Scattershot

Walking into our consciousness

I've written before about what I'll call the "walking into our consciousness" phenomenon. We learn the meaning of a new word, and suddenly we see and hear it everywhere. We find out a relative has a disease we've never heard of, and suddenly we see references to it everywhere. The word and the disease existed all along, of course, but we weren't conscious of them.

    Two weeks ago, I had never heard of Swedish author Henning Mankell. A friend recommended him, so I checked out The Fifth Woman from the library and spent an entire Sunday unable to put it down. I was delighted to find that the author has been around a while, so I've got a whole series of his books to enjoy. (I'm almost finished with One Step Behind.)

    Fast forward to last night. My husband and I were having dinner with friends, and I was looking forward to telling them about Mankell. I knew they would like him, and I knew Tedd loves to find a good writer and then read everything he's written. I even confess to deleting an email I was going to send them recommending Mankell because I was afraid, if I did, Tedd would get to the library before me and check out all the Mankell books. I wanted to get another book first.

    Last night my friends arrived carrying some books to share with me. The first words out of their mouths: Have you heard of Henning Mankell? I think you'll really like this one. And they handed me a Henning Mankell book.

    I find this so strange. Out of all the books in the world, they handed me one by the author I was just going to recommend to them, an author who has been around for years.

    I suspect Mankell is going to be turning up a lot lately, now that he's walked into my consciousness.

    

Stuck on "The Little One"

The cat my husband and I often call "The Little One" is really twice as heavy as our other cat. She was a tiny ball of white fluff when we got her, but she's no longer little. (In fact, she's no longer even white.) Yet we still find ourselves thinking of her and calling her "The Little One."

    I wonder what other outdated notions are stuck in my brain--things that used to be one way but are that way no longer. I think of the front of our 100-year-old home as beautiful, but with paint peeling in places as it waits for us to finish scraping and priming, it probably isn't. I still think of my 30-year-old sewing machine as my "new" sewing machine. My baby brother is still "a kid" to me, though he is a responsible adult with a wife and a son starting his junior year of college.

    People and things change, but sometimes we don't notice. Sometimes not noticing can be a good thing, as in seeing a friend as the young soul she is, though she really has wrinkles and gray hair. But sometimes it can be a problem, as in not noticing that a cute little puppy has become an undisciplined monster who scares people. Or that a two-year-old's funny little hissy fits aren't so cute coming from an eleven-year-old. Or that someone who has always been independent and strong has hit a rough patch and needs some help.

    I always think of a friend who sometimes told her kids to put on "Grandmother's glasses" when she asked them to straighten up the house. When she asked them to put on Grandmother's imaginary glasses, she was asking them to look at the house with new eyes, to look at it as someone else would see it. Sometimes we all need to put on Grandmother's glasses to take a look at people and things in our lives. And sometimes it's fine to go right on with our own special view of things. The difficulty is in knowing the difference.

    We are trying to stop calling our big cat "The Little One." That view of her does need to change, but our love for her and our delight in her funny little ways is as fresh as ever.

The frumps

On Saturday, my friend Kathy and I went to a wonderful farmers' market in Edmonds, Washington, and then wandered into a little boutique nearby. As we admired all the beautiful clothes, we expressed frustration to each other that, as usual, everything was too long—sleeves, pants, tops. We are both short, and only petite sizes generally work for us.

    One of the very tall young women who works there approached us and asked if we were finding what we needed. Kathy commented, "Oh, you have beautiful things—for people like you, not us." She was referring to height.

    But the woman misunderstood. She looked us over, up and down, and then said, confidently, "But we do have some loose, comfy clothing, too. Let me show you."

    Loose, comfy clothing—code for "frumpy"? Maybe we need to be rethinking our wardrobes...

The frumps, below:

Our mothers, ourselves

Perhaps it's because my friend's mother died last week, but I was thinking about my own mother as I was walking this morning. It was Mom and "aprons" that popped into my mind.

    When my mother became a 4-H leader when I was a kid, she paid close attention to the annual dress reviews, when all the 9-18 year-old girls in the county modeled the clothes they had made for a panel of judges. Nine-year-olds made and modeled aprons, and she noticed that the bright, solid colored aprons stood out more on the stage than the printed aprons. So she encouraged the girls in her club to make bright colored aprons and to wear white dresses for the dress review.

    What happened? Every year the nine-year-olds in our club won a disproportionate number of awards in the dress review.

    Mom had an ability to look at things from the point of view of the audience, whether it was dress reviews, plays she directed, parties she planned, or exhibits she organized. If there's anything I inherited from her, I think it is a bit of that talent.

