Sandy Slaga

Out of the Closet

In the words of the late Madeline Kahn as Lili Von Shtupp in Blazing Saddles -

Is it twue how zey say zat you people are … gifted?
(Lights go out, sound of zipper opening)
Oh. It’s twue. It’s twue. It’s twue. It’s twue!

And so yes, it’s twue, as Chuck Newton wrote, that I am ” … a mom, a lawyer, with teenagers, stuck at home.”

And it’s twue that I am betwixt and between, as my late father would say, on the issue of going back to practicing law. With a senior and junior in high school, I better figure out some way to fill the space between college parent weekends.

I do have the first few months of my son’s freshman year covered. It’ll take that long for the big suck machine, aka my wet/dry vac, to inhale the dearth of hair in his bathroom and for me to power wash his shower walls and under the toilet rim.

Still, there will come a time when even the melodic roar of my wet/dry vac will no longer cut it for me.

The question is, now that I’m out of the closet, do I have what it takes to dust off the license and launch?

Anatomy of a Teenage Bathroom

Fortunately for my eighteen-year-old son, my methodical vacuuming of the family room this morning saved him from being the subject of a post entitled Anatomy of a Murder, In Cold Blood or even Murder on the Menopause Express.

Unfortunately for my eighteen-year-old son, the toilet is front and center when one walks by the always open door to his bathroom. Also unfortunately for him, his bedroom and bathroom are located adjacent to a major thoroughfare in our house, that being the hallway leading from the family room to the garage. And, of course, he has a fifty-year-old estrogen deficient mother in mid-life crisis. The perfect storm.

If I close my eyes, hold my breath, stick my fingers in my ears and drone “I can’t see you!”, it is possible to walk by my son’s bathroom and keep going. This, however, is futile. The hair beckons.

Hair. Copious amounts. On every surface, horizontal or vertical, in his bathroom. On top of the toilet tank. The sides of the tank. On the seat. Under the lid. In the little hinge things that connect the lid to the seat. On the rim. At the base. Behind the toilet. God help me it’s in the sink. Behind the faucet. And the shower? Don’t make me go there.

There is hair in places where there shouldn’t be hair. And it’s hair from areas of his body that … well, let’s just say it’s hair.

The amount of hair in various locales of his bathroom might lead one to believe that my son is walking around with no hair on his body. I assure you, that is not the case.

You’d think with the amount of dried toothpaste and shaving cream residue in his sink that the hairs would congregate there, all nice and matted. Or that the hand towel which hangs next to the sink and that my son treats as a wall hanging would step up and attract a few strays. Certainly the aerosol-driven wind gusts from the assorted cannisters of body spray should herd the little suckers into a corner.

Not to be. The hair is there.

Fortunately for my son, my week-long angst sees the light at the end of the hair. It’s Friday. Cleaning day again in Teenland.

Ain’t life grand?

Boobs by Vicki

Last weekend the seventeen-year-old announced that she was in dire need of new bras and asked if I’d go shopping with her.

It’s a rare occasion when I am asked to be seen in public with either of The Teenagers. And an invitation by my daughter to go shopping is like finding a hair of natural color on my head. Shocking, awesome and not to be missed.

After repositioning my lower jaw, I smiled nonchalantly and quipped, “Sure, honey. Sounds fun.”

Wrong answer.

“Fun? Mom, it’s just for bras. And I’m going to Victoria’s Secret.”

Now I’ve been a bra consumer since sixth grade. No brag, just fact. And the workhorse in my underwear stable was a J.C. Penney white cotton number. No push-ups. No demi cups. No plungers. No miracles. Just white cotton, elastic straps and a prayer to St. Bernadette, who I had decided to name as my personal patron saint of cleavage.

Bra shopping with my mother was like buying that-time-of-the-month supplies. An event to be endured and offered up as a down payment on the penance I’d get from Father Michael at confession the following week.

Each trip was the same. I’d tell Mom I was capable of maneuvering the elevated parts of my chest into a bra in the J.C. Penney dressing room. Mom would say no, we needed to be sure it fit, and that’s what the bra ladies were for. I figured there were only two parts that needed maneuvering, and I could manage. But it took three of us to accomplish the feat. My mother, the bra lady with the wrinkly cold hands and me. In a dingy little dressing room with dark brown drapes on rings for a door.

