had inadvertently caused?

On a superficial level, I had loved Debbie partly because she was a handsome bird, partly because she was so easy to care for.  Was I ready to shower the same affection on the creature who would undoubtedly carry scars and might never fully recover?

When the vet carried a very groggy and obviously hurting pet out to me, my first thought was to ask them to keep her until she was better.  I was afraid, and I wanted nothing more than to run away.

But after a few minutes, I was amazed to discover that I was beginning to feel OK.  I could do this.  Something powerful washed over me when I was able to meet my uncertainties and know that they would not defeat me.

Out of this experience rose the conviction that it is possible to love broken things.  Furthermore, loving broken things could lead to embracing the broken things that are a part of all of us - the sum of our hurts and disappointments - the parts that send us running away in fear, and holing up inside ourselves.  If, instead, we hold those things close and promise to care for them, we might be able to accept those things in others, and love with strength and courage.  We are all flawed, yet all equally deserving.

So, Debbie continues to grow stronger each day, showing off her new feathers and acting like her sassy old self.  As do I.

For the love of bacon...

Life's been heavy the past few years.  There have been  low times for some family members and friends.  Stress has reared its ugly head on more than one occasion.

Like a trooper, I have coped with this by eating poorly and not exercising.

Well, that hen has come home to roost.

Seems my cholesterol level has crept into the "borderline" level.  My doctor's office gave me this happy news last week after my annual (well, maybe it was a tri-annual) check-up.

I'm nothing if not a worker bee, and I do well when I know exactly what task lies ahead.  Diet and exercise it is.  I can handle that.

But crap, does it have to involve cutting out bacon?

I will not lie.  I love bacon.

The ever-supportive Steve has greeted this news with wild and bubbling glee.  Over coffee yesterday, he began his litany.

"Let's make a list of all the things you can't eat anymore."  He held up a hand and began to tick off my favorite menu items, raising a finger each time.  "Cheese.  Ice cream.  Pepperoni.  Popcorn at the movies."

Each item drove a little dagger into my heart.  Instead of telling him to put his fingers AND his list someplace where they certainly wouldn't fit, I smiled and nodded.  I am, after all, a grown up.

"Oh," he continued, "and you have to eat oatmeal.  Not the instant kind.  REAL oatmeal."

Real oatmeal?  The kind that looks like something my kids used to leave in their diapers?  The kind that tastes like rocks?  (I know how rocks taste.  I used to put them in my mouth when I was a kid.)  The kind that always makes me GAG because it is like forcing a vat of paste down my throat?

Yep, that oatmeal. 

Shortly after this, Steve went grocery shopping, his weekly chore.

"Wanna come with me?" he asked, sounding like a 17 year old trying to procure a prom date.  "No thanks, honey," I said through gritted teeth.

He came home with delicacies to tempt my palate.  Delicacies like golden flax seed ("You can sprinkle this on your oatmeal," he chirped) and oat fiber cereal.  No ice cream was procured.

I am touched by Steve's concern for my health.  And by tomorrow, I'll stop hating him for his low cholesterol.  I want to live a long time.  I've got things to do and want to be around should either of my children ever decide to procreate.  

But really - no bacon?  Shit.

The whole Debbie story...

I've just dosed Debbie for the evening with antibiotics and painkillers. I think she's a little wasted.

Why am I delivering narcotics to my pet pigeon? It's a fair question, of course.

I find it ironic that only a short time ago I wrote about how Debbie, my pet pigeon, had fallen in love with me.

Oh Debbie, don't you know? Love hurts.

Debbie had taken to following me around at my school. She was my shadow, my constant companion, strutting about to find me should I leave the room. Unfortunately, Debbie's devotion led her down the road to disaster.

Debbie was pecking my feet the other afternoon, and had settled down under my chair for a prolonged bout of cooing her adoration.

I had gotten used to moving my feet very slowly if I needed to get up from the chair. I did just that the other day.

But instead of moving away, Debbie began to fiercely flap her wings. She shot out from under the desk and flew to the top of the door, shaking her head wildly and moving about like, well, a pigeon with her head cut off.

I noticed a flap of feathers on her chest vibrating. That flap of feathers was something new, and it wasn't good. Blood was also starting to pour out of her chest.

I had run over poor Debbie. Actually, I came to realize later, when inspecting the chair, that her neck had gotten caught in the little plastic flap that covers the chair's wheels.

Fifteen years of First Aid training has to count for something, right? Apply pressure to stop the bleeding. I grabbed a wad of paper towels and coaxed her into my hands from atop the door.

