New year, new you

One of the biggest changes I’ve witnessed in myself, over the years, has been a growing apathy about my appearance.

Back in the 80s, when I was a ‘tween and teen, I was obsessed with my own appearance. As were all my friends, my sisters and their friends, and every other girl we knew. It was perfectly normal to rise just before 6:00am, take a shower (or, in the old days, wash my hair in the sink—that was during the dark “pre-shower” ages in my childhood household), then eat breakfast with a towel on my head, go dry my hair, curl my hair with hot rollers, spray ridiculous amounts of ozone-unfriendly aerosol’d stickiness on my hair, and lastly paint a new face over my own—a face that seemed so much more glamorous than the plain one underneath. All this, mind you, to catch the bus at 7:30 for a typical day of school. No prom, no senior pictures—just a day. At school. Clothes? Had to be just right, with various high heels that came out every week, no bookbag because they looked so bookish and ugly…

College forced me to simplify my process a bit. Some days, hair went unwashed, in a ponytail (not very often, though). Makeup was stashed in a backpack that I’d finally given in and purchased, and hairspray morphed into the travel-size pump bottle, which was easier to hide and less likely to douse my books than that quick-on-the-trigger aerosol. During freshman year, I still went to the effort to put on some makeup before stepping out of my dorm room. That’s right—even to go sit in the TV lounge. Hey, you never knew whom you might see there. Best to be prepared. Always.

By sophomore year, I was a tad more relaxed. Still makeup and hairspray always, but by then I might occasionally wander into the dorm hallway without any eyeliner. Shocking. No one noticed. I also became a little less stringent about clothes; I’d begun to understand, you see, that the college town I inhabited lay directly within the snow belt, and that pretty little leather-soled loafers would not cut it through a lake effect snowstorm. I invested in some cute but clunky boots and actually wore a winter coat instead of layered jean jackets.

Then I moved off-campus. The beauty standards dropped further, as I was walking farther to classes and sometimes even riding my bike. Skirts all but disappeared from my life. There was no need, no place. I still wore makeup, but by now my hair was a tad more unkempt; I plastered it in the morning and then hoped for the best. Snowstorm? Oh well. Rain and no umbrella? The damp look was forced upon me. I survived. Again, no one else noticed. By senior year, I had to be reintroduced to skirts, because I was student teaching. To get to the school I'd been assigned, I had begged and borrowed a car from my parents (I eventually bought it from them). I still had to do some walking to campus, although not as much...but the relaxed standards stayed in place—mostly because I was just too exhausted to fuss much.

I tried to return to high standards of appearance with my first job teaching school, but I couldn’t doll myself too much—I was instructing a bunch of hormonal teenaged boys. Besides, I had to be there by 7:20am; an early schedule doesn’t allow for extreme beautification. I couldn’t get too lackadaisical, though, because the entire little town where I worked was bored, observant, and nosey. If you stepped out, they knew where, when, whom you were with, and how long you’d stayed. If you ate at a restaurant, they knew what you’d ordered. There was no part of life unobserved, short of moments spent hiding behind closed curtains. Boy, I don’t miss that crap.

Then I worked in a few offices. The standards began dropping again. I did what I needed to do to look “finished” for work, but the company where I spent five years was busy and demanding, and there simply was no time many days for extra efforts; lipstick and shadow applied hurriedly at my desk was usually as far as I got. Plus, the owners were firm believers in no privacy—desks sat next to desks, which sat next to more desks; any attempts to cosmetify were acutely observed and noted.

I had one other job after that, for a crazy woman. I had all the privacy I could want. But... I was married by then. Why bother? And finally, to seal my standards in their far lower positions, I got pregnant. Well, that was all she wrote. The standards have remained frighteningly low ever since. Now, there is a) insufficient time, b) insufficient concern, and c) less of a canvas to work with. I knew it was over when I first left the house in sweat pants. That was something I swore I’d never do. I did. Just last week, I ran to the grocery store wearing the offensive fleece fat huggers, AND sporting no eyeliner. That’s right, strode boldly into public that way. I’ve given up. Besides, makeup doesn’t do what it used to do. It can’t cover those lines around my eyes, and it certainly can’t detract from my firmly etched laugh lines; nor does it work on my new hairy chinny chin chin, and there’s no cosmetic in the world to hide the fact that I’m more jowly than ever before.

