Halloween

In February, when my boyfriend moved here, he found a federal government job almost immediately. They pretty much offered it to him instantaneously, with a catch: it was going to take some time for them to be able to get all of the paperwork done and have him start. Well, we know how this goes -- government budget issues, threats of shutdown, yadda yadda yadda. So, in the meantime, while waiting for the government to get its act together, he found a job with a moving company -- at the beginning he mostly worked as a mover, but now, most of the time, he schedules and supervises the movers. His job sucks, mostly because he generally works 12 hour shifts starting at 7 am.

This morning, on his way out the door, he told me he hoped that he would be home early tonight. I said, "Of course. Who moves on Halloween evening?"

In all seriousness, he said, that they have one job this evening. A guy named Vlad.

This can only end poorly.

It Could Have Been Different

As one of the editors of IndieInk, I again agreed to participate in the weekly writing challenges. This week, my challenge was from my co-editor James Whitaker, who challenged me to take my pick from the following writing prompts: "unthinkable." "somewhere...out there." "it's never meant to last..." "tomorrow." "they'll never know..." "it could have been different."

The choice was easy for me.

You see, I have an unhealthy fascination with the movie Sliding Doors. Before I understood anything about Schrödinger's cat or parallel universes, I found myself completely fascinated by the concept that one little chance occurrence – whether the movie’s protagonist caught the elevator or the train, or had to wait for the next one – could totally change a life.

As a result, I find myself constantly thinking about how things could have been different. “If only I had caught the earlier train. . . ” “If only I hadn’t accepted the invitation . . .” ”If only I had not gotten in the car. . .” “If only I had made the call. . .” It’s an exhausting way to live, trying to figure out which decision was the one that derailed everything – or worse, trying to augur whether any decision you make is going to be the one that changes your life. And, ultimately, things that seem inconsequential have deeper import; things that seem important turn out to be meaningless in the end.

Case in point: New Year’s Eve. I had spent the entire day (and the day before) catching up with an old friend, which mostly involved drinking and talking, then drinking some more. In the wee morning hours, I found myself getting up off of the couch, taking out my contact lenses, and diving face first into bed. But something held me back, and, as a result, I made the decision to go back out to the living room to check on him.

My entire life changed as a result of that split second decision. And I am completely aware that it could have been different.

My mom's Thanksgiving insanity

As I just told my Dad, I'm not heading to Florida for any of the upcoming holidays or his birthday. Then again, it's not like he's even thought about coming to DC for Thanksgiving or my birthday.

Secretly, I kind of like being on my own for the holidays since my mom died. There's no disruption to my life. I can do what I want, with whom I want -- and if that involves sitting in bed eating pie, so be it. I am beholden to no one. Plus, there's no sense of urgently trying -- and horribly failing -- to recreate the family feeling that died along with her.

Even if we tried, it would be impossible to recreate my mother's version of the holidays. She loved any holiday that involved her getting to have her entire family around her. She would get super busy with the planning and the cooking -- and, as a result, was more than occasionally crazy -- but she loved it. All of it. I have video evidence to prove it.

She also got super weird around the holidays. One year, shortly after they moved into the current house, I was visiting over Thanksgiving and wanted to go out for breakfast. She agreed, and said that we might go with some of her new neighbors. I got up that morning, and as is my custom, threw my hair in a ponytail and put on a ratty old t-shirt and jeans combo. She saw me and said, "You're going out LIKE THAT?!?", with an incredulity that belied the fact that she had seen me go out LIKE THAT almost every day of my life that did not involve (1) office work or (2) a formal occasion.

I chalked it up to the fact that she either really wanted to impress these new neighbors or was clearly losing her marbles, and promised her that I would at least brush my teeth before we left. (Basic hygeine FTW!) My dad was laughing in the background. I interpreted that as a sign that either he thought I was funny or that he knew that asking me to dress up for breakfast was as ridiculous as asking him if he wanted to go to the mall.

