Loss

The hardest thing in the world to understand is loss. What does it mean when we lose something? Where does it go?

Let’s start with weight. I mean, if you lose five pounds, where do those five pounds actually go? Okay, the scientific among us will say something witty like, “They are converted into energy (duh!)”. That is an insufficient explanation in my mind. I mean, you lose five pounds of FAT (that’s matter), and it is converted into ENERGY. In theory I can accept that, but in fact, it’s hard for me to picture.

In fact, every time we lose something – or someone – we are confronted with the same problem. Why? Where did it go? If it’s not here, does it exist at all? And finally, If I had it, then I lost it – What did it all mean to begin with?

Let’s start with an easy one: You lose your car keys. You have the typical stages of grief reaction: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. (We are forever in the debt of the late Dr. Kubler-Ross for this amazingly simple, yet accurate analysis of emotional reaction). So, at first you think, “Oh, they’re here somewhere”. Then you think, “Well, where the hell are they!?” Then you think, “Okay, if I can only find them I’ll never lay them down carelessly again.” Then you think, “They’re gone! My only set of keys and they’re gone!” and finally you think, “They’re gone, so I guess I’ll just have to get a new set”. The stages may not come as neatly and succinctly as that, and they may not come in that particular order, but you will notice that they do appear more or less just like that – no matter what the object is that you’ve lost.

So Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, God bless her, was able to qualify our reaction to loss. But who can explain the meaning of loss?

Not me. I’m just wondering.

I guess religion tries to assign meaning to loss. In Christianity, loss is explained through the story of the crucifixion. God willingly gave up His only son in order to save our souls. So, in essence, our loss became our gain. There is nobility in sacrifice, by logical extension. If we are Christ-like, we will suffer. We all suffer to some extent, and to whatever extent we suffer, we are following in His footsteps.

I used to be a pretty good singer. Recently, I have lost that ability. I have a paralyzed vocal cord. Where did that ability go? Was it converted into energy?! Is my voice out there somewhere lifting bricks?! Is my voice somehow sacrificing itself to save the world? Of course not.

But, wait a minute. Since I can’t sing, I write. Isn’t that a conversion from physical matter (vocal cord, mechanical strength) to energy (thoughts being placed on a blank screen). In fact, the energy I would have been using to sing is going not only to my brain but to my fingers and sent out over the Internet to you. But that’s not all. It’s going into home made jam which I will be sending out for Christmas gifts. It goes into a screenplay I’m working on. These are all new endeavors for me. They are things I didn’t do when my voice was working perfectly.

So I guess I’ve answered my own question, for now. It does seem that when you lose something, you do go through some kind of a transformation that enables you to convert the loss into a gain.

But that doesn’t stop the grief reaction. I miss singing. Oh, I still sing around the house, but it’s not the same. I miss the soaring sensation of full-throated, full-throttle singing. So,I’m still angry over my voice: “Why me? Why not Britney Spears?” And I’m still bargaining: “If I work really, really hard on my voice can I have my vocal cord back?”. And depression does come up from time-to-time in the form of “Poor me! Everything happens to me! Woe is me! Poor little Robbie!”. But I’m working my way toward acceptance: “The singer is dead! Long live the writer!”.

Fear Of Flying

FEAR OF FLYING

I wasn’t afraid of flying as a child. I can remember our family flying from Pittsburgh to New York City when I was no more than eight years old, so that was back in the days when stewardesses wore little hats and gave out tiny pairs of wings to the kids for their bravery and good behavior. I loved flying. It meant going to The City and it was the perfect prelude to posh hotels with pink linens on the table, Broadway shows, Times Square, the Automat, and window shopping on Fifth Avenue. The atmosphere was always festive, and my sisters and I felt so grown up as the engine of the plane thrummed along, dressed in our little white gloves, our shiny black patent leather shoes, and our organdy dresses. The stewardess would bring us a deck of cards and we would play Fish or Gin or Crazy Eights. I remember that I was happy and care free. On a plane.

Later, when I was in my college years I flew with total abandon from Boston to Pittsburgh for school breaks. I also had no trouble flying from one city to another to visit a boyfriend. I would blithely jump on a plane, usually on student standby status, not knowing for sure whether or not I would make my flight. I got on a plane as easily as I got in a car. It never occurred to me that what went up might come down ahead of schedule. Never.

