Millie's House

It was the same thing every day for years after my mom went back to work. I awoke to the alarm's siren-like, screeching monotone at the ungodly hour of 5:30 A.M. I then got ready for the long day ahead. I ate breakfast, usually a bowl of raisin bran, while my mom shuffled around the kitchen in her large, zip-front bathrobe like a barge drifting out of port. She'd drink black coffee, chain smoke long, skinny, brown menthol More cigarettes, and read some sort of Mystery or Science fiction novel, holding the tightly bound paperback with her bony fingers and yellowed fingernails.
At 6:30 we'd pile in the Cadillac Coupe De Ville and she'd stop in front of Millie Cohen's house around the corner. I'd run up their front lawn, enter through the unlocked front door and pull the screen door, against its will, quietly and quickly closed. Once inside I was greeted by the aroma of a house that was not my own. All houses, and the families that carry on inside them, seem to collect their own unique scent.
I still recall how dark and still it was inside while everyone was still sleeping. Sometimes I'd sit on the recliner in their den and watch cartoons with the volume turned low, my eyes growing heavier as I tried not to fall asleep. The house was so quiet I could hear the ticking of the kitchen's wall clock. Their dog, a huge Great Dane called Malka, would lay beside my chair, breathing heavily and licking her drooping, wet chops as she continuously shifted position.
As I grew more accustomed to this morning routine, I started going upstairs and stealthily entering my friend Valerie's bedroom. She was the youngest of Millie's three daughters. There was Marlena, the oldest and most crass in her daily choice of words and volume of delivering them; Stacey, a soft-spoken, slight young woman with a constant expression of surprise plastered to her flattened face; and finally, Valerie, one year younger, but in her attitude one year older and wiser than me.
As I padded into her bedroom, I envied her still wrapped in the safe, warm cocoon of sleep under covers and on top of a soft, yielding mattress. I'd shuffle across the shag carpeting and sit across from her bed, leaning my back against Stacey's bed and simply close my eyes and wait for time to pass.
When the sun began peeking in the bedroom window, Valerie would wake up and find her outfit for the day which had been laid out for her by her mommy at the end of the bed the night before. I remember being so envious of this simple ritual, thinking it was so cool to have a mom with nothing more important to do than make sure your matching sweatpants and sweatjacket had a coordinating top and pair of socks.
In fact, I thought this was so cool that one Saturday, when my best friend Beth arrived early one Saturday morning, on her dad's way to work, I pretended to still be asleep. I had laid an outfit, much like one that Valerie would wear, at the end of MY bed, imagining my mom had picked it out for me and placed it there, just so, for my convenience and comfort.
Millie's house became more than just a safe place for me to go in the morning before school. Over time, its memory has become its own unique and separate entity; pieces of another family's life frozen in time. It was their early morning ritual of frozen solid New York style bagels, popped into one of the first microwave ovens I'd ever seen, until they became hot and rubbery. Then they were slathered with cream cheese and baked salmon procured from a deli in Manhattan on their Dad, Phil the Plumber's way home from work once a month.
Millie's had perfected a recipe for Chicken A La King made from a series of ingredients all of which came out of a can. My mother once tried to replicate it, from scratch she says, and somehow the canned and preservative laden version beat her out in my book. She's never let me live that one down!
Millie was the quintessential housewife and mother. Straightening the house, bossing the kids, and wrapping gifts for the birthday parties they would attend on some weekends. I specifically recall watching her wrap a box so perfectly that this image is always at the forefront of my mind, to this day, whenever I am required to wrap gifts. While my mom perfected the art of covering gifts in tin foil, Millie would fold proper wrapping paper neatly at the corners and tape them up flawlessly. Although I shun tin foil and try to emulate Millie, the homemaking goddess, my ends always seem to be too long and end up smashed and wrinkled under the folded paper like a big mistake I must cover over every time.
While she would go about her homemaking, she would often confide in me; talk to me as if I were her friend and co-conspirator in all things home, while her daughters flitted about, needing things and requesting entertainment, like the children they ought to be. In her house dress, worn thin with washing and snapped all the way up the front, she would put one leg up on a kitchen chair, drag heavily on her Marlboro Reds, and complain about the kids, many of her sentences beginning with only four words..."Son of a bitch..." and ending - due to an inevitable interruption mid sentence by one of her charges - with a "You bastard!" pronounced as if she were spitting watermelon pits, her lips tight with frustration.
Thirty years later, I am a stay-at-home mom. For now, at least. Just like I always envied Millie's children and desired to emulate Millie. I do many of the same things she did on a daily basis and they don't seem as glamorous or grown-up. They are just what I do. But, let me assure you I DO NOT wear house dresses. Anymore. Although I must admit to a brief stint with them while nursing my second baby, Sadie. They were just so easy to snap and unsnap for feedings, which were frequent and left me feeling like a walking udder half the time. I do not know how to make, nor do I desire to try my hand at making Chicken A La King. I don't even know if there is such a thing anymore. But, I have my tried and true recipes that my family will probably remember years from now, many of which come from a box or get popped into a new and improved microwave. I still have not perfected the art of gift-wrapping, although Millie sits beside me, it seems, every time I try. Maybe when she gets frustrated with my half-assed folding and tucking, she might even be shouting at me...."Son of a bitch!!!"