We got to the restaurant, and the neighbors were there -- with their age-appropriate Jewish-y son, who, "coincidentally" also attended one of my alma maters and lived in the metro-DC area. It was a surprise set-up -- FOR BOTH OF US. And, as luck would have it, we were both hungry, tired, and completely disinterested -- and, as a result, spent the entire breakfast focusing almost exclusively on our eggs and bagels while our parents gossiped about the goings-on at the clubhouse and the homeowners' association.

I miss my mom, even if she was insane.

Archives

I used to love sitting down with my grandmother, looking at old pictures, listening to her tell stories of the way things were when she was a girl and her mother -- my great-grandmother -- still young. She would also whisper stories of my mother's childhood, perhaps with a wink, helping me to see the girl -- the person -- underneath the parental veneer.

I still love those moments with Nana, although they are more rare now. I try to get her to write things down, and she does it in spurts -- a caption on a photograph here or there. A few years ago, when she was sick, and my littlest cousin was still a toddler, I bought her a book so she could write things down for him, just in case. I'm not sure if she ever used it, and lucky for my cousin, she's beaten the cancer, so far.

I think that Nana's boxes of photos and clippings are why, since childhood, I've always tended to keep my own pictures, mementos, scrapbooks. I also think that, on some level, it's why I keep journals -- so that the stories live on. I'm a collector, an amateur archivist.

A few weeks ago, while cleaning out some things, I stumbled across a small collection of camcorder videos that I had made in law school: some footage of my friend's band playing; one of my brother's plays; a video of my roommate and I dancing around our apartment. And then I found paydirt: several hours of family movies over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays in 1997, where we were just sitting around, talking to each other, playing with the dog, eating pancakes. My mother at her best and happiest: surrounded by her college-age children and parents.

Watching the tape was like time travel. All of a sudden, I was sitting there, hearing my mother's voice, my mother's laugh, for the first time in years. And seeing the sights and sounds of a family, together, all under one roof, happy. I had not forgotten those sights and sounds: what I had forgotten was how much I loved being a part of a family, a collective.

I copied the video to my hard drive. I'm going to burn it to DVD and send it to my siblings and my father, so that they can remember too. And, in some way, the video will help my mother live on in some tangible way -- just a little -- for my nephew and, perhaps one day, my children.

Thoughts on Mother's Day

I'm not gonna lie:  Mother's Day is hard. It's not just the commercials and tv shows (et tu 30 Rock?).  It's everywhere, even in the non-touchy-feely realms like professional sports.  Everyone at the baseball stadium was wishing everyone else a Happy Mother's Day weekend.  Heck, every one at the 7-11 was wishing it too.

It's the whole weekend now?  Isn't the day enough?  Damn you Hallmark.

I've always hated the day.  My mother had very high expectations for Mother's Day and her birthday, and her whole demeanor was affected by whether or not you met those expectations.  She expected cards, presents, yadda yadda yadda.  A tribute.  She made her disappointment known when I couldn't manage to be there to celebrate with her.  In those times, she was the Godfather, and I was there to pay my respects.

I miss those times.  I'd take a demanding mother over no mother at all any day of the week and twice on Sunday.  Especially on the second Sunday in May.

Christmas Spirit

I am, at heart, a non-confrontational person. Yeah, I'm guilty of offhand sarcastic remarks and quips when things annoy me, but most of it is meant in jest. For me to really get aggravated -- and speak out about it -- things really really have to bother me.

Today, I was bothered.

On my way to pilates, I stopped at the UPS store to drop off a package. I was returning one of many, many catalog purchases of late. Apparently, one of the ways I dealt with not getting a birthday present from my mother was to buy new clothing and shoes. But I digress.

The package was prepaid. So, I just wanted to run in and run out of the store so I could get to my class, but there was no parking, so I wound up driving around for a couple of minutes looking for a spot. When I finally parked and ran up to the store, large box in front of most of my body (The box was 2 feet long -- no joke), I noticed that there was a very long line of parents and kids, most of whom were holding red and green balloons.

I quickly gathered that none of the people in line were actually there to conduct business in the store. You see, as luck would have it, the UPS store is in a neighborhood that was having its annual Christmas Tree lighting ceremony, and the store itself hosted Santa. So after exchanging brief words with some of the parents, I decided to bypass the line and go straight to the door.

