Mommie Dearest

I think last night I might have officially lost any hope for becoming “Mother of The Year.” In fact, I might have put myself into a Joan Crawford-like category for “Crazy Mother of the Year."

It all started after picking up my youngest daughter from volleyball practice after school. I dropped her at home to get her homework done while I went to an afternoon yoga class. In addition to doing her homework, I reminded her to bring her dirty laundry into the laundry room and tidy-up her room. She had two hours to accomplish these three tasks. Then she would basically free to do whatever she wanted with the exception of watching TV (which we really try to limit during the school week).

I returned home two hours later and she was “still doing her homework.” Hmmm. That was a little suspicious, but I went with it. She said she was starving and asked when dinner would be ready? I had already made turkey meat sauce earlier in the day, so all I needed to do was boil some pasta. I said, “I could have dinner on the table in about 15 minutes.” She said, “I am going to shower while the pasta is cooking.”  

As she headed towards the bathroom, I asked her if she had brought her dirty clothes into the laundry room yet? Nope.  

“Did you tidy your room yet?” Nope.

“I was doing my homework.”

“This whole time?”

She nodded yes. So I asked, “Then are you finished with your homework?”

“Almost,” she replied.

You can see where this is heading. I took a deep breath, fed the dog, sorted my own laundry, started cooking the pasta and setting the table. Even after all of that, my daughter was still not out of the shower. So, I decided to see what was taking so long. I was hopeful that she was busy tidying-up her room and gathering her dirty laundry. But as I approached her room, and then the bathroom, I could still hear the shower running. Not good.

I felt my inner-control-freak start to awaken.

I turned the corner and could see that she was still in the shower and, at the back end of the shower, was a clear plastic bag hanging from a towel hook. Inside that plastic bag was her iPhone playing an episode of cartoons on Netflix.

Yes, she was watching television IN the shower on her iPhone. No, she is not allowed to watch TV during the week.  Yes, she was supposed to be taking a “quick” shower. Yes, she was supposed to be cleaning her room. Yes, she was supposed to be bringing her dirty laundry into the laundry room. Let’s not even mention the fact that was wasting water… a ton of HOT water no less.   

Meanwhile, her room remained an unmitigated disaster. Dirty clothes were strewn everywhere. The laundry basket was overflowing with clothing and every single pair of her dirty socks were UNDER her bed. (Mind you, I was only gone SIX days.)

To say “I lost it” would be a gross understatement. I overreacted in such a profound way. I was screaming. (Maybe at the top of my lungs.) ARE YOU F*ING KIDDING ME??????

I know. I know. I said the F-word. To my 13-year-old daughter. I thought about it when the words came out of my mouth. I know this is very, very bad. But I bet a Child Service caseworker would side with me if they had a teenager too.

While I continued to rant (uncontrollably) about how this was totally unacceptable, I grabbed her phone (in its protective plastic shower case) and proceeded to get down on the floor, crawl under her bed, and pick up her dirty socks.  Then I proceeded to collect her dirty underwear, dirty tennis clothes, dirty volleyball clothes, dirty school uniforms and a ton of other clothes. Clothes on the bed. Clothes on the floor. Clothes in the hamper. Clothes next to the hamper. Clothes on her bookshelf. Clothes on her desk. Piles of clean clothes that I had washed (the Sunday before I left), were still neatly folded under dirty clothes that had been thrown on top of them.

I was still yelling.

I gathered everything up. Marched into the laundry room. Screaming at my husband as I passed through the kitchen, where he sat calmly enjoying a glass of white wine and reading “The Economist.”  

I then proceeded to sort through five loads of laundry. Yes, every week, there are five loads (not including sheets and towels) of laundry, because we all do sports. But here's the thing, I didn’t have any dirty laundry this week because I was in LA and did my laundry there. So why am I literally waist high in dirty laundry on this Monday night? Because, in my absence, my daughter must have decided to change her clothes three times a day and everything ended up on the floor. Whether it was dirty or not.

Sigh.

By the time I got the first load into the washing machine, checked on my pasta (which was slightly overcooked at this point), my teenage daughter was dressed, standing in the kitchen, and trying not to cry.

Having been down this road with two kids already, I’ve come to realize it’s always a little bit of an unknown if teenagers cry because they genuinely feel remorse for not following the rules.

Or if they cry because they got caught doing something they weren't supposed to be doing.

Or if they cry because they just lost their cell phone privileges.  

So, I took a deep breath and apologized for my inappropriate choice of words and for yelling. I explained that I don’t like being a “helicopter parent.”

I would like her to monitor her own homework.

I would like her to tidy-up her own room (without being reminded).

I would like her to do her best in school and in sports.  (I emphasized HER best.  She does not have to be THE best.)

With any time left, she is free to watch TV (on the weekends), Snapchat, Instagram, play on her phone or hang out with friends.  

At this point, her Dad jumped in and reiterated the importance of making her bed, keeping her room tidy and making her school work her top priority. He then decided to take this opportunity to point out that her mother (me) is a “neatnik.” While he never expects her to live up to “my” standards of “neatnik-ness,” she must do the bare minimum. Somehow the life lesson that I was trying to teach got turned into a mockery of what might be considered my tendency towards obsessive-compulsive behavior. (I suppose there is some truth to that, but it is also those qualities that were currently getting the laundry done and dinner on the table too.) They both had a good chuckle at my expense and dinner was served.

After dinner, my daughter went back to her room to print out a paper for school. I finished doing the dishes and then went to help her with her remaining algebra problems from the night before. When I walked back to her room, she was passed out on her bed with the lights on and on top of the covers. It was only 7:30 pm. I insisted that she was “fake sleeping.” This was clearly avoidance behavior, because she had gotten in trouble, and didn’t want to work on her math. I stood over her like an insane drill sergeant commanding her to wake up and finish her homework. I waited and waited. She didn’t move. I checked for a pulse (no seriously, I did). She was fine, but I still thought she was faking. So I turned off her lights but took her computer out of the room.

I came back at 9 pm (her actual bedtime) and she was still asleep and curled up in the EXACT same position. Still no blanket. Hadn’t moved an inch. I put the blanket on top of her this time and said goodnight. She slept through the night until I woke her out of a dead sleep at 6:30 am for school. She had slept for 11 straight hours and didn’t remember anything after she went to her room and printed her paper.