So, here I was a young woman flying all over the country. I even flew from New York to Heathrow while I was in college in order to spend a summer studying French in Switzerland. (It was one of those student tours where you start in England and gradually make your way by ferry to France, then by bus through Italy and on to Geneva. It was lovely.) And in no way and at no time did I worry that while gliding over the North Pole our plane might take a header into an iceberg. Never.

Then came my year in New Mexico. Living in Albuquerque and Santa Fe, I didn’t have to fly most of the time. I just had to drive over horrendous ancient roads with cliffs on either side that snaked through high mountain passes with no more than a foot on either side of the car between me and oblivion. That was a breeze. (Remember, I was young and stupid). Then I got a job in Pike’s Peak, Colorado playing a cocktail hour at the Four Seasons.

Well, at the time, my boyfriend was back in Albuquerque, so I had to fly back every weekend. I don’t know if it’s the same now, but back in the ‘70s, flying over the Rockies was a religious experience. Beautiful and terrifying. Below us, the jagged peaks of the Rockies peered out among the pristine white clouds. Meanwhile, the planes bucked and rolled, and the engines sounded like they were sputtering and dying. I don’t remember which airline I flew. I know if there is a flying equivalent to steerage, that’s what I flew. I do remember that, for the first time in my life, I began to wonder if the plane was going to make it. I began to dread flying. I even (by association) began to dread weekends. My palms would get sweaty. I would suddenly begin praying for a safe landing to a God whose existence I doubted. I would study the faces of the flight attendants for any signs of veiled panic. I remember more than once crying hysterically until the plane had stopped taxiing down the runway.

That experience of flying back and forth between Albuquerque and Pike’s Peak has never left me. Even though the specific memory had all but disappeared from my consciousness, the feeling of helplessness and, as someone once succinctly described it, of being an “egg in the carton”, never left me. I know it’s irrational.

So I went through hypnosis and rebirthing. That worked to a certain degree. I had a tape of the hypnosis session, and I would play it to myself for two weeks before every plane trip. It was a very relaxing tape. I literally played it until it wore out, but even so, the creeping fear came back time after time. I refused to give up flying. I did not see that as a reasonable option, considering the fact that I have family all over the country. So from time to time, I would simply force myself to get on a plane. It ruined every trip.

Then a few years back, I had an odd experience. One of my favorite aunts was terminally ill. I made a reservation to fly back to Pittsburgh to see her. The day before the scheduled trip, I began feeling dizzy and my heart was racing. For the first time, I felt I could not physically get on the plane. I just couldn’t picture myself putting one foot in front of the other inside that little plank they make you walk from the terminal to the airplane. My aunt passed away without my seeing her. That was awful.

That’s when I decided it was time for bold action. I called my physician and timidly tried to explain that I had “trouble” with flying, and that I had to fly in order to see my family in Pittsburgh. I thought he would take a cavalier attitude, but to my surprise, he was very sympathetic. He said, “Oh, I know how that is. My wife’s the same way. I have a little pill – I call it my ‘mother of the bride’ pill – and I’ll prescribe two for you two at a time; one for the trip to, and one for the trip from”. Well, that’s just what happened. I discovered Xanax (I think the generic name is alprolazine). I’m not proud of it, but for me, at least, this tiny white pill delivered better living through science. And since I don’t have an addictive personality, I can take these for their intended use and for nothing else. Thank God. (For those who eschew Western medicine – that’s okay. That’s just more for me).

The tragedy of 9/11 did not help. But I was determined that I would not allow the hijackers to derail my progress toward panic-free flying. It took me over two years, but I have been back on a plane twice since then. I have to take an aisle seat so that I don’t have to step over anyone to lumber back to the restroom every half hour; the anxiety reduction has not yet traveled from my brain to my gut.

So, I continue on like the “Little Engine Who Could”, ‘I think I can, I think I can, I think I can. . .’ But because the experience has been easing for me since I discovered my little white pill, my associations with flying are gradually becoming less terrifying. Soon, I won’t need to take my ear planes, my relaxation tapes, my chewing gum, my nasal spray, my lavendar-scented handkerchief, my spiritual guidance book, or my teddy bear. Or maybe even my Xanax? Well, I don’t know.

