Net Nanny

My staff finally saw me lose my temper at the office. While I can be something of a Home Fuhrer, I'm pretty laid back at work. It takes something outrageous to get me worked up.

And then I met the association's new Net Nanny. That bitch is blocking everything even remotely interesting to read online. Blogs? Forget it. I can see some of them, but I can't post or read comments. (And the prize for the most frequently blocked is Zeepdoggie, who, now that he has changed his banner, will never get through. First, Net Nanny told me that it was blocking adult content. The next time, it said that it was tasteless or obscene. Once, it even claimed I was trying to view porn.)

My poor niece is suffering mightily thanks to Super Net Nanny 911. She e-mails me several times a day just to keep in touch and tell me about her day, sometimes to ask for advice that she will not take. (My favorite: "Aunt Margaret, I've decided not to live with my boyfriend, but not because of anything you said.") Lately, most of her messages are being blocked. The reasons:

"I'm having a crap day." (Tasteless or obscene)
"He was talking smack about my team." (Illegal drugs)
"I hope he didn't hook up with anyone this weekend." (Adult content)

In dismay, I whined to a coworker about how I hate being treated like a child and how the association should just trust us, and she turned it all around for me. I'll change her name because, since I'm not doing this at work like I'm supposed to be, I can't ask for permission to use her name. Let's call her Bob. Here is the e-mail exchange that saved my life:

Maggie: Oh, I’m trying to keep up my morale...I guess I should just start laughing at this.

Bob: I have a strong feeling that all this B******T will pass. If not, we’re F****D. In the meantime, lubricate the * key, because that bad boy is going to be used a lot! I can’t wait to go home and give my husband a *******. Then, I’ll ****************. And I’ll LIKE it! Ha! Try blocking THIS message!

Maggie: Okay, that almost made me p** my pants.

Bob: Last night, I stuck my hand down my pants to *********************************. SUCKERS! If this weren’t blocked, you would know what I did. But, you can’t tell, can you Big Brother? I bet it’s just killing you! I’m doing it again tonight.

Little town on the beltway

Saturday night was the long-dreaded annual Brookeville holiday party. I dread and fear this event for several reasons:

1. Even though I've lived here for nine years, hardly anyone in this town of roughly 100 citizens can match my name to my face. Jeff, who has lived here only just over a year, they all know. I mean, all of them. Here's to my forgettable face.
2. Brookevillians are not known for their culinary wizardry.
3. Half the town is over 80, and the other half is 30 with toddler children, so I don't really fit in either category, although I'm starting to have some sympathy with the former.
4. Our state delegate, who lives down the street and has known me for the last nine years, always mistakes me for someone else. Two years ago it was my neighbor's 18-year-old daughter (okay, not bad), and last year it was the 30-something mom of a baby (I must seriously have aged).
5. It feels like it lasts forever.

This year was something of an improvement. Chad and Michael, the local same-sex couple who recently were married in Toronto, sat at our table and livened things up considerably with tales of a bride they knew who had a cake at her wedding that was a life-sized replica of herself in her wedding gown. I wondered if the head was like the top layer, so they'd have to cut it off and freeze it to eat on their first anniversary. And that whole year, it could just sit there and glower at them every time they open the freezer for a bag of peas.

Also, we sat with other people whom we actually know, who paid our daughter to feed their cats while they were away; and while they didn't get Fiona's name quite right, they did remember mine. And of course Jeff's.

This year the delegate sat at our table and did not mistake me for anyone else at all. She did, however, mistake Jeff for one of the same-sex spouses across the street, giving herself away by leaning in toward him and saying in a low voice, "I suppose you'll think this is a bigoted question, but..." before squinting and realizing he was not Chad at all.

She's a good delegate. I don't suppose she has to be able to recognize people to represent them in Annapolis.

Meanwhile, the new residents in town didn't recognize me as the woman whose dogs occasionally run into their yard and infuriate them by barking at their dogs, who are safely ensconced behind their fences. These woman have fussed at me or Fiona on more than one occasion about this, but tough luck. Dogs on our street are always running into their neighbors' yards. It's the culture here. At any rate, these new residents must be better cooks than the established Brookevillians, because the food was better this year. Even the stuff that looked like dog food tasted okay. Whatever it was.

This year, I must make myself unforgettable. Suggestions?

Please pass the corn

I love my in-laws. I realize I'm extraordinarily lucky here--not only for marrying a man who's as crazy as I am, but also for the fact that his own family is just as endearingly wacky. Who raises God-free vegan kids in Texas? They do! And I love them for it.

It's nice to have a family again. I'm basically down to a brother and a niece (and Fiona, of course), and I had grown accustomed to celebrating most holidays in a non-sentimental, practical, and non-traditional way. Thanksgiving had always been my least favorite--not because I have anything against giving thanks, but more because giving thanks is something I can do privately. Also, I despise turkey.

But now Thanksgiving is a lovely yearly reminder of the weekend Jeff and I got married last year. And Nearly Perfect Husband's family has taken us in and thrown their collective arms around us, and I feel like I belong to something at last. And they can indulge my desire to exercise, eat little or no meat, and avoid the G-word on holidays. Life is good.

