Film blanc

I now have almost everything I need for my trip. All I have to do is get on the plane and fly roughly 3,000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean and away from home. I don't get out much.

Oh, and I have to exchange some money. Dollars to euros. I'm monitoring the exchange rates, which makes me feel like a wheeling, dealing day trader. Not to mention an international traveler. I do live an interesting life, don't I?

*****

So, so interesting. I bought a rain jacket, and then I tested it in the actual rain. The rain jacket looks nice and it kept me as dry as a piece of toast in steady, though not heavily pouring rain. So with the jacket and bag situation under control, I just have to figure out what to pack and how to pack it, because I'll probably need more than the rain jacket.

Did I mention that I hate leaving home? Is that inconsistent with liking travel? Because I do like to travel and see new places and people. I just don't like to be away from home.

When I bought the rain jacket, I also bought a gray full-zip fleece jacket with a collar, because I believe in truthful packaging, so when I'm in a foreign country, I should probably dress like a middle-aged suburban American lady. The people should know what they're getting. The fleece jacket is very warm and comfortable with deep hand-warmer pockets. It's a little big and not particularly stylish or flattering, but it feels as secure as a turtle's shell.

You get where I'm going with this, right? The ugly, but comfortable fleece as a metaphor for home? OK, let's move on.

*****
It's Sunday night now, and I'm watching the Oscars. I'm not sure what to think about this crazy new host-less format. I guess it doesn't matter that much. I was disappointed that Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and Maya Rudolph led with a Trump joke, giving him Twitter fodder. And the Adam Lambert/Queen performance was only so-so; which of course, it would be, because Adam Lambert isn't Freddie Mercury. No one is Freddie Mercury, God rest his soul.

And the presenters? Why didn't Sam Rockwell present the Best Supporting Actress award? I'm confused. And although I'm sorry to see Amy Adams overlooked again, I'm delighted that Regina King is finally receiving the recognition that she has deserved for so long.

I don't know how late I'll stay awake tonight, so I can't commit to a full live-blog. Contain your disappointment. Here are some additional impressions:

• Who doesn't love Queen? Glenn Close and Octavia Spencer singing along with "We Will Rock You" were a highlight of the show. 
• Speaking of Queen, my favorite part of "Bohemian Rhapsody" was Rami Malek's speech about becoming what he (he being Freddie Mercury) was born to be. I thought about this as I watched Alison Janney during a pre-show red carpet interview. She's one of the few women her age who doesn't appear surgically altered, and she looks like a woman who has become exactly who she was born to be. Something to aspire to. 
• Why is Pharrell Williams wearing shorts? Silly. 
• I thought I saw Dana Carvey in the audience and wondered what he was doing there. DUH! Who else but Dana Carvey and Mike Myers could have introduced "Bohemian Rhapsody?" We're not worthy. No one is. 

I was so hoping that Richard E. Grant would win for "Can You Ever Forgive Me," a movie that I can't stop thinking about, but Mahershala Ali was also wonderful in "Green Book." It's just hard for me to understand the reasoning behind a Supporting Actor nomination for the actor playing one of the two lead characters in the movie. But what do I know? 

Actually, I do know a bit. I have seen seven of the nominated movies ("A Star is Born," "Black Panther," "Can You Ever Forgive Me," "Green Book," "Bohemian Rhapsody," "BlacKKKlansman," and "Vice"). This is a high number for me. I usually see only one or two of the movies before the show, and then catch up later.

*****
I did end up watching the entire show. I wish that Spike Lee hadn't given Trump any Twitter ammunition, but no one can silence Spike Lee, I guess. I share his disdain for the President, though I don't share his outrage over the surprise Best Picture win for "Green Book." I liked "Green Book." And I like Spike Lee.

As for the show itself, it was fine. That's all anyone can expect from the Oscars now, I guess. It was fine, but it was boring. When Spike Lee turning his back and Melissa McCarthy wearing stuffed bunnies are among your most outrageous moments, then the Academy Awards as a broadcast event is probably all but over. Next year, I guess they can just slap the winners' names on PowerPoint slides, stream the presentation on YouTube, and be done with it. It's a little sad.

