The “To Do” List

We all make “To Do” lists, right? Ok. Well, 90% of us make them and the rest of you are just weird. I make To Do lists all the time. Most of them just in my head. But I hardly go a day without making a list at some point. They come in levels; Things I must do today. Things I ought to do today. Things I cannot forget to buy at the store. Things I would like to get done this week. Things I want to do with my life...

At least once a week it inevitably spirals out into this rambling train of thought about my goals in life or what I’d like to accomplish in the next ten years or even just particularly ambitious visions about the number of things I can accomplish in a week (see above) . On particularly dull car rides, I find myself making a list of the things I will do for loved ones should I ever win the lottery (a wildly impractical list considering that I do not actually play the lottery.)

I get some joy from these lists. I feel centered when I go through and remind myself just what my goals are - whether those goals are to buy a carton of milk or to see the Galapagos Islands before I die (My Before I Die list is very very very long. What about yours?)

I think the trick is not having an excessive attachment to the whole “crossing off” process. Generally I find the reminder of more use to me than the actual plodding one-after-another accomplishments. I mean, it’s a good feeling to be able to cross things off a list and certainly supplies a feeling of accomplishment... when I KNOW I will be crossing things off I sometimes break each task into smaller components to increase the number of things I can cross off. It’s great fun. But I also just like knowing something is on the list. On the list - to me - means that I will, eventually have done that. And that can be tremendously reassuring.

The big abstract life lists are the best. I go back through old notebooks and discover lists made ten years ago. I love the thrill of finding something I have since accomplished. Lists are on my mind because this is shaping up to be a big list year for me. I’m doing some serious traveling. I’m in a play. I’m at this very moment searching for a new place to live so I can have a studio space for my art. At the end of the year I look forward to going back through old notebooks to see how many things I can cross off. Maybe I should break the list down into many little components so I can enjoy a magnified sense of accomplishment later on (1. Get passport. 2. Pack suitcase. 3. Go on very long plane ride. 4. Spend time in Scotland. 5. Flirt with Scottish men....)

'Tis the Season

... and on another holiday note, the following message appears in kid-style scrawly handwriting inside a greeting card created for an elderly parishoner by a student in my co-worker's sunday school class:

"JegoL Bell's JegoL
Bell's JegoL all the
way oH wute
fun it is to
ride oN a
one hors opiN
slay!”

Underneath is a big heart filled in with rambling, jagged squiggles. The front of the card is a manger scene and Mary is twice the size of Joseph and they both have big google eyes and wide smiles and the baby between them is tiny and his head is being squished by the bold brown box of a manger drawn all around him.

It is the cutest thing. EVER.

I may be forced to have some semblance of Holiday spirit now.

Over the River and Through the Wood

”Over the river, and through the wood,
to Grandfather's house we go;
the horse knows the way to carry the sleigh
through the white and drifted snow.”

- Lydia Maria Child

OK. Technically this is a Thanksgiving poem, so I’m late. But I associate it with the Winter Holidays in general. And this is what I learned today:

This very well-known poem was written by a woman, Lydia Maria Child (1802 - 1880). She was one of the first women in America to earn a living writing. She wrote domestic advice books and published a children’s magazine - which is where the poem first appeared. She was an anti-slavery activist and is considered by some to be the first white person to have written a book urging the emancipation of slaves. She actively supported Native American rights and her novel, Hobomok, published in 1824, was noteworthy for it’s sympathetic portrayal of a Native American character. Not surprisingly, Child was also a women’s rights activist - but she considered women’s rights as an issue that could not make progress until after slavery had been abolished. In her day, this woman was considered a radical and her writing was important to the movements in which she was involved.

I find it interesting that this poem is the one piece of Lydia Maria Child's work that has endured in the public awareness (so fully that it has remained popular for well over 150 years). This woman accomplished so much, but she is remembered for an innocent children’s ditty.

Lydia Maria Child was a Unitarian Universalist and a more comprehensive biography of her can be found here at the UU online dictionary. The full text of the poem can be found here.

