A Charmed Life

Am I Dreaming?

 

I dreamed last night I was reliving the late '70s. Harrison Ford was big box office. The energy crisis was making everyone look for "earth friendly" solutions. Gasoline prices were going through the roof, and people were ditching their big, gas guzzling cars for smaller wheels with higher miles to the gallon. Embroidering and embellishing denim was a hot fashion trend, and cork wedgies were popular, too. The president of the US was playing fast and loose with the Constitution, and we were increasingly worried about anti-American sentiment in Iran.

And then...I didn't wake up.

That's for Thoughts

You know I love my vintage tablecloths. I'm most drawn to the ones with bold purpley blues, reds, pinks and aqua greens. I love complementary colors: my living room is painted "Pink Mix" (aka Tequila Sunrise) and the adjoining hall is Muscari. The kitchen is Blue Room with accents of deep cherry red.

I often admire all-white rooms in magazines. And I can go into the home of someone who decorates minimally, with off-white walls, a few well-placed pieces of good art, and streamlined furniture--and not only admire their taste, but feel so calm and relaxed there that I vow to go home, paint the walls pale yellow or beige, strip the rooms of every unnecessary item, and decorate with white tulips. But I never do. I like change, variety, and lots of color. It's just my personality. I'm more of a double pink peony than white tulips. I love white tulips, but they're not me.

I do have several white-tulip friends, however. My friend Ann, is one. Simple, tasteful style. And my friend Wendy, too. Not bland by any means. At Ann's home the first thing you notice are her books and fresh flowers from her garden. At Wendy's, it her wonderful collection of artwork, much of it by her own hand, or through her camera lens.

When I decided to sell a few of my treasures a couple of weeks ago, one of the items I decided I could part with was a vintage tablecloth with a pale yellow, white, and silvery gray design of birch bark. Now, I love birch bark--it reminds me of Michigan where I grew up, and I could just see that tablecloth on a picnic table or in the kitchen of little cabin in the woods. It's a simple, elegant design. But it's not me. So I put it up for auction. For several days I watched the numbers tick up on all my other items up for auction, but no bids on that tablecloth--no one had even put it on their watch list. I began to regret even putting it in the auction, as it might just go for the minimum amount--if at all.

Then, suddenly, a bid and a few watchers. In the end, it went for twice as much as the other cloth I had up for bid. I sent off my congratulations and request for payment, and the winner immediately paid and e-mailed me a note: "Surprise, it's me!" The winner was Wendy! I was definitely surprised and pleased on so many levels: that the cloth was going to a good home, that Wendy would care enough to buy it, and that I would get to see it again at her summer cabin up in Vermont.

If you would like to see some samples of Wendy's simply elegant work, look here.

My Love List

The fabulous and talented Chrysti put a challenge on her blog from She Likes Purple and then sent me an email telling me that she thought I would be good at that challenge. Well, there's nothing like a challenge to do a challenge to, uh, challenge me. So, I'm taking up the challenge:

“*I challenge you to make your own Love List. The only catch? You can’t include a single person you know on your list. No “I love the way my husband laughs” or “I love hearing my little girl call for me.” It’ll be tough, I know. But this particular little exercise is about stripping away everyone who defines you and figuring out what you (not his partner; not their mother/daughter/sister/friend) love.”

So, here goes.

I love my job. There, I get to do all the things I like to do (write, edit, be creative) and very few of the things I don't like to do (paperwork, managing others) with a bunch of the nicest, funniest, most creative people on Earth, to make fabulous, beautiful products. If that sounds like an ad for where I work, then so be it, but that's not why it comes up first; it's because it is truly a blessing to do work you love in an environment you love, and I cherish it. My job doesn't define me; it lets me be who I am.

i love my home. It's a dream come true. After years, and years, of driving past old houses, pointing them out and saying, "Oooh, look at THAT one," or "Ohhhh, I could be happy THERE," (if it was an especially nice, big, and therefore expensive place, my husband would reply, "No, that one's not good enough for you, honey.") it finally happened: we got one. There was just enough done to it that it wasn't falling apart--in fact, it was in great shape--but not so much done that we couldn't make it the way we wanted...and I hope we live long enough and aquire enough money (or stay healthy enough to do most of it ourselves) to do just that. We've already done a lot.

I love vintage textiles and "the hunt." I should have a bumper sticker that reads: I brake for vintage tablecloths. I have close to a hundred (and I know some of you reading this have a lot more!). I love the colors--especially combinations of that pinky-red, blue, and jadite green--and the patterns of fruit, teapots, and cottagy flowers like morning glories. I love how cheerful they are, and how they remind me of times gone by.

