I Wanna Be Thin(ner)

I put myself on phase one of the South Beach diet two and a half weeks ago, to lose the pounds I packed on before my daughter’s July wedding. Maybe this is why I no longer have as much energy as I usually do to walk, talk, or write. What I now have is a serious case of active inactivity. 

Being inactive is my way of surviving round one of my dieting marathon, because these days I have to conserve my energy so I can prepare the four hundred and sixty million meals I need to eat each day to keep myself from plunging into the intense fruit and carbohydrate withdrawal I've been experiencing. 


If you could see (and many of you have) how similar to a linebacker I appeared in the random already-downloaded wedding pictures my daughter’s friends posted, you’d understand why I have chosen to diet. Just imagine, now, how much more awful I'm going to look in the professional pictures (which aren’t ready yet, thank God), where I’ll be professionally caught looking like a porker - for posterity. 


I know - no one will be looking at how fat the mother of the bride looks in the wedding album, but this mother sure as heck will. 


You see, when I look at those frozen-in-time wedding pictures, I'm going to only remember how I gained so much weight I couldn't zip up the lovely espresso-colored dress I bought so I’d look happy and peppy and bursting with love. (I didn’t anticipate the literal aspect of bursting, though, which is what happened when I tried to force my body into the dress a few days before the wedding.) In the future, each and every time we celebrate my daughter’s anniversary, I’m going to have to force myself not to make negative comments about how I'm wearing the wrong dress (I wore a black thing that was hanging around the closet, waiting for its chance to shine), or how my wattle and body look tripled in size. 


The good thing about dieting, is that as of today I have lost enough weight so that the original dress now fits me perfectly. In fact, I came up with what I think is a brilliant idea (but is actually a harebrained one, I know) to celebrate this miracle: I will call the wedding photographer and ask him if he’ll come to the house and take a few more pictures of me in the correct dress, which he can then unobtrusively slip into the wedding album. I realize that anyone who looks at the final album might think it’s a little strange that I am wearing two different dresses, but I figure that only I will notice, since everyone else will be focusing on the bride and groom. 


My husband told me I should start eating fruit again to get my brain back. I whined and wheedled, trying to get him to agree with my idea, but he wouldn’t budge. I tried to convince him it made sense by telling him that the fat me in wedding pictures isn’t the real me, since I was formerly such a skinny child my cousin called me Bony Sharoney (like the song – minus the Maroney). He laughed. Then, I told him he should call the photographer for me, so our future grandchildren would see pictures of their grandmother as she should be seen – thinner. I reminded him that I was once so underweight I wrote to Ann Landers to ask her advice on gaining weight. (She, or one of her minions, wrote back that I should drink milkshakes each night before going to bed.) He still refused to agree.

He reminded me that I have lost a total of six pounds (even though, as of this morning, a pound found its way back home). I told him that being on this diet is making it even more difficult than usual to be positive (well, I always find it difficult to be positive) about staying the course. He emphatically told me that there can’t be a wedding picture do-ever, and I know he’s right – but boy I wish he wasn't.

My Favorite Contemporary Cellist's Youtube video mocks Bloggers

You will need to click on the title of this blog entry, in order to see Gideon Freudmann's adorable blog-mocking music video.

In case you don't know who Gideon Freudmann is - this is your chance to see him make fun of people like me (boo hiss) in this most whimsical Youtube video. Gideon and CaravanGogh, the group he performs with in and around Portland, Oregan (and other places, I'm sure), are uber-hip and terrific. 

I'll let Gideon's video speak for me today, instead of mouthing off on my own. I mean, what can I say that would top this? Duh. Nothin'.

Confessions of an Obsessive Editor

I went back and revised my first blog entry. I know, I'm losing my mind - but when I re-read it for the zillionth time, I realized it lacked a certain cohesiveness. A certain oomph. A certain something. So I went back into editing mode and fixed it. Now I understand a little better why painters find it hard to finish a painting.

I just thought I'd tell you, you handful of faithful readers, so you'd get a quick glimpse of what it's like to be wackadoodle me, and you'd never imagine again that I'm someone you might want to be.

Plus, remember that if you were magically turned into me, you'd have to deal with having a freaking migraine brain. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy (oh, wait...maybe I would...).