I couldn't see the wound, but I knew it had to be bad. Luckily, our school is two doors away from an animal hospital.

I rushed out the door and up the hill to the vet's office, Debbie in my arms, paper towel pressed against her chest.

As I made my way into the office, I remember starting to cry. I babbled something to the front desk lady about running over my pigeon. Luckily, she took Debbie from me and went immediately into that mysterious back section of the animal hospital that I have never personally seen.

My thoughts centered on the fact that this was a catastrophic event for a small animal, and that I just wanted to have Debbie's suffering ended.

At this point, some mysterious forces in the universe began to align themselves.

"Go ahead and put her down if she needs to be," I sobbed. "I know that most vets don't work on birds."

The kind animal hospital lady replied with "The vet here today does work on birds."

While I was processing this information, all three of the animal hospital ladies surrounded me, offering hugs and a box of tissues.

Things started to look even better when the vet herself appeared to tell me that even though it was a nasty wound, it had missed Debbie's eye, ear, trachea and all other important parts. The doctor thought she could fix it.

Pigeons, she told me, are tough birds.

Debbie was put under and the vet started her work. I waited for two hours. My friend Sue, in response to my tearful and most likely incoherent phone call, came to join me.

The vet finally came to tell us that Debbie was stitched up. She would need antibiotics and pain medicine, but the vet was cautiously optimistic about her chances for survival, provided there wasn't a secondary infection. I found all of this hard to believe, and wasn't yet ready to claim some of the vet's hope for myself.

I brought Debbie home in a cardboard box, dragged an old parakeet cage out of the attic, tearfully settled her into it and went to bed dreading the morning, when I was sure I would find a former pigeon on the bottom of the cage.

Of course I didn't sleep. I had one of those nights where the tape is on constant rewind. Every time I felt like I could doze off, I was greeted by a vision of Debbie frantically shaking her head, trying to figure out what had just happened to her.

The worst feeling of all was knowing that I had killed my own pet. With a chair.

(Weeks from now, I'll be able to mine this whole situation for the dark humor it inherently contains. Right now, I'm still a little raw. So shoot me.)

Dark nights end, of course. In 51 years, I have at least learned that.

In the morning, I steeled myself for the trip down the stairs. I expected a disaster.

I heard her cooing before I got into the room. She was alive!

I saw that she had eaten and drunk overnight, and, although she looked a bit worse for wear (just look at the accompanying picture), she sat firmly on her perch, and bobbed her head as I approached.

I couldn't believe our luck.

She continues to act like her old self. She sits calmly when I put Neosporin and Mederma on her wound, and lets Steve hold her head so I can give her the medicine the vet prescribed. It is surprisingly easy to administer medicine to a bird.

I would like to think that she is fully on the mend. The next few days will tell, I suppose. I would also like to think that she has forgiven me. I know animals can't assess blame or hold grudges, but still.

I guess it wasn't her time yet. For that, for the kindness of strangers and friends, and for the toughness of pigeons, I am thankful.

The perfect cup of coffee...

We take our coffee seriously here at the Pierson household.

Listen, and I shall provide instructions on how to brew the tastiest cup of coffee, ever.

First, you must arise while it is still dark outside. All other members of your household must remain asleep. This is probably the most crucial part of the process.

Stumble into the kitchen. Ignore the whining dog who only wants his breakfast. Move with stealth and surety.

Start with fresh ground beans - one scoop for every two cups.

Use cold, filtered water.

Put beans and water into the coffee maker.

Now, this is the important part. Watch the coffee start to brew. When there is enough to fill your mug, pour yourself a cup.

Do this before the pot has finished.

You will, of course, risk being served divorce papers if your spouse should awaken before you leave for work, and have a cup of coffee from this pot for himself.

Yep, after almost 30 years of marriage, this is the cause of the biggest disagreement between Steve and me. You'd think I'd learn to wait.

But I have trouble denying myself that first, and most flavorful, cup of coffee.

On weekends, when we arise at the same time, Steve actually employs a strategy I believe elementary students refer to as "puppy guarding" around the coffee maker. If I get within a few feet of the brewing pot, he is likely to throw a complete body block in my path.

"Now?" I will whine.

"No, honey," he explains, as if to a four year old, "the coffee isn't ready yet."

Sometimes, if I have made it downstairs a short time before him, he will question me with the tenacity of one of those detectives on Law and Order. And, he never believes me.

"You drank out of this pot already, didn't you?" he'll demand. He pays careful attention to my eyes. I find it impossible to tell lies, but I have, in the case of the first cup, learned to perfect my technique.

"Of course not," I'll reply. "What makes you think I would do something like that?"

