"I'm sorry," she said.
"I forgive you," he said.
"What should I have done?" she said.
"This," he said, and hugged her.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
friend fail
Once upon a time there was a girl who wanted to be beautiful. But her hair was dark and her eyes were brown and she couldn't learn to be beautiful the same way the other girls did. She couldn't wear the same color earrings as they could and couldn't tie her hair up the same way they did.
But she knew she was beautiful.
She heard of a place where she could learn how girls like her could become beautiful, but she had to pass a beauty test in order to get in.
She learned everything she could from books and practiced making herself beautiful. Finally, the time came for her to take the beauty test. She asked her friend to drive her because she couldn't drive by herself.
He agreed. When the day came, he pulled his car up in front of her house. She stepped out of the doorway in a blue silk dress and shining silver necklace and walked gracefully to the car. She opened it and sat inside. "Ready to go?" he asked.
"Are you going to tell me that I'm beautiful?" she asked.
"Oh," he said. "I thought I was just driving."
He drove.
They arrived at the school where she was to take the beauty test. She got out of the car and shut the door, then walked to the dressing room.
"Don't try to be one of us beauties," a blue-eyed girl called from inside. The dark-haired girl knew she was taking a different beauty test, so she took a deep breath and walked into the dressing room.
When she came out she was even more stunning. Her friend walked with her toward the stage where the beauty test would take place.
Suddenly her earrings fell out and her necklace broke and dropped onto the floor. Her friend waited to see what she would do.
A boy walking down the same hallway happened to see, and he deftly lifted the pieces of fallen jewelry off the floor and set them on the table along the wall. He opened a toolbox that was sitting there and bent the clasp back into shape. He handed her the glittering necklace and earrings while her friend watched.
"Thank you," she said.
"You're welcome," he said.
She put them back on.
He looked at her. "You're beautiful," he said.
She smiled, and it was a smile so glorious that had she shaved her head and put on men's jeans and a shapeless winter coat, she could have passed the beauty test with flying colors.
But she knew she was beautiful.
She heard of a place where she could learn how girls like her could become beautiful, but she had to pass a beauty test in order to get in.
She learned everything she could from books and practiced making herself beautiful. Finally, the time came for her to take the beauty test. She asked her friend to drive her because she couldn't drive by herself.
He agreed. When the day came, he pulled his car up in front of her house. She stepped out of the doorway in a blue silk dress and shining silver necklace and walked gracefully to the car. She opened it and sat inside. "Ready to go?" he asked.
"Are you going to tell me that I'm beautiful?" she asked.
"Oh," he said. "I thought I was just driving."
He drove.
They arrived at the school where she was to take the beauty test. She got out of the car and shut the door, then walked to the dressing room.
"Don't try to be one of us beauties," a blue-eyed girl called from inside. The dark-haired girl knew she was taking a different beauty test, so she took a deep breath and walked into the dressing room.
When she came out she was even more stunning. Her friend walked with her toward the stage where the beauty test would take place.
Suddenly her earrings fell out and her necklace broke and dropped onto the floor. Her friend waited to see what she would do.
A boy walking down the same hallway happened to see, and he deftly lifted the pieces of fallen jewelry off the floor and set them on the table along the wall. He opened a toolbox that was sitting there and bent the clasp back into shape. He handed her the glittering necklace and earrings while her friend watched.
"Thank you," she said.
"You're welcome," he said.
She put them back on.
He looked at her. "You're beautiful," he said.
She smiled, and it was a smile so glorious that had she shaved her head and put on men's jeans and a shapeless winter coat, she could have passed the beauty test with flying colors.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Feast of St. Patrick confessions
Happy birthday, Emily.
I went to the scout office to turn in my paperwork and pick up some patches for my bag. Pat found a 2007 Camp Tapico patch for me and even let me buy a climbing merit badge patch, on condition that I don't give it to a scout.
I thought briefly about going to my grandpa's house while I was pulling out of the parking lot. I didn't really feel like going, but I wanted to see them at some point over break so I guilted myself into going. Then I realized I wouldn't have to take the freeway if I stopped at his house, so cheerily I went, making only one especially stupid navigational error ("that looks like some sort of factory on the left, so I ought to be turning right").
I pulled into his driveway and gave him a hug as I walked in the door. His clothes matched: gray pants (belt undone) and a gray-and-white plaid shirt. Both were stained with the blue paint he'd recently used on the basement walls. "Do you have any work for me?" I asked.
For as long as I can remember, these four black-and-gold profiles in tilted-square frames hung on the east wall in his living room. He had taken them down, and he told me he wanted to fill the wall with pictures.
These were gathered on the couch awaiting wallhanging: Uncle Steve's 11x14 senior picture in a large, smooth, light-brown wood frame (taken from a shelf in the basement); my dad's 11x14 senior picture in a large, rippled dark-brown wood frame (taken from the basement wall); Uncle Chris's 8x10 senior picture in a thin wood frame (taken from a shelf in the basement); an elaborate matching pair of worn-out-fake-gold frames holding 11x14s of my dad and Uncle Chris when they were about four (taken from the upper stairwell).
