Life in the Slow Lane

Goals, Theme Verses, Reflections, and Being Occupied

2012-01-01T06:17:00.000-08:00

On the planner I am using for 2012 there is a little note printed for today suggesting that I choose a theme verse for the year. After two seconds of reflection, I realize that my theme verse for this year is likely to be the same verse I have had percolating in my thoughts for three years.

Ecclesiastes 5:20

As the ESV says, "For he will not much remember the days of his life because God keeps him occupied with joy in his heart."

Let me back up.

Three years ago I was 100 days away from my wedding. Repeatedly friends, relatives, and passersby would instruct: write down all of the sweet things of your courtship so you will remember it always. So when I was given a journal covered in lovey-dovey hearts, I thought it the perfect keeper of all of the lovey-dovey memories I was going to beautifully script on to each page.

Up until then, I had been a prolific filler of journals. From the time my brother gave me a diary (complete with lock and key) when I was 11, I marched through an impressive collection of all things paper. So 100 days away from my wedding, I thought it not overly ambitious to set the goal of filling the heart-patterned journal completely by the time I said "I do." After all, once I was married, there would be no reason to keep up the ooshy-gooshy lovey-dovey flippity-floppity so romanticized in pre-marriage.

But I was planning a wedding, working full time,and discussing all of the Big Important Questions of Life Together with S.O.S. There just wasn't time for me to dreamily stare out over a blank page AND time for me to fill it. One hundred days dragged and flew by and I had barely marked any pages.

That's okay, I reasoned. Honeymoons are supposed to be even more lovey-dovey, ooshy-gooshy. What better time to write surrounded by hearts?

But friends, you know the story. If a woman is not able to find time to write while she is engaged and working full-time, she is not going to find the time to write while she is newly married and working full-time, much less newly married, working full-time and figuring out motherhood.

For a long while I carried a burden of guilt about the empty pages of my journal. Not only was the opportunity to chronicle "life at its happiest" slipping away, but this "spiritual discipline" where I had always excelled, lay dormant.

And then, like eddies forming in an otherwise rushing river, bits and pieces of Ecclesiastes 5:20 circled in my thoughts. "God keeps him occupied"... "He will not much remember the days of his life"... "joy in his heart."

How can I convey to you the sweet release of that verse? While there have been many times where I have wished to be not quite as occupied, the joy is real. In the verses leading up to this unofficial theme verse of mine, it talks about God giving the power to enjoy the lot in life He gives for the "few days" of life under the sun.

What better reminder that these days are few... not because CutieBabyBoy will soon be grabbing the car keys and heading off to college, and not because S.O.S. and I will settle into the "too-long married" sort of relationship that is devoid of whispered sweet nothings. These days are few because this life under the sun is meant to be just a vapor, just a faint shadow of Life as it is meant to be enjoyed. And that is a thought worth chronicling.

Now if only I can find a pen to script it on pages 23 through 180 of my lovey-dovey heart journal.

New Year's Resolutions

2011-12-29T20:26:00.000-08:00

I am making a slight deviation from my usual habit of providing New Year's resolutions for all of my faithful readers. What follows are goals I would like to accomplish, but I invite my readers to take these as their own also.

1) Learn the skill of simultaneous output.
There are people skilled in simultaneous translation and people skilled (?) in the special breathing techniques required to play the didgeridoo; I want to learn how to simultaneously recite One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish Blue Fish at the same time as answering emails or proofreading documents. I would even settle for the intermediate skill of reciting Dr. Seuss while participating in a conference call or strategizing for my day.

2) Convince computer programmers that even though they are quite used to working with code, most people are not. Plus, real languages are so much more beautiful and helpful.
What could follow here is a lengthy rant about all of the programs, etc., that have done away with perfectly clear worded menus in favor of icons, symbols, and barely discernible graphics. You are not reading the lengthy rant not because I have not written it, but because I wrote it in one of those "We care what you think" comment boxes and submitted it to the great void. Funny that they did not provide a keyboard of hieroglyphics for us to share our opinion but rather expected us to use real words.

3) Obtain another set of eyes in the back of the head.
I know each mother is supposed to come equipped with eyes in the back of her head, but I think the next logical step is to obtain a look out in the back of the child's head. Of course a mother is never going to know everything her child is up to, but an extra set of eyes to give the general location of the child seems like a good progression.

Eight Things Not to Say to the New Mother

2011-11-12T22:15:00.001-08:00

1) "I've got a new puppy (or an old one), and taking care of it is more work than a baby."
This could possibly be true. I've dog sat both a puppy and an old dog and multiple times caring for each, I thought to myself "I am never doing this again." However, as a new, sleep deprived mother, there is no comparison between a baby and a dog. If you have trouble distinguishing between the responsibilities involved, consider the difference between the approval process for adopting a puppy and that of adopting a baby.

2) "Your baby is crying a lot? You better get used to it."
Judging by reactions I've seen from mothers of grown children when their children cry, I do not think that the second sentence must follow the first. Yes, the new mother must sometime learn that she won't be able to (and, in some cases, shouldn't try to) soothe away the source of the tears, but in my limited experience, I am inclined to believe that no mother ever gets used to it.

3) "Shame on you."
A new mother has enough expectations she knows she isn't meeting. I've yet to hear from a new mother "Oh, I've got it all together. I'm doing everything just right." So don't pile on any more pressure. If she really is doing something shameful, like going grocery shopping in her nighty or letting her baby teethe on the toilet brush, she needs help. Find it for her.

4) "Ew. What is that?!?"
This is especially unhelpful when you are at the new mother's house helping her clean. It is a rare woman who is not slightly mortified to have someone she knows clean her messy house. If you are allowed the privilege (and it is a privilege) to help clean the new mom's house, it is for one of two reasons: 1) She is desperate. She knows the place is gross, it doesn't help to bring attention to it. Or 2) The house is still relatively clean from her nesting energies and she is hoping that your kind attention to a few key areas will prevent her from being embarrassed when all the other well-wishers drop in. In this case, your disgust at what she considers passable is devastating.

5) "Don't let anyone give you advice about how to raise your baby."
The irony in this statement makes it a gem all by itself. But even if you can get past the irony, how do you intend she stop the advice? Have the mother wear ear plugs 24/7 or encourage her to move to the moon?

6) "I had to take away my 13 year old's ability to text on her cell phone because of trouble she got into at school. See what you have to look forward to?"
I have a couple issues with this one. 1) Each child and each stage has it's own challenges and joys. Don't wish the particular trials you are going through on someone who has their own fill of challenges. 2) Technology is changing fast enough that by the time my baby is 13, texting will either be about as common as LPs are today or it will be so prevalent that taking away a teenager's right to text will be nigh on to abuse.

7) "Your baby is such an easy baby! He will probably trick you into thinking you can handle another baby, and then... won't you be in trouble."
Try not to attribute highly complex manipulative capabilities to a person who is still learning to burp. Also, steer clear of statements that sound remarkably curse-like.

8) "Enjoy every minute of it, because before you know it your kid will move off to college."
I understand that time has a way of zipping by, but between the unique combination of sleep deprivation, a body that is "not my body", and brand-new responsibility of Not Messing Up a Poor Helpless Baby that Relies Solely on the Woman Who Cannot Finish a Sentence Due to Lack of Sleep, give the poor woman permission to not enjoy every minute.

The Lesser of Evils

2011-09-14T21:22:00.000-07:00

With all of the recent advancements, parenting has become a rigorous obstacle course of navigating "How you will ruin and/or neglect your kid today". Observe:

Task: Wash laundry in laundry room.

Complicating Factors: One twenty pound toddler, a flight of stairs, three doors (one requiring a key), and an absolutely non babyproof laundry room.

Option 1: Leave child unattended in condo while you cart baskets to the washing machines. Hope child doesn't spend entire 5 minutes screaming and banging on door. (Although, at least with this option you know exactly how your child is spending the unsupervised time, as opposed to, say, chewing cords or pulling stools down on his head.)

Option 2: Place child on top of laundry basket and hope he hangs on tight enough for the trips down and up the stairs. Make sure that no one observes your awkward juggling act to keep basket steady while unlocking laundry room door.

Option 3: Allow toddler to come down the stairs on his own and trust that if he slips and falls you will have time to drop the laundry and catch him before he comes to grave danger. Believe intently that he will obediently ignore the lure of sunlight en-route and not wander off to play in the parking lot.

Once inside the laundry room:

Option 1: Place child on top of dryer while accomplishing tasks that cannot be done with baby in tow. Ignore distance to floor... distance to heavy duty electrical plugs... distance to grimy soap scum... and the fact that he is standing up and lurching around to better satisfy his curiosity of all things in the magic world of "behind the dryer".

Option 2: Allow child to play on the floor where he can have plenty of access to monster water heater, ancient trashcan, forgotten cigarette butts, and all things grimy.

Option 3: Corral child in laundry basket and knock him down every time he stands up or otherwise tries to get out.

Option 4: Use laundry baskets to form fence and encourage his "helpful" sorting abilities that includes pulling the lint trap out of the dryer to see if it tastes good and placing treasured toys in its place.

In summary:

If it looks like I haven't washed my clothes in months, just know I am being a good parent.

In Defense of Head-in-Sandism

2011-09-02T19:15:00.000-07:00

Ire. That is the best word for the feeling I felt when the book my sixth grade teacher read aloud to us ended unhappily. It couldn't have been the end, really. There had to be an epilogue that made the story resolve more to my liking. There just had to be.

That is, I think, the first time I remember feeling so betrayed by an author. How dare they make me care and then treat my emotions so cavalierly? (And how could my teacher, knowing the ending, go ahead with the choice?)

My mother tells me otherwise, though. She remembers how I would insist on finishing the bedtime story with Goldilocks coming back to the house of the three bears and becoming best friends with Baby Bear after her breaking and entering was forgiven.

I endured quite a bit of mockery in my English and Spanish literature classes following that first instance of disappointed trust in an author. Why did Kafka have to write such awful, depressing yuck? Why did Ana Maria Matute write with the assumption that everyone has something to hide?

And always, always came the accusation: Not everything is rosy and happy. Real life doesn't have happy endings. You can't stick your head in the sand for forever. Come on, wake up, get real.

I've been thinking about that recently as I continue to choose the story that ends happily and feel it unnecessary to follow the vast majority of news stories. But it is not because I must retain some airbrushed, Disney-perfected view of the world. No, I've cried with too many people in stuck situations to manage that.

And therein lies the difference. I've cared, and the person suffering has known that I've cared. Neither Ana Maria Matute nor Mariana the innkeeper will ever know how indignant I felt towards the nameless lodger who blackmailed his way to free lodging. And I get the impression that Franz Kafka would have been quite happy to damn all his readers to hell if he had known there would be any.

But J___, who has a past filled with abuse and abandonment... I've heard her out in the middle of a manic-depressive swing. K___, who lives in fear of the day his mother dies and he has no one else with the patience and dedication to see he is fed and occasionally moved to sit up in his wheelchair. And D___, who wonders what purpose life has now that he is old and has no family.

I've done nothing to make their ending happy. Separated by hundreds, if not thousands of miles, what could I do to affect change?

But I have cared, and they know it.

I cannot care for the whole world, non-fictional and fiction (don't even dare bring up fantasy!). My heart isn't big enough, my soul not strong enough. Find me a hole in the sand and let me hide there, people who need my care will still find me.

Ten Things to Remember About Train Travel

2011-08-03T22:41:00.000-07:00

1) Unless you are on a commuter route, plan on being late. Because Amtrak rents rails from freighter companies, freight trains get the right of way. Delays also happen on account of engine trouble (for your train or another on the tracks), objects on the rails (animals, water, another train), maintenance of track or signaling system, etc., etc. We had some early arrivals and some on time arrivals, but every time we had someone waiting for us, we were late.

2) Bring ear plugs, especially if you are riding in coach. Trains don't provide quite as much white noise as airplanes, so you may get stuck sitting in front of the woman who figures now is the best time to call all of her friends to retell (and retell) the same gruesome, juicy story she heard last night. Or you may end up two seats up and across the aisle from two passengers who start the 10 hour journey as strangers and DO NOT STOP TALKING until they have exhausted everyone's ears but their own. Sleeping also may be aided with the use of ear plugs.

3) Choose a fast shutter speed. You may be just lucky enough to have the train stop at all of the scenic spots along your journey, but then you would never arrive. Sure, there are a handful of stretches along Amtrak routes that are not scenic, but they are all in Southern California and West Texas.

4) Bring your own food and drinks. Unless you don't mind paying $2.00 for a can of soda or eating $10.00 hamburgers, bring plenty of options. We ate 25 meals on the train and all but four of those meals were made from our supply of canned tuna/chicken/salmon, fruit, granola, jerky, crackers, etc. And yes, we are forever indebted to our foodie brother who met us at the train station in Oakland with the most amazing breakfast ever.

5) Bring a blanket. If you are spending the night in coach, you will get cold. Amtrak provides the standard "airplane" pillow, but not blankets. It is much easier to sleep sitting up with the light shining in your eyes, a door opening and shutting five feet in front of you, and a baby draped across your chest if you are properly warmed.

6) Travel in pairs (baby optional). While the average Amtrak Coach seat provides a great deal more room than the average airline coach seat, it is still a lot more fun to sit next to someone you love for hours on end than someone you might wish to stay a stranger. Traveling with a baby adds more to love and gives you a (relatively) safe realm of topics to chat with strangers about.

7) Consider it camping, only with better bathrooms. Granted, they are small bathrooms (I overheard two size zero preteens complaining about not having any elbow room in them), but you shouldn't have to worry about bugs or finding your way in the dark. If you A) don't have high expectations about how fresh you will feel after any length of time, and B) think about possible food options as if you were camping without access to flame, and C) don't expect to have immediate news from the outside world, you will do well.

8) Trains west of the Mississippi are different than east of the Mississippi. This mainly makes a difference if you have trouble climbing narrow flights of stairs (ask for lower level seating in the West), are looking for a baby changing station (tough luck in the East), or have a feverish baby who is so uncomfortable that you really need to find an isolated spot away from sleeping passengers so as to not make any enemies. Other differences you may notice include the level of "in your business" your train attendant may be (out of Chicago ours chased the little boy in front of us back from the bathroom to scold him about not flushing or washing his hands), who the average clientele are, and how interested your conductor may be about telling you the sights as you travel.