The only problem? How the hell did I exercise every day, eat vegetarian (can't quite hack vegan), and STILL gain weight? I amaze myself.

You probably think this blog is about you

Whenever I get stuck for a topic for this blog, my niece Jessica always tells me to write about her. I think this is hysterical when I remember that years ago when I was in therapy, she always insisted I not talk about her to my therapist. All the confidence of the 20-something that the world revolves her has been replaced by the 30-something terror at the realization that it doesn't.

Well, Jessica, for all you do, this blog's for you.

Because of odd family dynamics and situations beyond our control, Jessica grew up not knowing me. We got in touch when she was about 18 and I 29, so I've had to cram a lot of auntly nagging and unsolicited advice into these last 14 years to make up for lost time. Since then we've both been married and divorced, I've raised a child on my own, I've finally met Mr. Right, and she's pulled herself out of the socioeconomic class she was born into and forged herself an admirable life. We've both accomplished a great deal, together and separately. And yet we both occasionally look in the mirror and vilify the girl we see there.

When I look at her, I see a beautiful, confident, bubbly young woman who, like the old TV theme song goes, "can turn the world on with her smile." I see someone without whom I simply couldn't have made it through 10 years of single parenthood. I don't know what or who she sees, but it can't be that person.

So Jessica, and all other women out there who might be reading this, please stop talking trash about that girl in the mirror. Chances are there's someone out there who just couldn't live without her.

This, of course, does not apply to me. I can say whatever I want to myself.

P.S. I was able to resist cake at the baby shower today. Be on the lookout for the four horsemen of the apocalypse, because it can't be long now.

Calorie bombs

I have a wipe-off wall calendar in my office on which I write deadlines, meetings, and other important days for myself and staff to remember. I've recently begun drawing a cartoon bomb on every day that there will be some sort of sugar-laden caloriefest at the office. Next week, there are three calorie bombs on the calendar.

I know this should be about my own self-control. I mean, why should I ruin everyone else's fun? But why is it we have no other way to celebrate the season or life's milestones but indulging in high-carb orgies? Is everything worth that manner of celebration?

Halloween begins the eating season here at our little association, and the season continues through New Year's. If it were just Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Chrismakwanzakkuh, I would be content. But it's every day between. So now celebrations mean nothing, and there's nothing in particular to look forward to because you just can't top the sugar orgies.

You'd think that would be enough to keep me away, to help me moderate. Nope. I'm a junkie. I realize not everyone has my glacially paced metabolism or my sugar addiction. But can this be good for any of us? We're stuffing our faces constantly, and it isn't even fun.

I wish we were throwing french fry parties. Those I could resist. Or pretzel parties. Or cold cut parties.

If I'm going to eat gloppy, sloppy sweets, I want to look forward to them and have them rarely. Jeff and I have been planning an anniversary cake all year because the wedding cake last year was so yummy and we barely got to have any at all. Now, that's something to look forward to. Not the joyless stuffing of our faces with random crap that's probably been purchased from Safeway, anyway, and not even made lovingly at home.

I will try to resist. I know it's all crap, but I can withstand anything but temptation. But I'd prefer a change of mindset entirely. I want to usher in the age of the office cold cut party.

Pimiento loaf, anyone?



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Made redundant

I've always thought that was a cruel expression. Along comes new technology or even just economic hard times, and British workers are "made redundant." Now I feel the meaning of those words with full force. I heard once that the purpose of being a parent is to make yourself obsolete; in that case, I have succeeded remarkably. I have made myself redundant.

Fiona attended her first bat mitzvah Sunday. We had been preparing for this for weeks, and I had a great deal invested in the outcome for various reasons. First, it was to be my daughter's first dress-up party without me. Second, at her age every social event is an opportunity for dizzying success or radical failure. Third, and this is embarrassing but true, I've never set foot in a synagogue myself. Hey, I grew up in the Deep South in the 70s and 80s. If there were any Jewish kids at my school, they were flying under the radar, hoping not to be noticed. As for me, I've always been something of a Jew-wannabe but sadly lacking exposure. So this bat mitzvah was a chance for my daughter to be exposed to something deeply meaningful and beautiful that I have not yet had the opportunity to observe for myself.

Excited, Fiona and I went shopping for the dress she would wear. Shopping together often consigns us to opposite and bitter camps, but this day was magic. She tried on a pink dress and loved it. You'd have to know her to know why that's so unusual (bit tomboyish, bit practical). She looked amazing. Oddly enough, she looked sophisticated in her pale, ballet pink. It had the weird effect, through its sheer simplicity, of making her look classic and elegant. It was 75% off. Every accessory was 75% off. We were charmed, tripping lightly through Macy's, collecting wraps and shoes and handbags, and the cost of the outfit in total fit on the remains of a gift card Jeff and I received last year when we got married. A propitious sign, indeed.

Sunday morning we awoke early and did her hair. It came out perfect. I let her wear a tiny bit of makeup. I knew how important this day was to her. We took pictures, and we deposited a happy but slightly apprehensive young lady at Beth Shalom.