Somehow, I think he is still suspicious.

The devil is in the details....

I am the first to freely admit that I never read owner's manuals.

I am, as I keep pointing out to my husband, a "hands on" learner. This means that I never read owner's manuals.

I am usually able to figure out how to use coffee pots, hair dryers, toasters and cameras without too much trouble. You turn them on. They work. End of story.

I do admit, however, to being shocked at all of the things my camera can do. My brother showed me. He has the same camera.

"How did you figure this out?" I asked, clearly in awe of his superior photographic talents.

"I read the owner's manual."

Ahem.

Anyway, I was vacuuming the sofa today, using the upholstery attachment.

I could digress and riff on the amount of dog hair presently in our home, but I shall spare you.

My efforts were laid to waste when I discovered that the vacuum was spewing tufts of dog hair back into my face.

Steve not being home - who needs owner's manuals anyway when you have a husband with the mind of an engineer? - I switched off the vacuum and pulled the attachment off to look at it.

I found this helpful picture, a mini owner's manual for the illiterate. I have posted it above.

Aha! I thought. Now I know the cause of the malfunction. I guess that:

• I should have put on my airport quality headphones, because
• I will look very unhappy as I am vacuuming, due to the fact that
  
• the upholstery attachment should vibrate until it takes flight, at which point
  
• I should unplug it, and
• look at it sagely.

I'm so glad that is all cleared up now. Who knew that owner's manuals could be so enlightening!

The object of her affection....

Apparently, I have become the object of Debbie's affection.

Debbie is my pet pigeon. She lives at my school. I acquired her several years ago....well, it's a long story.

Our school seems to attract a fair amount of animal life. We are set back from the highway, and the back of our building faces a pond and a large open space. Woodland creatures are always paying a visit. Ducklings and snapping turtles have hatched on our property. We have several nests that are used by mommy robins each spring. Deer eat our bushes. I've found mice and weasels in the strangest of places. A snake once took a sunbath in my classroom.

One summer day a few years ago, we discovered an injured pigeon within our fenced playground. This was not just any pigeon - he was long, sleek and white, nothing like the urban pigeons my husband refers to as "rats with wings." He was, however, sporting an injured wing, and it didn't look like he would be able to fly at all.

Being who we are (frankly, mildly insane) we scooped him into a laundry basket and carried him into the school.

This pigeon also had a band around his foot, indicating that he was a racing pigeon. Through the miracle of the Internet, we were able to track down his owner, call him and report finding his pigeon. He showed up late in the afternoon to retrieve his bird.

In the span of just a few hours, I became very attached to this broken guy. We've been over this before...I have a thing about animals.

So, by the time the owner showed up, I had convinced myself that, since this pigeon's racing career was obviously at an end, he was likely a candidate for pigeon euthanasia.

I voiced my concern to his owner.

"Can't we just keep him?" I asked. "He obviously can't fly anymore."

The owner's response is made more dramatic if you say it with a heavy Russian accent.

"Oh no, this bird, he can fly."

I was incredulous, images of my new pigeon friend having his neck wrung the instant he was taken from the building filling my little brain.

The owner continued.

"If you want bird, I get you bird."

And that, I thought, was the end of it.

A few weeks later, however, a woman came to the door of our school carrying nothing but a cardboard box.

With the same Russian accent, she announced "Here is your bird," put the box into my arms and promptly drove away.

With no idea how to care for a bird, I opened the box to reveal a puffed up and angry looking - chicken? This looked like no pigeon I had ever seen.

We promptly named her Debbie, and I set about learning how to take care of her. It took weeks to discover what she liked to eat, and months before I was able to open her cage without her puffing up and attempting to swat me with her wing. But I persisted, and eventually, she let me hold her.

Little did I know that all of that would pay off in an ample amount of pigeon devotion. I would let Debbie out of her cage each morning for a walk around the school, and eventually she became my shadow, following me around like a small prancing dog.

Birds, it seems, attach themselves to one person. Debbie is, after all is said and done, MY pigeon.

For a few glorious months last year, she started laying eggs. Now, she has begun a career as a stalker.

I let her walk around all day during the summer, when we have only a small amount of children in the school. No matter where I am, she will find me, and prance about, head bobbing and cooing, before perching on the highest surface in the room and, well, gazing at me with such concentration that I figure she is trying to control my mind.

Her latest trick is to walk under my desk and, just when I am not expecting it, peck at my feet. An internet search revealed that this is mating behavior. Apparently, in the absence of a suitable male partner, Debbie has decided to devote herself to me.

There are worse things in life than to be adored by a pigeon.

