Air Travel: One Molecule Away from Hell

For those of you who have been living under a rock and haven't had the joy and privilege of "Flying the Friendly Skies" post 911, it ain't what it used to be! The other day in the lunchroom at school, one of the teachers was telling the rest of us not to eat margarine. "Margarine" she says, "is one molecule away from plastic". Now I believe this was a history teacher, so I am not sure "one molecule away..." is an exaggeration or fact, but nonetheless let me make an analogy here. If margarine is one molecule away from plastic, air travel is one molecule away from hell.


When I was a child....a VERY young child, air travel was the most glamorous thing ever! Flight attendants were not invented yet. They were stewardesses. A stewardess was a friendly, beautiful, kind, hostess of the sky. Remember those commercials "I am (insert name) come fly me." "Wow", I thought as a child, you would need to be some sort of beauty pageant winner/model/movie star to be a stewardess (not fully comprehending the connotations of "come fly me"). Such a statement used in 2012 would totally offend me and be  discussed with outrage at many of my women's Bible study groups.


As my mother also reminded me, we used to get dressed up to go on a plane. You would be adorned in a dress with matching purse and shoes. Anything less would be embarrassing. After all you were an air traveler. You could afford to fly the friendly skies. You had to make a good impression on all the other air travelers. In addition as a child, I was able to go "meet the pilot". One Christmas heading to Pittsburgh in the early 70's I was invited to the cockpit and shown all of the amazing pilot stuff by the most handsome, smart, brave pilot ever. Pilots were required to be handsome, brave, and smart.....oh and men. To top that off, every child was entitled to his or her very own set of plastic pilot wings - just like the pilots! I am now wondering if girls got stewardess wings and boys got pilot wings.  


Not only did you get a trip to meet the pilot and official plastic pilot wings, you got a bag! Yes a real bag! Have you ever seen those pictures of the Beatles first arriving in the US? I believe it was George or John who was carrying a Pan Am bag! The Beatles! Not only that, you got a full meal - I think it was even good.


Over the past weekend, my husband and I traveled to Pinehurst, North Carolina for the funeral of my dear great uncle Buzz. I was naive enough to think getting there would be a breeze and even somewhat of a get-away. We have Air Tran points (Air TranS as it is pronounced in Atlanta), so we were able to fly first class. First class on Air Tran is actually a synonym for lame business class. Childhood impressions and expectations are hard to delete from your mind, but I think this experience eliminated any delusions of enjoyable air travel.


Getting through security alone is exhausting and degrading. After be shuffled through the roped off lines with the other cattle, and presenting my boarding pass and i.d., the TSA employee checked my driver's license with a flashlight, looked at me suspiciously, looked back at the i.d., turned the flashlight on again, looked at me again. For heaven's sake man, I am a petite, pale, wimpy looking middle aged woman, do I really look like I am going to blow up a plane???? Next I was directed to place my belongings in a bin. I never know what is supposed to be put in the bin or not. To confuse things even more, they have bins and little mini white tray/bowl things. What goes in the bowl, what goes in the bin, what to we keep on, what do we remove? By this time I am so confused. Shoes and belts are flying off left and right. I am directed to the X-ray machine. I am so not excited. During the process I am thinking, is this one of those naked machines? Are they going to see me naked? If they do see me naked will a female TSA person come? 


I get waved to come forward. I nervously enter the machine wondering if they are going to see me naked. Well it seems that during this whole naked dilemma going on in my mind, I forgot to take off my shoes. The TSA dude was not amused. "Take off your shoes and go to the back of the line!" By this time my purse is going through the machine out of my sight and I am convinced my purse will be stolen - I watch 20/20 you know. So with my head down I put my shoes in a bin (were they supposed to go in the bin or the bowl - I don't know), and head to the back of the line. After waiting my turn and nervously thinking my purse is being stolen and I will be the next identity theft victim, I make it through the machine. By this time I don't even care who sees me naked.


