Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

I'd like to say that I watched the Grammy's for the first time since sometime in the 1990's because Pittsburgh native Wiz Kahlifa was nominated but that would be a lie.  He's just the kind of artist that drove me away from the broadcast in the first place.

Actually, Whitney Houston, a performer who was worth watching a Grammy award show to see, made me do it.  A documentary about last  year's show that took place right after her untimely death featured a crazy good performance with Bruce  Springsteen and Paul McCartney.

So, I'm clearly out of touch with today's music, but I knew that going in.  I don't know anything about fashion either, as I am constantly reminded when I watch Project Runway and Fashion Police and I disagree wildly with the "professionals," although I still don't know why I should take fashion advice from someone with lilac-colored hair.

Nonetheless, I was taken aback when I saw Adele's dress at the Grammy's, which was a variation of a dress that walked the runway in Valentino's 2013 Spring Couture collection. I heard it compared to curtains, a couch, a carpet and an ottoman.  Adele is a beautiful 24-year-old and a talented singer.  She shouldn't be dressing like an old lady from the early 60's.

As it is with fine art, I may not be an expert on fashion, but I know what I like.  I have no idea what Valentino was thinking when he designed that dress, but I know that what you see on the runway isn't necessarily what will work for everyone.  Adele needs to learn that.  I AM an old lady and I wouldn't be caught dead wearing that dress. 

Hey, maybe I could help Adele to find a more youthful figure flattering style! Certainly I wouldn't do worse than any stylist she is currently using, and she could probably have me at a fraction of what she's currently paying.

Once in awhile though I do see something I want on one of the stars at an Awards show.  I appreciate that Anne Hathaway's short hair is the result of her sacrificial method acting for her role of Fantine in the big screen adaptation of Les Miserables, and not strictly a fashion choice. It certainly was pretty severe a look in the movie.

However when Anne showed up at Golden Globes her hair was looking VERY cute.  I was enchanted by her hair and couldn't stop looking at it.  I was already wearing my hair short and I couldn't see why I couldn't have that haircut too.  So, like some crazy middle-aged teenager I went to my next hair appointment with a picture of Anne Hathaway on my I-Pad Mini and told my very talented hairdresser Cara that that's what I wanted.  I assured her that I realized that I would not actually look like Anne Hathaway, and that I just wanted to look like me with Anne Hathaway's hair.

So Anne just won an Academy Award for her role of Fantine, and I have this cute new haircut.  I'd say her sacrifice was worth it.

Call Me Gravy

One day my husband flippantly made the statement that I hate gravy.  Where did he get such an idea, I wondered.

"I don't hate gravy," I said, genuinely surprised.

"You never eat it, so I just assumed..." he replied, reasonably.  Perhaps I could see his confusion.

"Well, it's never my first choice," I allowed.

"Or your second choice or your third choice," he countered.

Although that's all true, I don't hate gravy. "Hate"  is such a strong word.  I like gravy well enough, and if it coincidentally shows up on my food, it doesn't ruin my day, or even my meal.  It can, however, royally screw up my diet and calorie count, and since there are other condiments I like as well or better (like ketchup on meatloaf, for instance) I rarely eat gravy.

You see, my food choices are not all about how something tastes.  It's not that simple.   I can't just go around all willy nilly randomly eating whatever I want.  That's how I got into this mess to begin with.  Whether my goal is to lose or just maintain my weight, I only have a limited number of calories to "spend" each day, so some unnecessary extraneous things - like gravy - just don't make the cut.

Take french fries, for instance. I almost never order them.  I always enjoy them when I have them, except when they're thrown on top of my salad, which is just wrong.  Let's face it, when it's the burger OR the fries, I am going to order the burger AND a fruit cup.  Unless I'm at Kennywood, where I will forego all other food for some Potato Patch fries and a good juicy sno-cone.

So I will use mustard instead of mayo, and eat baked chicken instead of fried chicken, all for the greater good of the diet.

But sometimes I really want a piece of cake.  If I am going to splurge on some unnecessary foods, it is going to be something sweet.  That's where it really gets complicated.  I never buy quantities of candy or cookies for the house, because that would be akin to an alcoholic bringing home a case of wine.

However, say my boss decides to buy donuts for the office in honor of Shrove Tuesday when I've already eaten breakfast.  The prudent thing to do would be to just abstain, of course.  However, what I did was to carefully choose one of the cinnamon sugar cake donuts instead of the superior chocolate-covered cream-filled crullers from the box, and then make sure to go to the gym that day to "run off" that donut so I could still eat dinner.  On one recent trip to T-Bones, I chose a small garden salad with low calorie Italian salad dressing for dinner and a glorious large piece of red velvet cake with cream cheese icing for dessert. Yes, I know it sounds decadent, but it may have been the best piece of red velvet cake I've ever eaten.  Some things you just can't give up.

Honestly, I can't imagine going through all that trouble for a little gravy.

On This Day My Child Was Born

It was February 13^th.  I was 8 ½ months pregnant and returning to work after my weekly gynecologist appointment.

My doctor said he thought I may come a little earlier than my February 28^th due date.  That was okay with me.  I had had enough of the whole pregnancy thing- the tremendous weight gain, the sharp pain in my abdomen they called “heartburn,” the inability to sit, stand or sleep comfortably.  I really did Ache All Over.   I was more than ready to have my baby.

Snow was beginning to fall as I headed back to work, but I wasn’t worried.  The roads weren’t bad yet, and my workplace was just four miles from my house.  Nonetheless, I was pretty happy when I arrived at work safely, just in time for lunch.