Writing vs. Life

As many of my friends and family know...I am working on writing a novel. My second attempt at such a grueling task and I am hoping and planning to actually finish this one. And like so many of my inspiring thoughts, this one came to me after the lights were turned out at 11 p.m. one night and I was lying in bed, mind racing.
Writing is a lot like Life in three essential ways:
1. You can not do it in any order you map out. No matter how hard you try or believe you can.
2. It is a rather messy process that is mentally quite painful.
3. You must simply learn as you go. There are no prescribed set of instructions.

Holidazzle 2010

These past few days were devoted to shuttling to and from rehearsals and in and out of dressing rooms and costumes to the final two night extravaganza of John Leggio Center for the Performing Arts' annual Christmas recital. This year it was titled Holidazzle. The girls had a blast. And they are growing up and developing as dancers. They smiled on stage. They knew their moves. And, most of all, they were proud of themselves. And we were all proud of them too!

a tough year

As we round the corner to a whole new year, i get to thinking about this past one. there are, of course, some fond memories. however, i am clouded by many a difficult one. such as...one year ago, on December 8th, i went in for what was to be a routine sonogram for a baby which was unplanned, and a pleasant surprise. i was informed that he/she had no heartbeat. i will never forget this day. just like i never forget that day many years ago when i lost a dear friend on January 13th. it is these days that will forever remain etched in my mind.
my husband is about to lose his current job. through no fault of his own. just the ways of fate and how the cards were dealt (and how some people dealt them).
but this posting is not meant to be a long list of my woes or a sob story to make everyone feel sorry for me. instead, i try to look at each New Year as a new beginning. a perfect spot to collect the bad stuff that littered the past year and put it in the trash bin; to start with a clean slate.
 it is a time to remember the good times, be they even single good moments; like when my daughter Isabella started Kindergarten and lost her first front tooth; or my son Evan rode a two-wheeler for the first time, his little round head bouncing and weaving down the street as he pushed on those pedals and listed side to side to keep his precarious balance.these are the things I will remember most when i think back on my life. i am certain of it.
because now that i am 38, i look back on many a year, some of which may have seemed unpleasant at the time...for example those seemingly endless years of being single in my 20's, hoping to meet "the one" and get married. ...and realize that those times had their pleasant points - going out with friends all over New York City, first dates, first kisses. and, let's not neglect those stories we have all amassed during those swinging single years. the ones we tell and retell all our friends about. some dumb thing some bozo did. and, believe me, that bozo could very well have been ME sometimes!
point is, now that i am here in 2010, i look back on those years fondly. i have only bittersweet nostalgia for the tough times that only made getting to this place in life even sweeter.
and that brings me to my point. i have big dreams for my future and the future of my family. who doesn't? i dream of a big, old house that my husband and i can restore and put our whole heart and soul into; plenty of land for the kids to run and play; a couple of big dogs (Irish Setters, preferably); and, who knows, maybe even a horse or two!
i just KNOW we are gonna have a great life. things will improve. maybe i will finally FINISH a whole book. hey...maybe i will even publish a book!!
and then...one day...when we are sitting on our wrap-around porch, in rocking chairs, at our completely restored historic home, we will look with fondness on our perceived hardships and feel slightly nostalgic for our past...when we were younger...when our kids were still so little....when we tried (although unsuccessfully it sometimes seems) to stay on a tight budget (or grow grass in Florida)...when things were simpler (or, not so simple).
it is when we look back on these years that we will wish we had focused less on what we didn't have and more on ALL we did!

i lost my wedding band

the other day my son Evan, who is obsessed with all things trucks, got me to stand on a busy street corner and wait for trucks to go by. when they drove past he would pump his right arm up and down motioning for them to honk their horns. some did. and then, some were too busy on their phones or cb radios or whatever it is they do while they drive. poor little guy. he is so crestfallen when he can't get a beep outta one of them. some of them are such good sports though. thank goodness. for his sake as much as mine. i wanted to get outta there. it was one of the coldest days we have had yet here in Florida as of late.
it was so cold i guess my fingers must have shrunk and my wedding band must have slipped right out of my fingerless glove.
we continued about our day, finally arriving at the YMCA, where when i went into the locker room, i removed my glove only to discover my engagement ring sitting solo on my finger and my wedding band nowhere to be found. i searched all my bags. i searched my entire car. i searched on the ground beneath and around my car. i retraced my steps back to previous spots. did not find it.
then, i regrouped at home. i cried. then, i asked Evan to come with me one more time to the spot on which we had been standing that morning and look once more. i had resigned myself to the fact that i most likely would not find it. but, now i was calm. i had to give it another go.
we retraced our steps from where we had parked and walked over to the spot we had stood, all the while combing the ground. nothing. then, i sat down, spent, an emotional wreck, deflated, hopeless.....
Evan stood before me, reached down into the grass and pulled up something which he handed to me with a simple, "Mommy, what's this?" as he slowly lifted it from beneath a few blades of grass under which my own feet may have trampled it when I had searched the area earlier. he handed it to me. i slipped it onto my finger. i sat down. and i cried in relief and appreciation and joy. i hugged that boy so tight. and all i could think of was how i had only lost a ring. my wedding band. a symbol of a bond between two people. imagine the pain of losing an actual person one loves? i cried and held him tight, thankful for my angel; my healthy, smart, beautiful angel of a little boy. who had helped his mommy more than he could even comprehend.