Suzy Says

Too much has happened since I last posted, and none of it has been good.

Rob’s sister called him earlier this week to tell him that their Mother is gravely ill. The truth is that she is not expected to make it.

We made rushed arrangements to get him to Ottawa, hoping that he would be able to talk to her and at least that she would know he was there.

The ticket cost a zillion and one dollars, and Megan made several calls to the airline and the Canadian consulate to make sure that Rob could travel to Canada and back on his Permanent Resident Alien card (aka “Green Card”). Everyone said it would be fine.

Rob got a ride to Santa Rosa, then a bus to San Francisco, where he stayed at the Hotel Clayton. He got up at 2:00 am to catch a shuttle to the airport for his 6 am flight, which connected through Philadelphia. At the gate, he was told that he could not travel on his Green Card. Tired and stressed, he got pretty upset and left the airport.

He called Megan, and she calmed him down and told him to go back to the gate and ask to talk to a supervisor. He did this, and the supervisor said he was fine to travel on the card. They rebooked him on a 10 am flight. Megan called Rob’s sister to let her know of the delay.

When she called Rob to tell him she had spoken with his sister, an Asian lady answered the phone. It’s hard to say who was more confused by this encounter. Eventually, Megan was able to explain to the lady to bring the phone to the airline desk. She then called the SFO paging department, who obligingly paged Rob.

Unfortunately, by now Rob’s blood sugar had dropped. He kept looking for the white courtesy phone instead of getting something to eat or drinking a soda, so by the time he got to security, his blood sugar was at alarmingly low levels. They had to call an ambulance to get him cleared to travel.

Guess who didn’t make the 10 am flight?

On the bright side, he got his phone back.

Eventually, he was released from the hospital and made it through security for a 10 pm flight. Yes, he was at SFO all day and half the night, arriving at 4 am and not leaving until 10 pm.

He called Megan from Philadelphia, and when I went over this morning, he was on the phone with Megan, wishing her happy birthday and telling her that it was hot and humid in Ottawa. He was fine, other than being exhausted and having the cold Megan is just getting over. He hadn’t seen his Mother yet, so I will keep you posted on that. Good thoughts and prayers and what have you are all appreciated.

I had to work all day, so it’s been a pretty lousy birthday so far for my wonderful sister. I am hoping to redeem its crappitude with:

• A bottle of Skinny Girl White Cranberry Cosmos, which has been chilling all day;
• A card (which can be planted) and present (a gardening bench to make it easier on her poor knees); and
• A DVD of “One for the Money”, which we enjoyed so much at the movies this winter.

Hopefully that will redeem today a bit. I still say she is the best birthday present I ever had.

I’m up earlier than I’d like. As usual. When I’d like: 8 am or so. When I am: anywhere from 4:30 to 6:00. If I don’t stop these bad habits, I will never attain my lifetime goal of idle rich. Also, a girl must surely need more beauty sleep as she gets older, not less.

The boys found a new and novel way to get me out of bed today (and more importantly, to get breakfast and then outside into the early morning sunshine). This one involved rolling around on top of my unsuspecting body, clawing and biting each other’s heads with accompanying sound effects.

At least I didn’t get a new bruise to add to my collection. The old one is still there, now turning yellow at the edges while retaining its alarming lumpiness. It’s about 6 inches long and three inches wide, with the power to frighten innocent passers-by and co-workers. At least it doesn’t hurt any more and will eventually vanish into the mists of time, unlike some of the other scars I still have:

• The triangular one on top of my left hand. I got this one while ironing my father’s shirts when I was home from college. His mother taught me the proper Victorian way to iron his shirts, so when I was home, I’d iron them for him, usually while watching TV. I think it was an episode of “I Dream of Jeannie” which led to my being distracted enough to mistake my hand for his Ben Sherman shirt (which I now have).
• The long, lumpy one at the base of my left thumb. For someone who’s right-handed, I seem to be unduly hard on my left hand. I broke a goldfish bowl in Megan’s room, again when I was home from college, and rescued the fish. I picked up the broken glass and it slipped. Instead of letting it go, I clutched at it and sliced open my hand to reveal its inner workings (there’s a reason why they hide all that stuff under our skin). I immediately turned into a six year old, yelling, “Mom!” She took me to the ER for several stitches, which surprised me by being black and wiry, and held my hand when they injected novocain into the wound.
• Above my – yes, you guessed it, left – eye is a small wrinkle which I acquired while Mom in the hospital in the final months of her life. There is no tired like hospital tired. The little line mostly appears when I am tired at a normal level, but I notice it whenever I put on makeup and think of Mom. Accessorizing the line is a scar mostly hidden by my eyebrow, which comes from having a few glasses of wine too many after sharing Christmas dinner with Mom at the hospital and realizing there wouldn’t be any more to come.

  I lost my balance – which I am perfectly capable of doing with no alcohol involved – and hit my head on the open door of Megan’s desk. I was slightly stunned. Megan cleaned me up and called our brother. We still laugh about her calling him late at night and saying, “I’m drunk, but Suzy’s drunker, and she cut her head open.” He sighed and came over, and by his account, “When I opened the door, the smell of vomit wafted out.” In the meantime, Megan had butterflied my eyebrow together really well.

  Not my finest moment, but as usual, I was lucky to have my family there to rescue me. I think I threw up all the next morning. Merry Christmas!

• The chicken pox scars on my legs. I had mumps twice, and I had chicken pox twice. Both poxes were memorable. The first time, I was 8 and my parents had taken us kids and Mom’s aging parents to England to visit Dad’s parents. On the way home, the flight was delayed at the airport for many hours. But that was the least of our parents’ worries – we had broken out in chicken pox that very morning. Mom was convinced that if the officials found out, we’d be forced to stay in England until we were healthy again. “Don’t you dare get any on your faces!” she said as we approached Customs. We didn’t, and after an overnight stay at Charlie Chaplin’s suite at the Grand Hotel in Eastbourne, we finally went home.