9) You aren't the only newbie. Some forms of public transportation (Ahem, city buses) can be intimidating to ride for the first time because the majority of passengers could get on the bus, pay their fare, and find a seat (or place to stand) in their sleep because they do it so frequently. The uninitiated can feel like they have the glares of 53 people as they ask the driver whether they are on the right bus, fumble for exact change, or realize they needed to buy a fare card before boarding. With the exception of the commuter trains, all of our routes were populated mostly by people who were riding the rails for the first or second time.

10) We'd do it again. After spending more than 160 hours on trains over three weeks, we would do it again. We do, however, recommend not getting sick. Fevers and gunky coughs tend to make things not quite as fun. You may also be subjected to people's subtle (and not so subtle) avoidance of you. Also, if at all possible, arrange to get off the train every other day or so. On our longest haul (due to our desired route being cancelled on account of flooding), we spent nearly all of four days on the train. That was a little much. But really, how else are you going to see America, The Beautiful, from sea to shining sea?

Texas

2011-07-16T21:46:00.000-07:00

One of the best things about our trip around the country is the number of things I knew but didn't know until I experienced it first hand.

For instance, in case you didn't know, Texas is a big state. Our train arrived in El Paso at about 7 in the morning and we spent all that day and into mid morning the next traveling through Texas (with the exception of our hour and a half in San Antonio, as previously mentioned).

Texas has a lot of beautiful places, but it also has a whole lot of places that look just like what we saw five minutes ago and five minutes before that and even five hours before that.

While each of us three enjoyed watching our scenic routes throughout our trip, halfway through Texas, CutieBabyBoy found something far more interesting to watch than more of Texas.

Another Story

2011-07-15T20:25:00.000-07:00

It was midnight and we were finally in a taxi heading to our hotel room from the train station. We'd been in DC for two hours already but I had only seen the inside of Union Station and SOS had seen little more than I had: the Urgent Care of the hospital attached to the train station. But that is a different story.

Miraculously all of our luggage had fit into the trunk of the taxi and even more miraculously, our sick baby had fallen asleep in his car seat.

The streets were near empty and the route to our hotel curved around a number of museums and buildings recognizable as classic DC. We asked our driver if he knew which museums we were passing, and although he didn't know, he summoned some late night energy to tell us more about the captivating locations along our route.

We rounded a corner and before us, dramatically lit against the dark night sky, was the Lincoln Memorial. SOS and I both ooed in appreciation and our driver jumped in to tell us what sight we were enjoying "that is the Jefferson Memorial, I think."

SOS and I looked at each other and cringed. Our taxi driver had been so confidant of where our hotel was that he had refused directions. We sincerely hoped he had better knowledge about area hotels than internationally recognized monuments.

Believe you me, when we pulled into the parking lot, we were both relieved.

And not just because it was the close of a day that had included missing a train, a mad dash to make another connection, having lunch leak all over my pants scenting the day like dill pickles, being required to repack our bag to make a weight restriction, not finding the required bus because of a construction detour, a five mile march on Ft. McHenry, and another missed train connection.

But that is another story.

What does a lump of coal mean to you?

2011-07-08T09:00:00.000-07:00

What does a lump of coal mean to you?

When we were planning our travels, I came across information about a coal mine in West Virginia that conducted tours. If I put aside my initial unease about traveling underground, it seemed like a perfect opportunity to see a significant part of our nation's history. Remembering all the lore about company stores and caged canaries and coal darkened lungs, I was eager to see first hand bits of this necessary evil on our way to true modern progress.

Oh, how naive.

At first, my tour seemed to reinforce my ideas. On the grounds surrounding the mine entrance they have placed a number of original buildings from various mining towns and the tiny shanty of the mine worker contrasts sharply with the luxurious home of the supervisor. The description of the company store even seems to fit.

But then my little bubble of ignorance shook. We all took our seats on the rail car to travel into the mine and as we waited the tour guide handed out bumper-stickers that read "Friends of Coal".

I scrambled to make sense of this. Were they serious? What did they mean by it? Could I even imagine putting the sticker on my car and yet not be ostracized in California?

The rail car rumbled into the little mine and the tour guide, himself a retired miner, shared the history of the mine and explained some of the ancient pieces of equipment and the daily life of a miner. A few people on our tour volunteered stories of their family's mining past and it kept bumping into stories of mining present.

How is it that I only ever hear of miners when they are buried alive by an avalanche? How have I come to believe that everyone the world over will sigh with huge relief when men no longer need to travel deep into the earth to extract rocks to satisfy mankind's untempered thirst for more?

The rail car rumbled back to its starting position and SOS and I made our way outside to regroup before moving on.

That's where our tour guide found us. He huddled a little close and glanced around before slipping me something wrapped in paper towel.

"I want to give you this lump of coal."

I thought of a wise crack about me still having several months to prove I was good before Santa made his final decision, but mercifully I was saved from that rudeness.

"Don't let on to any of the others that I'm giving this to you. In these parts this is like gold, but I want you to keep it for your little one. You tell him about this, ok?"

He hurried back to his duties and I tucked the black brick deep in my purse before continuing on.

Up until now, this black rock would have been a bad joke at best and a sad part of history at worst, for me. For our tour guide, though, it was what he spent 24 years of his life looking for. It is what has provided for him and his family. It is the central object of his life work.

As we continued our drive through West Virginia, I received additional education thanks to billboards and road signs and I better understand this miner's request that we tell our baby about the mines and the people who have lived and died by them. Friends of Coal are fewer and fewer and the push for cleaner energy has put many of these Friends out of work.

Remember, Little One. Remember the ones who lived by the mining of coal and not just the ones who died by it.

Fourth of July

2011-07-04T21:12:00.000-07:00

After two full days in the nation's Capitol, SOS and I found ourselves in small town America to celebrate the Fourth of July.

So small, in fact, that we and our host family drove fifteen miles to find a small town big enough to have an Independence Day parade.

I've never been to a Fourth of July parade that I recall, but someone passed along a bit of insight they had overheard on the subject: if you are in or attend an Independence Day parade, you are probably a Republican.

I was wondering where everyone else was.

We saw classic cars, fire engines and police cars. Veterans of Foreign Wars marched or rode in the bed of a big truck. Red convertibles crawled by with the city mayor and other elected officers. And then the tractors!

I'm not quite sure why tractors are patriotic, but I've never seen so many tractors all in one place outside of a John Deere ad.

After the tractors proceeded what may have been every red automobile in town, representing various local businesses... and the local republican committee.

I kept waiting for the local Democrats to round the corner, but they never came. Depending on your own personal political persuasion, this is the perfect set up to insert a one liner to rib the others, but to keep this blog animosity-free, I will merely say that we also kept waiting for a marching band to provide rousing patriotic tunes, but it never came either.

Maybe the next parade I attend will be more noteworthy.

What is noteworthy about our small town independence day celebration is that our cook-out was rained out. For all of my Southern California readers, a cook-out is what we would call a backyard barbecue. Rain is that thing we sometimes get when water falls from the sky.

The rain may also have ended local fireworks displays, but I'm not sure. SOS and I celebrated true vacationing-with-a-baby style by going to bed before dark.

Lancaster County

2011-06-30T20:27:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday all day long I sang myself a song that went something like this: remember it snows and snow is cold. Remember it snows and snow is not fun to drive in. Remember it snows and you would need to shovel it.

There are many verses to this song and as we drove through the beautiful countryside I kept adding more verses. Otherwise I think SOS and I would have put an offer on a little house and moved. Really, there was nothing that we encountered all day long that detracted from the siren call of the rolling farms and wooded streams and charming architecture... Nothing except for the tenuous grasp I have on the concept of snow.

As if the scenery itself weren't enough to lure us, we spent the afternoon in the town of Lititz which is home to the oldest pretzel bakery in the US. Their fresh baked soft pretzels make you forget you missed lunch. And as if more magnetic pull was necessary, this is also the home to a chocolate factory that sends emissaries of chocolate fragrance on the wind to revive you when you have stopped at a bench to catch your breath.

Yes, it really is as good as all that.

Sing with me, won't you? Remember it snows and Snow is cold...

New Orleans

2011-06-28T18:15:00.000-07:00

Thirty nine hours after boarding our train in Arizona, we arrived in New Orleans. Nothing sounded as good as a shower, and so we made haste to our historic once-a-bank hotel and then regrouped for our first visit of the French Quarter.

On our way out the door we, inexperienced Californians that we are, thought it looked like it might rain. Assured by the concierge that there was only a seven to eight percent chance of rain, we headed out and soon were wondering how many showers we could squeeze in during our overnight in Louisiana. Hot and humid is humid and hot.

We walked to the river (yes, Virginia, there is a Mississippi.) and then went looking for authentic New Orleans. Just for the curious, the things New Orleans is known for are there in a plenty. SOS and I wanted to try those things that the city is known for and we don't have moral objections to, and we started off with a muffaletta. This sandwich is the size of a medium pizza and a double double hamburger combined.

I don't think I will go out of my way to get another one, but it was yummy for the time. SOS won't tell me how much it cost, but we both agree the plastic bag we were given to carry the sandwich was worth whatever we paid for the sandwich. Because soon the seven to eight percent chance of rain turned into the first rain New Orleans has gotten in awhile. The torrential downpour would have caused weeks worth of anxiety in Los Angeles. More water fell in the first half hour than southern California gets all year. That might be an exaggeration, but I'm not so sure. Anyway we were glad to have the plastic bag to put our camera in. The rest of us and our things got rather soggy.

Poor CutieBabyBoy was such a good sport. For quite some time he was sticking out his thumb and we couldn't decide whether he was giving us a thumbs up sign, trying to thumb a ride from someone who wouldn't get him rained on, or wanting the comfort of sucking his thumb without the energy to get it there.

He couldn't even enjoy the beignets we got. (An authentic food worth getting again.)

Because our thirst for adventure had gotten rained out and watered down, we decided we could wait for authentic Cajun fried alligator. Next time maybe we will double check to make sure the concierge didn't mean to say seventy to eighty percent chance of rain and be better prepared for showers.

Alamo by Accident

2011-06-28T18:09:00.000-07:00

If you had an hour and a half in San Antonio at ten o'clock at night, what would you do?

Amtrak trains do some splitting and rearranging in San Antonio and while they do, you have the option of staying on the train without power or getting off the train. We chose to get off the train and wandered into the station. There we discovered that the tv was tuned to Nick Jr.

We were initially quite pleased that at least we were not obliged to learn about the sex lives of prisoners, as we had been at the station in Arizona, but nevertheless, we could feel our brain cells dying. I asked SOS what time we needed to be back on the train three times and each time he would begin to answer but then the the tv show would kill the cells required for him to finish his answer, so I suggested we go on a walk, provided the area did not look too scary.

From the parking lot we thought it looked safe enough to go a little further and from there we found a little map of the near vicinity... Ruth's Crisp steak house!

It had to be safe to go there, SOS decided. I wasn't sure our budget was safe, but we were just walking, so maybe allowing SOS this pilgrimage to drool at the windows would be ok.

Once we rounded the corner at Ruth's, it seemed we had stumbled on a bonafide tourist walkway and amongst the various destinations listed on the sign was "The Alamo."

The Alamo? Here? In the middle of San Antonio? Nah, probably just some touristy trap. But we wandered on and soon came to another map and this one included The Alamo. We couldn't believe it. Here we were, maybe ten blocks away from it. Could we make it there and back in time? We decided the real question was how could we not at least try?

So off we went in our wrinkly stinky double-day old clothes and a half asleep baby, speed walking through what turned out to be one of the hippest happeningest places we've been in a long time.

And yes, it really was The Alamo.

And to think we would have missed if it weren't for a kids' television show. Who says television can't be educational?

Baggage

2011-06-28T18:05:00.000-07:00

My sister always tells me the nicest things. Today she told me how impressed she was by how lightly we were able to pack. We tried, but traveling with a baby requires a different definition of packing lightly. If not for the three weeks worth of diapers and everything a baby might need in the middle of the night while confined to a train, then certainly the size of wardrobe a baby requires. And I don't mean just baby clothes.

When SOS mentioned our plans to someone, she passed along this bit of wisdom for me, his wife: "Remember, you are going to see the country, the country is not coming to see you."
The point being to not worry about how fashionable I would be and to pack accordingly. That is good advice if we didn't intend to act on another piece of advice given by many: "Take lots of pictures!"

For instance, if it were just me traveling, just give me some Febreeze and I wouldn't mind wearing the same things days on end. Nobody who wasn't standing right next to me would know any better. But in the comparatively brief time of travel our very first day, CutieBabyBoy employed my shirt as a napkin for banana fingers and cracker goo lips, a tissue for his runny nose, a teething toy and a pacifier. My jeans were similarly abused. And from past experience I know that there are so many other possibilities: Burp rag, first line of defense on a malfunctioning diaper, belaying handholds, the list goes on.

While I am a realistic mom and know that my clothes will never last more than a few seconds in close proximity to child without showing evidence of it, I would like to insure that most days I do get at least those very few moments. And maybe have a nice picture every so often.

And then there are the three weeks worth of train time snacks and sack dinners and lunches. Needless to say, that as SOS and I were hauling the 50 pound suitcase, the 40 pound duffel, the car seat, umbrella stroller, 35 pound rolling cooler, 20 backpack, 15 pound purse(!), and 20 pound baby, "packing light" was not our lasting impression.

The good news is, though, that as we travel, our load will get lighter. Maybe with all the schlepping, we will, too.

Arizona

2011-06-28T18:01:00.000-07:00

First stop Arizona. I have three words for you about that: hot hot hot. Here we stayed in the guest house of a Mennonite intentional community, three houses down from my sister. It's been hot enough that several times I nearly asked for a ride rather than to walk the torturous 100 yards from one door to the other.

But while in Phoenix do as the phoenicians so I asked what were the traditional Phoenix activities.

Apparently Phoenix has many nice things to do, just not so much in the middle of June.

In the middle of June your best bet is to bathe in sunscreen and then find a pool to live in.

Fortunately for us, we were visiting during a cool spell. By 10 in the morning it was still a cool 107 degrees so that we could brave the outdoors.

Or, more truthfully, the outdoor sporting goods store: Cabela's. Because everyone should have the opportunity to explain to your anti-violence hosts why you want to go look at taxidermied animals killed for sport.

Adventure

2011-06-22T21:26:00.000-07:00

I've decided that adventure and comfort are almost mutually exclusive. Today CutieBabyBoy woke up at a quarter to five with the runniest runny nose. Of course SOS and I had been up late packing and then I woke up in the middle of the night with a litany of To Do and so was up for a couple hours. It is not the recommended way of starting a long trip, but so many trips begin similarly.