Of course some blond woman yelled at me, "How rude! Don't you see that this woman with a stroller and a baby is trying to get out? You should have let her out first."

In my defense, I didn't see the woman with the stroller and the baby. The box was obstructing my view, especially while trying to hold it while keeping the door open. And in all honesty, all of the people and all of their kids seemed like they were moving into the store, not out of it. But on some level, I was not being very observant. I mean, I was surrounded by all of the kids and the noise, and all I wanted to do was drop off the stupid giant box.

I said, "Oh. I'm just trying to drop off this box and I didn't see her." I continued walking into the store, handed the clerk my box, and proceeded to exit. The transaction itself took 5 seconds.

On my way out the door, the woman started with me again. She said "You are so rude."

I was halfway out of the store, but I got annoyed. I spun back around and said, "Excuse me?"

She didn't say anything, so I started walking again.

Of course, then she said, "I guess some people don't understand Christmas."

I stopped again. "You really want to do this in front of your children?"

She glared at me and said, "I can't believe you are so rude."

I got a little defensive. "First of all, I didn't see the woman with the stroller because I was carrying a very big, very heavy box. And second, if anyone has the right to be mad at me, it's her -- not you. Mind your own business."

She said something else, but I don't even remember what it was. All I know is that by this point, I was fuming. So as I turned and walked back to my car, I said, "Well, I guess your kids are learning that the true spirit of Christmas is to be judgmental and rude."

The woman with the baby and the stroller? She was long gone by that point. But if she had said something to me, I probably would have apologized.

Thankful

Tomorrow is my birthday; tomorrow is Thanksgiving. I've spent a lot of this past year grieving and trying to figure out how to move forward, which undoubtedly, is of more interest to me than to anyone out there in cyberland. But there are a lot of things that I am grateful for, even though I probably don't say it often enough or loud enough to compete with all the other noise.

Here are some of the major things that come to mind:

• My friends and family, old and new, near and far. It's been a tough year, and I cherish the love and support. I don't know how I could possibly have made it through the past year -- or at least the past 10 months -- without you. You are, collectively and individually, the best.


• My job. I really like what I do and where I do it.


• Nana. The past year-and-a-half has been really tough for you -- probably more so than anyone else -- but you teach by example that, no matter what, it's important to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and keep moving forward.


• My sister. Even though we disagree about things -- a lot of things -- I am so grateful for having spent the last 30-some-odd years trying to make each other giggle. I can't wait to be an aunt and tell your kid (or kids) about how wonderful it was to grow up having a best friend/partner-in-crime who lived in the same house.


• My brother. Thanks for making me laugh harder than anyone has a right to, for crying with me when we both needed it, and, in general, for being a good, good man. I am so proud of you.


• My dad. You are a rock. A crazy, weird rock, but a rock nonetheless.

Clearly, there's a lot more -- good food and wine, vodka, baseball, Entourage, cashmere, high threadcount sheets, homeownership, my Kitchen-aid stand mixer, naps, hugs, Robert Downey Jr. -- but the list keeps getting longer, and I keep thinking of more and more things. So I'll stop for now, count my blessings, and hope that this next year is better than the last.

Holiday musings

I miss my mother. I don't say it aloud very often, but it's there, all the time -- a constant subtext lingering just below the surface of everything I say and everything I do. Even when I am completely happy, it's not without a sense of profound loss.

Don't get me wrong -- I am happy. Things are good. In those minutes, the sense of loss strikes when I wish I could pick up the phone and tell my mother.

But I think that next few weeks will be a challenge of another sort. It'll start with my birthday and Thanksgiving, the first of both without my mother, and on the same day, no less. And then the rest of the holidays, which seem like they're off in the distance now, but will soon be rolling in like the tide. And even though I'm trying not to be sad or to dwell -- to keep things light and in perspective -- there's a part of me that wants to crawl into bed -- preferably with pie -- and not come out until after New Year's.

Dog Days

So this dog fostering thing? Let's just say that it hasn't gone swimmingly. Or, to be more precise, it has.

