Chin Up!

Nothing screams peri-menopausal married woman like a shopping cart full of root dye, cat food, and a Ladies Home Journal.

I was reminded of how old I had become when I unloaded my cart, and the smiling young cashier made small talk with me. At first I thought he was flirting, and I flipped back my hair and shot him a dimple, but as he scanned the last can of Friskies and said, "my mom buys this for our cat too," I realized I had become my mother. And his.

I'm not sure when I started 'acting old'. It might have been on my last birthday (and for those of you who follow my blog you know how I feel about birthdays! http://aprilaasheim.blogspot.com/2012/02/five-stagesof-aging-grief-as-another.html)

 I was actually feeling pretty good about myself shortly before that fateful day. I was working out, eating better, and had a pretty active social life. On the day of I decided to treat myself to a microdermabrasion as the last aesthetician I had seen assured me that I didn't need any kind of fillers for my smile lines, just a good scrubbing (God I miss Andre!). But now, as the lady ran the micro-crystal over my skin I asked her what she thought.

From my vantage point, lying on the table, I could see her Botoxed brow attempt to wrinkle. "I think it's gonna take more than a micro. Let me send you to Lucy after."

Lucy ended up being a 27-year-old, thigh-high-boot wearing gal who swore she could make me look ten years younger.

"With a filler?" I asked, chagrined. I was hoping I could wait on those another few years.

"No. You see, the lines are caused by your chin, which is starting to fall. Haven't you noticed that?"

No! I hadn't noticed it. Lucy said for a mere 2000 dollars I could get three full laser treatment that would zap my chin back in place. "It will feel like the worst sunburn of your life but it's totally worth it. Do it while you're still young. My mom did it and she looks great."

There were so many things wrong with that paragraph, but I slunk home, taking the cost analysis worksheet back to my husband who informed me that Lucy was a salesperson and that was her way of making money. And no, we weren't going to shell out 2k for me to get a new chin.

Still. The seed had been planted. I spent the next two months catching my reflection in the mirror, looking for turkey neck. I read magazines, looking for celebrities who were my age and older, checking to see if their jowls had set in. And I looked to peers around me, seeing who had avoided the face plague and who was still fairing well. It was a war, I realized. And according to Lucy, I was losing.

Since then I think I fell into old woman mode, dressing comfortably, making soups, subscribing to Oprah. Who knew that one comment, out of the blue, would change my perspective so dramatically? I went from feeling like a curvy cutie to a has-been jowl frau, with no ramp up time.

A few months have passed and I've come to grips with things. Lucy said my chin was 'falling' but it hadn't fallen yet. And even if it had, was that horrible? I was still me, no matter what my neck said. I had even started believing that cute guys could find me attractive again, if I lived in an alternate single Universe.

"What are you going to do today?" The cute cashier asked, bagging up my last can of Friskies.

"I'm going roller blading," I said, smiling.

"No way! I love roller blading."

"So do I," I said, and I meant it.

And that afternoon, after feeding my cat, leafing through my Ladies Home Journal, and covering up the gray hairs that had sprouted around my ears, I strapped on the skates and did some circuits around the neighborhood.

There were a million Lucy's out there, telling me that my only salvation lay in their costy and sometimes painful treatments.

But my time hasn't passed, nor will it, as long as I continue to live and embrace my life.

Maybe next time I send my husband for the cat food.

When I'm Gone

I've never seen myself as a poet, but I do consider myself a story-teller.
I wrote this poem five years ago while watching my mother read a bedtime story to my two-year-old niece Freya. I thought about the time when my mother wouldn't be around to do this anymore, and I imagined she might write a letter to her. I've never shared this before a few weeks ago, and I'm giving it to my mother tonight.



A Letter to My Granddaughter on Her 18th Birthday (Freya's Song)

My Darling Dear
My Guinevere
Though I have been absent now
For many years
And perhaps you no longer remember my face
Covered with folds like the pages of a book we once read
Of kings and fairies
And things that might be
When you sat small upon my knee
Before succumbing to your bed

I wanted you to see, my queen
That my stories are not yet through
Though I’ve taken my place
Among the bards of yesterday
I still reach out from time and space
To tell one final tale to you

Your future is a living story

Empty pages to be written in

With ink that cannot be erased

As you start on your adventure
Do not rush towards stories end
Notice lilies in the morning
Count the stars that end the day
Real heroes are not forged in glory
But in quiet journeys along the way

The greatest deeds a champion does
Are those we do not write about

Real moments that make up our lives
Are more important in the end
Than all the dragons we have slain
Or fleeting glimpse of unicorn
These cannot match the sun at morn
Or the smile of a friend

Dream big
Act small
In kindness
And my queen
Do not forget
Each life is a chapter
In a far greater story
Written across the universe
It is the small words that weave
Our stories together
Be thoughtful with pen
When contributing
Your verse

Stick Figure Family Values

 "Speed up," I tell my husband. We are closing in on a silver mini-van. I push the imaginary gas pedal from the passenger side, hinting that my husband is driving too slow. "We are going to lose them."

   He speeds up and soon we are neck and neck with the van, both cruising towards a red light. Bingo!

   As both vehicles idle at the light, I turn to check out the other driver. It's a round woman with too tight ringlets in her hair and a dour face. Her cheeks are flushed and her mascara is running. She looks pissed off. Maybe it's because we've been chasing her down for the last ten minutes. She doesn't look at me, even though I'm waving cheerfully out the window. She has two young children in the backseat, who appear to be arguing. As soon as the light turns green she hits the gas and speeds off.

   "Well, that was a disappointment," I tell my husband, who pulls into the McDonald's drive through for an ice cream cone.

   "It generally is," he agrees.

   What initiated our car chase was the stickers on the rear windshield of her mini-van.  It was a set of those cutsie, white, stick-figure families. There was daddy stick figure in a chef's hat. Mommy stick figure, a lean woman with a big smile and a briefcase. Two children's stick figures, one with pom-poms and one with a football. And Doggy stick figure, sitting obediently by an empty bowl.

   I had been desperate to find out if the people in the van matched their stick figure counterparts. But once again, I came up empty.

   "Why do you think people do that?" I asked my husband, who was driving with one hand and holding his ice cream with the other. "I mean, why lie about your life?"

   "Maybe they see things differently."

   "Maybe," I agreed. "Or maybe they just want to present an image to the world that isn't accurate. Maybe they think that if that's who they present themselves to be in fantasy-land, that's how people will perceive them in reality."

