I Am The Reality

What if I wrote a post in the middle of a typical working-mama anxiety-jag? What if I have too much work today, and tomorrow I am going to be judged on all of my work for the entire school year, based on one observation? What if at least one motherfucker is going to come in and tell me how incompetent I am because her daughter is smart and I should give her high grades? And despite the fact that that mother wears belly-shirts and her very sweet daughter seems to have a memory problem, I am utterly anxious about the conflict? Despite the fact that I am known for my sharp wit, etc, that having any parent kvetch is like a case of salmonella in a public school? What if my new-moan-ya is coming back, just a bit, and I had to sleep the past three days, way more than I expected? And last weekend, instead of work, I was attentive daughter to ailing parent? And what if I am doing laundry, right now, for crissake? I'm 10 minutes from fold and sort.

Instead of a theory, I am the reality, right now. I took the meds I take for the goddamn anxiety disorder, but if I take the PRN for bad days, I'll be sedated, and then what? Why did I choose a profession which earns me just enough? I was brought up to have what I want, and I want my own bathroom. I want to take a leave of absence after a family member dies, or is quite ill. And what if I am quite ill? Must I say always that I am lucky because I am not starving? Or the pathetic line I give my children: "we're actually rich, compared to the rest of the world." Can I just be a product of our piggy lazy society and say I wanna lie on the couch, I wanna minute to volunteer at my kids' school, I wanna go back and get my hair re-done without thinking about the goddamn money?

I am not a sociological theory, I am a lady barely managing financially and emotionally in the lovely woodsy suburb so my kids can get an education worthy of the best private schools around. Somewhere along the line I forgot about me, or maybe money and me. The brawny psycho-pharm guy said it was impressive how much I've done, considering my psychiatric history. Oh, puhleez. Isn't raising two kids, getting a master's degree, trying to live with a man, and working full time enough to actually give someone a psychiatric condition?

I'm off to persevorate more, the imaginary print lining the inside of my skull.

The Oscars Are Bullshit and The Wrong Kinda Whine

Brokeback was a precedent-setting film: every movement and still moment on Heath Ledger's face created a character utterly believable, miserable, and sadly wise. The chemistry between the two actors was also precedent-setting: in what other film have we seen two people pressed up and seeking each other like Ennis and Jack the first time they reunite on Ennis's steps?

The Oscars were pathetically mainstream. How innovative is a running fag joke? Everyone is scared shitless to offend African Americans in any way, but we can say whatever we want, we're all pals with "Will & Grace."

Movie actors are not the self-sacrificing altruists Mr. Clooney described: they may be artists, but they are not as innovative or political as some of them think they are. Reese Witherspoon, for example, is not an Oxfam worker, despite her yearning to matter. And would someone please reach down Ms. Witherspoon's throat and adjust her voicebox? That thing is like interference on an old radio.

Daughtering

I thought I would spend the weekend writing, doing laundry, and preparing a presentation at work. Then came the ring. Don't people always talk about the ring? It's probably nothing, but my dad is in the hospital with chest pains. It's probably nothing, but he's had some heart problems in the past. They put some balloons in there about a year ago, and told him to lose weight. He's very heavy. It's probably nothing, but I remember that documentary that Tim Lehrer did about his heart attack - he described it as a train running over his chest - and the doctors keeping him for observation before the train left the station.

One time, Dad felt chest pains, so he got up out of bed, took a shower, and waited for my mom to wake up. Like, duh! He wanted to be sure he smelled good or something? The doctors said later that a heart attack had been imminent, but the balloons opened up the clogged arteries. I knew then that that would be the first of several future cardiac-type visits. The folks there seemed professional and friendly - occasionally a rural hospital will be comforting rather than eerily backward. They had automatic doors, so they seemed hip to the high-tech thing.

Isn't it odd to be at an age when we consider a parent's death, not as a remote fear, but as a real possibility? It's not that he is in a dire situation at the moment, but the ER visits do give one pause. When my father was thirty years old, his sister died. A year later, his mother died. Dad sometimes said it was a broken heart that killed his mother. My brother died last summer. Both of my parents have been determined to continue to participate in the world, to grasp at what they do have, while they mourn. So I am going to be with them and to kvetch at him (nag) about eating the lousy food and drinking enough water. And I'm sort of hoping that he is not thinking about the irony, or even that he now shares an experience with his mother that he never imagined he would.

For my own mother, I am hoping that she has many years with her companion, a night with some sleep in it, and a little relief from the sadness. The latter two seem 'highly unlikely,' as we say in my family. She likes to 'think positive,' though, so despite my tendencies otherwise, I am going to join her there. This is one situation in which a little denial may be required.

Noprah on Oprah

Please register me as Anti-Oprah. She's a one-woman narcissistic corporate machine of superficial hair and false sentiment. Sure, she gives a lotta crap away. Ever catch the look on her face after all those poor suckers cheer for her? She tosses 'em a penny, and they're all like ooh, a Broadway show, we love you Oprah. Perfectly intelligent and sophisticated females rhapsodize over the phenom that is Oprah. What the fuck? She's showing us the houses she built in Texas for Katrina survivors. Saint Oprah? I don't think so. I remember when she was Ms. Why-Didja-Cheat? When that stopped working, she became someone else. Now she's all Ms. Mother Theresa. It is truly an i.q.-lowering experience to watch her expression as she asks - I had pneumonia, gimme a break - a "tough" question. Ha! How's about her brave turn-around when she condemned plagiarism, only after her followers complained?

I say she's offering herself up as the leader of a new religion. And I'm leery whenever a group of people is devoted to any religion, even if it's mine. Oprah worship is particularly repellent to me, however. What's up with the pseudo-honesty? Why does David Letterman give a shit? Am I supposed to link to all this stuff? Like, why? (I only link if I think it's a good thing to look at!) I'll tell ya right now that Oprah can hold a serious pseudo-soulful expression, while Brooke Shields describes her descent into post-partum depression, for a good 40 minutes. Maybe they inject Botox around the mouth before she takes the stage. Or maybe it's computer-generated animation. She can hawk a book like the best saleswoman around; she can go on about her favorite lady-like things. Such talent.

I don't give a shit. I don't like Oprah. Her show is dull. Her opinions are mundane. Her compassion act is all part of raking in the dough and keeping herself in an admired position of warm and beloved - ironically - mother figure. Or maybe she's going for gal next door. At this point, it could be Princess Diana. But I say she can take all of her crap and her romance-novel style, and get offa my t.v. And I'm not buying a book with her name smacked on the cover, either.