    I can say that now, but until I was well into adulthood, I truly believed that I hadn't inherited any of my mother's talents. Everyone said that I took after my dad and my sister took after my mother. I never questioned that, though I was sad not to be at all like Mom. Then I read the book My Mother, Myself. Early in the book, the author tells how, for years, she always cut one end off a roast before she put it in the oven to cook. Finally, someone asked her why she did that, and she realized it was because her mother always had. She called her mother and asked why. Her mother told her that her roaster was too small, so she always hacked off one end of the roast to fit it into the pan.

    Somehow, that book opened my eyes to the fact that it's really impossible for daughters not to be like their mothers. I started thinking about how I always grab Kuner's brand kidney beans when I buy them, how I never buy cheap dish soap because Mom told me that it's not a good idea, how I tend to pick my battles carefully, going after only what really matters to me. I started paying attention to the things I love to do and realized how often they are the things Mom loved to do.

    And, you know, if I were a 4-H leader observing dress reviews today, I truly believe that I would notice exactly the same things my mother did. I, too, would soon have little girls wearing white dresses and brightly colored aprons, just like she did. 

Advice coming too late

Last Friday I had my hair colored, asking my hairdresser to take pains to match what is left of my original red hair. Today I opened the newspaper to a huge, two-page article with tips from Charla Krupp's book, How Not to Look Old. Tip #2 was, "Lighten your hair, going two shades lighter than your natural base color."

    Sigh. Too late.

    Cautiously, I read on. I'm in trouble on other fronts as well. I'm supposed to lose my hoop earrings. (That's pretty much all I wear for everyday.) And my acid-washed jeans. (My favorite pair is acid-washed.) And my choker necklaces. (My husband gave me a choker I love.) I'm supposed to buy jeans that fit and flatter me. (The only pair I have that fits me well is acid-washed. I have no jeans that flatter me.)

    I'm supposed to wear a "make-up primer, which fills in wrinkles." I have no idea what a make-up primer even is, but she assures me that if I spend more time getting my "canvas" to look great, then I can get away with wearing less make-up.

    Still, there is hope for me. I'm supposed to cut some bangs. (I have bangs.) I'm supposed to avoid dark nail polish. (I'm lucky to have on any polish at all.) And I'm supposed to lose my tube tops and bustiers. (Like I would have any tube tops and bustiers!)

    What's sad is that I read every word of the entire article.

    What's even sadder is that I ordered her book.

Cat people

The woman stopped me in the library parking lot, a big smile on her face. "Hi...," she said, clearly not remembering my name.

    "Hi...," I answered, remembering her name, sort of, but not how to pronounce it. Was it Cor-RIN or Cor-RIN-a? Cor-REEN or Co-REEN-a? 

    Whatever her name was, she was living in my neighborhood again after several years of living in another state. Not knowing each other well, we turned for our chit-chat to the only thing we have in common: cats.

    Now I am a cat person, but this woman is really a cat person. At one point years ago, she had nine of them when another kitten arrived on her doorstep. (How do animals know who the softies are?) Her husband put his foot down--no more cats. She asked if my husband and I would take the kitten.

    We told her to bring the kitten over, and we would see if our thinks-she's-the-center-of-the-universe Cassie would tolerate her. Cor-Whatever brought the kitten over in a basket, set it down, and watched Cassie go nuts. Cassie growled, threw a little hissy fit, and acted as if she would tear the kitten from limb to limb if she ventured all the way out of that basket.

    We didn't take the kitten.

    Back to the library parking lot...."We finally did get another cat," I told the woman. "Now we have two."

    "You mean Cassie actually tolerated another cat?" she asked, surprised.

    And that's what got to me. After all these years, the woman remembered not my name but the name of my cat, a cat she had met only one time, ever, for just a few minutes several years ago.

    Now that's a cat person!

The battle continues

Last night I was home alone and sat down at my computer to do some work at about 9:00 p.m. Suddenly there was an awful racket right outside the window next to me, and my heart raced. My first thought was that someone was trying to break into the house. Then I remembered I was on the second floor, and I couldn't see why someone would choose the second floor for a break-in.

    It took a minute, but I finally recognized the problem: The raccoons were back. The raccoons that keep tearing apart the roof of our porch. The raccoons that make my husband's life miserable. The raccoons that are brazen in their destructiveness. The raccoons we hate.

    When I say that they tear up our roof, I mean that literally. They rip off shingles, break them into pieces, toss them around, and leave huge holes. To what end? We have no idea. The first time I looked out and saw their handiwork, my immediate thought was that a bomb had landed on the roof in our absence. It's that bad.

    Last night I wanted to protect our house, so I grabbed a flashlight and aimed it out the window. I could see nothing, but the racket continued. I threw on a robe and ran outside, shining the light onto the roof. Again, I could see nothing, but I knew my theory was right when chunks of shingles came drifting down. I ran back upstairs and pounded on the window and wall. The racket continued. Twenty minutes later, their mysterious roof-ripping urges apparently satisfied, they finally must have ambled on, as the sound finally stopped.