The Accidental Meme

After my post here about the Vanity Fair Proust Questionnaire, Sheila of “The Sheila Variations” picked it up in her blog here. I didn't actually think I was starting a meme. Thus far, however, I have traced it here, here, here, here and here.

I guess it’s about time I posted my own answers, although I know you will enjoy answering the questions far more than finding out what I have to say about them. I admit, however, that I have enjoyed reading other people's answers.



What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Being without worry, having unlimited time and resources

What is your greatest fear?

That I will not be loved

What historical figure do you most identify with?

Molly Brown

Which living person do you most admire?

Tom Waits

What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?

impatience

What trait do you most deplore in others?

dishonesty

What is your greatest extravagance?

time

On what occasion do you lie?

to prevent unecessary suffering

What do you most dislike about your appearance?

That I’m not a size 4

What is your favorite journey?

Hiking up a mountain on Mount Desert Island in Maine. The juxtaposition of the mountains against the ocean is breathtaking.

Any flight that takes me somewhere new or much loved. I enjoy the anticipation one feels traveling somewhere in the air, eager to arrive and explore a new city. I have always liked airports.

What do you consider the most overrated virtue?

chastity

Which living person do you most despise?

the current US president and his administration
(rote, but true)

Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

"Absolutely."

What is your greatest regret?

the time I have lost

What or who is the greatest love of your life?

It isn’t over yet, so I can't say for certain.

When and where were you happiest?

The first things that come to mind:

10 or 11 at night, Winter of 1993, walking outside in thick fresh snow with my little sister while the whole world seemed still and magical. Our two sets of footprints stretched out behind us and the moon glowed off the snow so everything was lit with a hazy half-light and we felt like the only two people in the world.

September 2000, in a hotel room in Boston, watching someone sleep.

Which talent would you most like to have?

a facility with languages

What is your current state of mind?

restless

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

I would be more driven and have greater faith in myself.

If you could change one thing about your family, what would it be?

Christmas

If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what would it be?

the universe has a sense of humor - I would probably be a man

If you could choose what or who to come back as, what would it be?

a bird

What do your consider your greatest achievement?

the distance I have come from where I began

What is your most treasured possession?

my grandmother’s engagement ring

What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?

abject poverty

What is your most marked characteristic?

my red hair, the manner in which I speak

What is the quality you most like in a man?

intelligence
lack of pretention
firm belief that I am absolutely wonderful

What is the quality you most admire in a woman?

wit
warmth
adventurousness

What do you most value in your friends?

loyalty and willingness to be there ("It's the friends you can call up at 4am that matter." - Marlene Dietrich)

Who are your favourite writers?

Harlan Ellison, Rita Mae Brown (earlier work), Terry Pratchett, Tom Robbins, Jane Austen, Octavia Butler, E.F. Benson

Who is your favourite hero of fiction?

Michael Valentine Smith

Who are your heroes in real life?

Katherine Hepburn

What are your favourite names?

Grace, Anton, Roarke, Gabriel

What is it that you most dislike?

worry

How would you like to die?

No, thank you.

What is your motto?

Live fully so that you have no regret.

Breasts. Boobies. Or, as my friend Sean calls them, “Woo-Hoos”

“Whoever thought up the word "Mammogram"? Every time I hear it, I think I'm supposed to put my breast in an envelope and send it to someone.”

- Jan King

If you are anything like me, you aren’t feeling your boobs often enough. I know I’m supposed to give myself a self-exam once a month, but the closest I usually come to that is when I push and prod them to make sure they are appearing to their best advantage in my demi-cup bra.

It is a serious matter, however, and we should all be giving ourselves self-exams (all straight men will probably be amazed we don’t mess with our breasts all that much but I guess they just don’t hold the same level of fascination for us) and women over 40 should be getting annual mammograms. Early detection is the best possible way of ensuring survival and no one thinks it will happen to them. Like all disasters, Breast Cancer is something that you think “happens to other people”... right up until the moment that it happens to you or someone you love.

I’m younger than the recommended age, but I’ve had a mammogram once. In spite of having some frame of reference, when I hear the word “Mammogram”, I picture someone in a large breast costume doing a tap dance and singing a little ditty at my front door. I assure you that the actual mammogram process is far less frightening than having a singing boob at your front door.

