Happy Birthday Willie S.

As many of you know, today is the alleged birthday of William Shakespeare. I say alleged because record-keeping 400+ years ago wasn't what it is today.

I don't read much Shakespeare these days, but I hear him everywhere. References to his words have infiltrated the English language at such a high rate, I've instructed my kids to always guess Shakespeare or the Bible on any test that asks the origin of a literary reference.

Find your favorite "Bardism" here.

One wonders where we'd be without to be or not to be.

Stop the Roller Coaster - I Want to Get Off

On Tuesday we dug the champagne out of the back of the fridge where it had been hibernating since New Years. Mark had received his official acceptance to Columbia College, along with a generous financial aid offer.

On Wednesday I learned I'd been accepted into the Rhode Island Teaching Fellows Program, an accelerated route to a teaching career in a high-needs district. If all goes well, I'll be teaching special education in September at an urban high school. This is becoming a pattern. Seven years ago we moved to Rhode Island; six years prior to that we'd moved to Costa Rica. Seven year itch?

On Thursday, Marty was laid off from his job. Although this was not unexpected, it still came as a shock. We now join the ranks of the unemployed who struggle to pay mortgages and utility bills, and who can't find new jobs because there aren't any. Don't cry for me America, but if you want to deck a hedge fund manager, be my guest.

So we're putting our house up for sale and downsizing. We were planning to do this in a year or so, but now it's not a choice. Anyone got a shotgun shack for rent?

I'm sure this will all be even worse when we actually look at the figures, but for now we're trying to keep our sense of humor. When Marty delivered the unsettling news, I'd just finished ironing a bunch of his work shirts. Dang. I called Marty yesterday to see how his job search was going. He was having lunch out. Where, I asked, at a soup kitchen? A friend who'd been laid off earlier in the week had taken Marty to a nearby tavern for lunch (and beer). Misery loves company.

We have a few tricks up our sleeves, and we keep reminding ourselves it could be worse, even if we don't quite believe it. In the meantime, we'll be keeping our seat belts fastened, throwing our hands up in the air, and occasionally screaming.

Calling All Poets

In addition to being the cruelest month, April is National Poetry Month.

I am soliciting poems from anyone and everyone who would like their work to be on display at the West Warwick Public Library, which is where I work. I have a small book shelf that I'll be filling with poetry books for patrons to check out. Each day I'll slip a new poem into the lucite frame on top of the display. If you don't care to send an original poem, tell me what your favorite poem is and I'll display that. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock will definitely make an appearance. My colleague Sue has suggested Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken, a favorite of hers because Frost once stayed at her sister-in-law's Vermont inn.

Send me an email with your choice. Don't be shy.

Vanishing Acts and Other Tricks of Time

Time to brush the dust off this blog.

Speaking of time, where does it all go? All those fleeting seconds, brisk minutes and racing hours. Poof. Vanished. Sucked away quicker than paint on new wallboard.

There's a reason for the painting metaphor. I spent most of last Monday painting the ceiling in the family room/kitchen. I was disguising the telltale signs of a leak we had last summer from the bathroom above. Right in the middle of it, I was flattened by the virus that attacked Mark last week. Somehow, I carried on. You can't quit in the middle of something like this.

One sore-throat day led to another, and I was suddenly sitting face to face with the tax assessor, an unenviable position ranked right up there with root canal and colonoscopy. A recent revaluation of all properties in town claims my home's value is $100,000 more than what my realtor predicts a buyer would pay for it. I won't go into detail about the meeting, but I want to note that tax assessors are a depressing lot. The one I met with was borderline pathetic: cheesy dandruff-dusted blazer, stubbly chin, greasy hair, and a shaving nick that kept jumping into my line of sight. I felt sorry for the guy, and was kinder than I'd normally be in that situation. This is a profession I would avoid at all costs. No one agrees with you, ever. No one is happy to talk to you. Everyone argues that you are surely wrong (or worse).

