Freebie List

Long before Friends, Monica, Chandler, Ross, Rachel, Joey and Phoebe, had a celebrity "freebie list", my grandparents had one.   A freebie list is a set of people who you are allowed to cheat on your spouse with, should they come to the door of your house for you.  The other spouse would have to stay behind, knowing it was a "once in a lifetime opportunity" for the other.  Yes, my Methodist grandparents.  Both have been gone for a long while now, as well as the celebrities.  On the long running sitcom Friends, the list was 5 celebrities, but for my grandparents, they only got one:  Rita Hayworth for my grandpa and Gregory Peck for my grandma.

This is how I imagine the scenario playing out.  My grandparents would be sitting by a fan in the house, on a hot Central Californian day, playing bridge, or rather a 2 person card game, and drinking water, while my dad and uncle were out in the street riding bikes.  A black car would pull into the drive, and either Rita or Greg would ring the bell.  My grandma would make a cute surprise noise, and my grandpa would get the door.  Depending on the whoever it was, the grandparent in question would quietly go to the bedroom and fill a suitcase, and without a word, leave in the black car for Hollywood.  As if a switch had gone off in his or her head, like in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (it is the 50's in my imagination, so I'm sticking to the theme).

There are a lot of holes in this plan beyond the morality of it.  I'm positive my grandparents told their children this quirky plan, to reassure them that they never would leave one another (as well as just kidding around, they were funny folks). They said it to confirm their love for one another until death parted them.  What are the chances of the most famous movie actors of the day coming to the front door?  Imagine George Clooney coming to your house, right?  What are the chances?

Inadvertently, the legacy that my grandparents left us was probably different than their intention.  For my father, it left him with worry as a child:  what if those famous people just do happen by our house in Merced California?  It is something a kid could worry about.  For me it left me with a huge crush on Gregory Peck!

good husband/bad man Part II

Last week Silas had an endoscopy.  The doctor and nurses sedated him to see why his stomach has been giving him trouble.  I was his ride home, so after the procedure I found him in the recovery room.  He was behind a curtain with a young nurse (younger than me) on a cot, laying on his side.  The pretty nurse told me he was very sleepy, and very chatty, then she smiled at me, sweetly sideways.  This is the part of the story where my concern for his condition turned to curiosity.

The nurse told me every time they tried to wake him, he would groggily look at them and say, "You're not pretty enough to be my wife!".  He would fall back into his dopey sleep, and they would try to wake him again, and he would say the same thing.  Had he thought that it was going to be me waking him up each time?  The nurses giggled, and were not offended.

I shook him awake, and he looked at me and smiled.  He was dopey!  He was telling the nurse how he might invent a program for her computer to make it work better, just before she stepped out of the curtain.  I told him what he had said to the nurses, and he was embarrassed a bit, so he said loudly, through the curtain, "you are pretty enough to be my wife".  I could hear her giggling behind the curtain.

I learned two things about what my husband is actually thinking, without his filter.  The first is that he is a pretty big nerd.  He holds back a lot of technical details and geeky computer inventions (my 5th grade son also has this trait).  I'm grateful for his nerd-i-ness, as it puts food on the table, and he is well rounded and social.  I'm also grateful I'm not responsible for all those details in his head.

The second thing I learned, was really just a reminder.  Silas thinks I am the most beautiful person he knows.  Compared to the other women in the doctor's office, if I were comparing objectively, which is a terrible thing to do,  there was no winner.  I might be the winner, in that I was not in hospital scrubs, but my 'mom uniform', which might be a 6 out of 10 rather than a 5.

How Silas views Tyson

What I actually look like.

Every girl wants her husband to think she is the prettiest girl in the room, and mine does.  The flip side, which is the 'bad man' part, is it could mean that he thinks you aren't as pretty as I am.  I don't think the two are mutually exclusive.   I think the real danger is if I thought I was prettier than you, and I don't.  I don't even care what you look like, I like you anyway.  I think Silas doesn't actually care what I look like either, because I can be an ugly person, he loves me despite myself.  Our time together has helped him love me: body, mind and spirit, and I reciprocate.

