breaking the rules {part II}

To get the full effect of me breaking the rules, you may want to start with Part I.

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There were hundreds of us—thousands of us—who'd all gotten up before 5 to make it here to O'Hare for early morning flights.

I wanted to stop a random sampling and ask, "Where are you going? Did you also set your coffeemaker to auto-brew this morning so that you'd wake up to the smell of coffee? Are you excited for your trip? Is it vacation or work or something else entirely? Have you ever seen so many people here this early?"

Sometimes, the thought of the stories going on around us can be overwhelming. Do you ever look around a crowd and think—everyone here has one memory that always makes them giggle. Everyone has a heartbreak, and everyone has a favorite book or song or movie.

It sounds naive, but the wealth of stories can make me feel both incredibly small and blessedly in awe. It also reminds me of a quote I have written somewhere: "Be kind to everyone you meet. They all have troubles and joys of their own."

But faced with hundreds upon hundreds of people in the security line at O'Hare, I didn't want to consider anyone else's trouble. For the moment, it was all horribly, selfishly about my trouble: even though I'd done everything just as I should—checked in online, printed my boarding pass already, packed just a carry-on, worn uncomplicated shoes {read: easy to take off}, and arrived 75 minutes early—there was no way I was going to make my flight.

Hundreds of people literally stood in my way, each of them with their own giggly memory or whatever else I was just waxing lyrical about, not that I was thinking about that crap just then.

I was more thinking: if I get a good enough running start, can I hurdle over these people and what would the TSA think of my ninja move?

Because I'm not a ninja, I did the next best thing: I talked to an airline employee.

Me: Why, good morning, Sweet Airline Employee (SAE)! Gosh, lots of people here today. I wonder why that is.

SAE: It's because a lot of people bought plane tickets to fly today.

Me: Oh, yes, a very astute point. You're quite clever and a little sarcastic. I like that about you. Also, you look very sharp in your uniform.

SAE: [blank, bored stare, as if she hates her uniform] Can I help you?

Me: I sure hope so! [flash former cheerleader smile, hold for a few beats] Now, my flight is at 7:15, and I've been in this line for about 20 minutes. I'm a little concerned about how the line stretches from here to Iowa. I mean, look at that! There should be porta-potties and benches along there.

SAE: 7:15? Oh, you just might make it, honey.

Me: [encouraged by how she called me honey] Ok, it's that "just might" that has me worried. I have a lunch meeting at a very good pizzeria in Montclair, NJ, and I'd like to be there for it. You'd love this pizza, especially the salsiccia, I think—all their pizzas are cooked in an incredibly hot kiln sort of thing. Tastes just like Italy. But this line is in the way of my pizza. [flash cheerleader smile again, although I'm starting to get the impression that maybe this lady didn't like the cheerleaders at her high school. They must've been the snotty mean girl variety.]

SAE: Well, honey, maybe you should've planned ahead better.

Me I know you don't know me very well {beyond that I like pizza}, but that's the thing—I did plan ahead, and I never ask for exceptions, but...oh, you're walking away. And laughing. I see how it is. Bye!

My boss called just then, saying that he was at the gate and wow, there were a lot of people flying today and where was I?

"For how far I am from the gate, I may as well still be at home in bed with my little pug snoring away in her little bed," I told him as I eyed the unmoving line.

"You can always try going through the Priority Access line. That's what I did," he offered.

"Yes, but you actually have Priority Access. I have an American AAdvantage credit card: do you think I could flash that as proof that I'm special?"

"It's worth a shot."

"Flashing my credit card? That'd be like Hugh Grant in Notting Hill trying to get into a press conference by showing his Blockbuster card and saying he worked for their in-house magazine."

"No, not flashing your credit card. Just walk through Priority Access like you know what you're doing." As he said that, I stepped out of line and walked toward the empty Priority line.

"All right, I'll see you soon. I hope. If I don't get on the plane, assume I've been banned from the airport for life for breaking the rules. And maybe also beat up by all these other people in the security line who are obeying the rules."

I briefly considered keeping the phone at my ear as I handed my boarding pass to the TSA guy.

I'd pretend to be on an Important Call and say things like, "You let Frank know that his proposal is laughable. As if the ROI he's promising is even possible. Tell him to be realistic and get me a revision by the time I land. Yes, I'll be in the office for lunch. Get me that kind of pizza I like from the place I can never remember the name of. And a salad, but not with the funny kind of lettuce. Also, make sure my schedule is cleared for a 5-mile run at 3:30. I hope you know where my running shoes are. On second thought, tell Frank that was his last shot. He's done."