In the end, the tax man gets the last laugh I guess. We'll see if my arguments were convincing enough to lower my assessment and thereby my real estate taxes, which by the way are pushing against the 10,000 mark, far out-performing the Dow.

Now I'm suffering from laryngitis. It started at a retirement party I attended Friday night, where I was uncharacteristically mute. I woke up Saturday morning with an important event on my agenda, at which speaking was a key requirement. Somehow, I croaked and whispered my way through it. There appears to be some truth to the adage "if you want people to listen, whisper. "

Let the next whirlwind week begin.

A Few Inflammatory Remarks

My life was in flames last week, making it impossible to blog. Smoke obscured the computer screen; the keys were beginning to melt. At one point, I doused my laptop with lighter fluid, finger poised on the "delete blog" button. I was in a destructive mood.

Switching metaphors, the economic vise grip squeezes ever tighter. Marty's salary is inexplicably tied to the stock market, plunging with each passing week. We in turn have tightened our belts to the point of strangulation. Maybe we shouldn't have them around our necks.

The Joyce Carol Oates novel I'm reading, My Sister, My Love, is acting as a flame retardant on my highly combustible outlook. A dose of Oates is purgative. She forces you to peer into the deepest darkest depths of despair, and suddenly you find yourself on the sunny side of the street.

Grab your coat and get your hat ...

Command Day

Happy Command Day! What, you don't celebrate this holiday? Never heard of it? Check your calendar. Today is March 4th. Or, March forth! Get it? Be sure to command someone you love today. That's a command.

Psychic Charge

I crawled out of my bunker this weekend and did a couple of things to recharge the old psychic batteries, which were seriously depleted.

Saturday began with a quick trip to my local police department where I underwent a background check to clear me for substitute teaching. I'm pleased to inform you I am not wanted by law enforcement, although the school department probably won't want me either.

Then I headed to Boston to visit a friend in the hospital. I won't go into a lot of detail about the experience except to say it was intense. I felt pretty helpless actually, which you might think would suck up any remaining psychic juice I had left in me. Counter-intuitively, the distress I felt worked in my favor and nudged me out of the doom and gloom region into some slightly hopeful territory. Maybe it was because no matter how challenged my ill friend is at the moment, she's fighting like hell. If she can do what she's doing, I can deal with whatever.

On Sunday, my youngest son and I volunteered at Habitat for Humanity. My family has put in a fair amount of hours at our local Habitat chapter. It's physically demanding work, but again, you take out more than you put in. This is true of most volunteer experiences I've had in my lifetime, and it makes me wonder why more people don't volunteer their time. Of course, I feel the same way about exercise. Oh well.

As Harry and I spent the day measuring, cutting and hanging sheetrock, a few things went through my mind. First, I noticed I felt strangely serene. Maybe it was because I enjoyed the challenge of trying to find just the right remnant of wall board to fit in the hallway we were working in, which was very much like a puzzle, or perhaps an arts and crafts project except we were using screws instead of paste, and sharp knives instead of scissors. Perhaps it was due to focusing on the mind-numbing task at hand rather than musing about my evaporating retirement savings or collapsing home value. And Harry was learning a valuable skill, one he might actually use someday. I think that if my family had to build our own shelter (hopefully it won't come to that), we could do a fair job of it, although we probably need to know more about cement. We've always encouraged our kids to get their hands dirty and learn how to fix, paint, nail and otherwise rebuild the world around them. Although you might not draw this conclusion if you looked in their bedrooms.

The six hours of manual labor passed quickly, even though we were cold and thirsty. We'd made a small dent in the work necessary to build a house for Augustina, who was there working with us. I'm hoping that next time we go, all the walls will be hung and ready for painting, because I (inexplicably) love to paint. The life of the mind isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Now that shopping therapy is no longer palatable or even possible for many of us, I recommend spending your time and energy in the many volunteer opportunities available in your community. I guarantee you will be the richer for it.