Go here for an FAQ about Breast Cancer, and here for instructions on giving yourself a self-exam (I think it would be much more entertaining and user-friendly if they called it “How to feel yourself up.”) There have also been attempts by anti-abortion groups to link breast cancer to abortion. If you’ve heard that and want to get more information, I recommend reading this.

The Scarf

A colleague of Audrey Hepburn’s is quoted as saying that when she was young she owned “one skirt, one blouse, one pair of shoes, and a beret, but she had fourteen scarves” and that she wore those scarves so cleverly that she always looked chic.

Some women just know how to wear a scarf. My mother was like that when she was younger. She always looks glamorous in old photographs and when I was a child she had a drawer that was filled entirely with scarves. She knew what to do with them, how to wear them to brighten an outfit or draw attention to her face. So I have always associated scarves with women who really understand style, with a certain level of sophistication.

I wear scarves, but not memorably. More often than my peers perhaps, and not only in winter (practical, wooly winter scarves don’t count). I have a drawer filled with diaphanous squares of fabric and long slender rectangles of silk. I find I am so uncertain how to best wear them that most of them stay in the drawer, much loved but never seen.

When I was young, my mother made me walk up and down the hall with an encyclopedia on my head. She bought me books about table manners for formal dining. She even taught me that a lady should select one perfume and wear it her entire life as it becomes her signature scent. These things are more remarkable considering that I come from a background where... well, let’s just say that during my childhood I was never required to identify one fork from another. My mother just had an idea of what a lady should be, and wanted very much for me to be one. As a result, I have excellent posture and have been wearing the same perfume for almost two decades - since I was first old enough to wear perfume. She managed, however, to skip the lesson about wearing scarves.

I wrap them about my head or neck and fiddle around with the ends or drape them over my shoulders and 9 times out of 10 I leave the house sans scarf (this is because 9 times out of 10 I end up looking like a swami in a turban or a mental patient who thinks she is wearing a superhero cape). On those rare occasions that I get it “right” and it looks presentable, I leave the house with a lighter step. It's funny how the things we learn as a child stick with us so. On days that I wear a scarf I feel I am somehow a bit closer to being the lady I was raised to be.

Tallulah Bankhead

To learn more about Tallulah Bankhead’s career, click on any of the photographs or the links under the quotes - each one links to a website or biography.

(On seeing a former lover for the first time in years)

“I thought I told you to wait in the car.”

- Tallulah Bankhead

This charismatic, “whiskey-voiced” woman had such a distinctive, forceful personality that, almost 40 years after her death, her personality is still what she is best remembered for. Her family (Her father was the Speaker of the House, William Brockman Bankhead.) tried to raise her to be more restrained by sending her to various private schools - including a convent school - but the effort failed. At 15 she convinced her family to let her move to New York to pursue acting. She became an actress on screen and on stage (where she garnered greater critical acclaim than in her films, with the notable exception of her work in Alfred Hitchcock's Lifeboat). While she found fame as an actress, she was just as well known for being bold, promiscuous and having a sharp wit. Always partying, she used drugs but wasn’t known to drink very much alcohol until later in life. She was also openly bisexual, quipping that, “My father warned me about men and booze... but he never said anything about women and cocaine.”

“If I had my life to live again, I'd make the same mistakes, only sooner.”

- Tallulah Bankhead

I’m not saying I endorse her lifestyle. Heaven knows it got her into enough trouble - in 1933 she almost died during an emergency hysterectomy for an advanced case of gonorrhea - but the experience showed no sign of slowing her down. Her behavior, which has been referred to as self-destructive, nonetheless appears to have been rooted in her powerful ego and a voracious lust for life.

While it wouldn’t be healthy to model one’s self after Tallulah Bankhead, the lingering fascination with her makes perfect sense. She was beautiful. She was witty and very outspoken. She didn’t ask permission. She didn’t care what anyone thought of her. She may have been something of a hedonist, but she lived life fully. Most people could benefit from just a little bit of her wild spirit.

“Nobody can be exactly like me.
Sometimes even I have trouble doing it.”

- Tallulah Bankhead

What Will They Think of Next?

