10 Must-Haves for Spring (not a fashion post)

Spring is the best season in all the land.  Why, you ask?

Because I said so, that’s why.

There’s something about the end of cold and the beginning of warmth.  It’s the new life that awakens literally overnight – the grass was slumbering just yesterday, a frozen and brown winter blanket.  Then today, it’s tinged with green.  In a week, the grass is ankle-deep.  Buds sprout on tree branches and flowers emerge from the ground, promising color and scents that were missing in the winter.  The world gets more vibrant every day; you can watch it unfold.  I can’t find enough words to describe the beauty and the feeling of awakening, stretching and growing that is spring.

As an aside, I’m quite positive that people find their favorite season to be the one in which their birthday falls.  It’s a little ongoing research project of mine.  Ask anyone their favorite season – quick, without thinking – and it will most likely be the one they were born into.  Mine is spring, my husband’s fall.  Both our birthday seasons.  My kids – both spring chicks – love summer, but they don’t count because they are weirdos, and plus they are kids and everyone knows that kids are dumb.

Sigh.  Just joking.  Calm down.

I do like change.  Any change, really.  I’m open to it, and although I can wear a routine down the nub, I don’t balk at change.  In our house in spring, we change our clothes, our eating habits, even the type of sheets on our bed.  We change our clocks to shift the daylight hours so we can capture one more hour of sunlight.  Spring is a fresh start to a new life, not just new fashion choices.

Even an old life can use a good sprucing up in spring.  Why not?

Here are my top non-fashion must-haves for the season:

1. Less fat.  I mean on my body.  OMG YOU GUYS I ATE SO MUCH OVER THE WINTER.  I am a slave to carbohydrates.  In the form of red wine.  And creamy chowders and breads and cookies.  In spring I don’t feel like I’m dying if I have a salad for lunch, because it’s not freezing outside and my body isn’t screaming WARM ME WITH FOOD.  I always stop eating like a hog in spring, and it shows on my butt waistline.

2. More exposed skin.  I’m not quite shorts-ready in spring, but my ankles are.  And so are my neck and elbows.  In winter I wear knee socks like a Catholic schoolgirl every single day and wear layers upon layers of sweater material from hip to chin.  I know why old ladies wear pantyhose under their slacks and decorative sweatshirts every day.  It’s warmth, people.  Last year the winter was so cold for so long that my skin began to break out from being covered for too long.  Ankles and shoulders need to breathe by springtime.  NEED.

3.  New hair.  I always feel better after a good spring cut.  Now you’re thinking, pssht.  This list is lame.  But a new spring haircut is a must.  As soon as it gets warm outside, I’m in the salon wondering if I should splurge on that $28 can of hairspray.  I fall for it every time like the sucker that I am.

4. Lady medicine.  In the winter I want to die.  At least, I’d not be too sad if I did.  So I rarely go to the regular doc in winter – I take chances with my health that way.  But when it starts getting warmer, I’m in the stirrups like Roy Rogers on Trigger.  Throw in a mammogram and it’s a party.  My birthday’s in the spring, therefore so are my doctor appointments.  I admit – it sort of ruins spring a little.  And maybe this list is a little lame.

5. Pedicures.  Self-inflicted or not, my toes need serious attention in the spring.  I usually get a good one right about now and try to keep up through summer so I can wear sandals without scaring off small children and adults with weak stomachs.

6. Get rid of all the baggage.  Seriously.  Our house collects bags like you wouldn’t believe over the winter.  I think we have 60 bags lying around.  So we get rid of the excess. That and clothing and household items we don’t use anymore.  I always get a rush of spring cleaning right about now and go around the house with a garbage bag and throw stuff in randomly – art right off the walls, knickknacks, half of everything my husband keeps in all of his drawers.  We never miss any of it, ever.

7. A shopping spree.  To replace all the stuff we just got rid of, silly.  Everyone needs at least one new pair of shoes or a new umbrella or something in spring.  Especially me.

8. Schedule for the summer.  Look.  If I didn’t schedule things for the summer starting in the springtime, we would end up at every single existing outside sporting event or suffer campfires every weekend even when it’s 95 degrees.  It’s the man of the house’s way.  It’s much easier to feign disappointment that we can’t go to yet another minor league baseball game because the kids have camp and I was planning on visiting my parents that day.

