Last fall I decided that I’d attempt to force some daffodil bulbs to bloom inside the house this winter. I thought the yellow flowers would be a spot of cheerfulness in February, the grayest of months.
I found THIS ARTICLE that told me how to create the perfect environment for my daffodils so that when it was time to take them out of the dark basement, they’d not get leggy. Instead, they’d use their energy to make the flowers bloom bigger, better, more colorful.
Bloom being the operative word here.
I did as instructed, rescuing the bulbs from basement darkness a few weeks ago. At first it seemed like I was going to have, as they used to say, a success experience because the bulbs were getting jiggy, pushing healthy green leaves upward.
I was jazzed.
In fact, in anticipation of the yellow flowers I put the pots with the bulbs in a sunny spot on the kitchen table, where I’d see the beauty from many rooms.
As per the article in order to stunt their growth, I watered the bulbs with a carefully measured concoction of water and alcohol. I mean when you task me with the responsibility of getting some daffodils drunk, I take it seriously. Do my best. Or so I thought.
However as the days have gone by, the daffodils have grown leggy and there’s no indication that they’ll ever bloom. I agree that they’re a lovely shade of green, but as for the yellow flowers?
There are none and I am sad.
Thinking this through all I can figure is that despite what the article said, in order to stunt their growth the bulbs needed more alcohol than I gave them. This means I failed them, not getting them liquored up enough to bloom where they were planted.
But if nothing else at least I tried, getting a good blog story out of it. 🍸
These daffodils appear to be sober and aren’t blooming, with no indication that they will. Let that be a lesson to you.
You’re with a group of people and one woman, Queen Bee, starts to talk about her moral dilemma “blah blah blah” problem. She wants everyone in the group to tell her what to do, that’s how distraught she claims to be.
You remain politely reserved saying nothing, thinking to yourself this isn’t a problem you crowdsource for a solution,while everyone else [oh. my. to. the. goodness. gracious.] tells Queen Bee what is wrong with her. And what she should do. And how she should do it.
Eventually all eyes fall on you so you go all Glinda the Good Witch. You say something like you don’t need any help because you’ve always had the power within you to solve this problem. Just put on your magic slippers, click your heels together, Dorothy Queen Bee, and you’ll find your way home solution.
Well a short time later you run into Queen Bee who tells you that she has no intention of following any of the advice from the group. In fact she says that she only talked about her moral dilemma “blah blah blah” problem because she was testing everyone to see who was on her side.
Oh dear.
In a nanosecond you realize that Queen Bee now considers you a supportive friend. You find yourself wondering how it is that being polite got you into this situation? And how in the future you’ll be politely distancing yourself from Queen Bee?
I NEVER INTENDED TO write about this person, she’s someone I knew a long time ago. I’d guess that I haven’t been in touch with her for over a decade, maybe longer.
I got thinking of her because I found one of her business cards wedged in the back of my desk drawer. I’m surprised I kept it, to be honest– but there it was and memories of her flooded into my brain.
So here’s a story, a character study if you will, of a pleasant someone who had her own unique way of rationalizing that which she said and felt no shame about telling, what were ostensibly, falsehoods.
• • •
ONCE UPON A TIME I knew a lovely woman who introduced me to a college acquaintance of hers; I shall call this acquaintance Nedra. The lovely women moved away but out of respect for her, Nedra and I still got together for coffee every few months.
Our relationship was superficial, but delightful at first. Nedra and I had interests in common, reading and healthy eating. She was dating at the time and had funny stories about her experiences. I was remodeling the kitchen and had ridiculous stories about my experiences.
All would’ve been well IF I hadn’t come to realize that Nedra was making up stories about her love life. And her career. Stories that she told me, doing what I’d describe as, a tango with the truth.
• • •
I STUMBLED OVER THIS dance with reality while we were having coffee one day. I hadn’t seen her in a while and I asked her about a guy she’d been on a date with, a date that she’d described in detail months before.
Well, she looked confused, baffled by my question– and told me I must be wrong about her, that she’d never been on a date like that. Clearly I was mistaken.