  The second time, I was 15 and spent hours lying in an Aveeno bath, complaining about the utter itchiness. Though I did get out of midterms.

Considering my ability to damage Self in nearly any circumstances, it’s somewhat surprising that I have never had major surgery, broken a limb (though I did break two fingers recently), and still retain my tonsils, appendix, and two of my wisdom teeth. I need all the help I can get.

Ever since Erica and Jessica decamped to Portland last summer, the fabulous quotient in Hooterville and environs dropped by about 1,000%. I’m glad that Jessica is living a Ramona life in the land of Beverly Cleary and that Erica is revelling in city amenities, but I miss them.

Megan wants to go and visit the Dynamic Duo this summer, but her older sister has some reservations.

Number One: It’s a twelve hour drive. TWELVE HOURS. It used to take me 12 hours to fly non-stop to London from San Francisco, and even with the ability to get up and walk around, drink cocktails, read, sleep, and watch movies on my laptop, I could hardly stand it. At least there was Dad, London, and Europe at the other end.

The whole problem with driving is that it’s the worst of both worlds: really boring, but you have to pay attention. Also, it is simultaneously too fast and too slow. On the freeway, if you’re going 70 mph and everyone else is going even faster (as they usually are), if they hit you, not even Rico from Six Feet Under could make you fit for human viewing ever again.

And then there’s the whole dead thing.

At the same time, you are speeding along at 70 mph or whatever it may be, and it will still take you half a day or more to get to the next state.

And then you’ll have to do it all again in a week’s time.

Add in the fact that I don’t get paid when I’m not at the jobette and gas will be around $300 plus whatever other money we spend while we’re away, and you can add “expensive” to “boring” and “scary”.

On the other hand, we haven’t seen Erica and Jessica since Christmas, and they braved the hideous trip with their dog to see us, so we kind of owe them. Also, Megan is afraid that if we don’t make the effort, E & J will drift out of our lives, and that’s a fate worse than road tripping.

What to do, what to do?

*Honestly, have you ever seen a cuter school picture? None of mine even came remotely close.

I realize it’s almost this weekend, and I haven’t told you about last weekend yet. Let’s look back, back…a long time ago, about last Friday.

It was the first farmers’ market of the year, and it was a beautiful, sunny day. The market was less crowded than it will be when summer really begins, and it was nice to wander about in comfort. I picked up a fresh baguette (to go with the black bean soup I had made) and some cherries, the first of the season:

After that, we stopped by the garden center and picked up several bags of chicken manure. Folks, don’t try this at home. I washed my hands six times after helping Megan to load the bags in the back of the truck, and I could still smell it. All the perfumes of Arabia couldn’t sweeten my little hands. Megan laughed at me.

We also got fixin’s for a BBQ the next evening and bought some redwood boards, which was harder than you’d think, especially since we live in the heart of redwood country. But the pretty boards were warped, and the non-warped ones tended to have fatal flaws, like a giant crack or way too many knots in them. We were looking for six 10 foot long boards. The guy at the lumber yard was really helpful, looking through board after board. Finally, we found two decent 10s and some decent 20s, which he cut in half while Megan paid for them. He even cheerfully loaded them into the stinky truck.

Saturday was a magical confluence of festivity: Cinco de Mayo, Star’s fourth birthday, and the 138th Kentucky Derby!

The Derby has to be the best sporting event EVAR. Can you name another one where there is a red carpet with celebrities, fabulous hats, daytime drinking is positively encouraged, and it’s over before even I have a chance to get bored? And then there are the gorgeous, glossy horses and the winner being draped in roses.

This year, the delightfully named I’ll Have Another won at 15-1 odds, the first horse in Derby history to win from post position 19. His jockey, appropriately enough, was 25 year old Mexican native Mario Gutierrez, making a memorable debut at the Derby after winning Santa Anita last month. I bet he had another!

We had expected company for dinner, so Megan and I bought a pork roast which I marinated in lime juice and spices on Friday, thinking it would be a good choice for a crowd to make fajitas. We hadn’t even thought about it being Cinco de Mayo, but it worked out well that way. Birthday girl Star celebrated spending half of her life in love and safety, where she will remain for the rest of her life. She patiently waited for her birthday dinner:

Other than Star, it ended up just being Jonathan, Megan, and me. We slow cooked the pork roast in foil over the coals, then grilled red peppers and rd onions and had it all with salsa in handmade tortillas by the fire as the sun slowly faded over the garden. We talked about the past and the future, sitting in the garden they have worked so hard to create. Looking at the faces of two people I love most in the world, I thought, “I love my life.”

In addition driving me crazy yesterday, Clyde also managed to get between me and the stairs, right before I left for work. I tripped down the last three steps, bruising my left forearm (and butt!) in a horrifying and lumpy manner, and doing something to my right foot which makes me a little limpish. But only when I walk.

Calamity Suzy rides (or falls) again!

Still, I think we can all agree that it’s an improvement over falling off the top of the stairs.

Today, my brother is going to stop by the jobette and pick up a tarp and random hunks of wood, which Rob brought over last night and stowed safely in Miss Scarlett’s capacious trunk. Why, you ask? Because my brother is going to pick up a truckload of dirt for me on the way home, and you have to cover it up and weight it down so your investment doesn’t end up flying all over the highway instead of making a comfortable home for your flowers. I’m looking forward to getting some things done in the garden over the next few days.

Hopefully I won’t fall off the truck while shoveling dirt. Stay tuned…

When I (finally) got home last night, I covered the outside couch with a plastic drop cloth, even though it was a beautiful, clear evening and the moon was smiling down on me:

The forecast said 100% chance of rain, and they were right: I woke to ran pattering on the plastic and the plants. I won’t have to water the garden today.