A parenting sin...

Last evening, my son's girlfriend came over, which, in itself, is not news. She spends lots of time at our house. I have to say - I love her. She is a Good Thing for him, and he glows when she is around.

While my son was growing up, I would occasionally think about how I was going to feel when another woman moved into his life and, well, took my place. I imagine most mothers with male offspring wonder about this. There is, after all, that tired cliche that goes something like this:

A daughter is a daughter
all her life.
A son is a son
until he takes a wife.

I am pretty sure that my own mother-in-law felt this way about me when we first got married. I understand now how she probably felt back then. I was an interloper, dragging her son off to be cared for by a woman hadn't birthed him, nursed him through childhood illnesses, watched him hit his first baseball and sent him off knowing she would be replaced.

So, I waited for this to happen to my son. And, sure enough, he looked around and he fell. Hard.

But, when faced with this new paradigm, I realized that it made me happy to see him so happy. When she's around, he smiles and laughs more. He is kinder to everyone, and he engages in conversations willingly. He is, in short, better for being with her. And that's not something I want to mess up.

So, like him, I've fallen in love with her too, and with all of the good she brings to his life.

But I committed a very serious faux pas yesterday. While he and his girlfriend were around, I found that I needed something heavy moved.

So I said, and I quote, "Teetee, will you carry this out to the garage?" I wasn't thinking, and out popped one of his toddler nicknames.

I realized my blunder when there were seconds of dead and heavy silence. Then, girlfriend let out a huge belly laugh.

"You can NEVER call me that, ever," snarled my son.

But we ended up sharing a laugh about it, and it felt good. We - his girlfriend and I - both love him, and we both want to see him happy.

I don't know what the future holds for these two - they're both so young, with so much ahead of them. But I remain thankful that she is in his life right now, and I wonder if she will now call him Teetee too. I hope so.

The solace of solitude...

It happened today. I didn't expect it, nor did I orchestrate it. It's been a long while since the last time it happened. Today, it was a gift.

I was all alone in my house for eight hours.

Now, I must preface my comments by saying that I love my family. I love my husband and kids, and the biggest source of enjoyment I get out of my life is to see who my kids are becoming. My husband and I enjoy each other's company, and it still gives me pleasure to make him laugh.

Having said that, I must add that they are pretty much all around, all of the time.

My husband started working from home several years ago, making only occasional trips into his actual office. It's ideal for him - he comes downstairs, pours coffee and is immediately at work. He manages to be very productive, and he's a much happier camper without a daily three hour commute.

But he's always here.

My kids both work and go to school, but their hours are the same as mine. Of course, they're not toddlers anymore, and their lives are pretty much their own, but they are still residents of my humble abode. They take up space and consume in mass quantities. They make noise and watch TV shows and text and cook and do laundry - all under my nose.

I know my days of having the kids around are numbered. I am already grieving not being a part of their everyday lives. If nothing else, I am at least aware of the fact that they continue to draw breath under my roof. That they sometimes talk to me, voluntarily, is a great treasure.

But they're always here.

Today, however, the stars must have aligned themselves to my sole benefit. Everyone but me left the house early this morning for work or school. I got to sleep late because it is spring break at my school. When I climbed out of bed, the house was silent. Silent. Montessori teachers know the value of silence. It is a condition that soothes the soul.

A feeling of giddy joy washed over me when I realized that I was alone, and that I would be for nearly the entire day.

But what could I do to fill up the hours?

First, I opened windows all over the house. Had anyone been home with me, I know it would have only been minutes before someone exclaimed "Why is it so cold in here? Geez mom, are you crazy?"

No one was here to say that, and I relished the smell of fresh air invading a house that has been closed up for months.

Next, I played music that only I like - goofy country songs, Rod Stewart and Faces, one-hit wonders by obscure bands (Dexy's Midnight Runners, anyone?) and show tunes - and I sang along. Loudly.

No one was around to shoot me a glare or roll their eyes behind my back. I even danced a little in my bath robe.

I puttered. I folded some laundry. I checked my email. I organized a drawer. I read a magazine while I ate my lunch. I completed lots and lots of mundane tasks and talked to the dog the whole time.

I savored every second of my day to myself. I didn't really do much of anything but luxuriate in the solitude, but it was enough.

They're all on their way home by now, my family of adults. They'll return with their stuff and their cell phones and their needs and wants and all of the things that make them my family.

And I won't feel even a tiny bit guilty that I enjoyed their collective absence so much.