Land of a Thousand Migraines

Right now – at this very instant – I have a migraine, a continuation of the original one I’ve had for the last four days. My brain manufactures them like crazy, which might explain why I am going crazy on this beautiful August day. Anyone who knows me, knows I suffer from migraines, because I don’t make a secret of it. I try not to go out of my way to talk about what it’s really like to have them, but today I’m going to tell you, even though I am well aware that non-migrainers might not really want to know.

According to Dr. Carolyn Bernstein, author of The Migraine Brain, I am the owner of a migraine brain, which might explain why I have so much difficulty thinking more positively of (my) life, liberty or pursuit of happiness. I know they’re supposed to be inalienable rights, but they haven’t been for me since severe migraines moved in and snuck up on me, wending their way down my neck, across my head, and through my eyes, filling the inside of my head with excruciating pain. Their frequency is why I have so much trouble feeling all that positive, lately, about my life or liberty. It’s hard to live free when you’re at a migraine’s mercy. 

In case you’re wondering, yes, I take something stronger than Tylenol to keep them under control. I take a triptan (Relpax is my tryptamine-based drug of choice) to keep them at bay, but Relpax isn’t a cure, just a palliative. Recently I’ve started finding that the more Relpax I took, the more migraines I got, but my neurologist disagrees with my layman’s assessment.

Yes, I also exercise regularly, cut out as many food triggers (tyramines) as possible, eat small meals throughout the day, drink lots of water, go to sleep early, and visualize world peace (and sometimes whirled peas). But, the fact is, my migraine brain has a mind of its own. More often than not it likes to take complete control, making sure I know it's the boss of me.

Frequent migraines make it hard for me to be a consistently happy camper, even on non-migraine days, because I often spend those days secretly waiting, waiting, waiting for my now old migraine brain to rear its ugly head and unleash yet another day of pain. When a new migraine starts to announce itself inside my head, my happiness quickly slips away like feet sliding across a just-waxed floor. As soon as it strikes – whoosh – I move from happy to unhappy. The back of my neck immediately stiffens, portending a new day of pain and suffering. Once that migraine develops, I have to cancel all plans and lie curled up in bed, enduring  its who-knows-when-it’ll-end side effects.

It’s difficult for me to talk honestly about my migraines, because then I have to think about their antecedent, my brain, a part of my body I was never encouraged to think highly of way back when I was growing up. My mother (too often) reminded me that I wasn’t much of a brain. My brother jokingly called me birdbrain (when he wasn’t calling me turkey legs). When I was about four or five (or maybe three, who can remember?), I split open a little piece of the back of my head after I stood up on a metal rocking chair in front of our house to get more rock out of it. Instead, I instantly fell backwards, smashing my head against the concrete. Afterwards, my brother laughingly told me that my brains had leaked out, so I was now officially a birdbrain and stupid. When my parents laughed along with him, I mistook their shared laughter for confirmation.

I didn’t fulfill their prophecy until fifth grade, when we moved to the suburbs and I landed a mean, vindictive teacher who took such an instant dislike to me that she assured me I was never going to be smart enough to amount to anything smarter than a fifth grader. Thanks to her, I was unable to be placed in a lower roster in middle school (the lower the number, the smarter the students – all pre-determined by your fifth grade teacher’s assessment). In high school, I did so poorly on my SAT’s that my favorite English teacher told me that she doubted I had the brains to succeed in college. I allowed myself to believe these people, because they were older and wiser (and brainier?) than I believed I was ever going to be.

I spent my late adolescence and early adulthood trying to prove them wrong, and mostly I succeeded. But today I no longer trust that my brain has my back. I now believe that my migraine brain was born that humpty-dumpty day, but waited around to pay me back for damaging it so that one day it could unleash itself at will, rendering me senseless. It, not my intelligence, tells me who's the boss of me, like my own Voldemort threatening me from the inside out.

I have tried to be brutally, down-to-earth honest here, to give you a sneak peek at how we (my little migraine brain and I) think. We accept that we're never going to be Einsteinian or Stephen Hawkingsian, just as my family and teachers predicted (even though we wish we could be). We know that we're never going to be Kleeian or Miroian, because we do not posses their art brains. I can promise you that we have little to no interest in being Sylvia Plathian, although some days I’m in such agony I think I might want to be.

