quoting mark twain

my brother wisely quotes the wise. 

this week, on facebook, he quoted mark twain, who wisely said, "travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness." (i commented with, "and to the bowels," which i thought was at once both wise and funny, but nobody pushed the like button, so i am now left to conclude that, although wise, the wise aren't much fun to hang out with.)

i also left a second comment, along the lines of, yes, i agree, but let's not forget to be compassionate to the prejudiced, the bigoted, and the narrow-minded. they need it more, maybe, than anybody else. at least as much as.

if we are compassionate to those for whom we feel sorry or for those to whom we are attracted in some way, that's great. i'll never argue with compassionate responses.

but are we compassionate to the ones we despise? to our enemies? to the ones we can't understand for the life of us how in the hell they could think that way? 

sadly, for most of us, probably not.

and that is why i go, er, travel, to church. to keep me on the path of loving those i loathe. i don't need to go to church to feel compassionate towards starving children in africa. i don't need to go to church to feel compassionate towards people who don't have health care (ahem).

what i need to go to church for (cuz it certainly isn't gonna happen of my own accord) are the people i don't like. 

and, for myself, actually. because if i am compassionate only or mostly to those for whom my compassion comes easily, then, really, i am compassionate for me. 

and if i am compassionate only, really, for me, then no amount of travel is likely to change that.


sorry, mark twain.

whether it's good weather or bad weather.....whatever.

it's been said that everybody complains about the weather but nobody does anything about it, and that's true. for now.

my fear is that someday, somebody will do something about the weather. hell, there's probably already an app for that and i just don't know it. please - people......don't send me a link!

weather is something that is meant to be left alone. if there ever was a time for the phrase, "it is what it is," this is. it, that is.

but we people types don't ever leave anything alone. except maybe ourselves. most of us think we're either fine just the way we are or if we're not, we're too lazy to change.

that's how we should be about the weather - let it be.



(except if it's hot. if it's hot, somebody needs to do somethin' about it.)
 

 

things that have no business being in or out

bacon.

bacon is currently in. bacon should have either always been in because it's good or it should have never been in because how can a pig be in?

brown.

brown is currently in, which is ridiculous. no color on earth should ever be in or out, except to the eye of the beholder. if you like brown, you should like it whether it's in or out and if you don't like brown, it should always be out. at least to you.

stripes.

stripes are at least two colors or at least two tones of one color going either up and down or across. how can that possibly be in or out? stripes just are.

stripes are what they are.

it is what it is.

in.

has no business being.

too much com, not enough fest

we have the hippie "comfest" every summer in columbus and every summer i go and every summer i wonder why and every summer i vow that next summer i won't go and every next summer, i go. (i believe the commonly known definition of insanity is contained in here.)

anyway, so i went to the hippie "comfest" yesterday even though last year i said i wouldn't and it turned out just like every other hippie "comfest" i said i wouldn't go to but i did - only worse. i couldn't get a beer.

i couldn't get a beer through every fault of my own - i didn't have my driver's license with me and i didn't have my driver's license with me because i walked to the hippie "comfest" instead of driving. i tried playing the "but, lady, look how i helped the environment" card, but she wasn't that much of a hippie.

so, i was denied a beer. which i understand and which i don't understand. it is ludicrous, really, to tell a woman who looks every bit the almost 58 years that she is, who has gray hair and wrinkles, that nope, we're not sure you're old enough to drink beer. i mean, i understand the letter of the law, but i just think it would be a nicer world if we could apply a little common sense and consider the spirit of the law. just once, people. spirit of the law. would it kill ya?

speaking of killing, as i walked home from the beer-less hippie "comfest," the thought occurred to me that at almost 60 years of age, i can't get a beer without "permission," but, if i were 15, i could get an abortion without it.

screwed up world.
 
 

june brides. and every other month.

people get married all the time in my back

yard. 

and i am never

there.

well, i'm there if being there

peeking through the blinds counts as

being there,

as opposed to counting as

spying and invading

people's privacy.


i live downtown and people think downtown is a

good place to get

married.

which, 

it is,

with all the funky this

and the hip that

in the 

back-

ground.