(P.S. I just discovered Wikimedia, where you can download images that are in the public domain, just like the painting pictured here. It is called "A Quiet Read" by Walter Langely, and I think it really speaks to the message of this post. It speaks to me at least - I often find myself just completely drawn into a book, losing all track of time and my responsibilities.)

Hitting the road....

This coming summer, I am planning to visit Yellowstone, meet up with some old friends and just allow myself to be awed by what we will see.

I have been spending a large amount of time contemplating whether or not to drag the kids along. At 24 and 18, family vacations hold no appeal whatsoever for them. Luckily, I can relate to this.

I think back to the vacations my family enjoyed when I was growing up. My parents, bless their hearts, were never able to provide a trip that didn't include some sort of disaster. Had Mapquest been invented back in the 60's, they would have done well to plan routes that ended not at tourist high points, but at local emergency rooms.

The most memorable vacation happened when I was 17. What were my parents thinking when they rented a Winnebago and loaded all three of us (my brothers being 15 or 16 and 7) into our rolling home and set off to visit relatives in South Carolina?

Being who I was at the time (have I mentioned that I was not a pleasant teenager?), I laid claim to the bed in the back of the camper and warned everyone away from me for the duration of the trip. My parents and brothers carefully avoided contact with me, and I slept, or feigned sleep, the entire journey.

Our first stop - Indianapolis in an ice storm. Said ice caused our wind shield wipers to cease working. Completely. We waited for nearly an entire day in a K Mart parking lot to have them fixed. I don't remember. I slept.

On we went. The Smokey Mountains were, apparently, quite beautiful and majestic. I don't remember. I slept.

We spent one night pulled over in a gas station in the heart of Deliverance land (really, dad, couldn't you have shelled over the few bucks for a campground?), where I couldn't sleep, convinced as I was that it was only a matter of time until several toothless rednecks would arrive to kidnap us and dump our bodies in the far reaches of the Smoky Mountains.

We finally arrived at our Uncle's house in South Carolina. Our cousins, who had emigrated to the South several years before, spoke a completely different language, and entertained us during our visit by opening bottles of Wild Turkey and sitting on the sofa. I think our cousins took us around to several different houses before the Wild Turkey was brought out. Really, why did these people drink so much?

The final leg of our trip included a trip to Myrtle Beach. We got to stay in a real campground. My brother tamed squirrels to pass the time. We walked the beach. I slept.

Only there was news that we didn't know about. Shortly before our beach sojourn, another relative, my aunt who had been watching our German Shepherd, Heidi, phoned my mother to say that Heidi had gotten away and been killed by a car on the road in front of their house.

My mom didn't tell us right away, knowing it would ruin our trip. It did, of course. I went from sleeping to mournfully walking on the beach all day and into the evening.

Finally, we all just wanted to get home. We set off for our long trip and steeled ourselves for the dogless house that would be waiting.

I must digress for a moment. My dad has never been great about filling up the gas tank. Many a vacation was spent hoping we would make it to the next gas station before we ran out of gas. Up until this point, his track record had been good, although the attendant anxiety probably took years off my life.

This time, we were not so lucky. Our giant Winnebago sputtered out of gas on the side of the interstate, about 50 miles from home. For what seemed like hours, no one stopped.

Finally, my dad and brother decided to head off to some nearby houses to call for a tow truck. This was before cell phones, kids. They returned to the camper, cars continuing to whiz past, and we waited for help.

Help arrived in the form of a tow truck driver and a can of gasoline. Even after adding some fuel, my dad had no luck in getting the monstrosity started. Then the tow truck driver decided to pour some gasoline directly on the carbeurator, which was located inside the camper.

Flames instantly shot up. I was aroused from my slumber only to be knocked in the head by the tow truck driver, whose arm was now on fire. I felt my hair and eyebrows beginning to singe and immediately jumped out of the camper. I surprised myself by remembering to STOP, DROP and ROLL. My mom and youngest brother tumbled out after me.

My middle brother, definitely the coolest head in our family, simply walked to the fire extinguisher in the camper, picked it up and put out the tow truck driver.

That simple act earned an admiration that I still feel to this very day.

We finally called some neighbors to pick us up. We trooped home - singed, defeated and sad - and I swore to myself that I would never take a vacation with my family again.

That vacation became the stuff of family mythology, and my kids know the story well. There is nothing about it that will convince them to journey west with us this summer.

Oh well. We are now empty Winnebago-ers.

The view from the sofa......

My family has been taking good care of me for the past few days as I recover from my knee surgery. I am frequently fed and watered, and have not fallen down the stairs or collapsed in the shower. Steve has completed all of the laundry, and the Pierson children have been pretty patient and willing to fetch things for me. They are even allowing me to claim half of the sectional, flagrantly disobeying Steve's rule that each person is allotted only one couch cushion.