Mah Jongging While America Burns

To take my mind off my worries, a friend suggested I come to her house last night for a round or two of mah jongg. I went, expecting a relaxing evening of casual conversation and a light mental workout. What I got was much hand-wringing and knee-jerking on the part of some of the players. President Obama was talking in the other room (on TV) about his plans to stimulate the economy. This provoked outrage at our game table. Why should I pay for my neighbor's greed? Why should illegal immigrants be allowed to work in Rhode Island? The latter is a common mantra where I live. Illegal immigration is the cause of all our woes. At least so sayeth our governor, who's best buds with Lou Dobbs.

All the railing took me back to another mah jongg game I happened to be playing nearly six years ago. Strange. At big moments in American history, I seem to be playing games. It was six years ago in March that American troops marched into Baghdad and toppled Saddam Hussein's regime. A number of the people I was playing with reacted as though we were viewing a Super Bowl game. Yay America! I was appalled by the turn of events. I couldn't believe how easily Amercia could be misled. This was only the beginning of the misleading, of course.

Gadzillions of dollars and a decimated economy later, many Americans are now screaming about not wanting to pay for their neighbors' poor decisions, not wanting to saddle their grandchildren with crushing debt, not wanting to reward the go-shopping mentality that's left us gasping and horrified as we scrutinize our fat credit card bills. Where were the complainers when the government reached into our pockets and took wads of money for a war we went to on false pretenses? Where was the oversight when Wall Street built an empire out of nothing, sold it at a huge profit, and then walked away from the mess? How's your portfolio doing?

Maybe "big government" is not the solution. Or even small government. Maybe we should dismantle the whole thing and figure out how to be a nation without spending a nickle on it. Give everyone a gun and a pamphlet on self sufficiency. Homeschool your children; toss your trash in the river; definitely get a horse.

Friends, I'd rather pay for my neighbor's extra bathroom that they didn't need, and as much as it kills me, I'd rather prop up banks and industries than let the country sink into the slime. I'd rather pay to build a stronger America, not just militarily, but structurally and morally. I've already paid dearly for what I didn't need and didn't want. What's a few trillion dollars more? If anyone has any genius plans on how to accomplish this on tax cuts and a prayer, speak now.

Mah jongg anyone?

Latest Sacrilege

When I think about my grandfather, I see him sitting in his easy chair reading The New York Times. He always wore white cotton gloves when he handled the newspaper because he was allergic to the inky residue. If you asked him a question while he was reading, he'd peer over the tops of his glasses and shoot you a look that said this better be good; you're interrupting me. If you asked him what he was reading, he always said the Obituaries. He'd been an actuary with the Equitable Life Assurance Company, and reading the obits had been part of his job. Or so he said. I think he enjoyed the little story each life summation told.

My grandfather would no doubt be shocked to pick up the Times today, and not just because he wouldn't need to wear those little white gloves anymore. Newsprint ain't what it used to be. No, he'd be surprised by the content, I think. Newspapers try to be most things to most people these days, and the Times is no different. I still read the paper on line every day (or parts of it), but last week I did the unthinkable: I canceled delivery of the Sunday Times.

The customer service rep couldn't believe it either, offering to halve my subscription price for 6 months and suggesting that if I didn't have time to read the entire paper on Sunday, I had time during the week. That's when I got a little testy and told her she had no idea how much time I had to read during the week. As I was writing this post, I received a telephone call from the Times confirming my cancellation and reiterating the special offer. Thanks, but no thanks.

It's the end of an era. If I move back to the New York metro area, I'm sure I'll subscribe to the hometown rag. For now, I'm sticking to the electronic version. That'll be the only version there is one of these days.

My Swiss Bank Account

A Swiss bank is about to do the unthinkable: release the names of American's who've stashed money there to avoid paying taxes. Is nothing sacred? The tax man can't wait to get his paws on that pile of back taxes, estimated at $300 million a year, plus penalties and interest. This is only one bank. Imagine the tax money that could be collected from offshore banking accounts worldwide. What's a wealthy person to do?