There you have it – my list of erm… must-haves for spring.  I stopped at eight because most of my other must-haves are fashion-related, and I didn’t want to ruin the integrity of my no-fashion list.  At least two of the things on my list are fashion-related anyway.  Let’s be real here – I was tired of trying to come up with things that I feel like I have to do in springtime.  Honestly, I just really love spring for all of the things that it promises.  Mostly that school will be ending soon and the sun will be shining more and I can go outside and soak it in for a minute or two before the bugs start buzzing me and I’m inside again. 

Not our yard yet, my pretties.  But soon.  Soon!

*******

This post inspired by:

Prompt #1: Write a list of your top Spring must-haves.

Old School Blogging – The 12 Questions of My Soul

I added that last bit to the title of Old School Blogging this month because I felt like it needed a little pizzazz.  It wasn’t what Elaine from The Miss Elaine-ous Life or Emmy of EmmyMom, partners this month, had in mind when hosting #OSB but I added it anyway.  I mean, I’m assuming they didn’t think they needed to play up the drama of Old School Blogging.  That’s just me.

Let’s talk about drama some.

I’m not much for drama in real life, choosing t-shirts over feathers any day, and peaceful interactions over crying jags and rage raves in general.  If you have real life drama to shill, peddle it somewhere else, please.  I am not interested and have no capacity for it.  I simply cannot join in playing circus of insanity with you.  Why am I saying all this?

Oh, yes.  To expose my soul.

I do like to write in exaggerated tones to catch your attention because generally I’m really pretty average and I sometimes feel as if my life is one big beige blahfest.

Let’s get cracking, then.  Pizzazz!

1. Are you young at heart or an old soul?  Definitely an old soul.  I’ve been an old lady since I was small, and I think about things very deeply, like I am the key that unlocks the universe.  Nothing surprises me.  If I were an animal I would be one of those huge tortoises that look like they’re dead or made of cement.  I move slowly and tire easily. 

2. Tell me about a movie/book that has changed your life.  When I was a small child I watched all manner of films strange and trippy.  Through my life I saw every movie that dealt with heavy themes.  I filled my brain with off-the-wall foreign and indie films, bizarre animated features, and violence-heavy blockbusters.  Then I watched Requiem for a Dream.  Oh my stars, that movie.  You can Google it if you don’t know it.  I watched it once, a year or two after it came out.  It made me realize that I need to protect my mind from things that aren’t good for it, and if something stays with me for a couple of days (or ten years) after viewing, that I probably shouldn’t have watched it in the first place.  Now I am more intentional about what I watch and even what I read.  If it makes me uneasy, I turn away.  I enjoy entertainment so much more now, and it has taken a suitable role in my life on the edges, where it belongs.

3. Would you like to reconnect with any friends you’ve lost contact with?  There are several people who I clicked with through my life that I wish I still knew well.  There’s nothing like old friends.  A shared history is so comforting, and although you can never go back, you can look back with fondness.  Nostalgia is my go-to feeling these days.

4. Where was your favorite place to go when you were a little kid?  Probably Disney World.  I was a kid, after all.  We went every couple of years, like every other middle-class rural Pennsylvanian family.  I also liked to go to my grandparents’ house.  They lived in the country and we were like children of the corn when we visited there, except for the murdering all the adults part.

5. Do you enjoy being with only one or two friends, or with a large group of people?  Just a few friends.  Many people equals many personalities, and that equals me becoming annoyed very quickly.   When there are a lot of people, everyone’s jousting for attention, and I end up looking for the nearest exit.

6. What’s your “quirkiest” habit?  I straighten things.  It’s a preventative strategy to free up my mind so I can get things done.  Like, I can’t do anything in a room until it’s straightened up.  Is that quirky?  To me it’s normal.  How do people do anything in a messy space?

7. What part of the past year sticks out in your mind?  My Grandma died in January.  When I think about her, I still think she’s at home, heating up fried chicken strips or shopping for Alfred Dunner or going to get her hair done or something.  Then I think about my kids and how much they’ve grown since last year.  And how I’ve reached the age where I forget exactly how old I am.  I need a calculator.

8. What do you use more often: your intuition or logical reasoning?  Intuition, completely.  I have all but abandoned my logical reasoning skills.  If I really focused on developing them I could get them back, but intuition has always served me well.  I am a master at feeling my feelings.