Speaking of the garden: Rob dropped by last night and we talked about making a bent wood trellis. I lent him the book, so I’m hoping we might get it done this summer. My idea is to have the trellis (and whatever I’ll grow on it) hide the decrepit trailer full of Rose’s pottery which Mark may or may not have time to empty out and/or move one of these days.

Rob also fastened some mesh to the underside of the balcony, so the jasmine that’s growing beneath:

can wind its way up to the balcony itself. I love the idea of a jasmine-covered balcony.

Last night, I suddenly realized that I had missed my own blogaversary! I even had to look back in my archives to find out what day it was. It was April 20, for those of you who keep track, and my blog is now 12 years old. Or my approximate mental age. Pretty soon it will be pestering me for a driver’s license and an overpriced prom dress and developing the surly attitude beloved of teens everywhere.

You have been warned.

Digit’s first week as our Office Cat was a success, at least as far as her human colleagues are concerned. I was happy to hear that everyone but Me stopped in to see Digit on the weekend. It turns out that our IT guy comes in pretty much every weekend (who knew?), so she will always have some company.

She is still completely uninterested in making a break for it, which is great considering how often people are in and out of there during the work day. She always greets me with a purr and rolling over onto her back to have her tummy petted. She’s good at playing by herself, chasing a toy (or her tail) around the office.

So far, so good.

On the Saturday after the Girl Day, we had the first family barbecue of the year. We had it in the huge (40 feet by 40 feet) new garden on the family property, which is an amazing work in progress. it’s taken a couple of months to get to where it is now, deer-fenced and gated and planted with fruit trees and almost every vegetable you can think of.

We were joined by friends, including Lichen, though it was unfortunately too windy to cut my hair. We perched on hay bales and drank wine and ate like kings and queens: turkey burgers; marinated, grilled peppers and summer squash; my famous potato salad (mayonnaise free for the picky eaters among us); as well as mixed olives and marinated artichokes.

It was a great evening.

Also part of our Girl Day was getting a new (to me) couch! I am hideously excited about it. I have been looking for a replacement for my battered old couch for at least a year, so imagine how thrilled I was to find the couch of my dreams for about $250. The store even threw in the decorative pillows for free, and you know how I’m all about the pillows (I think I have eight or so on my bed), especially ones like these, which are gorgeously beaded.

But we had to get the couch from the Big Town to my little house.

On Saturday morning, Megan and I went to our brother’s place and swept out Rob’s trusty old truck. Jonathan has been using the truck while his car is being diagnosed at the shop. We are all pretty nervous about this, because Jonathan couldn’t figure out what was wrong, and that means that whatever is wrong will be really expensive. The car has nearly a quarter of a million rough and tumble miles on it, so it may also mean that Jonathan will have to join Megan in buying a new (to him) car. I really hope these things don’t come in threes, because I’ll be next.

We also took a tarp from the hay bales and realized that we would need a tie down to keep the couch in the truck. Fortunately, one of the tie downs Rob uses for garbage hauling was still in the truck, though one of the hooks was missing. Jonathan sailor tied it to one side of the truck and hooked the other side on. We were ready to go.

Almost as soon as we did go, we saw that the gas gauge was empty. The light was on, but no gas was home. We drove the five miles to the store, hoping for the best, and I put in $45 worth of gas to get us to the Big Town and back, with enough left over for our brother to get to work on Monday.

Arriving at the furniture store, two nice young guys put the couch on the truck, tightened the fastenings, and removed the cushions, putting them inside the cab of the truck, observing that we wouldn’t want them to fly away on the highway, something I hadn’t thought of and was glad they had.

Boys rock.

We made our way slowly home, pulling over frequently, and arrived back at my hippie hovel with the couch still in place. Megan and I decanted the couch and the cushions, but we couldn’t move the old couch. Fortunately, Mark and his friend came over and moved the old one out (revealing a horrifying collection of dust bunnies, thirty cents, a lone pistachio, and a very small scorpion) and the new one in. It took them about two minutes all told.

Boys rock.

Megan suggested that I keep the old couch outside until it starts raining, and then we can take it to the dump, instead of doing it now. So now I have an outdoor living room:

And a much-improved indoor living room. Here’s how it used to look:

And here’s how it looks now:

You may also have noticed that I have new lamps, meaning that my whole house is now officially an IKEA-free zone.

The cats approve of the new couch. It now doubles as Audrey’s and Clyde’s bed (Roscoe still prefers the top of the armoire), and Audrey lounges on it during the day as well. I think she has noticed how well the beaded pillows complement her fur:

As for me, well, I think it gives the place some much-needed civilization.

And it’s pretty!

On Friday, I postponed work and all other obligations to spend the day with my sister. We’ve both been so busy lately that we’ve hardly seen each other.

I was shocked to realize that even though Megan has had her new car for almost a month, I hadn’t been in it. That alone tells you how overdue we were for a Girl Day.

I took the rare opportunity of being a passenger to try and show you my favorite part of the drive to Hooterville itself, where the trees part to reveal the ocean:

I also got a shot of the historic Hooterville bridge, one of seven that we cross on our way to the Big Town. The bridge is the only wooden bridge left on Highway One:

The car handles the curvy roads really well. It has good brakes and enough get up and go to pass the rude sluggards who refuse to pull over. I have noticed over the past couple of weeks that the traffic is becoming more summer-esque in its quantity and slowness.

The new car, unlike the old one, also has a CD player (I know, so 90s), so Eminem regaled us on our way to the Big Town. Once there, we stopped off at a used book store, where we learned that they also sell records. Yes, actual vinyl. Even more retro than CDs. I picked up a book on making bent wood trellises. I have a project in mind for Rob…

Boys, avert your eyes for this next paragraph. Go and get a beer or something. You can rejoin us later, when the coast is clear.