By the time I finished pretending to be Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada {is it bad that I was imagining being so many movie characters all in one morning?}, the TSA guy would've checked my boarding pass, overheard that I was an Important Person with a Schedule, and waved me through.

But I didn't do that, of course.

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Coming tomorrow: Part III, aka The Ending When I Actually Tell You About the Sandwich and the Sick Baby

breaking the rules {part I}

This is life: one minute, someone offers you a free sandwich. The next minute, a baby almost throws up on you.

Life is, in other words, a mix of the good and the bad. And the smelly. That's the reminder I'm taking from this early morning flight to New York.

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I was one of the first people on the plane, thanks to my boss' Platinum flight status on American and me following breezily behind him through the Priority Access line, even though I was technically in boarding Group 4.

"Here's what I've learned from years of travelling," he told me as he grabbed my boarding pass to present with his, "if you walk into a place like you belong there, most people won't question you. And if they do question you, smile and apologize profusely. If you're willing to risk the embarrassment of publicly being told you're wrong, then you'll usually end up where you want to be."

I smiled at the gate attendant, and she waved me through after complimenting my sweater.

He was right, I knew, but the concept felt wrong because—well, what do you do when you're driving on a busy highway and there's a sign telling you to merge right because the lane is closed ahead?

I immediately merge after checking all mirrors and my blindspot and signalling and checking my blindspot again.

I do it because that's what the sign is telling me to do and because I like to obey all rules so that I don't get in trouble.

But then—same driving situation and you've already merged—how do you feel when someone else ignores the MERGE NOW sign and instead zips ahead in the now traffic-less left lane to that point where you have to merge or you'll hit some construction equipment?

Then they edge their way into the line of cars, into the line of people who did what they were supposed to. These drivers callously push in because they know you'll have to let them in: it's either that or hit them.

They know that you're a rule-abider because of the blindspot-checking, signalling, sweet waving at other drivers, merging early thing you did the minute you saw the MERGE sign.

They know you won't succumb to road rage because as many times as you've seen Fried Green Tomatoes, you don't actually want to re-enact the famous "Towanda" scene where Kathy Bates rams the car of someone who stole her parking spot.

See that look of glee on her face as she rams into the other car? You will not have this look because you will not ram the car that ignored the MERGE sign and then cut in front of you. That rule-breaker knows that, and that's why they push into the line of cars in front of you.

But maybe when you get home, you'll make a plate of fried green tomatoes as a way to channel your rage. And because they're good comfort food.

How do you feel when someone ignores the rules like that?

I feel like screaming, "Cheater! Cheater!" That shrill cry coming directly off the playground. Do they think rules don't apply to them? These people with their blinkers menacingly clicking "Ha, ha! Me first! Ha, ha!"—do they think they're better than everyone else?

And yet.

For all my righteous anger at people who do not follow the rules of the road, I essentially did the same thing this morning, only not in a car: When faced with a massively long security line at O'Hare {hundreds and hundreds of people at just past 6am}, I jumped the line. I tricked the system. I didn't wait. I got ahead.

And it worked.

I think, if I were to be described as a character in a Jane Austen or Elizabeth Gaskell novel, it would go like this:

She was fastidious about following rules,
except when breaking them was to her advantage.

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Coming soon: Part II, in which I explain how I bypassed the longest security line I'd ever seen and got rewarded with a free breakfast sandwich, not that I'm saying that sandwich was some sort of twisted karmic reward {even though the bacon was really good} and that I've given up my rule-abiding ways and now will be ignoring all signs and regulations.

baby jesus is naughty

I don't remember how I broke baby Jesus.

Most likely, I was playing with him. There was a lack of toys at Grandma and Grandpa Walker's house, and my options were: wooden blocks or paper for drawing/hat making/confetti making.

Baby Jesus, as I called the statue when I was a 3ish-year-old, was always out in the living room, looking a lot like a little porcelain doll and therefore a lot like a toy. He wasn't actually Jesus as a baby—more Jesus as an angelic-looking toddler, which may be why my grandma kept him out when I was over: to give me an example of a good little child.

I may have been only 3, but I'd already provided my family with enough stories of "the time Kamiah showed off her strong will and intense personality" to last a lifetime. Certainly enough to last my lifetime, seeing as these stories are still brought up at many a family gathering:

• The time Kamiah screamed every five minutes for no apparent reason on a several hour car ride—aka, the time the family wanted to attach me to the roof of the car
• The time Kamiah threw a temper tantrum at a soccer match at the 1984 Olympics because her dad wouldn't buy her—little 2-year-old her—a king-size Snickers bar all for herself
• The time(s) Kamiah screamed without stopping for a breath—and then passed out, only to wake up a few minutes later the picture of contrition, a cuddly little thing who rivaled Beth from Little Women for sweetness

Most of these stories end with the summary: "My gosh..."

