Work it

Nine to Five, Norma Rae, Erin Brokovich, Working Girl, Baby Boom, Legally Blonde, Devil Wears Prada...each movie depicts women in the work force...different types of women. I think I fall somewhere between Sally Field and Diane Keaton.

I grapple with the balance of family, friends, work and pro bono.  There's nothing more important to me than spending time with my family and friends, but unless I block out time, it's easily eaten away with other commitments. I have a friend who calls me a lunch whore, of course always said with love but, knowing that it's difficult to schedule lunch with me. I look at my calendar sometimes and imagine elves have hacked my Google account and added meetings, lunches and dinners.

The working world hasn't been 9 to 5 since the movie of the same name was released. The plus of our 24/7 world is not having to stay in your office the typical 8 hours, since you're able to spread out the work day to after dinner, or late at night, or those times reserved for insomnia, or the weekend. It has though increased the load and the expectation. And, the 24/7 world was not created with procrastinators in mind. They are truly at a disadvantage being able to push off work until...later.

I love being able to take a break from work, have dinner, talk to Zach, and then return to a project or problem. The time away clears my mind to think about it differently and possibly find a different way to resolve the issue. I've read the reports that we do not really multi-task well, but I like having the opportunity to spend time on a work project, switch to a volunteer challenge, and back to a work report. In addition to keeping my interest, I believe each project enhances the other.

The challenge is making my time count and working on projects I feel are meaningful. I like making a difference and being challenged.  So, I've just spent a couple of hours with Norma Rae and I'm ready for a little J.C. Wiatt.

do the right thing

It's a bit unnerving how early college is discussed now in the life of a high school student. I don't remember even thinking about college until junior year. With all this talk happening earlier, there seems to be more opportunity to discuss what parents hope for their children and whom they hope the kids grow into as adults. I hear a lot about wanting the kids to be happy and successful adults who find a career they love. Nothing wrong with being happy and successful, or loving what you spend much of your time doing.

Not to minimize those dreams, but a few things feel like they're missing. What about being a good person? What about being the person who does the right thing? Over the weekend I was talking with my step-dad about the Sandusky molestations. We were both incredulous at the behavior of the assistant coach when he walked in on Sandusky raping a 10 year old. I recounted a conversation I had with Zach about what he should do if he ever walked in on that kind of a situation. I said you don't have to put yourself in danger, but you must do the right thing and get help immediately.

This touched such a nerve that I cried with my step-dad. I want Zach to be a happy and successful adult, but I believe with every fiber of my being that all of it will be meaningless unless you have values and a moral compass that leads you to making the choice to do the right thing. These are choices that come up frequently and most are not as life and death as what that assistant coach encountered, but each time you have a choice. Being proud of who you are and doing the right thing will make you a happy person.

mothers

One of my favorite movies is Mother with Albert Brooks and Debbie Reynolds. It came out in 1996...the year after I became a mother. 

The story centers on Brooks as he returns to his childhood home hoping to understand what went wrong in his relationships with women. What ensues is brilliant comedy between a mother and son. One of my favorite scenes is when Reynolds and Brooks are on the phone and her call waiting interrupts. She attempts to put him on hold only to return to him several times before Brooks asks why she even pays for call waiting. It's a scene those of us with technology-challenged moms relate to and appreciate. Of course I've never had a similar experience with my mom.

If you have your mom into your adult life, changes in them and in your relationship take place. You may hear many of the same stories again and again, and even when you think you can't listen once more, you may begin to find these stories a bit comforting. Topics may include: past family events, disagreements with friends or family members, movie themes, theater revivals, and most likely your childhood.

Moms are usually the only person in the world who can bring the adult you back to the 16 year old you faster than running into your high school boyfriend. They can also be the one to embarrass, humiliate and frustrate you more than anyone. I was at a dinner the other night and two of the guests brought along their mothers. It was fascinating to see how each of the daughters interacted, excused, and reacted to their moms.