So she wasn’t fake sleeping. She wasn’t ignoring me. She was just exhausted. Probably exhausted from playing in a tennis tournament over the weekend. Exhausted from a long day at school and then volleyball practice after school. Then two hours of homework. Then a lunatic mother screaming her head off, because she shouldn’t have been watching TV (in the shower no less), when she should have been doing the minimum of her chores. After a big lecture, followed by a comfort food dinner, she simply passed out. She is 13-years-old and has grown five inches in the last year... and she is tired.

Everything was back to normal today. She gave me a big hug when I dropped her off at school and we both said, “I love you.”  I have to remember that sometimes kids just want to be kids (which includes watching mindless cartoons when they should be doing their chores).  And sometimes moms lose their sh*t because we are trying to keep it all together... while buried in dirty laundry. 

Just Another Manic Monday

I got back from Los Angeles yesterday. LA is not just my hometown, but also the place where most of the television business occurs, so being there is always a whirlwind. I jammed in meetings and meals with writers, studio execs, network execs, my 90-year-old dad, my middle daughter, my brother, my cousins, errands, movies, shopping, reading scripts, giving notes and writing into six adrenaline-fueled days. I never know if these trips will be fruitful, or just wheel-spinning and exhausting, but this was a great trip. I was going a million miles an hour... and I was loving it.  

The best part was spending quality time with my middle daughter… who has thankfully made a complete recovery from this summer. We ate. We laughed. We hung out. We shopped. We even got mani/pedis.

I flew back to Hawaii feeling really happy that my trip was so productive and fun, but I was starting to run on fumes.

My husband and youngest daughter picked me up from the airport. My daughter had just finished playing tennis in a Juniors tournament, but was anxious to play more with me when I got home.

Let me stop here. This never happens.

My husband and I love tennis.  We each play four times a week.  We play socially and competitively.  Our youngest daughter has had a racket in her hand since she was three years old. Now, at 13, she is an excellent player but she has never “loved” it the way we do.  She takes lessons and plays in tournaments, but is almost never interested in just going to practice or play socially.  So when she says, “I want to go play tennis,” I take that invitation very seriously.  No matter how exhausted I am.

So, in spite of getting up at 5am to catch my flight, I went home, lathered on my sunscreen, put on my tennis clothes and packed up our gear to go play a match with her.  We had a great time. She came very close to beating me for the first time (which was the best part).

I raced home afterwards, because my husband had made arrangements us to play in ANOTHER tennis match later that afternoon. After our match, we stopped to have a cold drink at the bar with friends. It was after sundown and I desperately wanted (and needed) a hot shower. But by the time we got home, I needed to get dinner on the table and then I got my long awaited shower.

Around 9pm, I went to check on my daughter’s progress with her math homework. She needed to go to bed. I needed to go to bed, but algebra was standing in our way.

An hour later, I finally crawled into bed. I had been up for 20 straight hours. I worked the entire five hours on the plane. I played four hours of tennis after I landed, and then I had an evening of making dinner, doing dishes and solving math problems.  You would think I would have passed out as soon as my head hit the pillow.  

But no.

My anxious little (dare I say manic) mind started racing with all the things that I still needed to do:
I forgot to start the laundry.
I needed to coordinate the carpool schedule for my daughter’s volleyball matches this week.  
I needed to go to the grocery store.  

My husband and daughter did do some grocery shopping while I was gone, but they only bought a few important items: Pop Tarts, ramen, tortillas, and cheese.  

Not kidding.  Not a fresh vegetable, fruit or protein in sight. (Okay, cheese is a protein, but my daughter doesn’t like cheese except on pizza, so I’m not counting it.)

Why is it when I leave for a week, my family eats like they live in a college dormitory?

I had to fight the mania to get out of bed and do all of these things right then. I could still feel the adrenaline coursing through my veins from all the stimulation over the last six days. I needed to close my eyes, but there was one other thought keeping me wide awake.

While I was in LA, I got the call telling me that my “studio deal” is about to expire and they are not renewing my contract. That means, for the first time in 31 years, I will not have a guaranteed income next year.  I will now be a freelance producer (and writer).  BUT it will be entirely up to me to figure out how to get paid for that privilege.  

I was (moderately) prepared for this.  That’s the life of an independent producer.  But suddenly it just became very real.

My husband refers to me as a “belt and suspenders” kind of girl. Someone who likes EXTRA security. The “belt" has been my years and years of working in corporate life. The “suspenders" have been a dozen different multi-year contracts at various companies.  Ironically, in spite of all of those “contracts,” I have NEVER felt secure in a single job that I have had over my long career.  

So come January 1st, the “rubber will hit the (proverbial) road.” I will officially be on my own.  I will no longer be wearing a belt or suspenders.  I could argue that I hung up my "business suit" over a year ago. and I am now wearing my yoga pants to work.

Yoga pants may not say “power suit,” but I am infinitely more comfortable than I ever was.  

I just hope the elastic holds up… and I can continue making a living in my new life as a writer and a producer.  

If not, at least I am dressed and ready for an impromptu "downward dog,” meditating and writing this blog with a blissful smile plastered across my face.

Namaste.

Buried Treasure

For the past hour, I have been held “hostage” at my bank in Los Angeles. I am trying to close a safe deposit box that I opened in 1995.  Last month, the bank decided that they would like to charge me an annual fee for this box.  A box that has been free for the last two decades. By the way, a free safe deposit box was the least they could do given the ten different accounts that I have had at this bank over that time.  I tried to call them and close the box from Hawaii, but apparently you have to close a safe deposit box in person.  So here I am.

Thankfully I have a copy of my latest bank statement, my safe deposit box key and 17 forms of picture ID.  In spite of that, two different bank associates can’t find my “original contract.”

This is all to CLOSE a box that is in my name, at my bank, in person, with all of my banking information and photo IDs.

So I am not sure what the hold up is? Perhaps because my “original contract” predates the bank using the Internet and computers and was 3 kids, 3 dogs, 2 cats, 1 hamster, 2 marriages, 8 jobs and 6 houses ago? So I can see how it might be an old file, but they have the original signature card and they have my most recent address.