On the other hand, the Oscars broadcast makes my raincoat and fleece shopping and near-daily exchange rate check-ins (the dollar and the euro are both very stable currencies--the rates have not budged in weeks) seem interesting, even compelling. In a few weeks, I'll be on a plane flying over the ocean to the land of (some of) my ancestors, so who cares about the Oscars? Real life is always more interesting than the movies. 

Baggage claim

Saturday: After I finished making soup last night, I felt out of sorts. I haven't been depressed in some time, and I didn't really feel depressed, just anxious (more so than usual). I was worried, because things seemed worrisome. Then for some reason, I started singing Donna Summer's "Heaven Knows," a song I haven't heard or thought of for a very long time.

I sang Donna's part and Joe Esposito's part. I don't know the song that well anymore, so it wasn't one of my better performances. But I felt better anyway. I remembered most of the words, and I sang it twice, yielding to my imaginary audience's demand for an encore. Then I stopped, because you should always leave your imaginary audience wanting more.

As I washed the dishes, I had an idea for a story, but then I thought that it might be too close to my real life. Of course, that's where the greatest writers get their best ideas, but I'm not one of the greatest writers, so I'm not going to write this particular story. I don't even remember the idea.

Actually, I totally do remember the idea. But I don't want to write a story about myself. I'm the least interesting topic to write about that I can think of.

Oh who am I kidding. I'm my favorite subject. What else do I write about 95 percent of the time?

*****
Sunday morning:Yesterday was an exhausting day. My mother-in-law had chest pains and shortness of breath, so I took her to the emergency room.

If nothing else, the emergency room on a Saturday is a place to watch people, and I love to watch people. The staff checked us in and hurried us to triage right away, but after the nurse determined that my mother-in-law was in no immediate danger, we sat and waited.

When my husband called from work and asked me to take his mother to the hospital, I was already up and showered and dressed, well into my second cup of coffee. So I had a distinct advantage over most of the other ER waiters, most of whom appeared to have rushed out the door after an unexpected early wake-up call. They wore pajama pants or leggings and sheepskin boots and whatever coat happened to be closest to the door as they ran out of the house. One lady in her 60s or so was the exception; she had obviously dressed very carefully before she left the house, and she looked very nice--neat and stylish. She was alone, and I couldn't decide if she'd already been up and dressed and ready for a day of shopping or museum-going and then had a medical emergency and headed to the hospital instead; or if she just didn't like to leave the house, even for the hospital, unless she has herself organized. Either possibility seemed likely.

It was hard to tell what the other people were there for. The well-dressed lady was a heart patient, I think. She was wheeled away for a chest x-ray just after my mother-in-law returned from hers. Neither of them were thrilled about the mandatory wheelchair ride, but hospital policy is hospital policy. The other patients were in various stages of discomfort or distress, which they had to endure in the very public waiting room on the hard plastic chairs. I hoped that all of them would soon be in private rooms, resting in semi-comfortable beds.

One lady was carrying a grocery store tote bag that was obviously her purse for the day. She rummaged through it every time her name was called, pulling out insurance documents and prescription bottles. After 30 minutes or so of just waiting, she pulled out a magazine and a bottle of water and a sleeve of crackers, and settled in for what she must have expected would be a long wait. She looked a little disappointed when a nurse called her name a few minutes later.

*****
I thought about this woman as I planned obsessively for what to bring on my trip next month, and what to wear on every day, and in every possible weather scenario. I get very anxious when I'm far from home. I usually define "far from home" as any distance from my house greater than 20 miles, so overseas trips are a source of acute anxiety. Control helps me to manage the anxiety, and there's no greater feeling of control than having exactly what I need, and exactly the right way to carry it all. Bags and shoes and jackets are the most important items; but any time I take a trip, I overthink about every item that I'll need to bring or wear.

It would be nice to be the person who could just grab the nearest re-usable grocery bag, throw in her wallet and keys, and maybe a snack and some water, and just run out the door. I should be that person. As many times as I've obsessively planned for every item that should accompany me around the country (or around the corner if we're being honest), I can't think of many times that it made a difference to the trip.

Or maybe it did. Because maybe I'm just so good at packing that I've never forgotten anything and so have never felt the lack of whatever a less-careful packer might have left behind.

