Slow Cooker Romance

My less than stellar cooking career covers lame penne bolognese, not-so-great scrambled eggs that make the kids frown and meatballs that do double duty as hockey pucks. Most of my repertoire is mediocre except for my magnificent salads (but really, anyone can make a salad). That all changed when I was at my girlfriend Joanna's house two weeks ago, and I was set up on a blind date with a crock-pot.

It was instant love. I mean fairies dancing, bubble hearts bursting, gumdrops sparkling kind of love. It also happens that an unopened slow cooker had been quietly laying-in-wait in my pantry for at least a year and a half. Originally bought for Todd, who scorned it as a cooking short cut, it lay silently idle in its box. And then we met.

All it took was Joanna's gorgeous aromatic Apricot glazed pork tenderloin over onions served with Cuban black beans and rice to inspire a romance between my Cuisinart Crock-o-Love and me.

With my slow cooker, it’s move over, Martha. Meats and sauces that initially caused every panic button to screech in my brain became liquid poured from my soul. Beef stew, easy. Mexican pulled pork tenderloin, natch. Sticky peanut chicken, sweet and spicy chicken, sesame chicken - done, done and done. Chile, a slow cooker gift that keeps on giving.

My kitchen hunk, Crock-o-Love

Better yet, leftovers. Crock-pot cooking feeds family and friends and neighbors and family again. My kitchen finally smelled gourmet and it was because of my boyfriend Mr. Crock-Pot and me. Cooking became so easy, chopping a cinch, putting a flawless meal on the table a picinic. Joanna was so shocked by my ambition and determination that she was sure I was touched by a mania. I have never shown much interest in cooking.

Hardly the first suburban housewife to discover the joy of slow cooking, I am sure, this reformed kitchen-hater has a rising kitchen confidence quotient. Todd has dinner waiting for him each night when he arrives back from the city. We eat as a family and we eat what is served from the crock-pot, or in Chad's case, barely taste it (refer to Cheerio blog for further explanation). I feel proud to produce quality food that isn't in the form of a Perdue Chicken nugget. 

Last week, Chad's play date pick-up arrived while my kitchen was at Mach 7. Pots were boiling on the stove. Our red Les Creuset was stewing a savory sauce. The crock-pot was emanating a rich spicy aroma and the rice was fluffing. All the children, play date included were fed from the Pot-o-Heaven. "Are you hungry Olana?" I purred, Queen of the kitchen that I am. "Please, let me send you home with a homemade meal and some of these delightful sprinkle cookies that are fresh out of the oven." And with that I twirled around and proceeded to pack her a gourmet meal to go.

At the door, her charge Sean at her side Olana turned to me and said, "I didn’t know you cooked!" I chuckled and replied, "Oh, you mean all this?" gesturing towards the kitchen, eyelashes batting, "It's nothing, just a little something I whipped up!"

And it's true; the best way to someone's heart is through his or her stomach or in my case - one burning hunk of crock-pot love!

Basketball Throw Down

It finally stopped raining after a long week of grey sky and grey moods around our house. Motivated by the sun's vitamin D boost on Sunday, a little blacktop basketball with my son Chad, served up with a side of bike riding seemed pretty smart. After my driveway holler to shake-a-tail-feather, Chad slothed to the hoop looking about as excited to play hoops with me, as I look when I get a pap smear. In hindsight, I now know that my annual pap smear is actually a much more rewarding experience. 



Undeterred by his lackluster attitude, I checked the ball to him and made good time getting underneath the basket. I was all fast feet, fun attitude, perched with my arthritic knees bent waiting for the ball and the lay-up. Instead, Chad took the ball, kicked it at the hoop, went after it and then fell to the ground hugging the ball singing a Guns and Roses song. This happened over and over again in slight variations. What?

Berlent Point Guard

Okay, okay, up you go buddy boy, this mama is not going to get side tracked too easily by your shenanigans. I tried everything to get the kid to want to play, to embrace this sunny moment with his super cool basketball-playing mom. Nothing worked. The shooting game called Horse could more easily have been called Jackass based on how he purposefully threw the ball to the street, up in the air, into the garage, literally not giving a hoot or a hoop if he played with the basket or me. Rebounding was a resounding failure. Three-point shooting was more like a three strikes and you’re out debacle and plain old passing and shooting never got off the ground. 



So I quit on him. I threw the ball to him and spit out my challenge, "Hmmm, I guess my mad-skill makes you too nervous to take me on huh?" and while strutting into the garage added, "I guess I'll go find a pick-up game in the ‘hood where I can throw down my NBA moves." He was unmoved, literally. 


Holy cow was I a tangled yarn ball of emotions. I was so annoyed that on this beautiful day, my son only wanted to watch TV. Pissed, too, because this body of mine is no temple of fitness and playing ball is a physical sacrifice. The knees now lack reflexes and cartilage. The tennis elbow never healed properly. The left hip is always a sway behind the right and the lungs have no capacity for aerobic activity. Yet there I was ready to shoot some hoop with my boy. 



