Between The Lines

My first car was an exceedingly ugly Plymouth with no power steering. In order to parallel park that sucker, I’d have to get out of the car, bend down and manually shove the tires to the curb. Not really, but the pull forward, back it up, tote that wheel, lift that barge action wore me out. Once parked, I never wanted to move it again. Unfortunately, I lived in Chicago, and we had to move our cars to the other side of the street every other day.

Power steering makes maneuvering an automobile much easier, but parking a car well is still an art form that few people have mastered. For instance, visualize this: A parking lot is almost empty. A Porsche and a BMW are parked at the far end of the lot with a space between them. What happens next? If it’s my choice, I will fill in the gap between those two expensive cars because:

If that space was good enough for two rich people, the spot in the middle is perfect for me.

At least one of those cars will shade my car and protect it from leaf blowers.

Expensive cars will be careful backing out.

A thief will prefer a BMW or Porsche to my 2004 Saturn, which General Motors doesn’t even make anymore (and, yes, I am very angry with them, but that’s another story.)

People who drive expensive cars won’t give my car a bump in order to make the parking space bigger. The only time drivers of expensive cars park next to me is at the grocery store, because they want to use my car as a shield against run away grocery carts.

Where you park your car matters! Even on a lunch break; funeral directors know not to park a hearse in front of a restaurant. I would rather walk a mile than give my car to a parking attendant. Usually, these attendants are 12 years old, and their job experience involves driving bumper cars at the county fair. On the rare occasions that I have turned my car over to one of these characters, they invariably lose my car. I guess the little old Saturn doesn’t leave the impression that I am a big tipper.

I don’t like parking next to trucks. First of all, when I am backing out, it’s difficult to see past their long rear ends, and often those drivers are scratchers, and don’t seem to mind leaving a little ding on the side of my car as a souvenir of our time together. Parking next to a wall or tree is good, unless you hit the wall or the tree attracts prune-eating birds.

Once you have parked your vehicle, it helps to make a mental note of where you leave it---“My car is parked in the 13^th row, 25 spaces down from the school bus.” Of course, if you don’t remember if that was east or west of the school bus (which has already left) you can wander about looking miserable until eventually pushing the “someone is breaking into my car” panic button on your key chain. Everyone will know you have lost your car, and no one will call the police.

My mother used to say, “If you don’t have it in your head, you have to have it in your feet.”

Esther Blumenfeld (why do all cars look alike?)

In Days Gan Bei

When traveling to a foreign country, many Americans don’t attempt to speak the native language. They rely on the premise that “Everyone speaks English.” I, on the other hand, make an attempt---feeble as it may be---to learn a few words, so I can skid and slide into the culture as best I can. My trick is that if I can’t come up with a word or two in a foreign language, I just make them up. I have discovered that most of the time when I invent a few words, people assume that I am mumbling, or they don’t really listen anyway, so it’s usually not a problem.

However, several years ago, I was an honored dinner guest at an elegant home in Mexico City. It was a rather large crowd, and the host was the only person (other than I) who spoke English. Luckily, I had my handy-dandy English/Spanish phrase book with me, and I was able to nod and smile a lot, but unfortunately, at dinner, a woman sitting next to me asked me a direct question---just when the host was called out of the room for a telephone call.

Suddenly, the room fell silent and everyone looked at me expecting an answer in Spanish. I thought she had asked me a question about my son, so after flipping through the phrase book (which was no help at all) I valiantly attempted an answer. Whatever I said left very little oxygen in the room, because it brought on a universal, shocked intake of breath around the table. Happily, after looking at each other, and then seeing my bewildered expression, everyone burst into gales of laughter. To this day, I don’t know what I said, but the hostess spilled a dish of flan into my lap. I think it was an accident.

In Barcelona, I ordered tapas in Spanish and was served a dish of fried critters that were delicious, if you could avoid looking into their tiny eyes. The problem with learning only a smattering of several languages is that I tend to mix them up. If I can’t remember a word in French or Italian, I fall back on my lame Spanish and hope that the romance languages are close enough to soften the heart of my listener. I can speak kindergarten German, and have found out that German sounds best when you have postnasal drip.

Japanese is easy, because if you keep bowing and handing out business cards, you never have to say a word. Only two languages have a single word that means “Hello, Goodbye and Peace”---“Aloha” in Hawaiian and “Shalom” in Hebrew. I always suspected that Hawaiians are the lost tribe of Israel. Everyone understands you in Russia when you shout “Vodka!”

