7 Quick Thursday Takes

So, okay, I usually do 7 Takes on Tuesday (because I'm an alliteration addict) but this has been an odd week, mainly due to events at work that are far too boring to even bother getting into. 

So onto the seven:

1. I have to do some in-class presentations next week and absolutely LOVE that the presentations are now narrated wmv files instead of Powerpoint slides that I have to narrate.  Basically, I get to go into the class, hit play, and smile.  I don't mind giving presentations (I do it all the time, plus I teach) but these tend to be a bit dry and happen either first thing in the morning or last thing in the evening, so it's nice to have it be a passive activity.  (I'm lazy, whatever.)

2. Last night the hubby, his brother, and I had dinner at Bobby's Burger Palace, Bobby Flay's sort-of-fast-food restaurant.  It was super, super good.  The burger I had isn't on the menu because it's the monthly special: the Mulberry Street Burger, which will sound familiar to you if you watch The Next Food Network Star because it was the winning burger in a recent challenge.  It has mozzarella and basil on it (and other stuff I forget).  It was sooooo very yummy.

3. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (the film) comes out next week but IMAX doesn't have it scheduled until July 29th.  WHAT???  I think I might actually go see it in the local (non-IMAX) theater this weekend and then go see it again when the IMAX one is out - because I am that obsessed.  (Did I mention my grad thesis was on Harry Potter?  Yeah.  It's a way of life.)

4. I have another internet idol (idol #1 being Rebecca Woolf of Girl's Gone Child, of course).  I love Slices of Life because it is exactly what it promises - a slice of this woman's life.  Every day she posts a picture of what she's wearing, where the pieces are from, what she has packed for lunch, and what the plan for dinner is.   For many of us, I believe that really is one of the largest "slices" of our life.  Sure, based on feelings, our spouses and children and families and friends are far more important, but life is just as much about the daily in-and-out details and sometimes making those wardrobe and food decisions are just as taxing and annoying as an overwrought conversation.  I love the idea and wish I thought of it first so I could make a "Slice of Life" page on this blog.  Darn.  I never have the good ideas first.

5. I hate when people thank me for speedy email replies when it took me more than an hour to respond.  Why are there still such low expectations for email?  Are you really amazed that you emailed me yesterday at 3pm and I responded at 10am today?  I actually felt bad about how long it took me to reply.

6. I never mentioned visiting my best friend's new daughter, Madison.

Her dad, Mike, has been one of my best friends since I was 20 (so almost 14 years now, crazy to think about) and was my "Man of Honor" at my wedding.  When I got to their house, he was out walking the dog so I hugged his wife (who is also my good friend, of course) and squee'd over Madison.  When he walked in the house, though, I burst into tears and said, "Damn.  I knew I was going to cry when I saw you."  It was just so emotionally moving to see this friend I grew up with (because, really, we grow up in our 20s) as a father now.  It was so wonderful and I can't wait to be a part of Madison's life as she grows up.

7. I want to write a book.  Is that crazy to think I can do that between my two jobs, grad school, housework, and future family raising responsibilities?  Probably - but I still want to do it.

I have off on Fridays for the summer, so today is my Thursday-pseudo-Friday.  Hurrah!  What's better than a few extra minutes of shut-eye on a Friday morning?

Is this really who we are?

1. Today, on the way to work, I passed a school bus that had a hanging tag in the back window saying that the bus had been checked for sleeping children. Seriously?  We need to proclaim that we did this?  Don't all bus drivers check their bus before getting off or driving somewhere?

2. At 2:26am I received a text message that my best friend's wife's water broke.  I've finally come to terms with the fact that most of my friends are/are getting married (including the fact that I'm married).  Now we're becoming parents?  I have plenty of acquaintances and pseudo-friends who are parents, but no one as close to me as this person - and now he's going to be a dad.  I cried on the way to work today, just thinking about it (tears of joy). They live out of state, but I'm going to be in their area tomorrow and Saturday so I'm hoping she has the baby before I head back home so I can meet the little gal.

3. My job allows no casual wear, ever.  No Casual Fridays, etc.  But today is a half-day and the last day before a full three-day weekend (a total rarity here), so I'm wearing jeans.  So there, take that. I'm a rebel, that's who I really am.  (Okay, really, I'm really not.  But sometimes I wear the pants.)

Leave it and love yourself

Pouch test bonus: I lost 4.4lbs last week, yay! This puts me 1/3 of the way toward my first short term goal: to lose the approximately 15 lbs I've put on since autumn.  Nine pounds to go and then I'll set a new short term goal.  I totally believe it's helpful and great to celebrate small milestones along the way.