I was thinking about our early start on the day at about six PM when our train slowed to a stop by the Salton Sea. The Salton Sea is beautiful in a stark harshness that makes you glad you are merely passing through. The sun was edging lower and the soft light began to make the dry ravines snaking to the treeless shore almost alluring. And then there was an announcement on the intercom about waiting for a mechanic so enjoy our view of the scenic Salton Sea.

Like I said, the Salton Sea is best enjoyed knowing that you are merely passing through.

After a long while we were moving again, but slowly. I would have considered it normal except that as we were seated towards the back of the train, we could see that we were being shepherded by the aforementioned mechanic in his truck. The sign of things to come.

A number of times in preparing for this trip I have called it "In Search of America" or some similar, equally cheesy title. And I have this to tell you from our little train delay: Americans know how to complain quite remarkably.

We are also a great creator of conspiracy theories.

About nine o'clock we were told that we were stopping for repairs and that they were going to have to turn off the power. For those of you uninitiated in rail travel, that includes air conditioning and restrooms. The announcer said "So if you need to use the restroom, now is a good time to go. If you do not need to use the restroom, now is a good time to go."

An hour later, if you were to have learned about our status merely from the phone conversations, you would have believed that we were prisoners in hell on a hot day, required to sit in our own filth in pitch darkness, and being told lies just to make us feel like they cared about our welfare.

"How could they get a mechanic out here in the middle of nowhere? I didn't hear a helicopter." "They are probably wanting to purposefully make train travel uncomfortable so they can do more freight since that would make them more money." "Why don't they route the train through better populated areas? You would think they would want to make it more convenient for us."

But consider: we had to stop at 9:30, not in the middle of the 115 degree weather of the afternoon. They super chilled the cars before powering off and so I never even felt uncomfortably warm. There were running lights that were sufficient to write by, and we had cell phone coverage to call and complain, I mean, let people know we were running late. Compare that to train travel in 9/10ths of the world or even our country a century ago. Seriously.

So yes, we are four hours late, but my baby is sleeping. What more could a mama want?

We're Crazy

2011-06-19T13:42:00.000-07:00

I know it.

Three weeks, more than 170 hours on a train, 8232 miles to travel, a country to see.

As you can imagine, a trip of this magnitude requires quite the planning. Fortunately, my sweet husband is gifted in coordinating logistics. This has allowed me to spend my time agonizing over other critical matters like, "Which train puns can I squeeze into everyday conversation?" or "How many cliche comments can I make about life being the journey and not the destination?"

Obviously, I have the more difficult role in this vacation planning.

Which reminds me that I should go help pack lunches for our train time. I've just received word that some of the packaging on the snacks we bought may be too voluminous to fit in our wheeled cooler. I have a few ideas I'd like to try as to how to fix that problem.

The trip of a life time

2011-06-18T21:40:00.000-07:00

With the help of a borrowed iPod, I hope to entertain you, my faithful readers, with the riveting account of a trip across the country and back again.

My beloved husband has always wanted to take me to see these great United States. I've been to more countries than US states and he wants to change that. Thus the railroad trip around the four corners of the country. Details to follow.

But now that I am testing my ability to blog on this borrowed iPod, I realize my beloved husband may have another goal for this trip... To realize how much better our life could be if we didn't have to borrow.

Sent from a borrowed iPod

To my son, on his first Mother's Day

2011-05-08T08:50:00.000-07:00

Dear Child of Mine,

I realize that I shall always be "old" to you, but I have a few truths I would like to point out today, on this, your first Mother's Day.

When, in forty years, I can't hear you, it is not because I am old. It is because you've chosen to do so much of your wailing while only half an inch from my ear.

My balding head won't be because I'm old, either. No, that would be because of the many times you used my hair to keep your balance or test your strength. Let's hope there is even enough hair still attached to my head that you can make it go gray.

The way I will shuffle? No, that's not age, I promise you. That is merely a habit, picked up for self-preservation in order to avoid all of the toys, soggy Cheerios, and other precious paraphernalia of yours.

And yes, come that day, tears may drift across my vision at the slightest provocation, but it won't be because of unpredictable female hormones or very predictable female emotions. No, it will be because I have used up all of my "brave face" tokens to maintain my composure in the midst of your bumps and bruises and tantrums and temperatures.

All this to say, dear Child of Mine, when that day comes and you need to give me a little extra patience and a little more attention, it won't be because I'm old. It will be because I'm your mama.

Much love always,

Your mama

This is the post I almost didn't write.

2011-04-29T18:48:00.001-07:00

This is the post I almost didn't write.

And before I can actually write it, let me put in a few disclaimers:

This is the life I know. This is not intended as a statement about the lives of others or of how lives should be or even of how my life will be tomorrow. This is right now, in my little house.

I sit long-ways on our rocking couch, the laptop topping my lap, my legs resting on the pile of yet-to-be-answered letters I dreamed would be considerably smaller by now, my feet hanging off the armrest on one side and my shoulders hanging over the other side.

The toy box is tipped on its side spilling out a conglomeration of toys, baby books, wooden spoons and other miscellaneous kitchen items that worked particularly well as distractions at some point during the last few days.

There is a basket of laundry that includes a load of clean, dry towels and clean, wet diapers.

The sink is full of dirty dishes, the drying rack is full of clean dishes, and the table is full of everything that was rescued at lower altitudes in the nick of time from the exploring fingers and tongue of all-terrain baby.

The windows open on my computer tell almost the same story. My work inbox is open, with three projects simultaneously in progress, but I'm not quite sure what became of the pen I was using for one of the projects. Did I take it with me outside when we moved baby and computer outside for a change of scenery? Did it get swallowed by the couch or swiped by the child?

I started planning for dinner at 11 this morning, but eight hours later, what was started has been stashed in the fridge and the new menu features popcorn, brownies, and fruit snacks.

Some days as a stay at home work at home mom, I feel like I am thirty minutes away from being AWESOME. Sprinkle thirty extra minutes in my day at about 11:30, and I would have a healthy lunch for me and everything prepped for dinner. Pry in thirty extra minutes at 4:00 and I'd have the dishes put away and the laundry folded. Half an hour at 5:00 and I wouldn't be in my baby-worn clothes with banana goop in my hair when a neighbor drops by to chat.

But most days, it would take a lot more than thirty magic minutes to get me even halfway to awesome.

Today, though, thirty magic minutes is just enough for a blog post.

Seven Tips for Creating an Email Address

2011-04-21T20:46:00.000-07:00

This is a rant cleverly disguised as a "how to" article.

1) If you want your email address to contain both letters and numbers, resist the temptation to use “L”s or “1”s. It is probably a good idea to stay away from “I”s, too. (Say "no" to tinkerbell11@domain.com).

2) Remember that your email address is just an address, not everything you want to share with the world. That is what the body of the email is for. Otherwise you have an irresponsibly long email address that will cause everyone to hate you each time they have to enter it. (IsaveOrphansFromMeanStepmothersWhyDontYou@domain.com)

3) On a similar point to number two, if your domain name is extra long, remember the KISS principle. (KISS@happyhappyhuntinghouse.rr.co.uk)

4) Just because you have a favorite letter or number doesn't mean that you can't make good use of non-favorites when crafting your address. If you have to count to make sure you have the appropriate number of keystrokes, it is a bad sign. (luckynumber7777777@domain.com)

5) Don’t go too crazy with underscores or other special characters scattered throughout. Trust me on this one, you’ll thank me later. (this_email_address_is_a_bad_idea@domain.com).

6) If, when registering your email address, you misspell a word, START OVER. Don't make people who are correct-spelling conscious misspell words in order to reach you. (defanatelycurius@domain.com)

7) Once you have created your email address, remember what it is. Write it down on a card and carry it with you, if need be. No one will thank you for this, but at least it will prevent your bank, school, work, and want-to-be visiting friends from sending all the important details to a person you’ve never met.

Weight Watchers, Vance White, Personals and...

2011-02-04T18:53:00.000-08:00

Granny Cam.

I've decided I need a granny cam. Most of the world knows them as nanny cams, but it's not the nanny I'm worried about.

And before CutieBoyBaby's wonderful grandmothers take offense, it isn't the grandmothers I'm worried about either.

Each Wednesday my son goes to Weight Watchers and takes his nanny along. Maybe it is the other way around, but you would never know from the stories that come out of it.

For it isn't only CutieBoyBaby and his nanny that go to Weight Watchers. Three of my co-workers meet them there. Including my boss.

Four women and a baby. Let me clarify. Four women at the "Grandbabies!" stage of life and a baby.

Like I said, I want a granny cam.

It is not that I don't hear about things that happen during CutieBoyBaby's time at Weight Watchers, it is that I do hear stories.

One day I hear about the not-yet-granny entertaining CutieBoyBaby with her glasses which he promptly gagged himself with. She took it away and gave him a pen instead. The others jumped on her before anything more came of that.

Another time I hear of CutieBoyBaby and the personals ad, complete with picture, "he" texted to the infant granddaughter of the first-time granny. He invited her to share a romantic dinner of rice cereal and mashed banana.

And then about the assistance he gave the self-renamed Vana White for the final presentation of the newest gotta-have-it product. I'm told "Vance" held the product for display perfectly -- until he started chewing on it.

And did you know that the quickest way to get a fussing baby out of his car seat is not to have three women trying to unbuckle him simultaneously?

From the stories I hear, those 45 minutes of Baby at Weight Watchers I would catch with my granny cam just might make the best weekly reality TV show ever.

Pressure

2010-12-04T20:25:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I am overwhelmed by the heavy responsibility of these first few, formative months. For instance:

a) In this short time before my child becomes verbal, I must settle on the best way to read each of the children's books destined for endless repetition. If the dog in the story barks, what should it sound like? If there are words to a song, but no notes provided, what tune do I borrow? Because once my audience gains the ability to protest, I am stuck to one method per story and one method only.

b) Unlearning bad habits. I have frequently mused that young adulthood is the time to learn all sorts of bad habits not permitted while under your parents' roof that then must be unlearned before your children are old enough to mimic. Fortunately, I didn't pick up smoking, chewing, or going with girls who do, but I've begun to use horrendous amounts of cluttering... It's like I um... sort of put in words that are kind of unnecessary. And it is, you know, really sloppy speech, you see?

Oh, the pressure!

New Parents and Their Reasoning Powers

2010-11-04T12:28:00.000-07:00

S.O.S. and I might need more sleep.

As we were parking our car at the post office the other day, a man carrying a huge diaper box crossed in front of us.

I'm not proud of this fact, but I started thinking how I could distract the man long enough to put my address in the "to" spot. Or maybe after he left the box to be mailed I could sneak behind the counter and change the address.

I hadn't really come up with a good way to make sure the box was mailed to me, but it turns out S.O.S. was brainstorming on his own.

"Ok," he said, "I'll take him out with the car and you grab the box."

The thing is... if we had been getting more sleep, we probably would have realized just how unlikely it was that the box was still full of diapers.

Multi-Tasking Squared

2010-10-27T18:01:00.000-07:00

I have now been a parent for twelve weeks. This means that I am only moderately less certain of how to raise fabulously well-adjusted and attractively well-behaved children as I was thirteen weeks ago.

I have also now been a working mother for five weeks. I work from home three days a week and am in the office the other two.

I will let you in on a few secrets: with 473 square feet of living space for two adults, a baby, a home office, and a mostly dead plant, everything but the plant and baby had better be multitasking.

The other day S.O.S. and I had company over for dinner and as I was pulling the pasta off of our stove (doubling as counter-top), I quietly asked S.O.S. if he thought we should clear off the dining table so our guests could eat there rather than using barstools as TV tables. He whispered back that if we had wanted our guests to feel welcome and comfortable, they probably should not be witness to the conversion of diaper changing table to dining table. Oops.

The bar stools are great. Every home office / nursery / living room should have some. Besides the previously mentioned success as TV tables, bar stools also make great desks by day and rocking chair ottomans by night.

As far as the mother/employee, we are coordinating a massive chart to show which activities can be accomplished in each of the various scenarios facing mother and child. We've made great progress on it so far. Going across the top of the chart are baby states of being: "Baby Awake and Happy", "Baby Awake and Fussy", "Baby Awake and Wanting to Play", "Baby Eating", "Baby Sleeping", etc. Down the side of the chart are Mama states of being: "One Hand Free", "Two Hands Free", "No Hands Available", and "Too Little Sleep Last Night to Care".

As far as finding time to blog, let me just say that some day soon I plan on teaching myself how to type with my toes.

One Man's Trash...

2010-10-07T21:17:00.000-07:00

One day, in mid-pregnancy, S.O.S. and I were out for a drive and a large truck bearing the picture of a bag of Sun Chips turned onto the street in front of us.

I yelled "Follow that truck!" Because right in that moment, there was nothing that sounded as delicious as eating an entire bag of Sun Chips.

Now for those of you who know me, this might sound slightly out of character. S.O.S. thought so, too.

"Really?!?"

"No, I mean, yes. I mean, no. If we did go buy Sun Chips, then the advertising on that truck will have worked, and that would make me feel like I had given in."

But three minutes later we were pulling into the Vons parking lot, at my request, to find some Sun Chips.

S.O.S. drove the car around the parking lot while I ran in, went straight to the chips aisle, and found a bag of temptation itself.

*CRINKLE, CRINKLE*

The noise of the bag nearly made me jump. What was wrong with it? Some new-fangled packaging that was biodegradable... and extra noisy. How was I supposed to sneak as many chips as I no doubt would want to when the package was so horrendously noisy? I scanned the aisle to see if any other less noisy chips appealed to me, but no, only Sun Chips would do.

So out the door with my thunderous bag of chips.

Fortunately, S.O.S. had learned much by this point, and pretended not to hear my hand's many trips into the bag.

Fast forward several months. Wednesday I decided it was time to finish off the sad, lonely remains of that first bag's younger brother still in my pantry.

As I held Baby in one arm and tried to pour the last crumbs in my mouth (without choking) with the other, I noticed how my wiggly baby suddenly wasn't. And then I remembered the ancient bit of advice regarding using tissue paper or foil at Tummy Time. This bag was ever so much more crinkly than tissue paper or foil could even dream to be.

So on to the floor went the empty bag covered with a blanket and then topped with a Tummy Time baby.