The ridiculous part is that the box is probably empty.  There might be a penny stock certifIcate, from a defunct boat building company, that my ex-husband bought when we were first married in the 1980s.  But other than that, I think there is nothing of value in this box. At this rate I will never know, because the bank is closing in 8 minutes, and there is no end to this bureaucratic (literal) paper chase.  

If it weren’t for the principal of being charged for the use of this box (that I no longer need), I would just walk away.  But they have me here now, and I don’t appear to be going anywhere anytime soon.

It turns out, I was right about one of the items in the box.  I kept that worthless stock certificate, decades after the company went bankrupt, as a reminder to never buy penny stocks again.

But there was one other item in the box.

A letter I wrote to my oldest daughter, 22 years ago, on her first birthday.  

I have often said that time is my greatest commodity.  So I am truly intolerant of time wasted.  

This bank had just wasted a precious hour and a half of my time. An hour and a half of an already tightly-packed schedule for a week of meetings and other obligations.  But finding this letter to my daughter was a gentle reminder that time is precious... and it goes very, very fast if you aren’t paying attention.

90 minutes ended up being a small price to pay to open up this time capsule and find an emotional treasure inside.

A reminder of just how deeply I felt about my first baby on her first birthday.  
A reminder of how nervous I was that she would turn out okay.  
A reminder that I was bumping around in the dark, trying to figure out how to be a working mother, without screwing things up.

22 years later, she has turned out pretty great.  

Now I get to share this birthday card with her to remind her just how much I loved her... and still do.

So, in the end, it was worth the wait.

Happy Monday

I am coming to LA to do my other job.  My real job because writing is not (yet) how I make my living.  I am a TV Producer which means I need to be meeting with writers, studio executives and network executives.  So I am going to LA to do some of that.  

In my first year of producing, I came to LA every month or so to pitch a new project. Somehow I thought it would be easier.  I thought that I would pick a writer, come up with an idea, run it by my studio and I would sell it to a network.  But it was not that easy.  

At all.

It took about six months before I sold my first project.  

It’s a process.

When people ask me, “What are you up to?”  They expect me to talk about my television projects. My projects that I am proud of.  My projects that I have in the pipeline.  My projects that are getting made.  But my projects are all in various stages of development.  Some are further along than others.  But when people ask you about your television projects, they want to know what they can go home and watch right away.  They are not interested in what you might make someday, maybe, in about a year… IF ever.

What I really want to talk about is writing.  My writing.  This blog. This project that I’ve been working on for months and months. Almost two years of my life, as a writer, are contained on this site. Now that I’ve shared it with my friends and family, it’s actually “live” and it’s scary, but it’s also really, really fun.

But in the week leading up to my “come check out my blog email,” there was one person I hadn’t shown it to yet. My husband.

I love my husband. He might be the smartest person I know, but all of that intelligence comes with a price.  He is extremely cautious and at times very critical (although he would say the same about me).

My husband read the “book” and was (mostly) encouraging.  He loves books.  He loves to read.  So he thought writing a book was (mostly) a good idea.  

But when I decided to convert my book into this blog, he started referring to this as my “vanity project.”  That term reminds me a lot of the term “trophy wife” or other such catch phrases that marginalize people and their assets to something dismissible.

He finally sat down and started reading some of my more recent posts. When he finished reading, he looked at me with concern and said, “You can’t put THIS on the internet.”  

It was a true gut punch. One week before I planned on announcing my blog, he had just thrown a 500 pound cold wet blanket on my bonfire of joy.

“What do you mean I can’t put this on the internet? It’s a blog. It’s the book just expanded because I kept writing.”

He said, “But anyone could read this?  Why would you want that?  You are opening yourself up to ridicule, criticism, money scams, identity theft, con artists and stalkers.”

“Huh?”  was all that came out of my mouth.  Has he actually ever seen the Internet?  It’s not like he doesn’t have two computers, an iPad and an iPhone.  I’m not sure what he thinks people have been doing on the Internet for the last 15 years.  

But moreover, I’m not making a sex tape.  I am not publishing my diaries.  I don’t mention his name, the names of our children or even the name of my dog for that matter.  I asked him what the difference is between a book and a blog?  He said, ”A book is not available to everyone.  They have to buy it.  The internet is free and permanent.”  

So, if I charged for this, it would be different?  

We debated back and forth about the difference between buying a book online and the internet. The permanence of a book you can’t edit vs. the impermanence of posts you can change.  We debated the difference between autobiographies, stand-up comedians, famous people who talk about their feelings and unknown people who talk about their feelings and then develop a following from that. Apparently, the real issue is that I am honest about my feelings about stuff (not even anything controversial).  Just stuff.  But somehow he fears that this can only lead to bad things.

This debate went on for days.  Why would I want to do this?  What’s my ultimate goal?  No rational person would ever write about something and let the whole world see it.  Apparently, he has never seen YouTube, Instagram or read the thousands and thousands of blogs written by housewives, comedians, business people, teenagers and the like.

Finally, we found a compromise. I would write under a pen name.  

So, two weeks ago, 52 Mondays had its official premiere. I invited a few dozen friends to check out my blog.

But as soon as I clicked send on the email, the crazy thoughts began swirling in my head:

What if they didn't see my email?
What if they can't open the link?
What if they can't navigate the website?
What if they don't know how to share it?
What if they don't comment?
What if they don't like it? Awkward.

Maybe it was too much?  
Maybe I am too much?
Maybe I can’t write?
Maybe I shouldn’t write?
Maybe my husband was right?
Maybe it shouldn’t be a blog?

Here we go again… Hello Ursula.

I find myself saying, “Don’t be attached to the outcome.”  It is the number one principle of being Zen.  

But I am too attached to the outcome.  Which makes me sad that I am not more Zen.  But part of being Zen is not judging.  Not judging others.  Not judging yourself.  So, I guess I failed the second rule of being Zen.  

I also killed a fly in my kitchen this morning.  I am pretty sure that killing anything is not Zen.  So strike three.

Now it’s Monday.  I woke up feeling pretty unenthused about having to travel to LA.  I have no new projects to roll out to the networks on this trip.  The weather report says that it is going to be over 100 degrees in Los Angeles this week, which seems a little hot for late October, and I don’t love the logistics of traveling to begin with.