So what now?  Well, I'm continuing with a modified version of the plan.  I think I'm going to keep eating mainly light soups on Mondays and Tuesdays as a way to get me on track for the week.  For today I've made Hungry Girl's V10 soup (like V8 but way more veggies and lighter).  I'm already feeling a bit of snack anxiety (as in I don't have something to snack on, some crunchy little things to nibble throughout the day) but I know that that's one of my major problems and something I'm going to constantly battle, and if some super veggie soup is what's going to get me through today, then that's it.  I did put a 100 calorie pack of almonds in my bag, though, in case I'm not full enough from the soup and get lightheaded and can't concentrate at work.

The (my) relationship with food is so complicated that I just purely hate it (the relationship) sometimes.  There's an interesting article in The Daily Beast today about Disinhibited-Eating Disorder, which they describe as:

As a group, disinhibited eaters are people who are unusually tied into the world around them and, when it comes to food, are more vulnerable to the everyday temptations of the high-fat, high-calorie goodies that surround us than those lucky folks to whom a full table is just a full table . . . For these people, more than other folks, learning how to deal with our toxic food environment makes a world of difference. And by this, I mean learning how to comfortably control it rather than engage in futile battles of willpower with it. If you’re someone who tends to eat just because there is food for the taking, even if you’re not the least bit hungry, read on.

Seriously?  This is SO normal for me that I had to read it several times because I was looking for the part that stood out as the problem.  Obviously I know what the problem is, but what I mean is that it's like reading the definition for schizophrenia and going, "Oh, hearing voices - yeah, that's a big sign of bad things going on."  I read this and went, "Oh.  Right.  Um, that's just daily life." Their solution: surround yourself with a personal microenvironment that decreases opportunities for disinhibition and creates a hunger-free, more-satisfied metabolism. This is exactly what I'm trying to do.  Of course, we all have to live in the real world and work to control ourselves when out in the buffet that is that real world, but a huge part of my life is home and work - two places I do have some (although not total) control over. They go on to suggest six rules for helping keep control (I highly suggest reading the article).

As I mentioned before, my good friend My Right To Dream recently underwent gastric sleeve surgery, a type of weight loss surgery (a bit different from the gastric bypass I had) and she's having a hard time with the first week of recovery, which is significantly physically painful sometimes.  As she talks about it, I remember those times - but when asked before, I couldn't recall much of it because the mental workings of breaking up and reuniting with food was so much bigger for me.  Going into the surgery, I had no idea that I had eating issues.  I feel dumb about that now, but I just really didn't know. I don't need to be a size 10 (though a 12 would be nice).  I don't need compliments on how I look or what a good job I'm doing losing weight (from people who just see any diet as a good thing because they've been conditioned - I do appreciate the comments from the people who know how hard and what a complicated process it is).  I don't want to turn heads.  I'm not a fan of attention, really.  I just want to be happy with me.

Last night I watched the first four episodes of My So-Called Life with Delightfully Sweet.  The show was my first "Things I Miss Friday" item and I can barely describe just how influential it was and still is on me.  For me, that show is magical and I would give anything to have that same team create a new show today.  The closing voice-over of the fourth episode (which I also quoted in that first Things I Miss Friday) speaks to me today just as much as it did when I was 19:

Sometimes it seems like we're all living in some kind of prison. And the crime is how much we hate ourselves. It's good to get really dressed up once in a while. And admit the truth: that when you really look closely? People are so strange and so complicated that they're actually... beautiful. Possibly even me.

5 Day Pouch Test - completed!

I can't believe that I made it and don't feel remarkably deprived.  On top of that, I'm actually content.  It's not like I'm thinking, "Well, I'm going to go back to Combos and nachos on Saturday."  I don't want to, which feels almost miraculous.

Days 4 and 5 went fine.  The only off-plan food that appeared regularly was cheese, but I limited myself to just one piece (slice or string cheese).  Oh, and I licked mashed potatoes off the mixing spoon on Day 4.  I'm not one of those people who's all, "Oh my god I ate one thing off my plan and now everything is going to go to hell because this is a sign that I have no self control, blargh bleh schmeh blech."  I just wanted the taste, had it, and was done with it.  Will I have mashed potatoes again in my life?  But of course.  Regularly?  No. What I've gained most is some understanding about what I can and cannot have around.  Carbs are my weakness.  I'm not a fan of the "cutting carbs is the best way to lose weight zomg!" way of thinking.  I need to cut carbs the way someone else needs to cut sweets or someone else needs to cut soda.  Whether crunchy like nacho chips or soft and mushy like potatoes, rice, and bread, I love my carbs, love love love.  But they don't love me.  I end up hungry quickly and then just head for more.  I know this. 