What we know we are is one hundred percent, out-and-out Migrainian, a nasty cross between albatross and tight noose. What I need you to understand about me is that migraines have become the cross I bear. I am under their thumb, a Siamese cat of a girl. But without grinning, baby, always without grinning.

Damp and Stinky

I am temporarily out of sorts, because the condensate drain from our upstairs air conditioning backed up (see, I knew I was right not to turn it on!), water overflowed the so-called overflow pan, then leaked throughout the house, wreaking havoc on my computer room's ceiling and our downstairs. The smell is so offensive that I can't go near my desk, so I’m attempting to write in my hot and sticky kitchen.

The putrid smell is probably coming from the special stain repellant paint that was used to cover up last year's air conditioning leak, which I was promised, after our new system was installed, would never happen again. I was told the new system would shut off automatically if a drainage problem should ever occur again. Ha. Not true. According to the man who just left, that switch was inadvertently left off the new installation.

So, not only is the ceiling ruined upstairs, but so is the downstairs archway to the dining room, where paint has now buckled so thoroughly that it is falling off in sheets. The old, old irreplaceable wallpaper (which I loved) is now stained brown along edges abutting trim.  I am waiting for the carpenter ants to send out their signal so they can snake their way through the wet wood and gallop through the house. I know that’s what is coming next.

When I first woke up, drenched and stuck to the sheets because of the intense humidity coursing through our bedroom’s now-opened windows (I could hear crickets, though, which is one positive in this negative), I went from remembering the dream I’d just had (I was being bitten all over my arms and legs by fleas), to remembering the water damage. I cursed myself for getting used to feeling comfortably cool, because I should know by know that when I let down my guard and feel comfortable or positive, disaster happens.

The air conditioning guy took pictures, but I wanted him to wave a magic wand and make the damage disappear; instead I had to settle for listening to him groan with dismay as he saw what his installer had caused to happen. The best part of the morning, so far, was when he asked me if I'd mind staying home all day, in my now-humid stinkhole, to await his repairman. Of course I mind – but I have no choice. I want it to be cold again.

I know this is a small blip on the disaster scale, and I'm not claiming to be devastated (like Central Park and its trees). But I am distressed, disappointed and damp. Rather than bewitched, bothered, and bewildered, which would be much more fun.

Cheap Cheap Cheap

It has been so hot outside that I finally broke down and turned on the central air conditioning, after my tiny Vorndao room fan could no longer cool my overly-sweltering self as I moved it from room to room. Yes, you air conditioning fanatics out there, and you know who you are (I’m describing every living soul, aren’t I?), I know a tiny fan can’t do the job central air can do. Come on, stop laughing at me. I know what you’re thinking: She’s too cheap to turn it on.

Wait just one second. You’re not 100% right. I try not to use our came-with-the-house central air because it means I have to close all the windows (which I hate doing, since they have to stay closed for oh-so many months of the year). I would like to remind you air conditioning freaks that when you close all the windows you block out all the natural sounds and smells of summer. For me, closing windows means replacing Connecticut's short-lived, thank-God-it’s-summer delights with unnatural sounds and dangerous allergy-inducing musty smells (at least in my house).

Wait. Don’t believe me. I am not being honest. I don’t turn on the central air because I am cheap. I like to try to cover up for this cheapness by saying I inherited my father’s cheap gene, but we all know you can’t inherit such things. I confess: the reason I choose to drip with sweat instead of listening to our money-guzzling air conditioning units go on and off, on and off is that I shudder to think how much I'll have to pay CL&P for the extra usage.

There, you can stop stomping your feet and cheering. I admitted it. Let’s nod our heads in unison as we remember my random acts of cheapness. In fact, let’s knock ourselves out at my expense, and I’ll try not to mind, because it’s free to mock me, right?

Keep those smiles coming as you shoot your eyes backwards and remember how I: look for parking meters with time already on them, circle around so I can park in one of the three free places in town, try to get people to split one entree with me when we go out to eat, and have trouble leaving more than the exact tip. 

This one's for my husband, who reminds me that you have to pay for the best (I have a hard time understanding that rule): I always look for the cheapest deals on hotels and airlines, then bitterly complain when I'm not freely offered the best. 