For me, foreign languages have always been a grand adventure. I figure that even when people speak the same language, too often they have trouble communicating, so I might as well try a few more along the way.

Esther Blumenfeld (Skall! Prost! Salut! Gan Bei! L’Chaim! Kampai! Noroc! Nostrovia!)

What Do You See?

Besides thinking about what I should prepare for dinner, I have also been thinking about the difference between how we view ourselves, and others see us. When I mentioned this to my friend, Sally, she responded in her best English teacher voice, ”Ae wad some pow’r the giftie gie us to see oursels as ither see us.”

She claims that, Scottish poet, Robert Burns thought that one up when he watched a large bug slowly climbing heavenward on the back of a woman’s elegant hat in church. The woman was praying, the bug was preying, and “Rabbie” obviously had his head somewhere else.

So many times, I have heard someone say, “ I can’t retire. I don’t know what I would do with myself. I am my work.” If done well, retirement is an art. I have a friend who retired from being a banker. His professional reputation and lifetime work does not impress his toddler grandson, who already knows what really matters in life, and whose eyes light up when he sees, “The Grandfather!”

Children of celebrities don’t see the Nobel Prize winner or the “sex symbol”. They see mom and dad. When being interviewed, CNN journalist, Anderson Cooper, (whose mother is Gloria Vanderbilt, the famous designer) said, “I could never understand why girls in jeans had my mother’s name on their butts.”

So how do you see yourself? We all know that anorexics look into a mirror and see obesity. Tragically, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all?” doesn’t work for them. Mirrors should probably be banned, or at least heavily taxed.  Teenagers see a pimple and think everyone will notice. Little do they realize that their peers are so self-absorbed that they won’t see the pimple.  As a matter of fact, they probably won’t notice that anyone else is in the room other than themselves.

A mother who thinks she is “helpful” may have a child who sees her as “interfering.” An office worker who prides himself on “taking charge,” may be viewed as an “overbearing boor.”

A bit of sensitivity to the self-image of others can be helpful. Waiting in line for a movie ticket, I overheard a young ticket taker being berated by an extremely irritated customer. When she left, I suggested that the young man could avoid such confrontations in the future if he would say, “You’re not old enough for a senior ticket are you?” rather than, “Do you want a senior ticket?”

I read people pretty well. If someone is smart, he doesn’t have to tell me how smart he is---I will know. Most people like friendly folks, and they avoid rude and nasty people. If you want no friends, cultivate your nasty side. It works every time, unless you meet a masochist. He will think you are terrific!

I’m not sure if it is an urban legend, but one of my favorite stories about Tucson, Arizona involves an establishment that sells extremely expensive pianos. The store is located near some railroad tracks. People in Tucson are quite casual and unassuming. Maybe it has something to do with 350 days of sunshine. But I digress. Clerks in the piano store were trained not to approach anyone who wanders in, unless the prospective customer sits on a piano bench.

One day, a young man, wearing a torn tee shirt and sloppy jeans wandered into the store. No one approached him until he sat down and began to run his fingers over the piano keys. At that, an experienced salesman said to a new hire, “You go take care of that guy. He’s probably just a bum who wandered in off the tracks.”

The rookie salesman approached the young man and politely asked, “May I help you?” The man replied, “I like this piano. How much does it cost?” “$45,000.00,” replied the clerk. “I’ll have my man pick it up in the morning,” said the young fellow. The customer was Paul McCartney.

So the moral of this tale is:  Don’t be too hard on yourself, and be careful how you view others---unless they are nasty people. Then, “What you see is what you get.”

Esther Blumenfeld (“Here’s looking at you, Kid.”)

Installing A Zipper

Do you suffer from these symptoms---anxiety, dread, shortness of breath, panting, excessive sweating, nausea, dry mouth or the inability to articulate words? Well, if so, you may be experiencing Pentheraphobia---fear of your mother-in-law.

On Sunday morning, May 6^th, 2012, I was a regular person. At 5:30 p.m., on that same day, I became a mother-in-law. I am very fortunate, because my son gave me every Jewish mother’s dream---a doctor and a lawyer. Barbara has quickly become my favorite daughter. That is a no brainer, because she is my only daughter, but she is still my favorite.

Wanting to be the best mother-in-law I can be, I asked several of my more experienced friends for advice. Without exception they told me, “Keep your mouth zipped.” That will be easy because as far as I am concerned my son’s wife can do no wrong, and who in her right mind wants to argue with an attorney?