The key now is to live my life accordingly. I feel in control, but I know this control will ebb and flow throughout life.  However, I feel like I've stemmed the lack of self-control flood that's been going on for the past 3 1/2 years.  I really want to stick with this and get back to the healthy lifestyle I had in 2005 . . . and I think I'm on track. Today I had so much energy after work that I cleaned and rearranged our second bedroom (pseudo-office, future baby's room maybe) - a project I've been wanting to do for a couple of months now.  Welcome back energy!!  I can't wait to welcome back my old clothes, but that'll take a while.  I'll accept feeling better for now because it feels great.

Purpose - it's the fire under your ass.

Purpose. It's that little flame that lights a fire under your ass. Ha! Purpose. It keeps you going strong like a car with a full tank of gas. Everyone else has a purpose, so what's mine?

(Any Avenue Q fans out there?  Luuurve that show.) My dear friend Amy over at My Right To Dream is having gastric sleeve surgery today, which is a form of weight loss surgery (wls).  As I've mentioned before, I had gastric bypass surgery and, a year and a half later, corrective plastic surgery to remove loose skin (abdominoplasty) and complete a breast reduction/lift (most wls patients bemoan the loss of their boobs - nope, not me - I still had DDs, even after losing over a hundred pounds, lucky me). As can be expected with any major surgery, especially a life-changing one that someone is undergoing by choice, Amy is incredibly nervous and a bit scared.  WLS involves such a roller coaster of emotions - joy at being approved, depression and guilt and sadness and anger about needing the surgery in the first place, fear of failure, fear of success (because it changes everything in your life), and so much more.

I was at my lowest weight in September 2005, following my plastic surgery.  In the nearly four years since then, I have gained about 18 pounds per year, which I shouldn't have to point out is NOT GOOD.  Really not good.  Not good for anyone, but especially not good if you've had WLS.  This means you are defeating the surgery and "the tool" (i.e. the stomach pouch).  I got a scope done early last year to see if I had stretched out my pouch and it turned out that my pouch was perfect BUT that my stoma (the opening between my pouch and my intestines) had stretched and so food moved really quickly from my pouch into my intestines, leaving me hungry more quickly than it should.  In a fully working pouch, the food sits in there for a long time so you feel full for a while.  Immediately post-op, the stoma is the size of a pencil eraser.  I don't know how big mine is now, but it's definitely not small and apparently I would be eligible for stoma revision surgery, but that would involve doctors and bills and insurance approvals, blah blah blah.  I can't afford a dime of it right now if it's not covered 100%, so I haven't followed up on it. 

Instead, I'm going to work on this on my own. Amy's surgery today has lit a fire under my ass.  I was supposed to be a good example.  I was supposed to be a success story.  I was not supposed to become a raging snack addict.  I was not supposed to regain OVER SEVENTY POUNDS.  I'm not supposed to feel sad that my husband met me at my thinnest and most athletic and now has to live with a wife who continually gains weight, which makes her unhappy.  He continues to support me at any size and does not/would not care if I stayed my current size for life, but my unhappiness upsets and concerns him.

I spent over an hour on the phone with Amy yesterday, trying to calm her fears and reassure her that this will be wonderful.  One of the main points I wanted to make was that everything she'll go through is valid; all of her feelings and emotions and reactions are valid.  If she's mad that her husband can eat half a pizza and not care, that's fair.  It's not fair that some of us have to work better at maintaining a healthy lifestyle than others and it's fair to say that.  All's fair in food and weight.  I was told that it was "stupid" to miss food or pigging out and that people with food addictions had the real problems and that anyone who cried over missing food was laughable - so I cried in secret and became ashamed.  I know this is a part of my current food issues.

After my plastic surgery, my mother bought me a bracelet to commemorate the occasion (my apologies for the cheesy camera phone pic):

The idea was that the engraved dates are my birthday and my rebirthdays.  My WLS and plastics dates were my rebirth.  It was almost like a do-over.  I got to be me again (or, really, for the first time) - the me that I thought I could be but felt I couldn't be because of my weight. I haven't been able to wear the bracelet for a long time because I was ashamed of no longer meeting the criteria that the bracelet represented.  When I took it out today, it was tarnished because I haven't worn it or even touched it for so long.  So I buffed and polished it and put it on my wrist.  There are spots of tarnish I couldn't buff out, but that's okay.  I have spots of tarnish I will never buff out. 