   "Maybe."

   I have chased down many stick figure families in the past year, desperately trying to reconcile the fun families on the window with the tired, unsmiling families that are usually in the car. During this time I've noticed a few things:

• Daddy stick figure is always first. Even though it's most likely mommy's car as she is usually the one driving.
• Mommy stick figure is always thin. And happy. There are no flawed figures or under eye circles in stick figure land.
• Kiddie stick figures are always playing sports. They are never fighting. None of them are wearing baggy pants or skirts three inches too short.
• Pet stick figures never do a no-no on the back windshield. It just doesn't happen.

   When I see vehicles with the friendly stick figure families I am immediately reminded of the parents who put the 'my kid's an honor student' bumper sticker on the back of their car. Sure, it's nice. But is it necessary? Does everyone need to know that my kid is better than your kid? And why do we feel this incessant need to advertise how swell our life is going

   I would love to see a more accurate representation of the world, such as:

• Mommy stick figure has a swollen belly and dark circles under her eyes from trying to work, get the kids to school, and still have time for daddy. She stares absently ahead from lack of sleep.
• Daddy stick figure comes with a remote control in one hand and a beer in the other.
• Kiddie stick figures are armed with Smart Phones and Ipods, and they sit on the other side of the windshield, ignoring everybody.
• Doggy stick figure begs for food while trying to mount the family stick figure cat.

   I thought about buying my own cutouts, just to place on my windshield for shock value. I was going to put a Mommy stick figure surrounded by seven Daddies. Every daddy would have a different role, attending to mommy's every need. In this scenario mommy's smile really would be warranted.

   But as I proceeded to pay for the stickers I chickened out. Who knows what someone with an inflated sense of morality and no sense of humor would do to my car? It's the same reason I won't put the fish with the little legs on my vehicle.

   For now, I'm content to just chase down these mini-van billboards hoping that someday, the image will mirror the reality. The first time I see all five members of the family, in their corresponding gear and with happy smiles pasted on their faces, I will shut up about the whole thing.

**
(Decal above available on Amazon)

The Road Back from Costco

I was driving home from a Costco trip, kinda bummed because I had spent way too much money (as always). As I approached the last intersection before my house, I was stopped by a red light. Two men crossed in the crosswalk, both on bikes. I assumed by their dirty, bedraggled appearances that they were homeless. This assumption was further fueled by the collection of bottles and bins and bags they had taped and secured around their bikes.

The first man crossed, pedaling fast and hard, trying to make his way before the stop light changed and the rain that threatened dumped on him. The second man crossed, taking a more leisurely approach, peddling slower, his rosy face aimed towards the sun that was trying to peek out among the clouds.

I watched the second man. Although I have always had a soft spot for the homeless this was the first time I saw a man in this situation, not as he is now, but as he might have been years before. I imagined him as a twelve year old boy racing his bicycle down the road with his friends. Maybe they'd be delivering newspapers or perhaps trying to get to school before the first bell rang. His hair would be darker, his face would be cleaner, and there would be optimism in those blue eyes as he thought about the future ahead of him. This thought made me immeasurably happy because to me, he was no longer nameless or faceless. We had both shared a common historical thread; we had just wound up in different places.

I continued to watch. He smiled into the world; a beautiful beam of peace that preceded his slow peddling. I smiled too. He caught me. Normally, I would have turned my head, not wanting to make him feel like a spectacle. The lessons of my elders always play in my head, "don't stare, and don’t point." But this time was different. I just continued to watch, my head following his path, that trace of a smile sticking to my face. He seemed so happy and content, even though he had nothing and I had a carload full of Costco goods.

As he pulled out of my sight and onto the sidewalk he turned to me, saluted, and shouted something I couldn't hear. I rolled down my window, certain he would ask me for a dollar or tell me that I had blown a tire. Instead he said, "Thank you for that beautiful smile. It made my whole day." Then he tipped his worn hat to me and rolled away.

It's moments like this that put my life into perspective. How is it that we live on this planet full of people, yet continue to ignore those around us? Is it out of a desire to 'be nice' or out of defense? I will ponder this as I go about my day. And maybe I will smile at more people.

 

The Quest for Truth

     My stepdaughter asks me how the dinosaurs died? I look at her, wondering if I should tell her the truth.

     "Well," I begin, "some people think that dinosaurs were killed off by an asteroid."

     "What's an asteroid?"

     "It's like a giant rock from outer space."

     She accepts the explanation, but I wonder if I've scared her. "Don't worry," I say, "that happened a long, long time ago. We are safe."

     "It won't happen again?"

     I hate not being honest, but I tell her that I'm absolutely positive it won't happen again.

     She nods okay.

     As adults it's our job to protect children and to preserve their innocence. Sometimes that includes lying.

     We lie about the fun things: Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and The Tooth Fairy.

     We lie about reality: I'm not crying. I just got something in my eye.

     We lie about our uncertainty: There are no more asteroids. They died off with the dinosaurs.

     We lie about life: If you stay in school and work hard you will be able to do anything you want

     We lie about death: Goldie went to live with other dogs on a farm. He is very happy there.

     I'm starting to notice these things because she asks me the other day while I'm taking her to the potty if I will always tell her the truth? She's bright for her age and has figured out that adults are sometimes trying to pull the wool over her eyes, even if their intentions are good.

     I swallow, wondering how to answer. I could be really truthful and say 'yes, unless lying is for your protection or to keep your parents from getting upset.' Instead I respond simply,  "yes, I will always tell you the truth."

     "You promise?"

     "I promise."

     She uses her new found power right away. "What's in the boy's bathroom and why can't girls go in there?"

     "Um, potties are in the boy's bathroom and girls can't go in there because there's a 'no girls allowed' rule."

     "I know," she says impatiently. "But why?"

     She looks at me as if she's put me in check. I hedge. "What do you think?"

     "Well," she rolls her eyes to the side, "my friend says she knows."

     "Oh?"

     "Yes, she says its because the boy's bathroom is haunted and girls are more afraid of ghosts. Is that true?"

    As a step-mother my role is nebulous; I'm some kind of strange hybrid between parent and friend. I think about my options: It's not my place to tell her about the differences between boys and girls. It's also not my place to agree that the bathroom could be haunted.

     I kneel down beside her. "That's an interesting idea your friend has. What do you believe?"
    
     She puts a finger to her chin, considering. "Well, I want to believe the bathroom is haunted. That's just more fun."

     "It does sound more fun."

