Showering with Stinkbugs

After a winter that dragged on way longer than any of us wanted, today held conclusive evidence that spring is finally here. The trees are full of green, the sun is higher in the sky, and smells of lilac and freshly cut grass abound.

Unfortunately, there are also other less endearing signs that spring has arrived: an abundance of insects show up too. This morning alone, I saw three spiders, and my dog Bailey has been biting at flies all week. I even saw a wooly bear caterpillar in the driveway the other day.

While I understand that bugs have their purpose, I prefer that they experience that purpose somewhere that’s far away from me.

I work with a woman who will pick up and relocate the spiders that we find in our office. I can’t believe that she does this. I tease that she gives them tea and cookies and fluffs their little spider pillows. She even does this with those extra-macho wolf spiders that make me hyperventilate just thinking about them.

She is not at all like me. If I encounter a spider, I will scream like a little girl, and then try my best to convince someone else to kill it for me. If there’s no one around, I’ll do the deed myself just so I know that it won’t jump out later and surprise me, as spiders love to do. Of course, I then spend the rest of the day shuddering over my eight-legged encounter.

This morning, I was in the shower, shampooing, when I felt something hard and odd among the strands of my hair. Almost immediately, I smelled the tell-tale odor: it was a stinkbug. Even though I was minding my own business, I somehow had a nasty, awful stinkbug in my hair.

I grabbed the bug out of my soapy hair and flung it toward the floor of the shower, but because I can’t see anything without my glasses, I couldn’t actually see where it landed. I used the hand-held shower sprayer to hopefully flush the darn thing down the drain.

By this time, my hair, my body, and the entire bathroom reeked of stinkbug. I knew I’d have to rinse
my hair and re-shampoo it in order to remove the odor.

As I reapplied the shampoo, I heard a buzzing sound and then felt something hit my leg. Of course, I couldn’t actually see where it went because A) I still didn’t have my glasses on, and B) my eyes were full of water and shampoo. It didn’t take much to conclude that the stinkbug either didn’t go down the drain, or he’d brought along a friend. Neither scenario was appealing when all I wanted to do was wash-off the stink bug odor and finish my shower ALONE.

I quickly wiped my eyes and jumped out of the shower so that I could find the stinkbug. I grabbed my glasses, but the steam of the shower and the steady stream of water I’d neglected to turn off meant that I still couldn’t see anything.

Shampoo slid down my face and into my eyes. I took off my glasses and rinsed them. I felt around for the faucet and turned off the water as I grabbed a towel to wipe my eyes. I dried the lenses of my
glasses with the towel and was finally able to see the entire area of the shower.

That sneaky, smelly, no-good stinkbug was nowhere to be found.

Although I didn’t know where my nemesis had gone, I had to do something about the shampoo dripping from my head and hair that smelled like a stinkbug frat party. I took my glasses off and stepped back into the shower.

I rinsed the shampoo and grabbed the bottle of hair conditioner. As I attempted to open the bottle, I was horrified to discover that the stinkbug was sitting on top of the cap.

I threw the conditioner bottle onto the floor of the shower and immediately aimed the shower sprayer at it. I wasn’t about to let that stinkbug escape again. I turned the water on full force, desperate to wash that stupid bug and its stench down the drain for good.

After a few minutes, I felt confident that the stinkbug had gone to a better place – or at least wherever it is that dead bugs go - and continued with my shower.

I applied conditioner to my hair and tried to hang the hand-held shower sprayer back in place. I couldn’t really see what I was doing, but I felt around to put the sprayer into its holder. As if my shower hadn’t already been enough of an ordeal, the sprayer fell down and hit me squarely on the head.

Who knew that a shower could be so eventful? After this one, I’m not sure which I need more: pest control or laser eye surgery.

Driving Lessons: the Great Equalizer

We have a new driver in the house.   My son Matt is now the proud owner of a shiny new Pennsylvania driver's license.

He was certainly well-prepared.  After sixty-five hours of driving with a parent, thirty hours of classroom instruction, and six hours of behind-the-wheel training with a certified driving instructor, all of us were more than ready for Matt to be able to drive on his own.

I wish I could say that I had a part in this milestone, but I did not.  Having barely recovered from the tendency to grab the nearest solid object while teaching my son Ryan to drive, I knew better than to offer to teach Matt myself.  Besides, I birthed these boys; it's only fair that their father participate in something equally painful.