Frankly, the results were amazing. Never before has this Tummy Time baby been so happy for so long. I was thrilled, and was eager to show the new trick to S.O.S. when he returned home.

And that is when he told me about the sad news he had heard as he pulled into our driveway: Sun Chips is getting rid of that bag. Their sales have gone down because the bag is too noisy. Even Facebook has a group dedicated to this fact.

But what about my perfect Tummy Time accessory? That bag is designed to deteriorate, and I can't have that happening. The motor development of Baby and any younger siblings depends on it!

Blink

2010-09-27T18:15:00.000-07:00

I think I can tell you almost the precise hour when my Newbaby grew up. I knew it was coming based on a number of factors: his increased hunger, the famous "six week" spurt mentioned in all of the baby development calenders, and the inevitable truth that a Newbaby doesn't stay new for forever.

His growth has actually been the topic of one of the pieces of advice most shared with me:

Don't blink!

The thinking, of course, is that if I blink I will completely miss him growing up because it really does happen that fast.

And so it was that in the middle of the night Friday, my small baby got big. Why can I pinpoint this so accurately?

When I put little T down for the night, he was happily ensconced in a diaper size "N". Three hours later when I needed to change him, the clean size "N" diaper wouldn't fit.

And to think! I missed watching him grow because I was following one of the other most-frequently shared bits of advice: Sleep when baby sleeps.

Culinary Success!

2010-09-25T14:19:00.000-07:00

I am turning this blog into a food blog for just a bit to help out all of my readers who fell in love in Northeastern Brazil.

That is... fell in love with tapiocas in Northeastern Brazil.

For those of my readers who have not had the gastronomic pleasure of eating a hot tapioca on a crowded street corner, let me first inform you that a tapioca is not a pudding. Nor is a tapioca the pearls you find at the bottom of your boba tea. Imagine an omelet-type food only without eggs. To the uninitiated it may sound weird and not worth the effort of mustering up enough Portuguese to place your order, but you would be wrong.

Please don't be offended by that.

The other reason I am turning this blog into a food blog for a moment is because my husband, also known to readers as my S.O.S. (Significant Other, Sweetheart) is too excited by his culinary success to bother with sitting down to inform the world about this important breakthrough.

S.O.S. has, since he first tasted tapioca goodness on the sea breeze filled streets of Porto De Galinhas, wondered how he could survive a return to the tapioca-less shores of California. Many a trip to a new grocery store has involved him disappearing from my carefully charted course as he seeks to find the necessary tapioca ingredients. This of course is a little tricky, since we never saw the necessary tapioca ingredients in any packaging that we could attach appropriate names to.

It became a tapioca emergency. There were no restaurants within driving distance that served Brazilian tapiocas. The closest thing S.O.S. could find was tapioca starch, also called tapioca flour. But after purchasing, he discovered it was too fine and dry to possibly be what he wanted.

And so for months, the opened bag of Bob's Red Mill Finely Ground Tapioca Flour sat in our pantry, scaring me frequently with the uncanny resemblance of Bob to my father.

But yesterday, after days of concentrated efforts to make promising headway, S.O.S. found this website with directions on how to make dough for tapiocas from cassava starch (also known as manioc starch... and tapioca starch!). With the good help of Google translate, Google Converter, and additional Google searches, S.O.S. set off to turn Bob's Red Mill Finely Ground Tapioca Flour into manioc dough.

After three hours of soaking, three hours of drying, and a few rounds in a Parmesan cheese grater: Success!

S.O.S. was caught so unaware of his breakthrough that he was unprepared with the necessary fillings and so created his first tapioca with peanut butter and Nutella. But no matter, success was so sweet that his taste tester nearly didn't let him get any.

I'm told that there will be tapiocas soon with the more traditional fillings of coconut, plantains, sweetened condensed milk and also the savory options of cheese and meat.

Looks like one is about ready. I've got to go. I've got to go convince S.O.S. that when it comes to tapiocas, a taste tester's job is never done.

...And I'll confess to everything.

2010-09-06T11:31:00.000-07:00

New babies draw people. This is an accepted fact of life.

(To more accurately address this truth, we will be using the orthography newbaby, since this is the most widely employed term for this phenomenon.)

Newbaby dissolves the city-stranger mentality: when it is impolite to make eye contact, creepy to greet, and unforgivable to initiate a conversation with a personal question.* In this altered reality, it is not unheard of for cashiers to squeal over newbaby, parking spot neighbors to gush through their open window before putting their car properly in park, and for condo neighbors to yell at the yappy dogs next door because "SHHHHH! You'll wake the newbaby!"

I haven't yet gotten comfortable with the full range of comments and questions, but strangely enough, this is not the characteristic which unnerves me the most.

Gaze at my newbaby long enough and I will confess to everything.

I don't deny that the gazing is natural and understandable; I do it myself a good many hours every day. I only protest because the prolonged silence of the absorbed gazer makes me squirm and leap for ways to fill the silence with newbaby related trivia and miscellaneous confessions of well-intentioned mother-love gone wrong.

Like the hairbrush incident which explains the curious bald spot. Or exactly how long it has been since newbaby had his last bath. And maybe even the troubling truth regarding the number of seconds newbaby spends with his face hidden in his shirt in the process of being dressed and undressed.

I guess I can only hope that newbaby will so enthrall that no one will remember my self-incrimination.

*This does not hold as true in Southern California where we do not have sufficient weather to provide the niceties of impersonal conversation.

An Open Letter

2010-07-27T13:42:00.000-07:00

Dear Child of Mine,

You can come now.

I know I've been telling you all along that you can come late, but late is now.

I really appreciate your cooperation thus far. The kitchen is clean (until dinner time), the bills are paid for the next month, groceries are stocked, the trash has been taken out, the floors are clean (no thanks to your off balance mother), the pantry is organized.

Doesn't that make you want to come and mess it all up?

Yesterday marked a year since your dad and I bought our little house, and I am happy to report we finally unpacked the last box. And hung pictures. And put out door mats.

So really, we are never going to be more ready for you as we are right now.

Of course, everyone these days is asking about how we've decorated your room. "Room" is a generous term. Or maybe I should say the entire house is your room. You have more clothes than your parents do. And your father complains about how all of his "man space" has become diaper space. However, even though we have sorted and rearranged and donated all manner of our items, there is still a large number of your things that are without a place to belong.

That is why we need to you to come soon so you can put your things away.

I do sincerely appreciate your eagerness to please me. With your help I've been able to cross things off of my to do list that have been there a year or more. But really, you can come now. If you wait any longer, I will run out of excuses to avoid the other aging projects. And I'm not ready to stop procrastinating on them yet.

So this is why, dear child of mine, it is time for you to come. Now.

With love always,

Your Mother

Can you hear me now?

2010-05-13T18:29:00.000-07:00

Sound proof housing we do not have.

I know one set of neighbors uses a shower curtain rather than a shower door because I can hear the rings slide back and forth before they turn on the water. With another neighbor, I know when the dog runs to the door because I can hear the tiny toe nails on the floor.

Vacuuming, flushing, burping, swearing, fighting, closing cupboard doors, running the garbage disposal, plus.

Do I even want to know what sounds carry from our side of the wall?

Our corner of the complex doesn't put a great deal of emphasis on neighbor to neighbor bonding, perhaps because more than one neighbor has been introduced or recognized as the one who makes such-n-such noise.

This is never complimentary.

There is just something slightly awkward about getting to know a person after you have already determined their middle of the night bathroom routine. Or their vacuuming obsession. Or their lady-killer ways. Or their loose grasp of reality.

Like I said, I don't really want to know what sounds carry from our side of the wall.

Perhaps, for the sake of loving my neighbor as myself, I should make certain to add a white noise machine to the baby registry. And for the sake of loving my neighbors, I should purchase another six or seven.

Watching Paint Dry

2010-05-04T18:47:00.000-07:00

When the paint dries, the remodel we started nine months ago will be complete.

So says me. The one chiefly responsible for accomplishing the remodel still sees things that need to be finished, but they are so minor that I choose to mark the project completed.

(Pictures to follow when I find a way to hide all of my junk.)

I guess I am always surprised by the interest people show in things I think to be rather inconsequential, like our remodel. But people have consistently asked about what manner of chaos still reigned. "There is a hole in our wall" to "we are hosting Thanksgiving dinner and we have no sink or kitchen counter" to "we just need to paint". And now, all ye who are still curious, we are just waiting for the paint to dry.

Nine months is an auspicious time frame. If only I could guarantee that all of the other unfinished projects lying around could be completed in such a short time. Travel near and far and most everyone you meet will credit that measurement of time as important to their life story. Quite a coincidence, isn't it?

Besides the remodel, I've been involved in another all-encompassing project expected to take nine months. More and more people have been inquiring into the status of this project, too.

Too bad the questions and comments get so much more personal than "What color did you paint?"

Deadlines, Tips, and the Written Word

2010-04-02T16:45:00.000-07:00

Very faithful, very loyal readers of my blog may have noticed a sharp decrease in the number of posts in the last year.

This results primarily from the cloud of thank you notes awaiting attention for approximately the same amount of time. Every time I felt an inclination to write on my blog, I redirected myself as the simple equation this year has needed to be "writing = thank you notes".

But dear friends, my magic year given to me by all manner of manners experts comes to a close in two days, and I still have a pile (smaller, yes, but still a pile) of notes to write.

And all impending deadlines of doom must be met with procrastination of the highest order: blogging.

I attended a writers conference earlier this week. One of the workshops was for bloggers, and the leader shared all sorts of helpful information. The most encouraging thing, perhaps, was his retelling of the confession of one of the best bloggers of our time saying that he hadn't written a single good blog post until he had written 1000 posts.

I find this encouraging because it means I only have a year or two of substantial blogging before I can finally write my first good post.

Another way of looking at this is that I have an entire year or two of posts that don't have to be great.

Yes, very encouraging.

I'll just forget the part where the workshop presenter said that at all costs, avoid having a Blogspot blog. Maybe after I write my first good post I'll decide it is worth finding a different platform. Maybe.

Until then, I guess it is back to writing thank you notes. If thank you notes are like blog posts, I think I'm due to write my first good thank you note at any moment.

7.0

2010-01-18T18:10:00.000-08:00

Cyclone Nargis. Remember that? R___ does. He's writing from Myanmar, sharing about how the cyclone destroyed fresh water reserves and now disease is rampant. His one joy in the four pages of email is of a woman who let him know that she receives hope and comfort from hearing "sweaty Christian songs". He probably meant sweet, but then again, everything in Myanmar is sweaty.

C___ just needs adult diapers so she can wheel herself around her village with no fear of shame. The chances she'll get them? With embargoes and poverty? Slim to none.

And K___ over in India can't "pasteurize the thought" of people dying without a savior. I can't make sense of that, but there's a lot I can't make sense of.

A nation visitors have called "hell -- on a good day" shakes violently, a marriage of 30 years flickers and dies. A grown son commits suicide.

7.0 on the Richter scale. In thousands of places, millions of lives.

There are no easy answers. These are real people, not actors stepping on stage after time in the green room, not statistics in a textbook.

Say nothing of the indomitable human spirit. I've seen the human spirit, and it lies broken and refusing to communicate in a room darkened by choice.

An "act of God": the 7.0 and every tremoring aftershock.

And just as powerful and just as mighty are the acts of God which allow the human body to fight on, the human spirit to mend. An act of God that stirs compassion, extends hands, wipes tears, brings hope; so much greater than a 7.0.

New Year's Resolutions

2010-01-01T08:46:00.000-08:00

In typical slowlane tradition, I will now provide resolutions for everyone else to keep. (Because frankly, the likelihood of everyone else keeping them is just as high as the likelihood of me keeping them.)

1) Go walking in the rain.
2) Discover a new use for singleton socks.
3) Learn to write legibly with your non-dominant hand (Okay, some of you can take on learning to write legibly with your dominant hand).
4) Clean your oven.
5) Encourage a child to jump.
6) Rid your possessions of one outdated piece of technology and/or the manual to operate it.
7) Conduct rigorous tests to see if you (or someone you love) is truly a princess at heart. These tests should include, but are not limited to, "The pea under the mattress" test and whether or not you can find a pair of glass slippers that fit.
8) Make your random acts of kindness less random.
9) Tell somebody you love them in six languages (not including the five love-languages).
10) Create a Facebook quiz/questionnaire popular enough that you wouldn't mind if all 5600 of your "Friends" A) realized you crafted it, B) read your answers, and C) tagged you with their answers.

Impossibility

2009-12-15T20:54:00.000-08:00

Where have all of the apple cider mixes gone?

I can't find them anywhere and this is a BIG, DEEP tragedy.

Many years ago a friend's mother asked me, as she shopped her way through Costco for her college-aged child, "If you had an unlimited shopping trip to Costco, what would you ask for?"

Apple Cider. Of course.

Once I had my very own Costco card, I made certain to get a giant box of apple cider every time I was running low, and I have enjoyed every packet that I bought in the winters since.

For a staff Christmas party, I volunteered to bring hot apple cider, imagining a quick trip to Costco and then tearing open a bunch of pouches. Since I knew I would be replenishing my supply soon, I extravagantly used up the last of my carefully guarded stash.

But Costco doesn't have them.

Nor my favorite grocery store.

Nor my not-so-favorite grocery store.

What has this world come to?

I am lost in a world of no Alpine spiced cider!

Cooking with Small Portions

2009-11-04T13:03:00.000-08:00

S.O.S. surprised me with a cabinet he made and effectively quadrupled my kitchen counter space.

How did we manage a surprise in our home others have called a well equipped closet? All day long we kept the curtain closed leading out to our patio. I was inside wondering in curiosity to the sounds outside of drilling and sawing and the words of a preoccupied man talking to himself.

And I returned from a trip to the grocery store, and... WOW!

664 square inches of counter space.

I don't know if you have ever had this happen to you... the quadrupling of kitchen counter space in the span of one Saturday, but I tell you it can be a heady thing.

It can make you believe that cooking a meal for 25 people is no great problem. (Someone else volunteered to provide the dining room.)

Hey, who knows? When my other new counter goes in, maybe S.O.S. and I will open a cooking school!

Neighborly Advice

2009-10-18T07:46:00.000-07:00

I met a neighbor in the hallway as I tried to wrestle my laundry basket in the door. Of course, you can see the entire place from the doorway and she helpfully remarked "My husband and I made the choice to not have any furniture so we could move around."

Living a simple life we are not.

Utilize "use" don't use "utilize"

2009-09-25T18:29:00.000-07:00

Buzz words drive me batty.