This bracelet represents my goal.  I need to get back to the me of those rebirthdays.  I will continue to wear the bracelet as a reminder of what I am trying to achieve for myself. So today I have started the 5 Day Pouch Test.  So far today I had a coffee protein shake for breakfast (minus the cocoa because I didn't have any at home), a yogurt (which is off-plan but I didn't want it to go to waste), and am about to dig into some lentil and barley soup for lunch.. which I will also have as a snack... and as dinner... and repeat tomorrow.  So far I'm feeling okay, though.  No snacking anxiety yet (although that always tends to come later in the day) and really not any hunger pangs, surprisingly.  They suggest you cut caffeine, but can have one cup if cutting it completely will throw you into withdrawal, so I put one cup of coffee in my shake this morning.  There was no way I was going without coffee.  But other than that, I have just been sip-sip-sipping my water and I'm even going back to the "no drinking 30 minutes before or after meals" post-op rule.  If one of my problems is an open stoma that lets food slide through easily, then I need to make sure I don't make my meals into a slurry that leaves me hungry soon thereafter.  Not drinking while I eat is really difficult for me, and will be since I made my soup really spicy (I didn't have all of the spices the recipe called for so I just winged it and I think I over chili peppered it).  I'm also trying to eat more mindfully - slowly, thinking about what I'm eating.  My whole life, I've read while I ate and now I often watch TV and/or read online while I eat, so I'm not paying attention to how much I eat or how it tastes or, probably, when I'm full.  I've been living in fear of food and I can't do it any longer. So my purpose is to help Amy succeed and to drag myself back on the road to success.  My failures can be some of her keys to success.  I can take all that I've learned and help my dear friend avoid the same mistakes.  My failure will not be for nothing.  I can help her and I can help myself not do it all again.

I don't know how I know, but I'm gonna find my purpose. I don't know where I'm gonna look, but I'm gonna find my purpose.

I swore I wouldn't change...

But I've got some necessary revision to do.  Hell, I'm a writing teacher - revision is my life.

1. Lose 45 pounds (3/45) is now....  1. Lose 60 pounds (0/60).

I have not been in control of my eating and have made no attempt what-so-ever to get any sort of exercise or do any kind of physical activity, so more pounds are creeping on.  I got on the scale this morning and was absolutely horrified by what I saw, even though I just weighed myself two or three days ago.  I am out of control - meaning, I have relinquished control of my food intake and body's well-being... and I must do something about this.

There are a lot of reasons why I want to lose weight.  I can't fathom getting pregnant and putting on another 30 lbs and then having to lose ALL of that.  I want to be able to shop for semi-normal pregnancy clothes.  I want to currently fit into my old clothes.  I want to stop feeling tired.  I want to feel attractive and cute and sexy again.  I want to be proud of the shape that I'm in.  I want to be proud of the control I have over this lifelong habit and addiction.

Once again, I find Rebecca Woolf to be inspirational.  She is regularly 5'8" and a size 8 (damn lucky).  By the end of her first pregnancy, she was over 200 lbs.  She got up at 6am and went hiking every day to help work off the pregnancy weight (which was in the 190s by the time she got home from the hospital).  All that in the L.A. sun and heat.  Why can't I get off my ass and do something - anything! - when I don't have a newborn to take care of?

So this is it, intarwebs.  I'm making a change.  A revision.  I hate apologizing to myself every day.  I hate looking in my drawers and feeling depressed about the clothes I have and how they fit.  I hate how my back fat has grown back when, for a little while, I had a sloped back that I loved to look at. Without my snacks, I'm going to be mean.  Angry.  Sad.  Pissed.  Cranky.  But so is a junkie going through detox, which is really how I feel about this.  I have a habit that is detrimental to my health and plays with my brain chemistry and thought system.  No one but me can get it under control.

Nanananana... bread.

My nephew (age 15 months) says "nana" for banana... of course, he also calls one of his grandmothers "Nana"... so is he calling her bananas (i.e. crazy)?  I guess only time will tell.

I love bananas; I could eat one every day.  However, the hubby doesn't eat them so when I buy a bunch, I always end up with one or two bananas going brown.  This, however, isn't terrible because then I can make - dun dun da dun! - banana bread! 

