Yeah, I know, blame it on the fact that I've been watching way too many Golden Girls reruns...
But seriously
Long Island.
1988
I was on my high school's cross country track team.
I didn't run very fast but I liked it.
Two of the people on the track team were twins. Identical. I'd be lying if I said I could tell them apart.
They were funny and always kind to me.
I found out today that one of them committed suicide.
I hadn't thought of either of the twins for decades, and yet I feel terrible. I remember that smile. I remember how they used to go as each other for Halloween.
And yes, I think of the Weasley twins --as they were both redheads.
I think about the surviving twin and how he won't be able to make a patronus, and how every mirror is the mirror of Erised.
Wind to thy wings Charles. The world is less bright without you in it.
Thursday, April 28, 2016
Wednesday, April 27, 2016
If Hillary were a man
Yesterday Donald Trump said how if Hillary Clinton were a man, she wouldn't get five percent of the vote.
As with many things I have to disagree. If Hillary Clinton were a man, she would have beaten Barack Obama in 2008. The only thing she didn't have on her resume in 2008 was International experience. It goes without saying that she has filled that part in her experience.
I have to believe that even women who don't like Hillary will draw away from Trump's misogyny should this two become the eventual nominees. I have to believe it.
As with many things I have to disagree. If Hillary Clinton were a man, she would have beaten Barack Obama in 2008. The only thing she didn't have on her resume in 2008 was International experience. It goes without saying that she has filled that part in her experience.
I have to believe that even women who don't like Hillary will draw away from Trump's misogyny should this two become the eventual nominees. I have to believe it.
Monday, April 25, 2016
Microblog Mondays - Today
Today.
My contract ended and I am not employed.
Today.
I took time to exercise--walking a half mile on a beautiful Monday Morning.
Today.
I took an extra half hour to hug, cuddle, and play with this child who calls me mommy.
Today.
I took note of possible writing gigs and made notes of what I will want to write and maybe--be paid for it!
Today.
Is the first day in my new freelance career. I am keeping my eyes wide open and leaping.
I'm hoping I soar. If I fall I will leap again.
Today.
My contract ended and I am not employed.
Today.
I took time to exercise--walking a half mile on a beautiful Monday Morning.
Today.
I took an extra half hour to hug, cuddle, and play with this child who calls me mommy.
Today.
I took note of possible writing gigs and made notes of what I will want to write and maybe--be paid for it!
Today.
Is the first day in my new freelance career. I am keeping my eyes wide open and leaping.
I'm hoping I soar. If I fall I will leap again.
Today.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Dear new owners of the house where I grew up
It's happened.
An offer has come on the house where I grew up. It has been accepted an a closing date has been set.
I want to beg Dad not to sell it.
I want to have it sold already.
But it is the house where I grew up. I want to write a letter to the new owners and this is what I think it will say.
Dear new owners.
I grew up in this house. My earliest memories were of sliding down the stairs on my butt. Allow me to let you know some things about it.
The rungs on the bannister look wider than they are. Ask my brother. He got his head stuck between them. Mom called the fire department and expected them to cut through the bars, instead they poured a massive amount of cooking oil on his head. To the kids growing up--don't try it, it really sucks.
When you are in the basement, the house creaks. You will swear on a stack of bibles that there is someone else in the house. Nope. That's just the way it is.
My bedroom, the one that's pink now, is the warmest room in the winter and the coolest room in the summer. Yeah, you might like to have the big bedroom with the bathroom attached as the master bedroom--but if you are as sensitive to temperature as I am, take my room. It's good.
This house knew love. The kind that lasts lifetimes. My parents were the only owners of the house and they were married nearly 65 years. 54 of them were spent in this house. My oldest sister grew from toddler to adult in this house. My brother and I grew from newborns to adult in this house. This is the house where we hung out as teenagers, we held parties, and kissed our boyfriends (okay my boyfriends) at the front door. Grandchildren came to play in this house. The step that leads to the den from the stairs is called the evil step because every one of the grandchildren took a header on it. But afterwards they learned. This house rang with the laughter of a family with a good sense of humor. Yes this house knew tears, but when we wept, we didn't weep alone as the spirits of love remembered kept us company.
This is also the house where my mother died. I'm not telling you that to scare you or make this morbid. That is why my father is selling it, because when I come to the house I expect to see my mother in the kitchen, or coming up from the office in the basement, and it still hurts that she won't. We had a wonderful time in this house, and now it is your turn.
I have wishes for you.
May you make the house ring with laughter. The acoustics are such that if someone is laughing in the den, you can hear them upstairs.
May your children discover that if you talk about them in the basement office they can hear you in my room (the pink one).
May you have many meals where both ovens are used.
May there be a blackout--just cold enough that you sleep in front of the fireplace. I remember those nights of my childhood very well.
Fill this house with as much kindness, arguments, laughter, shouting, and love that we did. It's a tall order but we are wishing that a family enjoys this house as much as we did.
Gd bless.
(and, if you find a wedding ring in the corners of the house, please return it to me. It was my mother's.)
An offer has come on the house where I grew up. It has been accepted an a closing date has been set.
I want to beg Dad not to sell it.
I want to have it sold already.
But it is the house where I grew up. I want to write a letter to the new owners and this is what I think it will say.