I have no particular explanation for it, but I find myself saying that fairly often considering that I am not a cute doddering little old lady marveling at the technology created by clever young people. During my entire lifetime new technologies and new variations of every product have been released on a regular basis. I still stop and look at Kleenex “with lotion” or the gadget my neighbor has that pulls their garden hose whip-snap back into a circular coiled contraption and remark upon how clever people are to think of these things. I guess I just appreciate intelligent design and find the slow alteration of every mundane item we touch into a more useful, less work intensive version of it’s original self fascinating (Incidentally I also find it creepy because someday we’re going to live like the Jetsons and show our kids drawings of trees - but that’s a subject for a different post).

In spite of our marvelous advances, buns are still packaged in sets of 8 and hot dogs are still packaged in sets of 10 so it’s not like EVERYTHING is benefitting from intelligent design.

This weekend, for my unseasonably early "Spring Cleaning", I needed packing tape to put together the many many boxes I was packing off to the thrift shop. So I went looking through the tape options at the grocery store. That there are at least two dozen options is odd enough as it is. But what really threw me for a loop was this: Noiseless Packing Tape.

Is it just me? Is this not weird? No one needs packing tape to be noiseless as they pull it from the roll for any kind of legitimate reason. I mean, I suppose if one is packing in the middle of the night while someone is sleeping and trying to get out of the house quickly without waking them... but I think in those circumstances one just packs a suitcase. And maybe mace.

I can only think of nefarious uses for noiseless packing tape.

I picture animated conversations between persons planning bank heists discussing the benefits of noiseless tape for binding wrists together instead of the old-fashioned kind. I can just imagine a kidnapper happening upon the noiseless tape in the school supplies section and thinking, “Finally, a tape designed for MY needs!” Of course, I have a vivid imagination and watch too much Law and Order: Criminal Intent (I know television rots my brain, but I love Vincent D’Onofrio. I can’t help myself.) There are probably plenty of uses for noiseless packing tape that don’t involve hostages or ransom notes constructed with torn out letters from a magazine.

I just can’t think of any.

Spring Cleaning

It almost never happens in the spring for me, but that's how I think of it. Every so often I absolutely MUST clean out my home. It starts slowly and then gradually rages out of control as I rummage about in my house delighting in every discovery of something I do not need and therefore may get rid of.

It's more of a mental and emotional excersize. What am I willing to let go of? What have I learned that I don't need? How have my priorities shifted since the last Spring Cleaning? Who am I really and, as that person, would I wear this dress?

You know, the important questions in life.

I am on the verge of a "Spring Cleaning" (which ironically so rarely involves me actually scrubbing anything. I hate scrubbing things.) I have arranged for some boxes and already know which things are going first. I have checked to see what hours the local women's shelter thrift shop accepts donations. There's probably something wrong with me that the idea of getting rid of any material possesions that I can bear to part with makes me incredibly happy, but it just does. I think it's the sessation that I carry the weight of my material possessions with me in life, and that they are what ties me to the ground. The fewer things I own, the more free I feel.

Earlier this year a friend of mine sold everything she owned - literally opened up her three bedroom home and sold everything but some boxes of keepsakes and some sentimental things - and then sold her home and moved to another coutry with just a few suitcases in tow. I watched her progress with envy and glee as everything slowly disappeared from her home. Maybe I felt crowded as a child, or perhaps I was traumatized by a particularly scray home redecorating program - I have no idea. I just know that on Monday I will step more lightly, immersed in the illusion that my ties to the ground have been eased.

The Art of Wednesday Kirwan

Kirwan’s “Maneaters: Harpies”
© Wednesday Kirwan

Wednesday Kirwan is a children’s illustrator and artist. Her fine art often uses the same sweet moon faces as her children’s illustration, but is combined for an almost startling effect with mythological imagery and more mature themes. Really fascinating work. View her gallery at wednesdaykirwan.com. The website features a shop where she sells prints of her work as well as really clever little cameo reproductions of her work.

Of course, I am also very taken with her illustration depicting children with rabbits (which can be found in the illustration gallery). I’m a sucker for bunnies.