(makes for very cool

pictures.) 


and the

courthouse is in the

backdrop, too,


just in case anyone 


ever 


needs 


it. 


which,


of course,


no one


ever


will.

 

class rank

my motto, pretty much, was always, work hard, but not too hard. that motto has gotten me a pretty decent life.

when i was in school, i didn't give a rat's hoo-ha what my class rank was. i cared what my rankin was, but not my rank.

i could have had a higher class rank if i'd wanted it, but i didn't. i wanted to have an adequate class rank, but not a high one. a high class rank would have, in my case anyway, meant too much studying. my motto, pretty much, was always, study hard, but not too hard.

i could have been a straight A student, but that sounded boring to me. i have always been the "variety is the spice of life" type, and so it naturally followed that i thought a few Bs and even an occasional C - gasp! - would liven up things a bit.

i even got a D once. in chemistry. but hell, the way i looked at it, everybody gets a D in chemistry. i mean, don't they? well, besides mark smith, maybe. ok, and sam petroff. sam petroff probably never got a D in chemistry. but everybody else did. well, not bill mclemore. bill mclemore probably got teacher's pet in chemistry.

but, besides mark smith and sam petroff and bill mclemore, everybody got Ds in chemistry.

well, not sarah raup. and not mim wolf. ok, so lisa nave probably never got a D in chemistry. but every. body. else. did.

not pris levine.


not mark hard.

but. every. body. else.

not mark ryman.


so, anyway.......since nobody except one or two people ever got higher than a D in chemistry, i figured, why should i. besides, who needs to know chemistry in order to cook.

i mean, right? 

apologizing

there's a school of thought that says that people, especially children, shouln't be made to say they're "sorry" unless they really are.

i'm, um, sorry.........but that's crap.

if you do something wrong, that's bad enough. if you don't have the decency to apologize for it - heartfelt or not - that's even worse.

of course.......a truly remorseful apology is always better than an insincere one. always. frickin' DUH. but an insincere one is better than none. and here's why:

because only apologizing if you're really sorry puts the spotlight on you. on you and how you feel. nevermind how the person you wronged feels.

yesterday, abby and i took the kids to wendy's for lunch and as we were leaving, olivia decided to purposely meander through those rails that some fast food restauarants use to funnel the traffic through. you know what i mean......kind of like at an amusement park, where you gotta walk back and forth through a "maze" just to get to the ride. so, olivia decides to walk back and forth in wendy's "maze" and dump her milk on the floor as she did. and it made me mad.

i grabbed olivia's hand, marched up to the counter (there were no other customers, so we weren't being rude), and told her to tell the nice lady that she's sorry for spilling milk all over her clean floor.

olivia just stood there. i heard voices, about 70 million of them, in my head saying, "don't make her apologize. unless she's really sorry, don't make her apologize."

(sidebar: if i ever in my life develop schizophrenia and start hearing voices? i am pretty damned sure that i will never listen to any of 'em!)

so, anyway, i tell olivia to tell the nice lady she's sorry and finally, olivia says, "sorry."

"that's not good enough, olivia, " i said. "you need to say, ma'm, i am very sorry for spilling milk on your floor," and olivia said, "ma'm, i am very sorry for spilling milk on your floor." and the nice lady said, "that's ok. thank you for saying you're sorry."

and we left.

which we shouldn't have done, because we should have made olivia help clean the milk up. at least just a little. but we didn't, because the triplets were screaming their brains out.

so, the next time i take them to wendy's, i'm going to tell olivia to clean up whatever mess we make. and i'm going to remind her of the time that she spilled the milk.

and if you think that's harsh, well,

sorry. but i'm not sorry.

pens work so well.

not all pens, maybe, but a bic? what's more perfect than a bic?

i wouldn't mind computers so much if they had bic pens to go with 'em. and yellow-lined paper. i love yellow-lined paper.

bic shavers aren't so great, though. bic needs to invent a way to shave with a computer.

ok, so, summer.

it's here. yay.

summer is hardly my favorite time of year. humidity is why. humidity is proof that satan exists and if you don't wanna die under his spell, you better get to church.

where it's air-conditioned.

