stupidity

Just when I think there is no possible way her head could be lodged that far up her ass, it somehow nestles itself further still. 

I happened upon this today:

You come across (online comments) about yourself and about your friends, and it’s a very dehumanizing thing. It’s almost like how, in war, you go through this bloody, dehumanizing thing, and then something is defined out of it. My hope is, as we get out of it, we’ll reach the next level of conscience. - Gwyneth Paltrow

20 minutes on Twitter : a six-month tour in Afghanistan...

Totally Tomayto : Tomahto, Gwyn.

You’re out of touch and I’m out of time.

But one more thing!

Serendipity

Serendipity: "fortuitous happenstance" or "pleasant surprise"

I love the word “serendipity”. I love to say the word “serendipitous”. It is my absolute favorite $5 word.

I think it always will be.

As far as I’m concerned, witnessing or rather feeling a moment of serendipity is about as close as we come to real magic here on earth. “Magic”, in turn, is another word I love. But let’s face it, it’s been cheapened by the pink, fairy-princess business and all those Disney Mongers…you know who you are…

But I digress…

On to a moment of serendipity…

It all started back in November, November 30^th to be exact, at my sons’ elementary school’s holiday boutique.

I was standing over the display table of a local, trendy, jewelry-artist-come-school-boutique-vendor in our school’s Multi-Purpose Room (MPR). In keeping with the spirit of giving, I was about to order a custom, stamped plate necklace for myself. I was trying to decide what word or phrase I should have stamped on the rectangular, gold plate. Hot Mom was standing next to me.

“Look at this,” I held up a sample piece that the artist had on display. “How about this one?”

“#SorryNotSorry,” Hot Mom read the stamped plate hanging from the necklace and giggled a little. “That’s cute.”

“I think it’s funny,” I smiled broadly.

SorryNotSorry…a kinder gentler version of “F-You”. I am sold!

I made up my mind and the local, trendy, jewelry-artist-come-school-boutique-vendor was writing up my order in no time. She handed me my pink invoice.

“Alright,” I turned to Hot Mom. “What do you need?”

“I’m done. I was looking at this bench but Handstand Mom talked me out of it. She said she could find a better one at a flea market or a consignment shop and paint it for a lot cheaper.”

“Of course, she can.”

Freakin’ Handstand Mom can make anything look good…for nothing.

“What else do you need?” Hot Mom asked.

“Well, I wanted to get those lunch boxes for Vince and Nick,” I had a short, check list of items to get through in the MPR.

“The PACK-iTS!?! They are right over here,” Hot Mom walked me over to the vendor stand.  “I love them… I have this one for baseball games and this one for wine and these ones for the boys’ lunches…” Hot Mom was pointing at or picking up almost every sample on display. 

Jesus Christ. Is she getting a cut of these things?

“You know, I’m surprised you didn’t get ‘Self Care’ on that necklace since it’s all you can talk about.” Hot Mom changed the subject back to my previous purchase.

My eyes widened. I made a small yet audible and completely overly dramatic gasp.

“You’re right! How did I not think of that? I have to change my order!”

And so my order was changed to Self Care to capture my current life slogan. The words and concept that my Dearest of Dear Friends (DODF) had introduced to me several months before, at a time when I was feeling a little lost and awfully low:

“Focus on Lizzie,” she told me. “Take care of YOU. Do what is important to YOU. Say ‘NO’ sometimes. Put your needs first sometimes. Don’t put so much pressure on yourself. Figure out what it is you can do to make you happy. That’s all you can control in life, really. Do some ‘Self Care’.”

And I did. You can figure a lot of shit out just by doing Self Care.

Fast-forward to December 29. The season of giving has come and gone and I realize I have received no custom, stamped, Self Care necklace in the mail. It was not meant to be a gift for someone else so I’m not terribly concerned… but I want my freakin’ necklace.

SELF CARE!

I first contacted the local, trendy, jewelry-artist-come-school-boutique-vendor via her blog, which made me want to buy even more unnecessary objects to adorn myself with but I resisted…though I did make several mental notes!