I walk out to the other side. I quickly start looking for my purse. "Mam, is this your suitcase", says another TSA guy holding my suitcase. "Come over here. Put your hands on the table where I can see them". Once again, I am a petite 5'4" middle aged woman, does he think I am going to punch him out?? He then searches through my underwear and cosmetics. "Ah ha, Your toothpaste is too big". He pulls out my brand new Crest complete toothpaste with scope (the kind that costs $4.00!). "Toothpaste can only be 3.4 ounces. You have to buy the travel size. I will need to throw this away". Great. Somehow I had missed the fact that toothpaste was illegal. I knew the liquids rule, but I do not think of toothpaste as liquid. Who knew?


After being examined, searched, scolded and humiliated we head to our gate. "Due to a thunderstorm in Atlanta the flight has been delayed. Don't worry though, all the planes in Atlanta are grounded and you will make your connections".


Oh the prestige of Air Tran first class in 2012! We were assigned "zone 1" and allowed to load the plane seconds before the other common place coach passengers. We were also aloud to lug our carry on luggage over our heads into the storage compartments located above our heads. Despite those valuable extra seconds, our storage compartments were full when we got there??? Did the flight attendants put their stuff there? Who knows. Nonetheless, my husband Erik had to stow our items 5 rows behind us. You can image how that confuses things when you try to get off the plan when you arrive at your destination. 


We are offered drinks. Yipee! Finally the respect and luxury one would expect from traveling first class. Even though I have a bottled water and hot tea from Starbucks I enthusiastically accept an orange juice. Before I am able to take more than 2 sips, our flight attendant with a very heavy accent whom I could not understand, starts pointing at my drink. I was so confused. I had three drinks. She just gave me this drink. I asked her to clarify. She seems very offended by my questions. Now her incomprehensible speech becomes simply louder. I hand over my orange juice and she throws it away. She seems happy with that and walks away. Really? Where is my Miss America, kind hostess of the sky??? I am in First Class - my shoes match my purse!

As you can imagine, despite the promise from our very enthusiastic and reassuring captain, we missed our flight. No problem. When we get off the plane we are instructed to go stand in line to reschedule our flight. "No problem, instead of the 3pm flight to Raleigh Durham, we got you on the 10:30 pm flight". No problem??? I am supposed to meet my parents, and my aunt and uncle whom I have not seen since the 90's for dinner at 7pm. Not to mention the hour and a half drive to Pinehurst. 


Being that it is a loud airport, my husband had gone deaf. He has crowd deafness. It makes date night at loud restaurants a lot of fun by the way. So it is up to me to find a better option. I get them to change our flight so we arrive in Charlotte, NC around 7 pm. This however means we lost our rental car and it will cost an extra $200 to pick a car up at Charlotte and return it in Raleigh. After trying to go online using my deaf husband's computer, we find no good rental car options.


I am at the end of my rope. In the Atlanta airport, in tears, I call my Mom. Luckily she and my wonderful step father are on their way down from Virginia. They agree to come pick us up when we arrive in Charlotte and drive us to Pinehurst. I am blessed. Sometimes you just need your Mommy.


For those of you as old, or older than me who got to experience air travel in the 60's and 70's - cherish those memories.........and if you need to travel, take a train, or car, or subway, or even a bus........just don't go to the airport!

Beauty Disaster Queen

If there were some sort of contest for the person who has had the most "beauty disasters", I think I would have a good chance at winning. I actually think I could possibly be up for the Beauty Disaster Lifetime Achievement Award. 


For some reason: possibly society (always safe to blame society), the way I was raised (sort of doubt it), vanity (who knows).....as long as I can remember, I have been on a quest to improve or change the way I look, not that I am one of those people who thinks she is hideous or is trying to turn myself into the perfect Barbie Doll being. But somehow I am never quite happy with the way I look.


The first beauty disaster I can remember was when I was a young teenager. I just knew I would look so much better if I had blonde hair. Not sure if it was my obsession with wanting to be Farrah Fawcett, or the alleged fact that blondes have more fun.  Anyway, those "Sun-In" ads got me. An average looking young woman on the beach (probably Malibu) with average brown hair (hey just like me!), would be holding a plastic bottle of Sun In and effortlessly spray it into her wind blown hair. Next scene: after being out in the sun for only an hour or more, she was transformed into a beautiful blonde! That could be me, that could be me! 