(among other cool things.)

the grizzly bear room

we have a continuum of mental health services for children and adults where i work and one of the programs we offer is a therapeutic preschool. they have cutesie-pie names for the rooms in the therapeutic preschool, such as the dinosaur room and the koala room and the butterfly room and the panda room. and then there's the grizzly bear room, which, what's wrong with that picture? would you want your 3-year old identifying with a grizzly bear? i mean, 3-year olds have enough of their own grizzly bear moments without feeding (ha! pun!) it.

i don't really have any direct contact with our therapeutic preschool and i never go over there. it's in a part of the building that's removed from the part of the building where i am and practically the only reason that i even know that we even have a therapeutic preschool is because somebody from the therapuetic preschool is always being paged overhead. "will a staff person from the ladybug room please come to the front desk?"

the other day, for the first time (or at least for the first time that i paid any attention to), i heard one of our receptionists paging a staff person from the grizzly bear room. i stopped in my tracks. (bear? tracks? pun!)

why on earth, i wondered, do we have a grizzly bear room?

come to find out, we also have a tiger room. and a cougar room.


job security, i guess.

friars

friars are monks who live in the city. betcha didn't know that, did ya?

some franciscan friars have come to live in the old convent at st. james the less catholic (what? as opposed to st. james the less baptist?) church here in columbus. st. james the less catholic (not methodist) church is in THE. HOOD.

what's funny is, usually it's the people in the hood themselves who might scare you but apparently, one of the friars, as he strolled up and down the main artery of THE. HOOD., cleveland avenue, scared the bejeebers outa somebody. some dude packin' heat and saggin' into oblivion came around the corner, bumped into the friar, and screamed. and then ran.

i love that story.

i love that story for one reason.......vulnerability.

tough as some of those brothers in THE. HOOD. are, they're more baby on the inside than jack, luke, and wendy.

which is what all of us are. more baby on the inside than babies.

and what do babies need to do? re-ly. they need to re-ly on someone stronger than themselves.


the friar chased the dude a couple of blocks.......just so he could tell him who.

pride

two things about pride - we aren't supposed to have too much of it and the amount of it that we do have is supposed to be kept private.

i had a client once who fought tooth and nail, with every drop of blood, sweat, and tears that a human being could possibly possess to overcome the hideous damage her father inflicted on her for 9 years of her childhood while he sexually abused her. the wounds this young woman suffered were among the worst - perhaps thee worst - that i have ever, ever seen in my 32-year plus career. i remember one therapy day with her in particular:

me - you have come so, so far.

her - yes.  i have. it hasn't been easy.

me - no, it hasn't. but you did it. you did it. you should be proud of yourself.

her - why?

me - because you have worked so hard to get where you are!

her - so?

me - staring at her blankly......

me - sooooooooo.......you should be proud! you should shout it from the rooftops!

her - the only thing i should shout from the rooftops is, thank you, God. the rest of it, i'll keep to myself.

if you can eat it, you can grill it!

i decided to grill something every day from memorial day through labor day. i have only had one epic fail so far - watermelon. do NOT, i repeat, NOT, ever, ever, ever grill watermelon. unless you're looking for a unique way to die.

to date, my two favorites are grilled chicken ceasar salad kabobs and grilled bacon, lettuce, and fried green tomato sandwiches on panini.

i have grilled peaches, mangoes, and strawberries with a brown sugar-balsamic vinegar glaze. i have grilled avocados and bananas. black beans and white beans. red, white, and blue beans. put me in the zoo beans.

i grilled a chocolate cake. dee-licious!

blueberry cobbler.

and a whole bunch of other things that i don't remember.

tonight, i am going to attempt to grill ice cream.


i don't think nat king cole had a clue when he sang about those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer.

the unbearable sweetness of 3-year olds

the twins are at a wonderful age. 3-and-a-half sure beats 16-and-a-half any day.

they truly are almost unbearably adorable. everything they think, everything they say, and even most of everything they do is worth cataloging.

i am told on almost a non-stop basis that i am loved, and they don't always use their eyes when they say it. sometimes - a lot of times - they use their words.

speaking of words (that's funny - speaking of words), these are the two that i hear the most from olivia: "watch me!" 