    My husband came home later to a pile of shingles on the ground. The motion detector light he had installed on the roof had not saved the day. The raccoons evidently just huddled in the shadow beside it.

    He was not happy.

    The raccoons, I fear, were.

The oddball

He was the kid everyone laughed at in junior high a couple of decades ago. He walked on the front of his feet, almost on tiptoes, with his arms flapping at his side. He was very smart, but he was clearly different, and the students recognized that difference immediately and were often merciless. On top of everything else, he had a weird name, both first and last—names I've never heard anywhere else, before or since. Although this wasn't his name, I'll call him "Tribular Norstwick." It was a name just that strange.

    A couple of years ago, I was reading a wire service story about a couple who had made it their practice to adopt severely handicapped children, even children they knew were dying. It was a moving story, but what really got my attentionwas the name of the father: Tribular Norstwick. Certainly, there could not be another person in the universe with this name. That weird little boy had grown up, married, and was treating other children with the kindness he hadn't received himself as a child. I knew where he had learned his compassion for those who were different.

    Somehow, during the Christmas season, Tribular Norstwick often enters my mind as a bit of a miracle himself. I'm happy for him and for the children in his life.

Good salesman/bad salesman

Last night I thought that I might, finally, have found some comfortable new shoes to wear with jeans. The Merrils felt great, and the salesman told me how much people loved these shoes. I was about to buy them when I asked the question most on my mind: "Do people wear socks with these?"

     I just wanted reassurance. The style was just a tad edgy for me, and I wasn't sure about the socks. I definitely wanted to wear socks. But was that okay with this style?

     The salesman leaned forward and lowered his voice, as if he were about to tell me a juicy bit of gossip. "Well, some girls do wear socks with them, but, you know, it really looks a bit tacky."

     I did know. After all, I was standing there in my little ballet flats that I know perfectly well I should not be wearing socks with. But, well, my feet had been cold that morning. To add to my tacky look, the thin knee-highs weren't staying up very well, and I could feel that one had crept down and was pooling around my left ankle. I suddenly felt more than tacky. I felt like the queen of frump.

     I didn't buy the shoes. And I'm torn between appreciating the salesman's fashion advice and wishing he had just lied to me about the socks. If he'd lied, I'd now have some comfortable shoes that I could wear, with socks, blissfully unaware of my tackiness.

My nefarious past

It is a sad day for me. After reading and hearing all the political news of the past few days, I have had to face the fact that I can never run for political office. I simply have too many questionable associations. I will confess the worst of them now.

     I have associated with known terrorists. For a couple of years when I was a kid, my bus driver was Cameron Bishop, who was later charged with dynamiting electric power lines that supplied defense plants. He was on the FBI's "Most Wanted" list for years. I rode the bus with him every day, and I had a terrible crush on him. (I was very jealous that he paid so much attention to an older girl named Nelda.)

     But it gets worse. While I didn't know he was to become a terrorist when he was my bus driver, I was very aware of it when I chose to date a boy who lived across the street from Bishop's family. (Secretly, I kind of hoped they never caught Bishop. I still thought he was cute.)

     Yes, I am evil. But I am not finished.

     I also have questionable ties to a savings and loan association. When I was in high school, I was friends with the son of the owner of a credit union. One year I accepted money for playing the accordion at the company's Christmas party. I clearly got the job because of my association with the son, and yet I I had no reservations at all about taking the money. While I don't remember the exact amount I was paid, it could have been as much as $20.00.

     Then there is the fact that I associated with other criminals. For a good part of my ninth grade year, I willingly attended history class every single day. Unfortunately, it turns out that the class was being taught by a burglar. One day the teacher didn't show up. He had been arrested and later went to prison. To show you how bad my judgment is, I actually liked this man. (I remember the day people were joking around about Rocky Mountain oysters, so I asked him what they were. He said, "Bull testicles." I was a little fuzzy about what "testicles" were, exactly, but I appreciated his forthrightness.)

     I am still not finished. I have some family members with racist tendencies. I deplore those tendencies and speak out against them, but—I admit it—I still love these people for their good qualities. (And they do have them.) I have been known to attend family functions with these people. I have even been known to hug them on occasion.

     And then there's the fact that a high school friend of mine dated an accused murderer. It turns out he didn't do it, but....well, you know....It's still true that I associated with someone who dated a man accused of murder.

    Still not finished. This one is hard to admit, but I even have ties to a serial killer. I went to Sunday school for years with a guy who grew up to have a son who became a notorious mass murderer of women. True. And yet I didn't have the sense to foresee that.

     I am unfit, clearly, to hold any kind of public office.