The ludicrous thing is that to this day, I don’t think anyone else has noticed my lagging beauty standards and decreased efforts. Todd and I have this silly joke about how we used to be stars of our own shows; he had the Todd show, and I had the Mel show. And we painstakingly prepared for every take, for each new episode. Now, years later, we realize that no one was ever watching our shows. They were getting ready for and performing in their own shows. They thought I was watching them. The punch line of all this? None of our shows ever even got picked up. They never made it past the pilot stage.

It’s kind of a relief to realize no one is watching my show. It takes some pressure off. Now I have a different kind of audience: my little boy. Sometimes it seems as if he’s watching only the out-takes and mistakes of my life. But it helps keep me on track. I don’t worry so much about hair and "stage" makeup, thank goodness. I have more time to practice my lines. I can focus on my facial expressions, my voice inflection and delivery.

Come to think of it, maybe these lower standards are not really lower at all. They’ve just been juggled, reprioritized. Nowadays, I’m trying to direct my efforts where they should have gone all along—not to my physical appearance, but to the betterment of my moral and character standards. I wonder where I’d be today if I’d invested more time in that development all along. Hmmmm.

Happy 2008. Best wishes at being your best you ever.

Them's learnin' words

I have much more to say about Christmas, but I think I’ll leave it alone for now and talk about something new: Language acquisition.

The entire concept is pretty amazing, really; it’s even more amazing to witness it happening in a real person. I never truly understood the power of imitation, what little parrots we all are as children. It’s no wonder that these are golden years for absorbing words, learning to speak multiple tongues, etc. because pretty much all a hearing child does is mimic the bigger people around him. Sometimes this is cute; sometimes it is obnoxious or even dangerous. Often, it reveals how a human brain moves from generalities to specifics to rule exceptions.

Marcus is beginning to figure out past tenses. He’s applying generalized rules already, and this part is cute:

“Hey Mama, camel comed to see giraffe and he had Christmas present.”

“Hey, that Silent Night—we singed that in big church.”

He doesn’t yet grasp that some verbs are irregular, and can’t be changed into past tense simply by adding a “d,” but hey, he’s 2 ½—I’m impressed that he is applying any rule at all. And he’ll figure it out, as time goes by. He’ll get to know the tenses a little better, will start to understand how to turn all verbs into past tense, even in our unpredictable, unlawful English language. He’s figured out that there’s a yesterday, a now, a tomorrow that is yet to come, and that you refer to them in different ways to signify time of action. It’s awesome.

Not so awesome is his eagerness to repeat what he hears spoken. Yesterday, we made the mistake of turning on the TV, and the movie Bruce Almighty was playing on one of the stations. We left it on, foolishly—and don’t get me wrong, I thought the movie was rather clever and much better than I’d expected it to be—but at one point, Jim Carrey screamed “You suck!” Shortly thereafter we turned the TV off.

Now, Marcus never said a word about this. Never commented, didn’t respond with a facial expression, nothing. And what does he say today to his father? Without prompting? You guessed it: “You suck.” Todd was flabbergasted. I was horrified—but remembered in a flash where the kid had learned such rudeness. Yes, our own fault completely—and a good reminder of how everything a child hears is funneled through his awareness and stashed away somewhere inside. EVERYthing. Especially the stuff you were hoping he didn’t hear.

So, I’ll continue to be rendered speechless by my child’s language development skills—both by the progress therein, and by the disgust I feel when I hear my own words spouting forth from his tiny, clueless mouth.

Grinchin' it

Sing along with me—to the tune of “We Need a Little Christmas”:


Tear down that garland
And roll it up so I don’t see it anymore
Pull off those orn’ments
And put those fir-tree scented candles far away now

[Chorus]
For I need to banish Christmas
From this very household
Need to have my home back
Want to see the floor again
I need a little break now
From these Christmas baubles
I need to get my home back now!

