Conversations

A younger Facebook Friend of mine reported the following conversation with her 4-year-old:

K., while holding the iron token from Monopoly: Mom, who is Iron Man?
Friend: I'm not sure. Maybe a superhero? You should ask Daddy.
K.: I think he's a guy who irons any stuff that's in his way.

The commercial potential here is huge. Ironing Man could team up with Dyson Dude (sucks up wrongdoing while turning on a ball) and the bewitching, bikini-clad Mop Maid.

But this conversation also reminded me of Owen, about age 11. I was backing up the car; he was shooting baskets in the driveway. He walked over, motioned for me to roll down the window, and said, "You know that metal thing, that thing you heat up and rub it back and forth on clothes to get the wrinkles out of them, what's that thing called?"
"Um, you mean the iron?"
"Iron. . . Are you sure it's called an iron?"

We don't do much ironing in our house. Obviously.

Mom, the Microwave, and God

My mom believes God spoke to her via her microwave.

This was awhile back. My cousin and his wife had put their house on the market and my mom, unbeknownst to her children, had been thinking about moving (i.e. selling our Home, the one we grew up in, the place invested with all the memories, you know, that place). So Mom shows up at my cousin's house and when she discovers that her microwave will fit in their specially built microwave cabinet, she discerns a divine sign: This is the house God wants her to buy. And she does. And she's happy.

Does God speak through ordinary events, if not ordinary household appliances? Two days ago I received an email informing me that the publishing firm with which I've signed two book contracts has now cancelled its entire history list. Is this a sign? Is God talking? Is He/She/They saying (cue James Earl Jones voice, except maybe with some strong feminine/feminist undertones), "Oh, Facing-50, 'tis time to rethink your career?"

Or maybe 'tis time for a new microwave.

Check-Up

My annual pap: My apparently always pregnant young doctor pries inserts large steel torture device, pries open my vagina, and announces brightly, "Yep! That cervix has definitely closed up shop!" I and my gone-out-of-business cervix potter on to my supposed-to-be-annual-but-I-putz-around-and-so-it's-more-like-tri-annual mammogram: The 17-year-old tech clamps my boob in a vise and then says cheerily, "Just hang in there!" I hang. Boobs throbbing, I proceed to my foot doctor. She's an optimistic soul, probably because she has yet to enter puberty, so I'm surprised when, after pushing my toe back and forth for awhile, she sighs and suggests more surgery. We settle for another cortisone shot into the toe joint. I hobble out.

On Monday I have my first colonoscopy. It's only fair. Wouldn't want my anus to feel left out of the party.

Blarney Trees

On the grounds of Blarney Castle sit the most amazing trees. Sigh. Yes, yes, Blarney Castle, I know, I know. Total tourist trap, shameful that we take our students there on what are supposed to be serious study trips but hey, the Young Ones demand it; they really truly want to kiss the Blarney Stone and, as a Young One sternly said to me, "Sometimes it's really fun to be a tacky tourist." And if you turn your back on the castle and head out into the grounds, the trees make the otherwise ridiculous Blarney admission price worth every cent. Centuries old with enormous trunks and limbs polished smooth and hard by wind and rain, these trees tower above and yet intertwine with and spread themselves all about the surrounding boulder-strewn hills and cliffs, so that rock and tree and sky blend into one.

I thought of those trees when I came home after five weeks abroad and discovered that my dog had shrunk.

Why is it that old age so diminishes us ambulatory creatures? Experiences and efforts accumulate; pains and pleasures pile up; we dwindle. My poor, pitiful dog.

Not that he sees it this way. Let loose amidst the  Blarney trees, he'd just pee on them and amble off to resume his endless quest for a chicken bone. 

I made the mistake of saying Never

In two weeks Hugh goes to boarding school. This is weird. We are not boarding school people. We are not upper-middle-class Brits, members of the East Coast elite, or a missionary family. We're not even private school people. We're not Catholic. But here we are, sending our son off to a Catholic boarding school. In Mississippi, no less. We are sending our African-American son to friggin' Catholic boarding school in friggin' Mississippi.

Damn. Parenthood has made us do, and become, strange things.

It Was Simple

I'm home after four weeks abroad with 34 undergrads. Home to my lovely husband and bright boys and lovable pets. Home with my good bed and thick towels and uninterrupted internet access. Home (amazingly) to temperatures lower than those baking much of the United States these last few weeks. 

Home. No more lengthy headache-exacerbating bus rides listening to America's Future discussing  where they drank last night, what they drank, how drunk they got, where to go to drink tonight, what to drink, and how drunk they hope to get.

Home. So why am I incredibly out-of sorts, ill-tempered, cantankerous, downright bitchy?

Perhaps it's the fact that I'm on Day 2 of the 17-Day Diet. Sadly, four weeks in the company of 34 undergrads is not good for the Facing-50s waistline. Every day one wades through mounds and mounds of french fries and gummy bears and candy bars and potato chips. . .  But, no, this bitchiness is more than just hunger, more than the grumpiness induced by having to forego bread and wine and chocolate. (Although, gotta admit, seeing those words in stark print-- bread and wine and chocolate, I am doing without bread and wine and chocolate -- sheesh, it really is enough to send someone over the edge, isn't it?)

Still, more than diet is at work here. I'd love to blame jet lag, but as an incurable insomniac, I've lived most of my life in a state of chronic jet lag, and actually I think I'm fairly good at it.

So, nope, not a matter of food or sleep deprivation. Instead, I do believe I am suffering from the loss of simplicity. Life for the last four weeks has been stunningly simple: a small suitcase, a series of barebones hostel rooms, breakfasts of tea and toast, and best of all, a packed and inflexible schedule. Everyday I got up and knew what I had to do and when I had to do it. I did it. And then I went to bed. Few decisions, limited choices, and oh! glorious bliss! no self-flagellation at the end of the day. No "I shoulda coulda"s.  No wondering at how little I achieved. No guilt at chapters not written, errands not run, chores not completed and checked off the List. No sense of failure because I didn't make phone calls or dinner or love.

Just me, Irish history, and 34 hungover undergraduates.

Simple.