******
Thursday: So my mother-in-law is fine now. Her chest x-ray, EKG, and blood work were all clear. She'll see a cardiologist next week, just in case, but she's in very good health and I'm hopeful that we'll have her for many years to come. I suppose I should have told you that right away, but then you'd lose the element of suspense that's so important to a rambling, no-point blog post about absolutely nothing. Nothing but me, of course. I'm still my own favorite subject.

A week in the life: Seven days, three handbags, three books, 57 chocolates, and a pot of soup

Saturday: I don't have anything to write about right now, but it's a day, and I try to write every day. So here I am.

OK, here's something. I bought a travel handbag. There is no reason on earth for me to buy another handbag of any type whatsoever. But I thought about what I wanted to bring with me on the plane, and then pictured those items in each of the many bags that I already have. None of them worked in my imaginary plane scenario. So I bought a new one, and then learned that it was far larger than Aer Lingus's "personal item" size limit allows.  So I returned it and bought another one. The old ones are all mad that they don't get to go to Ireland. But they'll get over it.

*****
Sunday: The freezing cold has returned, after a short reprieve. I went walking/running this morning, thinking about how the beautiful thin January sunlight makes the cold bearable, and even a little pleasant. And then I realized that it's February, and has been for some time. It's always later than I think.

I just finished reading Emma Cline's The Girls, a really good, though disturbing novel, a fictionalized re-imagining of the Manson murders. The titular girls are devotees of the novel's Charles Manson figure, Russell (his last name is mentioned once, and I cannot remember it). Like Manson, Russell manipulates, abuses, and drugs the girls until they gradually surrender their humanity and willingly commit a horrific crime. The author does a very good job of illustrating Russell's control over the girls, without excusing for one moment their choice to remain with him and do his bidding.

The Girls is told in the first person from the point of view of Evie, a 14-year-old hanger-on who doesn't participate in the crime. That's not a spoiler; you learn about 10 pages in that Evie wasn't present on the night of the murders. The surprise comes in how that came about. Evie is an American archetype-- a young, affluent, neglected child of divorce so desperate for family and belonging that even a filthy band of drug-addled and depraved hippies will do.  But she's also a very emotionally complex and compelling character.

The adult Evie tells the story in alternating chapters--early 21st century, and 1969. In 1969, Evie, the granddaughter of a famous movie star whose mother inherited her wealth, is adrift as her newly divorced parents pursue new relationships and fail to notice their daughter's loneliness and alienation. Present-day Evie moves haphazardly from job to job and  relationship to relationship, mostly remaining anonymous but occasionally running into people who remain fascinated by the murders and who know about her past. Knowing better than anyone the intense vulnerability of a young unprotected girl, she tries to save the teenage girlfriend of her former boyfriend's spoiled and heartless son--not from physical danger but from self-destructive devotion to a man who doesn't care about her. We don't learn the girl's fate.

Though we know exactly what happened (in the actual Manson murders) and so almost exactly what will happen in The Girls, it's still suspenseful--intensely so during the last 20 pages or so. It's also filled with amazing writing--vivid (often horrifying) description and uncomfortably close observation of the worst in human nature. It's not something that I would want to read again, but I'll probably at least re-read some passages. This one will stay with me for a while.

*****
Monday: I watched the news for a few minutes but had to turn it off to demonstrate my utter disdain for the social media scandal du jour. Of course, I think that Trump would make fun of the Trail of Tears, but I don't think he did. He was referring to the campaign trail. He probably doesn't even know what the Trail of Tears is. All of the Democrats--all 50 of them or however many are running for President--are going to have to do so much better than high-horse faux outrage over every stupid tweet and every stupid identity politics offense. Because if they don't, he'll win again.

Meanwhile, let's talk about something important. Let's talk about my second unsuccessful handbag purchase in as many weeks. I want something utilitarian, but not ugly. Is this too much to ask? Apparently, it is. So I'll try one more time, then I'll give up and carry one of my old ones.

*****

Tuesday night: It's hard to believe that it's been almost a year since I wrote this but it was and here I am again. It's 6:45 PM and I'm just one of the milling crowd, waiting for the cluster concert to begin. It's my son's last cluster concert, so I'm a little verklepmt.