Teacher Credentialing, Huh?

i recieves this here letter froms the State of california credenttialling dept. Todays. I sended the monies in just like they said, $51 for the prosess of. 

I realize that I'm not the authority on spelling or grammar, but c'mon!!  I'm worn a bit thin, as they would say to send in $51 in black and white, then the next day send me such a poorly written email.  I wonder what state the author of this letter went to school in?

The letter asks me what I think, and I think if you are writing to teachers and prospective teachers, write more gooder.
also....

 $55-$51=$4

Maybe I'm thinking too much.

date Thu, Feb 17, 2011 at 11:19 AM subject Re: Credential application

11:19 AM (17 minutes ago)

Hi Tyson,

The Commission receives your application packet and a check $51.00 again.    It is insufficient fee. The current application fee is $55.00.  You may send me an additional amount $5.00 to my attention as I am holding your stuffs.  Let me know what you think.

J T

Cashiering Unit

Certification, Assignment and Waiver Division

Commission on Teacher Credentialing

good husband/bad man

I've named this blog for my husband, and have quite a bit to say on the subject of his goodness and badness. I've so much to say it may be the start of a series, or chapters.  First, some disclaimers:  I have been married to this bad good husband since 1995, and despite himself, I'm in love with him, no matter what.  I'm in love with him more now than ever and have been married to him all of my adult life, and a bit of my childhood (who's an adult at 19?).  I won't be bashing him. 

On with the story......

 

 Last summer we traveled to the Czech Republic with friends.  While touring Prague, Silas, the spouse in the spotlight, bought me a yellow rose at a market while we waited for everyone to buy souvenirs.  From the market, we took public transportation to the Little Eiffel Tower to look out over the entire city.  Walking through a garden to the tower, I dropped my rose.  We noticed just in time to see a school aged girl find the rose on the ground, and pick it up with obvious delight.

I noticed the girl's face the same moment as Silas was bounding like Tigger back down the path towards her.  I saw him squat down and talk to the girl for a moment, then she gave him the rose.  As he ran like a school boy back towards the group, my friend leaned in and said, "Silas, he is a good husband, but a bad man".  This is exactly what I was feeling as well.  What a sweet guy to go get the rose, what a jerk for taking a rose from a little girl.  The passing comment of a friend, summed up Silas, I just never thought of it so clearly.  Silas loves me, despite all others.  This is a very attractive attribute from my perspective, and only sometimes mildly embarrassing, and usually not.

After some awkward moments walking, I told him  I would rather it would be alright to let the girl keep the rose, and I'll keep the memory of his kindness: getting me a rose, giving it to a pretty little girl.  As we entered the tower he did give the rose back to the girl.  I'm sure she will always remember a stranger giving her a rose (her mom was there too).  The girl was all smiles as we headed up the stairs of the tower.

Small Library

Any free moment that our boy has you can find him reading. He has out-read his dad and me in the 6 years he has been riffing quickly through the pages of the Youth Fiction section at the library. Some moms take extra time to make sure their son reads enough, I sometimes offer a computer game or cartoon up to our boy.

This month I realized that most of the books that are appropriate for him (and some not), he has read. The only series I could find that he has not read was Anne of Green Gables, which I don't know if I can get him to read (though he will love it once he starts, the feisty heroin might remind him of his momma!).

He is 10, and on the precipice of being able to read more edgy things, and by edgy I mean Jack London. I was a bad mom and let him read "Call of the Wild" when he was eight, or so, and it ended in tears and sadness for his young, sweet, heart.

On that note, last week he decided to do a biography on his current hero, Brian Jacques, for school. He wrote the Redwall series, which pits good against evil in the form of rodents. It is perfect for my kid. He learned that Jacques had visited our local book store, and was daydreaming about getting to meet him (he is a kid and didn't realize that Jacques is from England, thousands of miles away). He went on and on about it, just last week.

Monday I had to tell him the sad news, that over the weekend, Brian Jacques died suddenly. I told him, and he cried, and hugged his dad. We talked about how lucky we were to have been able to know a part of Jacques, through his writing.