9. Where is your favorite place to go out and eat?  Anywhere.  Did you hear me?  ANYWHERE.  Did you know that at a restaurant, you pick what you want to eat, someone else makes it for you, brings it to you, and cleans up your dishes for you?  All you have to do is pay.  And if you’re really good you don’t even have to do that.  Contact me for tips and tricks on eating out for free.

10. What was the last song that was stuck in your head?  Uptown Funk by Bruno Mars, and also this guy called Mark Ronson, but honestly I’m not sure what he does in this song, if anything.  Do you love this song?  I love this song.  It’s so annoying how much I love it so much.  Bruno Mars, are you kidding?  I love him.  Let’s hear it again, shall we?

11. What is your ethnic heritage?  German.  Both sides.  Big healthy people, German women.  Birth-ready, deep-voiced, hearty, well-muscled, tree-trunk legged women.  Okay, just me. I even like sauerkraut.  I went to Bavaria once and really felt like I had come home to the motherland.

12. Give me the story of your life in six words.  I’m slightly weird but not exhausting.
Six words, man.  It’s not a lot.

*******

Want to join in with Old School Blogging?  It's stupid easy.

Write a post with your own answers to these questions, link up with Elaine or Emmy, 

and tweet at your convenience using #OSBlog to connect to others! 

I don't do this.  I know I should, but I don't.  

It's because I don't get Twitter.

Who wants to give me a Twitter lesson?  I can't pay you.

Nuts

A few years ago my husband and I were on a health kick, opting to starve, condition, and sculpt our bodies for the sake of weight loss, system reboot, and general bandwagon jumping.

At our healthiest, my husband and I ate only these items for ten days.
During that time, our children completed an exhaustive study
of the best gypsy communities nearby that take walk-ins.

We each lost a sizable percentage of our girth and volume, and basically became movie stars.

Unfortunately for our son, he turned 11 in the middle of our radical lifestyle change, and his birthday dinner consisted of little more than a spoonful of grains, a plate of steamed vegetables, and tepid water.

It was inhumane what we did to him in the name of good health, and he has not forgiven us.  On the bright side, we awarded him a life-long aversion to quinoa.  If you've ever tasted quinoa, you'll know it's a good gift.

Since that time, we have come to our senses and have gone back to a normal life filled with weekend meals of little other than burgers and bottomless baskets of French fries and regret over saying yes to a fourth cocktail.

What I’m trying to say is that my husband and I have become depraved gluttons.   

Life changed aggressively in a short amount of time, and we found it difficult to sustain a healthy lifestyle.  Instead of mornings at the gym, I started to spend hours of my day sitting in front of a computer reading and writing for personal gain, but more for personal entertainment.  He eschewed sensible meals for the consumption of portion sizes better fitting a much larger man, an elephant, or even a brontosaurus.  As a result of these changes, we are both less fit than we were those few years ago.

I have narrowed the reasons for our spiral into poor health down to three: age, laziness, and comfort foods.  The first, age, is cruel, raining on everyone's parade, especially those who still consider themselves young and vital to society's advancement and positive evolution.  The second is a character flaw that most people choose to hide, but only the brave display in the hope that they can someday be saved and magically set free from its clutches.  But let's talk about the third.  As the cook in our household, it used to be that I’d save the seldom-prepared meatloaves and cream soups to the winter months, when our bodies crave more hearty fare that ensures a layer of fat for protection against the harsh elements.

But the pendulum has stopped its swing, and the balance of hearty and light is gone.  We now enjoy lasagnas and pot roasts in the heat of July and the chill of January.  Cold salads no longer grace our summer table, unless they are accompanied by Crock-Pot chicken and noodles, a dish best served from a crash cart with a side of nitroglycerin tablets.

Now, it's almost as if I purposefully create unhealthy meals to create a deliciousness contest that nobody wins. Fish and rice and veggies sound okay, until you see how much butter goes into the preparation of these foods.  More butter is better than less butter, and exponentially better than no butter.

It comes down to general indifference about eating more arugula and less alfredo.  As the main meal maker in our house, I have lost interest in making food seem appetizing in favor of making food that is appetizing.  Plus, with long hours and work travel and kid activities every night, it’s hard to expect everyone to eat grilled chicken and salad when no one’s at home to prepare or eat it, and you’re drive-thru dining again.