{This usually said in the very Iowan accent of "My gaish"}

"My gosh, she was a little hellion."

As a 3-year-old, I already had a bit too much of the hell-raiser in me, so my grandma probably encouraged me to play with baby Jesus; perhaps his general heavenly character would rub off on me.

Or maybe I'd want to start imitating his sweetly innocent face—smiling as if he had never thought he deserved a candy bar that was bigger than his head—and then for once in my life, I'd have my mouth shut and I wouldn't be screaming.

So I was playing with baby Jesus. Given my obsession with cheerleading and gymnastics at that time, I was probably making him do triple back flips with a double twist. This meant I was throwing him in the air and then hoping my chubby little fingers would catch him, iffy hand-eye coordination notwithstanding.

Or maybe I was making him be the top of the pyramid during the cheerleaders' big halftime routine. Maybe his teammates were St. Francis of Assisi and the Holy Mother, and they, I'm sorry to say, let him down, not supporting baby Jesus well enough while he gave a big "GO, TEAM!"

Down down down our Lord and Savior tumbled because his cheerleading squad didn't have very good spotters, people positioned to catch Jesus, should he ever fall. Peter was probably his spotter, but it maybe would've been smart to make Mary the spotter, seeing as she did stay at the foot of the cross until they lowered his body. She totally would've caught baby Jesus the cheerleader who took a tumble from the top of the pyramid.

Regardless of how it happened, I broke baby Jesus. His head came right off, and my grandma walked into the living room to see me standing there with his body in one hand and his head in another.

I looked up at her and then hid baby Jesus' head and body behind my back. If she couldn't see him, then he didn't exist, right?

"Kamiah! You broke baby Jesus! You are a very naughty girl!" My grandmother stood with her hands on her hips, the time-honored posture for angry grandmothers. A finger-wagging may have also been involved.

I glared right back at her and snapped, "Baby Jesus is broke; baby Jesus is naughty!"

At that, I'm sure my very, very Catholic grandmother crossed herself and started going through the rosary in an attempt to make God forget what her next-door-to-a-heathen granddaughter had just said.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee, and I'm sorry that girl is being raised Pentecostal and not Catholic and that she just said your son is naughty after she decapitated him.
Blessed art thou among women, and if you forgive her, I promise I'll try to make her become Catholic, especially in about 20 years when she starts to attend an Anglican church.
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus, who, just for the record, I don't think is naughty.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, but mostly for that little hellion who just killed your son.

Amen.

how i developed a cleaning playlist

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That up there—that widget {who sounds tech-savvy now?}—that's my Cleaning Playlist. I've had it in mind to create one for awhile now, but a few weeks ago, I decided to make good on that idea because...well, read this story. It should explain why.

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A couple of Saturdays ago, my heating and air conditioning man was supposed to come at 10am to fix my humidifier, which, apparently, isn't working, a fact that may explain my dry lips and parched throat during winter.

This is the same heating and air conditioning man who was featured in my story "Some Like It Hot. I Do Not," so in some ways, I was looking forward to the visit.

Not wanting to be idle and awkward while he was there, I started a small cleaning project at 9:45ish. See, I live alone, and having someone else in my space throws me off.

What I mean is—before all my friends decide they're never really welcome and that I'm simply being polite when I ask them over—when there's another person in my apartment, 99% of the time, it's because I've asked them over for dinner or coffee or to watch a movie.

My heating and air conditioning man is the 1%—someone I have invited over but who's there to do a job. However, my brain works like this: "Someone else is in the apartment! You need to entertain him! Offer him pain au chocolat just out of the oven! See if he wants coffee! Stand and talk to him while he works!"

I'm not used to being in my apartment with someone else just being there quietly doing their own thing, so when heating and air conditioning man—who will forever afterward be referred to as HACM—comes over, I'm liable to break into a routine of "Let Me Entertain You," if only I knew how to tap dance.

This is why I was cleaning at 9:45ish: to control the urge to entertain. If you've found a better way to turn off your jazz-hands-big-finish personality, let me know.

Besides: idle hands do the devil's work, you know, and so I was cleaning the counters with Barkeeper's Friend, which is not a lonely drunk but a magical cream that takes away any stain with hardly any scrubbing.

Time tick-tocked closer to 10am as I wiped away whatever it was I let boil over on the stove. On my pristine white stove, these mars of dirtiness tend to look like burnt cheese, not that I recall letting cheese boil over, but there they were, scars of meal eaten, disappearing as I pretended to be a bartender, a job I wouldn't be good at.

It'd go like this: "You want what kind of drink? I've never heard of that. Can I just give you red wine instead? That I know and understand."