A few days later, I sent her a text:

Hi XXX! Hope you had a good holiday. Checking in on the status of my stamped ‘Self Care’ necklace that I ordered at the school boutique. Thanks. Liz Pieri

To which she replied:

It’s shipping this week. I had to remake all of your (school’s) orders the ups store I was shipping from was stealing my packages.

I chose to overlook the run-on sentence and feel sorry for XXX.

I responded:

What a nightmare! I hope you are compensated and not too discouraged. Looking forward to receiving. Happy New Year!

Fast-forward to January 10.

My DODF was bracing for impact. Something she and her husband had been wanting and working for, for years and years, seemed to be slipping further from their reach.

I went to my mailbox and there, among the bills and countless solicitations, was my necklace. Back inside the house, I dropped the stack of mail on the kitchen counter. I excitedly ripped open the package and stared at the necklace for a while.

This isn’t your necklace. It never was.

DODF sent me this text, upon receipt of her necklace in the mail:

U just have no idea how lucky I feel to have u. Thk u.

And to DODF, I say, BACK ATCHA!

Alas, I do so love serendipity. 

And that Self Care shit works!!!

And if you are a big, fat nerd like me, curious about the origin of the word serendipity, get your Wiki on here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serendipity

DODF and me, circa '03. We date back to '89. 

Reckless Driving

You are going over 85. You are going to get a ticket.  Then you’ll be REALLY late. You need to slow down. There could be a cop anywhere.

I was approaching an overpass.

They always tuck themselves away under these stupid things..like I don’t know their game by now.

I looked to my right, carefully examining the area beneath and around the overpass.

All clear.

It’s 8:31. You could make it by 9. If you are going to be a few minutes late, you can just call the office. They were very nice about it last time.

I lifted my right foot just slightly off the gas pedal to slow my car to 80, my standard, open-ish highway cruising speed.  I suddenly flashed back to the worst in the series of speeding tickets and assorted moving violations I earned in my early twenties.

***

“Miss, do you have any idea how fast you were going?”  The California Highway Patrol officer addressed me from my grandmother’s Oldsmobile’s passenger side door. 

To say that my grandma and I rolled deep in her beige, 1982, Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera featuring beige, vinyl interior; cassette tape deck; and white wall tires was a gross understatement.  Especially when you consider that we rolled together in the early 90’s, about a decade after the car rolled off General Motor’s assembly line.

My grandma was in her early 80’s then, and had lost her driver’s license, among other things, to dementia. 

“It couldn’t have been that fast,” I was quick to respond to the officer.

In hindsight, I’m sure these words sounded more like: “I have absolutely zero idea.”  I know that’s what my 20 year-old self was thinking.  My 20 year-old self that was now late for my Literary Theory class which I currently hated just slightly less than the California Highway Patrol.

“License and registration, please.”

I reached for my purse and pulled out my wallet.  I carefully pulled out MY driver’s license as opposed to Anne Darcangelo’s: my best friend’s older sister’s best friend who was 22 at the time. While she was a brunette and several inches shorter than me, Anne’s ID somehow did the trick…until that bar in Newport Beach…but that’s a story for a different time… that involved a different law enforcement officer. 

“I’m on my way to class.  I just dropped off my grandma,” I told the cop as I handed over the goods. He took them back to his motorcycle, parked behind me on the side of the freeway.

It probably sounded like a load of shit to the cop but it wasn’t. That was my Thursday routine then: drive out to my grandma’s in Pasadena, take her down to have her hair washed and set, then take her to the grocery store to do her weekly shopping. It was my grandma’s one outing during the week. On Sundays, my dad would come take her to church and out to lunch, and maybe to run a quick errand.

Some days, I couldn’t wait to drop her off. I was too busy. I wanted to get back to school. I had things to do. In reality, some days I just couldn’t bear walking behind her down the aisles of the grocery store. She’d stop, over and over again; look down at the list in her hand; look further down at the contents of her cart; then look at the grocery shelf before her. She was not quite sure how to put all the pieces together. I knew this was supposed to be “her time” but I didn’t always have the patience.

I regret to say that there were days when I would go to the grocery store without my grandma. I would drop her off at the salon, and go take care of her shopping before I returned to the salon to pick her up.

