A (Very) Small Triumph

Apparently I look bad today.

No, no. It's true. I can handle it. How do I know? Because my Contractor tells me. Not in so many words, but here's the situation:

I must look bad when Mr. Contractor, who wears a back-protection brace at all times which causes his belly to protrude over his pants in a "blurb" and therefore clearly understands fashion, watches me walk down the stairs leading to my driveway with what I believe is a bounce in my step but must appear somewhat hobble-like to Mr. Contractor, and yes, I choose to neglect my makeup this morning because it is in the backseat of the Civ and I do not choose to retrieve it and besides, I am going to Big Lots for crying out loud and wearing makeup at Big Lots is clearly over the top but I have showered and pulled my hair back into what I believe to be an adequate attempt at a "hairdo."

Big Breath. Continue.

So I am bouncing or gimping, depending on one's opinion, and he is looking at me with a definite head cock and concerned eyebrows which are like angry eyebrows but without the anger, and he is stepping closer and closer until he blocks my path and is definitely in my personal space because I can see the sawdust on his safety glasses, which are jauntily perched on his head and he is probably the nicest guy in the world, seriously, so I cannot blow him off and besides, he knows when I shower and eat and what I watch on television and he brings me fresh apples and heirloom tomatoes, so I pause and he says, " Are you okay?" which translated means, "You look like *&!!" and because he has seen me in a bathrobe and swimwear and flannel pants and big slippers he is probably qualified to make the assessment.

This is where regular wives are divided from The Trophy Wives, like the sheep and goats and the egg whites and the yolks.

I say to Mr. Contractor, "I am excellent! Have fun with those beautiful redwood posts you bought with the money I wanted to spend on a new Thermador range. I hope you don't slice any major arteries with that big noisy saw or plummett off the balcony you are replacing!"

Okay, I exaggerate a little. But I did say the 'excellent' part.

But it was still a triumph.

Carry on.

See the Signs

Sometimes life feels a bit crummy, no matter how hard we try to be positive. It's kind of the way the cookie crumbles, or the ball bounces or the hormones rage. But that's when a Trophy Wife shines by rising to the occasion to look for signs that the world is a wonderful place to be.

Cases in point:

•A dude's car is broken down in the right-hand turn lane of a very busy intersection. His hazard lights are flashing; he is standing on the sidewalk, pacing. Losers are honking and jockeying their cars, trying to get around. I am blocked in the lane next to the scene. An older green sedan pulls over and a young guy jumps from the car. He pops his trunk and leans into it, rummaging about until he pulls out a tool box and a jack. He holds up his sagging jeans with the same hand holding the jack as he runs to aid the stranger.

•I pause at a stop sign in my car and wave a little family to cross in front of me. The Daddy is tall and fair with a little blonde pig-tailed girl riding on his shoulders. Her curls bounce with each of daddy's long strides. She is jabbering and pointing. A light haired boy leads the way, pedaling on his tricycle. He has a baseball cap on his head, a little sideways. Behind them lumbers the family dog, a large nondescript hound. I hear their laughter through the open window.

•I have been gone all day, which is unusual for me. I walk in the door, dragging my pilates mat, purse, shopping bags and my attitude. I am greeted by Rubi as if I have been gone for days, weeks even. She leaps, she licks, she chases her ball. She gazes at me. Her whole body wiggles with delight.

Stop and read the signs, reader(s).

Life is good. Even when it isn't.

A Visit to the Pawn Shop

I am killing time downtown before a mid-morning meeting. Yes, a mid-morning meeting. It pleases me to appear important, but I admit that I am meeting three friends for diet cokes, basically. At least I have three friends.

I see a pawn shop. I've always wanted to go in a pawn shop and gaze at the sad wedding rings, practically oozing stories of lost love. Oh, and the antique watches pawned to buy the hair combs for the wife who cut off her hair to buy the pocket watch in the first place. Or something like that.

I can never get that story straight.

Amusing anecdote: A teenage piano student of mine had a part-time job at the pawn shop. The very pawn shop where I now stand. He was excitedly telling an adult friend about his new job. The adult friend misunderstood and somehow (probably because he's a man) thought the young fellow was working in a "porn" shop. "Yes," the young fellow says, "I work in the back. Where the good stuff is."

I digress.

I walk in. The carpet is turquoise and it smells like the Las Vegas strip a little bit. A guy with green hair is looking at a wall of electric guitars. Really? A whole wall of them? There are knives locked up in a wall case with sharp blades that could gut and slice me pretty darn quick, in the right hands. There are golf clubs and amps and really old televisions (all turned on, which amuses me).