I wondered if it were his dad on the blacktop, would he be chomping at the bit to play.  Maybe playing with your mom at age 8, in a public arena is just not cool. And then our friend Steve pulled into the driveway and a fireball of youth burst out of his dad's car; Chad's friend Dylan came to play. 



Out of the house came a peppy, amped, athletic-looking Chad. Eden followed suit and so did Dylan's little brother Ethan. In one instant the basketballs were bouncing, three scooters were dragged to the edge of the driveway and the football was corkscrewed to the front lawn.  Vrrrrroom went the Big Wheels. Brrring brrring went the bell on Eden's purple Mystic Trek bike and our driveway was filled with frenetic youthful energy and activity. Chad ripped off half his thumbnail stealing the basketball from Dylan and still took the layup. Dylan took a mean spill on the driveway curving the Razor scooter. No bother for either of them because the sun was starting to set and there were many more balls to be thrown. 



Sitting in my office watching the silhouettes of the two boys playing a game of football in the fading sunlight, my heart swelled and so did my knees. This is what kids are supposed to be and do – suck the life out of every last minute of every day just being kids. Passing the football and tackling each other in an imaginary arena packed with cheering fans is perfect. Racing your best friend on scooters as the wind chaps your cheeks and turns the rim of your ears pink is perfect. Whorl a football longer and faster than you have ever done before - perfect. Doing it with anyone other than your mom - perfect.

@#$% This...

I'm guilty. Bad words have tumbled out of my mouth in front of the kids. Enduring Chad's spilling a gallon of milk at dinner, our two girls trying to kick Chad under the table and an ill-timed game of duck duck goose, Todd let a few expletives slip too. My visiting Los Angeles sister used the word shit as often as a teenager misuses the word like with our kids in the audience. It happens. 

Recently, so furious with Todd, Chad turned to him in the kitchen and said, "Dad, I am so bleepin' mad at you." The bleepin needed no further explanation. We got it. It would be so much easier for us too, to just let a curse-filled tirade loose.

To this day I have no concrete memories of my mother cursing when we were kids. In fact, even now, she rarely curses. She prefers jibberish cursing like super-plum-fanny-foop or fongalottie.  Harmless completely. Once though, and it was recent, she misplaced her glasses (big shock), and in exasperation growled “Fuck Shit Piss.”  My sister Jess and I got hysterical.

Polish $%^& that!

Our reality is that even if we never rumble bad words at our kids, the rest of the world is out to foil our children's Eden. There may be no poison apples in our house, but there is an orchard of them just outside our front door. 

The school bus is a horror-show. Anything you are afraid your kids will learn will be taught to them enthusiastically on the bus by an excited peer. Novelties include new and fantastic names for penis (apparently a crowd pleaser), 101 ways to use the word *uck, gesturing included and how to talk, expletives strung together like a pimp. 

Older siblings can also wipe out years of clean living and edited communications. My mother-in-law Marcia tells a great story. Uncle Matt, the youngest Berlent brother was talking with his Nana Ann. "Nana" he said to her, "I know a really good curse word, want to hear it?" Always game, Nana nodded and asked to know what the word was. Proud to share, Matt told her, “Diarrhea!” Relieved, Nana laughed and told Matt that diarrhea was not a curse word and it was okay to use. Not to be outdone, Matt followed it with, "How about fuckin-asshole?" to which Nana replied, "Now that's a couple of curse words." No doubt, with three older brothers, Matt was initiated into the curse club quite early.

Even films deemed kid-appropriate cannot be counted on for completely clean concepts and cleaner language. Dylan, a good friend of Chad’s came into his kitchen one afternoon where his mom was preparing snack after school. Greeting her son with a "Hey Dyl how was your day?" got her an innocent response. "Oh hey Moron, it was good." She recalls standing by her sink, balancing on the edge of dismay and laughter temporarily immobilized. Her son just addressed her as moron and didn’t cringe or apologize.  After careful investigation, she figured out that Dylan learned the moron moniker from the “Toy Story Movie” Immediately told that using the word Moron is unacceptable, not nice and NEVER to be used again, Dylan responded, "can I just call you Mo then?"

As parents, we try to divert the train coming around the tracks. Sometimes, it works. Other times it fails miserably with the kids as wide-eyed witnesses. Chad recently pointed out to me that an impatient driver trying to make an impossible left turn in heavy afternoon traffic gave me the finger because my oncoming left turn happened before his. Chad thought he was witnessing one of the best moments of his life, seeing real-live cursing action. I took the high road and gave the guy of good verbal lashing in my head. Having taken the high road was smart. Having taken the high road for my kids even smarter. Having taken the high road, ugh, totally unrewarding for me. 