     "Then let's do it. Let's believe that together." She takes my hand and leads me back to her daddy who is waiting for us in our booth.

     "What did you ladies talk about?" my husband asks. My step-daughter and I share a secret smile.

     "Just girl talk," I say.

     "Yeah, girl talk," she echoes back.

     My step-daughter pulls out her dolls. The small doll begins asking the big doll questions: Why are some people mean? Are monsters real? Where does the tooth fairy live?

     The big doll replies, "what do you think?"

     And the small doll answers back, a long happy stream of consciousness. The small doll has lots of ideas about the world and the big doll listens.

    Someday, I may have to keep my promise to always tell the truth, but for now I think I'm safe. For now, I'll just be the one who has her examine the world. Through that, the truth will come.
    



    

Smile and Nod

(Note: This piece differs in content and tone from most of the other things I write in this blog. I wrote this five years ago but never published it due to the sensitive nature of the subject. It is not written as a dig at my mother but rather a snapshot of what I was going through during the year that followed my father's death).

***

     I wade through the boxes, bins, and totes that are strewn across my mother’s apartment. The living room is filled with long-forgotten treasures recovered from her storage unit; treasures collected from her daily trips with my father to the Goodwill store. Treasures that probably cost her $500in total to buy, but which she has paid $800to store over the past eighteen months.

     There are memories here, memories of when my father was alive; remnants of her happy past, lovingly preserved in a tin can tomb. Each item has a story and my mother is more than happy to tell it.

     "Remember this?" Her eyes mist over as she holds up a picture of a French village, ripped from an old calendar. The picture once had a frame and hung on her wall. It was ugly then and uglier now, crinkled and torn at the edges, but I’m a dutiful daughter. I smile and nod.

     "Your father and I found it by accident. We were out looking for salt and pepper shakers one day when we came across this perfectly good calendar. It was a few years old but the prints were still good so your dad framed them. Got twelve pieces of art for less than a quarter. I wonder where its frame is?” She searches through another crate and, not finding it, sighs. “Oh well, I can probably decoupage it onto a piece of wood or something. I need to get started on making Christmas presents anyway.”

     "What will you do with the rest of this stuff?" I sort through a nearby tote and find pictures of my dad from his infancy through his sixty-fifth birthday, when he was taken from me; pictures I resent my mother having because some part of me believes they are mine. I was his child. She was only his wife. I take a few, concealing them in my purse. She will never know. She has so many.

     "What do you mean, what will I do with this stuff? Keep it!" She clutches an old Tupperware bowl she has just unearthed to her chest. "I'm too old to start over now."

     My heart softens. This is her life. All that she owns. Every ounce of self-worth she still possesses is neatly bundled up in boxes I helped her gather from behind Safeway. It's junk. All of it. But it's her junk.

     "My therapist will be happy," she continues. "Going to storage and getting all this stuff back is a big step in my grief recovery."

     My toddler niece, born the day of my father's funeral, enters the room and removes a photo from a carton. "Look!" mom says, a smile spreading across her face. "She found a picture of your dad. She knows her grandpa." She has always been convinced that my niece is the reincarnation of my dead father. This cements her theory. She pulls my niece onto her lap and strokes her hair.

     I smile and nod.

     "I never knew being a pack rat was a sign of mental illness," my mother sighs. This was a new confession coming from her lips.

     "Well, being a hoarder,” I explain, purposely changing her wording, “means that you can't let things go, or that you have an obsessive-compulsive personality."

     She laughs. "Maybe both!" She is giddy. She used to deny she had a problem but lately she has begun to relish her craziness, to luxuriate in it like one would a hot bath. It defines her. It gives her purpose. But she will only accept it in the context of my father's death. He caused it. Before that, she insists, she was perfectly normal.

     "My psychiatrist told me there aren’t enough years left in my life to cure me." She grins like she has just won a game. "So he loads me up on pills now. I can't believe your father's death would do that to me."

     I want to say more. I want to say ‘mom, don’t you remember our childhood? Remember how checked out you were? Remember how you were so depressed you slept for days at a time and we were left to fend for ourselves?’

     But I don’t.

     I smile and nod.

     I spy another picture of my dad on the top of the nearest pile. I perform a sleight of hand trick and take it, knowing she would never give it up willingly. It's mine now. I’ve got secrets too.

     "But I think my psychiatrist is just going through a mid-life crisis and hates all women," mother continues. "He's probably about forty-five. You know how men are when they get that age? Crazy, all of them.”

     ‘Yes, mother,’ I want to say. ‘All your problems are related to my father's death and by men suffering mid-life problems. Your sanity, or lack thereof, rests completely with the men around you who have oppressed you in one form or another. Either by dying and leaving you behind, by running off with your mother's best friend in your formative years, or by labeling you a nut so far gone there isn’t enough time left on this earth to cure you."

     But I don't.

     I just smile and nod.

 

Time Passages

She got me. Worse, I didn’t even know she was coming. A quick detour through Waikiki’s evening street market district and I was one hundred dollars poorer.

“This is all your fault,” I said, grumbling to my husband and handing him my wad of ‘fun money’. “You had to check out that alley. I should have known we were going to get mugged.

He laughed. “As I recall you bought this stuff willingly. Besides, you might have fun with these products.” He was more cheerful than I expected. “It’s good for you to pamper yourself sometimes.”

Easy for him to say. He grew up in a house whose motto was ‘Life is good’. By contrast, our own family motto was ‘Hide your money and your women. The Vikings are coming’. Needless to say I wasn’t a spender, I was a hoarder. Giving the woman all this money, just for something that I was going to slather on my face then rinse away, seemed wasteful.

But she was so smooth, and beautiful, and from Israel. She had skin like soft desert sand and eyes the color of the ocean. And she appealed to my Achilles heel - my vanity.

“Look there, April.” She handed me a mirror as she sat me down at her cosmetics stand. “Do you see those spots on your cheek?”

I shook my head. I hadn’t seen them before. But here, under the unforgiving glare of her fluorescent lights, they stood out like craters on the moon.

“And over here, you have a bit of rosacea going on. You must not scrub very often do you?”

I shook my head again, ashamed.

“And those little lines on your forehead. Those are only going to get worse.” I started to say something but she stopped me.  “You have bags under your eyes too…you must not get enough rest.”

“Fix me!” I burst out, unable to control myself any longer. “Fix all of me!” How had I not noticed this all before? Suddenly, I felt like Franken-beast out terrorizing the villagers. How could my husband have let me go into public like this? I glared at him as he checked out the nearby stands.