On Tuesday (gotta love federal holidays!) I took the dog to the dog park. Actually two dog parks. At the first one, there were three giant dogs that wanted to chase him, and he did not really like that. After seeing if the little guy could hold his own for a couple minutes -- he did surprisingly well -- my friend and I packed him back up into the car and drove to a different park. And PJ was really really good with the other dogs for a few minutes, until one little brown puppy (about half his size) drove PJ to run away -- into the creek.

So yeah, I spent my Veterans' Day fishing the dog out of the creek. And then giving him a bath. (He liked the bath a lot, but did not like being dried off. He growled and snapped at me like you wouldn't believe!)



Of course there's the other thing. The thing where he tries to jump up into my bed over and over again and keeps missing. Eventually he succeeds, but it is really really annoying when I'm trying to sleep. Combine that with the having to get up before the crack of dawn to walk him and let's just say that I am the most tired I've been in months.

Still, I wanted to tough it out with him -- but my neighbors are not in agreement. The dog apparently barks at every single noise that he hears, which, in a mid-rise building in a quasi-downtown area, is a lot. When I'm there and I tell him to calm down, he gets quieter, but when I'm not . . . . And the neighbors have been complaining. So, as a result, as of tonight, the dog is going to another foster home.

Ultimately this dog experiment has been an abysmal failure -- but at least I've learned that maybe it's not the right time or place for me to have a dog and maybe that'll help abate the puppy envy for a while. In the meantime, I'm pretty sure that the agency will find PJ a suitable permanent home, and, as an extra added bonus, I will always have the memory of a tiny little dog humping a giant orange cat-shaped pillow.

Mother-less day

This is the first year that I can remember where I did not buy a Mother's Day card for my mom. I will never buy a Mother's Day card for my mom again. And, for all of these years, all of these cards, I always bought her funny cards -- even though I knew she liked the sappy sweet ones better. I always hated the mushy stuff -- now it's worse than ever.

I managed to mostly avoid being overwhelmed by mother's day stuff today by going to watch a stinky baseball game in the rain. For some reason -- habit, mostly -- I checked out some of the mom-themed postcards on PostSecret, and a couple of them made me tear up. What really got to me, though, is how my Nana said that she put out the cards she got last year from Pop and my mom. I waited until I hung up the phone, but that's when I lost it.

Cards and Flowers

When I was in law school, Mother's Day always fell right around finals. One year, I had a late final or a paper due or something, so I told my mom that there was no way that I'd be able to come down for the weekend. Then, when she and the entire family were out to dinner, I magically showed up, flowers in hand. She was so surprised to see me -- much as she was when I did the same thing for her birthday a couple of years ago -- but she lied and told me that she thought I'd be there. The truth is that she knew I would do something -- I always did something -- but she had no idea that I'd get in the car and drive for four-and-a-half hours just to turn around and head back the next day.

The real truth was that I hated not being with her on Mother's Day. Celebrations like that were very important to her.

One year, a long time ago -- back when I was still a teenager, maybe in my first year of college by then -- my mom and my sister got in a bad fight right before Mother's Day -- so my sister ignored her for the weekend.

That was so not my mom's style -- she'd get angry and then forget why she was angry about 10 minutes later -- or maybe the next day if it was really bad. So my mom wound up being upset that my sister was mad at her, but she was really bothered by the fact that that my sister didn't wish her a happy Mother's Day, or even give her a card.

Of course, I tried to negotiate a truce, and found out the truth: My sister had gotten my mom a card, but didn't give it to her as "punishment," like how you would take a favorite toy away from a misbehaving child.

But I digress. What I really mean to say is that this is the first holiday that she's not around, and it's way harder than I thought it would be.

According to a survey, this year, consumers plan on spending about $15.8 billion on gifts for Mother's Day. In 2007, the same survey indicated that consumers planned to spend $15.73 billion.

Not me. This year I am doing nothing.

Yesterday, I told my Nana that I couldn't even bring myself to go into the Hallmark store -- right downstairs -- to get her a card. Not surprisingly, she understood that I'm just not in the mood for it.