My boy is on the cusp of the world opening up to him. He will learn about the vastness of our world, and the suffering in it, because he is a reader. I am loving my boy for his innocence while he still has it, and am excited for all the conversations I can have with him, about great ideas, far away places, history, science, and religion as he grows. Now that nearly all the books in the Junior section have been read, soon he can climb the stairs and start in on the Science Fiction, Mysteries, Biographies and Novels.

I Want My Gym TV

Beware:  The next few paragraphs contain some grumbling.  Be warned.

I joined the gym this winter to exercise despite wind, rain, snow, cold, sleet or otherwise.  At my gym, and any other gym anywhere, there are televisions bolted to the ceiling and turned on.  I would guess there are about seven or more where I go.  There is some magic to getting the individual sound from each one to your ears, but I haven't figured that out yet.

I have not had television for almost 8 years. I don't watch sports, talk shows, reality TV, commercials, documentaries, promos, or news.  I do watch 30 Rock and Battlestar Galactica, streaming on my computer.  Television is not something that will keep my attention for the 4th or 5th mile on the treadmill (music will).  I do, however watch/observe it.  Here are my observations about television:

• There are cloning devices or CGI used on 24 hour news networks.  Men, mostly, all look the same: 45-65 years old, white, greying hair, square black glasses, 15+ pounds overweight, blazer, and rosy cheeks(they look worked-up about something important).  This is particularly spooky when at church, you see several men in the same uniform.  This maybe because there are only dark, square glasses available from the optometrist, and if you are that age, you need specs.
• There are only four or five 'newsworthy' stories everyday, run by all the news channels, concurrently.
• If you are trying to watch a match of the Australian Open while running and zoning out to music, the television to the right and left are probably playing a recap of that same match.  You can not watch the match usually because you don't have a television, and Australia is already well into tomorrow, so you can't watch it live, giving away the ending of the match you are watching blow-by-blow, simultaneously.
• There is always an older man, who will change the seventh and final television to a 24 hour cable news channel, so that all of them are cable news.

I'll admit that my avoidance of mass media is purposeful.  At the gym, I am like a child watching TV for the first time, I can not look away.  I can't hear what the TV is saying, and I believe my ignorance about television may skew my observations.

29 Hours to Minnesota

Last week I drove from Northern California to St. Paul, Minnesota with a friend who is moving.  I now am somewhat of an aficionado of Minnesota in January compared to most of the people in my neighborhood.  After nearly 48 hours in the state, and the coldest weather they have had in several years, I feel accomplished.

When I left my house, it was 60 degrees, and forgot my husband's coat in the closet.  Why would I think of grabbing it on the way out?  I'm not much of a detail person, and also not much of a coat person.  Coats make me feel like someone is choking me, which is why I suffer while skiing.

Fortunately, while traveling along I-80, there are several (~27) discount shops for outdoor supplies.  Also, all winter clothes are on sale.  If you do not yet have a coat in Wyoming, Utah, Nebraska, Iowa or Minnesota this year, you are probably a popsicle, and someone will find you during the spring thaw.

In the end, we drove for three days and made it to the 'Land of a Thousand Lakes', where the state drink is milk, and the state muffin is blueberry.  Here is my trip log in bad cell phone photos:

It starts to snow in, Evanston, WY for 20 minutes! No coat.

It is sunny and COLD in Nebraska.  Still no coat.

I purchase a coat in Cheyenne, deeply discounted, of course.

Minnesota is essentially tundra.  -22 without windchill.

Inga scrapes ice from the INSIDE of the windows.  

I am happy to live where there are 4 seasons which are moderately moderate!  I'm also happy to be home!

Facebook Vacillation

I vacillate between hot and cold on Facebook.  Sometimes I love it, sometimes I hate it, sometimes I am addicted to it, and sometimes I'm ambivalent.

Here are some of the reasons I'm cold:

Photos of food.  There are some great sites out there to look at photos of food, really yummy looking food. I am sure that your food is yummy, but it looks kinda bad unless you are a bang-up photographer.

357 photos of your trip to the beach.  You are only in 2, and those are fuzzy.  I love photos and photos of people doing fun things, but I can't really look at the virtual 7 rolls of bad photos you took.

Being someone who you are not, on FB.