Except, instead of Malibu Beach, I had the sun from my backyard deck in Sterling, Virginia. And, it wasn't so effortless to spray in. Many precious summer vacation hours were wasted in my 4' x 4' blue shag carpeted bathroom trying to apply this wonder spray. The worst part - that after hours out in the hot Virginia summer sun, I ended up with red hair. My Mom referred to it as "brassy". I didn't know what brassy meant, but I could tell by her inflection, it wasn't a good thing to have. 


Oh, so many beauty disasters in that house in Sterling circa 1978. At that time no one really talked about skin cancer. The longer you could stay out with baby oil slathered all over your body, the better. I was determined. I wasn't going to start slow, first sunny day I endured the heat for over 3 hours. The next day at school I was described as a lobster. I actually wish I looked as good as a lobster. I was bright red ......ugh.


The next thing I wanted to try was leg waxing. Who wants to deal with those pesky razors every day, or worse hairy legs? I went out and spent all of my lunch money on the first leg wax kit I could find. I followed the directions, really I did, but somehow the wax wouldn't come off and it was an Army green color. I spent literally hours trying to get that stuff off. Luckily designer jeans were "in" then and it was my little secret. I honestly don't remember how I ever got that stuff off, but safe to say, I haven't been investing in leg wax since - razors are much less risky and less painful.


Towards the end of high school I started to realize (despite my continuous attempts), that Sun-In just wasn't all it was cracked up to be. I would go for the real deal - a home highlighting kit! I scraped up enough money for the kit, got it home and excitedly tied the plastic cap around my head. The next step was taking this strange little crochet needle and try to pull strands of hair out through the plastic cap. This task was not only nearly impossible to do by yourself, but painful! I figured there must be a better way. I decided to simply apply the white paste-like substance myself.......FAIL! I ended up with the chunkiest streaks of white hair on top of Sun-In red hair, on top of mousy brown hair that you have ever seen.


My first summer home from college, I decided that this quest to be blonde was nearly impossible for a "do it yourself - er " like me. I got together some of my hard earned summer job money and marched myself into Dart Drug (which was eventually bought out by CVS, or Walgreens or some such drug store chain) and bought some brown hair dye. I must of somehow been mislead to think that my original hair color was much darker than it really was, because I ended up with the beauty disaster of all beauty disasters. My previously light brown/sun in red/ home highlighted hair turned black. Yes, black.  Well, at least a very dark brown. I remember exactly what color it was because at the time my then boyfriend is my now husband (Erik), and it was the same color as his!


I went into my summer job the next day and the other employees thought I was a new hire - really. I saw myself in the reflection in the elevator going up to my job and I didn't recognize myself! I was constantly in tears, Erik was sympathetic, my father said, "what happened to your hair?", my step mother recommended I use dish detergent to try and get the color out and pointed out that "at least I have dark eyebrows", and when I went back to college, Erik's friends said, "what happened to Butler's girlfriend's hair?"What a nightmare.


Things didn't get much better when I became an adult. As Erik and I became parents, I was determined to save money and therefore do it yourself beauty became more tempting. I did finally figure out the correct highlighting kit to buy and how to apply it without my hair turning out to look like blonde polka dots on brown hair. I also knew the exact time it took for my streaks to turn the perfect shade of blonde. Despite my new found knowledge, one day I was highlighting my hair figuring I had enough time as my toddler was in front of "Barney" (a good half hour at least). After applying the solution to most of my head, I had a bad feeling. I looked over the railing from our upstairs hallway to the downstairs family room and my toddler was gone! Completely forgetting about my hair, I went running down the stairs. I found him in the other part of the house, behind the living room couch eating an entire bag of Oreos. Not only did he need a bath, there were crumbs all over my living room! The perfect timing of my high lighting process was the last thing on my mind.....which became obvious after I cleaned up the living room. 