“In my country,” she cooed, taking my hand to let me know everything was going to be okay. “I got addicted to these products when I served in the Army. They are from the Dead Sea. You can look at my skin and see what they do.”

I not only wanted to look at her skin, I wanted to lick it. It didn’t matter that she was twenty and I was…not twenty. I wanted a face like that.

 “How’s it going over here?” My husband ambled in our direction. “Need my debit card?”

I looked at her to ask ‘can we do something about this?’ She nodded.

“Yes, honey,” I said to my husband. “I need your debit card.”

For the next fifteen minutes she showed me how years of bad nutrition, bar soap, and not living in Israel had taken its toll.  “Buy these April. They will make you look very beautiful, for your age.”I didn’t want to be beautiful for my age. I wanted to be beautiful for her age. I let her know and she sold me two more items for my patch and repair kit. I was a target, but I didn’t care. I had spent weeks dieting so that I would not feel ‘fat’ in Waikiki, but I hadn’t counted on feeling something else: old. So after a very good sales presentation I schlepped away with a bag full of products, and a promise from a beautiful Israeli girl that in just one week my lines softened, my jaw tightened, and the bags under my eyes gone for good.

As we left I noted that most of the people on the beach were young. There was a glow around them, and not just because their skin was still supple. It was because they had years left to plan, and live, and dream. The road to the world lie ahead of them, paved with possibilities. They had so much time ahead of them, and I did not.

 Maybe that was the real reason I bought all those products. If I looked as young as they did, maybe I could fool time into letting me go back, letting me do it all again. Relive every moment I had heretofore taken for granted: holding my sons, kissing my husband for the first time, spending time with my dad before he passed. The lines that were beginning to emerge on my face were a new reminder that time was passing, and I was passing too.

“Want to go back to our room and watch a movie?” My husband asked. It was 9 PM. I looked around me. There were young, fashionable people scurrying off to clubs and piano bars. If I ran to our hotel, slathered on a week’s worth of product, I might look good enough to infiltrate their group. I wasn’t that young anymore, but with the right clothes, makeup, and miracle cream, I could pretend.

“I’m glad you bought yourself something,” my husband said, taking my hand. “But you didn’t need it. You’re already beautiful.”

“For my age?” I looked up at him and batted my eyelashes.

“For any age. We have lots of years ahead of us, and they are going to be good.”

He was right. I smiled and wrapped an arm around his waist. The siren’s call of a warm bed, popcorn, and a movie with my husband was stronger than the call of the world. I realized I didn’t need to go back. I had all that I wanted, and needed, right now.  

When a Writer Takes a Vacation

       I stared at my aqua-marine messenger bag. It sat innocently on the recliner, where it had resided all week long. It saw my comings and goings, and I could feel its make believe eyes, watching me.

     “You can stare at me all you want,” I said. “I’m not taking you.”

      I was prepping for a romantic getaway to Hawaii with my husband, a trip I had been looking forward to all winter. It was going to be a week without children, family, or pets; A trip where we could lose ourselves in the moment without having to worry about anyone, or anything, along the way. This included my laptop and its accompanying messenger bag.

     “You know you are going to end up taking it,” my husband said as I arranged and rearranged my bags for the trip. “You might as well pack it now.”

     “You don’t know me as well as you think you know me. I can be strong. It just takes a little will power. That’s all.”

     “Uh-huh,” he answered and I walked away with my nose in the air.

     Maybe I had failed before but this time I could be strong. My identity wasn’t tied to my laptop. I was April before it existed and I would be April afterwards. This was my chance to prove it, to him, and to myself.

     “Besides”, I said to the bag as I threw it in the closet so it would no longer tempt me, “you’re bulky and oversized. You haven’t shed your winter weight. You’ll just slow me down.”

     As the time for our trip drew nearer I could feel the calling of the bag growing stronger, even through the closet door.

     “April, please take me. I can be a lot of help. Whenever you have a great idea I will be there for you. You wouldn’t want to lose that great idea, would you?”

     Shut up.

     “And if you leave me for a week you may lose that flow that’s been going so well in your novel. You could forget character details and motivations. And you will just get further behind on finishing it. Didn’t you say you’d have that second draft done by mid-March?”

     Shut up!

     “Please! I really want to see Hawaii! You won’t even know I’m there.”

     I hate to admit how obsessed I was and how the dilemma had cast a shadow over my trip. I was feeling a bit like Anthony Hopkins character (a ventriloquist) in the movie Magic. By the end of the movie the dummy and the ventriloquist had become so infused with one another, the audience wasn’t able to discern who was who anymore. My laptop had become my dummy, and it was really starting to creep me out.

     “Just take it,” my husband said again as I was recounting the reasons it needed to stay home.

     “No. I’ve made up my mind.”

     “Yeah. We’ll see.”

     On the day of our trip we packed our car, pulled out of our driveway, and rambled down the street that would lead us to the freeway. Having successfully left my bag in the house, I was feeling rather smug and was about to give my husband a great big I told you so lecture. But before we could make it out of our subdivision the panic set in.

     “Stop!”

     My husband looked at me, smiling. “You want your bag don’t you?”

     “Yes,” I nodded meekly. “I feel like a mother who forgot her child at the supermarket.”

     “Well, you lasted longer than I thought you would. It’s a good first step.”

     “I had just really hoped…”

     “It’s your safety net and your umbilical cord, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Even if you don’t write one word on our trip, you will be happy it came along.”

     He pulled into our driveway and I rushed into the house, cursing all the way. I threw my archaic, seven-pound laptop into my messenger bag, found my thumb drive, and ran for the car.

     “You are going to break my shoulders and make me use an extra bin in security,” I scolded it as we drove. “It’s because I lug you around all day that I have to go to physical therapy for my back.”

     “But you would have missed me so much.” It answered.

     “Yes. I know.”

     My husband shook his head. “You know I’m sitting right next to you? I can hear your imaginary conversation with your bag.”

     “Don’t listen to him,” the bag said. “He doesn’t love you as much as I do.”

     “I know.” I answered.

     “You’re insane,” my husband said. “But I love you.”

     “Just drive,” I directed him. And he did.

It All Started with Nancy Drew

      It was the summer before fifth grade and I had just turned eleven. Once again, I would be the newkid in school and I spent several weeks staring out the window, picking apart the girls who walked by, trying to guess by their mannerisms and clothing if they would accept me.