But in spite of all of that, I was really excited about getting up this morning and writing a post.  I wasn’t sure what I was going to write about, but I knew a five hour flight was going to be the perfect time for a little self-reflection.  

I made it through TSA security pretty fast (which is always a bonus), so I decided to have lunch at one of the airport bars.  Nothing looked good on the menu, so I went with a cold beer and french fries.  I felt like a rebel.  No salad.  No protein. Alcohol in the middle of the day.  Was I on vacation?  Nope.  I was getting ready for my business trip and I was celebrating my inner bad girl. 

The french fries were piping hot and crispy.  The beer was ice cold and bubbly. Suddenly I realized that in spite of my reluctance to go to Los Angeles today, this Monday was turning out pretty great.  

That’s when I remembered.  Every Monday, for almost two years, I have been working on this project that I love. A project that has almost “died on the vine” many times, but continued to thrive.  A project that sometimes fills me with self-doubt, and may not have any financial reward, but a project that gets me out of bed in the morning... because I am writing.  

So I was thinking that the secret to curing the Monday Blues is to do one thing that you love every Monday.  Something that you look forward to.  For me it is writing.  I’d love to hear what it is for you in the comments or send me an email.

And next time when someone asks me, “What are you up to?” I think I am going to start saying: “I’m writing a blog… and it’s awesome.”

Making Menopause Your Bitch

Here’s the deal, unless you are a gay man living in a bubble (that is without a 40+ women in your life), menopause affects us all.

Because you are either going through it, or you will go through it, or your wife is or is about to go through it or your co-worker is… someone is in imminent danger of irrational behavior.

And for those of you going through menopause, or perimenopause, right now. You are not alone.

We all thought PMS was bad: monthly mood swings, cramps, cravings, weight gain and the rest of it.

Menopause is a little bit more insidious. It slowly moves into your life and you’re not even sure what it is.  

Suddenly your body doesn’t look like it used to. Suddenly you feel a little crazy, but not the kind of crazy that lasts 72 hours, it’s like a tsunami of crazy. It comes in waves, with almost no warning, and you don’t know how long it will last or when the tidal wave will recede.

We’ve all heard the horror stories about hot flashes, expanding waistlines, plummeting sex drives and thinning hair. The struggle is real.

But then there is this overwhelming desire to hurt someone. Usually your spouse. Every little thing they do (and have been doing for years) suddenly feels like an epic BFD. Poor bastards don’t even know what’s happening because they’re like, “What did I do?”  

The answer is everything. You are breathing too loudly. Snoring too loudly. You left the toilet seat up. The toothpaste cap off. Your coffee cup is still in the sink. You never empty the dishwasher. You forgot to take out the trash. You left your smelly sock on the floor. You are late. You are lost. You are a man… and we might have to kill you now.

Here’s the good news ladies… it passes. It’s yet another test of our strength. Our moral compass. Another character building lesson. Just hang in there.

Here is the secret to making menopause YOUR bitch… rather than it making YOU the bitch:

You must exercise and start eating right. You’re not going to want to. You’re going to want to wallow in all the cliche foods: pizza, ice cream, alcohol and french fries. Occasionally, that’s ok, but it’s no longer your go-to plan. If you want to conquer your inner bitch, there is only one way through it. You need to exercise. UGH right? Sorry. But I’m telling you, it’s the secret sauce. Every day. Something.

If you have never exercised in your life, I would start with walking. It’s the easiest, cheapest, safest, most convenient. Start with around the block. Or somewhere where you feel inspired. A park. A path. An easy hike. If walking isn’t your bag, then start taking classes. Yoga or Pilates are the most gentle and you will find a lot of other like-minded people in a beginner’s class.  

I alternate between tennis and yoga mostly, but during perimenopause I was recovering from an injury and couldn’t play tennis so I started riding a bicycle. It had been about 20 years since I had ridden one but I still rode almost every day. Sometimes just a few blocks. Sometimes 20 miles. I was in the best shape of my life and it quelled my desire to choke the living sh*t out of my husband who was oblivious to my inner hormonal rage. Eventually I went back to tennis and then back to yoga (which I should have never stopped).  

This truly will be your path out of the wilderness. It’s a must. It will keep your body in shape. It will keep your endorphins firing. It will keep you distracted from the little sh*t that pisses you off. It will keep your loved ones and co-workers safe.  

So for the sake of everyone’s best interest. Put down the ice cream scooper, get off the sofa and get moving.

The Health Department Just Called

The health department just called.

I’m not kidding. Apparently my youngest daughter’s school is so small that when multiple kids are out sick (my daughter has been home for two days with a chest cold) the health department gets notified.

Seriously?

I can’t count how many days of school I missed when I was little or how many my three children have missed over the years. The health department has NEVER called before.

The woman was super nice. Very concerned. “How is your daughter feeling? When did she come down with symptoms? Has she seen the doctor?”

Yes, yesterday, and they looked at her ears, eyes, nose, throat, took her temperature, and did a rapid strep test. The results? They said, "She probably has a virus.”

Btw, that is exactly what I knew that is what the doctor was going to say. This is not my first rodeo. This is my third kid and I know the drill: Antibiotics are a last resort. Most everything is viral to begin with. If they don’t get better, sometimes a secondary bacterial infection can occur, then they need antibiotics... blah blah blah. It’s a waiting game. They get better on their own, or you wait for the secondary infection to arrive, and THEN you get a prescription for antibiotics.

I told the woman on the phone all of this. She replied, “Was she tested for the flu?”

There’s a test for the flu???

I said, “No, but she did get a flu shot two weeks ago.”
“The flu shot doesn’t cover all strains of the flu.”
(No sh*t Sherlock.) 

“Okay, but if they were worried about the flu, wouldn’t they have tested her for it?”
She replied, “Not necessarily.”
“What are they going to do for her if she has the flu?”
“They will give her Tamiflu or something equivalent.”
“But that won’t cure the flu?”
“No, but it will let us track her in our files,” she said.

I see. So I should get her out of bed, dressed, wait in the freezing cold waiting room to see the same doctor who saw her yesterday to test her for the flu, so that maybe they can give her medication to lessen her symptoms, but not cure her, all because the department of health would then be able to track this in their files?  

Hmmmm… I think I’ll pass on that.