Later that night I wondered if I'll embarrass Zach when he's older and I'm older. Then I realized, it's not if it's when, realizing I've already started. So I'll go on record now, I'm sorry for asking too many questions, repeating myself at every opportunity, and just generally bugging you. Know it all comes from a place of love.

I know you've got a good mother story....and I'd love to hear it.

like heaven

It's in one of the busiest neighborhoods of New York City. Through a maze of construction barricades. In and out of open tunnels. And after many security check points, I am pushed out into this open area. It's almost too large to take in. The grass is perfectly mowed. The trees are all lined up, with each similar in size. It feels very controlled.

Until you see the waterfalls. The water first rolls through a metal comb and then pours freely into a pool so deep and peaceful. The pools are massive in size...each surrounded by metal with names in an elegant font. It's the combination of perfect nature and flawless design that makes it look so solid.

This place is peaceful, some call it sacred. It isn't until I raise my eyes and look up only to see massive buildings, that I remember I'm in New York. I haven't been here since December 2001. It makes me proud that an almost indescribable monument is now here forever. Seeing the heaven that was built on hell...

The reason for living

It makes you re-think your life.  When someone you know dies, it makes you re-think your life. When someone has lived an exemplary life, it should make you question what you will do with your time left. I don't think it matters how young or old you are when confronted with this, except that it's more pressing if you are older.

How much time do you have to make a difference in the lives of your family and friends, and the strangers you encounter in your neighborhood or the ones you never see who are in need of help? It's not about how you'll be remembered after dying, but what you think of yourself before that happens.

I heard the most intensely beautiful remembrances of someone today. Two took my breath away and the others were so deeply personal they painted a complete picture of a person. The solid values his parents instilled, the importance of education and philanthropy in his life, and the career that was golden.

But what took my breath away were the touching examples of him as a husband, father, grandfather, brother and friend. I kept wondering how my life measures up to the passion, thoughtfulness, kindness and care he showed for people. And I came away knowing this will make me re-think my life.

I remember...

It's four days until the 10th anniversary of the day it all changed. Ten years can feel like such a long time ago, but in a moment I can be brought back to that morning.

I can remember every moment of the day and the days to follow.

I remember...dropping Zach at day two of kindergarten.
I remember...walking down Park Avenue to work and thinking the sky never looked this blue.
I remember...my friend Tanya calling to tell me the Trade Center had been hit by a plane.
I remember...not having a radio or CNN newsfeed, and only wanting to watch the Today Show.
I remember...Tanya calling back, now screaming the other Tower was hit by another plane.

I remember...being happy that I hadn't gotten the job at One World Trade Center the year before.

I remember...stepping outside to smoke a cigarette and someone yelled, "the Pentagon has been hit."
I remember...deciding to pick Zach up from school and us going home to be safe.
I remember...being glued to CNN, as Zach watched cartoons in the other room.
I remember...my breath being taken away as the first Tower fell.
I remember...Zach's school receiving bomb threats.
I remember...feeling so anxious of what was going to happen next and when.
I remember...the wind changing, and the smell of downtown lingering on my terrace.
I remember...how I couldn't stop crying and still today cannot think about that day without crying.
I remember...watching this video over and over and feeling unimaginably sad.

But what I want to remember, is the kindness and good I saw in the people of New York. 

In memory everything seems to happen to music.*

I know I'm a creature of habit. As much as a new something or someone can be exciting, I find so much comfort in things and people I've known for a long time. I've worn the same perfume for 20 years...Annick Goutal's Gardenia Passion, and before that either Bal a Versailles or Lumiere. And every now and then, a little Jo Malone thrown in.

Stay with me. I'm bringing up these perfumes, not to show you how limited I am, but because in looking for something this weekend, I stumbled upon an unopened bottle of Lumiere. I sprayed it on and was immediately taken back to my 20s, on a plane to Paris and smelling this fragrance for the first time. It amazes me how scents and sounds produce such vivid memories.