I suppose I can do what my dad always did. When Jess and I were younger, he was quite a verbal driver.  He used to curse in Polish, his birth language. One purchased Rosetta Stone, on its way...

Cotton is King

Too many years ago to count Todd came home from a trip to Paris with an obscenely expensive lingerie set for me. Picture it. Black lace corset top, tight in all the right places and black lace thong that looked more like architected dental floss than panties. I opened the present wrapped in a delicate deep purple tissue paper longing for a bracelet, maybe a necklace. Todd's face was all eyes and anticipation. The gift revealed, my instant thought: He must have mixed up my gift with the one he bought for his happily slutty mistress.

Spoiler alert: I'm the granny underwear type. My horizons have broadened over the years, but for this gal, it will always be comfort over class, coverage instead of crotchless and pima cotton above Parisian lace. Occasionally a Hanky Panky pair makes a show of herself, but not often enough according to my true love. 

The abuse from my inner circle is endless. To successfully sport the Granny style, one has to be strong willed, convicted and thick-skinned. They are a female chorus of thong advocates, lace lovers and an occasional g-string. My closest cavalry even has a few brave commando females who balk at my investment in cotton. 

Basic cotton undies simply don't get the respect they deserve. Anyway, despite Todd's desire to have me dressed in lace and corsets, the end game is still the same - love me or leave me but the grannies stay.

While the less is more philosophy isn't lost on me or my rear, paying too much money for too little fabric doesn't stimulate me either (who am I kidding? Is this really about cost saving?). But cotton is cool as in Saturday Night Fever dance floor cool.

I have tried the alternative and the result made me feel like a self-impostor, like a brunette dyed metallic blond with telltale dark eyebrows. The whole thing just didn't work on me. Plus, sexy panties that can double as band aids for paper cuts are impractical.  

I do try because what makes my husband happy makes me happy too, but probably not often enough. It strikes me as odd to have to "get used to wearing" a certain type of panties. Some things just should not require perseverance and fortitude. Jogging, of course. Learning to love Japanese Sea Urchin, for sure. Underwear that are so lacy and tiny they could thread through the eye of a needle, you've got to be kidding me.

Remi palate expanding

I'm reminded of when Remi got her palate expander to correct her cross bite. The orthodontist, giving me the marching orders, told me Remi would drool for the first day, lisp initially and feel discomfort from the newly installed bridge across the roof of her mouth. After that she continued, Remi and the expander would settle into a partnership of mild irritation. Mild irritation for a perfect smile, yes. Mild irritation because my undies are burrowing into my colon - ah, no!

Stay as You are a Little Longer, Please

Remi, Chad and Eden were a sweet chorale in the background as Todd, my friends Jen and Jess and I sat down to an incredible truffle-buttery feast prepared by Todd. Always, there is something palpably feel-good about sitting around the table with close friends, and rare is the evening that there is an adult dinner uninterrupted by tangled rubber bands that have to be cut out of hair, chicken nugget craves that have to be satisfied, ringing phones, dogs that need to go out, homework requiring explanation, someone needs a healing hug, a fight that needs breaking up. A missing stuffed animal that has to be found.

Remi Lauren

. . . and along came Remi. Done with her Lego project, she arrived at the table where she remained, anchored to her chair, not missing a single bite of food or morsel of gossip, for the entire meal. She ate salad with us as an appetizer. Told a very funny joke. 

She successfully passed me my glass of wine while Jen kept knocking over her own. She asked relevant and smart questions. Knew when to listen and when to listen even harder. Politely asked me to speak in kid-friendly language, like changing the word timid to shy. She cleared the table for us unprompted. She sat by my side the entire meal, curious, smart, attentive and respectful.

She was sad when told her it was bedtime, but put up no fight. No melee. The chorus of sound from the playroom was from Eden and Chad. Remi was here in the kitchen, at the table, intricately woven into the fabric of my friendships. She quietly arrived, it seemed, at the entry to tween and the exit of little girldom without any fanfare. It didn't arrive with a marching band, loudly announcing its entry early in its approach.

Sitting at the table, connected to that moment, those friends, my daughter, my husband by an invisible thread of love and loyalty, words left me and I was taken over by “Sunrise, Sunset” emotion. Where did the curious toddler who asked “wazzit?” about each item she couldn’t identify go? When did she stop crawling and start winning tennis competitions? Wasn't she just throwing her pacifier across the room? When did she stop playing with her food, using spaghetti for eyebrows and a mustache?

I tried to quietly tell Remi how much I love her, but my words seemed inadequate and wobbly and too emotional for the almost tween at the table. Hugs handed out, Remi was on her way to brush and wash for bed. "Night, love ya," I called out. She stopped, turned around and smiled and then let out an unrivaled burp, "night mom, love you too." Phew. And just like that, for a little while longer, she was my little girl again.