Art and I are hoping to go to England one day soon. I’m thinking about the QEII. Will it cruise to Hawaii? Aloha!

The Warranty

One of my favorite crackpot theories is the theory of the Warranty. This one came to me in a flash about five years ago.

Here’s the theory: When we are born we are like new cars; shiny, perfect, unblemished, and full of promise. Apart from the occasional childhood illness (measles, mumps, stomach virus), most of us go unscathed for a very long time. I would compare these childhood illnesses along with the occasional scraped knee, bloodied nose, or even a broken arm to the occasional early dent one gets in the parking lot. For all of these problems we are “covered”. That is to say, we can go in to the doctor (shop) and she’ll take a look under the hood (“say aah”), make a simple pinpoint the problem (diagnosis), and make the simple fix (splint, Pepto-Bismol, aspirin, or an order of bedrest). With rare exceptions, this is the physical condition of the body from birth to age 40.

At this blissful time in our lives, we can abuse ourselves anyway we want. We can go for long periods without food or glut ourselves on french fries and milkshakes. We can sit in front of the tube all day every day, then suddenly decide to get up and shake our booties at a club till four in the morning. We can pull an all nighter for a test three nights running and still find the energy to hang out in a mall the next day. We can drink. We can smoke. We can experiment with drugs. We can experiment with sex. Amazingly, every morning without fail, no matter what foolishness we have indulged the night before, the motor cranks up.

At age 40 (or thereabouts), your warranty expires. Depending on your brand (genetic makeup), there may be slight variations. But the pattern remains eerily similar. Our arms get too short when we read. Without exception, everyone I know started losing their perfect vision at 40. This is your warning. So you succumb to glasses or contacts, and you figure, “ no big deal.” At about 43, you start getting your first arthritic twinges. “What is this?”, you cry out as you slide to home or pick up a baby and your back goes out. The pain is excruciating. You tell yourself it’s a spasm and nothing more. Eventually, it passes into memory.

Somewhere around 45 you may notice that people have begun speaking too softly in loud restaurants. You begin to prefer the old-fashioned restaurants replete with heavy carpeting and cushy booths. The chic ambience of Planet Hollywood no longer interests you, since you would need a wall of Marshall speakers to hear and be heard above the din. That’s the heavy metal exacting its toll on your auditory system. (My husband can’t hear the birds in the morning unless they sing directly into his ear canal.)

One evening when I was 49, we had just finished a delightful supper with my in-laws at a sweet little Italian restaurant, when I got a stabbing pain in my abdomen. We were about to leave, and I couldn’t stand up. I thought it was menstrual cramps. As soon as we got back to Art’s parents’ house, I took four Motrin and lay down on the floor. After about half an hour with no relief, they took me to the hospital.

A CT scan revealed an irregular mass in my abdomen. Within a week, I was in surgery and I learned that I had uterine cancer. I can’t tell you what a shock that was. A lifetime of being in the peak of health with only the occasional blip on the radar screen – and then, this.

Okay. Fast forward. It’s four years later. I’m still here. And (thank God), in good health. I won’t take you through the cancer landscape today; that’s not really what this is about. I only bring it up to say – it shouldn’t have been so shocking. My warranty had expired nine years earlier. My vehicle had been nickle-and-diming me all that time. I knew it was only a matter of time before I needed a major overhaul; say a new transmission or a rebuilt engine, or at least new brakes.

I thought I was doing a good job of maintenance all along. I ate well, exercised regularly, and kept stress at a minimal. But let’s face it, before I turned 40, I barely gave it a thought. So I guess the sins of my wayward youth were catching up with me. I don’t know. Or maybe the problem was hardwired in genetically.

The point of all this is just to say – take care of your vehicle. It only looks rough and tough on the outside, but inside, it’s a very delicate machine. Go in for routine maintenance. Smoking corrodes the engine. Stop worrying so much about the paint job. Take her out and let her run from time to time. Feed her high octane fuel. And even then, be prepared. Take out an extended warranty (insurance) so that when inevitably she needs a turn in the shop, it doesn’t bankrupt you. And love your vehicle. It takes you through the roughest roads, and you can’t trade it in for a newer model. At least, not yet.