Making out to The Who's Tommy or Jeff Beck's Blow by Blow...if I hear a song now from either, I'm brought right back to high school. I still get why Jeff Beck, but for the life of me cannot figure out why anyone would want to make out to Tommy. Pinball Wizard... maybe we skipped that one. Or, maybe it sounded different back then.

This Labor Day weekend was going to be mine alone, and even maybe a closet or two would get organized. It turned into one of book reading, TV watching and walking Lucy. I think I may have glanced in a closet and thought that it really didn't look so bad after all. I finally read The Help and watched several old movies. By old I mean the 80s. By the 80s I mean the ones with great music. You remember those.

Even though I'm trying to break myself of routines and glamorizing the past, the truth is I feel safe with what I know. But with fall right around the corner, I feel changes coming.

* Tennessee Williams

rose-colored

There's something comforting about seeing elderly couples walk down the street holding hands.  I am in awe of couples that have been married 50 years. Maybe jealous is the correct word. I would need to live to at least 102 to make that happen, and that would mean getting married this year. At this point, I think the likelihood of either is pretty slim.

What I have noticed though is how many couples who were couples in high school, college or just years ago are getting back together. With social networking sites working overtime connecting people with people from their past, marrying your childhood sweetheart seems a bit more commonplace.  If you juxtapose meeting someone new on a dating site like eHarmony, JDate, Match, Chemistry, or Catholic Match, it's a bit like going to the grocery store and looking for what you want...and whom you find attractive, not necessarily about shared interests.

There's no history or no reference of youth. There may be pluses to that, but it seems that when couples from the past reunite or even those couples who have been together for a long time, a rose-colored glasses phenomenon takes place. The extra 15 pounds or laugh lines or bald spot that have occurred over time aren't noticed quite so much. If you're over 45 and not looking like your 25 year old self, and a bit reticent about injectibles, looking back might bring you into the future.

A friend of mine's mother used to say after the announcement of a couple's divorce, "well, they didn't grow up together." Years later I've come to understand her words more fully - the couple's frame of reference is greater, there's a foundation that only happens over time, and there's a better understanding of why your spouse is the way (s)he is, and maybe there's a patience and tolerance that's learned after a few decades together.

with a plop

On the totem pole of life's problems, this one's very low. I am a bit embarrassed to say how disorienting yesterday was for me, but I'm owning it. After coming home through what seemed like one of those rainstorms where you could imagine a flash flood sweeping Park Avenue, I stood in my kitchen drying off. I was going through the mail while waiting for an important call. Oh, and for the record, and just so you understand my reaction, my cell number was the only number I gave to this person to call me.

PLOP

Before I knew it my Blackberry fell in Lucy's water bowl. Seriously? The accuracy of it surprised me. She's a 10 pound dog with a small bowl. I grabbed it out of the water - all the while cursing like I can do on occasion - took the back off, pulled out the battery and sim card, put it on a towel, turned it over, got out the blow dryer, and prayed.

After giving the device a blow dry, I prayed again (now thinking maybe the Tea Party has had a serious effect on me), put the battery in and waited for the connection to happen. It charged up, powered on, message markers blinked, it even vibrated with voicemails. But the keyboard wasn't responding. More drying and I even put the Blackberry in a ziplock with one of those moisture remover packets overnight.

Here's the kicker - I woke up several times during the night expecting to see my Blackberry charging on my bedside table. I never realized how many times I wake up to check it. What could possibly be sent to me in the middle of the night that I need to wake up and put on my glasses to read? I think I have a problem.

The withdrawal continued throughout the next day, until I was able to go to Verizon. Pleasantly surprised that I bought the insurance, the salesman told me to call the insurance company and they'd overnight me a new Blackberry. One more night of waking up to no emails, texts, BBMS or voicemails, but I found I slept through the night. I actually had a great night sleep.