Except I wasn’t. I’m not that addled-brained. I remembered quite specifically her conversation and joyfulness vis-à-vis this date. That hadn’t happened, but she said it had. Uh huh.
• • •
AS YOU CAN IMAGINE after that conversation I became more disinclined to believe what Nedra said to me, but I was intrigued because I’m a curious person who pays attention to people– and here was a character for me to watch.
Up close and in action, so to speak.
Time passed, like a year or so, and I was to a point where I didn’t want to meet Nedra for coffee anymore. Beyond her propensity to make up stories, I no longer needed to be in her part of town on a regular basis so getting together with her was a chore. On many levels.
Still, I wanted to know more about her reasoning for making up stories: why she did it and, you know, if she experienced any remorse about deviating from the truth. So I asked her, politely, tactfully, why she made up stories about her life and this is where it got really interesting.
• • •
NEDRA BELIEVED THAT BY making up stories about her life she was showing people how to make themselves whole. She was, she felt, merely using her fictional tales to guide people to make better decisions about themselves.
She justified this by saying that when you think about it, scripted TV shows and movies were often fabricated stories that we accept as having a real impact on our minds, hearts, psyches. We believe the stories and accept the messages contained within.
Therefore she was doing the same thing with her stories on a smaller, more personal, scale so that she could help people become more self-aware and feel empowered to do better. And as such she felt no guilt for what some of us might call lying.
• • •
Have you met anyone like Nedra who does a tango with the truth?
Do you think she has a point about scripted TV & movies being basically lies so why not do it too?
Was she naive or manipulative?
Have you found a business card from someone you lost touch with and got thinking about them, for better or for worse?
If you ask me “what is your passion?” I will answer that it is “interior design.”
I think of myself as an active amateur interior designer because I like putting objects and ideas together to make any space, real or virtual, pretty. I love the principles of design and all the possibilities.
After some introspection I’ve realized that I’m a problem solver at heart and design is nothing more than solving the problem of how to live in a way that is congruent with your core values.
Thus I keep my eyes open to any possible design trend that might enhance our transitional-style home and add value to it. Earlier this week when I saw this article, Real-Estate Agents Think These Are the 3 Most Enticing Home Features, I clicked on it to read what it had to say.
[Spoiler alert] The three most-used keywords, therefore enticing home features, in real estate listings are: granite countertops, hardwood floors, stainless steel appliances. We have those three things so we are on trend should we want to sell this house, which we don’t.
Make no mistake about that.
But getting to my snarky point here, if you look at the photo at the top of the article you will see that it is of a gorgeous kitchen whose teal-colored cabinets and gold-tone handles make me drool. So much love.
However, as you continue looking at the photo you will notice that the kitchen has hardwood floors and stainless steel appliances, but alas and alack, the kitchen has marble countertops.
Now far be it from me, an active amateur interior designer, to tell domino.com that their choice of photo does not support the facts in the article, but it doesn’t. And it lends credence to something I’ve found to be universally true and shall share with you, my gentle readers.
Micheal Miller works for the dry cleaner/laundry service that we use. He drives the van to pick up then return Z-D’s dress shirts once they are clean and pressed with light starch. Nice guy, very reliable.
It’s my habit at the holidays to give a monetary tip to our laundry driver guy, who this year happens to be Micheal Miller. Thus I did that two weeks ago.
• • •
Growing up I was the child of older conservative parents and was taught that one must always send a written thank you note to the gift giver upon receipt of a gift. This concept of proper behavior was ingrained in me to such a degree that for a few decades I judged people harshly who didn’t send a written thank you note.
It seemed like a slap in the face to me. Disrespectful, even.
Of course over the years society has morphed away from Emily Post expectations plus I’ve grown more forgiving. I don’t hold myself or other people to the high standards of my childhood. In fact, I’ve come to reevaluate what matters to me when I give a gift to anyone for whatever reason.
I’ve decided that I like the giving part more than the being thanked part. I do what I do because I think it’s important to do so, not so I will receive a written thank you note.