I would hold the door open for her as she slowly stepped into the car. Then, I’d close the door behind her and be in the driver’s seat, buckled up with the car started before she was done fastening her seat belt. She’d reach into her purse, perched on her lap.

“Ok, I have my list for the market in here somewhere,” she would start to dig around as I pulled away from the curb.

“No, Grandma.  Not today.  I already went to the market for you.”

“You did?”  She would turn to me with a look of confusion and disappointment.

“Yes, Grandma,” I would keep my eyes fixed on the road in front of me.

Then, finally: “Alright. You have things to do.” she’d say. “Thank you.” 

She would lower her head a little and hang on to her purse a little tighter.

“Your hair looks nice. It will look nice for church.” That was my attempt at softening the blow of cutting her afternoon short.

“Thank you.” Now her eyes were fixed on the road in front of her.

How I sometimes rushed through that period with her. I eventually moved in with her but we had to put her in her first nursing home that same year. The year her dementia became so bad that one afternoon, she walked out her front door of 25 years, down her drive-way into her cul-de-sac and couldn’t remember which home was her own. I was at class. One of the neighbors called my father.

The officer reappeared at my passenger side window.

“Miss, you were going 92.”

“No, way.” My 20 year-old self didn’t miss a beat.  My grandma’s Oldsmobile may have been in mint condition but in my mind, there was absolutely no way I opened that engine up to 92 miles per hour. 

“Miss, I have it on my radar. Do you want to see it?”

I threw up in my 20 year-old mouth.

“No,” I managed.  “That’s ok, officer.” I knew then I had screwed myself. The only question was how royally.

“Miss, anything over 20 miles per hour over the speed limit is considered Reckless Driving. Do you know what that means?”

“Um.” I stopped breathing.

“It’s extremely unsafe and there can be severe penalties.” He answered his question for me.

He paused and watched my face contort in response to my upper intestines swallowing up my lower intestines or whatever it was that was now happening to my digestive tract upon receipt of this final blow. 


How will I ever explain this away to my parents?

“I’ve written you up at 82,” he continued, as he handed me my ticket along with my license. “You need to slow down. It doesn’t matter where you think you’re going, you aren’t going to make it alive driving that fast.”

“Yes, officer.  Thank you, officer.  I’m sorry, officer. Thank you, officer.”

I sat there motionless in the driver’s seat for several seconds, staring at the “82” on the ticket. 

***

My 41 year-old self looked at the clock.

8:47.

I picked up my iPhone, scrolled through the previous day’s “recent calls”, and soon pressed the screen.

“Good morning. Dr. Hung’s office. This is Lisa.”

“Hi, Lisa. This is Liz Pieri. How are you?”

“I’m good, Liz. How are you?”

“I’m late. I’m sorry. I didn’t give myself enough time.”

“That’s ok. How late do you think you’ll be?”

I quickly made a generous estimate.

“No more than 10 minutes late.”

“I’ll go ahead and check you in. We’ll be here when you get here. Drive safely.”

“Thank you.”

My 41 year-old self placed my iPhone in the cup holder and inhaled and exhaled deeply, settling into the driver's seat.

They’ll be there when I get there.

And I will get there.

Found an image of grandma's ride in baby blue.
I should have asked to see that radar gun. 92 miles per hour? No freakin' way!

While less pretty, I found my "CHiPs" almost as intimidating as these two.
Am I looking at a 28" waistline?

“I don’t know if Paul and Ringo are still friends!”

“Mommy, why did John’s hair get weird and his nose get bigger?”

“I think maybe he just grew his hair long and it made his nose look bigger,” I called back from my post over the kitchen sink.

“It looks like he got bad skin. Why did he get bad skin?” Nick continued from the couch as he flipped through the Beatles coffee table book he checked out from the library days before.

“I don’t know. It’s probably from drugs and not taking care of himself,” I grabbed my rubber gloves from under the sink and prepared for the scrubbing of the skillet.

Then, from Vince: “That’s why George and John died first; they didn’t take care of themselves.”  While not the mega-fan Nick is, Vince had to lay down his own Beatles knowledge.

“Well, actually no,” I paused briefly to wonder to myself why I had chosen to re-insert myself into this relentless questioning. I mean delightful, post-dinner conversation with the true lights of my life: my young sons.