So last night I set out to make (who else's?) Smitten Kitchen's Jacked-Up Banana Bread.  Except mine turned out to be more like low-jack banana bread - but still yummy. So I got all my stuff ready (note: those are not something gross - they're just REALLY brown bananas):

This was the first time I was going to use my mini-loaf pan so I was super excited about that.  (Those of you who know me IRL can expect a mini-loaf of something yummers for the holidays.  I have two of these so I can get EIGHT mini-loaves going at a time - rock on.)  And, yes, that is the cheap vanilla I'm using.  I'm trying to use it up in recipes where the vanilla isn't the star so its quality isn't of utmost importance (I bought it in a crunch one day for emergency vanilla use). So I got to mashing and mixing and just loved how the scoops of brown sugar kept a sand-castle-like appearance as I added them to the mix:

I also love that the recipe insists that you use a wooden spoon.  I don't know enough about the science of baking to know why you should use a wooden spoon for this, but it makes it feel extra special that it's required (although I would have used one anyway just because I love them and they mix really well).

However, here is where the banana bread went from jacked-up to low-jack.  I was opting out of the bourbon (I'm not a fan of alcohol in baked goods most of the time - I just don't enjoy the taste) and then also realized that I did not have nutmeg OR clove on hand!  What?  Ugh!  What happened to all of my baking supplies??  I could have sworn I had both spices on hand.  I swear, I am usually ready for any baking situation.  So, alas, my banana bread was going to be single spice instead of triple spice.  I figured it would still be good, though, so I soldiered on.

Aren't they cute?  So teeny!  I forced myself to let them cool before I sliced into one.  The hubby hates both bananas AND cinnamon (*gasp* - I know, right?) so these are aaaaaall mine.  Yum yum.  Except that my sister-in-law's eyes lit up when I mentioned this the other day, so I'm giving one mini-loaf to her.  The other one will be fully devoured by the end of today and I really don't need to be eating two whole mini-loaves myself in the span of two days (which is exactly what would happen).

I really love to bake - and I'm really beginning to love cooking now, too - I just wish I had more occasion to do so.  Money is always an issue, but I'm contemplating making a significant change in my diet in order to eat less meat.  I don't think I could ever be a vegan because the idea of giving up cheese makes me want to just quit life, but I have a lot of issues with the contemporary diet, its affect on human health, and how the industrial farming complex in this country works, so it's something I'm pondering.  I would love to get the hubby on board, but that won't happen so this is going to take a lot of resolve, something I've never exactly been full of when it comes to food.  More thoughts on this to come, I'm sure. But for now, back to nibbling on the banana bread.

They're not haters, actually - you might just not be all that.

Source: flickr.com/photos/lunchbreath

Every morning, I check the same websites: my email, LiveJournal, Wordpress, Google Reader, The Daily Beast, and Huffington Post.  I skim through, reading bits here and there, and often full articles if I have the time and inclination (I would love to read more full articles, but it's just not always possible).

Well, there was a really interesting piece posted on The Daily Beast on Sunday titled "Do Narcissists Have Better Sex?"  The thrust of the article is that we have created a generation of narcissists (we're looking at you Gen Y/Millenials) thanks to all the "Don't let anyone tell you you're wrong" "You can do anything you want" parenting and pop culture incentives that have happened over the past two decades or so.  This has lead to a whole generation of people who feel entitled to feel good about themselves at all times and who believe that anyone who tries to intimate that they might, just might, have things they might want to work on is a hater and the sort of person who likes to make other people feel terrible, just for sport.

I often read articles that I semi-agree or semi-disagree with, but every now and again I go, "Yes!  This!  Exactly this!"  This is one of those times.  I think the article's author, Hanna Seligson, has hit a very big nail right on its shiny, glaring head.  There might be a sentence or two that I take issue with, but I agree with her overall idea and postulations. I have been frustrated by this phenomenon but her article was able to put it into words in a way that I have found myself unable to do. 

It started back in 2003 when I was planning my sister's bridal shower and had an unpleasant run-in with one of the bridesmaids, a particularly bitchy and narcissistic blonde who accused me of overcharging them for the room rental so that I could make a profit on the shower (meanwhile, I had easily covered $1000 worth of expenses that they didn't contribute to).  What proceeded was a particularly nasty back-and-forth over email, during which I wrote things that I never believed I could actually say, especially to someone directly, and have since promised myself I would never say/write to someone again.  I insulted her commitment to her friendship with my sister and her overall intelligence... a few times over.  I don't remember most of what she said, but I clearly remember that she gave me the "People like you just like to take people like me down" line.