Being who you are on FB.  Be a better person than you really are, on FB.  I don't mean fudge, I mean put your best foot forward.  Don't be mean or even sarcastic, it doesn't translate.

Folks who over share angry opinions.  If you are angry about your opinion, it isn't valid for me.

The mundane. Some people share EVERYTHING on FB. Enough said!

Letting everyone know where you are and how long you will be there, or posting, "looks like you are at 123 Main St all week!! LOL".  We are not totally in control of who sees our posts. I'm not "checking in".

The reasons I'm hot (besides my appearance):

I can connect to media that I might not find on my own because I only look a the stuff I look at online.  If someone posts something interesting, I can learn something new, or at least smile!

I can continue community with people I don't live near or see often.

I can play Scrabble on FB.

I can celebrate life events that folks share on FB.

I can mourn life events that folks share on FB.

I can play Scrabble on FB.

I can remember/celebrate important events with family and friends.

January Summer Read: An Update

I gave up.  I had aspired to reading a long book during the winter months.  I just gave up.  I blogged about already here if you are tracking what a failure I am.

There are several reasons, the main one: It was too hard.  I am a smart-ish-type person, or I think of myself that way.  This book was not too hard to read, though it was rather wordy, and there was jargon in it that made it slow going.  It's a drag if you are already fighting dyslexic reading. Slow becomes tedious.

This winter has also been very cold for these parts.  I know you live where it is colder, and yet, I am cold.  This book took place 400 years ago, in England, in the winter.  Not only the dark ages, but a cold season.  Page after page was about the dank, dark, frigid conditions of the setting.

I got 50 pages into 700 and took a pause.  My grandmother told me that I had to give every book at least 50 pages before I decided to put it down.  In her honor, I think about every book I read at about page fifty.  Is this book a good book?  Do I want to read this?  Has the story even started yet?  Catch 22, I've tried it twice, but can't do it!   I decided, I'm too cold to read the book I'm reading now, which is another way of saying, I don't feel like reading it.

I went to the library and got a 200 page book that said, "A great summer read.-People Magazine" splashed on the cover.  The book is white, and has bright colors on it.  The language is about fourth grade reading level, the subject is light, modern, and takes place in the summer.  My toes are warmer already, though it may be the slippers, socks, blankets, sweats and hoodie I'm wearing.

I'll try the other again in July.

Let the Mall Fall Down

I feel like an alien at the mall.  I have been to a mall only a few dozen times in my life.  Every time I am there I don't know what to do.   It is like the first day at a new school, or in a new country, when you are not exactly sure where to put your bag, where the restroom is, or what to say to seem like you are supposed to be there.

This is how I find myself at the mall.  Do I talk to the overly friendly ladies at the kiosks in the middle of each hall?  Are those kiosks like mall-telemarketers?  Do I look people passing in the eye?  Do I keep to the right of the isles?

I'm not good at buying things that are fashionable or being in public with strangers.  It really doesn't matter as I don't live near a mall but still  I am riddled with insecurities when I rarely find myself there.  It is these very things that drove me to the customer restroom at the back of the Gap, in the mall several towns away.  It wasn't even the real mall restroom, it was the one for ladies who have been trying on the Gap jeans, behind the changing rooms.  The restroom is my trick.  If you are at a party or crowd with me, I will dash for the restroom just to get a grip (the life of a true introvert).

I'll back up.  I wouldn't have been at the mall, except that some people i like asked me to come with them for a flash mob singing of the Hallelujah Chorus.  I had received a few emails, and figured that type of thing wasn't for me.  It turns out, that if your friends call you, it is your type of thing.  We even had sushi, which means I was, for the most part, totally in!  I guess everyone else in Norther California also got the invite to the mall to 'secretly' sing the Hallelujah Chorus.  I love music, I love my friends, I love sushi, but I hate the mall.

It came as no surprise to me that we were all evacuated from the mall that night, as several thousand folks intending to sing, compromised the structural integrity of the mega-building.

As a person who is unfamiliar with malls, nothing happening there is a novelty.  The whole place is a novelty.  While I was in the bathroom, hiding from the "mob" portion of the flash mob, there was a  loud speaker announcement that we needed to evacuate.