Hoping to pick up a few hints from my computer I googled “mother-in-law.” At first I was bombarded with nasty jokes. I know that mother-in-law jokes are the mainstay of comedy. The premise is that the average mother-in-law considers her child’s mate unsuitable, and the stereotype of this “battle axe” mother-in-law is an overbearing and obnoxious person. These jokes date back to the Romans who delivered them during times of drunken debauchery. Mother-in-law revenge is that no Roman tells those jokes anymore.

After deleting the bad jokes, I found some helpful hints how the new mother-in-law can develop a relationship with her new daughter-in-law:

Accept who she is. (Ignore the Hells Angels tattoo.)

Refrain from criticizing her cooking. (Eat the squirrel stew and smile).

Always invite her to family functions. (Do not seat her at the children’s table).

Share family stories. (You might want to skip the story about the hanging).

Be neutral, diplomatic and kind. (You will know you have it made if a hurricane is approaching and your daughter-in-law tells you to take shelter).

But what about the mother-in-law who wears a black veil to the wedding and when the couple is asked, “Do you take---?” She shouts, “Over my dead body!” My handy, dandy google search also gave suggestions how to handle a difficult mother-in-law.

Be polite but firm during a baiting episode. (Ask your spouse to take away her liquor).

Ignore her if she follows you into the bathroom.

Rehearse comebacks such as, “We are not discussing this anymore. Would you like a Jawbreaker?”

Offer an olive branch. (But not during allergy season).

So here’s my advice. Heed the story of King Solomon. Two women came to him claiming to be the mother of an infant. Since DNA had not yet been discovered, he suggested that they cut the baby in half. “That’s better than giving it to her,” said the first woman. “No,” cried the second woman, don’t hurt the baby give him to her.” The King said, “You, are the real mother because you’d rather give up the baby than harm him.” The old King was right. Cutting someone in half is never a good idea.

Esther Blumenfeld (Mom #2 and loving it!)

Bon Appetit

Several years ago, my husband and I were on holiday in San Francisco. After an early up-and-down-hill walk, we stopped at a small restaurant for breakfast. The tables were all taken, so we sat at the counter. A man entered and plopped down on the stool next to me. The waitress greeted him and said, “Do you know what you want?” “Yes,” he replied. “I’d like a glass of water, 11 fried eggs and nothing else.” After the man finished his eggs and left, my husband said to the waitress, “Wasn’t that a bit unusual?” She shook her head and said, “Yes, he usually orders a dozen.”

Scientists tell us that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It kick- starts our energy, keeps metabolism running higher and improves cognitive abilities---especially in young children. That’s why I used to tell my teenage son, “Josh, Coca Cola and cold pizza is not breakfast food.”

I’ve always been a morning person, so I have no problem rising with the sun at 5 a.m., but I have to eat breakfast before taking my morning hike. My friend, Barbara is also an early riser, but unlike me, she doesn’t eat a morsel (I eat several and then some) before her 7-mile hike. All she needs is a jolt of caffeine. Barbara agrees with the writer, Joanne Sherman who said, “I have a ‘carpe diem’ mug and, truthfully at six in the morning the words do not make me want to seize the day. They make me want to slap a dead poet.”

When Radar the cat wakes up, he wants breakfast, so he jumps on the bed and slaps my son across the face. “What goes around comes around.” When Josh was a toddler and wanted breakfast, he used to wander into the bedroom before sunrise, lift my eye-lid and say, “Mommy are you in there?” A poke in the eye beats an alarm clock every time.

Truman Capote’s Holly Golightly snacked on a pastry in front of Tiffany’s. The title of his book came from an anecdote popular among Capote’s friends. An out-of-towner was asked, “Which glamorous restaurant in New York would you like to visit?” He answered, “Well, let’s have breakfast at Tiffany’s.”

Breakfast in bed sounds about as appealing as spending a night in the hospital. Movies make it sound romantic, but in real life, breakfast in bed usually means spilled coffee and berries chasing crumbs across the sheets.

On a book tour, I was once put up in a Bed and Breakfast. The bed was comfortable, but I had to eat breakfast with a bunch of chatty strangers. The only stranger I would enjoy having breakfast with is the comedian Steven Wright. He said, “I was at this restaurant. The sign said, ‘Breakfast Anytime’. So I ordered French Toast in the Renaissance.”’

 Pass the syrup

Esther Blumenfeld (“The bagel is an unsweetened doughnut with rigor mortis.” Beatrice and Ira Freeman)