You know how it is: you get caught up in cleaning behind the canisters and time passes without you noticing it. After wiping down the sugar canister, I glanced at the clock: 10:12.

HACM {how are you pronouncing that in your head? Hack 'em? Because that's how I'm doing it.} definitely should've been there by 10:12, but time in that profession seems to run differently, as if handymen have created their own space-time continuum. That is to say: HACM has shown up late before, and he's stayed for more than an hour but charged me for only an hour's work before. I decided to embrace HACM's space-time continuum, a lesson I learned from Star Trek.

The counters clean, I moved on to the floor.

On my knees, I was cleaning the baseboards as it became 10:30 and then 10:41 and by the time it was 10:53, I was wiping down the cabinets, and I was fuming.

my subconscious is quite the fiction writer

I woke up to the remnants of a dream about picture day at school.

Except: the school was providing the outfits, my Realtor was the photographer, and we weren't being photographed but videoed singing the National Anthem. With back-up singers. And a full band.

I'm still unclear on how this was going to work, but we each were given a word of "The Star Spangled Banner," and we sang the song up to that point {patriotism only goes so far, you know}.

My word was at the end—"...o'er the land of the free / and the home.."—so I had plenty of time to choose an outfit.

How much stock do you put in dreams?

Does it mean anything that I didn't want to wear most of the school's options because they were scandalously short and provocatively cut? I remember shouting at one point, "But none of us are Katy Perry!"

Does it mean anything that I kept quietly saying, "I wish you had more outfits like Audrey Hepburn wore in Roman Holiday"?

Like this outfit. Why couldn't I have been given this option to wear while singing the National Anthem? Also, holding Atticus Finch's hand while singing would make me as American as apple pie.

This outfit might've been too much. Besides, it's gauche to sing the National Anthem—about fighting the British—in an outfit that looks like what Queen Elizabeth wore to her coronation.

My dreams tend to be so detailed yet zany that I don't think much of them—when I can even remember them. Ask me sometime about my VERY SPECIFIC dream of driving over cadavers {yes, cadavers} in a pick-up truck that was driven from the back seat, not the front seat. Also, my vision was blurry in that one, as it usually is in my dreams. {You don't need a degree in psychology to interpret that last part: I'm scared of going blind.}

Given the few times a year I do remember my dreams, I'm thankful that I can't remember them more often. The intricacies of the stories make me tired, and you should not wake up tired.

My subconscious clearly works overtime at night and becomes quite the fiction writer.

i will never be warm again: lessons from the cold

When the weather turns cold again, there is a moment every year when you think, 'I will never be warm again. The earth will never come out of the winter it's heading into.'

Then you realize that it's actually 37 degrees and that it will, unfortunately but inevitably in the Midwest, get much colder.

Please tell me that you have this moment, too, so that I don't feel like such a wuss, someone so unworthy to be a descendent of my farming ancestors {and in one case, a peddling ancestor—no, for real, one of my ancestors, someone not that far back in the family tree, was a peddler}.

My moment came last night. I was walking Miss Daisy, and I had on a hat, my mittens from Norway, and a wool scarf wrapped tightly and tucked into my coat. I was shivering from the cold and yet I couldn't even really see my breath in the still night air.

It will get so much colder, and my body will acclimate.

This is the great wonder and lesson of living somewhere with four season.

The Wonder

Every few months, the scenery drastically changes, and we get to take in spring buds, humidity, falling leaves, and snow. This keeps us from much monotony because even a drive to the grocery store will eventually look different—colors, lack of colors, leaves, lack of leaves, everything in white because it's an icy-snow mess and you better hope you don't slide and you really should've put together that winter preparedness kit, etc.

Speaking of the grocery store and food, we have come so far from when food selection was limited by the seasons or canning. I feel qualified to say something like this because of the aforementioned farming ancestors.

Now, as we're all aware, you can pretty much get anything at any time of the year. Yes, there are times when certain produce is better—when it's at its peak, I do believe it's called, when what is really meant it: it's the traditional harvest time.

If you get apples in February, they won't be as peak-full as in the fall when you're supposed to be making apple pies and applesauce and whatever else you can think of to make with the five bushels of apples you somehow ended up with after apple picking.

But you can still get apples in February.

You can get strawberries in November, if you have a whim to make strawberry shortcake for Thanksgiving.

We no longer have to wait for the harvest; we no longer get the anticipation of waiting for the season's first plum and then biting into it—delicious, so sweet, and so cold. This is just to say: we have lost something when we got pulled so far off the land, and I'm glad we have the wonder of seasons to remind us that we used to be more tied to the land.