Fast forward to the next day, today, and the phone arrives. I set it up, which took a little time since it's a newer model and unfortunately I didn't have all my information backed up. Mostly just had to recreate my BBM list. Tonight, as it all seems to be be back to normal, I had a thought: should I leave it out of the bedroom permanently?

nude

This post started off as a light and meaningful story about a conversation I had with my son a couple of days ago about nail polish. We were watching a commercial for a color called nude and as I watched not thinking anything except that's a nice color, he said out loud racist. Racist? He looked at me and asked, why is that color considered nude, when that's not nude for everyone? Something that I've accepted as fact all my life was now being questioned and contested by my almost 16 year old.

We have several examples of one nude being the universal skin color: pantyhose, Band-Aids, and for the longest time make-up foundation was only available in a few shades. So now we've added nail polish to the list.  For me, it's not about the lack of shades or the insensitivity to naming these shades. At the moment I heard racist, I realized the education my son is receiving - at home and in school - is working. He's being taught to see the other point of view, realize there's more than one side to a story, be empathic and challenge the norm. It was one of those parent moments we wait for and hope for.

So that's the abbreviated post I was originally going with until I read the horrendous news story coming out of Jackson, Mississippi about the brutal beating and murder of James Craig Anderson. It's impossible for me to understand how a group of teenagers can have as much hate as it takes to beat and run over a 49-year-old black man solely because of the color of his skin. 

Who are these kids? Who are their parents? What are they learning in school? How do we live in a country where a teenager in NY sees how unfair the name of a nail polish is and in the same country have a teenager who can utter the words let's go f*#k with some n#*%ers and proceed to kill a man without remorse? 

If he gets what he deserves, he'll be in jail for a double life sentence. If he had gotten what he deserved, it would have been an education. 

i do

with those two words, ny says a lot.

i've always lived, worked and attended schools where i was in the majority. being white...being jewish...being straight. i don't know what it's like to be in a minority, but that has never stopped me from empathizing with those who are. and going one step further, it's never stopped me from supporting those who are.

i'm guessing that's why i was overwhelmed with emotions this morning during a news story on the first same sex marriage in ny today. how special to see couples who have been together for 4 years or 14 years on the day their relationship is honored and made legal. i realize it's an important day in ny, but i cannot help thinking it's 2011 and what took us so long. it seems incomprehensible to me that an entire group of people in the united states of america cannot get married simply because of who they love.

it's as incomprehensible to me as not letting women vote or blacks own land or jews live - and unfortunately the list goes on. so, do you need to feel for the persecuted only if you're part of the group being persecuted? and do you need to stand up for equality for all when it's just about your group? 

do you feel inspired to do something for another group?  i do.

only in new york

where else could you receive a text at 4:30 on a saturday afternoon and be offered 2 tickets to the last performance of driving miss daisy starring 2 legends? vanessa redgrave and james earl jones on broadway; the richness of their history is palpable. the spontaneity of the night made it even more special.

the play itself is a love story between a jewish woman and a black man that begins in the racist 1950s...the racist 50s. it's such a slice of our history, illustrating hatred based on skin color and religion. and it makes you wonder how far we've actually come. i know obama is in the white house, but that one act does not fix centuries of oppression.

it was an interesting evening to see the play. it ended a day spent thinking and discussing diversity issues and how they apply to independent schools. how far have we come if the need still exists to discuss diversity? as the last curtain call ended, what struck me with such sadness was the thought that this might be the last time either of them performs on broadway.

thank you, melanie!

wwcd:

 enjoy the special moments

no wings?

maybe i'm just nostalgic lately or maybe it was our recent flight to florida, but i've been thinking about how magical it was to travel when i was a child. i hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the magic is gone. not just a little gone, but all gone. while at laguardia last week, i saw a mom, dad and their 4 year old daughter looking haggard as they made their way through the terminal and couldn't help but remember how excited i used to get the minute we entered the airport. people dressed for travel and flying was an event, not a burden. pilots were dashing and exuded confidence. stewardesses dressed in colorful uniforms, smiled and were helpful. and i had a collection of airline pins, each one saying i had my wings to fly.