When I stood up after lunch, I felt an unfamiliar sensation.  I realized with a shock that my water was beginning to break.  I calmly called the doctor’s office, and they advised me to return to the hospital immediately.  I wasn’t able to reach my husband, who was making deliveries for his family’s business in a time before cell phones.  I left the message with his mother that I would go home and pack my bag and he could just meet me at the house.

I let my boss and my friend and co-worker Joan know what was going on and left.  I got in the car, turned the key and…the car wouldn’t start.  I had turned the headlights on when I was on my way back to work in the snowstorm and left them on.  My car battery was dead.

Okay, so now I was beginning to panic.
  

I found Paul, my co-worker with jumper cables.  Paul felt strongly that a woman in labor should not be driving herself anywhere, especially in the snow.  He refused to jump my car.  I explained that I just planned to drive the few miles to my house, and probably wasn’t even technically in labor.  Paul didn’t care.  He offered to drive me anywhere I needed to go.  I explained to him that this was my only car, and I could not leave it there, dead, , especially if I actually had the baby.  Paul was adamant.  We argued for several minutes.  I was getting desperate.  I begged.  I cajoled.  I cannot swear that I didn’t at one point grab Paul by the lapels and yell “Jump the damn car, Paul!”   Finally, Joan,  a very persuasive person, intervened and Paul grudgingly agreed to jump my car.

I drove home and packed my suitcase but hadn’t heard from my husband.  I called the doctor’s office.  “WHAT??!!!,”  the nurse said, “You mean you haven’t even LEFT yet?”  The last professional I saw get this excited was the whitewater rafting guide after I fell into the Youghigheny River.  I though better than to mention the dead car battery.  She asked how long it would take me to get to the hospital.  About 30 minutes when it wasn’t snowing, I told her.   “Oh honey,” she said, “You need to get here RIGHT NOW!”

I called my mother-in-law to tell her that I was leaving for the hospital and to tell my husband to meet me there.  She offered to come pick me up, but after my conversation with the nurse I didn’t think I should wait.

My mother also offered to drive me, which was very sweet but not really feasible.  My mother was terrified of driving in the snow, and lived in Swissvale, which was just about an hour away from my home in Washington, PA.  It would have taken my Mom 2 hours or more to pick me up and take me 
to the hospital in the snow, and I was certain that Mom would not want to drive in the snow and deliver her grandchild herself, at least not on the same day.

It was snowing a lot harder now.  When I finally arrived at the hospital, I told the doctor that aside from my water breaking and driving 30 miles in the snow, I was feeling fine.  He examined me and informed me that I was indeed having contractions and I was “officially” in labor.  Perhaps I was in shock as I drove to the hospital in the snow, and therefore numb to the contractions, or perhaps I had unknowingly been employing those breathing exercises they taught us in Lamaze class.

Meanwhile my husband had arrived back at the shop, and was so upset at the news that his parents did not trust him to drive himself to the hospital.  His family accompanied him, and his father drove.   He arrived at the birthing room about an hour after I got there, in plenty of time for the baby's birth.

I will not share all the minute details of the labor and delivery, because I hate when women do that.  However, I will tell you that I had to have a Caesarian section because the baby was large, and my birth canal was small.   I only mention this because I want everyone to know that there is actually a body part of mine that is too small, ironically located inside my body where nobody can see it.

At 10:15 p.m. on February 13, 1985, my beautiful, brown-haired, brown-eyed baby boy was born, 8 pounds and 9 ounces despite coming 15 days early.  When they put him into my arms, I was smitten- crazy about the kid from the start.  Every bit of the pregnancy and that day had been worth it.

That baby turns 28 today.  One word always comes to mind when I think of him- proud.  I am so very proud of the fine young man he has grown up to be.   Here’s wishing my son a wonderful birthday, and hoping that the weather today is better than on the day he was born.

Are You Talking to Me?

A few years ago my husband and I belonged to a gym that was a perfectly fine facility, but it did have one flaw.  There always seemed to be other people there, getting in the way, standing between me and the machine I wanted to use like the people keeping the woman from the tuna fish in that Christopher Durang "Laughing Wild" monologue.

Maybe it was because this particular gym actually had the word "Club" in its name, but a lot of the people insisted upon socializing while they were there.  They would sit on a machine chatting and not exercising while other people (like me) were waiting to use it.  There was one guy who seemed like he was there solely to fraternize.  My husband nicknamed him "Waldo," and we played a game with the objective to spot him actually working out, which didn't happen often.

This was all annoying enough, but then sometimes people would cross the line and try to engage ME in conversation.  This was entirely unacceptable.  I had a singleminded purpose at the gym - to do what I was there to do and to get the hell out.  I did not want to chat, or make friends, or even join a class of any kind.

So it was with great pleasure and appreciation when I recently joined my hometown YMCA  and discovered that the people there are just the way I want people at the gym to be.  Everyone is unfailingly polite and courteous, nodding hello and holding doors, and saying "please" and "thank you" and "excuse me."  Other than that, no one has any more interest in talking to or getting to know me than I have in talking to or getting to know them.  Yes, like the town itself, it was just perfect.

So perhaps I had my guard down yesterday when I was hanging up my coat at the Y, minding my own business, when the lady next me turned to me and cheerfully proclaimed "Boy, you smell nice."

Was it just me or was this an especially weird thing to say to a stranger? I mean, really, I  smelled nice?  I wasn't standing very close to this woman, and I wasn't wearing perfume.  What sort of sense of smell did this woman have, anyway?  

Why, oh why, do strangers talk to me this way?  I've been told that I'm approachable.  Oh, I curse my approachability, if it means that strangers talk to me at the gym.

I didn't know how to respond.  "Um, thank you?"  I said.

"But not for long!," she added, laughing gleefully, before taking off towards the workout room.  

I managed to finish my workout and get out of the building without interacting with anyone else, but I really have to find a way to be less approachable.