Ant Wars

It all began on a beautiful day in May. I had fed our kitties outside in their “kitty room”, a sort of makeshift shelter consisting mostly of white lattice work wood and a fiberglass roof attached to the side porch of our house. The kitties have a pet door that leads them out there from the kitchen. It’s the way we figured out for them to enjoy the great outdoors and not become coyote chow. Nothing larger than a sparrow could fit through the lattice work walls – and they would have to be very determined to do it. (Not that it’s never happened, but that’s another story).

Anyway, I left the kitties to eat, and when I came back about an hour later, their bowls were covered in black. I thought maybe a piece of the roof had fallen down, but when I put on my glasses and examined, I saw that in fact, the white bowls were covered in tiny, black sugar ants! They had formed an orderly line which seemed to originate at the southwest corner of the kitty room and proceded due north to the promised land of Fancy Feast. Once there, they congregated and took on the Herculean task of lifting pieces of cat food twenty times their size and carrying it back to the nest. I was horrified at the sight.

Well, the only thing I could think to do was to get out my trusty hose and drown the little beggars. I felt awful, but that’s just what I did. I rained down terror on their community and could not help but imagine a running commentary from a tiny ant newscaster crying, “The humanity! The humanity!” (or something like that). I hosed down the porch thoroughly, brought their bowls in to the kitchen and sterilized them in the dishwasher, and then showered off all the remaining ants which were scattering up and down my arms, inside my bra, under my waistband, and around my scalp. I vowed never to feed the cats out of doors again. I itched for days.

All went well for several weeks. I fed the cats in our kitchen and scrupulously picked up their bowls as soon as the last morsel had passed their lips. I scrubbed the bowls and made sure to pick up any crumbs of food they might have left behind on the floor. Then, one night, I foolishly relaxed my vigilance.

I forgot to pick up their bowls immediately after their supper. An hour or two later, I stumbled in to the kitchen and turned on the light. It was “déjà vu all over again”. The ants were now covering the bowls in my kitchen instead of covering the bowls outside. Of course, they hadn’t bothered with the kitty door – they had simply poured in through some invisible crack in the floor or the walls and were marching up and down my counters, behind the sink, into the cabinets and inside the dishwasher! Scout ants were exploring every nook and cranny and sending for reinforcements. Now, for the first time, I began to feel the killer instinct rising up inside of me. I grabbed a bottle of white vinegar and mixed some of it with a spray bottle of water. I found that if I aimed the spray bottle just right, I could destroy the enemy in a merciful way – instantly. I began to feel like the Hitler of Hollywood Hills. I began to imagine the wives and babies of these brave fighting ants waiting patiently at home in their nest, and slowly having the sad realization that Albert or Andrew was never coming home. I sprayed with a vengeance until there was not a speck of black on the counters or in the pantry. The house smelled like a pickling vat.

The next morning I arose and followed the whine of our tuxedo kitty, Henry, into the kitchen. There was not a speck of food anywhere. One solitary ant was wandering aimlessly on the counter. I figured he wouldn’t eat much and blithely opened the cupboard to get my cereal. Here I was confronted with an eerie sight: Thousands of ants had invaded our pantry and were crawling around a bottle of honey which, although seemingly clean, must have had a faint trace of honey smell attracting the critters. I screamed.

My husband, Art, charged into the kitchen expecting the worst. When he fully comprehended the situation, he reached below our sink and produced a can of Raid. He swept all the food off of the shelf, wiped down the cupboard, and applied the deadly toxin, then wiped everything clean again. As I was putting the food back on the shelf, I groaned. I told him sadly, “They’ll be back” “How?” he wondered aloud. “I don’t know”, I sighed. “They have ways. They’re very. . .” (I searched for the proper word) “resourceful”. Finally he announced: “This is a job for the Terminator!”.

So my stalwart Art called one of those services that advertise on TV. They came out and sprayed around the house. We had a two-week truce. It was wonderful. No ants. I could feed my cats and pick up their bowls without a single critter crawling in sight. Then last week. . . They were back. It began as a slow trickle in early morning, then gradually built to a deluge by late afternoon.