Our next stop was Understuff, a fabulous lingerie emporium, where we learned that, like almost 90% of women, we were wearing the wrong bra sizes. We were ably and charmingly assisted by a pregnant sylph (her baby, Ezekiel, is due in two months), who measured us and found bras which fitted, were cute, and were not that expensive. The magic bra trifecta! Also, we had the satisfaction of shopping locally. For the first time in my bra-wearing life, the straps have stayed up. As we left, Megan high-fived me and said, “Let’s take the pledge! It’s Understuff or nothing!”

OK, guys, it’s safe to come out now.

Flushed with triumph, we repaired to The Wharf for Mexican mojitos, mini crab cakes, and Caesar salad. As we ate, a fishing boat on his way out to the ocean passed by our window:

A seal was bopping around and playing in the waves, but I couldn’t catch him on film. You will just have to imagine the cuteness.

We had a commission from our brother to buy tomato insulation, so we stopped off in the Village on our way home and went to the garden center:

Where they have an innovative way of displaying plants:

It was a really fun day. As I told Megan, if she weren’t my sister, she’d still be my friend. As it is, she’s both.

Today would have been my mother’s 80th birthday. She lost her long, valiant battle against cancer seven years ago this summer. She was a fighter, and fought until the end. Her ability to withstand pain and not complain about it was astounding. Sometimes I wonder whether she would have been diagnosed sooner and maybe had a better outcome if she had complained more and earlier about the pain she was in, but that kind of speculation is pointless.

Though it’s hard not be a little concerned about the dwindling life expectancies of our rapidly dwindling family. My great-grandparents lived well into their 90s (my father’s maternal grandfather dying in style while doing a complicated math problem – come to think of it, maybe that’s what caused it); my grandparents well into their 80s (Dad’s father dying in style on Christmas Eve in his special armchair while his beloved wife of more than 50 years made him a cup of tea) and my parents barely making it to 70 (Dad lived 5 months after his 70th birthday; Mom made it to 73). So if I’m lucky, I might have another 10 or 15 years. Shouldn’t I be working less and having more fun?

Speaking of working: an unexpected side of effect of the jobette is that it’s brought me closer to Mom, proving once and for all that it’s never too late to work on your relationship.

The jobette requires driving to and from the Big Town three times a week, about 40 minutes each way. Mom loved to drive, and drove rapidly and skillfully, whereas I am not a big fan. To make the experience more bearable*, I always have music in the car, like Mom did, and for safety reasons, I have my Mouse**, which has never failed me yet. And most days, I wear the hand-forged silver bracelets that Mom always wore.

Listening to the radio so much inspired me to start a Song of the Day playlist on my iPod. It started out as the song that made me happiest when I was driving that day, but I have to admit that some days, there was more than one song.

The songs were a revelation of sorts. Though there’s a fair amount of new stuff, I definitely seem to enjoy the songs of my youth, songs that date back to when Mom was driving the car and I was the passenger, instead of the other way around, as it is now. Apparently, I like disco (who knew?) and never met a Steve Miller song I didn’t like. Go figure.

Megan’s gift from Mom was Schatzi, and mine was the love of music.

Mom inspired the playlist and I know she would love it, and have one too. When a song comes on the radio or the iPod which she really liked, I feel like she’s right there with me. In retrospect, she really had great taste in pop music. And when I finally pull into my rocky, potholed, muddy (or dusty) driveway, I always say “Thank you, Mom” as I take off my seatbelt and lurch toward my house.

Thank you, Mom. And happy birthday***.

*I do realize that complaining about a 40 minute commute beside the Pacific and through groves of ancient redwoods is very non Mom, and also annoying to the rest of you who have real commutes. Or wish you had one.

***There was a breathtakingly beautiful full rainbow over the ocean this morning. I thought of you.

Apparently, March did not get the whole “in like a lion, out like a lamb” memo. It both came in and went out like a particularly rambunctious and attention deprived feline. Or, you know, an Audrey.

I woke on Saturday night to rain and wind battering my hippie hovel. I checked all the doors to make sure they were closed tightly against the wind, and discovered a couple of new roof leaks in the kitchen by stepping in the puddles in bare feet. That will teach me not to wear my slippers, which were snickering quietly by the side of the bed when I went back upstairs, flashlght in hand, Just In Case.

Or not.

As I listened to the roar of the storm and tried to quell my fears by reading the latest in Lisa Lutz’s always entertaining Spellman series (about a family of private eyes in San Francisco), I thought how lucky it was that Megan and Rob had ventured to the city the day before to buy a car. By the time Saturday was over, there had been four hailstorms, heavy rain, a thunderstorm or two, and the highway to civilzation was closed due to the river overflowing its banks. Again.

But Megan and Rob didn’t have to care about all that as they sat with their dogs by the cozy fire. Safe in their driveway was a BRAND NEW CAR!

At least, to us.

So far, they are the only ones in our family to actually own a car made in this millennium (or century, for that matter), this one being a 2004 Hyundai Elantra:

On Friday, they went all the way to the wilds of the unknown East Bay, with Miss Scarlett and Miss Star (leaving me to give Schatzi that unforgettable midday pill) to buy a car. A couple of the other cars they had been looking at online had been snapped up in the meantime, but fortunately, this one remained.

Not only did we conclude the Great Car Share of 2011-1012, we learned why used cars are so #%^$#*%^ expensive. When this car shopping odyssey began, I foolishly assumed that with the economy so bad and the unemployment rate so high, there would be plenty of used cars for sale by desperate people.

I was wrong about this, as with so many other things, both recently and not so recently. It turns out that people are desperately hanging onto their crappy old cars and driving them until they no longer go, like Megan did, since they can’t afford to upgrade. There is a serious shortage of decent used cars for sale, at least in Northern California (Megan searched as far away as Sacramento and San Jose), and when one does come up, there is a bidding war for it between used car dealerships.