The Lesson

The seasons teach that it is possible to adapt to change. You may forget every year how cold it gets, but it won't take long for you to pull out the long underwear, find the warm gloves, and remember how cozy your home feels when you first step inside from a -20 degree day.

We're all much more adaptable than we think. We do get used to change, and the seasons remind us of our great adaptability.

This is important to remember when something so large and shifting happens in your life—that you're sure you'll never be able to adjust.

Think of things like your best friend getting married or people having babies or even you yourself getting into a relationship. I should stress that these are all good things {babies mean, for example, that you get to buy adorable clothes—little sweater vests! tiny dresses with ruffles!—and look forward to videos of the baby giggling}.

But just as we're an adaptable people, we're also a freak-out-about-change people. It's natural to see how everything will be different, and it's also natural to skip over the fact that different isn't actually synonymous with bad.

Different can be nice, once you get used to it.

Just like the humidity in the summer and the snow in the winter.

what i shouted at npr today

On my way to the gym this morning, I was listening to NPR, as I am wont to do in the before-light hours so that I can be better prepared for the day and any possible discussions of news.

It also helps me plan my outfit for the day—that weather report is so useful.

This morning, NPR reported on the dismal progress of the supercommittee, the bipartisan group that is supposed to be hammering out a deal to cut the country's deficit by more than a trillion dollars over the next 10 years. Their deadline is Thanksgiving, and David Wellna said something pithy and very NPR: "So that means they only need to find, oh, about $133 billion a day in possible cuts until the deadline."

And before I could stop myself, I was yelling, "I hate you, supercommittee! You aren't super at all!"

Only the streetlights on Harrison in Wheaton heard me, and they didn't even flicker at my Angry Citizen outburst.

I kept going; I clearly needed an outlet for this rage and the streetlights didn't seem to mind.

"No, not super at all! What have you been doing since August? Trying to come up with superhero nicknames for each other? Designing your outfits?

"Here's the deal: I've taken over designing your outfits, and NONE of you get capes. And you all have to wear your underwear on the outside of your pants. And your pants will be seven sizes too large in in your least favorite color.

"Also, they will be made of the itchiest wool ever created, and they will smell like sheep. Wet sheep.

"How super do you feel in that, huh, supercommittee?"

As I stopped at the four-way stop sign at President, I tried to calm myself down. Tried to see things from their perspective.

"Look, I know I don't know what it's like in Washington. I've been there a couple of times, and it seems pretty and historic, but no, I've never had to find a trillion dollars in the country's proverbial couch cushions.

"I'm sure this has been hard on you. All that political posturing couldn't have been good for you, probably put quite a strain on your back, actually.

"But come on, everybody said that you'd have to reach a deal because if you didn't, immediate budget cuts to defense and other programs would go into effect. Now, though, you're all talking about how if Congress put that trigger in place, it can just as easily remove that trigger.

"HOW IS THAT FAIR? What was the point of the trigger then?!?! What was the point of you, supercommitte?!?"

Obviously, I didn't maintain my cool head.

I couldn't help myself. This morning, I was channeling a bit of Julia Sugarbaker from Designing Women on my way to the gym.

Like in this video {ooh, a video! Such fun on the blog here today!}. Thanks to her, I sometimes wish I spoke with a Southern accent.

on pushing 30

"The one thing you should know about me is this: I'm the consummate good girl."

That's how the back cover of a book by Whitney Gaskell begins. The book is a pinkish-purple, and the cover involves a swirly font—looks like it could've been handwritten by a 15-year-old hoping to appear fancy—and high heels.

I tell you all these cover details because, contrary to that saying, I most definitely judge a book by its cover. I am seduced by typeface, clean design, and—although this is on the inside of the book, so perhaps it makes me seem less judge-y of outward appearances—hefty, creamy paper. No, saying that I like the touch of a book doesn't make me seem less superficial.

Maybe re-phrasing this way helps: the sensory details—the aesthetics, too—of a thing add to the reading experience.

You know it's true: the weight of a book in your hands, the smell of the paper, the pressure in your fingernail when you dogear a page to mark a favorite passage. These details are valid.

And these details, when applied to the Whitney Gaskell book I found next to Wives and Daughters at the library, said:

I am chick lit.

I am set in either a big East Coast city {preferably NYC} or a small town that is based not on the reality of small town life but more on the idealized but updated Donna Reed version of small town life. In this small town, there is a charming cafe that rivals Starbucks and has vegan options, even though in a real small town, you'd be going to something called the Dairy Barn for your Maxwell House drip coffee and ham salad sandwich at lunch.

I will have a protagonist who is either in publishing or a lawyer. Regardless of which it is, she will have the same amount of money and be able to buy scarily expensive shoes a la Carrie Bradshaw in Sex and the City.