Toby often lays his massive dog head on my bandaged knee. I am convinced that he is displaying doggie empathy. Steve tells me that he just likes to smell open wounds.

All in all, I would say the recovery is going pretty well. I am ready, however, to get on with things.

I am not a very good patient. I am used to doing things for myself, and I find it frustrating that if I leave my glasses in the bedroom, it's not just a quick jaunt up the stairs to retrieve them. It actually requires some thought - should I take the crutches up or just crawl? Shall I impose on someone else to get them, eroding the good will that is still abundant, or should I just squint at the computer screen until I develop a massive headache?

Life sometimes gets reduced to the bare minimum.

I have read three books, worked on a short story for a contest and watched a slew of House Hunters on HGTV. Frankly, I no longer care if the family of four is able to find their perfect house.

So far, that's the way things stand.

Oh, I almost forgot - I figured out how to shave my legs.

Per popular request - why I got a Kindle...

Friends, I love books. They have been a huge part of my life since I figured out how to read in first grade. Reading has defined me, has taught me many things, has been my close companion when things get rough, has amused me and made me cry.

Heck, reading is so important to me that I can actually remember the day I figured it out.

I was sitting in my tiny first grade desk, turning pages in my reader and perusing the pictures. I remember looking down and realizing that I knew what the words said. This was revelatory. I don't remember how I came to understand that fact, and since I now teach reading, I know that lots of little skills need to be in place for it to be successful.

Being in a Catholic school, of course, made me fearful. Who needs to be cajoled to behave when God himself is embodied in the figure of a Catholic nun, rosary hanging down to her knees from her waist, her habit and wimple covering just about every square inch of skin and leaving exposed a set of eyes that are capable of boring through your skull to uncover the unsavory thoughts beneath?

To put it in other words, I was afraid to let anyone know that I had figured out this reading thing because I thought I would get in trouble. So I played along.

Since that day, I have been hooked.

But this is about my latest toy, isn't it?

Let me say this - I love books. In fact, they are threatening to take over my house.

I love big books too - the kind that hit the floor with a bang when you fall asleep reading them.

I love having book shelves. When I visit someone's house, I make a beeline for their book shelves. What a person displays speaks volumes about him or her.

Knowing all of this about myself, I held off on getting a Kindle for years. Sure, it sounded cool, and even Stephen King came out with a giddy endorsement.

Nah, not for me, I kept saying. I like holding a book.

Then I got Kelsey one for Christmas. I fell in love.

I don't ever plan to stop buying books. I get too much pleasure out of opening and turning pages. But here's the reasons I love my new toy:

It is very portable. I recently finished a fantasy novel called Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. I loved this book. It is almost 1000 pages long, and even the trade paperback must weigh five pounds. I lugged the thing around with me everywhere. My wrists got tired holding it up in bed at night. Now, if I'd had my Kindle, none of this would have been a problem. I can keep my Kindle in my purse.

It provides instant gratification. I have read so many books that were part of a series over the years, and been frustrated looking or waiting for the next volume. Click on the Kindle and I can have the new title instantly.

You can download samples of books for free. My sister-in-law, bless her, just talked me through how to do this. I'm usually pretty certain I want to read a book if I buy it, but this feature should guarantee that I don't waste money on duds that I never finish.

I can read Twilight in public and no one will know. OK, I have never read Twilight, nor do I plan to, but should I want to read it, I won't be an object of derision. Sorry, Twilight fans.

Books in the public domain are FREE. This includes lots and lots of classics that I should have read, but haven't. Jane Austen, here I come.

It is easy to use. Even for a Luddite like me, who has never mastered texting, and barely knows how to answer a cell phone, the Kindle seems pretty idiot-proof.

So, that's the poop on the Kindle. I think we're going to have a beautiful friendship.

The razor's edge....

I got my surgery instructions the other day:


Nothing to eat after midnight the night prior to the procedure - no problem.


No Advil or other anti-inflammatory drugs seven days prior - okey dokey.


Take off all jewelry on the day of the surgery - check.


Wear loose, comfortable clothing and make sure you bring someone who can drive you home - yep, I can do that.


Stop shaving your legs 48 hours before the procedure - wait a minute - WHAT?

Now, this is simply unfair.

Here's my little secret - I shave my legs before bed every night. I can't sleep otherwise. I can't stand that scratchy feeling.

Strange? Bordering on the obsessive? Absolutely. I own it all. I have issues and I'm proud.