     By nature I wasn’t shy but years of moving around, sometimes cycling through two or even three schools in a single year, had taught me to be…careful. By studying the locals first I could copy them, lessening the risk that that I would spend my lunch hours alone, pretending to read a book.

     As I peered through the window, a cranberry sedan pulled into my driveway. I watched as two figures talked in the front seat. Eventually they emerged, carrying several large sacks and boxes. I recognized them as my grandmother and her new husband whom I hadn’t seen in over a year.

     I could hear excited squeals as my mother and siblings ran out to greet them, but I stayed sequestered in my room. I was at the age where family affairs took a back seat to more pressing issues, like my quest for popularity. A knock on the door let me know that my lack of presence had been noticed. I opened the door to find my new step-grandfather standing there, a small bag dangling from his hand.

     “Thought you might like this,” he said, handing me the bag. “I picked it out myself.”

     I raised a suspicious eyebrow at him. “You did? Why?”

     “Well, we’re both newcomers to this family. We have to stick together.”

     I took the bag and pulled out a yellow and blue hardcover book. I searched the rest of the bag, hoping for something else, like money.

     “Nancy Drew,” he explained. “My daughter loved it when she was your age. I thought you might too.”

     “Okay,” I said. I took the book, closed the door, and flung it on my bed.

     Dusk had settled and the neighborhood quieted as kids were summoned into their houses for supper. My mom announced that it was Shepherd’s Pie for dinner, and I faked a stomachache. With nothing else to do I fell onto the bed and opened the book. Anything was better than Shepherd’s Pie.

     I had read books before. I had grown up on the staple of children’s books available at that time,
works by Cleary and Blume. But there was something different about this book. I wasn’t just reading the story. I was immersed in it.

     Maybe it was because Nancy was my first grown up protagonist. Through her I was transported to an adult world where girls were allowed to make their own decisions, date, and drive. In addition, she was bright and curious, traits my teachers also accused me of, and I felt a kinship with the ‘girl detective’.

     The more I read about Nancy the more I loved her. I dove into the book, coming up for air and food only briefly and at the insistence of my mother, and had the entire novel read in one long weekend.When I closed that last page I was confronted by an emotion I had never experienced when reading a book: loss.

     I was never going to see Nancy again!

     The realization, along with prepubescent hormones, made me burst into tears.

     I couldn’t lose Nancy. I just couldn’t. I picked the book again. I wasn’t ready to part with my new heroine, and I would simply read it again. That’s when I noticed a long list of other titles on the back of the book. Nancy solved many mysteries, not just this one!

     From that day on, I was hooked. I begged my mom for odd jobs to earn enough money to buy another book. It wasn’t enough to borrow them from the library, I needed to own them. To possess them. I couldn’t bear to part with one, after it had become such a part of me. Whenever I was alone, I would look at my bookshelf – which was growing rapidly – and know that I had a friend there. All I had to do was open a book.

     Nancy taught me a lot that summer: I learned new vocabulary words including “chided” and“titian-haired” and “sleuth”. I learned that there were sinister people in the world but if you were pure of heart you could overcome them. And I learned that just because you lost one parent, it didn’t mean you were lost.

     Admittedly, Nancy also got me into trouble. I started seeing clues, and secret passages and mysteries everywhere. I tried to convince my little sister to climb into the heating duct because I was sure there was treasure hidden there (luckily she didn’t). And once I had my parents call the police because I was convinced I had witnessed a murder. I had been out riding my bike and was sure a man had threatened a woman with a knife. Upon investigation, it was determined to be a pork chop bone.

     When school started I was a different person, poised and ready to take on the world. Nancy could do it.

     So could I.

     That year I strode into the classroom, not caring at all what I was wearing. I took my seat among a classroom of strangers, smiled confidently, and raced through my schoolwork so that I could read the next chapter of a really good book. I must have been intriguing to the other girls, for I never sat alone at the lunch table. Even when I wanted to.

     In the years since fifth grade my tastes have changed, but my love of a good story hasn’t. Every time I pick up a new book, my fingers twitch, my mouth goes dry, and my heart races. I’m off an adventure and I just can’t wait to get started.

     I still feel a sense of loss when I read those two dreaded words: The End. But with the help of a Kindle and a Nook, I’ve learned to curtail my book hording tendencies. I don’t need to see them in order to be transported back. I will always have them. I just have to remember.

*
By April Aasheim. Originally published on TheIndieExchange.com Feb 5, 2013

Un-Decorating the Tree

“It’s time we take down the tree.” I hollered downstairs to my husband who has had his eyes glued on the NFL playoffs all morning. Suddenly, like a comic book superhero, he ran up the stairs, zipped past me, and stood in front of the tree.

“Already?”

I sighed. My husband liked Christmas more than most children. It was one of the things I found endearing in him during our early stages of courtship. He would keep the tree up all year if I let him.

“Yes, honey.”

“But we just put it up.”

“Almost two months ago. It’s time.” I crossed my arms and he slipped back into his mancave. If I wanted to un-decorate the thing he wasn’t going to stop me, but he wasn’t going to help me either.

My step-daughter sat on the sidelines, half-watching, half-playing with her harem of new Barbie Dolls that Santa had somehow managed to load onto his sleigh.

“You okay with this?” I asked her. She nodded back, ponytail bobbing.

I sighed again, returning to my task. Dozens of lights, ornaments, bows, and candy canes donned our tree. Removing them was a daunting task. It was always more fun putting them on the tree then taking them off.

I reached for an ornament, stopped, and found another. My brain said ‘take them off’ but my hands weren’t cooperating.

“Okay,” I said out loud, feeling crazy because my husband and step-daughter had lost interest by now, “you can do this.”

As I reached for the purple ceramic teddy bear - painted long ago by my son when he was young and still thought I was amazing - I stopped. I couldn’t take it down. It was too much.

I wasn’t just stripping the tree, I was stripping away my life; Years of collected memories going into a box. How could I do this? It was almost cruel.

I surveyed the tree again. Every ornament had a story: the beautiful, expensive ornaments given to us as gifts, hanging alongside the dime store decorations accrued during  years I could barely afford a holiday. “Remember that one?” My inner voice asked. “Your dad gave you that one on his last Christmas…”

I choked.

"Stop being silly", I told myself. "This isn’t permanent. I will see all my treasures again next year."

But maybe I wouldn’t

I thought about people I knew - whose lives had suddenly ended. They hadn't gotten their 'one last Christmas'.  I thought about how fleeting life was and how you never knew for sure if things as simple as a holiday would come again. I choked again and the tears welled up.