I tried not to worry all day about how the affair was going. I knew how much was riding on its success, but I kept myself distracted. When it was time to pick her up, I couldn't wait to hear all the details. Who wore what? Did she dance with any boys? Did any of the girls, jealous of her beauty, make catty comments?

She greeted me with an impatient toss of her head, settled herself into the passenger seat, and proceeded to listen to "Soulja Boy" on the radio. When I asked her questions, she answered with impatience and scorn. I was devastated. She swore she had a great time, but she had no intention of sharing that good time with me. It was hers, not mine. Not mine at all.

I'm starting to come to terms with this. There will be so many more moments that she will refuse to share, and some of them will be golden, and I'll just miss out. I can't stop this. I will always hate it. But I'm guessing this means that I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. I'm there on the sidelines, in the process of making myself redundant.

Bleargh

Everything I said yesterday? Never mind.

I sucked last night in my belly dancing class. I was stiffer than the basketball-playing med students (who also happen to be in the armed forces--talk about overachievers!), and one left foot kept stepping on the other. The only thing I seemed to do well was, unbelievably, turns. I usually suck at these at home, where I'm generally treading on a dog or running into furniture.

Even the nerd who dances with a look on her face that resembles that of someone being forced to jump from a plane danced better than I did last night.

And I lost my favorite cheap earrings. I bought them in Ireland before Fiona was even born, so they can't possibly be replaced. I never lose anything, but I pick these to lose!

Oh yeah, and how the hell does Starbucks cram 500 calories into one tiny scone? I want to sue them to pay for my lipo.

Rant over.

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Shaking Through, Part Two

Tonight is my belly dancing class. I love it. Last week I was on Cloud Nine because the instructor stopped me after class and told me I was doing a great job and to keep it up.

This may seem simple to you, but it's unbelievable to me. I've always loved dancing, but I've never been able to find something I could do that wouldn't make me feel fat and awkward. Ballet and modern choreography just don't look right on a short, stumpy woman, no matter how good a dancer she is. But belly dancing...it's magic. It's a wiggle that any woman with a little grace and a little jell-o in her limbs can make look fantastic and enticing.

It's so rare for me to find something that my body can do well. (Well, there's one thing, but I haven't always been so sure about my ability to do that, either.) I have no idea what I want to do with this. I can't imagine dancing in a recital. I just want to know I can do it and to study to improve. Just for myself.

Another thing I like about this class is that, unlike the last class I took awhile back, it's not populated mostly by gorgeous 20-somethings who've taken 12 years of classical dance and want to try something new. We're all more or less beginners here. And the 20-somethings who are in the class are newbies at dance and perhaps even at understanding their bodies. There's a group of medical students who come together each week who are earnest and hardworking but seem more at home on the basketball court than on the dance floor. Their bodies are stiff, as though they didn't know they could undulate and sway. It's fun watching them loosen up with an art form that's designed by and for women to work with the way a woman's body moves best.

Of course, it's a little unsettling for me to watch myself dance in a mirror. I thought I was a better dancer when I was doing it in the privacy of my bedroom with the terrible lighting. I didn't know then that my arms look like hams when I lift them over my head. And I seem a little stiff myself. I'm looking forward to loosening up and really letting go.

I wish I could get Fiona to do it. I'd like for her to experience the relaxation and joy of letting her body un-self-consciously move the way it's supposed to. Like me, she can be a little tense. But of course, the very idea of me belly dancing, much less her, prompts the never-ending eye roll.



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Shaking Through

Maybe I'm just having one of those hormonal days, but today I'm feeling that I'm only squeaking by in life. I will never be the one at the office to win an award for--well, anything. I'll always get the job done, but I don't feel that I'm excelling. I'm an adequate mother in that I'm keeping a roof over my child's head and food in her belly, but I'm not always understanding what she really needs. And as far as being a good wife, I'm only doing the bare minimum to keep Nearly Perfect Husband from leaving me for someone more attentive.

But here in the the Maryland suburbs, I seem to be surrounded by people who are succeeding. It seems like no one in Montgomery County does anything half way. Their houses are huge, their cars are sparkling, their kids are high achievers, and even their marriages don't reveal their cracks by the light of day. I thought I had a good salary--theirs are better. I thought I had a responsible job--theirs are better, or better yet, they're such good moms they don't even work. They totally devote themselves to driving their kids to numerous practices and lessons, and then, supposedly, they have quality family time when they all get home.

These people even excel at being tired. The busiest mom gets the bragging rights, and it seems that while their comments adopt the language of complaint, their first language is the boast. They're proud of how tired they are, dammit, when all I can think about is how the hell can I spend time with my family, do my job, and actually get enough sleep at night so that I don't have to nap in my car during my lunch hour just to keep from falling asleep at my desk or, horrors, during a meeting.

And when I try to tell these tired moms that my daughter has frustrated me lately, they look at me sympathetically, but they never chime in with their own parenting issues. Never. If I say that Fiona's being snarky and disrespectful, they never offer their own stories. "Really?" they say. "I would never put up with that."