In my informal survey of how a word becomes a buzz word, I have mapped out the approximate path below:

1) Find a word most people don't know the meaning of
2) Make sure the meaning has obscurities and shades of meaning which makes it difficult to translate and impossible to explain to second-language learners.
3) Assign some very important value to the word
4) Use it every time you possibly can to convey the utmost importance to your communications

Yum, Yum, Yum,... um...

2009-09-15T17:56:00.000-07:00

When we bought our cozy little condo, there was a definite color scheme in place. From the door frame at the front door, through the kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom, anything that could be painted was painted either black or dingy beige.

Anything and everything: hinges, electric outlet covers, circuit breaker box (painted shut), phone jacks (painted over), ceilings, cupboard doors and drawer faces.

Well, maybe not everything, as the shutters weren't painted shut like they were in the unit across the hall we briefly considered. But needless to say, paint was a top priority as soon as we signed the papers.

Now truth be told, you already know the rest of the story because chances are you have at least six stories just like it about choosing paint colors. And I could insert here any obvious statement about paint chips not being entirely reliable and this blog post would be nudged along in the direction I intend it to go.

With names like Sparkling Cider, Air of Mint, and Spiced Nectarine, it sounds like a harvest party and you can't help but be happy. Of course, the colors on the wall turned out to be vanilla and mint ice cream with a side of orange sorbet, but this isn't a great tragedy since we've already learned that a house is not quite a home without ice cream.

I should have known better than to veer away from food-themed colors, but the bathroom still needed a color other than black and dingy beige and I chose Gardening.

AKA pea soup.

Iron Chef: Remodeler's Challenge

2009-08-24T18:37:00.000-07:00

I look up from my place at the computer to see my husband squatting in front of two stools, carefully separating out egg yokes into a series of bowls perched on the bar stools. Good thing we registered for the mixing bowls with anti-slip bottoms.

He asks where he might find a measuring cup, and since I can't readily direct him, he pulls out the stack of paper cups we are using, notes they are nine ounce cups and calculates how full he needs to fill it in order to arrive at the proper measurement.

The microwave beeps over by where it is plugged in, smack-dab in front of our only door. At least we still have a box long enough and wide enough to rest it on. Very much longer and we may decide to add wheels to the box.

Speaking of resting on boxes, S.O.S. and I have been doing that for some time. 15 uniform boxes set side-by-side makes an excellent bed frame for an air mattress. And when it comes time to add spices, we know where they are by what position they held in the boxes grid. It's like playing Battleship only without the sunken ships.

The knife block sits on the step stool and the stove does double-duty as heat source and counter-top. Paper towels are on top of the bookshelf behind three rows of boxes; napkins are still providing padding.

It turns out to be a good thing we haven't yet added wheels to the box beneath the microwave... the flat surface laying idle and exposed in front of the door is too much to resist, and that, too becomes prepping space.

All those fancy kitchen shows start off with a pristine kitchen fully stocked, with acres upon acres of counters. What kind of a challenge is that? I want to see what happens when you give one of those chefs 120 square inches of counter, all of their supplies in boxes, and a pantry that is twice as deep as it is wide.

Well... I must go. I am the judge of this Remodeler's Challenge. (But insider's note: This Chef has already won, no competition necessary.)

The Nomad's Domain

2009-08-15T14:20:00.000-07:00

My dear S.O.S. remarked recently that he has moved more times in the four months of our marriage than ever before in his life. Poor man.

But he may prove just as influential on me as I have proved to be on him: we bought a house. Maybe the term "house" is too generous, but it is a domicile we intend on occupying for as long, if not longer, than any place I have previously lived.

One of the best things about our little condo is that because of the mirror which fills the largest wall in our home, I can eat a meal sitting next to my sweetie and across from him at the same time. Here is a picture illustrating this (don't you hate it when the photographer gets you with your mouth full?)

When we make enough room for a third person to sit on the carpet next to us, maybe you can come over for dinner.

Traveling

2009-07-12T20:09:00.000-07:00

The staycation is all the rage these days, but here in the Slowlane we've mixed it up a bit. Instead of staying home and doing all the things you would do on a vacation, we are spending a couple of nights in several beautiful locations, traveling from place to place, all the while going to our jobs. It is kind of the opposite of the staycation. For our purposes we'll call it the workadayroadtrip.

Similarly to a vacation, packing is critical. During our workadayroadtrip we will be staying in four or five guest bedrooms, one hotel room, tent camping, traveling by plane, car, and possibly bus, attend a beach wedding and at least one baby shower (where to stow gifts?), and show up smiling and professional looking for the nearly normal work schedule (iron mysteriously not included).

Try packing for that workadayroadtrip. Before you credit me with super-human packing skills, let me tell you that I trusted summer stupor to keep people from noticing that I wore the same outfit three times this week.

Good preachers will warn you that you can't take your stuff with you when you leave this world.

Dear readers, take it from me: that is good news.

Darkness

2009-07-10T19:46:00.000-07:00

A teenage friend of mine called me at work the other day, super excited about the new Bible he got in the mail. Of course, it was only the first half of the Bible. That is all that would fit in the shipment: ten thick volumes in Braille. He asked me if he could read to me from it and ever so slowly he read me a verse from Genesis, feeling out the words as only a new reader does.

The old story of God speaking light into the darkness... it matters.

Cataluna Honeymoon

2009-07-10T19:25:00.000-07:00

What a moon to end it on, eh?

The Nomad

2009-07-03T14:07:00.000-07:00

Do you know how many times I have tried to retire the "Nomad" series on my blog?

But here I am, at it again.

This weekend finds me patriotically packing my things and who knows when I will be able to unpack them?

Of course, I've gained quite a few things since I last packed all of my belongings and headed out to who-knows-where. The list of things I have acquired bears a remarkable resemblance to my wedding registries. Toss in a few miscellaneous items of furniture for good measure, the belongings S.O.S. brought to our marriage, and the MEGA-GRILL that suddenly has become the "make-it or break-it" determining factor in what housing situation will work for us... and you can well understand why I had hoped the word "nomad" would not be required.

But the time has come to say goodbye to our Cataluna house and I'm back to the life of a nomad.

This world is not my home, I'm just a passin' through... but in the mean while, I've got quite the carry-on luggage.

The grass is always greener...

2009-06-07T20:18:00.000-07:00

The Cataluna House, where SOS and I have honeymooned since our return to the mainland from Catalina, has a back lawn.

This lawn, at its widest point, is approximately twice the width of our lawn mower. On the other side of our back fence is a golf course which stretches for acres. The first Saturday that I pulled out the mower to make two back and forth passes over the lawn, I fantasized about picking up the green postage stamp masquerading as a back yard, and throw it over the fence so the custodial staff at the golf course would cut it as they dreamily drove on their riding mowers.

Surely they wouldn't even notice such a small addition, and I'd pull the lawn back over to my side of the fence before they even woke up.

But in Southern California, a patch of green grass, no matter how small, is a precious priority, and so SOS and I have carefully mowed, and weeded, and watered... anticipating that day when we are told to move out and must leave a showplace of Southern California dreaming behind us.

Enter the field mice.

The bottom portion of the fence which separates our postage stamp from the greens of golfing bliss is a brick wall. In this brick wall are two cracks not wide enough to stick my thumb into. And out of these cracks come an entire family of field mice who dart in and out, somehow squeezing their round little bodies through, and steal pieces of our grass taking them to the other side and leaving bare dirt trails behind.

If they would stand still long enough, I might just get down on eye level with them and tell them the same story the prophet Nathan told King David about a rich man with many sheep stealing the poor man's only lamb to feast on.

What could be so very much better about our grass than the lawns that are paid to be green?

Maybe if I got down on eye level with the mice, they would tell me. Or maybe it is true... the grass is always greener on the other side.

Money Laundering

2009-05-18T20:03:00.000-07:00

I'm spoiled.

I haven't had to pay to do my laundry since I graduated from college. (Actually, chances are I didn't do laundry for at least two weeks before I graduated. You know, finals... papers... social obligations...)

Even for the first three weeks of married life, when, for the first time in five years I didn't have a washer and dryer down the hall, I got to do my laundry for free thanks to two hospitable friends.

And if it weren't for the fact that my dear SOS has a uniform for work and it gets smellier than... well, it gets smelly... I think I might still have avoided a trip to the dreaded laundromat. I mean, one of the first things I demanded of my husband was that he buy more underwear. He didn't even have enough to put off doing laundry for more than a week and a half! (And believe me, I didn't want to suggest the eco-friendly option suggested here.)

Not to mention, poor dear, that as soon as we were married I became obsessive about collecting quarters for the eventual Day of Reckoning. I nearly had to hold my own hand to prevent myself from snitching a quarter out of the "take a penny, leave a penny" plate at a tourist trap on our honeymoon. When my purchases at other stores rang up, I would carefully calculate what change I could give that would protect my quarters and maybe even return one or two to me.

Much to my despair, however, my carefully hoarded quarters were exactly enough to start the washer on our first load of paid laundry. Never mind the change machine directly behind me. Using coins to pay for laundry is bad enough... seeing it eat through real cash money is downright terrorizing.

My theory goes something like this: our current laundromat fees and our current rate of dirty-laundry making equates to about $50 a month in quarters. That is a tank and a half of gas plus a box of chocolates. So if SOS and I can just accumulate enough days' worth of outfits to go a month without washing anything, then once a month we could visit different friends (provided they are the type of friends who come with free access to a washer and dryer) near and far, or maybe not quite so far, do our laundry while visiting with them, thank them with a box of chocolates, and still save money.

It would all work so perfectly if it weren't for that smelly work uniform. And the month long supply of outfits. And the difficulty of transporting an entire walk-in closet worth of clothing in a car that get's good enough gas mileage we could travel further than the laundromat without spending more than $50 in gas.

Ah well.

Maybe I'll start checking pay phones and couch cushions for quarters.

Us

2009-05-14T19:50:00.000-07:00

Oh, and yes, we did get married.

For anyone who hasn't seen the collection of photos yet, there are hundreds over on our facebook pages.

Visitor

2009-05-14T19:46:00.000-07:00

A visitor who very much wished it was breakfast for three.

Breakfast for two

2009-05-14T19:43:00.000-07:00

This was our view the next morning: breakfast for two on a private balcony overlooking the harbor.

Catching Up

2009-05-14T19:40:00.000-07:00

My post count has been way down in recent months. I thought since pictures are worth a thousand words, if I stuck a few photos in here, I might almost get back to where I should be.

This is the view from our doorway at dusk one of the evenings we were on Catalina.

Three Years

2009-05-14T19:29:00.000-07:00

Today I completed three years at my place of employment.

In those same three years many of my peers (and parents, congratulations, Dad!) have worked on adding letters behind their name.

All my letters end with my name... I average maybe 125 letters a month. That amounts to 4500 letters.

Just some random trivia for my readers.

I Scream for Ice Cream

2009-04-25T12:25:00.000-07:00

In the frozen food aisle, I was wishing I had thought to measure the dimensions of my freezer before heading out to shop. Like I mentioned before, SOS and I are living in a four bedroom house where the walk-in closet is larger than some rooms I've called home and the master bedroom suite is only slightly smaller than the entire square footage of the condo we hope to buy in the near future.

Needless to say, this house has more space than SOS and I know what to do with.

Everywhere, that is, but the fridge.

We have a mini-fridge, one of those kinds that has an itty-bitty cupboard of a freezer inside. And so that is why I stood with a box of ice cream in my hand, trying to guess whether it was equal or greater than the height of the box.

I succumbed.

I bought it, I brought it home, I opened the fridge door and the freezer flap, and thunk! it didn't fit.

But what sort of home can a house be if it doesn't have ice cream in the freezer?

So I carefully folded the cardboard ridge along the bottom so the box would be smaller, and thunk, thunk, no luck.

There may only be two pieces of furniture in the great big house, but certainly, there must be ice cream in the freezer.

Fortunately, we were given a plastic container that looked to be the perfect size to fit in the freezer, so I got it out, measured it against the freezer shelf, and began to repackage it. The good thing about spending so much time in the store deliberating about buying it was that the ice cream was quite soft and could be squished perfectly into the container (after a generous portion, that is.)

But newlywed containers are those fancy kinds where the lids are sturdy and thick and have special seals... which make it too big to allow the freezer flap to close far enough for the fridge door to seal.

Perhaps I needed to eat an even more generous portion?

But no, the key to problem solving is to try looking at it in another way. Like upside down. Flip the container and voila! Big side down, the flap nearly closes, door seals, and our house is one step closer to being a home.

...

2009-04-15T16:31:00.000-07:00

There is that famous section of Jane Eyre where on the eve of her first (unsuccessful) wedding, she reminisces about the name written on her luggage tags and her inability to affix them to her luggage as the name does not yet belong to her.

While, many pages later, the name Mrs. Rochester does come to belong to her, it should be noted that the name of the book wherein the story is told does not change.

I say all this to justify why the title of this blog shall continue to be "Life in the Slow Lane" even though I am now sharing the car pool lane with my beloved S.O.S. (whose name is now mine).

And maybe one of these days I will even get around to speaking of the other things I now share with my S.O.S., including the four bedroom, three and a half bathroom, two story house. (There are sixteen stairs leading from the bottom floor to the top which means there are sixteen places to sit in the house, not including the four porcelain ones.)

Riiiiiiiiiiiight.

2009-03-26T07:17:00.000-07:00

I received an email which included the following sentence:

I am making kind request to you my friends, relatives, aliens and all well wishers.

It has a very nice ring to it. Maybe that is how I should have prefaced my wedding invitations.

Who do you see?

2009-03-20T21:54:00.001-07:00

Most of the gifts I am writing thank you notes are things that either SOS or I chose to put on our registry. But interspersed among them all are the occasional "I thought of you when I saw this because it just looked like something you would like."

And friends, that is a very, very, very disturbing thought at times.

No further comment.

Thank You Notes

2009-03-16T20:26:00.000-07:00

(The official word is that this is me writing a thank you note. I would appreciate all of your vows of secrecy.)

But when you have just been through the third bridal shower in as many days, and with two additional showers in recent memory, there comes a time when you must stop and blog about it, regardless of exactly how many thank you notes are waiting to be written.

And, for the sake of all of my dear loyal readers who have survived far too long without a post of some sort, I write.

First, I would like to enter a new malady into the great big book of syndromes: Shower Thumbs. This is what happens when you tear open the wrapping on packages. It is akin to multiple paper cuts, but easier to survive because of the fun of tearing into brightly wrapped gifts.