I gently tried to discourage him from putting these together on the wall, but secretly I wanted to see what the wall would look like when he was done. We pulled three nails from the wall and left the top center one in to mark the middle of the wall, and it was time to work.
He'd bought a package of tiny plastic suction-cup hooks to hang them up. I pressed a dry suction cup against the white paint and let it fall, but I was disappointed to find out that my grandfather was not so easily discouraged. He explained that suction cups don't stick unless they're wet, so I lightly licked one while he soaked another like an excited puppy. We pressed them onto the wall. Neither stuck.
"I think your best bet would be to use nails," I suggested. Determined to get his money's worth from the tiny suction cup hooks, he told me he had some gorilla glue and asked if I'd heard of it. My eyes got real big.
He spread yesterday's newspaper on the kitchen table to protect the ratty old tablecloth and leaned over the suction cups, dabbing them with glue that was the nasty yellow-green color of hydrochloric acid.
I knew I had to prevent him from gorilla gluing the tiny suction cups to the wall because the tiny plastic hooks attached to the tiny suction cups didn't look strong enough to hold these heavy, decades-old pawnshop frames.
He finished dabbing glue onto one suction cup, and he stuck it on the wall. I was happily surprised to find that the glue didn't hold any better than our saliva had.
He tried again, this time with more glue. Again, the glue didn't hold.
I had an idea. I picked up one of the tiny suction cup hooks in my hand and hung my dad's senior picture from it, but it didn't break. I swung the picture back and forth a bit, but it didn't break. I twisted the hook back far beyond its normal range and it snapped with a pathetic little sound. The frame fell to the floor.
"Grandpa," I said, "I don't think these hooks are strong enough to hold the frames. Look." I showed him the broken hook.
He set down the glue and looked. "Well I'll be--" he started, and tried hanging a frame from a hook in his hand. The hook split almost before he started swinging it. It was time for nails.
Scotch tape from the kitchen drawer, hammer from the coat closet, a Gerber jar of nails from the basement, and he began.
I sat in Grandma's chair, watching him and laughing silently. One by one, the pictures went up.
"I don't care if it's symmetrical or not. I just want to blast a buncha pictures up there," he said. He looked at me as if asking permission. "Deal?" he asked.
I looked into his eyes. "Deal," I told him.
Oh, man. I just betrayed my entire family and pretty much anyone else who sees that wall.
"Glad you come over 'cause I wasn't sure if I 'as gonna do this or not, and you come over and I decide to do it. See what kin'a influence you got over me?"
My insides cringed. I should have sucked it up and driven home on the freeway.
I sank back into Grandma's chair. We small talked for a bit while he fiddled with the pictures, and, remembering his World War II exploits, I asked if he'd ever been to Thailand.
"Thigh-land?" he asked. "No, I never been to Thigh-land. Why do you wan' know about Thigh-land?"
"I have a friend who went to Thailand for a year," I told him.
"Why would you go to Thigh-land?" he asked, stepping around and back to the pictures. He answered the question for himself: "Study Chinese. It's not a very healthy country to go to right now," he said, maybe to himself.
Four pictures hung in a nearly-straight row on the wall. He looked at me and there was an instant of eye contact before his eyes danced into laughter. He, too, saw how ridiculous the pictures looked.
"They aren't even," he said.
When he turned around, I facepalmed and wondered what my parents would say when they saw the wall. I could hear my dad saying "what on earth?" The wall looked so bad that no one would notice that the pictures were uneven, and if they did, they would assume it was part of the lack of design.
There was still a nail hanging in the middle of the wall, between my dad's and Uncle Steve's senior pictures. He wanted something small to hang there, so I gave him a horizontal 4x6 picture of my immediate family (my parents and siblings and me; his son and daughter-in-law and grandkids) at Uncle Joe's. Framed in black, it fit snugly between the foiling brown frames.
He put another nail in directly below this one and asked for the picture of him and my grandmother. A vertical 4x6, it sat on the shelf in a simple fake-gold frame. There was no hook to hang the frame with, and he mentioned gorilla gluing the whole thing to the wall. "Can't see, can't hear," he muttered and distracted himself with a Cole Porter casette tape.
The wall had pretty much gone to hell, and I felt like I was responsible for it. What could I do? If he had twine, he could tie it around the shelf-stand and hang the frame from there, I suggested.
He didn't have twine, but he had packaging tape. He looped it around the shelf-stand on the back of the frame and hung it from the nail below the family portrait.