If you think about it, teaching a teenager to drive is kind of like childbirth: both are long, difficult, and potentially fatal.  The big difference is that when driving with a teenager, you can't just say, "Hey...I'd like that epidural now...with a side of Demerol while you're at it."  No, teen driver pain must be experienced while fully conscious if you hope to survive the driving lesson.

Getting my husband Dan on board with this idea required some planning, so I simply inserted, "Shouldn't you be out driving with Matt?" into every conversation:  "Hey, we need some milk.  Shouldn't you be out driving with Matt?"  "Happy birthday!  Shouldn't you be out driving with Matt?"

Over time, the brainwashing - I mean, gentle persuasion - worked, and the weekend ritual of Dan and Matt's marathon driving sessions began. 

Even though I did trick Dan into teaching Matt, he was a much better driving instructor than I could ever be.  He was patient and kind and never once screamed out loud, "You're going to kill us all!"  In retrospect, that phrase probably isn't particularly helpful when used with a young driver, but sometimes it's hard to hold in what you're really thinking.

While teaching Ryan to drive, Dan would often ask me how he was progressing.  My updates were typically something like this:

            "That kid drives way too fast.  He's going to kill himself and everyone on the road."

            "I think he needs his eyes examined; he has a hard time seeing stop signs."

            "Is there such a thing as nail remover?  Because I just left four fingernails in the armrest of the car."

            "I can't talk right now.  Just get me a margarita and maybe I can recover."

Dan was always much more positive about Matt's driving skills. Ever the optimist , he'd say, "My one leg is a bit pumped up from reaching for the brake, but all in all, he did really well."  That's kind of like saying, "Matt doesn't run over nearly as many people as he used to."

Now, after all of those months of Dan's patient instruction and guidance, Matt has officially become a licensed driver.  He can finally enjoy the privileges that come with operating a motor vehicle:  getting himself where he needs to be, and then picking up milk on the way home so I don't have to.

I hope that, like childbirth, Dan forgets the pain of teaching Matt.  I'm counting on him to be ready when it's time to teach Evan in three more years. 

 

Bailey gets her groom on

Bailey gets her groom on 

 

 

Does this look like a creature who cares about foofy beauty treatments?

 

Last week, I learned that the woman who’s been grooming my dogs for the past fourteen years is no longer able to groom Bailey.  Apparently decades of grooming dogs has taken a toll on her back, and she’s no longer able to lift dogs of Bailey’s size.

Of course this news comes at the time when I’ve finally managed to save up the $80 grooming fee and when Bailey’s coat is so overgrown she looks like a mutant chia pet.  Whenever she moves, a fine cloud of dog hair floats along behind her before finally merging into tumbleweeds of blonde fur upon hitting the floor.  This dog needs a haircut and she needs it now.

Like it or not, I need to find a new dog groomer. 

After googling “dog groomer” and reviewing websites, I made a few phone calls. The first two were no longer in business, the third was not able to receive messages (!!!), and the fourth, while farther from my home than I'd have preferred, seemed to be a suitable candidate. 

 

"Amber," the woman on the phone, sounded welcoming and knowledgeable as she reviewed rates and policies with me. 

I set up an appointment to have Bailey groomed in a few days.  Amber mentioned that they also have additional services available for purchase.

            “You can also get a relaxing mango facial," Amber offered. 

Hmm... my skin has been a mess lately and I could stand some relaxing.  A facial sounds nice. 

            "Your pet will enjoy the soothing, tropical scent.  Can I set one up for Bailey?”

Wait...they have facials for dogs?  Why would a dog need a facial?  Do they get stress acne like I do? 

            “No thank you,” I responded.  “I’ll just take the grooming appointment.”

            “But our customers love it and can't wait for their next one!” Amber was clearly sniffing too much doggy shampoo.

           “Um, I did mention that Bailey is a dog, right?”

 Amber was undettered in her enthusiasm. “We also have blueberry nail soaks…”

             “She likes to sniff crotches and lick her own butt.”

             “...which help to soften the nails and leave them fragrant.  Wouldn’t Bailey love that?”

             “I don't think Bailey cares much about fragrant nails.  She sniffs the cat’s butt, too.”

             "OK.  Well, how about a nice massage to melt those cares away?"

             "Now that's something I could really use!"

Amber giggled.  "I'm sorry.  At this time, our massages are only for our canine guests.  Shall I schedule one for Bailey?"