I love show tunes. I love the upbeat ones, the poignant ones, the bittersweet ones, and the silly/clever ones. I love Rogers and Hammerstein, Rogers and Hart, Lerner and Lowe, Stephen Sondheim and Steven Schwartz. I've told my husband, children, and best friend that when I die, at the reception after the memorial, I want them to play show tunes. (I had to tell my kids and best friend, too, because my husband hates show tunes.) "I want Ethel Merman singing "Everything's Coming Up Roses" and Irene Ryan singing "Just No Time at All," and Liza singing "Life is a Cabaret," and everyone there singing along with "Oklahoma!", "On the Street Where You Live," "Side by Side," "The Lady is a Tramp," and "I Wanna Be a Producer."

I love the first snow. I love the day when you can smell the warmth in the air that says spring is truly coming. I love the beach on a hot day with a good book, my kids playing in the ocean, and no one around with a radio. I love October when the sky is morning-glory blue and the leaves are yellow and red and there's energy in the air. I love sitting on my front porch with a tall glass of iced tea and a stack of home decor magazines. I love cracking red eggs on Greek Easter, buying or making the perfect Christmas present, getting a surprise gift on my birthday, and really good, fudgy, moist chocolate cake anytime at all.

So, what do you love? If you make a list, leave a link in my "comments."

I Confess

I met Donny Osmond. In his hotel room. His hair was still damp from the shower, and he was wearing a plush bathrobe and had a towel around his neck. The bathrobe was baby blue. We were both about 16. He kissed me.

There, I've said it.

OK, so there were a few other people around. Like most of his family, including Marie, looking ever-petulant. Plus, his "people," a couple of my cousins, and my great-uncle, a DJ and radio producer in Detroit who got us the tickets to the concert and the meet-and-greet afterwards in the hotel room.

The kiss was on the cheek. He was tall and incredibly gracious. I was a blithering idiot, even though "officially" I was not into the Osmonds. I got an autograph and heaven only knows where it is now--I haven't seen it for at least 30 years. But at the time, I was both embarrassed and thrilled to get it.

If I was about 16, then this was in the early '70s, at the height of the Osmonds' popularity. "Puppy Love" was topping the pop charts. All I remember from the concert was that the Osmonds put on an incredible show, it was incredibly loud, and when Donny sang "Puppy Love" and got to the part where he pleaded, "Somebody help me! Help me ple-ee-eeze," the place erupted with the screams of teenage girls quite willing to help him, whether he said please or not.

I think about this now because I just got back from teaching my Greek cooking class (part II) where we made moussaka (with an accent on the "ka", please). I tell my students that "moussaka" is Greek for "use up every pan and utensil in the kitchen," and by the time it goes into the oven, they believe me. So, I came home exhausted (we made tzaziki and tiropites, too), sprawled on the couch with a cold Diet Coke, and flipped on the tube to discover Donny singing "Puppy Love" on The Osmonds 50th anniversary concert on PBS. And, I confess, I watched the rest of it. And, no, he can't hit as many high notes as when he was 16, and he sings the song not like an anguished teenager, but like a mature man serenading his true love--the woman he fell in love with long ago, the one he's still with, the one who, to him, still looks like that pretty teenage girl he had all that passion for. And you know, that's probably MORE sexy than a plaintive teenager belting out a pop tune.

So, sue me. I know the Osmonds aren't cool. I know liking them isn't cool. But I was never cool. I was, however, young once. And Donny Osmond kissed me in his bathrobe.

Banner Day

Cupcake wanted equal time on the blog, especially as she allowed us to take a picture of her with a thread over her nose. It was just too cute. She hates it when we say she's "cute." She says, "Tell that to the mice I lay waste to." She is a pretty good huntress. Lucky for the mice, Cupcake takes them to the girls' rooms while they're still alive and they can often escape within the piles of clothes, books, hair accessories, etc.

Do you like the new banner? I've mostly figured it out. Not sure why there's a border only on three sides, but hey, it's different from the boring one before. I used the free online image editor, by the way, and it worked great.

I thought about using this one, courtesy of my friend Cheryl, who is having a birthday today, plus it's her wedding anniversary in the same week as Valentine's Day. (Cheryl, what were you thinking??)

And then there was this one:

but I couldn't seem to get the proportions right. That picture is from my "studio," the former maid's quarters in our attic (where the maid lived LONG before we moved in). When I finally convinced my husband I would not hire a pretty French maid to live up there, he turned the abandoned room (about 6' x 7') into an adorable craft room.