Like this evening, for example.  Will it be pizza, burgers or hoagies?  The choices are abundant.  At least I know dinner won’t be ruining anyone’s life tonight.

*******

This post inspired by:

Prompt #3: What’s for dinner?

Let’s Meet Famous People and Insult Them. Twice.*

“Do you have one of your cards on you?  You can tell him you’re a writer, hand it to him, and ask him to read your blog.”

“No,” I said, firmly. 

“Why not?  You’ll never see him again.  Who cares?  If he takes it, that’s great.  If he doesn’t, you’re no worse off than before.”

I glared at my husband, big oaf of a cheerleader that he is, and tried not to pinch him.

We were standing in line at a small theater an hour from home.  It was a school night, and we had just seen David Sedaris speak on tour.  My husband gave me tickets to the event as a Valentine’s Day gift, and we were waiting for an autograph.

“That’s not why we’re here.  We’re here to say hello, nice to meet you, we ask him to sign our book, and we go home.  Giving him a business card is your style, not mine,” I said.  Unlike my husband, I am an unqualified boob in casual gatherings.  My social ineptitude often leads me to say grotesque things that are out of line with my normally winning personality which emerges after several years of close friendship.  I’d have to work up the nerve for weeks, processing the logistics of coolly and confidently passing one of my contact cards to David Sedaris, famous writer.  I might even have to do several dry runs.  As it was, we were mere feet from the author who was conversing with a pack of rabid fans while he signed their stack of books.  And my husband was just mentioning this now?  

Like I said, I could have pinched him.

I stood in the line, silently willing my prodding husband to evaporate so I could think about what say – the love of my life never met a lapse in conversation he couldn’t fill, and I am no multitasker.  The people in front of us moved on, and the author shoved a forkful of tomato into his mouth and motioned for us to approach the table.

It was 10:30 at night and he was eating dinner.  I nudged away my motherly instinct to fawn and patronize.  Aw, poor you, having to eat your dinner so late! You must be starving!  He chewed and smiled.  “Hello,” we sang in nervous unison, a pair of warbly parrots.

My mind wildly rifled through a series of thoughts to calm my unexpected panic – a quick prayer to find the right words and not seem like an imbecile, one of the thousands of appropriate conversation starters that I had practiced hours before that were now hiding safely away in the grooves of my brain.   He’s a regular human, I finally reminded myself.

“Hi,” he said, reading my name scrawled on the post-it that the helpful line-tamer handed me just minutes ago.  He scrutinized my face.  “Have we met before?”

We all want to be remembered.  We want to make a mark, be witty and amazing and liked and likable.  I am not any of these things upon first meeting. 

“Um… I don’t think so.  Maybe,” I suggested, seriously wondering if I had met him previously, despite never having seen him in person before.  Had I rubbed elbows with David Sedaris? my mind stupidly considered.  I recalled taking the time to tape an episode of a talk show – Jimmy Fallon, perhaps – when he was a guest once.  Just to clarify, the correct answer to his question is NO.

“I like your dress,” he said, cannily observing that I am a hollow dolt.  “Thank you,” I gratefully replied.  The words tripped off my tongue.  I can do this, I thought.  Then the word vomit started.

“Someone gave it to me.  I think her mother gave it to her – or was it her sister?” – I turned away from him to my husband for correction, who stared at me with a frozen smile – “anyway, she got it as a gift, and my friend told me, ‘I’m too short to wear this, do you want it?’  So I took it!”  It was a riveting story.  I was about to go into the beauty of fabrics that required little care when he spoke again.

“Well, it’s nice.  Do you see this shirt?” He pulled his jacket away from the front of his shirt, which was stained with several small spots, a matter that he pointed out during his performance.  “Do you see what I am wearing?  This shirt; it is terrible.  Look at this collar.  It’s sort of too big, and it’s kind of awful, isn’t it?”  I had to admit that his shirt looked a little worse for wear, but I was wearing a cast-off dress, so who am I to judge?

“Well, it goes.  It goes with the tie,” I remarked.  His tie was a mess of color: yellow, green and orange.  I barely even noticed it before I realized that I just agreed that his tie was as awful as his shirt.