Those high heels may figure prominently in a scene where she meets a man who is perfect for her. She will meet him just after breaking a heel.

Or she will meet him the one time she doesn't wear the heels when she runs a quick errand—dashing out of her hardwood-floored, granite countertopped, vintage-feeling apartment that could be used for a photo shoot for Anthropologie. She will meet him when she hasn't done her hair and when she's wearing sweatpants and old running shoes.

I would make a good movie starring Katherine Heigl.

Chick lit can be so comforting in its predictability.

Chick flicks bring the same comfort. You know that Katherine Heigl is, indeed, going to get together with whoever it is after they go through a spell of "No, I hate YOU more! Also! Look at my adorable pencil skirt! Also! Have you met my whacky but endearing friends? Also! I think you're self-centered, but aha, I just learned that you can make an amazing coq au vin. You're full of surprises; I think I'll stick around."

Sometimes, you just want predictable comfort. Actually, a lot of times I want predictable comfort, which may be why I like Jane Austen so much and why I was at the library to get an Elizabeth Gaskell book in the first place.

I decided to go for the predictable comfort of the Whitney Gaskell book, too, because:

• the book is called Pushing 30: And I am, indeed, pushing 30.

  I did not get this book as either a) a guide {how can I make the last month of my 20s hilarious and worthy of a chick flick? And if I were to be in a chick flick, who would play me? I wish Audrey Hepburn were still available. I would also accept Mary Tyler Moore.}

  or b) a reassurance {OMG, THIRTY. THIRTY MAKES ME WANT TO TALK AND WRITE IN ALL CAPS.}.

  On this whole turning 30 thing: I'm not freaked out at all/delving into over-analyzation/starting to act like I'm wise beyond my years/thinking wistfully of college/officially declaring myself a spinster/planning on finally losing all inhibitions and partying until I forget how old I am.

  But I will read a silly book about someone else turning 30.

• the protagonist—Ellie—called herself the consummate Good Girl: And I relate to that, although she does talk about washing her make-up off every night, even when she's tired. If that is a sign that you're a Good Girl {and not, you know, going to church and singing in the choir and spending nights in Vegas reading Persuasion}, well, then, I may not qualify. I get really tired and lazy—and FYI, start to make a lot less sense—at about 10pm.
• the back cover talks about Ellie's pug: Honest-to-goodness, I was thinking that I could put the book back on the shelf.

  The story sounded so-so—and SO trite, actually. It's about how Ellie, our adorable lawyer who lives in Washington, DC, meets a man twice her age, and she immediately falls for him. But, OMG, can she finally have some happily-ever-after happen to her with "the one man who's so wrong for her, he's perfect"? {What does that even mean?}

  Plus, I could relate to Ellie only it that she was almost 30 and a Good Girl with a Clean Face {sometimes, on my part}. The rest of it—dysfunctional family {that's right, family, I don't think we're dysfunctional! Do not take Thanksgiving as a chance to prove me wrong!}, hating her job {Dear People I Work With: I like my job.}—I didn't relate to at all.

  Even from the back cover copy, I could tell I wasn't going to be all that invested in her family/hating work problems. Most likely, if we were friends in real life, I'd tell her to pull herself together.

  But then, there was this: "...and she's somehow become enslaved to her demanding pet pug Sally." A pet pug! Just like mine! Maybe this book will be portentous for the next month before I turn 30, especially since I dress up my pug like this:

  

  If that little face doesn't say "demanding pet pug," I don't know what does.

Turns out I shouldn't have let the mention of a pug sway me. In general, that's actually a pretty good life principle to live by: do not be swayed by pugs.

I didn't make it beyond the first chapter where Ellie meets The Older Man—while, GASP, running an errand in her sweatpants because she had a home-hair coloring disaster! How could she let herself go out in public like that? Oh, such tragedy! Oh, and her pink hair!

I hope you can tell from the number of exclamation points that I had very little sympathy for her. I did have a little for her pug, though.

And from now on, I will stick with Elizabeth Gaskell when I'm in the G section of fiction at the library.

go fish

I was drinking black coffee out of a white IKEA coffee cup. It came in a set of six—along with six blue and white saucers—for one of those impossible IKEA prices, like $3.00 or something.

When you're first setting up house, it's difficult to ignore the siren song of IKEA, beckoning to you just off the expressway, and it's only much later that you realize that nice furniture doesn't involve fake wood veneer that can peel off, nor is it made of compressed layers of something that was, perhaps, maybe at one time, wood.