I walk around the jewelry case. There are Tiffany boxes inside. Riiiiight. Do I look like I was born yesterday?

Wait. Don't answer that question.

And that's it. I'm very disappointed. It's just a bunch of crap.

Maybe I need to go into the back. Where the good stuff is.

The Exception to the Rule

Most rules can be stretched or bent or realigned or outsourced to meet our needs. I'm sure that if kids were really required to "eat those peas or there will be no dessert for you, young lady," the pea industry would suddenly skyrocket. Investors would pull their money out of stocks and bonds and mattresses to get a piece of that action.

Then there's the whole i-before-e-except-after-c debacle. Remember the additional baloney "except as sounded as 'a' as in neighbor and weigh?" Well, how does one explain 'seize', 'weird' or 'deity'?

Thanks to an alert reader (Daughter), an exception to the Shoulder Pad Rule has been identified.

Yes, I know. Unbelievable.

However, a very small sub-group of the population exists for which shoulder pads are most useful and I am not referring to football players.

I am referring to Bobbleheads.

And you think bobbleheads only exist as baseball-game-giveaways and as bobbing-head, bobbling-hipped hula girls on the dashboard. No, the Bobblehead is alive and well and found mainly in its natural habitat, Los Angeles. Or in this case, somewhere in the 90210 zip code.


These are girls desperately in need of the shoulder pad and/or a sandwich. It is a miracle that they can even hold up those giant heads on their little tiny necks and little tiny selves.

And yet, I cannot, in good conscience, recommend shoulder pads. Even for these exceptions.

I can, however, recommend the sandwich. Wait, I lied.

Make it a salad.

Pinheads and Beetles and Superheroes, Oh My!

It is human nature to try to relieve needless suffering. We teach our children not to repeat our mistakes and thus lead happier lives. Heck, even Erica Cane on All My Children had a dance marathon to raise money for starving children in Africa. During the marathon, contestants still had time for quickies, attacking killers in the women's bathroom and concocting kidnap plots all while never breaking a sweat or smearing their makeup.

(Sidenote: When I was a kid, the starving children were in China. We were required to clean our plates at dinner because they were starving over there. I am not sure how my gluttony helped those kids. But I certainly did my best.)

So it is my own compassionate human nature, wishing for the world to be a better place for my children, that causes me to sound the alarm.

Again. Yes, I am referring to the the Fashion Crime of the Shoulder Pads. The Fashion Industry has referred to this atrocity as "Power Suits" as a means of selling the product to women wishing to project a stronger image. But what if we call it like it is? What if we called it "The Pinhead Effect"? Would women be lining up to look like pinheads?

Warning: This post contains graphic images of The Pinhead Effect. Reader discretion is advised.

After a recent delightful evening with Son and Favorite DIL, I am at Fenton's Creamery, enjoying a salad. (Yeah, I know). It is late, after midnight, and there is a chilly breeze blowing off the San Francisco Bay. So, gallant Hub gives me his jacket. With shoulder pads. Need I say more?

No, but I will say more anyway, of course. Is this what we are looking for, Ladies? Pinheads? And note: I did not feel more powerful. I felt warmer but that's about it.







Perhaps truth in advertising should be taken a step further. Let's have the fashion industry tell us the truth. What about "The Soldier Beetle Effect"? Compare these photos, folks. I look frighteningly like a BEETLE.





What? Do you need more to dissuade you? Then what about the "Superhero Effect"? It sounds a bit more glamorous, but do you really want to look like 'Volton, Defender of the Universe?' (That one was for you, Son).

Fine. I will pull out the big guns. Is it your desire to sport the "Michael Jackson Action Figure Effect"?

I rest my case.

And my shoulder pads.

A Day in the Life

Trophy Wives lead glamorous lives.

Okay, not really. But a true Trophy Wife is inclined to find the glamour in her life. And if there isn't any glamour, then she must, at the very least, be good-natured about it all.

Which really describes my day. To the T. (As in Trophy, of course).

I go to get my nails done at my favorite place, conveniently located in the K-mart shopping center. Yeah, I know. But I've got a great nail girl and I can even remember her name now, Yvonne. (Click here for a previous post all about Yvonne). The shop has amusing signs like "Waxing. $30 for 1/2 Leg" and I like to imagine asking my girl to wax just the front half of my leg (who sees the back anyway? Not me!) . Or maybe the right side of my leg or if I'm feeling really crazy, let's wax it on the diagonal!

It is a quiet morning in the salon. I am amused to watch the other "nail care providers" monkey around and kill time.