So it's back on me again, the mediocre mom, boss, and wife--the woman with the only disrespectful child in the Metro DC area.

I think they're lying. I think their kids are equally rotten, if not more so. I know their kids are lying to them. I know their husbands occasionally cheat on them and often ignore them. I know there are plenty of nights when they turn their cheeks for a kiss in a clear signal that nothing else will be forthcoming. I know that success is sometimes only a fashion that they wear, but I'm still left bemused by their desire to wear it.

I want out. I want the freedom to admit I ain't all that. When I was a kid, I knew lots of mediocre people leading dull lives, and they were very nice. They were the "salt of the earth." If I'm destined to always finish in the middle of the pack, I want that to be okay.

Who is the Poet Laureate of the ordinary?

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Nostalgia (or RIP, Athens, GA)

Too much time on my hands at work the other day led me to hunt around the Internet for a rare recording of REM's "So. Central Rain" and thus began for me a long, strange trip into the past that left me astounded by the way a song can take you back to a time that wasn't so great and make it seem golden somehow.

I know that it's only the song that's golden. It's stood the test of time, sounding as fresh as ever nearly 25 years after it was released, while I've moved on, utterly altered by my Athens experience. Living there with the "cool people" taught me some valuable lessons--for example, the cool people are seldom cool. What I thought was a creative, friendly town where I could blossom wound up for me a tomb to the girl I'd created. Good riddance to her, anyway.

I was too star-struck, too happy to be in a place where "weird" was okay, and too willing to trust the wrong people. I loved the wrong people. I utterly lost myself.

So why does a song take me back to a place I never was? If I hear an old REM song, I'm remembering rundown group houses, vintage clothes, seabreezes (the drink, not the winds, for those of you aware of how land-bound Athens is), friends dropping by unannounced at 3 in the morning, and the humid afternoons that lasted until you thought the night, when everything began, would never come. I'm not remembering the breakup that woke me up and sent me packing to DC, nor the false friends who dropped me when He Who Shall Not Be Named (it's a legal thing) stopped speaking to me. I'm not remembering that instead of freedom from Southern narrow-mindedness, I found instead a harsh regime of its own kind. Certain bands weren't cool. You couldn't be seen in your office clothes, or no one would respect you. Under no circumstances were you allowed to like REM's music--but bragging about hanging with them and doing their drugs was de rigeur.

I don't mean to sound bitter about all this years later. I'm over it. It's just so odd how the music bathes it all in a flattering light. Jeff says it's the same kind of amnesia women get about childbirth. If we could remember how painful it was, we'd never slog on and have more than one kid.

By that logic, if we could accurately remember the past, would we keep slogging through life?

I never did find the version of "So. Central Rain" that I wanted, which I think is perfectly fitting.

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Boredom

I'm going to risk sounding ancient here, but I'm concerned about something I'm observing in my daughter and her friends lately. They are absolutely, positively unable to tolerate boredom. If they find themselves with more than five minutes' unscheduled time that happens to coincide with nothing to watch on television and no friends on IM, they panic. Fiona actually wailed last night about a workout she was doing that was boring, and she wanted to stop. Aren't most workouts boring? Is entertainment really the point?

Perhaps I'm jealous. I haven't been bored in years simply because I haven't had time to be. But I've always found boredom to be liberating, anyway. When my mind is free to wander, it goes to the most interesting places because it's not fettered by a task or deadline. I had a 3 1/2-day weekend this week, and by day two I was actually able to sit down and write a few paragraphs of fiction because my mind had finally had enough leisure to think creatively. Imagery of wild, beautiful animals being released from captivity comes to mind, but I suppose that's a bit trite.

I wish I could explain to her and her peers how liberating boredom can be, and how they're depriving themselves of these precious moments of nothing set to do, no flickering images before them, no electronic beeps alerting them that a friend is online. I didn't have these things when I was young, of course, and my creativity was fertile. Boredom, paradoxically, made life exciting.

I have no idea how these kids are going to fare when they hit the working world. Much as I generally enjoy myself at work, there's a lot of boredom in board rooms. Sometimes while sitting at my desk, I'm appalled at the lack of enthusiasm I have for some of the items on my to-do list that are less interesting or challenging than others. But I'm convinced that I could never have an original thought if my mind weren't free to wander, so I try to embrace the dull.

I'm sure we can blame the parents (I include myself here). It's so much easier to let the television babysit the kids, and isn't it a relief that they have the computer to entertain them while we're vacuuming? Okay, it isn't, really; but now that I want out of all this and want family time reading together, listening to music, or discussing current events, I realize I may not be able to have it. How are we going to have anything to talk about if we don't create some stillness so we can think? And how can children who've been bombarded with stimulation every minute of their lives possibly bear its absence?

Perhaps I'm just blowing hot air here. We parents complain about how we're losing our children to technology, but we don't seem to be willing to do much about it. For example, we still have a television in the house. Just one, and only in the family room, but there it remains. I'd like to kill it, but perhaps I fear missing out on something if I do.