He addressed my husband, who was standing there waiting to say something sparkling. “And it’s wrinkled. I should have ironed it, but I didn’t,” he said, hoping against hope that my husband was a more adept conversationalist.

Missing the cue that my time for speaking was over, I blurted, “I think it’s fine.  I don’t iron anything.  Why iron?”  Pure lies.  I had just put the ironing board away at home, having ironed a shirt that had air-dried in the closet.

“Well, I usually do, but I didn’t this time,” he replied, again to my husband.  As I contemplated adding that my dress was comprised of a fabric that is wrinkle free, he and my husband had a short exchange about no-iron shirts.

“Well, thank you for coming.  It was nice to meet you.  Have a good night,” he dismissed us.  I mumbled “Okay, see you later,” or something equally inane and inappropriate.  He handed me the book and my husband and I walked outside into the drizzling rain.

As I flipped through the front pages of the book to see what David Sedaris had written to me – he is famous for writing witticisms to his fans along with a signature – I saw that he had drawn an outline of an owl, possibly indicating his impression of me as a vapid twit.

In the car, my husband remarked, “Well, that was fun.  I can’t believe he sits there and talks to all the people who came to see him!  He’ll be there until midnight!”

“Yeah,” I said absently, mentally reviewing the conversation.  I had insulted him at least once.  Not too bad, considering my track record at small talk.  I insult most people once.  Then my husband confided, “He’s not as tall as I thought he would be.”

“Famous people usually aren’t,” I said, generalizing.  I remembered mentioning short people in our conversation with him, too.  So – twice, then.  I insulted David Sedaris, if he was paying attention to my blathering even a little bit, twice, in the span of three minutes.

I sighed and closed my eyes.  I should have just handed him my card.

*******

*The title of this article is a nod to David Sedaris’ latest book, Let’s Explore Diabetes With Owls, which you can purchase on Amazon or at any bookstore.  The author has not compensated me for this piece or my advertisement of his literature.  Really, are you serious?

Breakin'

Our Easter Break was pretty tame this year.

“Easter Break” is what we call Spring Break.  We do Easter, not Fort Lauderdale, which is what I immediately think of when I hear the term “Spring Break.”  Like we’re all running around in bathing suits, looking for the next beer bong.

Which was totally not my college experience, by the way.  One Spring Break my roommate and I visited my grandmother and great aunts in Florida for a week and the wildest thing we did was mini golf.  Another year, a group of us crammed into two hotel rooms in the Bahamas for four days, only to become sick on bad shellfish.  This led to a memorable 24-hour drive home with five girls in a small car.

This year, our family sort of just hung around and did life.  I skipped writing and social media, and caught up with sleep and errands.  My husband went to work because he is a cog in the machine, and the kids and I did stuff that we don’t normally do.

1. Movies.  We saw Insurgent.  It was pretty good, except for when I laughed out loud at a character’s hokey soliloquy, alarming my kids who were disgusted with my levity during this particular dramatic production about the post-apocalyptic world.  We get it, entertainment world.  The future sucks.

2. Basketball.  My daughter plays basketball.  Forever and ever, amen.  This is not new, but this break she had the first tournament in a new season.  We are one of those sports families. 

3. Lunch and shopping. I dragged the kids away from their iDevices/gaming consoles and took them out for burgers and shopping.  They each had a bajillion dollars in gift cards and birthday money, and they needed to buy junk.  They were happy.

4. Stay up late. The kids, not me.  I am a shameless early-to-bed person.  I’m not sure when the kids went to bed during the break.  I sort of lazily yell “don’t stay up late” and they respond “okay” and I take to my bed and this is how it went every night.

5. Easter with friends.  Easter was also the birthday of a good friend, so we descended on their house for Easter brunch and birthday festivities.  I brought two gifts: my famous solo rendition of “Happy Birthday” and a bottle of pink booze.  I am no solo vocalist, and we drank all the booze.  I am not the best at birthdays.

* * *

I asked the kids what they wished we’d done on break, and they had a hard time coming up with ideas.  I guess they don’t realize that Spring Break is a thing.  I’m not going to try to convince them otherwise – maybe during college they’ll just come home instead of go wild abroad.  A mother can dream.  Here are the things they wished they’d done on break:

1. Exercise.  My son came up with this one.  He said he planned on starting a running program for himself over break.  I admire his intention, and am saddened by his similarity to me in the fitness realm.  He did play catch with a friend and rebounded for his sister's free throws, and walked around the neighborhood a little, lest you think my teen is a lazy bum.

