I like box stores...

A really bad thing happened to me this afternoon: my esprresso machine came apart (I took it apart for cleaning) and I couldn't put it back together again. Naturally I tried to fix it myself and when I couldn't my breathing got tight and I began to rapidly dehydrate. (I can't cope for long without it.) I had purchased it at Bed,Bath and Beyond last December and they told me if anything happens to it "just bring it back and they would give me another." So this was a good time to see if they meant it. I drove right out, got a cart and wheeled in my machine to Customer Service. NO PROBLEM. "Just go get another one" the young woman with attractive eye shadow said. And I did, even though I noticed that the price had gone up $100 since I bought it due to revaluing of the euro (it's made in Italy.) The exchange was processed and I made my happy way home. They lived up to their guarantee. Previously, purchasing machines online, I had had no recourse except to send it back and wait - or try to get it repaired when the warranty expired....Love those box stores!

Think...

Is anything worth it? I used to live just by doing. If I wanted to watch "The Price Is Right" on TV I just did it without questioning whether it was "a good use of my time." Now I start to think about how boring a game show is. If I wanted an egg salad sandwich I'd just boil up an egg and mash it with a little celery and mayo. Now I start thinking about the saturated fat in the yoke and do I really want to use mayo that doesn't have any fiber. I've been thinking a lot lately about some of the things I used to enjoy: Yellow Checker cabs with a black and white checked detail running down its sides and two jump seats in its cavernous back, double-decker buses on Fifth Avenue spewing fumes into the air as you pushed a dime into the conductors little chrome collector; dirty, filthy Broadway with its upstairs 'dance' studios and porno 'lingerie' shops and big movie palaces sending gusts of cool foul air into the hot, sweaty street scene. Gone. And what about Saks and DePina's? Does anyone go to Macy's anymore? Try the Nieman-Marcus at the Westchester for a real thrill. I'm so glad it isn't all gone. And the trains still run to Grand Central. Why can't we work from home? Because then the trains might not run anymore....

Way to go...

Just got back from Westchester where we stayed with my two granddaughters for five days. I loved feeding the one year old her bottle (she drains 7 0z. in about seven minutes flat.) It feels so secure and comfortable when she nestles into the crook of your arm. Then she starts to wriggle out and is off like a Roomba in every direction. She wants to eat all the time and waits under her older sister's chair for "drops." (We both had fun sprinkling some Cheerios on the floor and watching her go for them.) The older one bursts into songs from her preschool spontaneously in a spasm of cuteness. Putting her in to sleep was ineffably touching as she babbled on in a stream of remembrance from the day's disconnected events.
The Westchester with its upscale stores and dazzling interior architecture is exhilarating - even if hardly anyone is in the stores. Such abundance - and for the first time I've seen anywhere you can go in the garage and pay with a credit card! Talk about convenience!
It felt so good to be away AND then be home again. That must be the best part about travel: it feels so good to be back in your own house!

Past tense...

I often think about my first love. If not every day then certainly every week. I was a senior in high school and she was two years younger. This was in 1958 - 50 years ago! We would kiss and pet until the early hours of the morning. I was in paradise when we were together. She was popular. I was a loner.
Here's the thing: I used to imagine us married because I wanted to be with her all the time. But I hardly ever had the courage to call her because it would be so easy to hurt me if she started to see someone else. I used to have asthma a lot. I couldn't have survived the wound. So I pretended that I didn't care by not calling. The following year I went to Middlebury and she went to private school. (Her family was of the local elite.) I felt like nothing exposed to worldly and wealthy kids from private school. I soon returned home and went to state school, spiralling down.
I wonder how my life would have been different had I not fallen in love with her. Maybe I wouldn't have become as depressed.
We met up ten years later in Burlington and had a brief (six weeks) affair but I didn't have the same feelings of tenderness and destiny. Yet, I still wanted her to love me. But when I mentioned marriage she said she wasn't excited at the prospect (of bacon and eggs) and other mundanities and, besides, she would want to be a Catholic. I guess this meant she didn't care that much about me. Maybe she had become a little crazy by then, too. And I think I wanted to marry a Jewish person.
You'd think that would have been the end of it. A few weeks later I read in the paper that she had become engaged to someone else (a doctor.) I didn't see her again until 1994 - 26 years later. She had two kids. It was at a very unlikely place that we ran into each other: a Bar Mitzvah reception where I had been hired as a photographer and she as a guest. I didn't recognize her when she said my name. I was turned in the other direction and my wife said "Frank, someone is talking to you." I turned and saw a very thin older woman with curly graying hair.. I felt no attraction at all for her and actually felt as if I wanted to avoid her. I asked her if she ever dreamt about me (as I did about her) and she said 'no.' I blinked.
She called a couple of days later but I didn't want to start up with anything so I was off putting. We've never spoken again nor run into each other even though we both still live in the same town.
I think the unresolved past all gets back to my dual Gentile/Jewish heritage. Until I consciously made the choice to identify as Jewish after I graduated from college I was never sure of who or what I was. I don't know if I am even now. In fact, it's not the ethnic heritage; it's the difference between maturity and immaturity.