Since the highlighting solution was on my head a good half hour longer than it was supposed to be, 3/4 of my hair was VERY blonde...the other parts, not so much. Being an adult did afford me the luxury of calling my hair salon and getting an "emergency" appointment.


Still you may think, she was young, she must have a clue now that she is middle aged....well not really. In the continuous quest for self beautification, I have realized that my skin is way too pale. I know not to go out in the sun, so what is the next best thing? Self-tanners of course. After a number of self tan disasters such as stripes, orange knees, brown palms; I decided to go to a professional spray tan salon. The first few times I left with good results, but last week the door to the vestibule inside the private spray tan room wouldn't close. Instead of notifying the spray tan professional, I was lazy and just went ahead with the spray process with the vestibule door partially open. The next day, to my horror, I discovered a dark brown line starting at my knee and traveling down to my heel. Yikes! I had two awards ceremonies in a few days where I had to present awards in front of an audience of elementary and middle school students and their parents - wearing a dress was a must. Thank goodness for black tights.


So in the future if you see me wearing tights in Florida in the summer, a hat in an inappropriate place, heavy make up to hide a sunburn, or hair parted in an unusual way, just smile and realize I have been the victim of yet another beauty disaster.

The Day is Finally Here.................

My father told me this would happen. I was in denial. After all I am forty cough, cough, years old and it hadn’t happened yet. Well, yesterday was the day. I can no longer see close up.

I have joined the club. I am one of “them”. You know, the people you see looking at restaurant tabs by moving the receipt farther, then closer. The people who have gasp, “reading glasses” and look down through their glasses to see, then look at you over their glasses. The people whose chins keep moving up and down to focus on whatever they happen to be looking at. What’s next? A fake gold chain around my neck with reading glasses dangling at the end?

Sure, I know others in this club. My Mom says she can’t put make up on without her glasses. How does that even work? I don’t think I can do that. I am not coordinated enough. Thank goodness I don’t wear a lot of make up. I could end up looking like a clown with lipstick on my cheeks.

My husband has already joined the club, so when we go out to dinner, I am the one who has to read the bill and add the tip. What is going to happen now? We had a system. In order to avoid looking like a grandma and pulling out the reading glasses, waitresses all over the Brandon area are going to have random tips because I can’t really see how much our meal cost. They always say that old people are poor tippers…….maybe they just have no clue how much the bill is.

There is an upside to this. I do like feeling part of a group. I am now in the over forty far-sighted group. It is certainly a conversation starter and people like to share their stories. It does seem as though people just wake up one day and seeing close up is gone. Our stories of woe bond us. My dear friend’s husband is one of us. My friend says he drives her crazy because he holds small print up really close to his right eye to see. She says he looks ridiculous. Now that is good stuff – you have to be able to laugh at it all.

So as I enter this new era, I am going to have a positive “outlook” (pardon the pun). I am now part of a proud and strong group of people who have over come life’s little limitations. I will proudly look over my glasses to talk to people, I will leave random tips (at the risk of being called cheap), I may even look into a gold-look reading glasses chain necklace to proudly wear around my neck declaring to the world, “I can’t see, and I don’t care who knows it”.

The Only Things that are Certain in Life are Death, Taxes, ( and two I would like to add.)

They say the only things in life that are certain are death and taxes. I would like to add two things to that list: God and Time flying by. For we Christians, Jesus is a given. He is always there for us. He is the almighty, never changing. We can always count on the Bible being the same and therefore His word being there for us as a guidebook.

In addition, as a woman who some may consider "middle aged" (yikes), I can absolutely count on time going way too fast. As a child I thought Christmas would never get here, never. Now it seems to always BE Christmas. Yes it is time to worry about getting those Christmas cards out again, figuring out what to get the kids and how much to spend, who to give gifts to, making cookies, managing Christmas party schedules, getting out the decorations, lights, wrapping, ................any woman knows exactly what I mean. Doesn't it seem like women get the lion's share of the Christmas responsibilities? How did that happen? I would love a Christmas where I could buy no gifts and just go to church and focus on the real meaning of Christmas, but that is a whole other blog subject. The point is that it is that time again and it ALWAYS seems to come around again too fast! How can years be melting away so quickly?