Perhaps if I sit here at work long enough with nothing interesting to do, I'll come up with the answer.

"Keep your husband off my husband"

I try to avoid serious topics in this online blathering of mine, but the recent news about a decision by the Episcopal bishops has me scratching my head. They promise to exercise restraint in consecrating gay bishops or face serious splintering within the denomination.

Why must they restrain themselves? Are they in any danger of going on a spree, wildly and with great abandon elevating random homosexuals to the see? My hunch is that they're unlikely to raise anyone to that level who isn't an Episcopal priest already, right? Right? And what do these would-be splinter groups fear from newly created gay bishops? Unsolicited fashion advice? That the traditional dog collars and "bishop purple" will be wantonly cast aside for something with lace and a subdued but elegant tone-on-tone stripe?

My mother's church in the 70s was ripped apart by faction fighting over a gay priest. My mom, bless her, took the side of the gay priest, but she watched many of her friends and fellow Vestry members leave for more traditional parishes, taking about half the congregation with them. While my mom was a comparative liberal in her day, I would never call her a leftist--or even terribly enlightened. She thought that homosexuality was possibly a psychological disorder that was simply a nuisance to the one who had it but no danger to anyone else. But you wouldn't want someone with OCD or bipolar disorder to be kept from delivering God's word, would you, if they seemed to have something valid to say? Mom felt that God was capable of speaking through anyone--humans were vessels, not sacred in and of themselves. And my understanding of Christianity tells me that this is an orthodox Protestant belief, not radical in any way.

And yet we have a group who want no gay clergy and no one blessing the marriages of homosexual couples. And it's this last one that really slays me. How are same-sex marriages any kind of threat to my marriage? Is heterosexual marriage, even mine with Nearly Perfect Husband, so frail and delicate a thing that it might fall apart because that lovely couple across the street tied the knot in Toronto?

The couple in question are legally married according to Canada, but their union is not recognized here in Maryland. They are nearing middle-age, totally in love with each other, and utterly devoted to their lives together. Isn't this what society wants people to do? My mother lamented that her homosexual friends--and she did have many--were promiscuous. If that were true, then shouldn't we be doing everything we can to celebrate the happy union of the couple across the street because they've promised to be faithful and stable? Shouldn't we do everything we can to support all couples who promise to be together forever and enrich each other's lives, including attending their weddings and their children's christening or naming ceremonies?

How on earth is my marriage threatened by the couple across the street? Sure, Jeff is adorable and anyone should want him, but they've promised themselves to each other. And should one of them stray and make my husband an inappropriate offer, remember, he's straight. Oh yes, and married. And one of the tenets of marriage, as I've repeated all too often in this post already, is that the couples promise to be faithful to each other. Anyone might break a marriage vow--plenty of straight people do. But the pressure from society (and, of course, the love of their spouses) should give them pause, gay or straight.

I don't feel threatened by the couple across the street. My marriage is more likely to suffer from my husband's friendship with the straight man in our neighborhood who has awe-inspiring power tools and an encyclopedic knowledge of how to restore crumbling historic houses like our own.

Neither do I feel threatened by a sermon delivered by a gay man or lesbian. (And no, those of you who know me, this is not because I'm unlikely ever to get my butt into a church where I could hear such a sermon!) I refuse to believe that any God would by so stingy with the Word that gay and lesbians could be unable to receive it and then pass it along to those hungry to hear it. If such a God exists, I'm willing to risk the flames of eternal damnation by refusing to follow along.

Until humans can invent a more loving and compassionate God, I'm going to continue to sleep in on Sunday mornings.

All the president's homeys

Who knew that MySpace is now the paper of record?

I'll give you a moment to catch your breath after that shocker. Meanwhile, I'll fill you in on how I made this discovery.

The other day my 12-year-old daughter stormed into my room in a fury. "Anyone can see your MySpace page!" she complained. "I told my friend you had one, and she found it. And it mentions my name. It's not fair!"

Ah, the resounding cry of American children: "It's not fair!" Poverty, famine, disease--these things aren't fair. But economically comfortable suburban kids who aren't allowed MySpage pages when their mothers have them are not high on my sympathy list.

"If you didn't want her seeing my page, you shouldn't have told her I had one," I pointed out. It's not as though any kid that age would do a random search for local moms on MySpace and whoops, there I'd be.

"But all my friends will see that you have a page!" Fiona wailed. She was truly distressed. Her other friends have pages, although the site asks for members to be at least 14. I won't let her break the rules, and besides, I'm envisioning pedophiles hiding behind every link. But I maintain a page so that I can check periodically to see what her friends are up to and if she's lied about her age to set up a page; and now anyone who cares to search for local moms can see that. I understand her concern, but too bad. Mom's got a page. Stop blabbing about it if you're embarrassed.

Then yesterday, I saw that the Washington Post Magazine is looking for a new columnist with a "fresh yet familiar voice." For someone who's been daydreaming lately about writing a column someday, this was an opportunity not to be missed. So I copied a couple of these blog entries into an e-mail and sent it along to the editors just in case they might give me a shot.