“John got shot and George got cancer,” I continued.

“Yeah, Vince.” Nick was quite pleased that his brother had been corrected. "I knew that."

Yes, I believe that discussion took place on Christmas. This, now months-long Beatles obsession of Nick's seems to somehow be gaining momentum.   

I rinsed the skillet and leaned it against the drying rack and turned to the other side of the sink to assess the remaining damages, then:

“Mommy, who’s older Paul or Ringo?”

“I don’t know, Nick. Ringo looks older but Paul looks like he’s had work done.”

“What do you mean ‘work done’?”

What are you doing? One word answers. Make up shit.  Lie.  It’s the freakin’ Beatles and they’re 8. It will pass.  It doesn’t matter.

I sighed an audible sigh of annoyance, “I… just… it’s… to make him look younger.  You can have surgery and do stuff to make your face look younger.”

“Well, it worked,” Nick responded, enthusiastically, somehow oblivious to my mounting frustration. “He almost looks exactly the same. Mommy, come look at this.”

“Honey. I am doing the dishes.” I hadn’t yet raised my voice but my tone was one of complete annoyance.

“Vince, look at this.” Nick didn’t break stride, motioning for his brother to join him on the couch, then:

“Mommy, are Paul and Ringo still friends?”

You have got to be kidding me!

“I don’t know.  I don’t know, honey.  I don’t know!  I don’t know every single thing about the Beatles.  Google it on your iPad!”

“I’m on technology restriction.”

Paul Then



< INSERT FIFTY YEARS FEATURING ROCK 'N' ROLL LIVING HERE > 

Paul Now

Dear Paul McCartney’s Plastic Surgeon,

Well done.

Yours truly,

Nick and Vince Pieri

Twisted

“Hi, I’m Liz Pieri.” I stood up from the cramped booth bench and extended my hand over the cash box, raffle tickets, pizza discount cards, and three glasses of red wine on the table. 

I was unsure which one of those glasses was mine for most of the night.

“Oh, hi, nice to meet you.  How are you?”  He extended his hand and a warm smile in return. 

I had seen this “dad form school” driving in the neighborhood in a box shaped car a few times and one of his sons was in one of my son's class last year. His other son was in middle school now. That was the beginning, middle and end of what I knew about him. But he had chosen to don a Cosby-inspired sweater to ward off the fall chill that evening. A seemingly simple move but in my mind, a bold move that won my respect right then and there. 

“I’m good.” I smiled back at him as I stepped into the narrow aisle between the tables. “Crazy with all of this.”  

I looked around the loud, hot, completely chaotic pizza parlor full of families from our school. Kids who were all but coming out of their skin with excitement, certain that it would be their raffle ticket drawn from the bucket for the grand prize. Parents who were already on the verge of breaking the “just one glass” promises they had made to themselves as they pulled into the parking lot just moments before.

“Oh, you’re not crazy,” he assured me. “I know you. You’re always together.” 

What a gracious response. Just like “The Cos”. Even if he is lying.

“Now, we’re crazy,” he continued. “Our house is crazy.”

“Oh, you guys are great.” I told him and I meant it. As far as I could tell, between the box car and the sweater, they were aces.

“We spent last night in the hospital with my son.”

 

What? Oh shit. He's not kidding. What if it’s serious? I don't want to ask. Would he casually mention something serious about his kid’s health to a stranger at a school pizza party? Ugh. I don't want to go down this road. You have to do it. You have to ask. You are the Fun Run Fundraiser Co-Chair for the PFA and this is the Pre-Run, Carb-Up Pizza Party. In this moment, this isn’t just a “dad from school”. This is a member of your flock: a member of your flock who is in need.

SHIT!

“Is everything ok?” I finally asked.

 

“It was the scariest thing,” he started.

Oh, shit. Here we go. 

“My son woke up in the middle of the night and said his stomach hurt.  He didn’t throw up. He didn’t have a fever. My wife and I weren’t sure what to do …”

Must be appendicitis.

The Cos continued, “He went back to bed for a couple hours, then came back into our room and said the pain was worse. We have never seen him in this kind of pain so we took him to the hospital and thank God we did…”

Because his appendix was about to burst? Or maybe it was some kind of stone? Do kids even get Kidney Stones?