Great Hair Expectations

I'm a big pusher of the pony tail. Its benefits are endless, and it enables me to compensate for my lack of hair-styling skills despite decades of trying to tame my own out-of-control mane.  

Pre-puberty I had long, silky, thick, shiny, pretty-straight hair that could easily be styled by my mom and occasionally by my dad (not recommended.) One day during the lovely time of life called puberty, I woke up with uncontrollably curly, frizzy hair, when just what I wanted was layers like Farrah Fawcett.

Product under protest

Now, I’m in trouble. The kids have great hair and a really crappy in-house stylist. 

With Chad, luckily, I am hands off by his decree.  He has thick beautiful hair that he does absolutely nothing with - ever. The only hint of styling is his chronic smoothing down of his “bangs” over his forehead in a poor rendition of the even poorer Caesar hairstyle. If bed head were in vogue, Chad would have the most enviable coif in the neighborhood. He winces at the mention of product, a category that apparently includes even the use of water. Brushing or combing is completely out of the question. This works for both of us.

A temporarily satisfied customer

Eden, like her brother, has marvelous hair. Hers is partly curly, partly straight, great color and texture. I do my best to give it a style. She abhors having her hair brushed because it's thick and brushing hurts so any detangling is done with fingers or not at all. Never a critic though, Eden is quite happy with the lumpy pony tails she wears to school. She recognizes my braiding limitations and opts instead for my poor attempt at twists. Her complaints about uneven pig tails are mild and relegated to her head feeling lopsided. She's fairly easy-going which makes my hair styling job so much easier. In September, she and a friend took safety scissors to their heads, Eden in an attempt to create “side bangs and layers.” She was delighted with the result even though she looked as if she did the tango with a shredder. It's this laissez faire disposition that keeps Eden happy and me off the chopping block - for now.

Best case scenario

Where my hair inadequacies shine most brightly is with Miss Remi Lauren, who sees straight through my ponytail campaign. What she expects my hand to do is a constant reminder of my limitations. Let's lead with my strengths: great at combing out all tangles moderately painlessly, solid on product application, better than a Twisty-Turbie at removing excess water and much better than Todd on my worst day. That's it. The weaknesses dominate, and no matter the effort extended, the outcome for Remi is about as great as getting bok choy when you thought you were getting a fudge brownie. My Magnum Opus is the pony tail. Beyond that it all gets very murky. 

This morning's pre-school request was, I think, based on a complicated Origami design. It had more tucks, twists, under pulls and right angles than anything I.M. Pei could design. SHIT. I don't know what's worse, trying, failing and fighting or not trying, failing and fighting. Figuring out who the loser is in either scenario is fairly simple. Failure is usually the option, but not trying is out of the question. 

Remi’s requests are endless, like a chain of ants marching towards a picnic basket. Each morning, it seems, she ratchets up the degree of difficulty. “Mom, can you make a French braid with beads that wraps around my head? “ Anything from the American Girl Doll catalogue would please. Or how about double pony tails, bump-free, tucked through each rubber band, pulled downward, split and then quartered, wrapped into buns with no barrettes or bobby-pins allowed? Is she really serious when she envisions microscopic braids that start at her hairline, merge together, separate again for twisting, come back together, get curled with a a curling iron and then sprayed into the same shape as her Birthday Barbie's hair? I'm afraid she is. Last week she wanted her hair parted in a zig-zagged line with temporary color jags off off each zig.

These requests never end well. Remi goes to school with only a pony tail, and I am thinking its time for a buzz cut.  And so it goes. Yet despite being totally vitamin deficient in the hair capability department, I am mineral rich in effort and determination and that will have to be enough; the alternative isn't any better and Remi knows it. It could be Todd styling her hair each morning... 

List Maker Extraordinaire

I am by nature and necessity a list maker. Listing keeps me organized and sane. I would speak to my kids in "list-ese" if it were possible. Using lists as a default style in blogging can become tedious, according to my mom, The In-House Writer, who once had to do just that for a client. But sometimes, it is just perfect. So, today, a list. I will leave the coloring and shading up to you, Reader.

Gummy bear Shih Tzu Theo

• Having just groomed the dogs, I spent half a morning pulling multiple, partially chewed gummy bears from the Shih Tzu's long hairy coat. Disgusting on so many levels.
• Attempting to open a stubborn water bottle, Chad jerkily stabbed himself an inch from his eye with a newly sharpened pencil, implanting the graphite tip in his face.
• Remi had a Q-tip dragged across her right eye, a metal device scraped across her eye and the morning before the surgery, in one last attempt at the grain of sand embedded in her cornea, a fire hydrant of water blasted at her propped open eye. Three failures meant surgery.
• Late to a pre-surgical appointment, as punishment (as if doctors never run late and keep patients waiting) Remi was made to sit in the waiting room for over an hour. She was so bored she actually begged to do her homework.
• Chad and his partner in crime Sean, jammed the wrong end of a USB cord into a video game console and it required electrical surgery which somehow they both thought I was capable of doing with my BA in English and double minor in Journalism and Judaic Studies.
• Todd has taken up yoga. Great for Todd. The first intro-to-yoga tape he bought has a running time of two hours. He is conscious in the house for only three hours each day. Do the math.
• My dad got an iPhone. He's called me 72 times with questions about his phone, from his phone. I now understand why tech support folk leave their shifts and go immediately to a shooting range.
• My mom discovered the show Celebrity Wife Swap. I now know more about Carnie Wilson's messy life than I should. I am the contestant to beat in the Jeopardy category "Things you never wanted to know about Carnie Wilson." Thanks mom for that hour-long conversation.