I honestly sometimes feel like I am still college aged. The other night I was watching a biography on Billy Joel. They showed a video clip of "Uptown Girl" - remember Friday Night Videos? That song was popular when I was a college Freshman pledging Delta Gamma. It brought me back to a road trip our pledge class took to Penn State. The video was on during this party we were having with a Fraternity there. I could so clearly remember the layout of the fraternity house, the temperature (cold), the smells (well fraternity houses always smell like beer), the guys (they were all short for some reason), and "Uptown Girl" was on Friday Night Videos. Now wasn't that just yesterday? It seems like it was.

I was transported to a short time ago when Billy Joel (the coolest dude ever) was married to the most beautiful female on the planet, Christy Brinkley. They seemed to be the perfect couple. There was something hopeful and exciting knowing that an uptown girl would marry a downtown guy. Life seemed to have endless possibilities. I still want a life I consider filled with endless possibilities, maybe that is why I can get back to that place, so easily.

Last month I went to my son's fraternity house for parent's weekend. Again, how can this be? Am I actually the parent here? While standing in line for the meal that was served, I felt like I could have been a sorority girl. It's funny how time goes by so quickly, but things never change. Even though we were at the University of Florida, not the college I graduated from, James Madison University in Virginia, it was the same: the smells, the activities (involving beer and ping pong), the deep bonds and friendships between the brothers, the comfortable feeling, the relaxed atmosphere. For a few hours I was back in college - maybe in a different role, but I was back.

Yes, time flies, but there are things you can always count on.

Housecleaning: An Uphill Battle

I don't know if it is just me, but when people walk into my house, I worry about what they think. Will they notice the dog and cat hair that has formed a ball and is floating around my hardwood floors?. If they need to use the restroom, will there be pee or heaven forbid poop stains on the toilet? What about the dirty dishes in the sink, the kitty litter smell, the windows that haven't been washed in years, the dust............what about the dust???

I think that at least some of my friends have this same issue. Many times when I walk into someone's house, they immediately start apologizing for the mess (which I don't even see). The funny thing is, that I honestly don't care what my friends' houses look like. I don't spend nearly enough time with my friends and when I walk into their houses, I am just thinking about how great it is to be there with them. Does this help me and my personal insecurities? Not at all!!!! I really need to get over it.

The sadly ironic part of this whole dilemma is that if my house happens to be dirty, 99.9999999 percent of the time it is not my fault! Why is it that how our house looks always reflects on the wife/mother? I am a very neat person, my beloved family................well not so much. For example, my kids tend to leave drinks all over the house. It is insane. Glasses....cups.......some empty, some full..........in the bedrooms, in the bathroom, upstairs, kitchen, family room, garage.......you name it. You can always tell where they have been. Added to the joy of this is the cat who tends to enjoy knocking these drinks (typically sodas) over! Rug Stain! Once I found a dirty bowl and a spoon in the bathroom cabinet upstairs. I am still not sure what happened there.

No one but a mom can know how much work our beloved pets are. Cat hair, dog hair, kitty litters, hair balls, poop & pee accidents............who do you think takes care of this in most homes? Roseanne once said that the definition of a mother is someone who cleans other people's poop and doesn't get paid for it! I tend to think of that often for some reason.

So what is the point of all of this? I for one, need to get over it! Housewives and moms as a whole need to not judge any other mom\wife on how clean her house is. If you really need to judge, place the blame where the blame is due: pets, kids, and husbands! If we all band together, we can overcome.

Keeping it Real

I have always considered myself a shy person. I feel comfortable not being the center of attention and enjoy observing people and how they act in different situations. When I was a child it always irritated me that adults  could be in a bad mood at home, but when the phone rang they became, what seemed like, very pleasant and friendly.  My grandmother was the beautiful Southern Belle who morphed into a completely different person when other people were around. Her voice, her expressions, her body movements - completely changed when friends were around. As a teenager, I despised this! I couldn't believe how fake she could be!!! (as a side note, I now realize and appreciate who she was and absolutely adore her and her memory. I honestly miss her and her Southern kindness and love every single day). But, at the time, she drove me nuts. I vowed to not be a fake person and try and act the same around my family as I do around friends. This of course is impossible, but I think I am on the "non fake" end of the spectrum.