Nevertheless, this phone call has made me paranoid. I don’t like ambiguity.

Yesterday, I left the doctor’s office with confirmation that she just needs rest and fluids. Today the department of health has called and made me feel like she is Patient Zero for an island-wide epidemic.  

I need to wrestle my inner-neurotic-Jewish-mother to the ground and go make her another cup of tea with honey.

Favorite Child

When my eldest daughter went off to college, we got a puppy.  

The first time we met him, he had his head tucked under the sofa with his little white fluffy tushy sticking out the other end. I think he thought if we couldn’t see his face, he would be invisible.  

I worried about him being skinnier than the rest of the pups.  You could see his ribs and he felt a lot lighter than his littermates.  My husband thought he looked “lethargic.”  But my youngest daughter loved him, so we took him anyway.

When we got him home, our new little puppy wouldn’t eat.  He was too afraid.  My youngest daughter suggested letting him eat out of my hand.  He liked that, so I went through that charade twice a day for weeks.

My eldest daughter accused him of being “her replacement” and that I was developing a mild obsession with my dog. She started referring to him as the "favorite child.”  It has become running joke in the family.  But five years later, she still won't call him by his name.  She just says "favorite child."

It’s really ridiculous.  A parent does not have a favorite.

Admittedly, I do talk about him a lot… but he’s really loveable.
Admittedly, I do take a lot of pictures of him… but he’s really cute.
Admittedly, I do feel bad when I leave the house even to run an errand… but he doesn’t like being alone.
Admittedly, I do buy him special food… but he does have allergies.  
Admittedly, I do have him groomed every month… but his coat is very difficult to maintain.
Admittedly, I do spend a lot of money on vet bills… but he was born with some congenital issues.

But to say that he is my favorite child is just a (slight) exaggeration. He just happens to be perfectly adorable, unconditionally loving and we have a special bond.  

He sits in my office all day while I work.  He follows me wherever I go. When I take a shower, he lays on the bathmat until I get out.  He sits beside me during my meditation. When I practice yoga, he does his downward dog during my downward dog.  

But he is not perfect.  He has a tendency to bark a lot.  Yes, this might qualify him as a “yappy little dog.” Also, when he is outside, he does not respond to the simplest of commands, and he is also a runner.

He does not “come” when you call him.  
He does not “stay.”  
He does not even respond to his name.

Okay, so that is a little bit of a problem.

Most of the time, he stays on our property, but yesterday he decided to roll around in our freshly planted flower beds (that had just been watered).  My perfectly groomed/all-white angel came into the house covered in mud from head-to-toe. No big deal except that it took me an hour and a half to wash him, dry him and brush out the mud.  

So today, when he went outside to do his business, I was careful to keep him out of the mud.  But something was bugging him.  He kept sniffing around the deck.  Something was under there and he needed to find it.  Next thing I know, he’s leaping off the deck and disappearing under the house. A moment later, I saw a shrieking feral cat, followed by a ball of white fluff, and then they were both gone, through the fence and into our neighbor’s yard. I started yelling because I have no idea how far he had run.  We live on agricultural land and the lots are two acres each. There is no easy way to find him. Thankfully, our neighbor heard me and offered to help me search. After 30 minutes, he pulled up with my  “little angel,” covered in mud (again) and with sticky green thistles throughout his coat.  This is wayyyy worse than yesterday’s mud roll.  I was furious.  

He knows he was a bad dog.  He knows that I was freaking out that he might be lost forever.  He knows that he should not have run away.  He knows that he should not get filthy, because it means another 90 minutes of pulling, brushing, washing and drying. It was like combing out broccoli covered in taffy. But he didn’t care. He’s a dog.

Sigh, he’s definitely not my favorite child today.

Unfortunately, the bad dog photo doesn’t do it justice, because even his “mugshot” is so cute.

Still Meditating

It has been over six months since my first meditation class and I am still meditating. It has become part of my everyday life.  Like brushing my teeth or taking a shower.  

But I have to admit something, meditation is not always easy.

There are some days I close my eyes and try to sit quietly for 20 minutes and it feels like 20 hours.  

Some days I find myself peeking at the clock.
Some days I find myself desperate to stop and jot something down on my grocery list.
Some days I can't stop thinking about how hungry I am or what I want to make for dinner.
Some days I can't get comfortable.
Some days I am so wired that I simply can't sit still. 
Sometimes I am so tired, I just want to sleep.  

The afternoons are particularly difficult when I am trying to “squeeze” in 20 minutes between picking up my daughter from school, taking her to sports, trying to exercise myself and then getting home to make dinner, feed the dog, eat dinner, do the dishes and take a shower.  

But when I am not rushed and it is quiet, it can be quite joyful.  

Like life, sometimes meditation is a real challenge.  But the overall benefits of learning to be alone with my own thoughts 20 minutes a day/twice a day has been transformative. I find that I am infinitely more creative and I have more clarity in my thinking.  

Meditation is a practice. Kind of like life. You have good days and bad days. You don't arrive at a destination when you practice meditation, you simply alter the journey.

Breakdown, It's Alright

A friend of mine was telling me that she stayed up all night watching the news coverage of the Las Vegas massacre.  She wanted to stop watching, but she couldn’t.  She woke up in the morning emotionally and physically exhausted and while she was on her way to work she heard the news that Tom Petty had died.  She said she pulled her car over the side of the road and just broke down and sobbed. She felt so numb and helpless; it was the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back.

I think we are all so overwhelmed by all of the terrible news lately.  Hurricanes.  Domestic terrorism.  Hate crimes. Even the looming threat of North Korea threatening to drop hydrogen bombs.   

It was Tom Petty’s own prophetic lyrics that came to mind as she told me her story:

Breakdown
Go ahead and give it to me
Breakdown honey take me through the night
Breakdown now I'm standing here can't you see
Breakdown, it's alright
It's alright
It's alright

My thoughts and prayers go out to all of those who have suffered and are suffering from Harvey, Irma, Maria and Las Vegas.

As for Mr. Petty of the Heartbreakers, hearts were broken at the news of your passing.  May you rest in peace.

I Am Not An Uber Driver

Last time I was in LA, I must have pressed the wrong button when requesting an Uber to get to the airport.  It now thinks I am a driver and I keep getting notices that I am not making any money with a “Weekly Pay Statement” of $0.00.  It then says, “Let’s fix that and get you to start earning!