“It was the craziest thing. It was his TESTICLE! Do you know what TESTICULAR TORSION is?”

How in the hell did I go from “nice to meet you” to inside some poor, pubescent kid’s boxers this fast?

Wide eyed, I shook my head no.

“His TESTICLE had twisted on the inside and cut off the blood supply to his TESTICLE. The doctor said he could have lost his TESTICLE if we hadn’t taken him to the hospital when we did.” 

“Oh my gosh. So is he still in the hospital?” At this point, I was more alarmed than he was.

“No, he’s home now but he can’t go to school for a week.” His tone was very matter-of-fact.

“That’s good.  I guess.”  

I imagined the indignity of his son’s eventual return to middle school. The kid next to him in homeroom would turn to him on his first day back:

“Hey, man. Where were you? You go on vacation or something?”  

            “Nah, it was my nuts, man. They turned on me. Literally.”

I had no idea where to go from there but I knew one thing for sure: I served as mother to not one but two sets of balls. It was my duty to protect them. I would get to the bottom of this TESTICULAR TORSION business. 

“Soooo, was your son particularly active the day his testicle twisted? Did some movement cause it to twist?” They seemed like fair questions.

“No. That’s the thing. Just sleeping. It happened in his sleep.”

“So, he didn’t turn a certain way?”

“It has nothing to do with physical activity like that. It’s actually quite common.”

“So no warning, no symptoms?”

“Nope. Like I said, happened in his sleep.”

“Wow.”

We stood there in awkward silence for a few moments. I thought about the people I knew that had one ball. Pretty much Lance Armstrong and one of my friend’s husbands. 

“So, can I get one of those pizza cards?”  The Cos was the first to break the silence.

“Oh, yeah. Sure," I smiled, returning to character. "They're 20 dollars and 10 dollars goes straight to the school. And there's a Free Pizza in there that you can use tonight!”  

I grabbed a discount pizza card from the pile in my booth.  We made our exchange.

“Thanks for coming!" I gave him a small pat on the shoulder. "Hope your son’s… well, I hope everything is ok with your son.”

“Thank you!  Have a good night”

"The Cos" or "The Dude"?

Who wore it best?

Parent-Teacher Conference

“Before we get started, I have to tell you what Nick shared with the class today.” 

My Nick’s third grade teacher had a wry smile on her face as my husband and I took our seats at her classroom meeting table yesterday. 

I turned to my husband, wide eyed, smiling a nervous smile. 

“Uh-oh.”

It was our first parent-teacher conference of the year and it was Monday.  The Monday after Cousin Gina’s big wedding in Manhattan Beach.  The wedding that brought four generations of Pieris from across the country together to celebrate with food and drink and dance… and a little more drink and dance.  

And some delicious baklava. 

What did Nick tell them?

My mind reeled.

I bet it was about that New York fan in the sports bar Sunday.  He kept screaming various forms of the word *FUCK* at the TV.  Truly cringe-worthy but Vince and Nick were thrilled. Nick must have told his class about that.  But we couldn’t NOT let the boys go sit and watch football with their family. It was an opportunity to spend more time with Great Grandma and their Great Uncle Tim before they went back to Indiana. 

I looked over at Nick’s teacher and she smiled at us as she gathered papers from her desk.

Maybe it wasn’t a bad thing that Nick shared.  Maybe he told his class about the wedding ceremony.  Maybe he told them about standing down on the beach with the rest of the guests, looking up at all the bikers on the bike path who had stopped to watch the wedding procession?  Maybe Nick told the class how they all clapped and cheered when his beautiful Cousin Gina first appeared at the top of the steps with her father, Nick’s Great Uncle Chris?  Maybe Nick told them how Gina was perfectly clad in a flowing, strapless, off-white gown; sparkling belt tied at the waist; jeweled, statement necklace; and small tulle veil in her hair, simply set to compliment her low set chignon?

Nick’s teacher raised her eyebrows as she walked over to join us at the meeting table. 

“I don’t know, Liz.  Sounds like you guys had a pretty wild weekend.  He said his cousin got married?”