I just, plain have difficulty understanding why I should shell out cash for things I deem “too expensive” - like the ring I fell in love with in an estate jewelry shop in Provincetown, which I decided was way, way too overpriced to actually buy. My friend ended up calling my husband and telling him I was too cheap to buy it, so she bought it for him to give to me. 

Then there was the time I had to replace my desktop computer with a laptop, and another friend shamed (and bullied!) me into buying it when I wouldn't stop kvetching and moaning (to her and the Apple salesperson) that I'd like to buy it, but it cost too much. 

I almost didn’t buy my first Prius five years ago, because it ended up being the more expensive loaded model instead of the cheap, bare-bones model I’d originally ordered. I again had trouble this June when I bought my second Prius, which I refused to buy until they took off the $50 charge for the cargo net, which I hadn't asked for and didn't want. It's turned into my favorite feature; I use it every day. 

I have trouble paying full price - especially for cherries (this revelation is going to make my sister very happy), which I won't buy unless they’re on sale (and even then, I only buy a handful at a time). I lied to her about my cherry-buying cheapness when she confronted me about it. I tried to convince her I wasn't cheap by spinning a long, drawn-out saga of not buying cherries because I once got sick on a train in Spain (mainly on the plain) after eating a kilo of them (which is true). I obviously protested too much, because she started chirping, "Cheap Cheap Cheap."

A few weeks ago, when my husband and I were on vacation, I said I’d rather starve than buy fish or meat at the gourmet-y store (c’mon, $28 a pound for fish?).  Can you blame me - in this 2009 shaky economy, which keeps tanking? I believe I should be honored for my cheapness, then reclassified as frugal. But that's not going to happen, is it, to this pay-for-coach/wanna-be-bumped-to-first-class-for-free cheapskate? 

Even though I’ve kept the air conditioning on for three full days. 

As another friend loves to remind me (with much rancor and glee): once a cheapskate, always a cheapskate. Rats, foiled again.

If My Daughter Can Blog, So Can I...

Since my 27 year old, newly married daughter started a blog, I decided I would copycat her and start one, too (but with a different-looking page layout, because the one she chose is surrounded by polka dots...which I adore...but I think I'm way too old to be loving them as much as I do). 

At first, I imagined that blogging might help me stop crying each time I remember that she moved far, far away - to a galaxy called Seattle - a godforsaken place that takes two incredibly expensive plane rides to get to from here (Hartford, CT). 

Then I told myself - hey, maybe blogging will light up my life (move over Debbie Boone) and make me famous, like I used to want to be when I was younger.

What I am finding out, though, as I type and edit and re-edit, is that I am spending so much blogging time revising and correcting that I'm incapable of writing any content, because I keep obsessively checking and rechecking for possible spelling and grammar errors. I hope I'll be able to cut loose, soon, and write something worth reading, like how I had a coupon at the New Balance store for a free foot exam and two pairs of socks, so I went there to try my luck at having my feet evaluated on what I immediately realized was a bogus foot machine. I let my needing-to-be-convinced grieving self believe that I should buy the very shoes the sales boy brought out for me. I'm not being ageist, but he was a boy, in comparison to 61 year-old-lady me. He assured me that this pair of shoes was the only pair that would make my high-arched, sore big toes feet feel like walking. He neglected to mention that they were also the most expensive shoes there, but I ignored that red flag and instead agreed with him that he was right - the shoes must be bought. 

I am now wearing them so I can see if they hurt (even though sitting instead of walking around doesn't count as trying them out, does it?).  So far, so good.

I just realized I bought them because my experience in the New Balance store momentarily sucked me back in time to my grief-free childhood, when I used to get my August back-to-school shoes (as well as those cancerous feet X-rays in the foot-measuring machine). The nice shoe salesman used to tie my laces real tight, like the New Balance salesboy did today. Even though I've been wallowing in daughter-grief all day, my memory floodgates opened up long enough to blind me for a nano-second. Buying shoes allowed me to close the gates and feel like I used to when I was young and daughterless.

Haggling for my two pairs of free socks (offered on my coupon) brought me back to reality, but what a relief it was to let grief take a back seat for a few minutes so both my inner Imelda Marcos and long, lost childhood could come out and play.

See, I told my recently-sad self, it's not necessary to let grief take everything away from you.