I can afford to be smug. Not only do I not have any money squirreled away in foreign accounts, I haven't any in on-shore accounts either. Sure, I have my rapidly dwindling home equity line, and several IRA/529 accounts from which I was planning to fund my kids' education and my retirement, but these have mostly been eviscerated in the market crash. My daughter earned a whopping $1400 in 2008, but because she cashed in $3200 worth of shares from a Fidelity account we created to help pay for her education, she owes $3 in capital gains taxes.

I'll be fine. Really. But where will these poor billionaires shelter their cash now that the offshore banking world is coming unhinged? Egads, they might even have to start paying employment taxes on their staffs, too. This is a sad day for rich folks.

My own Swiss bank account has nothing in it but chocolate and cheese. I'm pretty sure I paid import taxes on them, folded into the price. What a dope I was, playing by the rules, actually paying my share of taxes to my country all these years like a good citizen. I'm so thankful capital gains taxes were lowered years ago. Gosh, my daughter might have owed $6 on her windfall profits. What a fool I was not to shelter that money off shore.

Maybe the meek (read: poor law-abiding saps) shall inherit the earth after all. At least we won't be outed, and although we haven't kept our cash, we've kept our good names.

I need some chocolate.

Running Thoughts

My normal running speed is slow. Very slow. There are two reasons for this: I'm slow; and while I'm running, I'm thinking about the day ahead, and many times, the days behind. The present counts for little when I run, which is why I'm not much of a runner.

The truth is, I don't much enjoy running. I do it for my health, physical and mental. Running is work, and it hurts. It's also very dull, which is why I fill it with all those thoughts. Some days at the end of a run, my only proof that I've exerted myself is that I'm sweating. I get so lost in a mental maze, I'm not conscious that my knee hurts or my face is frozen or my heart is pounding. Usually it's not pounding because I'm running in slo-mo. Only thinking about running makes you push for a faster speed. It does not guarantee it, of course.

My running thoughts have helped me work through problems. They've helped me focus my ideas and energies in ways that sedentary thinking does not. I have conversations with people dead and alive and occasionally out loud. Running has helped me claw my way back from serious illness and been a tremendous boost to my self -esteem. It's therapeutic in so many ways I often wonder why more people don't do it.

I'm not here to promote running or thinking on the run. It's not for everyone. But it's a way of multi-tasking that works for me.

Rhode Island Takes New York

We took our first 24 hours in New York at a slow pace. We arrived in Brooklyn shortly after noon and thought about lunch. Three of us wanted pizza but Mark wanted race fuel. No problem. There's a bagel store and a pizzeria within two blocks of our friends' house.

While Mark rested, Marty made phone calls to area colleagues and Harry and I read. Then it was off to the subway and on to Manhattan. Most subway rides can put you to sleep, but not this one. We had entertainment in our car, in the form of a raving pole dancer. This was one of the more creative uses of a subway pole I've seen. Normally, riders are hanging onto the pole for dear life as the subway hurtles through dark tunnels, grinds to a halt and then lurches forth once more. The pole dancer had plenty of room to do his thing though, complete with inappropriate commentary.

We delivered Mark to Madison Square Garden and went off in search of our daughter who was arriving by train from Phillie. The Gyro place we used to eat at all the time when we lived in New York was still serving up heaping Greek delights so we went in for some dinner before the races. I'm happy to report that the gyros are still an absolutely delicious mess--just like we remembered them. We've been eating imposter gyros for years. It was nice to be home.

The Garden is directly across the street from the building where I worked during my first years in New York, so I know this area well. It hasn't changed much at all. At 6pm on a Friday, thousands of people are scurrying from work, and since Penn Station sits right below Madison Square Garden, it's swirling with bodies streaming every which way. Your Alive Meter can't help but surge upwards.

We went inside, found our seats and watched the track and field events as they unfolded before us. One highlight was pole vaulting. Nothing thrills a crowd like this event, and the evening's vaulters didn't disappoint. An Aussie managed a personal best just under 20 feet. Wow.