The irony is that I don't even live in Los Angeles and I don't even own a car there. 

The superstitious part of me fears that this notice is the ghost of Christmas future. If none of my projects go into production soon, then this weekly notice will be a subtle reminder that I am not making any money as a producer, so I might NEED to start driving for Uber. (No shame in that.  Just not exactly what I had in mind for my second career.)

The sad part is that I don't know how to go to the website and dissuade the app from thinking that I am a driver.

If that isn’t bad enough, this whole misunderstanding is because I am over 40 and I really need to be wearing my reading glasses whenever I am doing something on my phone.  If I had seen what buttons I was pressing, I wouldn’t be having this issue with Uber.

But meanwhile, it’s Monday.  I just spent two hours on the phone with my cable company trying to find out why they arbitrarily raised my bill $12 this month.  Apparently, the “introductory promotion” I had has now expired.  Did I really need to spend two hours to learn this?

Perhaps I should have activated my Uber driving status and picked up someone for a ride to the airport.  It would have saved me the aggravation on the phone with the cable company, and I could have covered the cost of the additional bill this month.

i miss you, Carrie Fisher

I just finished “The Princess Diarist”  by Carrie Fisher.

I am obsessed with Carrie Fisher.

I love her writing.  I love her tortured soul.  I love her sense of humor.  I love her honesty and self-deprecation.  I love her self-awareness to know that her fans were obsessed with her "Princess Leia" alter-ego and not actually her.

I love the heart-wrenching honesty in which she writes about her complicated relationship with her mother in “Postcards From The Edge.”  I love her transparency and wit about addiction in “Wishful Drinking.”  I love her fearlessness in writing about her mental illness in “Shockaholic.”

I love when she equates signing autographs at Comic-Con to lap dances. I love that she never felt confident about her body or her sexuality until she learned that Princess Leia was the object of gratification for millions of young boys around the world.  

I love that she talked about how she failed to appreciate her young face until it later “melted” as an older woman.

I love her unapologetic obsession with Coca-Cola and cigarettes.  (If I weren’t such a control freak, those would be at the top of my list too.)  I love her loyalty to her French Bulldog named Gary.

I liked Star Wars.  I liked that Princess Leia was fun and refreshing as one of the early females heroines with “sass.”  

But I was never obsessed with the movie franchise like millions of others.  To me, Princess Leia is just a great character with a really unfortunate hair-do.

Carrie Fisher, on the other hand, was a complicated human being.  Carrie Fisher was a world-class storyteller and a writer that truly speaks to me.  Carrie Fisher was the one who inspired me to write. Carrie Fisher was the one I would wait in line to meet.  Not Princess Leia.  

Princess Leia has been memorialized in memorabilia and film and even in a wax museum.  Carrie Fisher will live on through her books which bring me great joy and inspiration.  But I am sad that I will never get to tell Carrie that it was “Carrie” who inspired me to write and find humor in the mundane and the absurd.

I miss YOU, Carrie Fisher.  May your tortured and hilarious soul rest in peace.

Lady Macbeth

You'll be happy to know that the six hours I spent procrastinating yesterday from doing any real work paid off... a little.

I ended up washing all of the slipcovers on my white sofa and they came out almost as good as new. Unfortunately, the upholstered frame of the sofa remains yellowed and stained, so I still needed a professional to come in and steam clean that part.  

By the way, washing the slipcover cushions was not as easy as it sounds. First of all, there were seven over-sized covers and there is nothing "slip" about them. They are made to fit "tight as a drum" and they are almost as hard to take off as they are to put back on. It was like putting on Spanx on a hot humid day. 

Meanwhile, while I was on this washing/bleaching frenzy, my Old Navy white canvas sneakers also got a second life.

By late last night, I started to feel like Lady Macbeth. (If Lady Macbeth was trying to clean white canvas from chocolate stains and dirty dog prints rather than blood from her hands.)

But what causes these compulsive cleaning jags? Is it truly work procrastination? Or is it in the hope that if I get these things done, I will have a clearer mind to work.

I am not sure I know the answer. Meanwhile, I was making turkey chili this morning, while waiting for the furniture cleaners to arrive, and I accidentally splattered some tomato sauce on my white shorts in the process. I was tempted to run into the laundry room and bleach my shorts too, but I decided to get back to work instead.

I think that qualifies as progress.

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Procrastination

I have been very busy procrastinating on everything this morning.

I have been taking out the trash, taking clothes to Goodwill, bleaching old canvas tennis shoes and I am now attempting to get a chocolate stain off of a white sofa.

I have become Martha Stewart with a compulsive OCD twist. Except that I am not baking wedding cakes or crepes. I am literally bleaching a bucket of old shoelaces in an attempt to get them white again. I just realized that I need to sew one of the slipcovers on the sofa before I attempt to wash the stain off. I don't believe that these stains will actually come out, but somehow it is very important to try.

Why am I suddenly having DIY cleaning frenzy? Because it's Monday? Because my husband is out of town and I have more free time to do projects? Or because someone casually asked me, "How is your book coming?" 

When I told them that I had converted it into a blog, they said, "Oh? Are you sure you want to do that?" They paused when they saw the look of horror on my face. Then said, "I mean, what is the blog about?"

I said, "Well... you read the book. Right? It is about transitioning from one career to another, reinvention, discovering patterns and trying to break them. It's about other people's misconceptions of a "perfect" life. It's about trying to create a better life by finding your passion and breaking old thought patterns. I guess it's just about life.  But the story kept going."

Let me clarify. I was stumbling to find the response. I was tongue twisted and defensive. I felt embarrassed and uncertain.

That question keeps haunting me... "What is this blog about?" When I cannot sum it up in an easy TV Guide logline (which I now call my "blogline"), I get paralyzed all over again. Who will read this? Who cares? Why am I writing?

Sigh.

My $19 Old Navy sneakers are pretty trashed. My white sofa has doggy footprints and chocolate stains.  My endeavor to clean these things will most likely be futile and I will have wasted hours trying.

But the alternative is going back to work. I have projects that require creative fixes, but I don't have any creative solutions today.  So my inner Martha Stewart is going to procrastinate a little longer.