I don't expect to hear from them. But I would hate myself forever for not trying, and believe me, over the years I've learned to handle rejection. I've had plenty of practice at it.

Now, Fiona was delighted that I sent in the samples. I warned her that if I was selected--which wasn't likely--that might not be such a great thing for her. I'd write about her occasionally, and possibly a million people would read about it. Didn't she hate that I mentioned her on the MySpace page? This is the Post.

"No, Mom, that's totally cool," she said. "Mention me all you want. It's not like it's MySpace. No one I know will see it in the paper."

I think the Post should get a MySpace page.

In which our Author bludgeons one T. Shandy, Gent.

I finally finished Tristram Shandy. This was no easy task; in fact, reading this classic took me the better part of a month, and it offered me little joy. In retrospect, the reasons for committing to finish it seem tame: 1) it's an 18th-century comic novel, and I generally like that sort of thing; 2) I think I recall that my dad was fond of it; and 3) I absolutely refused to believe that the narrator would never get to the point. I know that's the conceit of the book, but I couldn't believe that 478 pages after embarking on this "sentimental journey" (another book by Sterne that was well worth the effort I put into it), after many promises by the narrator to get to the point, I ended the book feeling not only that I hadn't made any progress whatsoever but also that perhaps my copy had the last page missing.

I can't say I wasted that month of reading, but I feel the same way I do when I work out solidly all week and then find that the scale hasn't budged. What's the point? I know I've gained some benefit by exercising my body or my mind, but it's hard to grasp.

Then the other night, Jeff and I were enjoying delicious margaritas and Mexican food at a place called Samantha's, and we were talking about the blogs I read and some of the "characters" I follow. I can be quiet the callous author, you know. I understand intellectually that these people writing the blogs are sentient human beings, but I think I see them more as book characters. I'm always wanting them to further the plots of their lives, and I get quite frustrated when they don't.

There's one in particular whose entries can be extremely dull. She admits her life is going nowhere. She's depressed and sees little hope for improving her situation. And yet there's this spark--I feel that she could pull herself out of her funk, get her life together, and start writing some good stuff. I keep believing, but she has yet to deliver.

"She's your Tristram Shandy," Jeff observed. "You're so sure she's going to get to the point. I'm telling you: She'll never get to the point."

He's probably right. And he actually knew this person once upon a time, so he's not just basing his observation on stereotyping. I know that people who live in that perpetual fog don't find the way through the gloom more often than they do. But I have to believe that it's possible that this "character" will come out on top. Or at least, that she will find a way to go down in flames rather than sighs.

But we all shine on...

Jeff turned up something when searching for my engagement ring that, on first hearing, absolutely appalled me. Finding a diamond that was "cruelty free" was his number-one priority. He had filled me in on the evils of De Beers and the diamond industry in general--I'm ashamed I knew nothing about it at the time, but what the hell, I never expected a man to buy me a diamond.

So in his search for high-quality, lab-created diamonds, he turned up this: www.lifegem.com. I found this idea of making diamonds from your loved one's carbon remains to be repellent at best. But when he told Fiona about it much later, she was electrified by the idea: "I want to be a diamond!"

Now, Fiona's an old soul. If there's any such thing as reincarnation, she's lived, and therefore died, many times. It's clear from the mistakes I've made, however, that this is my first time around. And I've already lost my fair share of loved ones, so it was natural for me to be thinking from the point of view of the survivor and not the deceased. I did not want to wear Mom. It never once occurred to me what it would be like to be the diamond myself.

Then the other night Jeff and I were talking about how becoming a diamond could be problematic for those whose religions insist that the body will be taken up to heaven by Jesus on Judgment Day. And then the image struck us both at once--billions of glittering diamonds ascending to heaven in tremendous clouds and columns of twinkling lights. It made me wish for heaven when I don't believe.

I want to be a diamond.

Sending out an SOS

This is serious. I have procrastinated long enough on writing the story covering the annual meeting. It must get done today, or Edie will have my head, and I will be the biggest hypocrite on the face of the planet.

I don't know why I assign myself stories at all anymore. I always put them off until after what any reasonable person would call the last moment, leaving Edie in a bind, pursing her lips to keep herself from saying something tart to me because I do, after all, sign her timesheets and approve her days off. I'm taking unfair advantage of the system.

So how do I fight this kind of writer's block? This is just a straight story on what went on in Philly--I could even phone it in and copy and paste some standard language I used in last year's story. But there's a part of me that wants to take pride in even the most mundane hack writing I have to do, so I'm mentally pacing back and forth trying to think of ways to make this piece sparkle.

Any writers out there who can give me a clue how you handle this? Are you able to let go when you're not feeling inspired and just write--pound it out, make sure it's factually and grammatically correct, and then send it out into the world to fend for itself?

Who let the atheists in?

Fiona and I spent our evening at a talent show at a Baptist church. A friend of Fiona's from the school orchestra had begged her to play with her because she didn't want to play alone, so we found ourselves at a Baptist church in Howard County, wondering if our godlessness radiated from us like the fires of hell itself. We dressed primly and smiled as sweetly as we could.

