Category — Communication

Last Monday, I got home to find my back door hanging open, door frame shattered - someone had broken in, and I wasn’t sure if they were still there or not. Deep dread took root - I immediately returned to the sidewalk and called 911. The cops came, cleared the house, and took me on a quick tour to see what had been taken. And while very little was actually stolen - sorry folks, no Xbox or plasma TV in this family - they went through EVERYTHING. Every single drawer in our bedroom was dumped out; they went through our closets, took the cushions off the couch, pawed through our photographs. Ugh.

So all week, I’ve been feeling shaky, crazy, violated - there’s something really unique about trying to decide whether to pick your underwear up and put it away, wash it in hot water, or throw it out and start over. Last night, I was having a hard time getting to sleep, and my mind wandered to an odd summer 10 years ago. In college, I spent 18 months living in and running houses owned by the Brown Association for Cooperative Housing. This experience was amazing and inspiring - nearly 50 students responsible for everything from household maintenance (purchased a new boiler and new roof at age 19) to planning menus and cooking meals. But keeping the houses full in the summer was a critical part of the organizations’ financial solvency, and sometimes a challenge. One summer we had an interesting house mate: a Trinidadian steel drum professor whose wife had kicked him out for running around on her. He was desperate for housing, we were desperate for a rent check, and a match was made.

This gentleman had major physical limitations due to childhood polio, and once he latched on to me as the “landlady”, he was constantly calling me to help him put up curtains, move furniture, etc. Always generous, he would try to pay me for my time with joints - he smoked more pot than any college student I’ve seen before or since, and we had some serious hippies in the house. But he also taught me the secret of using blueing crystals to wash out the bad spirits from a space that’s being moved into, or that’s been tainted with bad juju. You put just enough blueing in to turn the water pail blue, then scrub out each corner of each room with this purifying water, to bring peace to any tormented spirits and to the home. I’ve had a square of blueing tucked into my stuff, moving around with it for 10 years, but never using it. Maybe it’s the secret I need to clear my head.

You have the right too look good and feel great. GUCCI DEALS everyone can afford.

That was the subject line for an email I received. 

Just wanted to share.

So I’ve been going to Weight Watchers meetings.  I’m coming out about it.

I’m a little self-conscious about it, but I’ve decided to bite the bullet and just say it. Oy.

My most recent weekly meeting had me a little bit irritated.

The process works if you actually do it. (It works if you work it… keep it simple… one day at a time… they’re all the same…)

I like the group I attend.  I chose it pretty carefully.  On a Sunday morning, so folks who might be inclined to go to church would already be there.  In a town where I don’t know anyone.

I get there early.  Big surprise.

I weigh in… down a bit, which is exciting.

And then I sit down to read the cute little booklet they give you every week.

Out of the corner of my eye, I can see three other people in the room.  A woman I think of as The Complainer, and another woman I have never see who I now think of as The Bitch.  The Bitch has a kid with her… probably 12 or 13 years old. A girl.  Overweight, tom-boyish (not that I know anything about that), close to as bitchy as her mother.

The Complainer always has a reason why Weight Watchers isn’t working for her… she can’t eat too much fish because of the mercury.  She can’t exercise because her joints hurt. She can’t have too much water because of her kidneys.  She can’t eat balanced meals because she eats at her workplace.  Lots of excuses and complaining.

The Bitch I’ve never seen before. Their conversation goes something like this (they’re talking about me):

The Bitch: Who’s that?

The Complainer:She’s stoopit. (She has a wicked RI accent.)

The Bitch: I thought you had to be overweight to go to WW.

The Complainer: Yeah.

The Bitch: I just got back from vacation… I need to do something.  I want that scale down NOW.

And on and on and on.  Now, I’m not huge, but I am definitely overweight. 

And really, I don’t go to WW for The Bitch or The Complainer.  I go for me.

It gets better.

Other people arrive.  A woman I call Chatty and The Sister.

Then a relatively fit woman comes in. 

Now remember, if you did WW and lost weight, you can be a lifetime member.

You can go to meetings for free forever. (You have to follow some rules…)

I have no idea if Fit Girl is a lifetime member.  It’s not really any of my business.

The Bitch (to Chatty): Who’s that?

Chatty: She only  has 10 pounds to lose.

The Bitch: If I looked like that, I wouldn’t be here.

Fit Girl (to Chatty): This is why it took me 6 months to actually come to a meeting.

The Bitch: What’s that?

Chatty: This is why she didn’t come before…

And my personal favorite…

Chatty: I started going to the gym… but I put on a half pound. But I’ll see what happens next week…

The Bitch: See, that’s why I don’t walk or exercise.  I don’t want to gain.

Really?  Come on. 

The Bitch needs to get a grip.  Perhaps if she spent some of the time on herself that she is spending making other people irritated and self-conscious, she’d actually see that scale go down…

More: http://improveverywhere.com/

I went to high school with about 120 people at any given time.

That’s right, the whole high school.  120 people.  And that’s being generous.

Most classes had 30 or less girls in it.  Young women.  Whatever.

It was a fancy private school.  Lincoln School for girls.

One of a handfull in the greater Providence area.

I have a bit of a strange memory.  I was a math geek.  I almost failed history.  Like every single year.  I got a 2 on the US History AP exam.  Not pretty.

But I can remember the names of most of the people in the classes 4 years ahead of and behind my grade.  It’s a fun party trick (really, though, only if you are one of the people who I went to Lincoln with… otherwise, it’s just boring).

Of late, I’ve been keeping up with some folks who I didn’t really know at Lincoln, but whose names are on that list that I can rattle off.

One of them writes a fab Monday Mantra at 3″ Heels & the Search for Spirituality.

When I knew her, at Lincoln, it wasn’t well.  To be honest, I still don’t really know her, other than what I hear from my Lincoln gossip tree and her blog.  But I enjoy it more becuase I remember her from school, and the adolescent preconceptions I had about who she was and what she was all about (and I had her mom for a class). 

I don’t know if any of what I thought about her was true back then, or now. 

But I like the idea that even in that tiny community, it is years later and only virtually, that I know anything at all about her.