“You okay?” My husband hollered up at me. He was good at ‘feeling’ me, even when it was the NFL playoffs. I gulped, swallowed, and nodded. He didn’t see me but he understood.

Somehow I collected myself and got the job done. I removed them all, carefully wrapping each one in soft newspaper. I placed them in boxes in long, thin rows, hoping they would make the journey through another year intact.

“You know the holidays are coming back,” my step-daughter said, marching her dolls around in a parade on the floor. “They are in a circle.” She is an incredible girl. She understands things on a level most people don’t get.

I nodded at her and smiled.

“Halloween first?” She asked. Her blue eyes widened as she tried to imagine what she was going to dress up as.

“Not Halloween. Not for a while.”

“Oh. First it’s Valentine’s Day, then Easter, then my birthday…” She counted down. “Then Halloween?”

“Yep. You’re getting good at that.”

“That’s why I go to Kindergarten.”

I saved her Hallmark Ornaments for last: Ariel, Cinderella, and Snow White. They had all mysteriously lost their arms during the festivities this year. She gave each a peck on the head and told them she would see them next year. Then I put them in the last bin, and closed the lid.

I smiled. She had faith in the circle. So could I.

The house looked starker, emptier as I removed the last trappings of Christmas from our house and piled them into the garage.

“All done,” I told her when the last bin was stacked.

“Maybe we can get some glue and glitter and red paper and start decorating for Valentine’s Day,” she said. Her eyes sparkled with anticipation.

“That sounds like a great idea. I think a trip to the craft store is in order.”

“I’ll get the keys,” my husband said. He must have heard us, even though his team was playing.

“No.” I looked around the house. My husband was cozy in his sweatpants, my step daughter was dressing one of her dolls. Pictures of my family – my sons, my siblings, my mother, my father - graced the shelves. Life was uncertain but life was good. “Let’s wait a few days. It’s good to remember things before moving on. Besides,” I added, looking at the bare window where the Santa Claus cling-ons had been only moments before, “It will give us something to look forward to next week.”

My Holiday Ritual

As part of the Meet the Family Blog Hop we are supposed to share something we do as a family during the holidays.

I've never had much permanency in my life. I spent most of my childhood moving from one house to another. In my early adult years I also traveled quite a bit, living in 5 states in 12 years. These last ten years in Oregon have been the longest I have ever lived anywhere, and in the same home.

One tradition that I have established for myself is my end of the evening 'me time'.  This includes finding the cheesiest, gushiest Christmas movie I can tolerate from TV stations like Lifetime, Hallmark and TMC. The plots are pretty much the same. Save a town. Save Santa. Save Christmas. Sometimes characters find love in the process. I've been doing it since I've owned a TV. Admittedly, its gotten better since I got cable.

I'm a writer but I enjoy how predictable these are. They are like comfort food for me. I know without a doubt that everything will be okay by the end of the movie and that are no surprise endings. If I'm really lucky there's a kiss under the mistletoe.

A few years ago I got married. The first year my husband watched me watching my movies. He said it was cute and charming and one of the things he loved about me.

Last year he started watching them with me. Every night before bed he would slide onto the couch with me, pick up the remote, and find one the two of us would watch together. We ate cookies, drank cocoa and laughed at all the ludicrous plot points of our chosen flick.

Of all the wonderful things my husband does for me, this little tradition ranks high on the list. These movies aren't his thing, but he shares them with me. He's telling me I'm not alone anymore. And that's more than I could ever ask from Santa.



This post is part of a "meet the family" holiday blog hop. Please visit others participating in this activity by clicking on the button below.

The H Word

Just got into my first holiday 'debate' with my mother. She said something like 'women fought for women's lib and what did it get them? Sexual harassment. Low paying jobs. Women should all just go back into the home.'

My mother is a liberal, a die hard Democrat, so her declaration that women should all just 'return to the home' was jaw dropping news for me. I suddenly imagined her with a flip hairdo, a poodle skirt, and a set of pearls.

"Mom, most women today aren't fulfilled by being a full time homemaker. They want to do something besides attending to their homes. Work full time, go to school, or maybe even take a part time job."

"Well, why? I just don't understand. In the 1950s women all got their hair done twice a week, entertained for their husband's boss, and got a heck of an allowance for managing the house. My mother was well taken care of. Sounds like a good life to me."

"So women in the 1950's were happier? I find that hard to believe." I had watched enough shows to see that every woman of that era carried a martini glass and a bottle of pills while looking out the window to see when 'daddy' returned home.

"Yes. They loved it."

"As women, we have more opportunities than ever. We don't have to stay in the home now, if we don't want to."

"But still, you go to work and the men maul you and act sexually aggressive towards you. Then men get promoted to better jobs just because they are men. What kind of world is that?"

Trying to explain to her that there are now sexual harassment laws, that more women are employed then men, and that women can be anything they want now proved futile.

"So what you are saying is that women are confused by what they want and aren't fulfilled by anything. If they were they would be happy caring for their homes."

I love my mother, I really do, but I was feeling a vein in my head pop. "I'm just saying everyone needs to do what they want to do to find happiness. If that is being a homemaker, they should do that. If its working at Taco Bell, they should do that. If its owning their own company they should do that."

"Don't you consider yourself a homemaker?"

"I write from home, then I turn on my robot vacuum and throw a pot pie in the oven for my husband before he gets home. I'd hardly qualify myself as a homemaker."

She just looked at me like she had won.

I had to ask myself why I cared? I have great respect for homemakers. They do things I could never do. But hearing my mother call me one was unnerving.

Then the epiphany came. She defines herself as a homemaker, and though I love my mother Ive never wanted to be anything like her. I didn't like being cast in the same play.

While I was absorbing this revelation, she continued.

"All I know is that I never wanted to be rich, or famous. I just wanted a home to take care of."

I thought about all the homes we had lived in when I was a kid. All of the eviction notices posted on our doors. She had never really gotten her dream and I felt really sad. I had taken for granted the things she had always wanted: A husband who loved me and a home to take care of. Sure, it wasn't what defined me, but it was mine.

"I'm sorry." I almost said, but I didn't. I walked away to my computer to try and make sense of it all. I didn't like her thinking. I still felt it was dangerous to say all women should do anything. But I  wasn't wearing her lenses.

In her 1950's world - the time of her childhood, before men hurt her and jobs disappointed her and my father died -women were free and cheerful and didnt have to worry. That's what men were for.