• I am calling Cablevision and having them disable my mother's cable boxes stat.

• A previous blog of mine about sweating now has my mom convinced that I have a thyroid disorder and maybe the beginnings of diabetes - because no longer is it possible to just sweat.
• Why am I still getting pimples? 
• Spent an entire day in the car dealership for a car that needed new brakes and tires for way too much money. Got home, took the car out that evening only to have two tail lights go out.
• Apparently dogs can smell urine on a carpet even after it’s been Nature's Miracle'd to death and will continue to mark that spot if given the chance. Those spots were in the kids' bedrooms. Ever try taking three area rugs out of rooms that look like scenery for the show Hoarders? Competing in a National Cross Fit competition is easier.
• Wasn't able to fit in a shower from God only knows when, until Thursday. Have no specific recall of my previous shower and my hair hurt to move like it does after a baseball cap has been worn for a full day.
• Helping Remi look for a top and bottom in identical shades of navy in her closet, I stepped on her kiddy stool and my foot and leg went right through it, taking the skin off my shin and sending me head first into her dresser drawers. Remi was devastated that her stool was broken, not so much that her mother was.
• I've eaten meatloaf for four dinners in a row. Clearly I'm craving protein and salt. If only our local deli sold horse-size salt licks to hang in my bedroom.
• I made cupcakes from a box to make me feel better and they were delicious, all nine that I ate.

But . . Remi's surgery was a success. She was so brave, and we are thinking about bronzing the piece of sand from her right eye for our mantle. Eden danced on the counter to “Pocketful of Sunshine,”  Chad stayed up late because he couldn’t put down the book he was reading. It’s a good life. Funny though, while the weekly list in its semi-entirety tires me out, it's not a source of stress. Therefore none of this is actual complaining. It’s just a list after all. 

Oh, and Chad's guppies had babies over the weekend...

Bravery in a Small Package

Remi sun guarded

The second night of our winter vacation Remi started complaining her right eye hurt. It appeared red and irritated with the lid slightly chaffed and lazy-like. Our salve was her bed time and in the morning it would be all better. Except is wasn't and two new symptoms were added; light sensitivity and chronic tearing. The left eye would have to hold fort for the right. Two clinic appointments with a lovely on-sight Mexican physician, 1200 pesos and one bottle of numbing drops later we were sent packing to the beach.

The nagging irascible eye never stopped tweaking Remi, but always a trooper when sand and sun are involved, she made do. For the remainder of the vacation, Remi was hatted and sunglassed and kept in what little valuable shade was offered. Five days later, we said our goodbyes to our friends at Club Med Cancun, our hellos to the friendly flight attendants on Jet Blue and did our best of proffer cheer to the epically bitter immigration and customs agents at JFK who grumpily gave us our passports back into the United States. Remi's bitter right eye, shaded the entire time, arrived back into Queens with us.

Suffice it to say, I let a week pass before thinking about calling an actual opthamologist. As often as Remi complains about not having the right outfit, or hating multiplication and wishing I were a better cook, she rarely if ever complains about injury, ache or physical upset. The eye was no different. We heard about it, but apparently not enough to get a jump on. Actually, my layman's diagnosis was eyeball sunburn exacerbated by excessive rubbing. For a split second of day four in Mexico I thought, maybe, just maybe she scratched her cornea... nah.

Not only did she scratch her cornea, she has a grain of sand embedded in it. Mucho painful. I think my "Parent of the Year Award" is being shipped by First Class Mail.

This past Tuesday, off to the eye doctor we went. To prevent an official hospital surgical procedure, Remi was asked to be as brave as she could be and maybe the villainous piece of sand could be extracted from its strong hold. A fearless risk taker by nature, Remi consented, I approved and the doctor did his job almost successfully. All Remi had to do was sit totally still like a statue, eye propped open, stare into a very bright light as the doctor dragged a sterile Q-tip across her eyeball too many times to watch comfortably. OH MY GOD. It didn't work.