i understand we live in different times since 911 and i appreciate the idea behind strict security measures. what i don't understand is the arbitrary act of some security agents. as i said, zach and i were just in florida and our dog lucy came with us. it's insulting enough that i have to pay $200 for her round trip under-the-seat ticket, but guess what item stopped us at security? her prescription canned dog food. 

the tsa agent uttered the words you never want to hear, "please step to the side." he went through my carry on (no checked bags to delay us when we land) and he found 3 cans of lucy's food and looked at me as though i should have known better. he called over 2 other agents and they deliberated only to point out that water was the first ingredient and that made the dog food not permitted on board. seriously? my options were to throw it out or check my bag. not wanting a starving dog in florida, i opted for the latter. 

fast forward to our return flight and the 3 of us are once again faced with a tsa agent who is looking at me and not smiling. "please step to the side." again?! this time it was the small container of water that i was carrying for lucy to drink...though i did know better on this one and meant to fill it up after we went through security. zach went back through security to rid us of the offensive water. 

but here's the kicker: once home and unpacking, i was looking in my make-up bag for a lipstick (the same make-up bag that flew with me in the cabin to and from new york) and pulled out a metal pocket knife. all i felt were chills. 

wwcd:  forget the wings, i'm installing an x-ray machine in my house

happy 50th

it's a friend of mine's 50th birthday today. 50. what a big number. i remember thinking i'd never be 50 and that of course happened regardless of what i thought. what's amazing is that it didn't take very long to get  to 50.

each decade represents something different for each of us. my teens were spent exploring boundaries and pushing them. in my 20s i found out how much i love working - while balancing it with a ridiculous amount of running around. my 30s stabilized my life with marriage and zach. and my 40s kept me in love with being a mom, led me to a career i never expected to find, and brought me back to a place i didn't think i'd ever want to revisit, let alone care about as much as i do. and that brings me to my 50s and wondering what this decade holds. even faced with so much change that's happened recently and more to come in the next few years, there is a new sense of calm. yeah, yeah, i know...calm, shmalm...i can laugh harder and cry more easily than ever. so much for the calm.

so with that...tom, i wish for you to remember:

it's a new year. 

decade.

chapter.

with untold opportunities.

adventures.

possibilities.

enjoy it all...each and every minute.

wishing you a very happy birthday.

me

wwcd: maybe i'll save the calm for my 60s 

separation anxiety

a feeling usually experienced by first time nursery school toddlers and parents or sleep away camp campers and parents, but at 51 i'm feeling it for the first time. my mom has decided to move to florida...year round.  it'll be the first time that we haven't lived in the same building or city.

i'm having a hard time managing all of the emotions surfacing with this change.  friends who don't have good relationships with their parents are jealous. those with good relationships know how hard this is for me. i know my mom and i have had our ups and downs, but we've always been there for each other. now we'll be helpful by phone or skype. it'll be different.

our family hasn't been the close-knit one i hoped for and that makes this feel more difficult.  my mom is zach's only grandma and that makes me like having her even more in his day-to-day life. i'm also a true creature of habit, not one who likes change in my personal life. and there's so much change going on now...

wwcd:  going to enjoy that we've got a lovely place to go 3 hours away by plane

my time off

i would love to tell you i've been on some exotic island...or even just a plain island enjoying the sun and water, but that's not how i spent january and part of february. it's been a time of nursing myself back to health, loving the snow, nursing zach back to health, avoiding the snow, spending time with some fun people, cursing the snow, and working loads. and a self-imposed blog hiatus.

as i write this almost 3 weeks into february, i wonder how it's possible 6 weeks of 2011 has gone by. i'm still not used to typing or writing 2011. and i wonder if the northeast is going to get pelted with a storm tomorrow after having 60 degree weather the other day?  i don't remember this much snow since the winter of 95 when zach was a newborn.

the big dilemma is what to do with this blog.  i've missed writing all these weeks, but i need to decide what i now want to write about. feel like i've been preachy about doing the right thing a little too much. and feeling too emotional to write what's going on now.

wwcd:  hoping to write more soon