I don't think she knows how bad it is. Every time I see an ad on tv, or get an email from one of the places I used to send my mother flowers in years past, I get annoyed. I think I'm just about ready to add 1-800-Flowers and ProFlowers and FTD to my spam filter. All that marketing is really just too much for someone who just lost their mother. It borders on offensive.

No, that's not exactly right: It feels like a kick to the stomach.

You would think that the retailers would have done some kind of survey on that.

Resolved

Last year, around this time, I dismissed the notion of New Year's resolutions. This year, I'm taking a different approach. I'm going to resolve to not make the same mistakes in 2008 that I already made in 2007.

So, in true obsessive-compulsive fashion, here's a list of things that I am going to try my hardest to NOT do again:

• Lose my MP3 player
• Take fewer than 10 days off of work
• Be overly bossy and overbearing
• Sleep in my contacts
• Get in a fender bender
• Dwell on the past
• Work so much I forget to have fun

I'm sure I'm missing some things, but this seems like a good start.

Reflecting back on the year that was

Everyone else is doing it -- and like last year, I'm a little late to the game -- so, without further adieu, here are my first lines for each month of 2007:

January: Maybe this is me being hypercritical, but would it have killed the folks in my leasing office to use spellcheck?

February: Over the past year or so, I had completely forgotten that most people get out of work at a reasonable hour and then -- here's the important part -- go do other things.

March: Remember how I said I'm in New Jersey for work for the rest of the week?

April: Or, "Toto, I don't think we're in Nigeria anymore."

May: I'm bummed today.

June: Memorial Day marks the start of summer -- and the start of the summer associate stories.

July: A trip to the beach would be nice.

August: I think my summer would have been so much more awesome if I had read the AV Club's Hater's Guide to Summer Fun before today.

September: Florida State plays Clemson in less than two hours, and I can already feel my heart pounding in my chest as if the game is tied with seconds left in the fourth quarter and FSU is attempting to win by kicking a field goal.

October: I just finished watching Moonlight on the DVR.

November: One of these Novembers, I will actually write a novel.

December: I almost never drink at work happy hours.


Happy New Year! Here's to hoping that 2008 is even better than 2007. And this goes doubly for Florida State's football team.

Pot vs. kettle

This year, my brother did not find his Chrismanukah presents -- a pooping snowman candy dispenser and Dysfunctional Family Therapy Mad Libs -- particularly amusing.

Of course, this is the same boy that sent me this in an email.

For the office party

I started out by making snickerdoodles, but I didn't like the way they looked, so I made gingersnaps too.

Bah humbug

Even though the mass media would have you think this time of year brings out the best in people, my personal experience is that it does exactly the opposite. Everyone is rushed and busy and striving for some kind of perfect holiday, and in being that way, they inevitably wreak havoc on everyone and everything that gets in their way.

I'm not any different.

Take last week at work. We're planning the office party, which happens to be reviving an old tradition -- the gag gift secret Santa. The tradition had been all but extinguished because at various times, feelings had been hurt by insensitive and occasionally inappropriate gifts. But this year, we got the go-ahead to try again -- a probation of sorts. Everyone wants this to work, to keep the tradition from dying out for good.

One of my friends decided to be in charge of the process, but it became clear that he didn't have some of the organizational details down -- such as how participants have to both give and receive gifts, and that it's not "secret" if you are both on the list and making the list. So, in a way that was probably less than diplomatic, I interceded and said that I'd be in charge of the list. Admittedly, the way I went about it was undoubtedly bossy and overbearing, but in my head, I just was trying to help.

I sent an email announcing that I'd be in charge of the list. In a joking way, I referred to it as a "bloodless coup." Another co-worker got offended by my tone and, apparently, the fact that I took over in a bossy manner. So, she cornered me and proceeded to lecture me about how horrible I was. At first I thought she was joking, and then, once I realized that she was, indeed, serious, I got offended by her tone -- which I would later describe as "essentially calling me a bitch without actually using that word." I did, however, understand her point that I might have stepped over the line. So, I apologized to my friend. At the end of the day, I thought it was over and done with.