Anyone who has been around Erik and me for any length of time has probably seen us bicker about things. Anyone who has been in a Bible study or Life Group with me knows I have some personal struggles. I don't hold back or try to give the impression of a person who has no flaws. I like this quality in other people as well.  I can relate to people who aren't perfect. Have you ever gotten one of those Christmas card newsletters and wanted to slit your own throat? Stories of beautiful people with beautiful, smart, athletic, successful and flawless children. I have come away from some of those letter thinking - "wow, in comparison, my life sucks". After a few moments I realize that this letters typically represent families who are trying to convince themselves that they have perfect lives and perfect children. News FLASH - no one does!

In this blog I have been very honest about my struggles to try and be a good parent. I have been honest about the issues my family deals with and my own insecurities. Yesterday I received a seething facebook message about how hurtful my blog must be to my children. This person couldn't seem to hold back the anger towards me anymore. It made me question myself and this blog. The last thing in the world I would want to do is hurt my children. My main goal in life was always to be a mother and I love my kids with all my heart. I would honestly die for each one of them. They have been shown love, respect, care, and kindness in this home. I really don't want to try and defend my parenting, because that is not the point.

The goal of this blog is to "be Real", to reach out to other parents who may have some of the same struggles and issues. I could write a blog about how beautiful, smart, talented and wonderful my children are - and I truly believe they are, but who would learn anything from that or be comforted by that? As I am considering continuing with this blog or not, I would truly appreciate any positive feedback and reluctantly accept any negative feedback (LOL).

A Mohawk.....REALLY?

With teenagers, I have learned, you need to choose your battles....do I hear an amen? When Erik and I first talked about having children we boldly declared that no child of OURS would have a piercing, dress weird or have an (what we deemed) inappropriate haircut. We simply wouldn't allow it.

Well with raising a teenager there are much bigger issues to face. A few "challenges" we have had to deal with include lying, having girlfriends in the house alone, skipping school, and having a planned fight appear on YouTube. Oh yeah, and the first day my oldest got his driver's license, he drove to St. Petersburg, an hour away via Interstate 75, to purchase an Xbox from a guy he met on the Internet (still can't get over that one). Thank goodness nothing bad happened. These are all things I never planned to deal with because, well remember? MY teenagers would be perfectly well behaved......they were related to me after all. To steal a phrase from Virgina Slims, "I have come a long way baby". All of the above issues and incidents involved a lot of yelling, arguing, punishment enforcement, and tears (from me).

Last year my middle child came to us wanting to get his ears pierced. I said "no way", but I would let his dad decide. Well, Erik assumed he meant one ear. IN OUR DAY, two ear piercings were unheard of at least in the conservative suburbs of Washington, D.C....... 

Erik caved. He agreed to one piercing while our son believed he was agreeing to two. When the discrepancy was discovered the poop hit the fan (to put it nicely). Arguing, yelling, and angst followed. Both sides polled facebook friends to see what their opinion was. Surprisingly(LOL) most of the over 40 crowd was "against" and the younger generation was "for". Since it was eventually established that two piercings were not going to happen, our son agreed to one. It's a proud moment when a father takes his 15 year old to the mall to get his ear pierced. Even prouder when you run into people you know from church. As Erik saw the church ladies approaching, he strategically started walking diagonally away from the earring piercing counter (close call).

This event took place last year and I am getting over it. I fine with it (I think). Well, lets just say I don't want to argue about it anymore. Our church picture appointment with Olan Mills is tomorrow. Yesterday, my son asked if he could get a haircut (wow, I thought, he really cared about looking nice for this church picture). He then tells me of his plans for a Mohawk. Really........really? Luckily, without much yelling or family turmoil, he agreed to wait until AFTER our picture is taken. I am not excited about the idea, but feel blessed he was willing to wait without much hassle. This is a battle I choose not to fight.