The other night I was on a mass Zoom call with the author of White Fragility. The group sponsoring the call was Women for Biden, and from the nature of the questions I’m guessing most of the several hundred participants were white suburban women like me. One of the questions for writer Robin DiAngelo was how to deal with racist comments made by others. The speaker said the first step was to recognize your own racism. As in, stop trying to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye when there’s a big fat log in your own, even if you’re very, very sure it’s the other way around. She said we…
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Annie
There are science-based facts about dogs, other than that they’re loyal, lovable and (sometimes) obedient: They know if we’re happy, sad or angry. They yawn when we yawn. They actually bond when we share a mutual gaze. They feel jealousy. They age faster than humans. Way too fast. My cousin Kerry, a devoted animal mom, wrote this on Facebook a year ago after losing one of her fur babies: “No one tells you how quickly dogs age. How one day you wake up and suddenly their face is all white, how their eyes start to seem more milky than before, how you have to call their name a few more…
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GUEST BLOG: Sorting things out
My women friends – a.k.a., the Ladies of a Certain Age – are doing something we wish our parents had done. About 15 years ago, my cousin, Joan, gave me some advice. Her mother, my Aunt Phyllis, had just passed away. “Do your kids a favor,” Joan said. “Get rid of stuff before you die.” She was sorting through her mother’s possessions – things that Aunt Phyllis had acquired and kept for decades. We, the LOACA, are divesting. We’re getting rid of stuff. Stuff we don’t use. Stuff we don’t need. Stuff we’ll never dredge up or re-purpose or refurbish. Broken stuff, out-of-date, worn out, unfashionable stuff. Things we once treasured, but after we’re…
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Freeze frame
Much to my great-niece Elia’s dismay, I had never seen the first “Frozen.” “Seriously? Don’t you guys ever go to the movies?” she asked with more than a hint of teenage judginess. As if. I swear she’s 13 going on 21. There I was at the Emagine Rochester Hills movie theater waiting for my sister and four of her grandchildren. Who on earth goes to the movies at 10:30 on a Saturday morning? Lots of children and seniors, including the six of us, apparently. After the previews ended with about a minute to spare until the movie was starting, I leaned over and asked Elia what the first “Frozen” from…
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Cutting the cord
First thing’s first, my friends: Welcome to 2020. I swear I can’t write that iconic phrase without hearing Barbara Walters utter her signature opening line for “20/20,” the TV newsmagazine she anchored for a quarter century. Hard to believe she’s 90. Speaking of television, if one of your goals for this new year is lowering monthly expenses, here’s a tip: Ditch your cable. We cut the proverbial cord last summer. Best decision ever. Other than deleting my Twitter account. Cut to a recent scene in our family room: “Honey, what’s on TV?” “Nothing.” “There must be something. We have like a thousand channels.” “Nothing. Zip. Nada. It’s a wasteland.” Seriously? Hundreds…
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Ev’rywhere you go
This will be brief because I know everyone’s busy. It’s Tuesday, for goodness’ sake. Woke up today in a lighter mood. It’s been a tough December this year. Not sure why, except around certain holidays I miss my folks and other lost loved ones more than usual. Guess it’s not uncommon. Check in with me on Groundhog Day. Our house is decorated, the stockings are hung, and all of the gifts (and checks to the Amazon children) are written. So, as I’m lying in bed this morning, petting the dog and thinking about actually getting up, I started singing to Madison: It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas ……
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Tell me more
“It was impossible to get a conversation going. Everybody was talking too much.” – Yogi Berra “Tell me more.” When’s the last time you heard that? Or were asked what you really thought about something important in your life? I don’t mean a tweet, text or email. Not by phone either. I’m talking in-person, face-to-face conversation when you answered meaningful questions, such as: What do you like best? What makes you laugh? Who do you enjoy spending time with? Your answers might surprise you. Just in time for the holidays, there’s a card game from the Netherlands called Vertellis, which means “tell us more” in Dutch. The object of the game is simple: Turn off…
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Game of chance
It’s not often you find a Las Vegas slot machine sitting in the middle of an RV center’s waiting room. But there it was, next to the camouflage-themed popup camper marked down to $9,995. An authentic Bally’s casino Blazing 777, the slot machine had plenty of complimentary credits for customers to pass the time as they waited for their recreational vehicles at Kline’s RV Center in Warren. Before I could pull that one-armed bandit’s lever, an older gentleman got up from his chair and walked toward me. “Good morning, young lady,” he said. Seeing his crisp, blue Oxford shirt with the RV company name and logo on its breast pocket,…
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Scat
The “tap-tap-tapping” was loud enough to startle the dog, who woke up from a sound sleep with her game face on, barking as if the Jehovah’s Witnesses were on our front porch with copies of The Watchtower and Awake! As I’ve been known to tell them, “Trust me, you’ve got the wrong house.” “Tap-tap-tapping.” The ubiquitous Ring Video Doorbell we had installed wasn’t chiming. No one was outside. It was something else. Madison – the killer dog who allegedly nipped Sprinkler Guy John – growled, barked some more and then went back to sleep. I heard the noise again, so I got up and put my ear to the outside wall, where the…
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Staycation
If it’s early November, then I am, as Gilbert O’Sullivan sang, “… alone again (naturally).” A three-time Grammy Award-winning record, this 1972 soft-rock hit may be the most depressing song ever written. Recap: Jilted groom gets ghosted at the altar and contemplates jumping to his death. Pass the popcorn. More than 45 years ago, this song made grownups cry and sixth-graders like me giggle, especially at these tender lyrics: “To think that only yesterday, I was cheerful, bright and gay.” What can I say? There’s something incredibly silly about the word “gay” to a 12-year-old kid. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Luckily, I’m not getting married or throwing myself…