I looked down at Bailey, who was sitting expectantly at my feet, smiling her big goofy dog smile.  She's clearly happy just to be alive, and not bothered at all by acne, or stress, or non-blueberry-scented toenails.

            "Actually, we're good.  Bailey's good.  Just the haircut, please."

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to take my dog out for a walk in the field.  There are rodent holes to sniff and pee-mail to read.  These are the things that Bailey truly  loves. 

No spa treatment required.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cold Showers: They're not just for breakfast anymore

I was having a good week for a change. Thanks to some creative money-wrangling, I'd managed to keep the family alive and well during our monthly mortgage-imposed Two-Week Period of Impossible Austerity.

While the other weeks of the month are financially tough for us, those first two, when our mortgage is due, are especially difficult. Every dollar of our income for that time goes toward paying a mortgage that did not used to be oppressive but which has become, due to higher prices and diminished wages, a bank account-draining monster.

There's no such thing as buying food or gas or kids' shoes or toothpaste during that first half of the month. There simply isn't anything leftover. This week, though, finding ourselves on the other side of the mortgage payment, at least until next month, felt liberating.

I felt better mentally, too. I decided to accept that our current state of affairs was probably the new reality for us. After dealing with the financial fallout from the never-ending Great Recession for so many years without a break in sight, a future without struggle seems unlikely. For my own sanity, it makes sense to make peace with the struggle rather than continue to fling myself at an unmovable wall.

If life was going to be hard, it was going to be that way whether or not I moped or fret or railed on and on about the unfairness of it all. The outcome was beyond my control, so why continue to worry about it?

I thought of my daily To-Do List as I turned on the shower in preparation of the day ahead. Everyone else had already left for work or school so the shower was finally mine.

As I stood under the water, I noticed that it just didn't seem to be warming up. In fact, the longer I stood there, the water grew noticeably colder.

Some days my brain behaves like an obsolete computer, incapable of booting up those neurons with anything resembling speed. It took several moments of enduring the increasingly cold shower before my brain seemed ready to dismiss the To-Do List in favor of solving this current problem.
And then, the terrible realization: we had run out of heating oil.

Indeed, it had been a couple of months since we last purchased it, and even then, we'd only bought the minimum of 125 gallons. We'd had to drain the remainder of our savings account in order to pay for it. At nearly four dollars a gallon, the price of home heating oil equals the cost of a car payment. And that's just to buy the minimum amount. Fill the entire 275 gallon tank and the cost easily exceeds that of our mortgage payment.

These days, we do not have the cash equivalent of a car - or mortgage - payment just lying around.
Although we've run out of oil, we've also run out of the money to buy more of it.

No oil means no hot water and no heat during a cold January in Pennsylvania.

So much for acceptance and going with the flow. Just when I think I've found peace with my situation, and that there may finally be a healthy way of dealing with it, the Universe is there to remind me of exactly how badly we're still screwed.

Facing relentless financial struggles has a way of forcing you to lose all inhibitions. Suddenly, selling off possessions or taking an odd job or asking other people for help isn't nearly as intimidating as it used to be. You do it for survival. You do it for your kids.

When all of the pain and uncertainty and embarrassment is removed, our days of challenge have a way of showing us the best in ourselves and in other people. I know that our family would not have survived this long if it weren't for the small kindnesses of friends, arriving at just the right time, at that exact moment when we needed it most, and for that I am overwhelmingly grateful.

As unlikely as it feels right now, I'm doing my best to believe that things will work themselves out this time, too.

"Everything is alright in the end. If it's not alright? It's not yet the end." - from the movie Best Exotic Marigold Hotel


(originally published on phillyburbs.com on 1/21/2013)

Enlightenment? Maybe tomorrow

Even though much of my life these days feels out of my control, I'm trying to be a better human being.  Stop snickering - it's true.  I realized that once in a while - OK,  maybe a lot in a while - I'm not as loving toward my fellow earthlings as I should be.  I often lose my patience when others behave stupidly, I can't handle narrow mindedness, and rudeness makes me crazy. 

Choosing to be tolerant when what I'd really like to do is smack the stupid right out of someone doesn't always come easy to me.  While I may not always be successful, I've gotten to the point where I don't immediately criticize or react to someone else's behavior.  Instead, I try to understand where they might be coming from:  are they having a bad day?  facing a difficult challenge?  just visiting from Cleveland?