One of the new dudes (I will call him Jim) is in the back behind a beaded partition, which doesn't part much. He has a mannequin head back there with long dark hair. He is squirting the head with--I swear--windex and then parts it and clips it, parts it and clips it. Then he clips it and parts it. Danny is chain-smoking out front even though I tell him it'll kill him. Some very old dude I do not know, also Vietnamese and whom I will call Robert, is sitting on the couch reading "Woman's Day". I am not sure if he is reading "5 Clutter Busters--They'll Surprise you!" or "Fall's Cutest Cookies Easy How-Tos" but the expression on his face is clearly not one of surprise, so perhaps it is the latter.

And Cindy is hungry. She comes from the back where Jim continues to clip and part, carrying a tray of white stuff. This white stuff is cut in large triangles and has forks sticking out. Of each piece. Straight up.

Since I'm the only client there at the time. she asks politely, "Would you like some?" And so I am taken off guard. Completely. I don't know what is happening but I hear myself say, "Sure, I'll try it." And before I know it she cuts off way too large of a piece and spears it with a fork and hands it to me.

Yvonne says, "It's jelly" and I think of "jello" (a personal favorite) and for some reason I bite off some of it.

At first I am okay. It is firmer than I expect. It feels bouncy. I think to myself, "if I drop this on the floor, I believe it will bounce right back." I swallow. Coconut! I recognize the flavor. Vaguely. Because there is another flavor also. And I don't care for it. And I remember Danny telling me how when he lived in Vietnam his dogs got stolen and cooked up in the restaurants and I'm looking at this white stuff and wondering what the heck is in it and I'm not feeling so good and now what do I do with it?

Note: Upon returning home to my blessed Google, I have found the following, slightly stomach-roll inducing information: Agar is a gelatinous substance derived from seaweed. Historically and in a modern context, it is chiefly used as an ingredient in desserts, but in the past century has found extensive use as a solid substrate to contain culture medium for microbiological work. (Oh YUM!) The gelling agent is an unbranched polysaccharide obtained primarily fromseaweed (Sphaerococcus euchema).

Further Note: Anything with "ococcus" in it DOES NOT BELONG in my mouth.

So I do what any Trophy Wife would do. I take another huge bite. I realize that the best way to make it go away is to eat it.

Wait! What am I thinking? I feel a gag coming on. I swallow. I feel gag tears coming to my eyes.

The only option now is to pretend to blow my nose and slide the substance off the fork and into my kleenex and then drop it in my purse.

"Oh, no thank you, Cindy. No more for me! I'm full!" I say, patting the belly for emphasis.

Which reminds me. I need to get that stuff out of my purse.

P.S. Of course those toes aren't mine!

Twenty-Three

Twenty-three years ago today, Daughter arrived in this world somewhat against her will. And if you know much about her, she has quite a will. When she was just two years old, she stood at the top of the stairs in her pink dress and white cowboy boots, demanding something or other. Probably a cupcake. When I didn't comply, she responded by holding her breath until she passed out, tumbling down the stairs.

Daughter got her head stuck between the wrought-iron railing of those same stairs when she was three. It didn't matter if we suggested that she "not stick her head between the rails," because if Daughter wanted to do something, well, she usually did it. The neighbors gathered to assess the situation and we alternately greased her head with oil and shortening and soap. Finally her dad got the jack from the car and pumped the iron railings far enough apart for her to remove her goopy little self. As I recall, she was mad that she had to take a bath afterward.

When she was not yet five, she announced that she was going to "ride her two-wheel bike now." I must have given her some sort of encouragement, because she ran outside. Less than thirty minutes later, she returned to the kitchen, urging me to watch her "ride a big girl bike." I figured she'd be scooting herself along, Fred-Flintstone style. Imagine my surprise when she hopped on the bike--by herself--and rode happily down the street, the wind blowing her pigtails.

Daughter came up missing one day when she was eight. I wasn't too concerned; we lived in a pleasant family neighborhood. But nonetheless, I went on a search. When I finally found her, she explained that she had been going from door-to-door selling tickets to a "show" that she would put on a few hours later on our front lawn. Before I chastised her, and explained that she "can't sell tickets to a show no one wants to see," she pulled wads of dollar bills from her pockets and looked up at me in delight. So, we had a show.

As she grew, that determination became her great asset. When my own mother died, my barely-sixteen year old daughter stepped up to the plate. Together we made 100 enchiladas for the family dinner, side by side. Daughter found the strength to sing at the funeral and to become my dearest friend and greatest ally.

And now, we "share a brain between us." I never laugh harder than when I am with Daughter. I never feel more hopeful than when we are together. I have hope for my Daughter, hope for myself and hope for many more years of birthdays.

I love you, Dottie.