As I said before, the new normal is not a pretty one.

So for around $7,500, Megan and Rob got a car with a mere 45,000 miles and 8 years on it, but with no floor mats or extras of any kind, unless you count the slight ding in the windshield. Still, it drives well and has good pickup and good handling around the curves and good gas mileage, which is pretty much all we care about.

As Hootervillians, it has come to my attention that our concerns when making big purchases are not the same as Civilizationites. With cell phones, it’s durability and receptiveness, given the lack of cell towers in our big, but underpopulated County, not how many apps and games and movies you can get on it or how cool or pretty it is. With cars, it’s how safe it is, along with its ability to grip the serpentine, rough roads and enough get up and go to pass those losers who refuse to pull over as soon as you have the chance. Oh, and good gas mileage if you can get it. We do not care about coolness, color, moon roofs, or leather-wrapped steering wheels. We really don’t.

Anyway…I’m happy that they once again have a safe, reliable vehicle (already test-driven by our brother) and that once again, all’s well that ends (or starts) well.

Megan’s Boss

We all have little tricks for helping us remember things. Post-Its on the mirror so we are reminded of mundanities like picking up milk while applying our DiorShow mascara. The classic string tied around the finger (though I’d probably forget why I tied the string there in the first place, and then I’d want to add a tassel and maybe some beading, and….I can see why I’ve never tried that one). Mnemonics like HOMES for the Great Lakes.

Rob, of course, does it in his own inimitable style.

Little Miss Schatzi is on a strict regimen to keep her at her happiest and healthiest. Seeing her prance through my garden, as she frequently does, or jump for joy when she sees me, you’d never know that her bones look like Swiss cheese under her elegant brindle coat (and cuddly sweater, since it’s still winter in Hooterville, no matter what the calendar and reclusive East Coast rodents say). This is almost entirely due to Megan and Rob’s care and feeding of their aging princess.

Schatzi gets pain medication and anti-inflammatories three times a day. Megan usually takes care of Round One when she gets home from work in the morning, and Round Three when she heads out to work, but Rob has to remember the middle of the day pilling. This can be a challenge if he is out of the house or not feeling well himself or if he just plain forgets.

Instead of the string or Post-It, though, he went the Rob Route:

He created a sculpture out of found items around the property (I can practically hear James’ ghost saying, “See? That’s why I kept all that stuff!”) and fastened it to the mirror, which is also conveniently located to the most frequently frequented area in their little cottage: the coffee pot. He painted it with the words “PILL THE DOG” to remind him of why it’s there.

Notice that there’s an arrow pointing to a picture of a dog for extra reminding help.

Oh, and the little cup on the top left-hand side of the sculpture holds the actual pills (in a delicious Pill Pocket, which is meat-flavored Play Doh beloved by all of the canine persuasion). So you have form and function. How often can you say that?

Today would have been my father’s 81st birthday. He never cared that much about his birthday – though he went along with how much I care(d) about mine; our plans for my 40th birthday were to go to Pompeii together, so I could be around things that were older than Me – and he would almost certainly dislike the way I cannot help but commemorate both his birthdays and his deathdays.

Indeed, Megan and I were talking about Dad’s birthday on Wednesday morning, when she brought the car back. Her co-worker asked her to switch shifts with him, which means that she will work Saturday and Sunday, then Wednesday and Thursday. So she’ll be working St. Patrick’s Day night. Any night of a drinking holiday like St. Patrick’s Day or New Year’s is not a good one in the ER. But Meg said, “The whole world is throwing Dad a party!”

As it should.

Here are some things you need to know about my father.

• He was my best friend. He knew the worst things about me, and still loved me. Also? vice-versa. He never judged me. Indeed, he admired my brother’s free-spirited, full-bore approach to life, though his own was the opposite. He never made me feel bad for anything I felt, thought, or did. This is not a small thing.
• When he was a small boy, his scientific gifts soon became obvious in a very practical way. Everything was rationed in England during (and after) World War II, including the coal that heated the house. Coal, as you may or may not know, tends to create dust, which was usually swept up and thrown away. Dad, at the age of eight, decided to see how much cement he could mix with the coal dust which would still produce a viable briquette to burn and warm the family house. It was fun! And useful. Even then, he couldn’t stand to waste anything.
• He used to walk five miles to school and back every day. When he first retired back to his native land, I made him go on a sentimental journey to the house he grew up in – a whole 12 miles away from his home – and was kind of shocked by how far it would be for a young boy to walk every day. Or, you know, a grown-up.

  One day when walking these miles home from school, there was an air raid near the train station. My father, about ten years old, buried himself under bodies to stay alive. His terrified mother, knowing he was walking home, stood in the front garden, watching for him. Nothing would induce her to go inside the house or into the bomb shelter. When Dad made his way home, bloodied and exhausted, nothing could express her joy.

  He had nightmares for the rest of his life.

• He was an amazing cook. His mother was a very good, even excellent Victorian cook, one who made a roast on Sunday and made the leftovers into shepherd’s pie on Monday and baked once a week. I don’t think a clove of garlic ever appeared in her kitchen. But Dad loved the garlic, and made food that would have appalled his mother.

  Yet…I remember when Tesco made its unwelcome appearance in the village where my father grew up and his parents lived all their married lives until their deaths in their 80s, my grandmother was appalled, and not without reason. She continued to shop every day, at the butcher’s, who knew what she liked, and the Lincoln sisters’ greengrocers (the five unmarried sisters had inherited the business from their father), where they knew that Daddy’s Daddy liked bananas and Grammie did not, and where they would cut a hothouse cucumber in half and keep the best peaches for you.