So, as part of my quest to be more accepting of others, I've begun to imagine everyone I encounter as helpless infants.  Everyone loves babies, right?  They're innocent, adorable, and absolutely incapable of hurting anyone.   A baby's spirit exudes nothing but pure love until the cynicism of adulthood erodes it away. 

I'm trying to honor the fact that everyone doesn't start out as difficult or curmudgeonly as they appear to be in the checkout line at the grocery store or while shopping the aisles of Costco. 

I'm also trying to set a good example for my kids.  I tell them that everyone they meet was once someone's precious baby, deserving of our love and respect even if we don't feel like loving or respecting them in that particular moment.

The kids don't always buy it.

Recently, while running errands with Evan, we seemed to encounter an overwhelming abundance of challenging drivers.  I'm sure you know the ones:  braking for no apparent reason, applying make-up while driving, and - my personal favorite - weaving so much you expect they must be making a sweater.

Through all of these frustrations, I didn't react, choosing instead to remind myself that each of these drivers used to be someone's precious baby.

I felt pretty smug about my new enlightened attitude, thinking that my son Evan must surely admire my patient and serene attitude. 

And then, out of nowhere, a car cut in front of us and abruptly stopped, causing me to slam on the brakes in order to avoid a collision.  Evan and I flew forward against our seatbelts. We stopped short of hitting the other car by mere inches. "Whoa!" Evan exclaimed. "What was that guy trying to do?"

I was shaken, but did my best to remain calm.  "He probably didn't see us," I reasoned, as we resumed driving with Someone's Precious Baby in front of us.

Soon, the driver began swerving erratically from one side of the lane to the other.  I could see the profile of his head turn to the right and then drop below the level of his seat headrest.  He appeared to be searching for something under his seat. 

            "What's he doing?" Evan asked.

            "I don't know," I said.  "Maybe he dropped something and is trying to find it."

Someone's Precious Baby was quickly turning into Someone's Dangerous Nightmare as he continued to pay more attention to whatever was on the floor of his car and less attention to his driving.  A few times, his inattention caused oncoming cars to swerve out of the way when he failed to keep his car from drifting into the other lane of traffic.

            "Shouldn't he pull over if he dropped something?" asked Evan, already exhibiting more sense about road safety than the driver in front of us.

We continued to follow the distracted driver, although now allowing a much greater distance between our car and his.  If this guy was going to drive this erratically, I didn't want to become involved in an accident with him.

Both of our cars stopped at a traffic light.  Suddenly the driver's side door flew open on the car in front of us, and a young man in his twenties jumped out.  With the traffic light still red, he ran to his trunk and opened it.  He pulled two small torpedo-like things out and slammed the trunk lid shut.  Evan and I looked at each other, too stunned to voice the obvious questions:  what are those things and why did he suddenly need to retrieve them from his trunk?

            "Well, maybe now that he has his torpedoes with him, he'll be able to concentrate on his driving," I offered.

Not a chance.  The light turned green and Torpedo-man was once again back to fussing around on the seat of his car.  I could no longer find empathy or excuses for this man who drove so carelessly.  I felt helpless and afraid as I watched him swerve from right to left and back again, into the lane of oncoming traffic. 

            "For crying out loud, this crazy jerk is going to kill someone!" I screamed, having reached my limit of frustration.

So much for my plan to be a role model of tolerance for Evan.  I tried to correct myself.  "What I mean is, I hope that Someone's Precious Baby gets where he's going safely."

            "It's OK, Mom," said Evan.  "I think that even Someone's Precious Baby knows he's a terrible driver."

Evan was right.  Instead of tolerating everything, maybe the wisest thing for us to do is to recognize trouble when we see it.  The next best thing after that is probably to take a different route home, away from the crazyflakes.

We can always try this tolerance stuff tomorrow.

Mom finally gets a clue

(Evan, back when he only had eyes for me.)

My son Evan is growing up.

I know I shouldn't be surprised.  For some time now, I've been listening to the cracks of his pubescent voice as it searches for its new mature range.  I've seen his growth measurements on the inside of our pantry door move dramatically higher.  Soon, we will run out of pantry door to mark them on.  And let's just say I've become even more appreciative of the miracle of deodorant with so many boys in the house.

I know that kids are supposed to grow up.  As parents, our job is to keep them alive so that they can grow up and eventually move out (hopefully taking all of their stuff with them.)  If those rapidly disappearing groceries and too-small sneakers are any indication, Evan is indeed actively engaged in the business of growing.