We wound up having a wonderful time. These were really nice people. Granted, there wasn't a minority in the bunch, but they were mighty nice folks all the same. They were relaxed and friendly, and I have to say, they seemed full of the spirit they believed in. The talents acts were young, old, silly, impressive, or simply just for fun. The pastor played hymns on his harmonica. It didn't suck. A group of teenagers played Christian rock, and they were excellent. They didn't have a singer, so the "Christianness" of the song was blessedly lost. An old guy with a cane, so frail that his sons had to help him up on the stage, told jokes.

These people weren't self-conscious--they were fun. At one point when Fiona and her friend were playing their instruments and got lost, stopping, blushing, a woman behind me cried out, "That's okay! Keep going--you sound great!" and everyone applauded. I could have kissed her.

One lovely woman was telling me all about the church and how kind and friendly everyone there was, and she rounded it off by saying, "And we really love the Lord here." I had no idea what to say in return. What do you say? "I'm sure he loves you, too"? "You can't have Him, He's mine"? I think I muttered something inane like, "Good for you." I hope she didn't hear me.

Of course, we didn't tell them we were atheists. Besides the fact that Fiona and I both don't like to discuss religion, we didn't want to stop the show and have them all rush over to us to lay on the hands and try to save us. Seriously, we're not in any danger. And I question the usefulness of a lord who keeps getting lost so that his followers must continually hunt him down.

But religion or not, we had a great time. And I can't describe how refreshing it was to be in a place where everyone was friends with everyone else, and where no one cared if the acts were actually talented or not--they just wanted to celebrate their community. Kids around here are pushed and pushed until they're all tiny prodigies or commit early suicide, but at this particular church, they were just encouraged to have fun.

Buying a car

I had a feeling when Jeff woke up Monday morning that we would be buying a car that day. His trusty Saturn let him down Sunday when he was running late for a gig, and that was the last straw for the hapless vehicle. When I casually mentioned Monday morning that Labor Day was a good time to buy a car (what was I thinking?), Jeff's eyes lit up.

He ran outside and immediately began cleaning out the Saturn.

Should I be offended that it took him six weeks to decide to date me and dog knows how long to ask me to marry him from the moment the idea first flitted across his mind, but a simple "They have good deals on Labor Day" was all it took to get him to sign over big bucks for five years?

Jeff is a slow decision maker. Which makes me think that though he talked about seeing this relationship with the Saturn through to the bitter end, he'd already been eyeing other cars.

Fiona, of course, was totally psyched. She asked for a Rolls at first but seemed content enough to accompany us instead to the Toyota dealership. She was excited to sit in all the cars and ride around as Jeff and I drove several, taking in the new car smell and making faces at our driving skills. For the first hour or two, she was in heaven.

I remember loving car shopping, too, when I was a kid, but I have a feeling the process was a little simpler back then. We were a VW family, and the dealership sold only VWs. And I have no recollection of the actual purchasing process, so it can't have been the hours-long, paper-signing ordeal that we all went through Monday. Fiona patiently tried to entertain herself while we waited and signed, waited and signed.

Part of the agony of the process is, for me, the time that it takes. This time becomes longer each time I buy a car. Monday's excursion lasted about five hours--at one dealership only. Of course, we had to drive three different cars. And we had to listen to why each of them was an excellent choice for us. Each car was the best damn car ever made. Then we had to listen to the warranty manager tell us that the car we picked just might be the worst car ever made and how we'd better get all kinds of treatments and warranties and roadside assistance because that piece of shit was bound to break down, so we'd better cover our butts. We patiently withstood the subtle sneer when we refused this posterior protection and the warranty manager wrote on our application "No Adds." It might as well have been "Communists." "Kitty Torturers." "Fucking Cheapskates."

But now it's all over, and Jeff has a well-deserved, shiny red Toyota Corolla. And I'm a teeny bit jealous. I replaced my car in January and liked being the one with the pretty new car. Now it's passe, and I'm just a schlub in an 8-month-old Subaru.

I'm not going to draw any analogies between the way Jeff car shops and the way he shops for women. His woman-shopping days, after all, are over. But I wonder where I went wrong. Was my salesmanship sub-par? Was my lifetime warranty somehow insufficient? I don't know--perhaps he examined the report of past incidents.

Scapegoats

I've been doing some thinking about the excuses we make for not having what we want. I remember a woman I worked with years ago who drove me absolutely nuts--she was loud, rude, insensitive, and she even smelled a little. Occasionally she would complain that our company was full of anti-Semites because no one liked her there. I wanted to scream at the top of voice that being Jewish had nothing to do with the fact that she was unpopular, but that being a raging, whiny bitch had everything to do with it.

It was easier for her to blame it on something intrinsic about her that she couldn't change--even better that she chose something she could take some ethnic pride in. That intensified the injustice in her mind, I believe. It was easier because to address the real cause of everyone's dislike would be too personal, too painful, and too damn difficult. It would mean taking a hard look inside her soul and cleaning out all the gunk--the narrow-mindedness, the bitterness, the insecurity, the pettiness.