That line stands out in my memory because it was one of my first encounters with this sort of thinking.  First, I was put off by the binary.  People like me = older, fat, (then) dateless, loser.  People like her = naturally thin, blonde, super pretty, popular, mean because she can be.  It was simply crazy to me that someone "like me" was trying to take down someone "like her".  It was a total reverse of the standard power structure and so crazy that I couldn't understand where it was coming from. Now I know, though.  It was all that namby-pamby, give everyone a trophy for showing up stuff that's been going on for a while now and is a huge support system to the current reality show production system.  I watch some reality television, but I have very little patience for and tend not to watch the shows where when someone gets voted off, they go into the standard, "They made a mistake/they just don't 'get' me/you haven't seen the last of me/everyone will know my name/I'll be famous anyway" rant.  I'm sorry, snowflake, but odds are you won't be famous anyway unless you sell out that attitude and become a ridiculous farce of yourself. I'm so glad someone was able to put this into words. 

I hope more people take notice and there is an effort to work at reversing this trend.  Let's get back to trying to raise citizens that feel a responsibility to their communities and fellow people.

What was downtown is now uptown... namely me.

Yesterday I went to Teachers College (Columbia University) for some admitted students activities.  It ended up being a mixed day.  As someone who has already completed a graduate degree, the ins and outs of grad school are old hat to me by now.  However, it was great to meet some current students, hear an alumna speak, and spend some time on campus.

I had my camera with me but, unfortunately, since it was raining, the campus tours were canceled and there wasn't much of a point to walking around and taking pictures.  There's a full orientation day in September and I was told the campus tours will be done then.  One of them was a tour of Columbia's historic cultural sites; I am super excited for that one! (There's a statue of Alexander Hamilton that I haven't yet had a chance to go see!)

What struck me early in the day, though, was how this represents a shift and continuum in my life.  I used to take public transportation into the city and head downtown to NYU.  Instinctively, I almost headed for the downtown trains but caught myself and made sure I was going uptown (similarly, when heading home, I had to remind myself that Port Authority was now downtown of me, not uptown).  But NYU used to have a Morningside Heights campus and Teachers College had classroom space in the Village, so it really is like my NYC schooling is linked and circular.  (I'll add that I started kindergarten in the Bronx, so this really is like a move towards my past and a move to the future at the same time.)

The highlight of yesterday, though, was getting to meet the woman who helped create Blue's Clues and who has also worked on Oswald and Little Bill.  (She's a TC alum.)  All that history and talk of registration and student loans and nitty gritty and it comes down to a bunch of Noggin shows, which is fine by me.  Someday my nephew will be impressed that I met her.  For now I'm just happy to be a student again and on the road to what should be the last stretch of my formal education.

Flame... Flames... on the sides of my face...

Any Clue fans?  Full disclosure: I can quote the whole movie... in Cantonese.  Okay, kidding... about the Cantonese, that is.  If we watch the movie together, I will try not to quote the whole thing as it plays, I promise.

As I sit here watching and reading lots of news clips, I can only wonder why it is that EVERY SINGLE PERSON I see criticizing Sonia Sotomayor is a white man? I can't even bring myself to calm down enough to adequately address the language being used in reference to her.  It is so extremely gender and race biased that it makes me sick. 

G. Gordon Liddy saying that he hopes she doesn't have to make decisions when she's menstruating and referring to the language of Spanish as speaking "illegal alien"???  What about Glen Beck calling her "Hispanic chick lady"?  Several intimating that she only got in to Princeton because of affirmative action.  (Oh, yes, and George W. Bush got into Yale based on his stellar academics.  She won the top prize when she graduated.  What did Bushie win?  Nada - we all lost.) 

And so what that all of the judges on Obama's short list were women?  Guess what - the bench needs one.  I'm sorry old white men, but your time is up.  Time to learn how to share. In reference to the recent Prop 8 decision, my brother said that decades from now scholars are going to look back on this time period - our time period - and view it the same way that we view segregation and the ban on interracial marriages.  I'm hopeful that his guess of "decades from now" is correct because I really fear that it's going to take longer than that.  Better yet, though, I hope it happens even sooner than that.  I'm not sure how long I can bear to live in a state of constant frustration at the intolerance of my fellow citizens.

Three months of stasis

49. Pick a blog theme and stick with it for more than three months.

I realized recently that I may have completed this and, lo and behold, I have!  I last changed the blog theme on February 19 so I completed this list item last week.  The reason that this was a goal for me was because I tend to like to change these kinds of things frequently and I think that would be bad for the blog.  I know I, as a reader, would be thrown off if a blog I liked looked unfamiliar every time I went back to it.  I'm that kid that moved her bedroom furniture around once a month, just to change things up, but I've gotten used to this theme and still find it to be the most useful one.  I can't promise it won't change in the future, though.

Gay marriage and beyond?