For Valentine's Day this year, he not only made a lovely dinner (which, frankly, doesn't earn him a lot of extra points because he cooks all the time) he led me down to the cellar where he unveiled a Victorian bureau I had bought at a yard sale a few years ago, with lots of scratched yellow paint and balky drawers but some very nice molding. He brought it in from the garage, stripped, sanded, and stained the whole thing, painted the insides of the drawers and added new knobs. I was speechless. When he brings it up to the bedroom tomorrow I'll take a pic and share.

Today he and the teen are at a 24-hour sci-fi marathon and the little one and I are home alone. I think shopping and lunch will be on the schedule.

Oh, the irony!

I just wrote a long post about this manual, portable typewriter (above) that I picked up at a flea market last summer for five bucks. I wrote poetically about how my children approach it with wonder and gingerly touch the keys as though a genie might pop out of the carriage and bite them. I wrote about how while I love word processing--I was born to word process, actually--I miss the clatter and rhythm of the old typewriter keys. And I wrote about how, no matter how slow and frustrating it could be to type out something and then have to re-type to fix mistakes, etc., at least while using a typewriter I never once hit a key and then screamed out, "Where did it just go?!" after all my hard work disappeared into thin air.

And then, satisfied with my post, I hit what I thought was the preview button but was obviously something else, because the whole post went bye-bye. Vanished. Gone. Sayonara.

Advantage: Universe.

I have often found (after I stop swearing and crying) that having my hard-won words evaporate can be a blessing. That having to re-create a long article or essay from memory often leads to better, tighter writing, because all I remember are the most important points and key phrases. The chaff falls by the wayside.

But it's a little late in the day for that this time. I'm too tired. So I will just leave you with the image of this very cool, aqua machine that's as beautiful as sculpture.

Perspective

Is experience necessary? I’ve read a few articles lately written by 20- and 30-somethings that experience is overrated—in fact, not even necessary—when it comes to one’s career. This, of course, is a backlash against Baby Boomers, for whom experience was almost always required when job hunting and who now, with many years of on-the-job experience, naturally think it’s an asset.

Here’s what I think: If you asked a 23-year-old preparing to have brain surgery if he or she would rather choose a doctor who had never done such an operation or one who had done the same procedure more than 20 times with success, the answer would be the latter doc (if not, then that 23-year-old should have his or her head examined). However, I agree that 20 years of experience at a job does not necessarily mean you automatically perform that job better than a smart neophyte who’s had some training. (Although, isn’t it ironic that younger people think older people are clueless about technology and can’t learn it, when the reality is, a big reason why some older people adapt less easily to new technology is that they are less familiar with it—you know, inexperienced. Not to mention that it’s hard to see and press those tiny buttons when you need reading glasses and have arthritis. But I digress….)

What I have come to learn as I’ve grown older is that it’s not so much experience that’s valuable on the job or in life. It’s the perspective that experience brings. By 40 or 50, you’re aware that most of life and business is cyclical (and the concept that the seasons, they go round and round did not originate with Joni Mitchell or even The Lion King; you can read about it in the Old Testament—to everything there is a season—and goodness knows some cave person carved it into a wall somewhere). Perspective teaches you that yesterday’s Total Quality Management is today’s “best practices.” Tomorrow, there will be another name, but it will all boil down to balancing what best for the company, what’s best for the customer, and what’s best for you. No matter what it’s called, do your best work and it usually works out—if not at this job, then the next.

With perspective, you learn that if the FedEx truck arrives two hours late, it’s a shame, and maybe even an expensive inconvenience, but so long as the truck isn’t carrying a life-saving kidney, it’s probably not that big a deal in the grand scheme of things.

You learn that money isn’t everything, but it does help. And it really helps if you can keep the importance of money in perspective. You learn that you really don’t know what something—child rearing, cancer, being the boss—is like until it happens to you (there’s that experience thing again).

You learn that it really is a good idea to be nice to people on the way up, because you’ll probably meet them on the way down.

You learn that no matter how wonderful someone’s life or job looks from the outside, there is probably something sad, bad, or illegal in their past, present, or immediate future.

You learn that every day you wake up and your children are alive and healthy, you have healthcare, and/or the roof hasn’t fallen in, is a good day. That it probably is a good idea to turn the lights off when you leave a room, not leave the water running, write thank-you notes, smile, and wear your hair off your face, just like your mother told you.

You learn that nothing lasts forever, so enjoy it while it lasts.

Perhaps it is my Greek heritage, but I have spent a lot of my life acutely aware of the concept of hubris, that you don’t tempt the gods by reveling in your accomplishments and good fortune. I grew up in a culture where mothers routinely pinned a mati, an evil eye charm, to their children’s undershirts to protect them against misfortune in the world, and who never gave a compliment—especially to their own children or another young person—without immediately following the words with the sound “ptoo-ptoo-ptoo”—spitting on the devil three times so he wouldn’t punish the child for her beauty or talent.