The moment we were waiting for arrived. There's my lanky son, briefly in the spotlight, waiting to enter the track. There he is warming up with his competitors. On the starting line. Getting out in front. Leading for five laps. The pace seems very slow, although in truth, time has little meaning at this point. Around and around the banked track they run, Mark losing the lead, dropping back to fourth, fifth, then speeding up and passing runners. Around the final turn, Mark kicking and finishing third. I know he wanted to win but that he is happy with third place. I am so happy for him.

The rest of the evening passes in a blur. There's much running and hurdling, jumping and throwing, but the meet's over for me. I enjoy visiting with the friends who've joined us. I watch as Mark joins a group of Columbia track athletes and sits with them in the stands. They will be his teammates next year. Maybe Mark will run the college 4x800 relay at Millrose 2010 wearing Columbia blue. He's already there.

Good things, as my mother-in-law says, good things.

Not So Easy Come, Easy Go

My grandparents were newlyweds when the Great Depression hit. As luck would have it, they owned an employment agency. Needless to say, they didn't stay in business very long when the bottom fell out of the economy.

The current financial downturn has unfolded at an excruciatingly slow pace for my family, akin to having a limb sawed off with a butter knife. We watched college and retirement savings melt more rapidly than the Arctic ice shelf. We worried as oil prices rose to outrageous heights, only to recede and grant us an uneasy reprieve.

We fretted about job loss, especially since Rhode Island has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. Yesterday my husband was told he has to take a 20% pay cut effective immediately. If that's the worst of it, we'll manage, but it's quite possible his company will close its doors in the months ahead.

Let's see. We'll have two kids in college at the same time for the next 5 years. Our annual health insurance premiums will be higher than what I earn at my current part time job. In a healthier economy, we'd be able to find other jobs, but not here, not now.

The days of easy borrowing and obese bonuses are over. Too bad we didn't experience their fleeting pleasures. On the bright side, we still have health insurance and we're healthy. I'll keep that in mind as I take a hatchet to our budget.

See Mark Run

If you tune in to ESPN2 on Friday, January 30th at 7:00 pm or to NBC on Saturday, January 31st at 1:30 pm you'll see my son Mark run the boys' high school mile at the 102nd Millrose Games at Madison Square Garden in New York.

Mark qualified for the event at last week's Yale Invitational where he clocked a personal best of 4:14.68. See Mark run. That's him coming in 2nd to Westerly, RI's Andrew Springer. Mark's teammate Nick Ross placed 3rd and has also been invited to run the Millrose Mile. That means that East Greenwich High School, one of the smallest high schools in the smallest state, will have two entrants (out of nine) going for the gold.

Back in the glory days (1978 or '79), Marty and I went to a Springsteen concert at the Garden. We all thought the Boss was singing about our lives in Born to Run. Now the song takes on new meaning. Was it a prophecy?

Run Mark run.

Dramatic Ironing

It's not every day I iron shirts while watching the President-Elect of the United States make moving remarks from the National Mall. There were more than a few wet faces in the crowd as the smiling Obama spoke about the hope he has for the Nation. There's no use trying to blame the steam coming off the iron--I got misty myself.

I tried to explain to my 16-year-old why the moment was so poignant, mumbling something about the Civil Rights Era, memories of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., the difference a few decades can make.

I doubt he gets it, and that's a great thing.

Crazy Snowy Running

Yesterday, an early morning meeting kept me from running when I normally do which is around 7-7:30. Sure, I could have run in the afternoon, and I would have, but the mercury clawed at 20° and the wind carved the sun into tiny bits. No thanks.

Coulda woulda shoulda. This morning it was 11° and snow was falling. Disgusted by yesterday's wimpiness, I went for a run despite the weather. It was a tad slippery but conditions were otherwise fine. I rewarded myself with blueberry buckwheat pancakes for breakfast.

My boys were complaining this morning that school hadn't been cancelled, even though other schools are closed. They think I'm a mean momma for ridiculing the school districts that cancelled classes for the day. Let me point out we're expecting 3 to 5 inches of fluff, and it should warm up to 16°. When I was a kid ...