Next a blunt metal tool, larger than a toothpick and smaller than a battering ram was used on the malefactor. It too was dragged across the offending spot on her cornea, back and forth, back and forth casual scrapping of her eyeball. HOLY HELL. Remi never spilled a tear while her mother was practically in fetal position sucking her thumb. She didn't whimper. She never even flinched. She was the bravest little warrior with the world's stubbornest grain of sand lodged in her eye. Gandhi's tenacity pales in comparison to this single grain of sand.

When success was not an option, surgery became the reality. Today. It should be quick and effective and Remi should feel immediately better. Add to her street cred, on Tuesday the only moment that brought tears down her cheeks was her own reality defined; she would have to keep the sand in her cornea for three more days. I understood completely and secretly wanted to buy her a pony and a stable for her fortitude, bravery and composure. Instead I wrapped her in a huge hug.

With her right pupil dilated to the size of a full moon and big black lens glasses, Remi has forged through her week impressively. She completed a 71 minute ELA practice exam sans complaints with one eye shut. She played through her tennis lesson with half court vision and laughed off every ball she missed. She listened to two hours of 4th graders reading Torah at Hebrew school (painful with two good eyes) even though the Hebrew letters looked like rigatoni pasta. She just continued to be a terrific nine-year-old, sand or no sand because that's how she rolls.

I plan on taking a lesson from Remi's handbook. Like an oyster creates a magnificent pearl from a single grain of sand (urban legend, but let's go with it because the scientific fact is less attractive - the invader is really a parasite and ultimately not relevant to my denouement). Remi fashioned a difficult situation into her own personal gem. Let her diamond strength encourage us in our times of need. May her twinkling opalescent laughter remind us to smile even if we hurt and may the emerald richness and depth of her courage help us remember to always put one foot in front of the other. All from a single grain of sand.

Fish Tank Failure

Purchasing a fish tank for each child’s room was my idea and clearly not my brightest. It's funny how if an "h" is accidentally added to the word tanks, you end up with the word thanks. I'm still waiting for mine. My only experience with fish in captivity was a single goldfish I won at a carnival. I spent a wonderful 45 minutes with him until he did a suicide triple axle out of the inappropriate cereal bowl he was put in, water too cold, on to my dad's kitchen floor and promptly died. Clearly not a great aquatic resume for me or the fish.

My little Guppy, Remi

A second grade written seahorse project for Remi prompted a request for her own tank of seahorses. We settled on a ten-gallon tank of fancy goldfish and decided to get each child “something to take care of.”  The initial setup complete, the fish inspecting their new environs, I was as content as a kitten with a ball of yarn. That lasted for one day as I inadvertently started getting strangled by the ball of yarn.

No one at the fish store informed me that keeping fish alive and tanks stable was akin to deep thalamus brain surgery combined with a Harvard degree in chemistry. Fish don't just live in tanks and tank water doesn't just sustain the fish. Fish are delicate creatures. Feed them too much they die. Water too high in alkaline, they die. Water too hot, they die. Water too cold, they die. Water too clean, they can die. Fish are like fragile, early Crocus flowers hinting at the first of spring until March yields a nasty snow storm and silences their bloom. I have yet to get it right for the sake of the fish.

The uptick here is that I am no longer averse to handling slimy dead fish. I can easily return them with a water sample to the pet store using my bare hands to try again. Fish are now added to the tanks with fingers crossed and a wish on a star. Please live.

Slowly, the enormity of tank management is coming into focus like a color by number picture yields a beautiful butterfly if shaded properly, but I've been using blue instead of pink and my picture is less than pretty or inspiring. I have unknowingly walked straight into needing a degree in marine biology. Apparently my BA in English isn't an effective tool when it comes to fish or their tanks. Fish don't respond particularly well to my reading them Catcher in the Rye. Now, on the list of daily responsibilities is fish-tank supervision, water reading, feeding, temperature monitoring, check-ins with the fish folk at the fish store and a ton of praying. A lot of science and maybe a little bit of luck and the fish will live until tomorrow.

Keeping fish alive is harder than raising children. Don't believe it? Give it a go.

At least my kids recognize my effort and determination and reward me with encouragement. Fortunately, they see my passion for preservation instead of my perfection at pillaging any form of fish life in their tanks. Dylan, Chad's buddy has two fancy goldfish in a tank on his dresser. Every three weeks his mom and dad lovingly do a partial water change, spiff up the gravel and coo at Murdock fish and Melville fish who are now each respectively five thriving pounds. They also happen to be six years old which is something like eight gagillion years older than any goldfish is supposed to be. They may possibly be the longest living suburban goldfish and they're right here in Suffolk County! Dylan's mom swears she has motioned through the same routine every three weeks for six years and added that they live in perpetual fear of doing anything differently that might tip the scales towards the fishes' demise.