Still, none of these signs fully prepared me for the day that Evan stopped waving to me from the school bus.

I've been waiting for the school bus with some or all of my three boys for seventeen years now.  The bus stop is right in front of our house so that means we're able to hang out on the front porch until the bus arrives.  We talk, or joke around, or simply see how far we can shoot our breath at one another in the chilly winter air.

As soon as we see the bus, Evan grabs his backpack, gives me a quick hug, and runs off the porch to the catch the bus.  As the bus drives by, I wave to him.  Until recently, he'd always wave back.

After a few days of unrequited waving, I asked Evan about it.

                "I guess you're embarrassed of your mom," I teased. 

                "It's not that," Evan assured me.  "It's just that now we have assigned seats and I'm sitting on the other side of the bus."

                "You can't wave from the other side of the bus?" I asked.

                "I don't know..." he said impatiently.  "It's just that everything is now... sort of... different."

Different?  Life didn't feel very different for me.  It was still the same work-family-finances dance that I've been doing for years now.  Day after day, I'm busy juggling those same precarious balls, stopping only to clean up the resulting fallout from those I've accidentally dropped.

While I've been preoccupied with all of this juggling, my youngest boy - my precious baby - was busy growing into a young man.  I am no longer the center of his world as I was when he was two or three years old.  There are other people and other experiences which have moved into that role, as they should.

The next day, I watched as Evan boarded the bus and settled into a seat mid-way toward the back.  There were girls sitting in the seats on either side of him and they eagerly started talking to him as soon as he sat down.  I thought of waving to him but didn't. 

As the bus drove away, he glanced at me.  I'm pretty sure I saw gratitude on his face.

Wishes for a Happy (or at Least Disaster-Free) New Year

 

Happy New Year!  I hope that all of you enjoyed the holidays.  Mine was lovely in spite of not receiving the World Peace I've been asking for since I was sixteen.  I mean, what the hell, Santa? 

Anyhoo, 2013 is off to a great start so far:  the kids are back at school, the house is quiet once again, and my sanity is mostly intact.  It feels good to have just the usual stuff to stress about rather than the dozens of additional worries that the holiday season ushers in. 

I always have such high hopes for each new year.  Each January 1st brings with it a feeling of bright and shiny optimism, bursting with potential.  Yeah, that old year really let us down (I'm talking to you, 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012) but this one, THIS new year, is going to be when things finally turn around. 

So, before the alcohol wears off, er, I mean, before the disillusionment sets in, and while my cynicism is still sleeping, I'd like to throw a few of my wishes for 2013 out into the universe and see if they stick:

-  For starters, can this Great Recession/Depression/Whatever please end?  It's like an uninvited guest who keeps messing up the place and refusing to leave.  While the politicians remain beholden to  their own agendas, so many of us remain forgotten and continue to struggle.  Here in America, we shouldn't have to choose between paying the electric bill and buying food after working a full week.  We shouldn't be living one illness away from financial ruin or homelessness.  Something is fundamentally wrong with an economy that is content to allow the majority of its population to subsist as long as the stock market keeps humming along.   I pray that this is finally the year that people will matter more than politics or profits.

-  Speaking of politics, can Congress please just do its job without reducing every single item of legislation to a whiny-baby partisan fight?  If Moms ran the country, we'd know what to do to break the stalemate:  we'd count to three, and if the fighting continued, we'd take away their video games and send them all to the Naughty Chair.  The privilege of representing the American people should be reserved for those who will honor it and who will work for the good of the people - ALL of the people,  not just the wealthy, powerful, and influential ones. 

-  How about a year with no natural disasters?  Certainly, we've paid our dues in 2012 with wildfires, tornadoes, floods, and hurricanes.  We haven't even gotten all of those sorted out yet, so a boring year weather-wise would be much appreciated.  How lovely it would be to have a rainstorm just be a rainstorm and nothing more! 

-  Lastly, can we please at least move closer to that World Peace thing?  Maybe try diplomacy a bit more and violence a lot less?  Perhaps a good place to start would be by being kinder toward one another.  We gain nothing by magnifying our differences rather than embracing our similarities. We're all members of the same grand club known as the human race.  It would help to remember that we're all just doing the best that we can even if it doesn't always look that way. 

Wishing everyone a happy, healthy, peaceful, prosperous, and disaster-free 2013.