Now, I am trying to come up with a scheme whereby I can continue to shave up until the surgery. Something along the lines of "Oops, I forgot," or "What do you mean it looks like I've shaved my legs? I just have naturally smooth and not-at-all-hairy skin."

Wish me luck.

Under the knife...

So, next Thursday they will insert a small camera and a tiny knife (yes, I am quite sure that this is the correct medical terminology) into my knee and, hopefully, scrape away all of that nasty torn meniscus.

In the meantime, I am hobbling around the best I can.

I doubt many people look forward to surgery the way I am counting the days until this is over. Mostly, I look forward to the end of this pain.

Pain is a pervasive thing. I have nothing but sympathy for people who suffer from it chronically. It takes over your life. One minute you're feeling pretty happy and optimistic about, say, your new washing machine and the next - WHAM - you are reminded that you are nothing but a giant pain receptor.

"Ha," says pain, "you thought you could forget about me for a few minutes. No deal, mister. I intend to remind you of my existence as often as it takes."

I have now reached the point where I no longer need reminders. It is there.

I imagine my orthopedic surgeon not as a kindly young doctor but as a Knight of the Round Table, ready to do battle with the evil, immoral and uncivilized being who has taken up residence in my right knee. I hope for violence. I hope for annihilation. I hope for total victory over the interloper.

Sorry. Guess it's time for a Tramadol.

Sore knees and psycho dreams....

A few months ago, I began to experience excruciating hip pain. My doctor sent me to physical therapy.

The very nice therapist informed me that 1) my left leg was longer than my right leg and 2) as a result, my body was pretty much misshapen, from my pelvis up to my shoulders. This is not the best news to receive as you enter your fifties, but I remained hopeful that she would make me feel better.

Apart from practically sitting on my chest to pop my pelvis into place, the therapist gave me a long list of exercises that would help me to build up my core and strengthen the muscles around my hip. The good news was that I could feel them working, almost immediately.

Thus inspired, I added some weights and some lunges to my workout. I had hopes of getting back into shape and dropping the 20 pounds I'd managed to gain over the past few years.

One morning, while doing my lunges, I felt a most disturbing pop in my right knee. This was followed by pain resembling having a nail pounded into my kneecap. I began to hobble.

In a bout of faulty reasoning that should win some sort of prize, I decided that I would just keep working out. I'd probably only strained something, and exercising was going to make it feel better in the long run. Right?

Well, no. After three or four days, I could barely walk, much less get up and down the stairs. The pain was constant. I mean so constant that I couldn't sleep at night. I tried Advil and ice, which was about as effective as trying to bring down an elephant with a flyswatter.

After my co-workers informed me that my gait most closely resembled that of Frankenstein's monster, I came to grips with the fact that I had probably suffered another meniscal tear.

The meniscus is, as I understand it, the soft tissue around the kneecap. It can tear due to injury or due to long misuse. Sitting cross-legged on the floor for the past 15 years pretty much qualifies as long misuse. Plus, I'd already had a meniscal tear repaired about 8 years ago, and this felt exactly the same.

"Mom," the ever-cheerful Kelsey informed me, "women have shorter ligaments than men. It's just a matter of time."

So, after a teary phone call to my orthopedic doctor ("what do you mean, the first available appointment is the end of February? I am in pain now. Someone is driving nails into my knee"), I consulted with my doctor, who concurred with my diagnosis (love when that happens) pending an MRI. He also prescribed some lovely pain pills and a muscle relaxant.

Excited about the prospect of actually sleeping for a whole eight hours, I took the first dose of the muscle relaxant the night before last.

Unaware of the fact that I was totally and completely wasted, I announced to my family at about 7:30 pm that I was going to take a bath and go to bed early.

"Mom, you'd better be careful. I think you may drown," was my daughter's warning. I could not make my addled brain think of why she was saying this.

Said bath was delightful, and I dragged myself into bed soon after. I think, but I am not sure, that I actually melted into the mattress. At least that's how it felt. My legs, arms and torso became nothing more than a quivering mass. I read a few chapters of the book I am working on, but I have no idea what any of the words said. Then, I fell into a deep, deep sleep.

When not under the influence of powerful drugs, I tend to dream vividly. According to Steve, I sometimes thrash, sometimes laugh and sometimes scream in my sleep. When I wake up, I don't often remember what caused these reactions, but I figure that there's no reason why Steve would lie to me about it. What would he stand to gain?

But on this night, I vaguely recall dreaming about a dark and evil presence - perhaps a ghost or demon, perhaps a serial killer - trying to hurt, of all things, my dog Toby.

