Making Faces

  

Not any more!!

I was in a doctor’s office last week and I saw it: the “Face Masks Mandatory” sign at the reception desk had been replaced by “Face Masks Encouraged But Not Required.” Medical facilities were, if I’m not mistaken, the final frontier of mandated masking. At this point I no longer keep extra KN-95s in my purse and car. The pandemic is ending, as T.S. Eliot would say, “not with a bang, but a whimper.” Gradually, over time, the forbidden places were once again permitted: grocery stores, restaurants, airplanes. Due to the high numbers of the vaccinated, plus the people who have been infected, immunity levels are rising. It feels…kinda good; it may be rear-view mirror for COVID very soon. But I also fret about this: what if the virus comes roaring back with a powerful, booster-proof variant? Will we ever truly be able to relax about the specter of mass contagion? Is mankind’s future to be forever marked by waves and waves of dreadful diseases?

 

Oh, let’s think about something more cheery!

 

They say it takes more muscles to frown than to smile, which means our faces are definitely more muscular since March of 2020. With all the glum news, noticeable smiles are in short supply these days. As we remove our face coverings, some of us are realizing (to our horror) that our ability to put on happy expressions has deteriorated. It’s use-it-or-lose it time for the toothy grin, and many of us are losing it. 

 

Japan to the rescue! In Asia generally, the use of face masks during, for instance, the annual flu season, is the norm. But even those countries never had such a prolonged stretch of hidden mouths, as have been experienced worldwide these past three years. So some enterprising Japanese folks are offering what they’re calling Smile Therapy, and retraining people to turn their frowns upside down. Not sure what all is involved, but if such therapy was designed especially for me, I have a few suggestions:

 

THINGS THAT MAKE ME SMILE

 

*Comedy videos (the "Philomena Cunk” mockumentaries are hysterical)

*Convos with funny friends (I have a number of them, lucky me!)

*Babies in general (and any related to me in particular)

*Certain songs (Aiden and Peter belting out “Supercalifragalisticexpialidocious” is a winner. Ironically, the Charlie Chaplin song “Smile” makes me very sad.)

*Acceptance emails from magazine editors (the bigger the pay rate per word, the bigger my smile)

*Watching the sunset from our back deck (extra smiles for fireflies, points off for mosquitoes)

*When I’m baking bread and I’m not sure the yeast is still OK, but the bread rises so I guess it is OK.

*Sitting on the beach, reading a funny book by David Sedaris, or Dave Barry. (Send other books by humor writers named David my way.) Actually going in the water does NOT make me smile) 

 

If you, too, are struggling to flash those pearly whites, don’t worry. Your smile will come back! Someday! Just in time for the next pandemic!

All smiles! We can do it!

Foraging

 

Morels--gathered, cooked, eaten!

  

The other day I was foraging in the thesaurus for synonyms for “forage.” Here are a few:

 

Rummage

Scour

Scrounge

Hunt

Explore

 

The primary definition involves "finding food in the wild," which meant about zero to me until Evan began to forage out in the Pacific Northwest. I prefer all my edible items to be shrink wrapped and marked with “sell by” dates for guaranteed freshness. It was a major mind shift to realize that not all un-domesticated mushrooms are toxic, and that stinging nettles lose their sting--and become delicious--when they are blanched and sauteed. I still hesitate to eat a thimbleberry from a bush, even when an expert (who just happens to be related to me) pinky-swears that it’s a perfectly safe nibble. Sadly, if I were lost in the forest, I’d probably croak quickly, preferring starvation to taking a chance on munching some salal leaves.

 

I’m much better at other kinds of foraging. I really enjoy rummaging in a used bookstore in search of a rare volume. For example, I was on the hunt for a cookbook illustrated by the great artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, ever since I first saw it in the kitchen of a babysitting customer when I was 12. It’s been a Holy Grail of sorts, and I’m thrilled to have finally found a gently used copy (on Amazon!) Need a new Grail now! Also, I’m good at hunting for makeup that doesn’t look like makeup, for those times when I feel the need to prettify myself, but very subtly (never mind the illogic of spending $$$ on “invisible” beauty products.) If I know that I’m wearing “barely-there” blush, then that’s good enough for me! 