I work a later shift today, so I had some time this morning to read emails and watch a little TV before heading to work.  I watched a little of the Today show, but then they were heading into the dreaded fourth hour with Hoda and Kathie Lee, so I very quickly switched over to Tyra. She was doing a show about LGBT issues.  Since I only got to watch about five minutes of it, I don't know what issues she went in to, but what I did get to see was that she divided up her audience by sexual orientation.  Each audience member was wearing a shirt that said "straight" "gay" or "?". 

Question mark?  Seriously?  For a show that's supposed to be enlightened, that's just wrong. Then Tyra launched into a montage that compared the gay rights movement to the civil rights movement, which I feel is an accurate comparison (although I've seen plenty of angry arguments stating that it's not).  You don't choose to be gay just as much as you don't choose to be black.  Both groups have a history of high imprisonment, prejudice, and persecution.  And, of course, there is the joint issue of marriage. I know that in some parts of the country or in some circles, biracial marriage still receives looks and comments and even hate mail (ask Taye Diggs and Idina Menzel, sadly). 

However, in my experience, it is not much of an issue but I have run into prejudice in my own family.  I once had a boyfriend who was Indian and dark-skinned and I was thinking about bringing him to a family wedding.  When I mentioned this to a family member, they said, "Okay, but everyone is going to think he's black"  as if that statement alone explains everything.  So what if they think he's black?  Oh no, wait, so what if he IS black?  It was aggravating and saddening, but it was a number of years ago now and I do believe that there has been progression within my own family.

I am in favor of gay marriage and I believe that most, if not all, of my immediate family is, as well.  My parents are religious and spiritual (there is a difference between the two, but they are both); however, they are also very accepting of "the gay lifestyle", for lack of a better phrase. 

I don't believe marriage is a religious institution and the people who frame it as one are being incredibly historically myopic.  Marriage, if you truly look at it historically, is a financial institution.  Women were property and came with property as well.  Period.  The idea of marrying for love is relatively new in the expanse of human experience (however, with US tax laws and benefits rights, it's also still strongly a financial arrangement).

So, if we are still relatively new in the process of defining marriage as an institution of love, then why are we defining it in terms of who we love?  I did not grow up and choose to be straight.  There was no day where I went, "Yes, I have decided - I shall be attracted to males."  I don't believe being gay is any different.  As my mother says, it's hard to imagine that someone would choose something so societally difficult on purpose. What I am left to wonder, though, is what the next step will be.  No, I do not equate gay marriage with marrying your pets or whatever other cockamamie idea the anti-gay marriage people have come up with.  However, I am personally aware of some three-person relationships.  Often, two of the people are married and the third lives with them as a boyfriend or girlfriend to either one or both of the married persons.  This is not a situation I can picture for myself (I've got my hands full with just a husband, lol) but I've seen enough people truly happy in this situation that I feel that I cannot judge it as wrong for any moral or personal reasons.  As long as all involved adults are happy and satisfied, who am I to butt in?  And, more so, why would I want to?

But what happens when a polyamorous couple, err, group (? we need words for this) wants to get married?  This thought crossed my mind a few days ago and has been dancing around in my head.  I haven't come to any conclusion on it yet.  I do lean towards inclusiveness in life in general but I haven't been able to figure out how this would work legally or socially.  Once gay marriage is more of a norm and allowed through most of the states (which I believe is coming), I think this might be one of our next social issues, although I don't know how much traction it will have since the numbers for this are probably significantly smaller than the ones for those with a stake in gay marriage (not that numbers should matter, but it will regarding press coverage). Sometimes I fear for the open dialogue in this country.  It feels like people just want to shut down ideas and topics they don't like instead of actually discussing them and hoping to learn something or educate someone else.  I hope this feeling passes and that everyone relaxes and has more conversations (instead of shouting matches) going forward.

An email made me pause

A couple of days ago, I received an email that seemed normal, then startling, then fear-inspiring, then weird, then hopeful and happy.

What was it?

My regular tri-monthly reminder that it was time to renew my birth control prescription.

Totally on autopilot, I started thinking about what was in the bank and if I could afford to file the renewal at that moment.  Then it dawned on me: I wasn't going to be renewing the Rx because we're actually going to TRY and conceive instead of actually working to AVOID conception. Whoa.

So over dinner last night, I started with, "Uh, so, I got this email..." and ended with, "So, uh, are we really going to start trying?  Like, do I really not renew the prescription?"  And it turns out, after all this time of the hubby being more sure about this than me, now I'm the one who's more sure and he's the one who's a bit scared - not scared in the "no, we should wait" way but in the "wow, having kids at any time is going to be scary" way. 