Flash forward to Vicki’s. After choosing several bras of assorted colors and styles, my daughter is escorted to a dressing room the size of my bathroom by a young woman in sleek black slacks with a headset. She enters the dressing room alone and emerges a few minutes later, a bright yellow demi cup in hand.

St. Bernadette, you can sit this one out.

Maggie’s Gift

The inoperable big black ball took Maggie swiftly.

My beautiful girl of the rich chocolate coat and soft, tender eyes. Set free from the big black ball by Dr. Ann’s gentle hands while my husband and I cradled her in our arms.

Maggie.

She of unconditional love and no demands. No expectations.

Only love.

Loving me every damn day of her life. Regardless of my mood. Regardless of how much attention I had paid to her the day before. Or the moment before.

She forgave my bitchy moods and the times when I was too wrapped up in stuff to take her for a walk or throw her tennis ball.

She forgave and forgot at the moment of my infraction. And eagerly and willingly accepted anything I gave. No matter how small the gesture or fleeting the moment.

Always there. Living in the moment. Ready to love me. To be with me. Just be. For no other reason than the sheer joy of being.

Unconditional love. Simple joy. Life for life’s sake. Untouched by worry or resentment or envy.

Thank you, Maggie. Thank for teaching me how to love and how to live.

Maggie Mae Eyes

If eyes are a window to the soul, then my chocolate Lab’s eyes must be a window to her heart.

Two nights ago, during our ritual bedtime hugs and petting, I felt a lump on her right front elbow. Correction. This was no lump. This was a damn softball.

Shocked at its size and perplexed at Maggie’s obvious indifference, I did what any menopausal married female in crisis does. I screamed for my husband.

My mind was already in the car with Maggie, cuddled in my down comforter, rushing to the emergency vet and demanding the best of everything and NOW.

My husband, being of the Y chromosome, calmly observed that there was no need for panic. Certainly, when I’m at Defcon 1, that’s what I want to hear. Relax! That yes-the-house-is-burning-but-calm-down attitude.

I shot him a look expressing how special I felt about him at that moment.

Then I looked at Maggie. “Let it go,” her eyes said.

Maggie slept like a baby that night. I tossed, turned, paced and fought urges to devour the entire contents of my kitchen.

Yesterday morning we were first in line at the vet. Long history. Over the last ten years, our yellow Lab and Doberman both got their angel wings while under Dr. Ann’s loving care.

So when it wasn’t Dr. Ann who attended Maggie, my eyes flared while my teeth held my tongue and mouth in place.

Then I glanced at Maggie. “Give her a chance,” her eyes said.

The softball came with a high fever. And I’ll be damned if that softball didn’t turn out to be a black ball. A big, black, inoperable ball.

While Dr. Ann’s colleague tested and biopsied, I bit my lip to stop the tears and so that I could listen carefully. As if what anyone had to say mattered.

And then I looked at Maggie. “Ok. Ok. But when are we going home?” her eyes asked.

So home we came. One blubbering menopausal female. One there’s-no-need-to-panic male. And one feverish canine with a bright red gauze and ace bandage-wrapped right front leg.

Blubbering and wailing, while cathartic, are a bit of a hinderance to good nursing care. And so while Maggie hobbled, I followed. While I held her, my husband got the pills down her.

This morning she was worse. This morning, I was on a mission. Eight o’clock. Vet’s office. Maniacal, menopausal and now mustering every last hormone in my body, I looked at Dr. Ann’s colleague, prepared to launch a tirade.

But before I spoke, I looked at Maggie. “It’s ok,” her eyes said. “Just get rid of this damn fever so I can feel better. And then take me home.”

The Law of English Muffins

The eighteen-year-old was late for breakfast this morning. Again.

Three years of law school, two bar exams and almost ten years of practicing law ain’t got nothing on one eighteen-year-old boy’s skill at driving me into a close relationship with Jack Daniels.

As I sucked in brewing coffee vapors, the scholar of AP X-Box Live and Honors Cigar Smoking announced his goal for the remaining three months of his high school career. To-wit: thou shalt not complete a full week of school. Leave early, arrive late. Fabricate illness. Whatever it takes.

