Another Reason to Love Madeleine Albright
I have always loved Madeleine Albright.
My dream as a girl was to become the first woman Secretary of State. It was the only secretarial job I was ever interested in. I still imagine it as my dream job. You get to travel all around the world as a person of influence, representing great power,and meet really interesting, history-making individuals. Albright beat me there as a history-maker herself, and as it turns out, some equally formidable women have since followed in her path.
I, of course, admire her as a woman of intelligence, depth, and substance. Secretly, however, I am heartened that a woman can accomplish so much, undeterred by really unfortunate hair. Of all my physical insecurities, hair has got to be number one. Like Madeleine, I too have really thin, fine hair. Her’s is more of a receeding hairline, where mine is more like my dad’s – a thinning patch right on top. (Maybe this wouldn’t bother me so much if I were tall.) So please, if you see me on the street, try not to stare at my head. I work very hard to maintain the illusion of “normal”.
And now I have another reason to love her even more: Today I have learned that she has a new book coming out called Read My Pins. Apparently, she used her jewelry as a diplomatic tool back in the day. Oh, as if I didn’t love her enough, to find she can accessorize with style and wit! What better way to make a point than with a pin?
I have decided that I shall adopt this practice. I have always loved “statement” jewelry, but I think I can take this to a whole new level. Now, anyone know where I can get a skull brooch that shoots lasers from its eye sockets?
I’m not dead yet, people!
I just had a birthday. It was kind of a mile marker birthday – 45. I was completely non-plussed. I didn’t have any birthday nostalgia, wistfulness, regrets or dread. It just came and went without much fanfare. I was actually surprised every time someone mentioned it.
It’s been a transformative few years. I have had a sort of mid-life rebirth rather than a crisis, much of which has been tied to my weight loss. I went from being this aging, matronly, invisible woman to someone people were starting to notice. And even though I am smaller, I am not younger. But the donut guy was actually flirting with me this morning. Sure, he may be an underachieving slacker with regrettable dental hygiene, but I’ll take it where I can get it.
Picture This
This year, I tucked a little something special into the Father’s Day card I gave my husband.
For years I have assiduously avoided the camera. I never could reconcile the fat woman in the photos with the woman I saw in the mirror every morning, so I just stopped having my picture taken under the auspices that I was the family photographer. There was a real danger that my children were never going to have any photographic evidence of having grown up with a mother.
Now that I am starting to look more like the person that I really am, the pictures aren’t so strange and frightening anymore. I thought it was about time I gave my husband a picture of me, something that would remind him throughout the day what was waiting for him at home. (OK – I just threw up a little bit in my mouth.) So here it is:
What? You were expecting something racy? I’ll have you know that nothing turns my man on like a red solo cup. Oh yeah – we’re classy like that.
Chivalry is alive and well!
This morning I am feeling pretty pleased with myself. Flippy skirt, sassy sling backs and hot pink all add up to me feeling pretty cute. I arrived at the front door of my office building with my usual battalion of tote bags and coffee. A nice, burly man opened the door for me and said, “Good morning, young lady.”
Woot! Young lady, indeed!
The gratuitous flirting doesn’t come my way as often as it used to, but after the initial warm glow of masculine appreciation passed I couldn’t help but wonder: Was he being sarcastic? Maybe just overly gracious -it is a fine summer morning. Oh hell, I’m just going to tuck this friendly pleasantry in my pocket and move on – even if it is with a little extra spring in my step.
Am I hip enough to buy a cup coffee?
Today I decided to treat myself to some good coffee, so I stopped in at Shenandoah Joe’s on Preston Ave. This was my first visit there, but I am a big fan of their Bo Joe at Bodo’s. As with most coffee places in town, this place is uber cool, and the menu board is overwhelming. I like coffee – no, I love coffee – but I don’t go for anything fancy. No espresso, cappuccino, latte, or the infinite variety of size/flavor shot/caf/half caf/decaf/fat/skinny combinations. Just give me a very large, strong, dark roast with room for cream – real cream, thank you.
Now, I like Starbucks as much as any other red blooded American seduced by earthy mission statements wrapped in super slick packaging, but I am terribly self conscious about ordering a venti anything. I mean how ridiculous and pretentious does that sound? When did the word large become not good enough? So as much as I love the occasional venti skinny mocha, I will only push though the pain of saying the word venti during the holiday season, when it means I can get it in an extra special pretty red cup bedecked in snowflakes.
So if I feel like a jack-ass going into Starbucks and asking for a venti coffee, how much more so is going into an unfamiliar coffee house fraught with anxiety? There are different names for everything. I have to study all the peculiarly named varieties and read descriptions and then hope I make the right pick. So what are they calling just a cup of coffee here? It’s the draft coffee, of course. Oh brother! I am not going to ask the bartender to pull me a pint of draft coffee.
I do manage to squeak out a request for the Smokey Mountain Roast (I know what this is because they have thoughtfully labeled this the dark roast draft coffee of the day). I pay and worry if I should be tipping. I mean, my cup of coffee is not labor intensive like those beautiful cappucinios where the baristas’ can do a quick portrait of me in foam. It’s just a cup of coffee, so I decide: no tip.
The guy behind the counter asks something which sounds to me like, “Do you want that to go?” I answer, “To go,” and then I am immediately sure he has not asked that at all. What did he say? Did I just answer in the most idiotic way possible? Would the answer to that question make a difference, or do they serve every drink in a disposable cup? Maybe he was asking if I need room. I do need room for cream; maybe that’s what he asked, and that is the question to which he applied my answer. Yes, I’m going to go with that.
So now I have my wonderfully dark, fragrant coffee securely in hand. I take a quick look around and cannot immediately identify where the fixin’s station is. I need cream and a lid. I leave without either because I am worried about looking too ignorant and unsophisticated to figure out how to dress my own coffee. If I were cool, I could so totally navigate my way around this place. But I take my steaming hot cup of defeat and head off to the office where at least there, I know where the cream is.
I’m a recovering snarkaholic.
I have a deep and abiding love for Irony, and I even love her ugly little sister Sarcasm. I really try to employ them only in the service of my self deprecating humor, but they can be unruly, those two. So if I offend, I am sorry. I almost never truly desire to wound.
I wish I had been blogging this journey from the beginning – at least from the beginning of what has been a transformative couple of years – but I just wasn’t ready. Sometimes I just have to keep turning things over and over in my head before I am ready to make a move. Ever seen (or been) one of those teen age girls, seemingly absent-minded, twirling a hank of hair over and over while silently plotting the conquest of some poor dope three seats over in history class? It’s like that – my mind – stealth, deliberate, on the offensive, moving forward. And then one day there is action, often intense and unyielding, the plan suddenly in plain view. That’s how I roll.