We talked about our plans for the apartment and I told him about the recent Momversation episode about birth plans and what I think mine would consist of.  We talked about how a baby would fit into our lives - or what I think our lives will look like a year from now - all while kind of laughing in my head because I know it's not that you fit a baby into your life - it's that you fit your life around the baby. I definitely think there's something to timing and feeling that you're ready.  I used to hate shows like A Baby Story and mommy blogs... and now I can't get enough of mommy blogs and have caught myself watching an episode or two of A Baby Story.  Meanwhile, I no longer have the patience for wedding/bridal-related shows and sites, something I couldn't get enough of this time last year.

Life is a beautiful, scary, awe-inspiring journey.  There are so many great things one can do in life: travel, learn, explore, ponder, love... but there's nothing as unretractable (is that a word?) and permanent as having a child, which is probably why it's so fear-inspiring to those not yet initiated and such a constant and glowing topic of conversation amongst those who have.  We're not trying yet (really, not yet - I promise) but I'm definitely more excited about the prospect than I ever have been before.  Still scared, but kind of in a good way.

Things I miss Friday - MASH

No, not the TV show - the game little girls play:

As you can see, you listed the boys you liked, the careers you wanted, cities you wanted to live in, and cars you wanted to drive.  MASH stood for: mansion, apartment, shack, house - i.e. the places you might live as an adult.  The person doing the selection for you drew a squiggle in the middle until you told them to stop.  Then they counted either how many spaces were in the swirl or how many lines from top to bottom (I grew up counting the lines).  Then they went through the list counting off and crossing off until you were only left with one item in each category.

I just did one for myself and here's my future:  I'm living in a shack with Chris Pine (the new Captain Kirk - HAWT!) in Baltimore.  I drive a convertible Mini and make my living as a writer.  Now isn't that fun?  (Although how I have a Mini and a movie star as a husband but live in a shack, I don't know.  Shopping habit?)  As a little girl, imagining these aspects of your future is one of the most fun things you could do, or at least it was for me.  There was nothing like imagining what it would be like to have someone who loved me, who promised to love me for life, to have my own home and car, and a full career in a city I imagined I'd love (since I hadn't been to any foreign cities in elementary school).

I imagine that today this would be very different.  In fact, even filling this out right now was really difficult.  I could only think of a few careers I want.  I only chose celebrities as future husbands because there's no other "regular" guy I want other than my hubby.  The cars weren't really interesting to think about and the cities felt really unlikely since so much of my life is tied to north Jersey - I don't see going far.  So what would the grown-up game look like?  There might still be cars.  Other lists might be number of children or places to visit or some valuable life comforts (like winning the lottery or college loans paid off).  I don't know; I'll have to think about it a bit more.  This game told us what we thought we'd value as adult women; now that we are, is it the same?

I love you, except when I don't.

And by "you", I mean student papers.  In theory, I love grading papers.  When I have stacks of short grading to do (say, introduction paragraphs), I really get into it.  But when I have a stack of final papers, even if they're only four pages long (or, unfortunately, less), I just do not relish digging in.  There are just some things that I do not enjoy as often as I love them. Other things I love, except when I don't:

• cleaning
• making coffee
• cooking dinner
• styling my hair
• choosing my outfit for the day
• going clothes shopping
• going out to dinner
• hanging out with people

Sometimes I need and yearn for these things.  Some mornings I love getting my hair "just so".  Other mornings, I wish I could just wear a hat because I cannot be bothered to toy with the hair dryer, round brush, and texturizing cream.  I sometimes love being home by myself, putting on my favorite music and yellow gloves, and scrubbing the kitchen from top to bottom.  Other times, I would rather lie on a crumb-laden floor than take out the Swiffer and clean it.  Of course, at times like those I can call up my sister and have my one-year-old nephew come over since Swiffering is one of his favorite activities (no lie):

That's my nephew on Easter with my Mom's Swiffer... right before he sat on it and broke it (TJ the Destroyer).  (By the way, can you not love that outfit??  He looks like a future Justin Timberlake.) 

Anyway, there was my daily excuse for getting my nephew into the conversation.  Moving along...

So what is it that causes this love vs. avoidance conundrum?  Is everyone so fickle?  I hate to admit it, but even books fall into this.  I adore reading but sometimes it's the last thing I want to do, even if it's purely reading for pleasure - even if it's a book I've been looking forward to.  Is it the behavior of the residual three year old in all of us, defiant even against those things we love?  Or is it something else?  Or is it (*gulp*) just me?