Talk amongst yourselves. I'll give you a topic.
The Cluster Concert: Both a Cluster and a Concert. Discuss. 

The auditorium filled quickly when the doors finally opened. The high school musicians will make their customary grand entrance, after spending a few minutes watching from the corridor outside the auditorium, marveling at how young the elementary and middle school kids look.

It's cold and rainy today, just a few degrees above the freezing temperatures that would have given my sons a much longed-for two-hour delay this morning. I almost never drink coffee after noon but I had to stop at the store to buy snacks for the bake sale and a hot drink seemed like just the thing. So I went to Starbucks and got a latte. I always say that I can't afford a three-dollar coffee every day so imagine my dismay which I found that a Starbucks latte actually costs five dollars now. It's been a while. Again: It's always later than I think.

I just finished my coffee. Now the young musicians are taking the stage and the lights are going down, so it's time to stop blogging and behave like a respectful audience member.

*****

Wednesday: The concert was lovely, and over by 8:15. Meanwhile, today is another day, so I have another handbag. My handbag habit is one of the many reasons why I can't afford a five-dollar coffee every day of the week. This latest one is almost exactly what I wanted: just the right size with a narrow, but not skinny strap; enough pockets, but not so many that I can't figure out what to put in them; reasonably durable and waterproof, and pretty. So I'm going to keep it. With that decision out of the way, I only have to figure out what else to bring to Ireland. I thought for five minutes about going carry-on only, but that's crazy talk. We leave in just over a month, so I have time to figure it out.

*****

Thursday: Valentine's Day. Every year, my husband gives me a Whitman's Sampler, my favorite-ever boxed chocolates. The boys also received their own Samplers, and the three of us have been trading for our favorites. Come to Mama, Cashew Clusters.

After the rather grueling experience of The Girls, I'm now reading I'm Judging You: The Do-Better Manual, by Luvvie Ajayi. I usually lose patience with hilarious-blogger-turned-author books very quickly, but this one is OK. Ajayi has a voice and something to say, and I'm enjoying her company. I'm also reading Martin Stannard's Muriel Spark: The Biography. Muriel Spark will require a separate post.

*****
Friday: I ate too much chocolate, as I always do on Valentine's Day (except for last year, when Valentine's Day fell on Ash Wednesday). It's 6:30 PM, and I'm making soup. A lot of stuff happened in the world today, but that's all I have--too much chocolate and just enough soup. And a three-day weekend, just in time. Maybe I need a rest. 

Things that go bump in the night

Things always seem worse in the middle of the night, when you should be sleeping but you can't. Problems seem unsolvable. Weird things seem weirder. Scary things are much scarier. Things that would seem ridiculous in daylight seem possible, even likely, when you're alone in the dark.

I'm a city girl who doesn't relish any encounter with wild animals, small or large. But I live in the suburbs. and although Silver Spring is a pretty close-in, urbanized suburb, it's still home to lots of animals. And I'm a fair-minded person. As far as I'm concerned, it's their turf just as much as mine. I'm not thrilled to run into foxes in daylight, or swarming bats at dusk, or rocket-launched frogs; or snakes, real or imaginary. But I acknowledge their right to our shared habitat.

I have to draw the line somewhere, though. There are limits, you know?

A few days ago, a neighborhood friend posted a picture of a very large paw print in her backyard snow. And according to commenters on the post, the print belonged to a bear. And according to the Internet, bears are not at all unheard-of visitors in Silver Spring. And according to me, WHAT? WHAT? WHAT? What, as my 17-year-old son says, in the ACTUAL HELL?

I mean, really. Bats and squirrels and deer and raccoons and foxes? Fine. But bears? This isn't Yellowstone, for crying out loud. A bear. A BEAR.

Clearly, it was time to get off social media for the day, and so I did. And I didn't give the bear another thought. Until I woke up at 3 in the morning for my regularly scheduled anxiety attack, and realized that I could never again go outside unarmed. A BEAR! I've seen "The Revenant," and I am in no way equipped to survive a similar encounter with a bear in the wild, even if the wild is the DMV suburbs.