Take down the tree please
And roll the tinsel and the lights back up again
Pull down the cards and
Make sure they don’t leave tape marks on the wall again now

[Chorus]

Hide all the pinecones
And get all pine green and bright red back in a box
If I see Santa,
I just may let him have a big ol’ piece of mind now!

[Chorus and fade out]

**********

Okay, okay, perhaps I have a touch of OCD. So what? Just because I have it doesn’t mean the house isn’t cluttered and difficult to navigate with all this Christmas stuff.

And remember, just because you’re paranoid, that doesn’t mean that they aren’t out to get you.

: )

Warm wishes

So, Christmas is fast approaching and I know that time will be short in days to come. Therefore, I take a few minutes now to touch base and say this: I hope that your Christmas is a joyful time. That's what it is meant to be. I hope that you don't waste time thinking too much about the food you're making, or the gifts you've bought, or whether your house is spotless. I hope that you do spend time well by pondering how God sent us a savior, the king of kings, and He didn't show up with hoopla or swarms of paparazzi. He showed in a completely unlikely place, in a completely unlikely form. He showed up to save us. He showed up to give us a glimpse of our father.

He showed up. We can know Him and be His friend.

Talk to you soon! I'll even be seeing some of you soon. Safe travels to you, beware of gift-wrapping incidents, and if you're a parent, leave at least twice as much time as you think you'll need to put those toys together. You know what I'm talking about.

Merrrrrrrrrrrrrry Christmas!

Kitchen contemplations

Spending so much time in the kitchen this week has reminded me of a few beliefs I hold true and dear.

First, I am downright leery of gadgetry, especially in the kitchen. I am all about the elbow grease. I’m not sure why, since I’m a self-admitted lazy person. I just don’t really feel like I’m creating a work of culinary art unless I’m working at stirring or mixing or kneading or breaking up pieces. I even have a few gadgets; I just don’t use them. I either forget to get the thing out until it’s too late, or simply eschew it out of sheer stubbornness (although some would argue stupidity). It’s not just that the gadgets are often out of reach or in a cupboard somewhere—it’s that I simply don’t feel like retrieving them, using and dirtying them, and putting them away again. I’d rather just stiff it out and rinse off the same spoon, dish, cutting board, etc. for reuse in a few minutes.

This might be a bit of a phobia, because I’ve even come to distrust people who love and gushingly profess their affection for kitchen gadgets. I wonder why they’re condoning these items with such tenacity; what are they hiding? Is the person unable to hold his own in the kitchen? Does he rely on these time-savers to cover a cooking shortcoming? Honestly, the folks I know who collect such tools very rarely if ever use them. There the wonder sits, shiny and spotless, untouched but revered. Why bother? Is once a year or so really enough to defend what is frequently a counter- or storage-space hog?

Before I really start to rant about that, I’ll simply say that most people I know who love to cook do so with little pomp and product, and instead with much passion. Big, fancy kitchen? Betcha it doesn’t see much use. Lots of fancy whatchamacallits sitting around? Probably haven’t been exercised in quite some time.

Perhaps I just fear technology and progress, or love tradition. Perhaps.

The other thing that all these hours in the kitchen have brought to the forefront of my mind is that we are really quite spoiled with the appliances that most of us use without thought every day. The stove, the sink with running water, the microwave oven, the dishwasher that many folks enjoy—they’re all incredible time-savers that more than justify themselves. As I baked and cooked endlessly, I kept thinking that if I’d been a pioneer woman, I would have been an advocate of raw food.