So in twenty minutes or so my odyssey begins, not with 20,000 leagues but a couple of ten gallon tanks. This morning's fish patrol turned up a single upside down floating guppy. Poor fella, it wasn't anything he did or said. He sacrificed himself for the greater good of Chad's tank. But apparently it's not about to get any easier because a cautionary tale told to me by my mom just resurfaced from the murky depths of my brain:

Years ago, a much younger Barbara, my mom, had a fish tank of her very own. It was a thriving aquatic habitat for black mollies and neon fish and guppies. Except what Barbara didn't know and I obviously didn't remember at the time of my purchase is that happy healthy guppies reproduce more easily than the Teen Moms on MTV. Barbara's did and she was so excited until she realized that adult guppies eat their fry because in a tank, the fry have no where to hide and ultimately thrive... 

Fortunately for our tanks, we've never achieved this type of fish longevity or had to bare witness to this raw form of survival of the fittest. Maybe I'm doing something right after all.

Silence is the true friend that never betrays - Confucius

Reading a single page of a book or magazine uninterrupted in my house is impossible. Finding a single location that is insulated from the noise level of life in my home is harder than finding a lost wedding ring in a mile of sandy beach. My home's noises are not unique; they just seem louder and more disruptive than normal. I will never join a book club - my house does not ever let me finish a book.

To read a single page of a magazine or even the list of ingredients on a cereal box, I have to tune out: children, television (on weekends and vacations), Todd's jazz grooving, the dogs barking, the phone ringing and the computers dinging. It paralyzes my cerebral cortex. I am on a constantly moving freeway of cacophony.

Years ago, studying with music plugged into my ears on my awesomely cool yellow Sony Sports walkman, Alphaville blasting away, Mom tinkering behind me at the stove and Jess doing back handsprings across the foyer, I could focus on studying. Fast forward too many years to count and tying shoe laces with music on has become an epic challenge.

Quiet and noise are a cat and mouse game in the house. Quieting one television enables an iPad. Muting an iPad enables a stereo. Diverting the stereo output to Todd's man room in the basement elevates Chop Chop Ninja on the playroom computer. I never effectively bat the mole on the head and win my prize - a few precious moments of silence. Silence or a poor imitation of it is more valuable to me that food. Its my sustenance and recharge and unfortunately, it's around as often as rain in the Sahara.

Electronic noise and child unite as one

When I am not trying to read or think or stammer out a complete sentence, the noise is livable and forgivable. After all, what can be expected in an average size house that shelters a family of five, four dogs, two non-stop chirping love birds, too many electronic noise-making devices and one piano whose ivories get hammered despite no one knowing how to play the first note of Heart n' Soul. My mom and my sister, both who keep very lovely and serene homes, can literally survive for just a few short hours before they become symptomatic from the discord. My sister has often told me, being in my house physically hurts her ears and pounds her head. Much of her communication while visiting consists of emphatic SSHHHhhhsssss. She cannot be blamed for her sensitivities. Noise levels in my home may ultimately be proven toxic to one's health.

A few years ago, I noticed my hearing was not acute or sharp any longer. Add background music to a conversation and streams of sound became  intelligible to me. Sitting at my kitchen table with my friend Jessica, cell phone answerer extraordinaire, Todd's music in the background, often she'll say, "Are you going to answer that or just let it ring forever?" Huh? Answer what? I hear nothing. Yet my nothing turns out to be a cell phone ringing with apparent urgency, a few feet away on the counter. It's just back noise to me. At 38, I hear less and less. In the indirect fashion of math; the sounds in the house keep getting louder and louder and my range of hearing keeps getting lower and lower. Darwinian at some level I imagine.

The noise that carries my household from sunrise to sunset doesn't always bring me to a frustrated boil. We have oodles of excessive laughter, excellent conversation and many I Love Yous screamed from room to room. Hooting and hollering is always the usher into our den when we do family rounds of Just Dance on the Wii. Remi successfully completing a difficult clarinet piece in the kitchen sends out waves of applause and the additional accompaniment of Todd on the Sax. In-house obstacle courses require a ton of cheering and encouragement and Karaoke is a must - at full stadium volume. Add the game of fetch with the dogs, our long hallway being used for soccer, chair racing or monkey in the middle, Remi making a video with her best friend Christina, Chad walking any where - thump thump and Eden babbling a made-up song to a tune never heard before, we've got awesomely rejuvenating noise.

I am often the island surrounded by a sea of lively dolphins clicking away at each other and I don't want to quell their fun. I just can't tolerate it as well as my kids and husband can. Finding a solution other than moving into a sanitarium or locking my kids out of the house, is my responsibility.

Way off to one end of the house, is a guest bedroom. It's colder than all the other rooms in the house. No one opts to hang out there. We often use it for storage. It's door has a lock. There is also a bathroom deep in a corner pocket. There is no basement underneath this room to radiate a pounding base note from below. The cable box is currently disconnected and the phone's ringer is permanently set to off. There is a seat in the bathroom for me, the toilet. The lighting is great for reading anything and for a few short but miraculous minutes each day, I read my book, one gloriously uninterrupted page at a time until the noise beckons me out and envelops me.  