Ok, he definitely didn’t mention the chignon.

“Yes, Jeff’s cousin,” I quickly distanced myself by marriage and braced myself while I searched for neutral ground.  “It was a big wedding.  Lots of family came in so we stayed down in Manhattan Beach where it was held.”

His teacher smiled.

“Yeah, Nick said something about his cousin trading her earrings for four bottles of wine?”

Oh, Jesus.

“Oh, thaaaat.”

Oh, shit.

“Yes, well that was a funny story.”  I sort of trailed off. 

Nick didn’t even witness this “last call” exchange between his Cousin Angela and one of the bartenders at the reception.  I didn't even witness it, though I wish I had.  What the hell is he doing sharing it with his entire class?  We only heard tale of it when we visited with Angela at the beach house where she was recovering the next day.  Nick was wrestling with his brother on the couch while she was talking!  What the hell was he doing LISTENING?

Nick’s teacher continued to look at me with a bright smile and wide, curious eyes.   Jeff was seated between us so I shifted my gaze from her to Jeff, hoping he would give me something.  Anything.  He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. 

Nothing.

I had no choice but to continue. 

“So, yes, the sister of the bride: the maid of honor who is also Nick’s cousin Angela wore these beautiful earrings that one of the bartenders who doubled as a stylist or something really liked and kept complimenting Angela on.  And I guess at the end of the night, after the reception, there was an after party scheduled…”

I kept looking at Jeff as I spoke, smiling, trying to make a story about drinking to complete and utter excess sound as G-rated as possible for my son’s third grade teacher.

“…so yes, I guess Angela figured she had something the bartender valued, and the bartender had something Angela valued…”

There was a life-lesson in there somewhere and I'd be damned if I didn't try to extract it.

When the agony finally ended and I finished, Nick’s teacher was somehow still smiling.  

“Nick really thought it was funny,” was her comment.

 

“So what did the other kids think?”  I couldn’t help but imagine a classroom of eight-year olds staring blankly at my son as they tried to digest his strange tale. 

“Oh, they thought it was funny.  They wanted to know what the earrings looked like.”

I then began to imagine each of Nick’s classmates re-telling the story to their parents that night at the dinner table.  Then, all at once, all I wanted in life was to die, right there, in Nick’s classroom. 

But dying would have to wait.  Instead, Nick’s teacher began to take us through his progress report. 

***

Cousin Angela and the infamous earrings.

Great Uncle Tim.  Also a Great Dancer.
Great Uncle Dave and Great Aunt Debbie in the background.

Cousins Gina and Nick!

Because It Just Does

You know what saying I have outgrown?

 

“Everything happens for a reason.”

Really?  Then, what’s the reason? 

Seriously, I need to know. 

Because to me, reason implies logic and logic implies dots somehow connecting and right now, I am seeing a bunch of black dots just floating around, willy-nilly.

How about this saying, instead?

“Everything happens because it just does.”

Some days, from out of nowhere, we’re handed a bouquet of flowers.

And some days, from out of nowhere, we’re handed a bag of shit. 

We have no choice in the matter. 

And it’s okay, if when we are handed our very own, personal bag of shit, to just drop it on the floor.  To maybe kick it around the room until we are exhausted.  To even lock it in the closet for a week.  And maybe after that, to place it on our neighbor’s doorstep, light it on fire, ring the doorbell, and run like hell. 

This is an actual flaming, bag of shit on a doorstep. I didn't leave it.

Because eventually, we will lay claim to our bag of shit.  We will pick it up and we will carry it because we know that we never had a choice because we seldom do.  And we know that the dropping, kicking, trespassing, and felony arson charges were just the beginning of the excruciating, often life-long ritual called acceptance. 

Some days our bags will feel lighter and some days our bags will feel heavier and they will always stink; and we will likely carry this stinky weight for most of the days of the rest of our lives. 

Except on some days, when we are handed a bouquet of flowers.  

Because on some days, if we are lucky, from out of nowhere; we will be lifted.  By a bouquet of flowers or by a letter in our mailbox or by the laughter of friends, we will be lifted.

And our bag of shit will seem to disappear completely, if only for a moment. 

Because everything happens because it just does.

See you in November, dear Julie!