What Steve tells me is that I let out a blood-chilling scream, one so loud that everyone in the house heard it. One so loud that Steve actually rushed into the room to check if I was OK.

I have a dim memory of lifting my head, which by this time weighed about 650 pounds, off the pillow to ask "Is Toby OK?"

I woke with what can best be described as a hangover, and struggled through the day at work, feeling fuzzy and as if I had been on a college-level bender. Had the children set fire to the classroom, I probably would not have noticed.

Anyway, tonight I'm back to Advil and ice. Oh, and Kelsey wants to know if I would scream so loudly should some evil presence be after her.

Not for the queasy....

Nothing strikes fear into the heart of an adult person quite so much as the stomach flu. I mean it.

I went home from work the other day feeling nauseous and icky. As I was getting ready to leave, our office administrator (aka my mother) was spraying herself with WINDEX. Windex? Seriously? Others in the building were escorting me, rather quickly I might add, to the door armed with cans of Lysol, and spraying it, not very discreetly, in my wake.

Had I not been ill, I would have been offended.

Most folks I know would rather suffer through a bout of pneumonia than face the stomach flu. Throwing up seems so unnatural. It's a helpless feeling knowing that you need to upchuck the contents of your stomach, and knowing NOTHING on earth can stop you from doing it. Ick.

Anyway, before I descend into graphic and gross descriptions, I'll leave you with this.

I'll never eat beef barley soup again.

Ring out the old stuff.....

I accomplished one chore over my winter break. I managed to clean out my closet.

I am not, by nature, a very organized person. I am also a bit of a hoarder. In fact, "stuff" threatens to take over my life in a way that can't be healthy.

I spend a lot of time moving stuff around. Sometimes, I move it from one drawer to another. I am working on being able to just let go of stuff, but it isn't easy.

Take, for instance, some candles I received for Christmas several years ago. They don't smell very good and I don't really trust myself with candles anyway. I am prone to lighting them and then forgetting about having done so. But I can't bring myself to toss them or, better yet, put them in a box and donate them to the Goodwill store, which is located only minutes from my house.

So I move them around. I encounter them every so often in a desk drawer or in the dining room hutch. Perhaps I feel guilt about getting rid of something that someone took time to buy for me. I think I'll just move them here until I decide what to do with them and then I promptly forget about them for another six months.

My closet is my biggest challenge. It is jammed full of past mistakes and hopeful intentions to reinvent myself.

See, I have a little problem with dressing. I am fussy, for one thing, and I just may have some issues with sensory input. This means that a wool sweater feels like a straight-jacket, and I will be in agony if there are any tags in a garment. Synthetic fabrics most often feel like sandpaper on my skin and if my socks fall down, my day is ruined.

Yeah, I know. We all have our things, don't we?

So I shop with this in mind. The most comfortable thing to wear, I have found, is a cotton t-shirt, with the tags removed, of course. Cotton sweaters and fleece are also OK, most of the time.

I must also say that my job requires me to sit on the floor for hours at a time, and a good day is one where I don't get paint, play dough or any type of bodily fluid on my clothing. Why on earth would someone wear "nice" clothes for this?

Now bear in mind that this little problem of mine pretty much disqualifies most clothing for me. So, when I find cotton t-shirts that fit and feel good, I buy one in every color. My daughter finds this a never-ending source of hilarity. She, obviously, did not inherit my sensory issues.

Anyway, in cleaning out my closet last week, I found that I have five long-sleeved white t-shirts, and seven short-sleeved white t-shirts. Then, we get into the colored ones. There's pink (two), light blue (three), purple (only one, go figure), black (four), gray (four again) and an odd assortment of pastel colors that must have seemed like a good idea at the time.

Are you sensing a theme here? Yeah, me too. I have thought of nominating myself to be featured on "What Not To Wear." I adore Clinton, by the way, and wouldn't mind spending some time with him in the Big Apple.

I can see myself now. First, I get put into the room of mirrors, wearing t-shirts. Clinton and Stacy mock me until I am shamed by the way I dress, and then they send me out to shop. They'll want me to buy trousers, jackets and those boots with the pointy toes. I'll feel overwhelmed and head directly for the t-shirt section.

Then, I'll hear Clinton on a megaphone, as if he is part of a SWAT team:

Put down the white t-shirts and no one gets hurt.

So, I tried, I really did, to get rid of my t-shirts when I cleaned out my closet last week. I just couldn't do it. But what I did do is arrange them by color and style. Long sleeves in one section, short sleeves in another.

I'll try to widen my horizons in 2011 to include something new. I really will. There's always 3/4 sleeved t-shirts. In a variety of colors.

Happy New Year.