Having resolved never to leave the house on foot again, I went back to sleep. And then I woke up. And the sun was out. And the snow had melted, not completely, but enough that roaming bears wouldn't have had enough snow in which to leave a decent footprint. This made a difference, for some reason. Even if the bear was hiding somewhere, I wouldn't have to see its footprint. Out of sight, out of mind. So I went running, picking my way around the remaining patches of ice and noting likely options for shelter if the bear were to appear. And I returned home unscathed after an uneventful morning run.

*****
It's Monday now, so warm that the snow has completely melted, leaving mist to rise from the sidewalks in the bright sun this morning. Maybe a rodent is just as reliable a predictor of weather conditions as NOAA. And speaking of the wild kingdom, I haven't seen so much as a squirrel today. Not even a pigeon.

*****
Tuesday: I worked from home today. It's not my normal WFH day, but I wasn't feeling well. I don't have the kind of job that lets a sick person just rest and get better (who does?) but staying at home helps. I'm still not 100 percent, but I'm better than I was.

I'm torn about the State of the Union. On the one hand, I'd like to continue with my Trump embargo. I just don't want to look at his face or hear his voice. On the other hand, I want to maintain some level of informed-ness, some situational awareness. Plus it'll be fun to watch the reaction when he declares the state of emergency, as I expect he will.

I should call the White House. Maybe they can do something about the bear.  Some sort of neighborhood enclosure, to keep the people on one side and the bear on the other. It doesn't have to be a wall; any sort of physical barrier will do. Steel slats, maybe, or a chain-link fence.

*****
Wednesday: So that was interesting. No state of emergency, and even the Democratic women in white were forced to applaud--standing, no less--when the President spoke about the record number of women in Congress. And even I was moved, once again, by the story of Alice Johnson. Criminal justice reform is long overdue, and if there's any reason to be hopeful, it's that even some of the most conservative Republicans are championing the idea that our incarceration rates represent a sinful waste of human life and potential. I'm happy for Ms. Johnson, and I'll give credit where it's due, even if it's due to Donald Trump and Jared Kushner and Kim Kardashian.

I fell asleep before the thing was over, and didn't get to see Stacey Abrams give the Democratic response. And the usual post-Trump-speech fact checks gave him better truthfulness ratings than he usually earns. Apparently, at least half of what he said was actually true.

On the other hand, he loses points for the "war and investigations" remark, which doesn't even make any sense. So it's a C-plus.

Yes, that's right, I'm giving Trump a C-plus. Factor that into his GPA, accounting for every other speech and public performance since January 2017, and he's still failing.

And if a bear wandering around Silver Spring isn't a damn national emergency, then I don't know what is.

*****
It's Thursday now, and a week into February. My trip to Ireland is just over a month away, and I'm figuring out how to pack. I thought about trying to manage the week with a carry-on alone, but I don't know. I have some planning to do.

And why does a kid jump into my seat on the couch every single time I get up?

I bought a travel handbag, and I'm not sure if I like it or not. I think I do. I want all of the handbags. It's a problem. Next week, I'll discuss my packing strategy and my obsessive-compulsive what-to-bring decision process. There might be flow charts, or maybe a Tableau visualization.

It would be nice to be one of those people who don't panic about every minor detail and who can take a trip without spending weeks worrying about what to bring and what to leave home.

But you know what? I almost completely forgot about the bear. Sometimes my gnat-like attention span and my obsessive overthinking work in my favor. There is always a silver lining.

An early spring

My son swam in his last high school swim meet today and joined his fellow seniors for the traditional senior recognition. During the break between the 50 Freestyle and the 100 Butterfly, the seniors walked through a human tunnel of underclassmen as a parent volunteer read each senior's name and a short biography. As the seniors emerged from the tunnel, they shook hands with their coach, who has been with them for all four years; then another parent handed them balloons. Holding their balloons, the seniors lined up one by one on the bulkhead that separates the aquatic center's two pools; and then they stood for a few moments, smiling, posing for pictures, and waving to acknowledge the cheers of their fans.