I lovingly suggested that such reckless disregard for the climax of his Catholic education would perhaps not be wise within earshot of a menopausal mother who holds title to his car.

Then I popped his English muffins in the toaster, invoked St. Jude, patron saint of lost causes, and savored a few minutes just hanging with my son before he left for school.

In another year and a half both of The Teenagers will be in college. The heavy lifting will be done. Then to law or not to law?

There have been mixed emotions since taking a break from law seven years ago. Was it the right thing to do? Have I been gone too long to go back? Have I wasted the degree and license?

God knows it’s been one fantruckingtastic moment after another being home. Expletive-laden X-Box Live chatter echoing in the heating ducts. The familiar 11 p.m. weeknight cabinet slamming and glass clanging in search of a bedtime snack. The aroma of maturing socks at the bottom of a bowling bag. The eyeball rolling and heavy sighing.

And the English muffins.

Cream cheese or peanut butter? OJ or milk? Yea, it’s been indulgent. Maybe even spoiling. But not for them. For me.

And while I may not miss the occasional expletives courtesy of the cheap heating vents, I will sure as hell miss the English muffins.

Little Girl from Texas

Kids, work and life kept me blissfully ignorant of Anna Nicole Smith until her legal battles with her 90-year-old late husband’s estate hit the front pages.

Never short on self-righteousness, I skimmed the “facts” and slam-dunked my conclusions about her and her life.

And on with my life. You know. Real life.

But she kept showing up. And then one evening, there she was. Her own reality show. Oh, for god’s sake. What won’t they use as fodder for a tv show?

That damn tv show reached out, grabbed me and held on. Or maybe it was this young woman with a sadness beneath the candy apple lip gloss.

And so I kept watching. Week after week. Embarrassed to admit I was a closet watcher.

And in this woman with the candy apple lip gloss, I sensed compassion and genuineness, masked by a search for acceptance at any cost.

Anna Nicole was used and manipulated, and, many will say, did her share of using and manipulating. But she never lost her soul, as if any of us can. She never lost the core of who she was.

For all her mistakes - Lord knows we make a few from time to time - she was always a little girl from Texas with dreams and a heart just as big.

And she wanted what we all long for - to love and to be loved not for what we’ve done or what we have - but simply for who we are.

Old News at Duke

Three Duke lacrosse players. An exotic dancer. A party.

Wrongly accused? It appears so.

Outrageous? If true, yes.

News? No.

It happens every day in this country. And it’s been happening since the first gavel hit the bench.

To young men of the working class. To young men of color. To young Hispanic men. To young men without the financial resources to hire the best that money can buy.

Darryl Hunt. North Carolina. 19 years old. Life sentence for the rape and murder of a 25-year-old woman. Imprisoned 18 years before being exonerated in 2004.

Alan Gell. North Carolina. 20 years old. Sentenced to death for the murder of a 56-year-old man. Imprisoned 9 years - half of those on death row - until a jury acquitted him in a retrial.

Brandon Moon. Texas. 25 years old. Imprisoned 16 years for the rape of a woman in El Paso before being exonerated.

Ronnie Bullock. Illinois. 27 years old. Imprisoned for almost 11 years for the rape of a 9-year-old Chicago girl before being exonerated.

Where were their headlines?

Where were their mothers’ appearances on CBS’ 60 Minutes and the morning talk show circuit?

Where were the state bar associations investigating those prosecuting attorneys?

Where were the state attorneys general to conduct reviews of the criminal charges against those young men?

Why is it news now?

Perhaps because now it’s happened to some upper middle class young white men.

Michigan Shames Supreme

Shame on you, Michigan Supreme Court.

In the respect and trust categories, the legal profession has long ranked up there with used car sales people and the IRS.

Sadly, the justices on the Michigan Supreme Court are seeing to it that we stay there.

20,000 Plus

More than 20,000 additional American troops. Soldiers.

Men. Women.

Sons. Fathers. Brothers. Uncles.

Daughters. Mothers. Sisters. Aunts.

Friends.

Ours.

Theirs.