Sweating is the New Black

Like the forehead of a teenager unwillingly welcomes its puss-filled visitors, I am aggressively using the techniques of The Amazing Kreskin to rid my body of the sweat that pools in my right angles more often than I'd like. 

Back yonder, never, ever an effective sweater, I was the gal on the elliptical machine begging my sweat glands to pitch in and make me look like the lady on the machine next to me - glistening wet, sports bra soaked, forearms shellacked in iridescent sweat beads. Never happened. Even sitting outside on a mean 90- degree day layered in black with an early 80s reflector tucked under my chin on our black-topped apartment building roof - no sweat, just seared soles on my feet. People who could sweat when they were supposed to were heroic and sexy to me - perfect little human-gods running next to me at the gym or tanning near me on the beach. They were everywhere. 

Come to think of it, my family lineage is a long line of non-sweaters. Never have I seen anyone in my nuclear family sweat. My mom is perpetually freezing even in the height of summer, in her apartment building that never turns off its heat. She never perspires and even if she were to, she's so cold all the time, her sweat is probably frozen in a freezer bag stored in her skinny little body unable to will itself into a salty liquid. My sister Jessica is also always cold. She's the shivery type. For them, spending any time in my house during a winter is on par with having ice cubes rammed up their noses - freezing miserable  horrible torture. They never visibly sweat, and I am convinced they were both born without the ability to produce sweat effectively. Scientists everywhere, come find these two lovely ladies and study them. There is money to be made here.

Joe my dad, not only doesn't sweat, he wears long pants all summer long in moist Manhattan and wears light parkas against NY's winter elements. He's also the only human I know who eats his entire dinner at my house without taking his winter coat off, under a heating vent in the kitchen and doesn't sweat. Not a tiny drop.

I used to be in this very elite club of non-perspiring mutants. As of 37, I was thrown out on the grounds that I traveled to the dark side of the sweat gland and now I make a peacocky show of sweating merely by throwing my two legs out of my bed to go to the bathroom in the morning. Sexy for sure. Since when did drinking a cup of coffee while still in a light sleep stage, practically horizontal, induce sweating? I put on deodorant before my first sip and keep a Sham Wow! perched nearby for my sweat gland tsunami. Forget make-up or even foundation. My morning sweat routine would leave me looking like Tammy Faye Baker after a public crying jag, streaky and stained.

Mine is a classic case of "Be careful what you wish for," because here it is and it's miserable. Sweating at the gym after running 15 miles is totally gorgeous. Sweating making breakfast for the kids is disgusting. They no longer see anything odd about my getting them ready for school almost naked with a sweat towel draped around my neck instead of a fabulous bauble from Target, part of my daily uniform. Forget wearing underwear during the morning shuffle. I sweat enough to sustain a small African village during a dry spell. 

My living room, kept obviously cool for comfort

I spent a week in Los Angeles with my sister and her adorable little family; baby Phoebe was just two months. The sun drenches their apartment by 7:00 a.m. and doesn't quit its job until after 7:00 p.m. We should all work that hard. Jess, never hot, despite the microwaving effect of the sun, used no air conditioning and the windows / screen doors were never opened wider than two inches. If I had a pair of balls, I would have sweat them off. 

I slept on an air mattress pressed to the living room screen doors begging the fading dry breeze to cool me down to below my internal 100+ degrees. My situation drew no sympathy from Jess, but she did let me know that, "Something could be wrong with me because it's not normal to be sweaty and hot like I am." No matter that she now uses her air conditioning. No matter that I left Los Angeles more well done than a Peter Luger's filet mignon. No matter that when ice-pop Jess and Popsicle Mom come to my house, I have to turn the heat up to 80 degrees to keep them warm, which also enables me to bake my kids Shrinky-Dink cut outs without having to use my toaster oven. 

There are ways of staying cool, despite my body's singular drive toward the doorway of inappropriate sweat shows. Keeping the house temperature super cool keeps the ice in my soda from melting and my sweat glands dormant temporarily. I have yet to put on a winter coat, a hat, snow boots. I do not wear my hair down too often because it feels like a fur coat around my neck. And while some folk carry mouthwash or Tide Spot eraser, I carry a purse big enough to tote around my Ban Deodorant -- like Amex, never leave home without it. I will never roll my eyes again at a menopausal woman. I will blow in her face. Fan her. Rub ice around the back of her neck. 

My younger-self's dream of the perfect glistening sweat sheen is with in reach. I could be that girl that everyone admires at the gym, sports bra soaked, calves glimmering, forearm veins mapping my hard work through my skin. Except it will never happen because just thinking about the sequence of sweat-triggering motions I'd need to take to get to the gym has sent me to my shower to de-sweat my skin and scalp. God bless my Ban deodorant...