I'm not a fool.  If someone tells me to evacuate, I do.  I wanna be the first person to evacuate.  I even knew where the exits were, as the crowd grew, so did my anxiety.  The voice over the speakers didn't say why we were participating in a mass exodus, rather than singing a Christmas song, but I left.  I left out a different door than the other 6 thousand folks there.  I left before all the trendies could finish purchasing their fancy jeans.  I left before a fire could burn the whole joint down (which was a problem, as the mall nearly burned all down 6 weeks prior, still not strange to the alien-who-is-me).

I participated in pandemonium.  There were folks in their cars for hours waiting to leave the mall exits.  A mall should be able to hold a person (or two) for every parking space.  My dad, who was a county planner, explained the parking lot is extra-too-big, so that when you drive by, you think the mall is not crowed, and pull in.  It turns out if every space is full, all those people will break the mall.

The Hallelujah part of the evening was who I was with, my friends, which didn't change because things didn't go as planned, and I survived a flash mob.

Van Gogh & Vivian Maier

This is simply beautiful. Even with the attention span of a kid raised on Sesame Street, I couldn't stop myself from watching this.

Drunk Oven

My oven in our rental didn't work until our landlord bought a new one a few days before Christmas. Before this, I would stand at the oven, while it was hot, reading the portable thermometer I bought at the grocery. When the temperature was too high, I would open the door until it cooled slightly, then shut the door until it was again too hot, repeating step one.

 Baking cookies this is a reasonable thing to do, standing in the kitchen opening and shutting the oven door for 15 minutes. Imagine this if I was baking a pie, a roast, or bread. I took the pressure off myself to cook from scratch this holiday season. I didn't want to feel neurotic with the oven door in my hand for 1 hour and 15 minutes, while the temperature hovered around 425 degrees: open, close, open, close, abierto, cerado, abierto, cerado....

I am grateful to such a landlord who would fix the problem. I'm used to problems being mine, and it was refreshing not to have to shoulder the responsibly for something that was not mine!

One aspect of the experience that was not refreshing was the odor of the installers who came to my door. They called because they were late. I was fine with their tardiness at that point, it was snowy out, it was lunchtime.   When they came to the door I realized I have been too understanding. Their smell told me they were not eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and a juice box for lunch, or that they were late because it is hard to drive in the snow. Their stink was unmistakably alcohol.

I pause at the door before letting in the older worker. Do I let this man into my house to work with electrical outlets and wiring? Does this smell necessarily mean he is currently inebriated, or is it the stench from last night? I decided it was the former, and let them in anyway. I then went for a walk, while my husband stayed home to 'supervise'.

When I arrived home, the new oven was working, and I imagined all the pizza I could bake, cookies I could bring to parties, and fresh bread smells wafting through the house. I didn't feel sorry for two grown men who drink enough to smell like it by lunchtime, I didn't worry if they installed the oven wrong. I simply was glad the oven worked, and if it didn't, it wasn't my problem.  This maybe foolhardy, but after 2 weeks, nothing has exploded.

Twenty-ten

I had been writing a reflection for the year 2010, but this sums up nicely, without me having to type anything!  I got hooked on these folks in the Spring, they say it for me.



Also thanks to my kids, husband, franks, helmuths, music, pratts, siblings, outlaws, czechs and friends for making it  rich & worth it.

Bad Mom

During most of December my family has had the flu.  I have not had the flu, and I could say that it was my superior immune system, but I got a flu shot, and it worked.  The flu takes ages to recover from, it is hard to breathe, you can't sleep, you have low energy, and food tastes funny.  I wondered why the very cute packages of chocolate from the advent calendar were piling up on the counter in the kitchen.  I finally put them in a dish, one for each child.  They weren't too sick to open the little doors, but they weren't in the mood to eat the candy!  Could a kid ever be too sick for one piece of chocolate a day?  Could two children be that sick at the same time?
As the mother of these people who are not eating their sweets, what am I supposed to do?  I was thinking I would tell them that they had to eat them, as if they were lima beans.  As soon as they are done with the Halloween candy, I'll make them eat the Christmas candy, in time for Easter.