The next day, the coworker who lectured me came into my office, purportedly to apologize. Of course, she did this by first telling me that we're still friends, then by telling me that she never actually used the word "bitch" to describe my behavior, and third, by telling me how wrong my behavior had been. She repeated the third point four times. The first time, I said, "I got your point. I was offended by your tone yesterday, but I got your point. And I apologized, and it's over now, so let's move on."

The second time, I said, "Alright, I get it, it's done. Can we stop now?"

The third time, I just said, "Can we stop? Please."

When she continued, I said something offensive, taking her lord's name in vain and using a very bad word, one that's not allowed on television. She then said, "Now I'm offended" and stormed out of my office.

Clearly, I shouldn't have gone for the nuclear option. But I was pushed.

Damn holidays.

'Tis the season for ignorance, I suppose

I am often astounded by the stupidity of others. But nowhere am I more aware of it than when I'm riding public transportation and I am subjected to other people's conversations. Sometimes I chuckle to quietly, sometimes I shake my head -- but I never ever say anything out loud. Because, like my rule about not honking at people while driving on highways in places where people are known to carry guns, you never know what people are going to do next.

For example, on the New York subway, some people got the crap beaten out of them for responding to a "Merry Christmas" with "Happy Hanukkah." According to the CNN article:

Two women who were with a group of 10 rowdy people then began to verbally assault Adler's companions with anti-Semitic language, Hellerstein said.

One member of the group allegedly yelled, "Oh, Hanukkah. That's the day that the Jews killed Jesus," she said.

When Adler tried to intercede, a male member of the group punched him, she said.

No, you idiot, Hanukkah is something completely different -- and, according to Slate, totally misunderstood. But I digress.

For the record, Jews don't celebrate the birth or death of Jesus -- except to the extent you're talking about Jews for Jesus, who are not really Jews. Plus, you have the seasons all wrong -- the Jews purportedly killed Jesus on Good Friday, and he was resurrected two days later, on Easter. You know, in the spring. Heck, I'm a Jew and I know that much.

So, maybe you should like learn your own religion before you go making uninformed comments about others. Or at least watch the Mel Gibson movie.

Eighth night of Hanukkah

When my siblings and I were kids, my mom always varied the way we got our Hanukkah and/or Christmas presents. Sometimes there was a big pile, and every night we got to take something off the pile -- or there was a bag that we weren't allowed to look inside, and we had to reach in and grab something. Other times, she had what we would get for each night mapped out, and the presents were all hidden away out of sight -- and each night she would hand us the gift that she wanted us to open.

Sometimes the big gifts were for Hanukkah, sometimes they were for Christmas; some years there was more than one major present, sometimes the major present was something that we had to share; and sometimes the biggest and best present came in the tiniest of boxes. The only things we knew with certainty were that there would be a tangelo in our stockings on Christmas morning, and that at least one of the gifts would be something VERY SPECIAL.

Tonight, I got my special present. I was a little bit bummed that I had to buy it for myself -- but it was something that I knew that I really truly wanted the moment I read about it. My siblings or my friends -- or heck, or any regular reader of this blog -- probably could have walked into a store and seen it and wondered whether I had gotten it yet.

So here it is:



The 20th Anniversary of The Joshua Tree box set -- with remastered CD, bonus CD, DVD, book, and 5 pictures. Of course, this makes the fifth edition of this album that I have owned in my lifetime -- the first tape that I wore out, the record, the second tape, the first CD, and now this new CD. It really is the small things that make me happiest.

Seventh night of Hanukkah

Today's gift was U2 videos.



In all honesty, this is something I had bought -- and promptly forgot about -- some time ago. I'm hoping to get to watch it soon.

As for the leftover cookies, well, I brought them in to work, and next thing I knew, they were all gone. I'm kind of surprised by how fast four or five dozen cookies could disappear.

And finally, this Twitter is for my dad.



It's thoughts like this that make him proud.

Sixth night of Hanukkah

For Hanukkah tonight, I got the new Killers CD. More importantly, earlier today, I finally got a new space heater for my office -- with a remote control.