• • •
Still, when I found a written thank you note pinned to an empty laundry bag hanging from the hook by the door on our front stoop, I was pleased to see it and said out loud to myself: “Micheal Miller has good manners.”
It was a sincere spontaneous remark. A blessing even.
One that put me in a happy place for the rest of the day as I mused on what seemed to me to be a random act of kindness, a throwback to a different era when a written thank you note was the done thing.
Such as this handwritten message of gratitude scribbled on a piece of paper by an almost stranger.
ONCE AGAIN OUR VOTING PRECINCT has been assigned to a different polling place. In the 20+ years we’ve lived in this community we’ve voted at:
the VFW Hall [smoke-filled with parking in a field used for their monthly turkey shoot];
the Country Club [time-consuming with parking at nearby Methodist Church, involved a shuttle bus taking us to the country club’s front door and then back to our cars];
the Elementary School [smelled like chicken sandwiches, had limited parking but nice landscaping to look at while waiting for a space];
the Non-denominational Christian Church [easy ingress and egress, adequate flat parking, short walk to front doors, only there one year];
the Greek Orthodox Church [difficult ingress and egress, limited parking on uneven sloped lot, many shiny gilded-gold objects inside building]; and
the Presbyterian Church [no deets yet].
BUT FOR TODAY
HIM: Where am I voting today?
ME: With the Presbyterians.
HIM: Which Presbyterians? The ones near us or the other ones?
ME: The ones near us. The ones who were hidden down the lane.
HIM: They’re not on the lane anymore?
ME: No, they’re in the same place on the lane but they’ve built a big driveway to the road, so that’s how you get to them now. They have a big welcome sign on the road.
HIM: How do I get there?
ME: Go down the road past the street that takes you to the United Methodists, but not so far as to make that sharp right turn into the Roman Catholics. And for goodness sake don’t go around the curve and make a right into the Bible Believers Baptist Church compound. Who knows what weirdness is behind the bunker they’ve built around that building.
HIM: OK. So where do I turn to get to the Presbyterians?
ME: It’s easy. When you see the big welcome sign on the left, turn left, and you’ll be in the right place.
HIM: Are you telling me directions to the polling place or voting advice?
ME: Both, I guess. Get on the road, go left, and you won’t go wrong! 😉
HAPPY ELECTION DAY
May you find your polling place without trouble. May you say *yes* to the school levies and mental health issues and support for the less fortunate. And for the love of all that is good and holy, I beg of you, may you dump the Trumpian chumps.
Some of you know this story already, but I’ll be brief, keep it snappy, and tell it here so that the title of this post makes sense to you, my gentle readers.
After 4 1/2 months of waiting we finally got new replacement windows on the front of the house.
It was a tedious, anxiety-producing process that started with a 3 1/2 month wait, involved delivery of mis-measured windows, a thwarted installation, a makeshift faux installation of the wrong windows to fill the holes in the house created by the thwarted installation, waiting… waiting… waiting again…, and then correctly-sized windows properly installed.
A Christmas Pella miracle, she says with a hint of sarcasm.
The result of this home improvement project is: 1) we no longer have leaky broken windows; 2) we are noticing how much quieter it is in the house with new windows; and 3) we have no blinds, my preferred window treatment, to put on the new correctly-sized properly installed windows on the front of the house.
Specifically blinds for the windows in the home office where I sit at the desk while using a desktop computer to write this blog.
Forsooth.
But here’s where it gets fishy. Now that it’s darker outside in the early morning, and with no blinds on the windows, I feel like a guppy in a fishbowl sitting in this room. Passersby, whether they be kids on school buses or runners or adults walking their dogs, can see me swimming around sitting at the computer, under the overhead light, doing my early morning bloggy thing, often in my pajamas.
We taped a plastic super strength high density painter’s drop cloth over the windows in an attempt to make this room less noticeable from the street, but it just blurs me, doesn’t hide me.
Ptooey, she says with a hint of defeat.
I don’t like the idea of being on display here each morning but until we get blinds on the new correctly-sized properly installed windows, that took longer to manufacture and install than building this house did, I’ve no choice but to live my life like a fish in a fishbowl for everyone who goes by to see.