2. Vacation.  They both said they wished we’d gone on vacation somewhere.  When I asked where, they couldn’t think of a place to go.  I bit my tongue when “Disney World” flew into my head.  Disney World is that kind of place that every family visits on Spring Break – once.

3. Visit family.  My husband and I had decided that we weren’t going to travel to see family this Easter, and because of the basketball tournament, we couldn’t very well host a big family holiday celebration, either.  So we sort of said no to family this year.  The kids noticed.

4. Get homework done earlier.  Aw, these kids.  They want to do good things.  They were both doing work the morning before they went back to school.  Procrastination lives here.

5. Sleepover. This, from my daughter.  What is it about tweens?  Sleepovers are king, and when they don’t happen during a break, it’s like there is a tear in the fabric of the universe.

What did you do on break?

*******

This post inspired by:

Prompt #6: Spring Break!  Ask your child to name 10 things (or less) they’d like to do for Spring Break.  Share the list with us and tell us…will their dreams come true?

Keep Your Mouth Shut

Morgan* and I sat across from each other in the office.

We had the same job, and came into the company right around the same time.  I had reason to believe that she was better at our job, since she took half the time to do the computer test than I did.   But we worked together at the small, fast-paced office, and we became friends.

She was from New York, like most of our office mates.  Living in the South, that was unusual, I thought, until I realized that most of our friends were transplants from somewhere else – mainly the north.  Northern people love Southern winters, and when you’re in your twenties, a young city in a warm climate is where you think you’ll live forever.

We shared stories about our lives with our significant others: her husband, my fiancé.  She told me about New York, her family members that still lived there, the job she left to come here.  I learned about life in a city from her, and I shared my rural upbringing with her.  I was square; she was cool.  I was naïve; she knew better.  We cussed like sailors and laughed and rolled our eyes at office drama and difficult coworkers, told dirty jokes and raised eyebrows surreptitiously at each other over our screens. 

We were different, had different friends and spent our free time doing different things, but we bought tickets for a concert and made plans to go together.  The concert was cancelled and we got our money back.  We never made any more plans together after that.

Time went on and I settled into my job and advanced my competency – my learning curve was steep. The job got easier – speed and accuracy were the most important skills to hone, and relationships and flexibility were key, two things at which I excelled.  I took on more work and worked myself up to a pay raise, part of the package I was told to expect when I was hired.

Sitting across from my boss in his smoky office, he said he was pleased with my performance and that I’d be rewarded, and because of the timing of the raise, I’d even get a little back pay for work I had already done.  I was proud that my hard work paid off, and giddily looked forward to having more money in my bank account.

I was never a game player, never one who understood shrewdness or the weight of words beyond their immediate meaning.  I never expected that sharing my good news with my desk mate would come back to me a week later.

“Andrea, can I talk to you?”  The words came unbidden.  I was doing great at my current task.  I had been in a good mood lately, buoyed by my boss’s confidence in my abilities and the possibility of new opportunities.

Facing my boss again in the smoky office, this time I sat with trepidation.  An uneasy feeling in my gut took over when I saw the vague look of disappointment on his normally smiling face.  “It is none of anyone’s business in this office what or how you are paid,” he said.  “I didn’t…” I started lamely. 

But I did.  I had.

“I’m sorry,” I replied.  “I shouldn’t have.”

“All right,” he said, simply.  It was my cue to leave.  Nothing more needed to be said.

I returned to my desk, tight-lipped.  Morgan asked what happened.  “I messed up on something and he’s mad.”  Trying to explain something without explaining it is hard.  I was ashamed and I couldn’t find the words to express it, so I didn’t even try.

Months later I got my own office and a new workload to manage, and eventually negotiated a work-from-home position when my husband and I moved back up North for his job and to start a family.  Eventually I lost touch with Morgan; the dynamics of the office were changing, and I think I remember hearing that she quit not long after I left.

Despite our friendship, we were also co-workers.  It is a lesson that I will never forget.

*not her real name 

*******

This post inspired by:

Prompt #5: A memorable day at work.