In a Galaxy Far, Far Away …
Sorry, Anousheh honey. I’m not feeling your pain.
Iranian-born American Anousheh Ansari, having been-there-done-that, dropped $20 million for a round-trip ticket to the International Space Station and something to talk about at the salon.
Now I figure that $20 million would buy a pretty damn good list of while-you’re-in-our-cosmos travel tips. Evidently not.
Anousheh’s been blog-itching about enduring primitive primping conditions. A coiffed space ‘do with mere water bag and dry shampoo. Wet and dry towel bathing. Teeth brushing, rinsing and swallowing ….. not spitting.
Which brings me to the recycled water.
All water in the International Space Station is recycled. Ewww. Those used workout clothes are air dryed so the water conduction contraption can collect and purify the sweat before Anousheh and the boys fill their water bottles.
And then there’s that come-to-mama zero gravity.
Eight days sans the seven signs of aging?
Anousheh, honey, it was worth every million.
Cold War Parenting
Henry Kissinger, where are you?
A recent series of crises on the domestic front has resulted in deteriorating parent-teen instability.
Between the advent of the sixteen-year-old’s adolescence and the last time she and her father or I were in the same room, there have been 926 armed conflicts in 37 different locations.
The majority of these have been mother daughter wars. In the month of September alone, 43 armed conflicts occurred in 7 locations, only 2 of which were fought between father and daughter.
The sixteen-year-old’s arsenal has included: The Look, The Stare and the always effective Silent Treatment. My big gun? Her cell phone.
After an attempted coup, a ceasefire was declared this morning, leading to a break in open hostilities.
Her father, who conveniently is also my husband, has courageously stepped forward to act as a neutral third party. He hopes to bring the combatants together to facilitate a dialogue which will avoid further conflict, boarding schools or overseas religious communities.
The neutral third party is committed to hammering out a peace agreement or, in the alternative, a period of détente, either of which will demand patient, persistent efforts and Jack Daniels as co-counsel.
Because He Can
My son turns eighteen tomorrow.
Over the past few weeks he has been prepping me for surgery. Apparently he will be performing this procedure, which will involve the severing of someone’s apron strings.
I’m not aware of anyone whose apron strings need severing. Nipped and tucked, perhaps, but not severing.
But I digress.
Several weeks ago, the still-seventeen year old informed me of two events in which he will be participating following the eighteenth anniversary of his birth. My presence is neither required nor requested.
The first event, I was told, would be the purchase and smoking of a cigar. From Rudy’s Cigar Shop. A real cigar. A man’s cigar. As opposed to a woman’s cigar?
I can handle that. I’m not thrilled with my son intentionally ingesting toxins and ash, but I can deal with it.
The second event, my son announced, would involve his also-turning-eighteen-this-week friend. Something about a road trip. And a strip club.
And my son. My son. Fruit of my womb. DNA of my DNA.
After my eyes resumed position in their sockets and the mysterious screeching faded, I advised my son that such a road trip would proceed only after certain other events occurred.
Events involving my dead body, below zero temperatures, hell, pigs and flight.
Now I like to think I’d make a pretty damn effective dead body, but there are some things that sons are going to do just because they can.
Strip clubs are like peeing al fresco.
I’ve done the guilt. Not going there. Not for this. I’m saving it for greater where-was-his-mother-when-he-was-doing-that issues.
He peed al fresco.
And he’ll find his way, eventually, to that damn strip club.
Because he can.
Subbing for Dollars
The call came late last week.
Was I available to sub Monday at The Teenagers’ school?
I was torn.
We could use the income. But their high school?
Do I dare thrust myself onto the heretofore exclusive turf of the almost-eighteen year old and the sixteen year old?
A mother among the dudes and dudettes?
A fifty year old parent, given to occasional outbursts of sick-goose-honking laughter and swine-like snorting, loose among the is-there-any-food-between-my-teeth adolescents?
And what, God forbid, if I’m assigned to cover for one of their teachers?
What to do?
Flashback to last week.
Ah yes. That special feeling when I saw my car’s gas gauge on one eighth of a tank. For the second time. Same infraction, different teenager. That poignant memory of The Teenagers’ verbal love fest to determine the guilty party.
Fortutunately, clarity was only a menopausal moment away.
The look on the sixteen year old’s face that morning when she saw me covering for her consumer ed teacher?
Good for two snorts and a honk.
Good Enough
Listen George. Listen to Colin and John on this subject of interrogating and trying terror suspects.
Colin Powell was good enough to serve two tours of duty in Vietnam. He was good enough to be wounded and be awarded medals for valor both times.
Good enough to serve as your dad’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Good enough to oversee Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
And he was good enough to serve as your Secretary of State for four years.
John McCain was good enough to fly Navy jets in Vietnam and get shot down over North Vietnam in 1967.
Good enough to be held as a prisoner of war for five and a half years. Good enough to be interrogated. Good enough to be tortured. Good enough to be bayonetted. Good enough to be beaten until losing consciousness. Repeatedly.
Maybe. Just maybe now. Maybe Colin and John are good enough to get more than a sound bite’s worth of your ear, George.
Interloper
I am caught up in Lincoln’s Melancholy, which hit the shelves last year.
Joshua Wolf Shenk spent seven years researching this glimpse into Lincoln’s lifelong struggle with the Black Hole of depression. The result of Shenk’s toil is engrossing.
Shenk has allowed me to step inside Lincoln’s tortured mind and eavesdrop on his most private thoughts.
For those of us who have walked Lincoln’s path of pain, his story is a light in the darkness.
Keep walking towards the light.