 

NO one of my acquaintance scours the internet for useless info with my level of skill and perseverance. Why, just the other day Steve and I were trying to remember the actor who played Richard III in a 1975 production we attended at the University of Connecticut when Steve was a grad student. My hubby was content to shrug and go on with his life, but I spent a decent while Googling (did you know there are online archives for the UConn newspaper that go back way before the 1970’s? True!) It was with triumph that I found the show review, and announced the actor’s name--though we actually couldn’t recall his performance after all.

 

Our prehistoric ancestors, we’re told, were “hunter-gatherers,” traveling all over to find sustenance, before the dawn of agriculture and “grow it yourself.” This has evolved into “buy it yourself at Costco,” but the basic idea is the same. 

 

Yet, the thrill of the hunt is still a part of our nature. Just watch a determined woman tearing through the racks at H&M for a LILAC colored top (NOT purple!!!!) Observe the madness around Christmastime as frantic parents search everywhere for THE hot holiday toy. 

 

Let Evan seek morels in the woods. I’ll keep looking for obscure actors online.

 

Foragers, the two of us.

Bingo!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Coronation Derby

Saturday, May 6th was a big day! It happened to feature both King Charles III’s coronation in London AND The Kentucky Derby here in the USA. I couldn’t help but notice the parallels: 

*Kentucky Derby is billed as the first of the Triple Crown

*Charles got his first (though only) crown too

*Both were televised, for optimum celebrity-watching fun

*Both involved trumpets/bugles

*Both were attended by women wearing ridiculous hats

*One at site of Churchill Memorial

*Other at Churchill Downs

*Family inspired a hit show

*One of the horses named “Hit Show”

*Commemorated with minted coins

*Celebrated with mint juleps

*Neither involved Meghan Markle

 

Here’s where they differed:

 

The Royal to-do lasted almost four hours

The horse race lasted three minutes, give or take

Wouldn’t it have been much better if they just switched durations? I know by the time I settled down in my recliner, mint julep at the ready, the Derby was OVER, whereas the festivities in Westminster Abbey were so long that I was able to take a shower, scramble an egg, and start some laundry going, before Chuck and Camilla even pulled up to the door in that gaudy Kingmobile! 

 

Besides the opening fanfare, all the music on offer at Churchill Downs were the mellifluous strains of “My Old Kentucky Home.”

Whereas the London spectacle was chock-filled with tunes, from Handel, to a gospel choir, to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s new song (forget what it was called, but possibly--“Music of the Knight?”)

 

The Derby run was narrated by apoplectic announcers, hyperventilating as they called every second of the race—annoying, but it did add energy. It would have been veddy cool if a BBC personality was giving a breathless coronation play-by-play: “Here comes the scepter. Here comes the orb. Why are they giving this stuff to him and then taking it all away? And the poor Queen Consort, that crown is definitely squishing the royal hairdo!” As it was, even the hoi polloi in the pews were nodding off, snoring genteelly.

 

Granted, kings and queens are anointed only once every 10-70 years (give or take), and the Kentucky Derby happens annually. But I think they can still learn from one another, don’t you?

 

Here are my thoughts (you knew they were coming, right?)

 

The Coronation should be MUCH SHORTER, and the Derby MUCH LONGER. Think of it: a snappy 10 minute ceremony, one verse of “God Save the King,” a few well-chosen words from the Archbishop of Canterbury, here are the robes, here are the crowns, off to the jolly afterparties!

On the flip side, let’s make this Louisville thing a real race, shall we? Like the Indy 500, only equine! Jockeys tuning up at pitstops, the occasional horse going up in flames, etc.  

Finally, there’s NO reason the Coronation has to happen at 6 AM. I know it’s much later in the UK, but who cares? America First! 

 

Filling out my comment card now. Look for some significant changes in the future!

And here are the big moments:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lagging on a Jet Plane

On Alaska's Kenai Peninsula in 2006, time of day indeterminate

It takes me several months to adjust to the one-hour daylight savings time charge (which only leaves me a few months before it changes right back). I don’t do much better on switching years, as all who have received checks from me dated “day-month-PREVIOUS year” will attest. Once stuff changes, it needs to stay changed for at least three or four years, say I!

Time zone variations are really next level. After living in Hawaii 12 years, my poor sister C is still on the receiving end of calls and texts from me at 9 AM (Eastern) which is really 3 AM in Honolulu. Even the three-hour difference with the West Coast gives me pause--is Evan awake yet? Or is he down for the night? Or perhaps…sleepless in Seattle? (Sorry, couldn’t help it.)