Or those compressed layers that are making up your stylish yet frustrating-to-assemble bookcase {why isn't the faceless IKEA man on the directions ever shown fighting with the person who's trying to help him assemble the furniture? Because that happens all the time and is pretty much part of the process}—those layers could just be scraps of Swedish newspaper that have been skiied over by blonde-headed Swedish people as they chant in practically unaccented English about how they will draw America's youth to them with promises of cheap meatballs.

But these white coffee cups from IKEA have stood the test of time and two moves. In IKEA world, they are heirlooms now.

I was drinking out of one when I suddenly thought of Grandma Walker. It was the black coffee in it that reminded me, I think.

She had coffee throughout the day, I seem to recall, and it was always black. My grandparents had these milky glass mugs that showed the faintest outline of the coffee through as she drank cup after cup.

Grandma Walker would always have a cup of black coffee on the kitchen table as we played Go Fish when I was just a very little girl. Because my hands weren't big enough to hold all the cards, I would use the swivel kitchen chair as my card stand. I'd swing the chair around so that the back was facing the table.

High-backed, no arms, and covered in a light brown plasticky material that made them easy to clean, those chairs were set-up for me to play cards.

I'd crouch on the chair, studying my carefully-arranged cards—they were propped up in between the seat and the back—and peek around the side to study my grandma, to see if she was giving away any clues in her face.

Glancing out the kitchen window: did that mean she had 3s?

Looking at the orange and brown flowered wallpaper: maybe it meant she had no 3s?

Hard to tell. My grandma's thin but sturdy face and milky eyes rarely betrayed a tell.

I'd pop above the back of the chair as she took another drink of her coffee. "Do you have any 3s, Grandma?"

"Go fish," she'd say.

or

"Oh, you got me! Here you go," she'd say.

And I'd retreat to my hiding place to study her some more and wonder if I'd ever like coffee as much as she did.

when it turns cold, my thoughts turn to england

When the weather turns cold and damp—just as it's been this week—my thoughts naturally turn to England, and my reading choices soon follow.

My mind associates the wet cold with England because:

• That's what it was like when I lived there. It was a semester abroad—the fall term—and while I'm sure there were sunny days, what I mostly remember is wet leaves, an ineffective umbrella, and slick steps outside the National Portrait Gallery, where I'd go to look at Wallis Simpson, the American divorcee who caused a king to give up his throne. In her portrait, she almost smirks haughtily down at you as if she's in on a joke. {The punchline for that joke may be, “...and then I almost destroyed the monarchy!”}
  
  I was drawn to her portrait time and again, possibly because other wings of the National Portrait Gallery involved many, many oil paintings of people in lace collars who looked like they'd been eating lumpy porridge for every meal for 13 years.
  
  In Wallis' portrait, though, she has a sprig of flowers pinned to her blue shirtdress, and when I looked up at her, she seemed to be saying, “Oh, forget these British people. They're a tricky lot to figure out, so show them some American gumption, just like I did.”
  
  It seems silly to say now, especially after reading more of her story and seeing how she was portrayed in The King's Speech, but when I needed a boost on a foggy day in London-town, I'd go visit Wallis, my fellow American. She made the rain and cold and loneliness seem laughable, like a big joke that we were both in on.
• of that scene in Sense and Sensibility when Marianne and Margaret Dashwood are on a rainy walk through the Devonshire countryside. “Is there a felicity in the world superior to this? Margaret, we will walk here at least two hours,” Marianne enthuses over the little bits of blue sky peeking through, as Jane Austen describes it, “a showery sky.”
  
  Don't say things like that, Marianne—that thing about felicity and walking. You are the personification of flights of fancy in Jane's world, and I think I should let you know: she's using you to teach a lesson about how impulsiveness and unguarded emotions lead to tumbles down rain-slicked hills overlooking the sea. Literally and metaphorically.
  
  Going on and on about blue sky and the animating gales of a southwesterly is not going to end well for you, Marianne, so you may as well come in from the rain and embroider something.
  
  I am so like Elinor. Thank heavens. But that also helps explain why rainy days make me want to stay inside with a book, preferably one set in England.

I went to the library recently with this goal in mind: get something set in England.

Having just re-read Persuasion and wanting to avoid appearing like a one-trick pony {not that I'm concerned about my personal brand, but I do think it should be more than "I am obsessed with Jane Austen"}, I decided to expand beyond Jane; I went for Elizabeth Gaskell.

That's Elizabeth Gaskell of Cranford, Wives and Daughters, and North and South.

The Elizabeth Gaskell who wrote in the mid-1800s and who has been so good to the BBC and its desire to make every book written in the 1800s into a period drama they can cheer the nation with on Sunday nights through the cold, damp England fall and winter.