We called The Terminator again. A jovial kind of a guy, he asked us if we had an irrigation system outside. Of course we do. We have a garden and we live in a desert. “Well”, he patiently explained, “That’s why. You’re just washing the stuff away. You see?” I saw. So, he was coming back. “When?”, I gasped. “Soon”, he promised. “Probably Thursday”. Thursday came and went while I twiddled my thumbs and paced and periodically chanted to no one in particular, “He’s coming today”. But, of course, he never did.

Art called again. He said he would come back to us soon. At least, as soon as his truck is repaired. I began to feel like a jilted bride.

It is Tuesday. I keep hoping to hear the rumble of a small truck lumbering up our narrow street. Meanwhile, I keep the vinegar bottle at the ready. I don’t know what this is doing to my karma. Pray for me and mine.

Labor Day Reflections

LABOR DAY REFLECTIONS

I sometimes think I was born in the wrong century. Domestic bliss comes naturally to me. Career (at least with a Capital C) does not.

I just got done making my second batch of preserves for the season. Peach. The first batch was strawberry. I’ve never made preserves before, except once with a neighbor in Tennessee, and I really didn’t grasp the whole thing. But thanks to a kind friend who gave me a lesson last week, I’m now doing it on my own, and it feels challenging, but good. Very satisfying.

The rest of the day will be devoted to laundry. Ho-hum, you say? Well, yes, I suppose, in a way. But it’s Labor Day, and what else can you do? You can’t go to the mall or the grocery store. I guess you could go to the movies (if there was anything worth seeing). But it’s definitely too hot for a picnic. My idea of heaven today is to stay inside with the A/C blasting.

So, getting back to laundry. And cooking. And all those infinite little chores that make a house a home. Not to get too Martha on you (although I secretly admire and envy Martha) – but I do think of the home I share with my husband and our two cat children as our canvas, our one truly original work. It reflects our values, our foibles, our sense of aesthetics (or lack thereof), and even perhaps it influences all those things, too. I can look at the state of the house and get a good sense of our state of mind. We have a predictable but satisfying division of labor between us; I generally tend to the inside of the house, while Art generally tends to the outside. Each of us feels free to cross the inside-outside line to help the other.

But you can’t always judge mental state by outward cleanliness. Chances are, if my house is a mess, I’ve been preoccupied with writing. That doesn’t mean that my psyche is a mess. In fact, when I’m preoccupied with writing, that’s kind of like housework of the mind. I mean, I scour out all the cobwebs, the confusion, the dusty relics of past hangups, then go about searching for hidden treasures which have been buried in debris. I take the treasures out and polish them, make them gleam, and put them in a place of honor to be appreciated by all. Doesn’t leave much time for cleaning.

On the other hand, when I am preoccupied with my home, all that inner stuff gets put on the back burner to simmer. There is something unbelievably liberating about devoting an entire day to setting things to right; watering the plants, dusting the furniture, scrubbing the kitchen floor, finally getting around to that sticky imprint on the counter that’s been bugging you for six months, throwing away old newspapers and magazines, emptying the trash, de-lousing the bathroom, vacuuming the rugs. Then maybe you turn on the radio, wash your hands and bake a batch of muffins. At the end of such a day, it seems that the house sings to me. For one brief, shining moment, all is right with the world. Then, one of us turns on the news. (Sigh).

Back to 2004.

Creativity

Creativity

I will preface all of this with a disclaimer so that I can stop saying, “I think. . .”. This is based only on my own experience, so it may or may not hold true for you. In fact, please refer to this disclaimer from now on whatever I write so that you and I won’t be forced into a battle of wills. Nothing I say holds any more authority than your average opinion.

I don’t know what creativity really is, but if I had to come up with a simple definition, I would say it’s a manifestation of the impulse towards life. Any kind of an activity can be deemed creative. It seems to me that labeling one sort of person or another “creative” based on their profession is a mistake. We have actively creative people, and we have people whose creativity lies dormant or perhaps damaged. We have creative janitors and creatively challenged sculptors.

All my life I have been told that I am a “creative”. I have been told that I come from a creative family. By the way, the words “creative” and “artistic” are used interchangeably in this context. You would think that being told over and over that you are a creative and/or artistic soul would have a positive effect – that it would become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I can only say, well, yes and no.