  There are so many things I do in the kitchen that I do because of him: hot pan, cold oil; when making an omelette, put in half an eggshell of milk; roll a lemon or lime hard on the counter before cutting it to get the most juice; the less done to good fish the better.

• His parents never said to their only, over-achieving son, “I love you.” That was understood. But he never stinted his own children in saying that. One of my earliest memories is waiting for him to come home from work, and when he did, he rolled around on the floor with us in a very un-English manner.

  When we went to Maine in the summer, I would swim in the cold, cold Atlantic until my lips were blue and chattering, and I would emerge from the frigid waves and go and lie on my father’s sun-warmed back, where he was lying reading either the “New York Times” or the “International Herald Tribune”. I’d pull my towel over my back, and snuggle my wet, cold head into his neck. He never flinched or complained. It’s still one of my best memories.

• The last thing he ever said to me was “I love you lots”

Being swamped with work from both the Job and the Jobette has made me too sleep and time deprived lately to give you the lowdown on what’s been happening around here. Amazingly, things other than work and more work have occurred. Such as…

My neighbor Jim stopped by, bearing gifts. This is my very favorite kind of visit. We have been Facebook friends and email buddies for years, and he reads my blog (as all fabulous people do), as well as actual neighbors – he lives about three miles away from me – yet we had never met before in real life.

So it was definitely about time.

Jim arrived bearing a couple of calla lilies to add to the garden:

I will have to re-pot them, but apparently, they grow like weeds. I’m looking forward to their first elegant blooms.

He also brought me a fabulous outdoor candelabra, which might need a cup of Rob to repair it a bit, but it’s certainly a worthy addition to my ever-growing outdoor lighting collection:

I had a great time hanging out with Jim and I hope we get to spend more time together soon.

Megan woke up one day to find several thousands of dollars in her bank account. This what you call a nice surprise. I have heard of them, but seldom, if ever, experienced one in real life.

It was most of the back payments for Rob’s permanent disability. Apparently they give you some of it (after neatly removing the lawyer’s fees off the top) and then give you more six months later, for some reason. But what’s six months when you’ve already had to wait four years?

Now there are decisions and purchases to be made, notably a car for Megan, so we can stop sharing, and some kind of shelter for her and Rob on the family property, so they can stop paying for two places.

It’s happy and exciting news, but I haven’t found time to celebrate with her yet. One of these days…

The splendid pool closed last month. They ran out of money to operate it, despite cranking the water temperature down to 77 (from 85), and I sure felt every single one of those degrees. They also saw fit to keep the exercise rooms open while keeping the locker rooms closed. So – you could go to Zumba or spinning class, but you couldn’t shower afterwards. So that’s out. Basically I am exercise-free until I a) find some time; and 2) find somewhere to do it and get cleaned up afterwards.

On the bright side, Measure A passed last week. It ups the sales tax by half a penny, and apparently the half pennies will add up enough to reopen the wonderful pool and keep it open forever. At least, that’s the story. However, it will take until at least July for enough pennies to accumulate to reopen the pool, so it’s kind of a good news/bad news scenario. I will definitely have to come up with a Plan B if I ever find the time.

The hospital where Megan works is also having financial difficulties. Like pretty much every other company or corporation in America, it’s the worker bees who have to bear the brunt of it. At first, they actually considered closing the Emergency Room at night – yes, the dark hours when babies are born and car accidents and heart attacks tend to happen – but they soon realized the error of their ways.

Unfortunately, their Plan B is for Megan to work three 10 hour shifts one week, and four 10 hour shifts the next, instead of three 12 hour shifts in a row. So it’s more inconvenient; for several hours she will be the only person to answer phones and admit patients and deal with paperwork and transfers. Oh, and she gets less money because she’s not working 12 hour shifts. Pretty much a lose/lose.

On the other hand…we are lucky that we are employed at all in this day and age. As my boss says, this is the new normal.

One thing about being sick is that it gives you time to notice how your house is slowly descending into chaos around you. Dishes and laundry remained undone; dust and spiderwebs accrued at an alarming rate; gravel and pine needles drifted unchecked across the battered wooden floors.

I’d notice all this, and then just go back to bed and watch more mindless TV – surely the best thing about being sick.

Even though I was well enough to go to the jobette – and I worked four days this week, instead of my usual three – I still haven’t really addressed the Housework Situation. Maybe if I ignore it long enough, it will go away.

While the house was undoing its thing, other things happened.

I ordered and received a new coffeemaker. Online shopping is another activity that is suitable for the bedridden. In my weakened condition, it was even more annoying than usual to deal with the French press and its endless, messy grounds. So it was a necessity:

So was replacing my favorite lipgloss from Sephora, since the first day back at the jobette, I was shocked to discover that the tube was basically empty.

I’m never too sick to shop.

While I was shopping, Rob was fixing a hole (or two) in the laundry room/pantry/cat dining room (multi-purpose room?).

The one under the door (being inspected by Clyde):

And the one that was so useful during the great Booze Breakage of 2010:

The repaired door:

And the repaired drain:

We had a storm after the holes were repaired. I set the battery-powered alarm clock and made coffee the night before, just in case, but the power stayed on. In the morning, I realized that if the power had gone out, I couldn’t have used the generator. I used to thread the extension cord from the generator through the hole under the door and into the house, but now the hole (and its draftiness) are a thing of the past.

I mentioned this to Rob, and he is going to drill a hole in the wall near the generator for the extension cord. I’m hoping that we are past power outage season (I’m watching the first Spring Training baseball game between the Evil Empire and the Phillies, so the year has turned a corner), but we should still deal with it before storm season rolls around again.

Well, Le Bug has finally begun to loosen its Vulcan death grip. Sure, I cough myself awake a couple of times a night, and am still the major Kleenex consumer on the west coast, but I was well enough to go back to the jobette this week.