Second, I would like to mention some of the most interesting gifts SOS and I received. Of course, the gift that takes the "weirdest-what-on-earth-are-we-going-to-do-with-it?" prize is the XXXXXL (yes, that is 5XL) T-shirt we got since "two are becoming one." If it weren't for the size of the neck hole, I think SOS and I could both comfortably fit in it along with a baby elephant. (Well, maybe it wouldn't be quite so comfortable with the baby elephant.)

Thirdly, I would like to recommend that perhaps the most effective punishment for a teenage boy who decorates a car with many hearts and gushy phrases about "just showered" is having him ride in it.

Fourthly, if I hadn't just lived through it, I wouldn't have believed that they could be so utterly different (and yet none of them played my least favorite bridal shower games!).

Fifthly, how on earth did SOS and I find so many people who love us? We may not have a home waiting for us when we get back from our honeymoon, but I we are so incredibly wealthy.

Showers and Dust

2009-03-06T18:03:00.000-08:00

The email I received the other day started like this:

Now that the dust has settled from your shower on Sunday, I was wondering if...

I think I may have burst out into hysterical laughter, but I don't remember. I'm not sure how someone can be under the impression that the bride will have more time after her first shower.

This morning I woke up from a nightmare where two people were chasing me down to kill me and I was running from place to place asking everyone if they could tell me when and where my next shower was because I didn't want to miss it. Because, of course, making it to your own bridal shower on time is just that important.

I think I've reached that point where I'm misplacing important information in some corner or another of my mind and room. Both are equally cluttered at this stage. I'm not even sure I can find the surface the dust was supposedly to have settled on, but if I do find some, I have more showers approaching to take care of it.

Novel writing

2009-02-27T20:24:00.000-08:00

Please do allow us to the outset of this letter, our most sincerely apology for the quite unforgivable presumption of writing to in this manner. However, we do hope that our letter is not too disruptive on your busy schedule of numerous commitment and obligation or worse an effrontery on good sense.

These words were penned by two people imprisoned for espionage in a far away country.

Maybe I just bumped into a novel in the making.

Soothing Tones

2009-02-25T18:05:00.000-08:00

I've been working on a special tone of voice to respond to emergencies at work. The receptionist may have just told me that the particular caller is horribly upset and talking about suicide, but the caller doesn't know I've already been told that and I answer the phone speaking as if I were taking a lovely stroll in the park with an iced lemonade.

I practice this tone of voice not only with callers but with my co-workers. When they call me from their desk "I need you!" I've learned to recognize their panic in the very way they same my name and then I know to switch to "the tone".

The tone could be used to say "That's interesting, usually the Titanic sinks on Wednesdays not Thursday mornings." Other times it more closely resembles "Yes, the Titanic always sinks when you run into that iceberg, but let's find the life boats."

After such an episode this morning, my co-worker pleaded... "You can't go on a honeymoon. What are we going to do without you? Every morning you will need to wake up, get down on your knees, and pray for us in your absence."

For some reason, my ability to find that soothing tone of voice completely disappeared.

Meanwhile...

2009-02-24T21:20:00.001-08:00

My landlady told me two weeks ago that David and I should save time and just handout our wedding invitations as people arrive at the ceremony.

Two days ago she said that we could just include the wedding invitation when we send the thank you notes.

I don't remember seeing anything about that in the etiquette books.

Friday the Thirteenth

2009-02-14T20:31:00.000-08:00

Sometimes the diverseness of life springs up to surprise me, even on a normal work day like Friday.

In the school year 1954-55, a junior higher took his year book down to the railroad where President Truman and his wife had briefly stopped. Truman signed it, scrawling his name across most of the front cover. And Friday I held that same yearbook in my hands as it's owner explained how he found it sorting through his attic. He flips open to the page that bears his picture, and I imagine what the scene looked like 54 years ago when the skinny boy with great big glasses met Harry Truman.

Later my phone rings and I am asked to come downstairs to talk with a couple who has just walked in off the street. They've never heard of us before, but by the time they leave, they want everything we have to offer and some time in the chapel, too. I can't even pronounce their names, but I suspect I just met two people who are real somebodies in the country they came from.

I run out to my car in the pouring rain to eat my lunch and watch the rain pound on my windshield, enjoying the wetness in a way I haven't in ages. I'm cold, and wet, but it is the perfect day for it.

The sun comes out just in time for me to leave work early for a walk-thru of a condo amazingly in our price range. The owner greets us and chats with our realtor as SOS and I open closets and cupboards, peering in corners and through windows. Framed newspaper clippings and layered cobwebs tell a story I'm not certain I want to read, but maybe this place could be a home.

There is a special sort of weather that is crisp and clear and glorious, which might almost prompt you to spin a circle for sheer wonder of it. But I think there is a special sort of breath a day has when it is filled with moments that are crisp and clear and glorious... and yes, those days can even fall on Friday the Thirteenth.

The Important Thing...

2009-01-26T18:10:00.000-08:00

I am issuing a general apology to everyone to whom I have previously said "Well, just remember that the important thing is that at the end of all of this crazy wedding planning, you will be married."

The reason I am issuing a general apology is that I am earnestly doing my best to suppress all memories of any specific instances where I said such an absurd thing.

Of course, the important thing is that I will be married to SOS, but there seem to be a great many other "the important things". Such as inviting people. Or finding a place to live. Or not forgetting to add oil to my car. Or paying my taxes.

I have heard this phrase a lot recently, and my mind conjures up the final scene in Walt Disney's version of Robin Hood where he and Maid Marian ride off in their carriage with everything Happily Ever After The End. I somehow suspect that the closing credits would not roll with such a sense of good will and happiness toward all if you could have seen Maid Marian stuffing her W2s and itemized tax deductions into her bag as she raced out the door in her elegant pointed-ear veil. But I guess that is what her sweetheart had spent his efforts fighting.

The important thing is that in 68 days I will be married. Anyone want to do my taxes?

Spanish in Any Other Language

2009-01-24T06:38:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I received an email with an attached document and the request that I translate it and return it.

From the start, I could tell there was some weird vocabulary going on, especially as it dealt with a religious order founded during the Crusades. I hop-skipped-and-jumped my way through the text, translating what I could and trusting that what I could get was sufficient information for their purposes.

And then I gave up and went to Google. I thought surely I could get some information somewhere that would help fill in my knowledge enough to make sense of what I was translating, and I did.

Wikipedia had a lengthy entry on the subject and I began to read through it until it sounded eerily familiar. On a hunch, I visited the Spanish version of Wikipedia and found almost word-for-word the document I was translating.

I work with someone who has become well-known for her answer "Let me tell you about this new thing on the web... it is called Google. Everything is google-able." You will all be very proud of me that I did not include that with the email I sent back with my partial translation and the link to Wikipedia.

But if only all translations were so easy. Earlier in the week found me sequestered away in a conference room remote controlling my way back over the same 45 seconds of film a bazillion times. A woman from Guatemala was crying, sharing details of her life, and words were swallowed up in sobs. The words I thought I understood enough to verify in the dictionary didn't make sense in context so I drafted a co-worker whose family is from Guatemala to help me. She listened a half dozen times before she asked for her "phone a friend" lifeline.

"Hey, random question. What are chuchos?"
"What? Why are you asking about that?"
"We are watching this TV show and this lady uses the word and we think it means dogs but it doesn't make sense."
"Why don't you just turn on the subtitles?"

Maybe next time we watch the show, we will. After we've finished writing them.

I am so smart

2009-01-19T06:26:00.000-08:00

And I say that will all humility.

We've been registering for home items, SOS and I. And sometime during the course of "is it permissible to register for things like cheese cloth and bathroom soap" it was suggested that maybe we really ought to register for at least SOME tools, as every household needs a hammer and the like.

So yesterday found us in Sears with a scanner and aisle upon aisle of tools. Of course, they all look the same to me (except for the new brand that comes with lime green accessories) but SOS actually knew that each tool has a different purpose... and he knew the purpose!! And since he knew what each tool is for, I let him decide what to scan.

Along about the third "theetbabeep" of the scanner, I began to revisit the question of what exactly wedding guests would and would not be willing to count as "necessary for starting a home." And then I had a brilliant stroke of epiphany:

If not a single item was purchased off this list, I would then have gift ideas for SOS for the next ten years.

Aren't I so smart? Maybe I won't even let people know we are registered there.

Just in case you didn't know...

2009-01-11T20:08:00.000-08:00

I'm getting married to an amazing guy.

A Day in the Life of... 89 Days

2009-01-05T18:04:00.000-08:00

Today the count-down brought us to 89 days and I thought I would share with you what this particular day looked like for Slowlane the Bride-to-be.

5:55 Slowlane opens her eyes, sees what time it is and closes her eyes.
6:30 Slowlane's alarm clock goes off and in reaching to turn it off, she finds the thermometer.
6:32 Through a highly scientific method evaluating her temperature, how many times she had to open her mouth to breathe during the temperature taking process, and the number and productivity of coughs and the number of kleenexes needed before 6:30, she decides she is well enough to go to work.
6:55 Slowlane sorts through her recent pay stubs trying to find the most recent ones for verification of her income for the meeting later in the day.
7:40 Slowlane remembers why it was she was going to get up early when she gets to the kitchen to eat breakfast and sees a sink full of dirty dishes.
8:06 Slowlane finally leaves for work and sees she missed a phone call from S.O.S. She calls him back to give him the number of the wedding officiant.
8:20 Slowlane arrives at her desk twenty minutes late and settles into work.
10:28 Slowlane writes to her boss's boss to get clarification on an issue regarding her boss being out of town.
10:31 Slowlane receives a call from her boss in India and learns she has not been getting emails.
11:14 Slowlane finishes forwarding emails and returns to her own desk to begin writing letters.
12:28 Co-worker comes by with the offer of excellent packing boxes and Slowlane realizes that 89 days before the wedding also means 89 days before moving.
12:45 Slowlane begins eating her lunch while proof-reading co-worker's letters.
1:27 S.O.S. text messages saying he is running late for their two o'clock meeting.
1:40 Slowlane walks outside to meet S.O.S. and is met by a woman wanting to know what our organization does and whether she could be helped by it. Slowlane realizes the person this woman needs to talk to is her, whips out her business card (#7 of 500) and apologizes about going on lunch break.
2:00 S.O.S. and Slowlane meet with a mortgage broker to discuss buying a house.
3:38 Slowlane returns to the office and checks her mailslot to find a package returned from Germany.
3:38:48 While manuevering the package out of the mail slot (and listening to a voice message from the bridal shower planner and returning a text message), Slowlane is asked to stop by someone's desk to approve scheduling of a meeting for website training.
3:44 Slowlane arrives at her desk to learn that the printer malfunctioned in her absence and needs her attention.
3:51 Slowlane eats more of her lunch while a co-worker stops by to get a second opinion about throwing away spectacularly awful books.
3:56 Slowlane translates three sentences another co-worker needs for radio transcripts.
4:12 Slowlane finishes writing the letter she started at 11:14. And begins to return calls.
4:28 One caller asks to call back in five minutes and then another caller is transfered through and Slowlane talks super fast and manages to hang up with three seconds to spare before first caller calls back.
4:45 Slowlane hangs up with suicidal caller and begins writing notes.
4:49 Per request, Slowlane autographs two copies of the first ever book to have her name on the title page (Contributing Editor, and no, the book is not yet available for purchase).
4:51 Frequent Caller Child calls to talk about the forcast of freezing rain and Slowlane continues writing notes while trying to ask appropriate questions about footwear for those kinds of days.
5:10 Slowlane walks to the parking lot with co-worker to fill her trunk with hand-me-down wedding supplies.
5:15 Slowlane returns to her desk to finish notes and straighten piles and grab the two packing boxes which are perfectly sized for the wedding supplies.
5:43 Slowlane swings by the post office on her way home to mail first batch of wedding-gift thank you notes.
And last, but not least, finish the day with some canned vegetarian chili with a hot dog thrown in (Slowlane Kitchen special).

What will the next 88 days be like?

New Resolutions for a New Year

2009-01-04T16:54:00.000-08:00

Friends, countrymen, and far-flung family... Today it is my privilege to publish for you, in traditional slowlane fashion, resolutions for your new year. I realize that this is now the fourth of January and you have four fewer days to fulfill these resolutions (does it make you feel better or worse that I started this list several days before the turn of the year?) but I have endeavored to make them achievable so that you will all come back next year (and I promise that next year won't have the same recurring theme).

1. Using your knowledge of architectural design, draft a blueprint for how you could comfortably install a tropical cruise into your cubicle.
2. Wear a hole in the toe of your sock, and wear it proudly! (Okay, the proudly part isn't necessary.)
3. Plan a weekend with no plans (and then send it in the mail to me).
4. Come up with a better wedding thank-you note generator than this one. (Try it! It is almost as fun as Mad Libs.)
5. Promise to buy a copy of the riveting memoirs (yet to be published) entitled Slowlane Goes Bridezilla.
6. Learn a new dance step (the one you do when something tumbles out of the refrigerator is acceptable, but it has to be one you've never done before).
7. Borrow somebody else's kids for a trip to the zoo.
8. Plan a meal around the color green... the use of food coloring is acceptable.
9. Write an ooey-gooey love letter to your sweetheart and send it in the mail.
10. Travel to Calabasas the first week in April. It should be beautiful that time of year.

Six Degrees of Separation

2008-12-29T19:13:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure I buy it. I don't have any proof either way, and I know Facebook is running an experiment to prove that everyone is connected to Kevin Bacon or something, but have you ever considered the obnoxious email forwards that are supposed to replicate signing a petition?

I get more than my fair share, since many people I have responded to at work add my email address to their list of contacts. And more than once, I have received an impassioned plea for my signature at the end of a list of several hundred. I sometimes, because I have an over-developed sense of curiosity, will read through the list looking for names I recognize. I have never found one. Wouldn't you think that with only six degrees of separation, once the petition had been passed around to several hundred people, I would know at least one or two?

And while we are on the topic of statistics, I would like someone well experienced in such matters to give me the probability of a handful of co-workers all showing up with the same general color scheme on any particular day. After the topic of weather, it seems quite popular to comment on how so-and-so and what's-her-name and the person at the coffee pot are all wearing red or black or whatever.

I think I am inclined to think that the theory of unplanned office coordination is much likelier than the theory of six degrees of separation. But if you think I'm wrong, don't start a petition to get me to change my mind.