A few years back, PBS sponsored a reality show of sorts called Pioneer House, posing the premise that modern families might not have what it took to survive in pioneer times. They sent out some couples, a few singles too I believe, and had them settle on property, build a home, fences, garden and gather and butcher for winter, etc. The gist, if I remember properly, was that at program’s end, it was clear that not one family would have survived the tough mountain winter that likely would have followed all their preparation. But what struck me, as the show was concluding, were the profoundly different ways men and women exited the claim. The men, by and large, left the scene tearfully, looking back longingly at the little homestead they’d constructed. You could see in their faces how much of themselves they identified with the back-breaking work, with that humble dwelling they’d made in the wilderness. The women? Not a glance. All of them commented (and I’m paraphrasing, of course) that they’d spent the vast majority of time cooking and doing laundry, not to mention helping with outside work. They were exhausted and unfulfilled. Those gals could not wait to get back to their old lives. Regrets? Looks back? Heck, NO. They practically scurried toward the end of the experience, dreaming no doubt of their easy kitchens, their labor-saving washers and dryers.

So, I will not fear all technology and progress; sometimes it’s a great thing. No wonder life spans back in those days were so much shorter.

'Tis better to give...

Still Christmas shopping? Don’t do that to yourself. Seriously.

If it’s an adult you’re gifting (or even an mature child), take a minute to consider giving a gift of charity—not to the recipient (who likely has all he/she needs and more), but to someone you don’t know. Someone who may not get much if anything in honor of Christ’s birth. Numerous great charities would welcome your donation in honor of a family member or friend.

There are plenty of wonderful local options:

Local Red Cross
Local Salvation Army, Goodwill, etc.
Church/hospital/library/etc. of your choice
Veterans organization of your choice
Light of Life Missions (North Side of Pittsburgh)
Animal charity of your choice

Or, you can choose to go global:

World Vision (www.worldvision.org)
Smile Train (www.smiletrain.org)
American Leprosy Missions (www.leprosy.org)
Save Darfur (www.savedarfur.org)

This is just a handful of options. Heck, there are hundreds—thousands, even. Not sure where to begin? Check out www.charitynavigator.org to get some ideas. My point is this: If that person you’re buying for had a genuine need, you’d likely have filled it already if you're able. Save your loved one the trouble of having to list another item on Craigslist in a couple of years, and give a gift that can change someone’s life. It’ll likely be a strange someone who benefits—but a stranger is still a brother or sister in our big ol’ human family. And that’s a great gift, for both the recipient and the person you honored by doing so.

Still hate the idea? Okay, then—buy the person a membership to something: a club of some kind, the zoo, a museum or historical society, AAA roadside assistance, etc. You get the gist. It all helps us avoid more stuff cluttering our world, and reminds us of how blessed we are materially.

Now, doesn’t giving feel good? It really is better than receiving. Most of the time. ; )

The good stuff

Bread. So basic, so primitive, yet so rich and complex in every way.

It was one of the first foods. A main part, if not THE main part, of every meal in some countries. The manna form of it sustained people for years. It’s been passed around, shared among people for longer than we can imagine. It represents our savior, the “living bread,” his body, and his body broken. Generations have reserved and used a bit of the family yeast for daily baking. It’s not so hard to make a loaf, but it requires time, a certain touch, respect for the heritage of the task, and a firm but not necessarily heavy hand.

I’m still perfecting my “hand” at making bread, but I do enjoy the “larning” if you know what I mean. There’s something so deeply satisfying about creating the dough, about watching the flour you dumped in become absorbed. And there’s no other sensation like kneading, just rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands in that lump, working it, using your fingers and the heel of your palm and really breaking it down.

There are endless varieties, different grains to use, ways to make it unique and wonderful, whether it begins with plain old bread flour or wheat flour or blended oats or even with a biga. (No, I haven’t tried that yet—biga is the yeasty starter you create to make ciabatta. Maybe when I feel a bit more confident in my abilities…and have managed to get my hands on a baking stone.)

I’m only sorry I waited so long to try it. Living near the Bread Works factory for years didn’t exactly inspire me to bake my own bread, since they do such a fabulous job of it there. But even with that great, cheap bread down the street, I was still missing out on a simple joy: making dough, letting it rise, and popping it into my own oven so as to fill my home with that delicious aroma of life.

If you haven’t yet, or haven’t lately, get out in that kitchen and make a floury mess. It’s good for the soul.