Dear new owners.
I grew up in this house. My earliest memories were of sliding down the stairs on my butt. Allow me to let you know some things about it.
The rungs on the bannister look wider than they are. Ask my brother. He got his head stuck between them. Mom called the fire department and expected them to cut through the bars, instead they poured a massive amount of cooking oil on his head. To the kids growing up--don't try it, it really sucks.
When you are in the basement, the house creaks. You will swear on a stack of bibles that there is someone else in the house. Nope. That's just the way it is.
My bedroom, the one that's pink now, is the warmest room in the winter and the coolest room in the summer. Yeah, you might like to have the big bedroom with the bathroom attached as the master bedroom--but if you are as sensitive to temperature as I am, take my room. It's good.
This house knew love. The kind that lasts lifetimes. My parents were the only owners of the house and they were married nearly 65 years. 54 of them were spent in this house. My oldest sister grew from toddler to adult in this house. My brother and I grew from newborns to adult in this house. This is the house where we hung out as teenagers, we held parties, and kissed our boyfriends (okay my boyfriends) at the front door. Grandchildren came to play in this house. The step that leads to the den from the stairs is called the evil step because every one of the grandchildren took a header on it. But afterwards they learned. This house rang with the laughter of a family with a good sense of humor. Yes this house knew tears, but when we wept, we didn't weep alone as the spirits of love remembered kept us company.
This is also the house where my mother died. I'm not telling you that to scare you or make this morbid. That is why my father is selling it, because when I come to the house I expect to see my mother in the kitchen, or coming up from the office in the basement, and it still hurts that she won't. We had a wonderful time in this house, and now it is your turn.
I have wishes for you.
May you make the house ring with laughter. The acoustics are such that if someone is laughing in the den, you can hear them upstairs.
May your children discover that if you talk about them in the basement office they can hear you in my room (the pink one).
May you have many meals where both ovens are used.
May there be a blackout--just cold enough that you sleep in front of the fireplace. I remember those nights of my childhood very well.
Fill this house with as much kindness, arguments, laughter, shouting, and love that we did. It's a tall order but we are wishing that a family enjoys this house as much as we did.
Gd bless.
(and, if you find a wedding ring in the corners of the house, please return it to me. It was my mother's.)
Monday, April 4, 2016
Dear Mom - 2 years out.
Dear Mom,
It's been two years since Dad called--his voice nearly unrecognizable--and said, "Honey, she's gone." It wasn't a surprise. You said, often, you wanted to go "fast and first" and you did. First being that you didn't have to wake a single day in a world where Dad wasn't. Fast--well that is a relative term. You meant to have a heart attack. But the cancer that was discovered in October, left you bedridden in late February and took you in April was plenty damn quick.
I remember clearly how at 5:30 in the morning I woke up. I glanced at the clock, I got up and waited for the phone to ring. I was so sure you were gone. I called dad at 8:00, but he told me no, you were still alive, only to call back three hours later with the news. I told this to my sister and brother and father and all of us woke up at 5:30 or within 10 minutes of the time. No idea what that was.
It was monumentally unfair that after years of trying to have a child, waiting for the adoption that I never had a mother's day when I was both mother and child. You got to meet our Lotus and hold her, but she won't remember you--and I hate that.
You would have loved that I've been working the past year with audiobooks.
Listing the things I don't miss about you would take a shorter time.
It's been two years since Dad called--his voice nearly unrecognizable--and said, "Honey, she's gone." It wasn't a surprise. You said, often, you wanted to go "fast and first" and you did. First being that you didn't have to wake a single day in a world where Dad wasn't. Fast--well that is a relative term. You meant to have a heart attack. But the cancer that was discovered in October, left you bedridden in late February and took you in April was plenty damn quick.
I remember clearly how at 5:30 in the morning I woke up. I glanced at the clock, I got up and waited for the phone to ring. I was so sure you were gone. I called dad at 8:00, but he told me no, you were still alive, only to call back three hours later with the news. I told this to my sister and brother and father and all of us woke up at 5:30 or within 10 minutes of the time. No idea what that was.
It was monumentally unfair that after years of trying to have a child, waiting for the adoption that I never had a mother's day when I was both mother and child. You got to meet our Lotus and hold her, but she won't remember you--and I hate that.
You would have loved that I've been working the past year with audiobooks.
I remember your likes and dislikes sharper than when you
were alive. I remember your scent and the strong way your hands moved. I
remember how you would cut an onion, potato, or apple in the palm of your hand
and never use a cutting board. I kept buying you cutting boards for Mother's
day, your birthday, Chanukah. Two of
them I found after--unused.
Listing the things I don't miss about you would take a shorter time.
I miss your voice and your assertion that "everything
happens for the best." I don't believe it now, anymore than I did then.
But I miss you saying it.
I think what I miss most about missing you is Dad. He's not
with you--not yet, and I have some idea on how much work he has had to do not
to just will himself to your side. But my strong Papa is gone. He's far more
indecisive than I have ever seen him. He's more fearful too-- fearful of
driving, fearful of stuff. By your side
he could do anything. The two of you could do anything. I miss that.
I'm getting along--like you told me to, but you never taught
me how to get along without you so I'm winging it most of the time.
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