What are you reading?

2008-12-21T11:19:00.000-08:00

I have never been an avid reader of news. In high school, I'd read a few articles in the front page as I waited for the comics section. For a time in college I felt obliged to stop and read the headlines through the glass of the newspaper stand on my way to class. As a responsible adult, I read the news feed from BBC, but that was before I began suspecting that someday I would see a name I recognized in the news.

But recently my boss signed me up for an international news service where everything pertains to people with disabilities. Except for the headlines I may glance at as I sign in to my web-based email account, this is the only news I see.

I've only been on this disability-news-only diet for maybe as long as two months, but it has greatly affected my perception. I would not have guessed this beforehand; my job has revolved around this theme for more than two and a half years. But I've been given a different set of lenses to view the world, and it is almost enough to make me an activist.

Which leads me to ask, Where are you getting your news?

Yes, yes, yes

2008-12-14T07:53:00.000-08:00

Everywhere there is talk of economic hardship. I keep getting letters, both in my personal mailbox and the piles at work, mentioning the harder times individuals and organizations are facing. My alma mater mentions students who won't be able to return next semester... a mother with five young children asks if I can send a box of used clothes and old toys for Christmas.

And the red-aproned red kettle keeps ding, ding, dinging the bell.

"No" is painful to say, yet avoiding the eyes of the woman collecting donations for the homeless shelter downtown hurts even more... and pictures prove the shelves at the food pantry are bare.

Another family writes in that they will be losing their house unless we can help with their payments, but we can't. And that is just the plain, hard truth.

And the gift catalog for goats and bicycles sits next to the magazine advertising the T-shirt that supports the end of world hunger.

No. No, I'm sorry. It is just not possible. That's not what we do here. I don't know who can help you. I can't.

And I wonder if in my words someone is hearing "What?!? Are there no poor houses? Are there no prisons?"

Oh, that I could say "yes!" That I could buy the biggest turkey in the shop window and send it home to the Tiny Tims the world over. That I could, by simply unlocking my storehouses of hoarded wealth, keep illness and death at bay.

Oh, that I could say "yes, yes, yes".

But my yeses need be much smaller. I have but five loaves and two fishes, and they can barely make a decent lunch for me, much less the five thousand crowding all around.

I can't end world hunger. I can't keep families from losing their homes and ending up in the homeless shelter in the wrong part of town. I can't keep disease from spreading among children. The multitudes are too many. And I... I am just me.

But what if I could alert my neighbors and their neighbors to the people who need to hear "yes" this season. I don't have the talents of the Ghost of Christmas Present and I don't want to use the intimidation of Christmas Future, I just want to encourage others to share their little lunch of five loaves and two fishes and then maybe we will see we have twelve baskets full of yeses left over.

Rights

2008-12-13T07:34:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I spoke with a woman who told me she's been receiving advice to divorce her husband. He's a great guy, works hard to pay the bills, loves his family... but he makes too much money.

"Too much money" in the "we can't pay our medical bills" kind-of way.

I've known for a long time about "marriage penalties" and people losing health care benefits when they get married, but this is the first time I actually heard first-hand from someone who had been told to divorce her husband so she could get help... "Everybody's doing it."

Where are the protests, the mass campaigns, the well-funded advertisements and societies fighting for the rights of this woman, and thousands of others like her, to be married?

Oh, that we could protect the rights of people to keep the vows they said before God and man "in sickness and in health... until death do us part."

Instead it is even worse. Not only does this woman have the right to divorce her husband, in some states she would have the right to death with dignity. Medical insurance in Oregon might even recommend it as the only approved medical treatment (Read here).

These are not the unalienable rights endowed to us by our Creator.

Random Facts

2008-12-05T18:40:00.000-08:00

My fingers are happy today. This week a year ago I was given the task of training up a department around me, and my personal productivity plummeted.

But this week I was back within range of my previous records of letter writing, and oo-wow. Does it feel good. In honor of this occasion, I thought I would share a few random facts:

I have corresponded with people in over 100 countries.
I have won accolades from my co-workers for my ability to tell people "no" (Folks, unlike the anti-people-pleasers might tell you, it isn't just a matter of saying "n" and "o").
I started a collection of foreign stamps because there must be something good to do with them.
I have 494 business cards out of a box of 500.

And certainly last, but not least, SOS and his violin playing has made it onto the "unofficial optional stories to tell" tour script.

Standing On(e) Ceremony

2008-11-29T20:04:00.001-08:00

This week marks three years since the first of my siblings got married. I am one of five, and the only one not yet "hitched".

As anyone knows, coming at the end always creates a great deal of expectation to maintain traditions, but I always was the really rebellious one (just ask my sister about the only time she thinks I ever got into trouble).

So speaking of traditions, let me share with those of you who are not aware, some of the numbers involved with the four marriages that have already occurred among my siblings:

#1) Two wedding ceremonies, two receptions, two languages
#2) Three ceremonies, four receptions/after parties, two languages
#3) One ceremony, three receptions, two languages
#4) Two ceremonies, two receptions, two languages

Folks, I plan to do what has never been done before. Yes, dear readers after a total of 8 ceremonies and 11 receptions with significant usage of multiple languages, I plan to break the mold! Who knows whether it is actually possible?!?

But come April, we will see one ceremony, one reception, accomplished with the use of only one language.

But my S.O.S and I will be no less married.

Friends

2008-11-14T18:12:00.000-08:00

Early on someone gave me this tip to narrowing down a "much too large" wedding guest list:

Only invite people you have talked to in the last six months.

I think if I were to do this, I might end up with only ten friends at my wedding... and that would be a very lonely feeling indeed.

Well, I suppose I could invite the man who informed me that all of a certain central African country was mad at me (I heard from him the other day, he says that this is no reason why we cannot still be friends.) or maybe even the woman who braved the wire tap on her phone line to tell me that the mafia, the catholics, and the military were all thick together "if you get my meaning".

But friends I actually know who I have talked to in the last six months? Certainly not enough to justify getting much more than a wedding cupcake.

That is until in one moment of wedding planning procrastination I started a Facebook profile. And in four days I found 46 friends.

Yes, of course, it would be ridiculous to invite them all to the wedding, many of them I haven't seen in nearly fifteen years. But it is awfully nice to remember that after a quarter of a century of living, I have more than ten people I can invite to my wedding.

Storm-Tossed Words

2008-11-08T09:30:00.000-08:00

I am not a fan of floating words.

Hope

Family

Blessings

Love

Laughter

I've seen all of these floating in decorator space, and it seems almost painful. Perhaps it has to do with a Compulsive Reading Disorder which causes me to read and re-read a word no matter how many times I see it and have read it. For instance, you don't want to know how many times I've read the same cereal box or the really lame comic posted next to the computer I sometimes borrow. (The irony is that the lame comic is this guy at a race track and every time the race car flies past he says, "Woah. déjà vu.")

But Compulsive Reading Disorder aside, I think it has more to do with a sense that you have lost everything but one magnet from the set of magnetic poetry on your fridge.

Or maybe it is because it is like one solitary little wisp of a cloud on a day that was meant for a soul-stirring sunset.

Floating words are like a single note confidently played and then left hanging, naked of the concerto it was meant for.

These words are all "heavy" words, meaning that from the beginning of time and across the globe, philosophers and poets, politicians and pre-adolescents have all tried to grasp the weight and the mystery of these things. But in unloosing these words from even the basest of moorings they are prone to every storm and undercurrent.

So take these storm tossed words and root them: root them in truths even more weighty than the words by themselves.

Her Majesty

2008-11-06T21:19:00.000-08:00

Dear [My one name here],

Thank you for your letter… You said you would be willing to assist me, so I am going to take you up on your offer. Please write to the Queen of England and tell her to read…

[Seriously.]

The things I plan for

2008-10-27T19:32:00.000-07:00

I may not have the slightest idea what color scheme will tie together "my" special day but I've been planning the important things: how I will write thank you notes.

When the course of the day typically includes writing between five and 25 letters, you have to plan for writing any additional correspondence, (Can we use this excuse to pardon the delay in my response to personal emails?) and thank you notes following a wedding certainly qualifies as additional correspondence. So I've been planning.

First and foremost is the need for appropriate stationery. I hope this will justify the acquisition of some way snazzy cool note cards. Kindly forget the fact that I already have well over two hundred blank thank you note cards in my possession. I suppose one of these days I will have to find a Stationery-ics Anonymous. Of course, I don't have a problem with it yet. I could quit whenever I wanted to.

Secondly is the question of keeping the text of the message alive and fresh, never downgrading into roteness and triteness. At work whenever we can forecast an increase in mail, we like to draft sample responses in advance so that it won't take us too long to meet the increased need. The advantage of wedding registries is that you can have a fairly accurate idea of what gifts you will be receiving and so a glowing thank you note can be written for the bed sheets that you know will coordinate quite lovely with the wall hanging. The small snag here, of course, is for the items that are rather small and usually come combined with other things. Apparently continued planning needs to go into this area.

And thirdly is the concern of a good ink pen. I've seen several suggested wedding schedules, and while a number of them recommend a tasting with the caterer, I have yet to see one tip regarding a testing of the thank you note pens. Do the wedding pros not realize the seriousness of this issue? How many times have you gone to write something only to have the pen fail on you half way into the message? My point exactly.

Yes, one of these days I really should get around to deciding what kind of dress I plan to wear (atleast the color choice is easy), but don't say I'm not planning.

Wedding Planner(s)

2008-10-24T20:03:00.000-07:00

The last day that I was house sitting, the neighbor came over to introduce herself and gush about me getting married. Frankly, I was surprised she knew and even more surprised that whoever had told her had been excited enough to gush enough that she could gush.

But I did my level headed best to answer all the questions.

"And when is the date?"

"April."

"Oh, the daffodils will be lovely!"

I wasn't sure where there had been any daffodils involved at all, but she flipped open her date book she was carrying, and there, the week of my wedding, was a news clipping about daffodils. She continued to share with me how perfect this particular flower was for my purposes and then excused herself, commenting over her shoulder about the need for me to start gathering addresses.

Right. Note to self.

In the lunch room at work, idle conversation about the weather turned to "So have you picked your colors yet?" While the sheer number of people asking this question has made me begin to think that this might be something I should be thinking about, I could excuse this inquiry a little more easily, as this co-worker is in charge of layout design. I pointed out that I had no clue, and wasn't it proof that it was a good thing I earn my living with words and not visuals?

She didn't even acknowledge my weak attempt of an excuse.

"Green. You seem to wear a lot of green."

She's the fourth person to suggest it and I promise, there is no more green in my closet than any other color.

And then there was the helpful soul who worked her myriad of connections to secure the location and the kind friend who got so excited about me registering for dishes that she used three exclamation marks and told me which stores I shouldn't even consider going into. Then my boss volunteered the rest of the department to take care of the food for the reception and a co-worker suggested her daughter would be thrilled to make confectionery and and and.

I've heard a thing or two about wedding planners, and in the magazine someone checked out of the library for me, there was a list of tips to finding a wedding planner. I'm not sure how it works when the wedding planners find you, but I suppose the key quality still holds true: "Your planner should... be genuinely excited about your wedding."

No problem there.

(Check out your own opportunity to be a wedding planner in the side bar!)

Bridal Magazines

2008-10-24T19:49:00.000-07:00

And I quote:

"She has no empire and has kissed no frogs. She is not royalty and holds no court. And yet, on this, the most memorable of days, she lives in a palace, where ladies in waiting carry out her every wish and attend to her makeup and hair while chefs of world-renown prepare a celebratory feast, fit for a king and queen, but made just for her. So it's easy to see why she cannot shake the feeling that today, she is a princess."

And that, my friends, is the secret to the $7,000 dresses and the $3,000 cake ("It makes me believe that the cake really is a window into the soul of a wedding").

However, there is no way that I am about to part with that kind of money (even if I had it) in order to feel like a princess for a day.

No, I've found a man who plans to treat me like a princess for a life-time, and friends, that's priceless.

Rollercoaster

2008-10-17T21:43:00.000-07:00

Maybe engagement is like a rollercoaster. You wait for a really long time for a ride that whips you up and down and in and out and maybe even upside down and before you can catch your breath, it is over, and you hope that maybe someone thought to take a picture so you can at least pretend to remember what it was like.

Wrinkles in Time

2008-10-02T19:50:00.000-07:00

I wander into the kitchen to check what time it is. The microwave reads five minutes faster than the stove, so I peak at the clock in the living room. It reads 10 minutes to 8, but I have a vague recollection that it was that time on that clock when I started my laundry three hours ago.

The digital clock next to my borrowed bed has to be at least 10 minutes fast, maybe 15, but certainly not more than 20. I know this because it is about ten minutes slower than the alarm clock on the right side of the bed in the master bedroom. The alarm clock on the left side of the head board is half an hour slower than it's twin glaring from the other side of the room.

I lean on the door frame in the office, trying to decide whether the clock there is more likely to be on time or not. It's analog, and one of those that have pictures instead of numbers. If it is a canary past a cardinal o'clock, will my laundry be done in the garage where the clock read fifteen minutes after six when I filled the dryer? I suppose I could wait another long while, until I'm sure my clothes will be dry, but they aren't permanent press, and may wrinkle.

I guess time wrinkles, too. But that's okay. It's better than being permanently pressed.

pls i want money n books bye.

2008-09-29T19:19:00.000-07:00

That was the entire content of the email.

For some of you, perhaps that reminds you of the emails you get from your college-aged children, although perhaps with better orthography. But no, someone in a central African country took all of the trouble to write this lovely message and press "send".

It might interest you further to know that I have received similar requests from that same African country, that same city, and yes, even that same PO box before. Different names, of course (or not). I can understand that a number of people might share the same post office box to cut costs, and I can appreciate that since I sent one person a lovely letter and little booklet, all of their friends and relatives and strangers in the street would also want to benefit from the magic "give-me" link in the internet sky. But really.

And yet I can't quite just ignore the requests. Because the booklet I've chosen to send is one that emphasizes the worth and value of all mankind. Even if these internet leeches are simply selling the booklets on the street, someone somewhere must be reading them, right? And certainly, this world could use a bit more teaching on the worth and value of all mankind.

How often is it that you have people pleading for the message you most desire to advance?

And so I swallow the ire the rude requests provoke, and I write a lovely little letter, and address it to a name I can't pronounce at a post box number I nearly have memorized by now, and include the little booklet I hope they look at long enough to read.

Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have give I thee.

Have Plant, Will Travel

2008-09-25T18:32:00.000-07:00

In July (or was it June?) I was given an orchid. I have now managed to keep this plant alive longer than any plant I've tended since my sophomore year of high school.

Conventional wisdom says that orchids like the humidity of a bathroom and the gentle sunlight of a window sill.

You might remember that I rent a room and borrow a bathroom. The bathroom does not come with natural light, and I am very grateful that my room does not come with humidity. But my solution to the problem was to take my orchid on a walk with me to the shower each morning and then back to my room to play in the gentle sunlight of my room during the day.

That is until I began my marathon of house-sitting.

But like all good mothers of living things, I had planned in advance for the proper care of my plant and saved the plastic sleeve all orchids are sold in. It is very rare for a plant to come in it's own suitcase, but orchid growers are smart that way, I suppose. And after making my back seat into a closet, my trunk into a pantry and linen cupboard, and the front seat into an office, I tuck my pet plant into the corner of the seat next to me and merrily make my way to my next place of residence.

And the next one.

And the next one.

I think this travel has been good for it, except for the few petals and leaves it has lost along the way. I mean, I have found that it has served my plant well in growth and maturation. One of the houses we spent time at, the orchid and I, had many orchids spread throughout the house. As any good mother is tempted to do, I couldn't help but compare how mine measured up to theirs.

And yes, if I were having a parent-teacher conference, I have confidence that I would not only hear that my plant deserved an "S" in Development, but the report card would also read "Plays well with others."

The Chords that Bind

2008-09-24T13:10:00.000-07:00

Yesterday SOS came an hour before I got off work to play his violin in the chapel.

I usually try to stay extra alert when he is there just in case there is someone who is not happy about the surround sound. But no sooner had I gotten back to my desk than the receptionist called and asked if I could talk to a lady who was crying.

So I took the call.

And with the sounds of magnificent hymns seeping into the arid hallways and walkways, I listened to the heart of a woman whose husband is dying. I made my way to the end of the conversation and hung up, once again becoming aware of my environment.

My cubicle mate commented "I am so amazed at your ability to concentrate. The two of us were..."

I interrupted, "Oh, no! Are you having trouble concentrating with the music?"

"No, no... the music is wonderful... it is just the romantic bonds we can see and feel between you up here and your fiance down in the chapel... it's hard to concentrate!"

The other gushed, "It's so romantic."

I had never thought to put the term romantic on two people ministering to souls: me by listening and him by causing people to stop and listen. But I suspect the fragrance of that hour will last far longer than even the potpourri.

An Expensive Flower Press

2008-09-12T20:12:00.000-07:00

I spent $200 at Amazon.com for a flower press.

That wasn't my intention, of course. I planned to read the books, base discussions on the books, maybe even dare myself to write in the books. But there is that old, annoying song it never felt right to sing in my family because of the number of teachers: "No more school, no more books, no more teachers' dirty looks."

No more school.

No more school.

It doesn't get any easier to say. But sometimes learning important things in school drastically changes your life. And Tuesday's homework assignment was particularly instructive and so I withdrew from classes on Wednesday.

And now I have a $200 flower press.

Yes, I will try to return as much of it as I can. And maybe, after I whittle down the pile of books faithfully preserving the petals that escaped a life of potpourri, I will be reminded that Life in the Slowlane is really the best sort of life to be living.

Potpourri

2008-09-06T17:17:00.000-07:00

The day SOS asked me to marry him, he was very careful to get permission from my supervisor for me not to return to work after my lunch break. Because SOS knew that after the emotion and excitement of the events surrounding "the question" I would not be up for returning to work and the military style drilling I would endure.

And so after the romantic picnic that was only interrupted a handful of times by the docents who had first applauded us when we stepped out from the rose arbor where we had tried to gain some semblance of privacy from the doting senior citizens who had shadowed both our moves in the minutes leading up to the proposal, SOS promised all the surprises were over and I could return home, change out of my work clothes and heels and we would go find a park not populated by nosy docents.

But then, as I unlocked the front door, SOS squeaked "Um... so I forgot about the last 'big' thing." I dutifully promised that I would not be overwhelmed by whatever last surprise he had dreamed up and forgotten, and swung open the door.

A path of rose petals awaited.

Of course, such a display was horribly sweet, and I told him so all the long while that I tiptoed in and around the petals down the hall to my bedroom. "This is the surprise?" I gushed.

But I was too busy concentrating on not crushing any of the petals and thinking about how he had managed to cultivate enough of a relationship with my landlady to have her put down flowers on her clean floor, to hear his response, "Um, kinda."

And then I opened my door to kick off my shoes, and I was met by a wall of fragrance and more color than my room has ever seen.

Roses.

And Alstromelias.

And Roses. And Roses. And Roses.

A dozen vases lining my dresser and my closet and my bed and topping any flat surface I had managed to clean off the weekend before.

And now, nearly four weeks later, the fragrance still lingers. Because friends, when love gives you roses, make potpourri.

Telephone Numbers

2008-09-06T14:10:00.000-07:00

I experienced a bit of culture shock last weekend when I was driving and saw a billboard with the admonition to call a seven digit phone number.

The number looked so short, naked almost. Where was the area code?

At work I've begun to see whether I can remember which part of the country a particular area code belongs to. Zip codes are easy, they go mostly numerically from the East Coast to the West, but area codes? No rhyme or reason, that I've yet discovered. Someday I might even be able to recognize immediately what the area code is for Jamaica or London, Ontario.

But then again, perhaps I never will get to the more difficult aspects of zip code braggery because I keep getting stuck on the numbers that come before the area code.

Yes, I do mean the "1".

And the "9" I have to dial before that when I am at work.

It's that whole "at work" thing that gets me confused. Several times now, when I am about to make a phone call on my cell phone, I dial the nine and get the whole number entered in before I realize that it doesn't look right. And several times at work I've remembered the "9" but not the "1" before the area code.

This, surely, is a sign of mental deterioration. For a time while I lived in the dorms, and before the advent of my cell phone, dialing an outside line required more than 40 digits. There were the ten digits on the campus calling card to have access to an outside line that wasn't tied up, then another eleven digits to call the better-priced phone card toll-free number, then the sixteen digits of the pin number and then, I could call home.

My co-workers are already commenting on the magic transition that supposedly happens at thirty when you no longer are able to untangle difficult technological problems like how to get rid of the help menu or how to power up the printer. One commented that I only have four more years were I will be able to assist them in solving their conundrums.

Maybe by then I will have memorized the United States area codes.

Playing Dress Up

2008-08-31T18:19:00.000-07:00

Last week I was invited to high tea. The tea room we went to had scores of hats and feather boas and we were all encouraged to play dress up. There were a few with me who were highly doubtful that they wanted to wear such outlandish hats, and so I took it upon myself to convince them. However, the most outlandish, spectacular hat somehow made it to my head instead.

Do you think there is any chance of these hats coming back in for normal wear?

I'm cruel

2008-08-28T18:09:00.000-07:00

Dear faithful readers,

I have started school. Someday, perhaps, I will be able to answer your questions and even provide fun pictures.

Until then,
Slowlane

Life

2008-08-25T15:55:00.000-07:00

When I answered the call of the doorbell on my birthday, I met a man who within the first minute of conversation confessed he was a mortician.

I've never had a conversation start out that way and I am glad he rambled on, as it gave me time to realize he wasn't kidding.

He went on to say he had a recent career change which required him to come door to door seeking donations. I sincerely hope he finds his way to a career which has happier endings.

We ended up having a rather nice conversation, once I confessed that I don't give spur of the moment donations. And before he left he gave me a compliment I choose to count as a blessing. And I consider it all the more meaningful as it was the musings of a mortician on the subject of life.

Arranged

2008-08-25T13:32:00.000-07:00

Eight months ago a cousin of mine scooted next to me at a family party and scolded "Don't you know it's a bad idea to let the family know your boyfriend plays an instrument before you've decided this thing is for real?" I probably should have known better. Relationships come and go, but music...

Three months ago, SOS found time to come play in the itty-bitty chapel at work, where the acoustics make even the worst vocal rendition of "Amazing Grace" sound amazing and the best musician can transport people in every corner of the building into the finest of concert halls. My boss came striding towards my desk and informed me "I'm sorry, you no longer have any say in the matter. You must marry that man just so he will come play here more often." This sentiment was repeated by various others of my co-workers, as they frequently asked when our next date night was so that he could drop by and give a concert, "tell him we miss him" or "when do we get to see him again?"

The receptionists were no better "So when are you getting married?" Or, at the close of the day, "Good-bye, get out of here, you need to go get married."

Even my pastor yelled from the pulpit "It's time to stop dating and get married!" He usually managed to add on that he meant it only in the sense of "dating the church" in not going through membership classes, but every week that he shouted it, I jumped nervously and wondered if he noticed.

Is there something about me that doesn't breed subtlety in my friends? Or is there a resurgence in the attractiveness of arranging marriages (as long as you get to do the arranging)?

August Hands

2008-08-23T14:51:00.001-07:00

Back at the beginning of this month, I thought it would be fun to try and have one post per day, as some people are of the mind that August isn't special, and I wanted to do my little part to make others see more worth in August.

But then a few things happened.

I think I have gotten more attention this month than I have in a very long time. My image was emailed around the globe and then again it made the printed newsletter which goes into thousands of homes around the country. And people started joking with me about needing to insure my now-famous hands.

And yes, I had a birthday (apparently, I turned eight years old) (also, notice my hands are not showing in this picture... maybe it would have violated the conditions of my hand insurance?)

And I also spent some time considering how a change in appearance can go unnoticed. Only two or three people noticed the change in eye wear, and no one noticed my change in hair length, but one little change in appearance seems to have been noticed almost as widely as the emailed broadcast of my hands writing.

It all had to do with my, now more famous than ever, hands... and the little extra sparkle resting on my finger.

The Anger of a Country

2008-08-14T19:43:00.000-07:00

Sometime in the last month or two a writer from a central African country began writing. He alone contributed more emails to my inbox than spammers did. From the very first he assumed that all he had to do was ask for visas and partnership and we would roll out the red carpet and purchase six international plane tickets for him and his entire family.

On Monday he wrote from a new email address which included the name of my organization as his ID.

I crafted a firm response denying any and all future contact and demanded he stop using the new email account. And today he replied.

Apparently, he, along with his entire country (which shall rename nameless for the purposes of this post) are upset and he demands further encouragement.

It's a good thing I am only known by my one name. At least this way if I ever happen to have opportunity to travel to this country, I will not be barred from entering.

The Raisin Bran Incident

2008-08-09T10:56:00.000-07:00

As everybody knows, the best way to get over an embarrassing incident is to announce it to the world. And so I will tell you all the story of the Raisin Bran Incident.

In everybody's life there are those days were the easiest thing to fix for dinner is the same thing you manage to fix when your greatest accomplishment of the day has been to get out of bed.

And so it happened that a few short weeks ago, after a day and a half's worth of work in the preceding 9 hours, I walked into the kitchen and poured myself a half a bowl of Raisin Bran cereal.

I say only a half a bowl because that is all I had left.

And I say Raisin Bran because I was too tired to reach further back into my pantry space for Honey Bunches of Oats. And isn't Raisin Bran a more likely dinner food than Honey Bunches of Oats? (Stay with me.)

And then, into my step-by-step plodding, intruded my landlady, "You are eating Raisin Bran for dinner? You are welcome to share the pot-roast I made."

But by then I had already thrown away the empty cereal box and I had no further problem solving capabilities for the day. And so, to the utter amazement of my audience, I took my half-bowl of dinner cereal and ate it, then retired to bed.

In the days and weeks since then, this incident has frequently come up in conversation. The best explanation I have been able to give is that I need advance notification for difficult decisions such as that one.

Which explains the note left on the table this morning for me:

Dear ___,
If you have no better offer(s), I would enjoy your company at dinner tonight. The menu:
Mexican Chicken
Salad w/ Avocado
Rice
Beans
Tortillas
Dessert: Raisin Bran a la Mode

Wisdom

2008-08-06T13:09:00.000-07:00

Wisdom is supposed to come with age. And since you will all be a little older when you are done reading this than when you began, let me share with you two pieces of wisdom:

1. Grocery shopping when you are hungry is a bad idea.
2. Costco grocery shopping when you are hungry and only are buying for yourself and only have a vegetable drawer and half a shelf in the fridge is a really, really bad idea.

I confessed my bad choices to my landlady and she kindly pointed out: That is why Costco has samples.

From This I Was Saved

2008-08-04T17:32:00.000-07:00

My co-workers marvel at my memory, but I am horribly forgetful. Yes, I may recognize the hand-writing of a woman who I haven't heard from in seven months, but I'd forgotten to what extent I'd been saved from the terrors that are at the front desk. Of course I remember in general, but I confess, as time passed I've found myself wondering "It really wasn't that bad, was it? I'm a big girl, I've matured a lot. Surely, it wasn't such a big deal."

And then I had ten minutes to reacquaint myself with the many pressures that come with sitting at the reception desk.

And then a new surge of gratitude floods me as a person great in compassion takes over and lets me go back to the safety of my desk.

It's true... sometimes a taste of what you have been saved from is all you need to appreciate anew your liberation.

A Small Difference

2008-08-04T13:05:00.000-07:00

This morning I had opportunity to think about how while there is little difference between the questions "Are you going inside?" and "Are you coming inside?" there is a great deal of difference between "Everything's going my way" and "Everything's coming my way."

A large tub of yogurt jumping out of the fridge and splattering across floor, shoes, window, and carpet tends to make people get philosophical like that.

Burgundy

2008-08-03T08:15:00.000-07:00

Last night my granny car was used by the police.

As I sat on the curb half a block away and watched four policemen, in full armor (even a few in those funny space-ship hats) crouch in front of my burgundy car, I kept thinking "At least it's clean."

I have my SOS (Remember? Significant Other, Sweetheart) to thank for that. Otherwise the windshield probably would have been more of a hindrance than a help.

A split second decision as to whether to park my car on one side of the driveway rather than the other determined whether it would provide good coverage for the police or not. And at least I had cleaned out most of the junk a very short hour before the police informed us we needed to evacuate the house.

Sitting on the curb as a police helicopter circles above and police cars creep closer and closer to the suspect... but no closer than the burgundy granny car... as a party of curious passersby slow and stop to ask questions and speculate... amidst all of this I find many things to be thankful for.

At least I wasn't in my pajamas.