I used to think that no one would love a fat girl. I was certain of it, and it was for the very good reason that this message is drilled into the head of every American girl from at least the age of 10. And my personal experiences seemed to back it up. No boy ever looked at me until I lost the weight. I've never been thin, but I became slender enough to attract the attention of the average male adolescent.

And here's where my theory fell all to pieces: I was attracting the AVERAGE male. The kind of guy who was too insecure to take a chance on a girl his friends might laugh at him for dating; the kind who wasn't terribly interested in what I was interested in but who needed someone moderately attractive on his arm at parties. I dated some nice guys; I dated some nearly evil guys; I dated some losers.

What I needed, and was too stupid to understand, was a guy who could embrace my weirdness and silliness at the same time he could embrace a body that would go up and down in weight, attractiveness, and fitness. Someone who wouldn't run screaming if he knew the Real Me, whoever that was.

I never found it until I totally gave up trying. After a scary first marriage and a couple of years or therapy to untangle all the knots I'd tied in my head--or at least most of them--I was finally okay with who I was and too old and tired to have any time for someone who didn't like that. If I was going to put any effort into a relationship, that man was going to have to be worth my time. To put it simply, I set my standards impossibly high.

But it wasn't impossible. Surprise of surprises, I found it. There was someone out there who didn't see an older, dumpy suburban mom, but rather an intelligent, creative, sensual woman who could make him happy. (And yes, it is hard for me to describe myself that way, but I'm trying to see myself through his eyes.)

I didn't need a scapegoat. I didn't need weight or ethnicity or any number of other intrinsic qualities to explain why I hadn't found love. To find love, I had to make myself lovable. And to do that, I had to strip away all the pretenses, excuses, defenses, and prevarications that had always held me back. Jeff wouldn't, couldn't, have loved the girl who blamed her lack of romantic luck on her weight. But he could love the girl who decided, "Fuck 'em if they don't love this. This is lovable."

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right

Here I am, stuck in the middle. Alone. Utterly alone.

No, I'm not being melodramatic. I put Steeler's Wheel and Beetlejuice together in a blender, and that's what came out. It has been an awful day. I'm stuck between my boss and his perception of a deal we made, and the employee with whom we struck the deal. And now both of them are questioning the deal and each other's honor, and I'm left questioning my sanity. And clutching a bag of bagels that I brought for the employee's goodbye breakfast--all for naught, because she was too upset to show up on her last day.

I remember when I wasn't a boss and sat at my desk amid piles of work to do, wondering why the hell bosses get paid so much money while the rest of us actually produce something. What makes them worth so much more than us grunts?

Well, now I know. I'm not one bit more valuable than anyone on my staff, but I am constantly confronted with decisions to make, fires to put out, and people whose emotions get the better of them. I love being the one who makes things happen, but I know it must look like I'm just filing my nails while I count my cash.

Okay, this blog isn't meant to be just about work life. It's not the most important thing to me at all. But Jeff, my Nearly Perfect Husband, can testify to the fact that I've had so many fires to put out at work lately that I can't seem to stop trying to put out phantom fires at home. I get into hyper-problem-solving UberBoss mode at the drop of a hat--if the trash needs taking out, I spring into action, bagging the trash and formulating a plan about how we can develop a better trash-hauling procedure or, better yet, eliminate trash altogether by implementing a five-year plan.

So UberBoss is on her way home now and worrying about how she can be a sex kitten. Okay, sex cat. She hasn't been a kitten in a long time. So on her commute, she will try to formulate a plan for making herself look cute, relaxing, and rocking his world. But I fear the UberBoss would not go quietly if you plied her with a pitcher of margaritas, an angry massage therapist, and a chorus line of Johnny Depp look-alikes singing her praises.

Why I Work

Well, obviously, it's because I prefer eating to starving. I have a perfectly round shape that I need to maintain, and regular meals and mouth-watering sweets don't come cheap. I've often wondered if I'm a big fat coward, hiding out here in the non-profit world, disguising myself as an executive who lives for her work. Don't get me wrong: If I have to work a 9-to-5 job, this is the way to do it. They're great to me here, I love my coworkers, and I'm well paid to do work that I find enjoyable. I just never thought when I graduated that I'd be doing the corporate grind 20-odd years later.

What did I think? I planned to be a world-famous novelist and host Saturday Night Live by the time I was 26. I would list Monty Python as one of my biggest influences, and that was going to mean something to someone. But now I'm not even sure I care if I'm published--although I care very much if I write--and when I mention Monty Python, I generally get blank stares. Needless to say, I have not received the call from Lorne Michaels.

Somehow, I've managed to stumble into a lovely life, despite all my attempts to sabotage myself. After a disastrous first marriage, an attitude toward work that some call unconventional and others simply call lazy, and a rather seat-of-my-pants approach to parenting, I've landed in a beautiful place. I think I might just be the luckiest girl in...my zip code, definitely.

And quite frankly, the money comes in handy. Little girls like mine sure know how to drain a bank account, and she's not even financially spoiled.

Have I sold out? I guess so. But life is good, so I suppose I won't apologize.