Houston We Have A Problem

I was on a roll. I was writing again. The words started flowing. The endorphins started flowing and then it came to a crashing halt... again.

Houston. The hurricane and the floods. 50 inches of water. Non-stop news coverage. Devastating photos. Neighborhoods destroyed. Animals drowning. Families left without shelter. Freeways under water. I can't stop looking. I can't stop talking about it. My husband is a news junkie and, worse, he has a particular obsession with natural disasters. So he keeps showing me pictures.

But I am to blame too. I keep looking at social media. 1 MILLION homes have been destroyed. How can I even think about finding something cheeky to write about when it was the biggest recorded hurricane in history?

I thought maybe as the water began to recede and the winds were no longer 180 miles per hour, maybe life would return to normal.

But no.

Hurricane Harvey has come and gone. But now it's more violent cousin Irma is on its heels. Irma has just devastated St. Marteen and is heading directly for Florida. Again, I can't stop looking at social media and the photographs. 90% of St. Marteen's structures have been wiped out. But Irma's not done, she's heading for one of the most populated cities in our country.

Meanwhile, Mexico had a massive earthquake. There are wildfires out of control in the pacific northwest. It's as if Mother Nature has had enough of us on her planet, and she's trying desperately to shake us off her planet like a dog with fleas.

I find myself paralyzed again. I am grief stricken and unable to focus. So I am writing about the source of my sadness in which I feel powerless and guilty. Powerless that I cannot do anything to prevent or solve these massive crises, and guilty that I am still bothered by my own daily minutia.

I need to stop looking at social media and I need to start researching charities to donate money to help the cause.

Food & Fatigue

Is it just me or are you tired today too?

I feel like I have been hit by a truck.
Sometimes three day weekends do that to me.
Or maybe it was the impromptu Labor Day BBQ that I decided to have Monday night after feeling the pressure to do something Labor Day-ish?

I can't even take credit for this BBQ. My husband did the grilling and he bought potato salad at the last minute when I realized I had a bag of potatoes that went bad. I was annoyed that he didn't buy the potato salad from the deli counter. Instead, he bought it from the refrigerator section and it came in a big plastic tub. So there really wasn't that much "cooking" involved. But somehow I was doing dishes for hours after they left.

I did bake homemade chocolate chip cookies. My daughter was over the moon because I followed the Toll House recipe exactly. Usually I attempt to make them "healthier,"  which really bugs her. But this time I didn't substitute white flour for almond flour. No dark chocolate chips for semi-sweet. No coconut oil for butter. I used the fully recommended white sugar with no maple syrup substitution. They were totally old-fashioned, as my grandmother and mother used to make, and she loved them. I ate about six of them myself. Then I felt like I needed a nap immediately.

Ah yes! I remember why I don't eat those kinds of foods now. They make me feel exhausted and they open the proverbial Pandora's box to eating hell. At the BBQ, I ate an entire bowl of salt & vinegar potato chips by myself, washed that down with two beers, a hamburger on a delicious Hawaiian sweetbread bun. I even gorged myself on the plastic tub of potato salad.  I hate to admit that it was actually delicious.

But I have been tired ever since.

I know I spend a lot of time talking about my complicated relationship with food.

I love food. I love cooking. I come from a family that almost does not know how to socialize without food. My dad is 90 years old and the highlight of the each day is going out to eat.

It's is not about vanity as much as it feeling good. It is really about a lifetime of experimentation of what food does and does not do to my body. I can eat almost anything in moderation. But certain foods "trigger" an addict-like behavior. So I try to avoid them when possible.

But I believe our bodies are delicate machines. The older we get, the more delicate the machinery is. In my case, it's not just physical, but mental. So I am on a permanent mission to try and figure out just the right balance for my body to work at its optimum capacity.

A huge factor in managing my anxiety is limiting stimulants. As much as I love coffee and sugar, I have given both up again. While I am not militant about small amounts of sugar, the less caffeine and sugar I have the less anxious I feel. It's pretty simple. In my corporate life, I had a daily ritual of an afternoon Coca-Cola to get through the long afternoon of back-to-back meetings. 

Now that I work from home and my meeting schedule is much less demanding, the Coca-Cola has been replaced by afternoon meditation and/or exercise. 

Food is my drug. If I don't take my drugs as prescribed, or if I have an accidental Labor Day weekend overdose, I pay dearly for it.  My joints ache. I don't sleep well. My stomach hurts and now I want to go back to bed.

Labor Day

Labor Day is coming! A three day weekend!

So what is it about Labor Day that makes some people unnecessarily anxious? Is it because it is the last days of "summer vacation" and there is this unspoken pressure to make it count?

For families who have summer homes, they are packing up, shutting off the utilities, covering the furniture and closing the shutters until the next summer. The casual attire of flip-flops and bathing suits are worn one last time before being packed away for the next nine months. The lazy days of summer are about to become a distant memory.

Maybe it's the fact that there is no other three-day weekend in sight. For a few lucky ones, there might be an odd Columbus Day or Veterans Day off. But, for the rest of us, there are no long weekends until Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving? Isn't that the holiday where they jack-up the airfares so people can come together for a long weekend of carbohydrate-laden food. Sibling rivalries rear their ugly heads. Families are torn between mothers and mother-in-laws or in some cases between moms and dads. That's not a vacation.

As a kid, Labor Day meant back to school shopping. There is nothing more fun than picking out new school supplies? (Do you remember denim covered notebooks? I think everything was denim in the 70s.) We made our book covers out of paper shopping bags and then you could draw all over them. Now they have nylon books covers. The new book covers remind me of the Spandex leggings girls wore in the 80s. I think they feel creepy. We didn't carry backpacks in those days. We just had armloads of books.

Labor Day means there are no more Monday holidays until the kids go on Winter Break. The next three and half months is 40-50 hour work weeks, carpools, commuting, shorter days, colder nights, homework, sports, schedules to juggle, constant battles of getting kids in the shower, reminding them to go to bed earlier, brush their teeth, and pick up their wet towels off the floor.