Beauty more than skin deep

She was sitting there with her legs crossed and her cleavage slightly exposed. Her toenails were painted a little too brightly red and she wore discreet small silver hoop earrings. And I didn't care about any of this even though I noticed it! She was about 42 years old, a mother of two, with lovely brown eyes and her light brown hair pulled back in a ponytail. She was here as friends of my wife's good friend to celebrate the latters' 65th birthday. But she was so animate! And listen to this: a graduate of Harvard Law School. But, most important of all, she's a commentator for VPR on legal and civic issues. And all this made me realize how are society tries to fool us all the time by making us think that what matters are movie star good looks are what matters. Nothing could be further from the truth - and I think in my psyche I always knew this. It's PERSONALITY and INTELLIGENCE that makes someone attractive. Looks hardly matter at all. She speaks out! She speaks out...

Breaking through...

What a day: a sleepless night, dehydrating slowly in bed while aching too much to turn over, much less to go pee. The morning news on NPR , damp and dismal house on the inside, unable to get more than two words on the crossword puzzle...Then, in the afternoon, the oil price jumps more than $10 and the stock market swoons and war with Iran looks more likely and how would poor Obama cope with that? Is there no hope? Then the phone rings and the Caller ID says "Josh Home" and I know it's my granddaughter Saydee calling but I don't answer because I talked with her this morning when 'Baba' wasn't here and I know she probably wants to talk to her now but she isn't here again, having gone to the garden, but then the answering machine goes on and I get the best event of the day: Saydee sings "My ABC's" and then "Twinkle, twinkle" and it is so cute that I can feel my whole being breaking out in a smile and turning around in circles as her WONDERful little voice fills my space. Worth continuing just for that.

It's how you play the game...

What's going on with Hillary? By not congratulating Obama on his victory she's looking more and more like a sore loser. What an embarrassment! She kept talking about how the Democratic Party was going to be so "united", but apparently she just can't bring herself to accept that sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. And she's looking like a real loser!

My new toy

Recently my son gave me a new laptop with the ability to receive TV signals - as I said I was planning to get to replace my small TV set which I keep in the kitchen. I had visions of a TV display with bright, hi-def images that I could also use to browse the Internet when I wanted to. He said that he would find me one and not to worry about it. So I let him as I thought it would please him to see me happy and he is proud of his shopping expertise.
Alas, the computer does not function as a TV very well. It's very finicky and sometimes the TV function can't be connected until the show is almost over - if then. At other times the image and sound tend to freeze up for a second or so, making watching a show more of an ordeal than a pleasure. The image, when you can get it, is also hard to focus on unless you are at the exact right angle to the screen. Otherwise, it tends to fad into mud.
I pleaded with him at least to buy it at Costco, because of their return policy, in case I didn't like it; but, apparently, he had other ideas and must have bought it at the cheapest place he could find. I appreciate his generosity but now I don't know what to do. It will probably work as a great computer...but I didn't need one. It's one of those things that you just don't know what to do. Suggestions welcome.