If there’s one thing the Muse hates more than a six pack in front of Monday Night Football, it’s pressure. I absolutely can not for the life of me will myself to sit down and write a song. All I can do is place myself in front of a piano or a piece of paper and see what emerges. Sometimes it feels as if all I can do is run a scale on the keyboard or practice my penmanship. And sometimes, that’s pretty much what I do. But most of the time, I find that by simply fulfilling my wish to doodle, sketch, noodle, fool around on the piano, or just hum a melody, something happens.

The quality of what happens is certainly not in my control. This was one of the hardest lessons for me to accept. Most of the time I come out with drivel. I do the modern equivalent of filling a trash can with balled up pieces of paper – I delete, delete, delete, delete. But I can not delete the drivel from my brain.

It turns out that drivel has a purpose. Deep in the unconscious, the drivel becomes the seed and the fertilizer (how fitting) for the flower that will bloom somewhere down the road. Furthermore, and probably more importantly, it creates habit. (If you need more information on this, please read Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way, and try the exercises in the book. You will be amazed).

My voice teacher tells me that the reason the earth revolves around the sun is habit. When you think about it, even doctors go to school so that they can form the habit of being a doctor ( a complicated habit comprised of many smaller habits).

So the paradox is this: In order to be creative you have to be habitual. That is why I have begun writing this blog. I am creating the habit of being a writer. And by creating the habit, I am in fact becoming a writer. Now, I have written all my life in a stop-start kind of way. Call it laziness, call it writer’s block, but I go through long stretches where I don’t write, and then bursts of inspiration where I write like there’s no tomorrow. But depending on the occasional inspiration makes me feel like the well could dry up tomorrow, and that’s not a good way to feel.

So here it is: Slow, steady, habitual, reliable, unhurried, unpressured, uncensored, every morning after breakfast, my offering to the Universe. I can not control the quality. I can not control the reception. All I can do is write.

Politics

I’ve been watching the presidential race for a long time now. It has probably sent my blood pressure up ten points and caused my digestion to run amok. I am a shameless liberal Democrat. Matter of fact, I’m proud of it. So you can imagine that when the Republican National Convention was on last week, there was steam coming out of my ears.

Having said all that, I think it’s time I took a more relaxed approach. After all, I only have one little vote among some 250 million, so it’s the old drop-in-the-bucket analogy, but in this case, it’s more like a drop in the ocean. I am approaching the point where I have to accept that I am powerless over the Republican party.

As has been pointed out, Republicans are scrupulously organized. Democrats, by nature, tend to be people like me – dreamers, artists, people who dabble in the “grey” areas of life, and/or, people who simply keep their nose to the grindstone and think of politics as someone else’s purview.

Republicans are religious. Democrats are spiritual. If Republicans are more like hard-boiled eggs, carefully separating the yolk from the white, Democrats are more like scrambles, where white and yolk are indistinguishable, and frequently mixed in with spices and cheese and God-knows-what. Republicans think that’s disgusting. Democrats think it’s yummy.

I wonder if there’s any truth to the hypothesis that the brains of Democrats and Republicans are different. I have often wondered if maybe the two parties were the natural result of ancestry from different planets.

Then I had an “aha moment” the other day. It occurred to me that most of the people I know who are die-hard Democrats are people who are relative newcomers to this country. They might be first, second or third-generation Americans; whereas the die-hard Republicans tend to be folks who can trace their roots back to the Mayflower. (Now, this is a BIG generality, so there are going to be lots of exceptions of course). But the overall philosophy of the Democratic party seems to be more old-world in nature. The most striking difference seems to be the view of government as a benevolent force. That’s why they push for Social Security and health care reform. The Republicans generally have an extreme mistrust of government and see it as a necessary evil. Well, judging by recent history – they do have a point.

(Sigh). It’s no use. When I really start thinking, I get all muddled up. Better to lower the shades, cut off the newspaper, watch only Fox news, or better yet, no news, and see what happens. Go cast my measly one vote. Hope for the best.

Maybe I’ll turn into an Independent.

Misfits Welcome

MISFITS WELCOME

Growing up a small, pale, Jewish girl in Pittsburgh in the 50s, I was the odd one.