So the pressure to REALLY enjoy Labor Day is almost too much. We all want to finish that summer novel we started. We feel obligated to throw (or at least attend) one more backyard BBQ. But no one sent me an invitation and I am feeling too lazy to throw one myself. I need to relax, but I have a long list of things to do. I need to go to the grocery store and stock up on back to school lunch items, what to make for dinner this week and something my daughter will eat for breakfast. I have at least five loads of laundry to do. Oh and I am out of dog food.

By the way, my daughter's school ACTUALLY started two weeks ago and yet...

I still feel the end-of-summer, last-three-day-weekend, how will I make our Labor Day special-angst?

Gratitude

Gratitude.

Oprah says this has become her new religion.
To feel gratitude.
To express gratitude.
It is essential.
It is the key to life.
My daughter started eating again today. It had been a week.
We still don't know what caused this condition, but at least today she is eating.

I am so grateful... and I am officially converting to Oprah's new religion.

Motherhood in Retrograde

I seem to be struggling with Motherhood this week.

My middle daughter seems to now be afraid to eat and is chronically nauseous.  We don't know if this is a mental, emotional or physical condition.  She is depressed, anxious, has too much stomach acid (from not eating), exhausted (from not eating), pale and gray.  

Her stepmother is pulling her hair out and I feel helpless 2500 miles away.  She is barely interested in talking to me (or anyone for that matter).  Her stepmother is worried that she will develop anorexia as a result of not eating for so long.  I am at a loss.  

My youngest daughter is about to turn 13 and I feel like some alien has taken over her body. She has become an eye-rolling, snarky, impatient teenager. It's almost impossible to even have a conversation with her at dinner. She is annoyed by any discussion of current events, questions about her school, her sports or her friends.

When we go to the movies, she hates that we talk about the movie afterward. When we took her to a tennis tournament this weekend, she was annoyed that we watched her play her matches too intently. When I remind her to take her PE clothes to school this morning, she rolled her eyes and still forgot them 2 minutes later. She couldn't find her tennis racket today because our cleaning lady put the racket inside her tennis bag, and it didn't occur to her to look for it there.

Yesterday we asked her what she would like to do for her birthday. We offered to have a party at our house or the beach or whatever she would like. She just wants to hang out with three of her friends. But she hasn't picked a day, time or place. She's not interested in finding out which of the weekend days they might be available.

She is also planning to run for Vice President of her middle school. When we asked about campaigning, she said, "No one does that. They just give a speech." When we asked about what she was planning to say in her speech she said, "I don't know. How would I know? It's not written yet."

Every question we ask, no matter how big or small, is responded with utter disdain and her responses make no sense. Every sentence contradicts the one before it and somehow it is all our fault. Either we are not listening or we just don't understand.  I feel like I should be an expert on teenagers by now.  This is my third one.  And yet... every time I get that eye-roll, I feel like I am starting over without an instruction manual.  "Just breathe," I tell myself.

Thankfully there is no issue with my oldest daughter at this time, but I am reluctant to call her for fear of jinxing that too.  

I am hoping this is some kind of mercury in retrograde for parenting right now. I need a sign that this too shall pass. Right now I feel like I am in a bad remake of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers."

P.S. On the bright side, my dog is no more or less spoiled than usual. His listening skills are always terrible. He barks too much and wanders into the street any chance he gets, but at least he doesn't roll his eyes at me. He just has a confused look whenever I give him a command and then proceeds to lick my face when given a chance. It could be worse, he could be acting like "Cujo."

Continuing to Meditate

I have been committed to meditating twice a day for 20 minutes since I learned how to meditate last February. I sit quietly with my own thoughts, my mantra and my little fluffy white dog. Unfortunately my dog doesn't always sit as quietly as he did that first day. I figure staying focused on my mantra, while my dog barks his head off every time he sees a bird fly by, is part of the practice.

The truth is meditation is hard.

It is difficult for someone like me to be quiet.
It is difficult for someone like me to sit still.
It is difficult for someone like me to find extra time in the day.
It is difficult for someone like me to be with my own thoughts.

When I told my sister the story about my first mediation training, she laughed so hard she cried. Something about me being so physically uncomfortable while sitting with myself for 20 minutes cracked her up.

A few weeks later, she asked me if I still liked meditation. I told her some days were better than others, but it was definitely interesting and worth exploring. So I gave her a TM meditation training as a gift.

She called me after the first session and said, "Something great is happening. I don't know what it is, or if it's real, but I want to thank you for this gift." We continued talking for over an hour and it was the first time in years that we were really talking. It was honest and emotional and funny and awesome. She said that she felt like someone had thrown her a lifeline.

I don't know how to qualify or quantify the benefits of practicing meditation.  I just know that it has been transformative for my sister.  In turn, that was transformative for me... and for our relationship. So I continue to meditate.  

Trying to Be Zen

Trying to be Zen.
I am having trouble being Zen today. Maybe because it's Monday.
I am not in control today.

My daughter is still sick. Her mystery illness and her all-encompassing symptoms are choking me. They are choking me with anxiety and my inability to fix it. To fix her. To fix the situation.

So it comes down to "control." I can't control her illness, her symptoms, her sadness, nor her state of mind.

I flew to LA to be with her. To distract her. To feed her. To entertain her. I was only successful for a few hours where she was not nauseous and did not vomit. We went for mani/pedis, meditation training and even out for dinner. But the wonderful day came to a grinding halt when dinner didn't go down well and certainly didn't stay down. The vomiting cycle started again and so did the panic, depression, frustration, and weakness. This, in turn, made me feel helpless and out of control.

Six days have passed and she can barely eat. She gets weaker by the day and more frustrated than ever. She even stopped meditating.

I gave her the gift of meditation training and, less than three days after I left, she stopped practicing. I don't know if she stopped because she doesn't feel well enough to meditate. Or because she just doesn't like it. She said it was helping, but then it wasn't. The whole experiment lasted less than one week. I was too attached to the outcome.

I am too attached to the outcome.
In order to be Zen, you can't be attached to outcome.
You have to be ok with whatever it is.
But I am NOT ok with whatever it is.
I am agitated. I am angry. I am sad. I am unmoored. I am not in control.

I like control, but maybe that is the problem. If I was more detached from the outcome, then perhaps I would have more control? At least of myself... if nothing else.

I have a sign in my office. 

It does not say Be A Patient.

It does not say Be The Patient.

It just says Be Patient… I am trying.