"watch me!" is almost always followed by some sort of acrobatic or dance gyration that almost always includes me seeing her underwear. 


charlie's two favorite words when i'm around are, "hey, gam....." and he says it kinda like how beaver cleaver used to say it to wally......."hey, waaaaally......"


charlie's a boy and olivia's a girl. no, i mean, seriously. you don't have to pull down their pants to know. charlie is all zoom, zoom, zoom and olivia is all, well, olivia is all "watch me!" as she twirls and spins in ballerina dresses and everything pink.


but charlie's a little bit girl, too. like when he puts his arms around my neck and nuzzles me. if he's just eaten peanut butter, it's even better.


and olivia? well, i guess she's a little bit boy. last night she told me that when she and charlie grow up and charlie's a farmer (his newest craze) that she's gonna be a tractor. so there ya go.

but don't go too fast. don't let it zoom, zoom, zoom past me in a blue-pink blur.


well, too late. it already is.

what i've learned this week

i've learned that experience really is the best teacher, which, sidebar for a minute......my parents gave me a card when i graduated from college that said on the front, "congratulations, graduate, and remember.......experience is the best teacher." and then you open it up and it says, "now they tell me."

:)

anyway.......back to the moment......

experience really is the best teacher. i guess, ha ha, no one can teach you that. you have to experience it.

i experienced it this week -  in spades -  as i began my new job. what i did was, without even realizing it, i made the transition from my old job to my new job absolutely seamlessly. i just osmosised (yeah, no such word) from one to the other. it took other people's feedback to even make me aware that i had adjusted so well.

i received lots of wonderful feedback from many different sources and all of that was very nice. very nice. but what really made me open my eyes and realize that, hey, nancy, you've learned a lot over the span of a 32-year career was when, in team meeting, our boss brought up the teensy weensy oversight that she had made when she approved vacation for everyone - everyone - in my  department for the same week. next week.(another sidebar - in my boss's defense.......no, she is not a dolt. some computer snafus were largely responsible for her not realizing what she was doing when she made the vacation approvals.)

so, anyway, here we are, in team meeting on the third day of my first week in my new job and i find out that, with the exception of our administrative support person who, incidentally, also started this week, i will be the only one here next week. and i totally didn't bat an eye. actually, it didn't even really occur to me that that might be a problem until my boss and my co-workers leaned over the table with deep, deep concern in their eyes (like only social workers can do) and inquired (also like only social workers can do) how i felt about that.

how do i feel about what, i asked.

about being all alone next week.

i dunno, i said. fine. i feel fine about it.

and it was true. i did feel fine about it. i still feel fine about it.


experience is the best teacher.  

now i tell you.  

:)

signs

(with apologies to the "five man electrical band").......

1. "school's out- drive slow." in a few months, that sign will be replaced with "school's in - drive slow."  makes you scratch your head. y'know?

2. "kohls staples dicks" - as seen on a shopping center sign listing the stores in the center.

3. "if you or someone you love has been injured or died from mesothelioma, call 1-800....."

 4. "nobody has the right to hold anybody else to his standards." - on a church marquee! really????????? so, the nobody includes God????? what happened to the 10 Commandments????? and the nobody includes the law????? in that case, ima speed up to 65 mph next time i drive past that church. i mean, "church."


("so i got me a pen and paper and i made up my own little sign, i said, thank you, Lord, for thinking about me, i'm alive and doing fine.")

but, just barely.