Bear Prints for Jim

The world is full of mysteries, some are more mysterious than others.  Animal prints aren't very mysterious or miraculous, and yet, they are a sign that something was there and now it isn't.    I was reminded of this, looking at these photos, and wondered why I would even be moved in the moment to take them:  They catch my eye, like a magic trick.  The animal is gone (in the case of the bear, not far ahead of me) and while I'm looking down, the creature is pulling away from me.

Camel print in Sinai Desert, Egypt

Black bear print, Malakoff Diggins SP,  California

Yesterday a man traveled ahead who has left as many tracks as a man can.  Tracks of Peace, and Love, Compassion and Grace.  As I look down to marvel at what he left, he is pulling ahead of me, just over the horizon.  I know he is there, I just can't see him yet.  I hope to follow.

I'm not the Only One

It seems I'm not the only one who has been thinking about the quality of Christmas music.
Here is an article from NPR:

Annoying Songs for Christmas

Smoochin' Santa

Christmas provides people who love music, hours of festive listening and music making.  It also provides us agonizing listening experiences in long grocery lines.  For every inspiring, sensational Christmas song that echos through concert halls across the world this season, there are also those unfortunate tunes that litter the easy-listening radio tracks.


It is one of the latter tunes that was confusing to me as a young person, and by young, I mean until I was 33, which was last year.  


There is something virtuous and enchanting about Christmas (besides the commercialism, and pregnant-virgin-teen), so I was righteously upset by "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus". Did someone in the 1950's think that it was okay to spin the story of Santa: twinkly eyed, bowl full of jelly, tarnished with soot?  


How could it be that Santa would be cheating on Mrs. Claus with the singer's mother?  The thought frightened and shocked me!  Would Santa really come to a kid's house, with toys and Christmas cheer, while the reindeer waited on the roof-top, prancing and pawning their hoofs, and kiss someone else's wife?  Besides the song just being bad, to me, it was unethical, and messes up Christmas.


I've come to my senses, the song is still terrible, but in a moment of clarity last year, I figured out why this song is even allowed to be a Christmas song.   Mommy is kissing Santa, because Santa is really the dad, dressed up as Santa!  AH-HA!!!  I have been known for thinking outside the box, but I missed the point of this song for three decades.


There is still so many things wrong with it, the main one being, that if you are a smart kid, or smarter than me, you could tell there is no such thing as Santa just from this song, but I've come to realize that it is not unethical.  I still think it should be banned for the sake of believing, smart, children everywhere.

Baby Sitter

Addi, Emma, & Baby 

This is my sister, and my dog.  The dog loves my sister more than anyone in the whole world.  The dog is small, noisy, and weird, but for some reason she has the personality of a real dog, which I like! I guess she wanted to be right in the middle of the action, or wanted to sit on the baby's lap?

Christmas in the Trenches

Merry Christmas

Magazine Aspirations

Thursday I found a book in the mystery section at the library which was recommended to me.  Usually if a book is recommendable, it is also checked out and I have to wait in line for it.   It was sitting on the shelf waiting for me to pick it up, and check it out.

I recently read the top 100 books the BBC thinks are the best loved books.  I have read 65 of them, which to me, seem a lot!  I have read hundreds of books in my life, simply for the joy of a good story.  The book I picked up, however, I am not sure if I can read.  The book is An Instance of the Fingerpost.

As I was checking the book out, I told the librarian, that lately I've had magazine aspirations in regards to reading.  This book might be 80 magazines long!  With the hustle of life, kids to raise, parties to go to, cards to send out, gifts to buy, trips to plan, cookies to bring, socks to match, and detail upon detail to tend to, a 685 page book might not be in my near future.  If I renew the book, I can only have it 6 weeks!  That is NEXT year.

There was a time when I could read without interruption, for years.  Now I can not.  I am having to let my love of reading sit up on the shelf for a while.  Someday my kids will move away, and I won't have so much to do,  and I'll read all the long books I didn't get to read in my 30's, and miss my skinny, soft-faced, school aged children.

I'm going to try to read the book anyway, it has got to be better than a magazine, or even 80 of them.  All I have to do it stop blogging and heft the book into my lap, easy, right?