It was a week that reminded me just how petite this town really is. On Monday, I saw my brother and one of his charges emerging from the health food store across the street. I called out to him, but he didn’t hear me through the wind and traffic. By time I could get across the street, he was gone.

The next day, I was just starting up the steps of the office when I heard a horn honking. It was the lovely Monica, waving good morning as she drove past on her way to her store, two blocks away. Daisy, of course, was smiling from the passenger seat.

On Wednesday, I was getting in my car when I noticed a dog across the street who looked a lot like Star. A closer look revealed that it was in fact Star, whose excitement when she saw me too could barely be contained. I honestly think that no-one on earth is as happy to see me as Star is.

It turned out that Rob was walking her while he waited for a new tire to be applied to his trusty truck. When you start seeing metal poking through the treads, it’s time to invest in a new one. We hugged goodbye, and he and Star trotted off to pick up the new and improved truck.

It’s a good thing that I’m feeling better, because my house turned into Grand Central Station last night. Rob stopped by to work on a couple of projects, and Mark called. He needed to borrow a cup of internet, so I told him to come on over with his computer.

It turns out that Mark has a YouTube video of Lucky the deer and Luna the dog which is so popular that he gets little checks from them every couple of months. Who knew? Also, he’s going to New Jersey on Friday to start a huge project: overseeing the dismantling of a L’Oreal factory and moving it to its new home in Mexico.

I missed a lot while I was sick.

Then Mark’s wife (and Rose’s older daughter) Citlali came over to check her email on Mark’s computer. Citlali said that it’s still a little strange for her being in her mother’s house, even though it’s been nearly three years since her death. “But,” she said looking around, “you have really made it your own. Everything is so beautiful.”

It really was: friends and family together in my little house, with the rain falling outside in the darkness and love and laughter within.

Generally, we like to think that we are a little better than the common man. We aren’t the Ugly American tourists giving our great country a bad name. We aren’t tourists at all! We are citizens of the world. But sometimes, we have to face the fact that we are, in fact, the Ugly American tourist, fanny pack and all, speaking English loudly and slowly enough* for those silly foreigners to get it**.

Yesterday, I had to face the fact that I am One of Them.

One of the many, uh, challenges Megan faces at work in the ER is people who come in saying they’ve had back pain or whatever for a month, but they need treatment NOW. Yes, they’ve had it for weeks and could have gone to the clinic or seen their doctor, but instead chose to go to the Emergency Room at night and get in the way of traffic accident victims and people having babies or heart attacks.

The ER staff does not look kindly upon such individuals.

Yesterday, my fever and chills were so bad that I called Megan at work, thoughtfully placing the call about five minutes after her shift started. She calmed me down and said she’d tell Rob what to bring me.

Rob appeared with Tylenol with codeine (later, I noticed that it had been prescribed for one of my mother’s dogs, who died a couple of years ago), cough syrup, and ibuprophen. He also thoughtfully brought their coffeemaker, which he will repo later on today when Megan wakes up.

I took all these things and shiveringly watched “Pan Am” until Megan called to check up on me. This morning, I feel a little better – though not enough to go to work – and as I came downstairs, Megan arrived, bearing ginger ale and soup and hugs. I may be sick, but I’m still lucky.

*My father believed that there was absolutely no point in speaking a foreign language abroad unless you were fluent in it, since offering a word or two in the other person’s native language simply unleashed a flood of it which you couldn’t understand, thus creating a conversational impasse.

**I always loved that line in “Big Trouble in Little China” (filmed in San Francisco!) where James Hong says, “Shut up! You are not brought upon this world to get it! “

The phone rang at almost exactly 2:00 on Friday afternoon. I knew the appointment with the judge was at 1:30 (the meeting with the lawyer was at 1:00), so I didn’t think it could be Megan.

But it was.

Me: “Hello?”

Megan: “It’s over! We won!”

Me: “What?!”

It was almost the same kind of stunned feeling I had when she called me to say Dad was dead. I heard the words, but there seemed to be a disconnect between my ears and my brain.

Eventually I learned that they had gotten a really nice judge, and that their lawyer had read all 600 pages of Rob’s medical records and condensed them down into two pages of notes. She had every fact about Rob’s medical condition at her fingertips.

The lawyer led with the three spinal surgeries, the last of which has failed and must be repaired within 6 months. The judge asked Rob a couple of questions, and then made a bench decision, granting him permanent disability payments, as well as back pay – this process has been dragging on for four years. He should start receiving payments as early as next month.

This will enable Megan and Rob to move onto the property with Jonathan. We are hoping that Jonathan can start working a little less once the money starts coming in. He works 60 hours a week to keep the mortgage paid, and lives on $200 a month in a 29 foot trailer, with water from the well he dug and electricity from solar panels he bought and bartered and installed. There aren’t too many people who could or would live so austerely, all in order to save the family land.

On the way home, Rob confessed that it was a little painful to be officially disabled, instead of unofficially, even though it didn’t really change a thing about his physical condition. Still, it’s a little hard to celebrate being officially too damaged to work ever again, when you are still in your 40s.

Still, the relief of the long ordeal finally concluding in the best possible way overcame the sadness, and it happened that the Vintzes, who are buying the property with my siblings, and Jonathan’s old friend Carrie happened to be here that day, so we all gathered at Megan and Rob’s little house, where so many celebrations were held in the past; where Mom lived out her final illness; where Dad visited and Jarrett lived for a while – so many happy and sad memories in one little place. We toasted the future in Champagne, and while remembering the past, looked joyfully toward the future. Together.

Christopher Hayden: Thought our stomachs should start adjusting to French cuisine so I got us croissants and cafe au lait.

— Gilmore Girls, 2006

Yesterday, I turned on the coffeemaker and the heater (in that order; it’s been cold enough to have the orchids in the house at night so the frost doesn’t ruin their budding blooms), and then went to feed the kitties. Arriving back in the kitchen, I checked on the coffee’s progress.