She wasn't saying she really wanted that world again. She was just telling me she wanted to feel safe again.

Maybe for Christmas I will buy her a vaccuum, or a broom. And she can clean up the pain of her past as she attends to the orderliness of her present.

A Thanksgiving Adventure

     I was determined to host Thanksgiving Dinner that year, though my mother - she of the longest memory - firmly opposed the idea. You send twelve kindergartners to the hospital with a batch of botched brownies and you are branded an unsafe cook for life. But this time would be different. I had been reading books, watching the Food Network, and accumulating twelve pounds of potatoes that needed to be cooked by Thursday, at the latest.

"This Thanksgiving will go down in history!" I informed my husband as I planned the seating arrangements. We had four stools and a high chair, and five grown-up sized diners.

“I don’t mind eating in the living room.” My husband offered.

“Oh, no you don’t. If I have to watch my mother eat yams, so do you.” I checked the decor. The last time we had actually decorated the place was around the time of Lent, three years ago. "We need new place mats," I said, eyeing the plastic Easter Bunny mats that still graced our table.

"We just got those!" My husband gripped his wallet. "Here’s a marker. Color in some feathers and a waddle and no one will ever know.” His eyes darted towards the oven, pausing. "You do realize you’ve never cooked a turkey before?”

"How difficult can it be? It's just a big chicken, right?"

“And you’ve never cooked a chicken either.” He walked away. I caught him on the Internet that night when he thought I was asleep. Researching. There are apparently nine restaurants in our neighborhood that are open on Thanksgiving Day. Two deliver. One even sells something resembling a turkey, plus or minus a few key parts.

Filthy traitor.

That a boy, husband. Way to sap my holiday enthusiasm.

Still, as crazy as it sounded, he could be right. I had never cooked a chicken, a hen, or any other member of the fowl family. The closest I had come was reheating a bucket of chicken from the KFC, and even that turned out disastrous. They should put warning labels on those paper buckets: highly flammable.

Reluctantly, I sought out the wisdom of my mother.

"I had hoped you would have changed your mind and let me handle dinner, April.” My mother had always ‘done’ dinner and had a hard time letting go. “How were you thinking of preparing the bird?"

"I’m brining it."

"Brining?" My mother’s voice wavered. She had the same tone the year in Junior High when my softball coach asked if he could take me camping. "Do you even know what brining is?"

Honestly, I hadn’t a clue. I had read about it in a magazine while I was in the Supercuts. Unfortunately, I had only read the part that said Want to start a new Thanksgiving tradition? Try brining your turkey this year, before the stylist called me to the chair.

"It’s our new Thanksgiving tradition," I explained.

There was a long pause over the phone, followed by my mother uttering a Catholic prayer. My mother isn’t Catholic.

"Please, honey. Find a recipe. There are a million of them out there."

As always, she was right. I googled Turkey recipes and almost instantly, found the perfect one. I called my mother and gave her the news.

"Guess what? I’ve got a recipe!"

"I'm so glad.” My mother sighed into the phone. “What spices does it call for? Rosemary? Sage? Thyme?"

I blinked as I tried to recall where I had heard those words before. Weren't they the gifts from the three wise men? That seemed almost heretical. I shook my head, glancing at my six-gallon bottle of Season All purchased from a recent Costco expedition. “Don’t worry mom. I’ve got it all under control.”

My mother hedged. "Would you like me to at least make the stuffing? I can have it ready in the morning before you stuff the bird."

"Stuffing the bird is not on the recipe.” I checked my meticulously written note card hanging on the refrigerator door: Defrost turkey for two hours...bake for four.

Any variation and I risked disaster.

“Okay,” she said, but I could tell she wasn’t done yet.  “Can I at least bring the pies?”

“Sure mom. I couldn’t find any pie recipes that didn’t require hours of dough rolling and ingredient mixing. Pie duty is all yours.”

Thanksgiving Day I woke up at the crack of ten to begin my long reign as culinary queen. Of course, a good cook is a happy cook so I spent the first few hours of my morning watching reruns of Real Housewives of Atlanta. They were airing a holiday episode and I wanted to get properly ‘in the spirit’.  At noon my mother called to ask how dinner was progressing.

"Fine”, I told her absently. Someone was pulling out someone else’s hair extensions on TV. Shit was getting real. “I’ve got it all under control.”

“You sure. I can come by. I don’t mind.”

Sigh!

My mother is from a different generation. In her day you got up at four in the morning, baked, chopped, basted, broiled, and basically worked your patooty off for a meal that was consumed in under seven minutes. I however, am a modern woman with gadgets and gizmos my poor misguided mother had never seen. Such as a DVR. So I finished Real Housewives and watched three episodes of The Big Bang Theory. All was going according to plan.

At 2 PM I removed the turkey from the freezer and let it sit on the counter to thaw and poured myself a glass of wine.

"Mom, turkey's still frozen." My son reported. It was 4:30 and I had put him on Turkey watch duty. I went into the kitchen and knocked on it. Solid as a rock.

"Put it in the microwave for an hour," I said. Lucky for us I had made the executive decision last year to buy an industrial sized microwave. My foresight was paying off and I intended to brag to my husband about it the second he emerged from his man cave.  

Sixty minutes later I heard the microwave ding and I plodded into the kitchen. It was time to bake that bird. But the microwave had done more than defrost the turkey. It had aged it. The skin was yellowed and cracked, bunched up and broken. It looked about half the size coming out of the microwave as it did going in.

"This thing okay to eat?" My husband asked sticking a fork in it. “I think it’s burned on the outside and still frozen on the inside.”

"That's how all turkeys look before you bake them. If you helped out more around the house, you'd know that little piece of trivia, wouldn't you?"

“All I know is that is not the way the turkeys my mom cooked looked.”

He was lucky I didn’t beat him with a drumstick.

I handed him a turkey bag, a large plastic sack that guaranteed our turkey would come out moist and delicious. He opened it and I dumped in the bird.

Thwak!

That is the sound a turkey makes when it falls through a turkey bag and onto the floor. Additionally, fliffttthhhh is the sound it makes when it slides across that same floor, knocking over unsuspecting family members along the way.

"Catch it!" I cried. My dogs had entered the room and were circling like bandits around a wagon train. The only thing that kept them at bay was their inability to reconcile the smell of turkey with the shriveled thing slithering across the floor. My husband hurdled the chairs and seized the bird just as three canine jaws snapped shut behind it.

