Men and mammograms

While waiting for my annual mammogram, I noticed more men then women in the lobby.   Husbands waiting for their wives, obviously.  My gut told me that the men were only there because of a wife's cancer diagnosis.  Why else would husbands go to the "breast health center?"  I wanted to get up and say "I'm so sorry that you have to take this journey..." knowing first hand how much cancer sucks (and how it's often sugarcoated as a journey). About the only thing that's good about the beginning of the 'journey' are waiting rooms like this one. I remembered getting my diagnosis after waiting in a room that resembled a spa.  I recall thinking how about the lengths that health care facilities go to to create an atmosphere of serenity, when your world feels like it's caving in. Since I'm now in my 6th year of the journey, I feel slightly less anxious about these visits.  I've traded in anxiousness for empathy, feeling a desire to reach out to those who may just be beginning their journey today, the ones who's husbands are sitting next to me now.

Exit Row Strategy

On a recent SouthWest Airlines flight, I was making a connection, with no plane change.  As a passenger, this meant an opportunity to get a choice seat before the new patrons embarked.  I was content with mine, one of two seats in an exit row.  As people boarded, I noticed the flight attendant standing between the two men in the window and aisle seats of the exit row across from me.  They chatted as if they were old friends, as the plane filled.  When almost at capacity, the attendant started offering the seat that she’d essentially been blocking, to approaching petite passengers.  I use the word petite in a broad sense, i.e anyone whose body mass would be comfortably contained with the arm rests, and whose knees didn’t pierce the back of the seat in front of them.  While still in the middle, this exit row seat was prime real estate, considering the flight was full.  An oversize passenger however, would depreciate the value of the adjacent seats which were occupied by the two men who’d been so actively engaged with the attendant.  It was then that I realized their strategy.  She was simply a placeholder.  Attendants need a place to stand during the boarding process, so why not make that simple act a favor to others?  When the plane took off, a young polite college student occupied the middle exit row seat.  She’d been offered the seat by the attendant when she vacated the spot to resume her routine tasks… only after a wink and nod to the two men who’d been privy to the exit row strategy. Until now I’d thought the most successful way to survive the perils of open seating on SouthWest was to avoid eye contact with non-petite embarking passengers.  This experience gave me a new found respect for the creative strategies of seasoned frequent travelers. 

Thrifting fueled by compliments

I love to thrift shop.  The more overflowing with stuff and under crowded with shoppers, the better.  Recently found treasures included a little black dress, fun belts and a bedazzled top that may be a little young for me, but it was designer and only $3.  Yesterday's trip resulted in $5 paten leather shoes, Aerosoles that hadn't been worn.  The clerk commented on how nice they were and I realized that that was yet another benefit of thrift shopping. The excitement over the find is fueled by compliments from other shoppers or the clerks.  Simple words of praise also wipe away any buyers remorse, not like there's much when your total bill is less then what you'd pay for a bottle of wine or a few lattes.

Friends, No Ice and Napa

I like ice in my water, but am fine without, a girlfriend that I've known since college, prefers no ice.  It was my other girlfriend who mentioned that when we were together for a girls weekend earlier this month.  The three of us vowed, in 1999, to get together for a girls weekend every three years.  It's 2014, and it's happened twice; there were a couple of visits in between, but husbands, kids and an occurrence of cancer were involved, so those don't count. What does count is uninterrupted girlfriend time to take note of small things (no ice), and pick up where you left off; even if it takes a few moments, or glasses of wine, to remember where.  What counts is casting aside all the multitasking involved in the daily life of being a mom and wife, so that you can just be a friend for a few days.  What counts are friendships that are timeless, and friends who are priceless.  Thanks ladies for your friendship, endless generosity, and therapeutic shoulders.  Oh, and of course... Thanks for Napa!

Pine Ridge Vineyard, our table, inside their winery cave, set for tasting... hands down our favorite winery!

Tonight, I made ugly cookies

On the to do list tonight was to make shamrock cookies for my brother-in-law's party this weekend.  I don't have a go to recipe for cookies, I would like to be the person that pulls out their worn cookbook, or recipe file holder, and retrieves the tried and true, perfect sugar cookie recipe.  But I'm the 'what can I do without going to the store' person, the allrecipes.com cook.  The result? Cookies that were shamrock shaped until baked, then they just melted together into flat awkward shaped blobs, which I topped with green icing to complete the perfectly ugly shamrock cookie.  The girls made few disparaging remarks, wisely opting to eat, rather then critique. There were countless events in my community tonight. A meeting with some women in leadership positions last evening made me feel like I should be going to at least one of those events. I'm sure I would have enjoyed them, networked a little and perhaps caught up on the latest in current affairs. My absence at those events tonight didn't win me any points in the 'leave your mark on society category', and I truly do want to be that person, someday. But, tonight I made ugly cookies with my girls, and I wouldn't have had it any other way.

If only it was as easy as Safety Town

The police officer who presided over Safety Town when my daughter was in preschool, is now conducting workshops on cyber safety.  I still remember Safety Town graduation day, standing room only with parents elbowing each other out of the way to capture it on video. There were tricycles, firetrucks the kids could climb into, stickers and snacks. Safety Town had everything a five year old needed to master the course content of bicycle, poison, fire, and traffic safeguards.  Fast-forward to middle school, and now the course content is cyber safety, and the safeguards are far more complex.  I suppose you can draw a parallel between the inquisitive minds of middle schoolers and the naive minds of preschoolers.  We don't assume that a five year old instinctively knows how to avoid eating something that is poisonous, so we teach them not to.  Likewise, we shouldn't assume that a tween understands the impact their shared pictures or online discussions could have on their college application, so we need to teach them what to avoid.  In order to teach them, we must first learn it ourselves.  Seek out a workshop on digital dangers and kids, I thought I was relatively internet savvy, but I still have a lot to learn.  The workshop I attended was from the Digital Innocence Recovery Group. 

Snow shoveling and neighbors

Three hours... the amount of time I would have spent with a client this morning, but instead spent shoveling... ah, the joy of a corner lot.  My 10 year old failed to make a dent in the ice covered snow when she attempted a snow angel.  That should give you an idea of the weight on each lift of the shovel.  Regardless, I enjoyed the exercise, did my homeowners duty of clearing the sidewalk and made the following observations about my neighbors:

1. some embrace shoveling, strap on their heart monitors and count calories
2. some pitch in and help others, shoveling beyond the boundaries of their own sidewalks
3. some say "Why bother? I've got nowhere to go.  People can walk on the other side of the street."  

While the 'why bother' option was tempting, I'm thankful that I am capable of and have the flexibility in my schedule to bother.  I guess I'm grateful:

1. to have the time and physical ability to do a chore like shoveling (to bother)
2. to show my kids that this is what you do, when your get 6 inches of snow.
3. to have seen the trash collector stop to retrieve what I thought was a soda can, but in fact was an injured bird that he gently moved to safer ground.

My dog was just grateful
for the path to pee