 

But when you add long-distance air travel to time changes, watch out! Suddenly, everything I ever knew is thrown out the window! I’m returning to Philly from Italy, and ready for dreamland when everyone else is in their midday. Conversely, I’m deplaning from Alaska at what I think is mid-morning, and the folks at home are setting the table for dinner. It doesn’t help that there is no airline food menu any more that would at least clue me in to the mealtime where I’m going to land (when—if ever—is the right time to savor that tasteless bag of mini-pretzels?)

 

Along with my skin and knees, my brain is lagging behind under the best of circumstances. I am hoping to lose some of the extra weight my antidepressant meds have gifted me with over the past few years, but I fear my epidermis won’t keep up with any shrinkage (we used to call my sweet Nana’s excess flesh “underarm dingle dangle” and Lord I hope that doesn’t come back to bite me). Today Aiden AND Peter demonstrated their latest trick: jumping up instantly from a kneel to a squat (Aiden even did it wearing his heavy backpack)! My joints shrieked just watching them. And my cognation is similarly challenged, and bested, on the regular.

 

Centuries ago, there was no such thing as jet lag (no jets, for one thing). It took weeks to cross the ocean on a ship, months to cross America in a covered wagon. The body, mind and heart had ample opportunity to acclimate. In our urge to go ever faster, we’ve lost the joy of gradual. And now that space travel is destined to be an activity for the masses, it’ll just get worse. Imagine stepping off a shuttle and meeting grown grandchildren who weren’t born when you’d taken off!!

 

Maybe it’s only a matter of semantics. If we did a reframe, we could speak of this time travel we’re all doing as “hopping,” a much livelier and pleasanter term than “lagging.” I much prefer the image of merrily leap-frogging across time zones, rather than slogging along like a zombie. 

 

Let’s hop to it! Meet you for dinner—or—breakfast?

Photo Terence Burke on Unsplash

Saturn Returns

Photo by NASA

Well, it happened again. I heard a phrase for the first time ever, and since then I’ve been seeing/hearing it all over the place. Just like whenever I was pregnant--it seemed every other woman I saw on the street was also waddling along, big with child.  

At any rate, the new magic phrase is “Saturn Return.” The gang at Evan’s farm talked about it, and the next day I saw a book by that name at the market. I had no idea that it’s when the planet Saturn returns to the exact same place it was the day you were born. It takes between 27 and 30 years for Saturn to complete an orbit around the sun so that means we live through Saturn returns in our late 20s, and then again in our 50s, and 80s. According to astrology, Saturn is the planet of discipline and maturity, and the return is a time in life where hard but important lessons have been learned. I looked up my birth chart and learned that my sign (Capricorn) is in fact ruled by Saturn! On December 22, 1956 Saturn was in Sagittarius at 08° 12', and it’s been there two more times in my life (and will again if I make it to 82).

 

What to think about this? Well, to me it’s just another instance of humans trying to make sense, make patterns, of it all. To weave our lives into a bigger tapestry. As a person of faith, I really don’t feel the need to delve deeply into astrological signs and forecasts; I’m convinced my life has meaning enough. 

 

But it was sort of fun to go back in time and see how accurate my Saturn returns have been. Let’s see—27 was the year I was pregnant with my firstborn, Sheridan, after 7 years of marriage and 27 years of swearing I did NOT want kids.

Discipline/maturity/life lesson learned=check.

Moving on to 54. It would have been neat and tidy for this to have been my year of bipolar diagnosis, but no, that was 49. 54 was December 22, 2010. I was nearly halfway through my time at Christ’s Lutheran. Several of my children had graduated from college. Wracking my brain, I cannot pinpoint a major change in my life tied to this year—on the contrary, I recall it as a pretty uneventful and peaceful interlude. 

 

One for two so far. 

 

How will I fare when Saturn returns on December 22, 2038? If I’m still kicking, somehow I don’t think it will be a time of huge change and growth. But maybe I’m shortchanging this Major Milestone! Could ’38 be the year I finally scale Mount Everest (no mean feat with a walker)? Write a symphony (sorry for horning in on your turf, Sher!)? Run for president? (Joe Biden has proven it’s never too late!) With mighty Saturn in my corner, there are no limits, right?

 

Saturn, Octogenarian Style: Return of the Great-Grandmas!

 

Coming soon to Netflix? 

"Saturn Return" by R.E.M.