“I knew I should have played sports in high school,” he said, handing me over the turkey and rubbing his shoulders.

Before anything else could go wrong I shoved the turkey in the oven - sans bag - and turned the dial to 450 degrees. The temperature was a little higher than what the recipe called for, but my parents would be here soon and we didn’t have time to wait. I suppose I should have preheated the oven, but I had already strayed dangerously away from the recipe. I was close to going rogue.

“I did all the hard work,” I said to my husband and son as I opened a can of Cranberry sauce. “You gentlemen can take it from here.”

With that, I went to pick up my vehicularly-impaired parents. The roads were dark and still. The fog swallowed up the flickering Christmas lights from the lights on neighboring houses. The only sound came from my father, who yelled at me to slow down as we approached dizzying speeds of seven-miles-per hour.

When we finally arrived, it hit me: I was a bad, bad daughter.

Holidays had always been important to my family, especially my mother. No matter how many recessions, lost jobs, or tragic family events that occurred, she had always made sure that holidays were special. She had cooked, baked, sliced, diced, and cried in order for us to celebrate together, something I never fully appreciated until now. I had taken this day from from her- demanded it actually – and thought I could replicate what she did with a few modern conveniences and some prepackaged stuffing.

As my parents climbed the stairs to my front door I wanted to warn them, apologize for what would come: Franken-turkey, canned yams, and lumpy gravy from a jar. But they seemed so happy there, holding their pies, buzzing about Black Friday sales and what Santa might bring their grand kids. So I said nothing. I wouldn’t take this moment from them. It would be like the Grinch announcing to Cindy-Loo Who that he was stealing Christmas. Better to just let the Who’s sleep for now. They would find out soon enough.

We walked through the front door and I was greeted by something I hadn’t expected: the sights and sounds of the holidays. My husband had lit pine-scented candles and decorated the tree and my son was dancing to Christmas music from an old Bing Crosby CD. Store bought cookies sat on a silver tray on the coffee table and my dad reached for one, and then another. My dogs greeted my parents with loving licks, almost knocking the pies out of mother’s hands. The house wasn’t filled with the traditional Thanksgiving sights and sounds and smells, but it didn’t matter. It was the holidays and there was a certain magic that couldn’t be undone by a shriveled turkey and a lazy cook.

I still remember that Thanksgiving fondly, even though the food was so bad we spent most of the evening joking about it, threatening to send it to our enemies during times of war to weaken their morale. We made up for it by playing games, making wishes, and sharing jibes the way that only families do. That fourth Thursday in November the world was filled with potential and unlimited possibilities. And innocence.

 *

It was the last Thanksgiving I had with my dad; He passed the following spring. Poor guy. His last Thanksgiving and I nearly poisoned him. I’d eat that horrible, wretched turkey every evening for the rest of my life to have that night back. I’m sure my mother would too.

I’ve given my mother back her cooking torch. It makes her happy and keeps her busy. As for me, I’ve learned a valuable lesson: everyone has a talent and a passion and we should all focus on what we love to do.  I stay out of the kitchen now, unless I’m asked to help (rarely) and do what I do best: live life, observe the world, attempt to find some meaning in it, and record it.  

 

Swinging for Success

I participated in FlashFiveFriday. You have five minutes to write about a topic. Here are my thoughts on Success:

http://theindieexchange.com/flashfivefriday-1-success/

I’ve been watching the Olympics Gymnastics competition this week, and it got me thinking about success.

Success can come suddenly. Gabby Douglas, the new Women’s All Around Gold Medalist, wasn’t favored to win. In fact, it was a surprise that she was even in the games at all. But as Gabby lept onto the uneven bars and swung like a monkey on Ritalin - she suddenly caught the attention of the world and became America’s new sweetheart.

Success can end just as suddenly. While Gabby Douglas was in, with a few bad moves, the favored woman, Jordyn Wieber, was out. Meanwhile, the hunky American Men’s Team was touted at being the next wave of gymnastics golden boys, but somehow tumbled out of our hearts as one after another succumbed to the mighty pummel horse. It was almost painful to watch.

Sometimes, a near success isn’t good enough. American McKayla Maroney looked like she had bitten off her tongue when she earned silver instead of gold. And those Russian gals, they literally wept when they learned that they had come in second instead of first. They cried so much I was actually worried about what would happen to them when they returned home? Did Russia ship off silver medalists to work camps? Or worse, make them work the Starbucks Drive through window in Moscow? I wasn’t sure, but I wanted to smuggle a few of them back to the states because the looks in their eyes said their next few days with coach were going to be really, really bad.

Success is something we all want, strive for, sacrifice for, and once attained, do everything in our power to keep. It’s in our DNA. From the moment we enter grade school and start chanting “We’re number one, cuz number two won’t do,” we strive for nothing less than perfection. When the Great Britain team, a team who had never won a medal, suddenly secured the Silver, the crowd went wild. Only minutes later, however, the Japanese team, who had won second in 2008 and weren’t happy about being pushed out of medal contention, actually paid the judges to revisit the scores. The newly tallied scores put them back into Silver status, knocking the Brits to bronze. The London crowd, who would have been happy to win any medal only moments before, sat scratching their heads, dazed and morose. The same look my twenty-something friends had when they realized the Twilight movies were coming to an end.

When someone succeeds, someone else loses. Above all I ponder this. Why do we want to win so badly? Does being Number One mean we are better, more loved, and more important than the person next to us? And as viewers, why are we so heavily invested in our teams? Not only in gymnastics but in any sport. I know adults who let a loss by their favorite team ruin their weekends. If Aly Raisman hadn’t medaled, I’m not sure how her parents would have gotten through the week. My guess is with a lot of alcohol and some Sylvia Path poetry.

Is being the best really showing what human beings are capable of or just another way to say nanny nanny boo boo?  We can’t really live through athletes, nor should we try. We should enjoy the games, celebrate the successes, appreciate and learn from the losses, and move on with our lives. In the Olympics, the NFL, or the Fourth Grade Spelling Bee. There’s no dishonor in being second, or even tenth. There’s only dishonor in not trying.

We are each given gifts, but too often we are afraid to let that gift shine because Billy down the street can do it a teensy bit better. So we sit on the sidelines because society has taught us that being number one is the only number that counts.  That’s sad. Life isn’t about being the best. The Best is a fleeting place to be, a chapter in our story. But it isn’t our whole story.  Our real story is about coming together, learning from each other, and honoring one another. And that’s what the Olympians, or any contestant of any event, should truly celebrate.