The group, 12 seniors in all, is not particularly close. They swim for four or five different summer and club teams, and most of them don't share interests outside the pool. But they're still friends, connected by the shared experience of pre-dawn practices in the chilly water of the county aquatic center pool. They shoulder-hugged and exchanged fist bumps as they lined up on the bulkhead, laughing as their bios and favorite swim team memories were read aloud.  The whole thing took no more than 10 minutes, and then it was time to get back to work. I blew the whistle to start the 100 Fly races, and the meet continued.

And that's what the rest of this year will be like. A last band concert, a last track meet, a senior cut day, prom, and then graduation. Time marches resolutely on.

*****
It's Monday now, a regular work day for me, and the first day of work since before Christmas for thousands of federal employees. I'm not the first person to comment on the timing--a ground stop at LaGuardia, followed less than two hours later by the President's decision to reopen the government in exchange for zero dollars for the wall. There's no national emergency more pressing than rich people missing their flights. Anyway, I'm glad it's over, for now.

*****

So now it's Tuesday. I worked in the office until about 12:30 PM, and then I followed all of the rest of the lemmings home to beat the blizzard. I've been in the DMV for 20 years, and I'm exactly like everyone else here. Two inches of snow is an emergency, and the only reason why I didn't stop on my way home to buy every roll of toilet paper and every ounce of milk in the store is that I'm me. I was born bracing for a siege, and I don't run out of anything, ever.

The snow hadn't started this morning, so my sons went to school on time, much to their dismay and chagrin. They often complain when there aren't enough snow days. "This is a rip-off," they'll say. My answer is always the same: "Who did you pay?" They're getting their money's worth now--early dismissal today, and an already-announced two-hour delay tomorrow morning.

*****

Wednesday: The two-hour delay turned into a full day off, so my sons won't have to demand a refund. It's icy icy freezing horrid cold, so the county has already called a two-hour delay for tomorrow. I'm home now, and after the short walk from my car to the parking lot across the street, I abandoned the idea of going to the gym. I'm in for the night.

My house is old, and in the coldest weather, it's drafty. The family room and kitchen are fine, but the bedrooms are cold.  The hot water takes a long time to reach the bathrooms, and it runs out quickly, so cold-morning showers have to be quick. On days like today, I'm tempted to just go to sleep in my clothes, so I don't have to undress in the cold. But sometimes, I'm glad for a little discomfort. I drive a nice clean car from my nice clean house to a desk job in a nice clean office. A cold bedroom or a lukewarm shower save me from being spoiled.

*****
It's Thursday now and I think I wrote some nonsense yesterday about gratitude for the character-building cold. Who knows where I come up with this crap. It's freezing. Whatever.

But it will get warm again. Eventually. Meanwhile, let's talk about my hair, shall we? I got what appears to be a non-terrible haircut. This, as I have mentioned before, is rare enough that it's worth writing about. I say "appears to be" a non-terrible haircut because I legitimately can't tell for sure. The stylist blow-dried my hair to within an inch of its life and it's so straight and shiny right now that I don't even really recognize it. This will last exactly one day. Ain't nobody got time for that kind of hair effort. Tomorrow morning, I will perform my usual five-minute styling routine, and we'll see what my hair really looks like. I do love a surprise.

*****
So it's Friday now, and my hair is fine. It looks like my normal hair, only about 3/4 of an inch shorter. I worked from home today, and left the house only to pick up my son at the bus stop, so that he wouldn't have to walk home through the Antarctic cold. I picked him up 2 1/2 hours early--unexpectedly heavy snow prompted yet another early dismissal, so they went 5 for 5 this week: one scheduled day off, one snow day, one late start, and two early dismissals. A full week of school is going to kill these kids.

It was a productive day, and now I'm waiting out the last few minutes of the Capitals' All-Star break, which followed a horrendous 7-game losing streak that included a 7-2 loss to Nashville, a hideous overtime loss to San Jose after the Sharks scored to tie the game with ONE SECOND remaining, and a brutal beatdown at the hands of the Toronto Maple Leafs. The puck drops in ten minutes.

*****
OMG, that was the longest 57 seconds. The streak has ended; and a rodent meteorologist is apparently promising an early spring. It's already above freezing, so things are looking up. Until next week...