The light was on, but no-one, or at least no coffee, was home.

I peeked inside, wondering if I had forgotten to put water in. Nope. Water and coffee grounds were present and accounted for, but no hopeful brewing sounds were forthcoming.

I went back to the pantry/laundry room/cat dining room area and dug around in the cupboards, looking for the French press. No luck, though I discovered that I had coconut milk, which I had forgotten about, and found the silver polish.

I put shoes on and went over to Megan’s. I knew she would be home from work by then, but I was desperate enough to risk her wrath if I woke her up while stealing some of yesterday’s coffee.

I sneaked in, and was pleasantly surprised to find that there was a full pot of fresh coffee. Olé! I filled up a cup and was preparing to creep out when I heard Rob’s voice. Then Megan’s. Uh-oh.

It turned out that she had taken the night off, so they had just made coffee and were planning to drink it. So I stayed and we had coffee together, which was really nice – I can’t remember the last time we did that. It was a nice way to start the day.

Today is Rob’s permanent disability hearing in San Rafael. As I write, they are heading down the highway toward their 1:00 pm appointment. Apparently the judge has up to three months to make his or her ruling, so we almost certainly will not know today whether Rob will get his very modest monthly payments. But it still feels momentous.

Cross your fingers for us. I have to say I feel like we are due for a change in our luck, after the decade of bad luck and bad times that we have endured since our father’s death. Here’s hoping.

Ernest Raymond, my mother’s father, was not a mystery to me, or anyone who knew him. He was a charmer until his dying day. When he was in his 80s, more or less blind and bald, my grandmother would leave him sitting on a bench outside when we went shopping. Almost every single time, we’d come back to find him surrounded by young women who were laughing at his stories. Nana used to grab his hand and tell him it was time to go. “You’re tired, Ernest”, she’d say briskly. “No, I’m not”, he’d protest as he was led away to the car.

Like me (and Mom), he had green eyes and crooked pinkie fingers, and I have to keep reminding myself that he wasn’t my blood, being my mother’s adopted father. But just as she always regarded her parents as simply her parents*, I regarded them as my grandparents.

Ernest Raymond was born on May 11, 1896, so he was a mere 18 years old when the Great War started. He was also a naive farm boy from New York state, unlike my urban paternal grandfather from the slums of London.

But both Ernests were stationed in France**. My mother’s father told me that his feet literally rotted in the trenches, and he saw his boyhood friends blown to pieces in front of his eyes. He was the only survivor of his unit, simply because he caught the measles and was in the infirmary when everyone else was being blown to pieces.

After the war was over, he had a week in Paris before being shipped back to the farm. That was it. Obviously it’s not as bad as the jeering and harassment that my friend Paul and other Vietnam veterans received on coming home, but Ernest didn’t get any help readjusting to civilian life, or dealing with the horrors he saw in battle.

He grew up to become a teacher, and then a high school principal (unfortunately for my mother, of the high school she attended, since it was the only one in her small town). He and my grandmother were married for more than half a century, and like Ernest Victor, he and his wife adored each other until the end of their days.

I used to sleep on a cot in my grandparents’ room when we visited my mother’s parents, and I know for a fact that my grandfather suffered from nightmares nearly every night. In some ways, I think veterans are always fighting a battle, even if we can’t see it.

*Mom was about three when they adopted her. They always told her, “We chose you out of all the children in all the world. Other parents just have to take what they get.” No wonder she never cared about her biological parents, or felt stigmatized by being adopted.

**I recently came across his infantry drill book from the war, with his own notes in it.

Like the rest of the world, I have fallen in love. Hard. With “Downton Abbey”. “Obsessed” is probably not too strong a word.

Sure, I love the fabulous costumes. The gorgeous settings (Highclere Castle is now a Destination for the Devoted). The wonderful ensemble cast (though I fear the next season appearance of the dreaded Shirley MacLaine, who has not yet learned to be more than mediocre or less than tiresome despite her multiple lives). The scandals and melodramas.

It is the Suzy-est thing EVAR.

But watching Season Two and the Christmas Special made me think less about these frivolous (yet delightful) things, and more about my grandfathers, Ernest and Ernest.

Ernest Victor, named for the Queen, was born in 1893 in Southwark. It was, and remains, a not-lovely part of London. It was bombed heavily during WWII – the war both my Ernest grandfathers fought in not turning out to be as advertised “The War to End All Wars” – and when I went to visit the site of his birth in 1993, the only thing left of that century was the long disused railroad stable, with the fading painted sign on the brickwork.

I only learned afterwards that the day I chose to go – and my father to accompany me, despite his lack of interest in geneology – was in fact Ernest Victor’s 100th birthday: October 13, 1993.

And it was much later that I started to piece together things about him that were odd. His mother registered his birth, a month after the fact, in a time when men almost always did these things. He was barely 21 when war broke out and he signed up.

He went to France and saw unimaginable horrors. He was gassed. He suffered from what I now realize was PTSD, called “shell shock” then. It has lately been acknowledged that most, or perhaps all of the painfully young men who were shot at dawn for desertion suffered from what we now call post traumatic stress disorder – the same thing that haunts every day and night of my friend Paul’s life after what he saw and did in the Vietnam War. The same that woke Ernest Raymond, my mother’s father, screaming, just as it does Paul.

I learned that all 306 young men shot at dawn for cowardice were posthumously pardoned – in 2006.

Ernest Victor never spoke to anyone in his family again after he returned from France, other than his sister Elsie, who in turn would become my father’s confidante.

He was a big shot in international banking at Lloyd’s, an incredible achievement for a man of his background. He never once told his only son he loved him. That was, my father said, understood. But my father’s last words to me were, at the end of a routine phone call, “Love you lots.”

Ernest Victor, for all I loved him, is a mystery to me.