We've been threatened with 0° in the early morning hours of tomorrow. My husband and I will be driving to New York City to see our daughter run the 500 meter race for her college team at the Armory. We plan to visit friends overnight in Larchmont, and then drive to New Haven, CT on Saturday to watch our eldest son run the mile at the Yale Invitational. This is a big race for him, as he's trying to earn an invitation to the presitigious Millrose Mile at Madison Square Garden the end of the month. The field is stacked, so it should be a great race.

One more bit of parental bragging: he'll be attending Columbia University in the fall.

I Feel The Earth Move

My first earthquake occurred while I was on the checkout line at a supermarket in San José, Costa Rica. I didn't understand what was happening at first. Why were the shelves undulating and pitching forth their contents? Why had the cashier fled the store? When I realized it was an earthquake, I thought, I'm going to check out of my life waiting to pay for milk. How mundane.

It ended well. I paid for my groceries and walked out to the parking lot. When I started my car, Carol King was blaring from the radio "I feel the earth move under my feet, I feel the sky tumbling down." Welcome to the violent world of plate tectonics.

Earthshaking became a way of life. It would randomly occur while I was driving, sleeping, stirring soup. Drinking hot coffee during a temblor was especially tricky. Once, the entire country was jolted from bed at 4:00 am. A 6.2 quake had struck, and there was a whole lot of shaking going on.

On Thursday, a powerful earthquake hit the Central Valley of Costa Rica, leaving death and destruction in its wake. I saw a report on CNN, and tried to find more information on the Internet. Most of the reports were sketchy, so I went to the site of the country's major newspaper, La Nación , where I was able to find more details. I have friends who live in a little town that was especially hard hit. I called Karen's cell phone, connected briefly but the call ended after several seconds. I thought I heard her voice. I called back and was put straight into voicemail, where I left a message. Karen called back an hour later. She was in Boston, but she'd spoken to her husband in Costa Rica and he was okay.

When I moved from Costa Rica, it took some time before I stopped flinching every time the boiler fired up, or a heavy truck rumbled by. The slightest shaking still sends me into alert mode. I check for exits and am ready to flee if necessary. Earthquakes are rare here in Rhode Island. Maybe we're due for one.

Writing Notes

I went to a friend's house yesterday for a knitting intervention. We got to talking about reviving our dormant writing group. My friend's been working on a historical novel for many years, and I've been puttering around in a number of projects myself. Here's what I have on the shelf, in order of viability.

There's all the stories I wrote about our life in Costa Rica, some of which have been published in various magazines. Poems and letters, too. It needs shaping of course, and some kind of unifying device. The problem is, it would fall into the memoir genre, and do I seriously want to bring another one of those into the world? I know I don't want to read another one. Last night, as I was wrestling with the sleeping gods, I thought about putting one of the essays on this blog to see if I could stomach revisiting them. We'll see.

I might be qualified to write Leukemia for Dummies or Field Guide to Bone Marrow Transplants but the question is, again, would I want to? I might not be able to bring the proper gravitas to the subject. The potential to offend would be great, which I suppose is better than being on Oprah. No offense to the world's most famous woman, but I don't see myself baring my soul on national television. I'd feel compelled to joke about a seriously painful subject.

There's a story to be told about my son's cross country team, which won the Rhode Island State Championship in 2007. I've already given it some thought (and a title: The Little Team That Could, a small high school's cross country team's season of glory), and have discussed the idea with a young man who knows most of the history leading up to the culminating moments. Having a collaborator would definitely help. Maybe it's time to move this from the back burner.

Finally, there's my so-called novel. Doesn't every writer want to believe they have one in them? I have a working title, pages of notes and outlines, character sketches, and even some crude attempts at stitching together sentences and paragraphs. A little research is needed (but not too much), and a dollop of discipline. It's discipline I lack. It's one thing to post on a blog several times a week; quite another to nail oneself to the chair and write every day even when it's boring, painful or inconvenient to do so. That's what makes a "real" writer. I'm just taking notes.