I have always worried when things are going well. Get a new job? Maybe we’ll wreck the car. Buy a new house? Worry we’ll lose a job. Have a healthy baby? Keep one eye on the thunderclouds, waiting for that lethal bolt of lightning. I fretted so much when things were going well that I couldn’t enjoy the happiness because I was so worried about how I would be punished for my good fortune. Once, a simpatico acquaintance told me: “You’re like me. You’re not happy unless you miserable.”

However, what experience—living—taught me is that you can be happy or miserable, rich or poor, boastful or diffident—it doesn’t matter. Bad stuff is going to happen anyway. What perspective has taught me is to not go over the bend in these situations, because it can always be worse. Always. And to appreciate what I have rather than worry about losing it.

One of my favorite movie scenes is in Young Frankenstein when Frankenstein and Igor are digging up a body in the graveyard. It’s creepy and smelly and dirty and completely disgusting and Marty Feldman says, “Could be worse.” And Gene Wilder says, “How could it possibly be worse?” and Feldman shrugs, “Could be raining.” And then there’s a crack of thunder and a downpour. See? It got worse. And yet, it’s very funny.

When things are going very badly, my husband and I often look at each other, shrug, and say, “Could be worse. Could be raining.” And then we laugh. Because what perspective has taught us in our “old age” is that, indeed, things could always be worse.

And, invariably (in my experience), they get better again.

Happy New Year. Keep it in perspective.

A bird feeder is like a blog

Yes, little by little, the birds have been coming to the feeder, just like the readers have been coming to the blog. The readers have been leaving comments, the birds have been leaving....well, never mind. We do enjoy their sweet voices. In both cases, though, you have to watch out for the squirrels (present company excepted, of course).

I am pretty good at identifying most common birds, thanks to my mom's love of nature. So I can tell a cedar waxwing from a tufted titmouse and a sparrow from a wren. When my husband said, "Hey, I noticed a bird at the bird feeder--it looked like a little penguin," I immediately answered, "It must be a chickadee." And, sure enough, now that the birds (and one fat squirrel) have found the feeder, the chickadees have come flocking. (They are the state bird, after all.) But then one day I saw a slightly different bird that, indeed, had a striped black head that was slightly more pointed than a chickadee. And a rusty breast as well. What was it? I groped around the 'net for several minutes, finding a lot of black and white birds that were not "my" bird, until I found this website: whatbird.com. You can search several ways, but the best, if you don't know what you've got, is to search by values (location, size, colors, feeding habits, etc.) until you narrow it down and then, bada-bing! you've found your answer; in our case, the red-breasted nuthatch. Which, in fairness to my birding skills, is related to the chickadee.

My favorite Christmas movie is "White Christmas." (Oh, how I long to look like Rosemary Clooney in that slinky black velvet dress during "Love, You Didn't Do Right By Me.") One of the lines (spoken by Danny Kaye) is, "I don't know if the best things happen while you're dancing, or if they just happen in Vermont..." Well, I think maybe the answer is "Vermont" judging by the picture above, taken by my good friend Wendy of her husband, my good friend Chris, driving a two-horse open sleigh on the farm where they live in Vermont. Currier and Ives, eat your hearts out. We plan to visit in February and hope they save some snow, and a sleigh ride, for us.

Mother and Child

This is the last Christmas gift I bought for my mother, a Limoges nativity, in miniature. Yesterday I talked about how my mother, Mary, loved miniatures. She had a special subset of nativities, so I bought this one for her in anticipation of Christmas, 1993. Unfortunately, I was not able to give it to her; she died December 20th of that year. For years after, I kept this nativity in the box, unable to even look at it. It seemed a sacrilege, somehow, to actually put it on display. But after a while, as I got used to not having my mom, but having many of her precious and endearing collections around me, I decided it was time. Like a lot of things in life, it didn't hurt as much as I thought it would when I actually faced opening the box and putting the little figures on display.

Maybe it's because a lot of other people close to me have lost parents this year, but I am particularly missing my mom this holiday and also, ironically, feeling her very close to me. Having the things she owned and loved around me helps, but I really don't need them because it's true what they say, the ones you love never really leave you...they are always in your heart.

Sleep in heavenly peace, Mom.

Radiate Positive Thoughts

I promise to upload new pictures and stories very soon, but right now I would like you to click over to Lesley Riley's blog, listen to the beautiful music she has provided for you, and send positive and comforting thoughts for her mother, who is very ill, and for Lesley and her family.

Thank you.