I pulled Wives and Daughters off the shelf and then glanced to the right at the book right next to it. This is one of great pleasures of the library, by the way: going to a section where you need one book, and then taking a look around to see what else that section has to offer.

If I'm ever in a reading bind—and it does happen, especially when I have no seasonal promptings to read things set in England—I pick a letter and then go to that section of fiction. With my head tilted and my fingers tracing the spines, I don't let myself leave until I find a book or two, maybe even something out of my typical reading likes.

Right next to Wives and Daughters was a book by Whitney Gaskell. 'Maybe she's a great-great granddaughter!' I thought, nerdily excited by this idea of a modern-day Elizabeth Gaskell.

I stood on my tippy-toes to pull the book down and saw there was no way in heck I was checking this book out.

That is, until I read the back cover.

-----

I'll tell you why soon, I promise.

cooking for one and for all

The smell of garlic and onions sauteing in olive oil fills a kitchen. As soon as the onions hit the pan with a quiet sizzle, the memory of chili, meatloaf, and cold winter nights starts to saute, too.

No matter where you find yourself, smell is reliably the same. Whether in Iowa or Glen Ellyn or France or anywhere, it's true that when onion starts to sweat and turn translucent, it smells precisely the same. It is a constant to savor, and there is ritual comfort in cooking.

Since I live alone, people often say to me, "But isn't it tiresome to cook for yourself every night?"

I smile and offer up two secrets.

One, I do not cook for myself every night, but thank you for believing me capable of that.

Two—although I'd hope this one wasn't a secret—I'm worth it.

I take great care in planning meals for others. Today is my best friend's birthday, and we're having a small dinner. I spent Sunday afternoon flipping through cookbooks to plan a meal that was just right for her, and then I scheduled in times to do the shopping, prepping, and cleaning.

I took great care for her meal, and I'm worth just as much care, aren't I?

Of course.

I am—we all are—worth the excitement of planning and the ritual comfort of clicking on the gas burner to saute onions.

i am a crazy pug lady

When I write in the early morning—I've been getting up at 5:15ish to write before going to the gym—Miss Daisy, my little pug, sits just next to me in another of the kitchen chairs.

It's as if we're an old farm couple, sitting here having coffee. Ours is the only kitchen light on for miles, and the cheery yellow glow is an oasis or a beacon in the dark. It's the only thing, besides the hope of a good day, pushing back against the darkness.

But we're, of course, not an old farm couple. We're just sitting in a square of light in the suburbs.

Miss Daisy sits so patiently in her chair, and she sits so observantly. Her eyes follow my hand as I try to fill the paper with words that are worth leaving, with words I don't need to claw away, to scratch out.

When I look up and smile at her, happy I didn't cross out a word in the last sentence, she looks woefully back at me. She's a pug; woeful is her typical face, particularly when she's just waking up from a night's sleeping and snoring.

Her wrinkled brow seems to say, "Are you sure you want to write that? Are you sure you're happy with it? It's all right if you need to keep trying. I'll stay right here next to you."

And then she looks hopefully, not woefully, at my coffee cup, sitting in an NPR mug on the table in between us. She's perhaps suggesting that she have a sip or two of that as a reward for her encouragement.

I scratch her behind the ears, tell her that pugs shouldn't have coffee, and get back to scratching on my paper.

away, away they must go

It was a cold fall morning, feeling for all the chill in the air just as November 1 should. As I walked baby pug down a side street and past a house with a bright red door and a For Sale sign out front, the birds above us chattered the solfege.

Do-re-mi, they said to one another, perched {a word made for birds, I tell you} in a tree that still had most of its leaves, which were finch-gold and full of glory and grace.

The leaves hid the birds; looking up into the branches spreading across the pink sky, all I saw were leaves and all I heard was birdsong, as full of glory and grace as the leaves hiding the little singers.

A movement then—was it me? Or the pug?

A movement—a signal from time immemorial, perhaps—set them off, and in one flap of their wings, they were away.

For just a moment, it seemed the tree was moving, flying away, lifting off. The birds were extended branches, and because of them, the tree stood taller, scratched more of the sky.

The small black birds had stopped singing, and now they were no longer hidden by the golden leaves. They were dotting the sky above me—away, away they must go.

The manipulation of air: that was all there was to hear as the birds aimed up and away. Wings moving air, and even in an instant, I thought of the beauty of physics and creation. Science and nature together {can they ever be apart?} give the illusion of magic at times.

All around me, gold pieces were falling, gently—a ballet of the season. The leaves felt released when the birds revealed themselves, and down the leaves fell as up the birds rose.

I stood in the midst of falling gold and heard the birds start singing again as they decided on a direction. This way, this way—they beckoned to each other.

And the leaves piled on the ground.