For one thing, I had very curly, frizzy hair. No matter how hard I tried to tame it down with barrettes, bobby pins, rubber bands, and goop, the bangs still flipped up, the curls went in every direction, and the frizz haloed my face in what I now recognize as a precursor to the Afro. My front teeth showed a slight but definite overbite.

For another thing, I was a ham. I was raised on Broadway musicals and light opera. I sang “I Could Have Danced All Night” and “Loverly”, “I Feel Pretty”, “The Heather On the Hill” and “In My Sweet Little Alice Blue Gown”. I would perform my songs at the drop of a hat. In first grade, Miss Pollard loved my miniature stature and my lyric soprano voice, bless her heart. The kids hated it.

Oh, and did I mention my fear of kickball? It seems as if Mr. Pittman, the gym instructor at Linden School – who must have been a drill instructor in his youth – was bent on making my life a living hell. At least twice a week he would have us line up for kickball. I remember the palms of my hands sweating. I had trouble with directions. No, not that

Kind of directions (well, yes, that too), but I mean telling left from right. I mean, I would kick the ball and then run in the wrong direction. To further humiliate me, if someone threw the ball at me, I had a reflex reaction and flinched. I would get that “deer caught in the headlights” look and stand stalk still and duck when the ball got near me. I was always, always the last one picked for any kind of a team. I was so humiliated by all this that I would fake being sick to stay home from school. (Didn’t work, most of the time).

Lastly, and most importantly, I was a dreamer. Oh, I don’t mean that I was a dreamer in the sense of genius. I mean I half-dozed most of the day in class and daydreamed my way through my least favorite subjects, especially math and science, imagining myself a glamorous movie star or ballerina.

For all this, I was teased mercilessly (and many would say justifiedly). I couldn’t help it. I just wasn’t one of the cool kids. I could not win the acceptance of my peers, so I tried for the acceptance of grown-ups. I was a little more successful with this. The music teacher liked me. Unfortunately, she set me up as an example to the other students, thus causing them to grow a new layer of contempt for me.

And why am I sharing such intimate and embarassing information with you, dear reader? Because this is the beginning of my blog, and I want to introduce myself. At heart, this is who I am. I am the nerdiest of the nerdy, the unhippest, uncoolest. Over the years I have trained myself to fit in. I have managed to straighten my hair, dressed myself in jeans and t-shirts as befits an aging baby-boomer, have learned not to burst into song wherever two or more are gathered, and for God’s sake, I have kept myself out of any and all situations that involve team sports.

On top of all that, I have had the great good fortune of finding a soul mate who loves me as much as I love him. We are both “misfits” in many of the same ways. But he’s really hip and cool (a rock and roll musician). He finds my predeliction for musical comedy bemusing, but he doesn’t take off points for it.

I have also discovered one very surprising and important piece of information. Many years after I graduated from Linden School, when I was in my mid-twenties, I was singing at a club in Santa Fe. (I’ll tell you that one later). A young woman walked in whom I recognized immediately as a Linden School classmate. She was one of the “popular” girls. She was one of the anointed ones in my mind. I could not even hope to be one of her crowd, as a child. Now, seated at the piano at the La Fonda Hotel, dressed glamorously and singing jazz standards, I felt comfortable enough to approach her on my break. We had a very pleasant conversation, and towards the end of my 15 minutes, I had to broach the subject: “You know, Nancy, when we were kids, I thought you and your friends just hated me!” She looked at me with genuine surprise. “Oh, no, Robin. Not at all! To tell you the truth, I sort of thought you were a bit of a snob and that you weren’t interested in being friends!”. I was flabbergasted. Both of us laughed.

So I guess, nerdiness is in the eye of the beholder. I found out in the course of that conversation that one of the most admired figures of my childhood had been just as insecure as I was. That she had been shy of me as I was shy of her. Years later when I was in psychotherapy (oh, of course I was), my very wise therapist cautioned me repeatedly not to judge my insides by other people’s outsides. In other words, the “popular” kids probably feel as rotten inside as I do. There’s comfort.

So I feel like it’s time someone heard from a misfit. Maybe you’re a misfit, too, in some way? I am starting this blog to say, “Welcome. Here, you are right at home”.

© 2004 Robin Munson

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