To recap, this is what the wall looks like from left to right:
.elaborate fake-gold frame with 11x14 of either my dad or Uncle Chris at about four years old
.dark brown rippling wood frame with 11x14 of Uncle Steve at eighteen (looking slightly left)
.black frame with horizontal 4x6 of my family, below this a simple fake-gold frame with 4x6 of my grandparents
.light brown smooth wood frame with 11x14 of my dad at eighteen (looking slightly right)
.matching elaborate fake-gold frame with 11x14 of either Uncle Chris or my dad at about four years old
"Okay, if I keep messing it up, it won't matter, will it?" he asked me. He straightened my dad's senior picture and for a second I thought the whole thing didn't look half-bad.
Suddenly he realized he'd forgotten Uncle Chris's senior picture, the lone 8x10 sitting in its simple medium-brown wood frame. He decided, with some egging on from me, to put it on top in the center. He dragged a dinette chair into the living room and stood on it. I knelt on the couch, handing up equipment and spotting in case he fell.
"Scotch tape and duct tape. You can't live without 'em," he muttered. I wondered where the duct tape was.
I thought it strange to display the middle child in such a ridiculously prominent location, so I handed him his 50th anniversary frame with wedding-day photos of him and my grandmother. Well now he needed a place for Uncle Chris's picture, and he fit it snugly between the two other senior pictures, hanging down below. He found a spot, stabbed at it with his finger, marked it with Scotch tape, and started the nail. "So much for measuring," he said.
The 4x6 of him and my grandmother slid out of its frame. He knocked it around a bit, trying to straighten it, but without any luck. Finally he gave it to me.
"Get the picture straight and put that sucker back on," he instructed me.
I took it to the kitchen table, emptied the frame, and taped the photo in place. The shelf-stand was in the way. Grandpa stole a guilty look at me and ripped it off.
"Why didn't we think of that before?" he asked me.
I sat back in Grandma's chair, watching him, and then I realized this wasn't as ridiculous as it looked. It was his house, let him have it how he likes, I thought. I've spent a lot of time in college going out of my way to be tacky because I've had a nagging feeling that once I grow up and settle down somewhere, I'm going to have to look respectable and my house will have to look respectable and my picture frames will have to match and hang symmetrically from the wall. It was kind of liberating to known that I can grow up and still be tacky.
I understood, then, what he was trying to do. He was thinking the same way I thought when I attached a hanger to the ceiling with push pins and twine so I could hang my internet cord up or when I carried an old drumhead back to my room to use as a table. He knew where he was going, and now I knew, too, and I could help him without silently mocking him.
"I shouldn't even be doing this," he muttered into the wall. "Someone smart should be doing this."
He wanted the 5x7s of his five grandkids on the wall on the left side, and I went through each one, Scotch-taping the bottoms so the pictures wouldn't fall out. The shelf-stands on the frames were too big to hang the frames on the wall. "I don't dare rip these off," he said, and so he turned the first one over on the table and began nailing the shelf-stand to the back of the frame. He'd had some success with this tactic before, but this frame was thinner. We heard the glass break.
"Oh, sh-t, I mean, shoot," he said. He didn't mean shoot. The glass had shattered and there was a nail sticking out through Emily's shoulder. We cleaned out the glass and, without it, there was plenty of room to tuck the shelf-stand into the frame. We used either tape or gorilla glue to tuck in the other four shelf-stands, then we realized that Anne's frame didn't have a loop to hang on the wall. I found a paperclip and taped it to the back of her frame.
We were done for the day. He stepped back and we admired our work. He asked me if I liked it, and I told him I did--and told him this honestly. I also told him I didn't think my parents would like it, and he was surprised, but I said it didn't matter. I liked it.
My Thigh-land friend once told me I was endearingly tacky, but he hasn't met my grandfather. He is impossible not to love.
Saturday, I went back to Grandpa's house, and he had more pictures up. It looked better, actually, sort of collage-like. Now I got to run off to Greek, but here's a picture of what it looked like on Saturday:
I went to the scout office to turn in my paperwork and pick up some patches for my bag. Pat found a 2007 Camp Tapico patch for me and even let me buy a climbing merit badge patch, on condition that I don't give it to a scout.
I thought briefly about going to my grandpa's house while I was pulling out of the parking lot. I didn't really feel like going, but I wanted to see them at some point over break so I guilted myself into going. Then I realized I wouldn't have to take the freeway if I stopped at his house, so cheerily I went, making only one especially stupid navigational error ("that looks like some sort of factory on the left, so I ought to be turning right").
I pulled into his driveway and gave him a hug as I walked in the door. His clothes matched: gray pants (belt undone) and a gray-and-white plaid shirt. Both were stained with the blue paint he'd recently used on the basement walls. "Do you have any work for me?" I asked.
For as long as I can remember, these four black-and-gold profiles in tilted-square frames hung on the east wall in his living room. He had taken them down, and he told me he wanted to fill the wall with pictures.
These were gathered on the couch awaiting wallhanging: Uncle Steve's 11x14 senior picture in a large, smooth, light-brown wood frame (taken from a shelf in the basement); my dad's 11x14 senior picture in a large, rippled dark-brown wood frame (taken from the basement wall); Uncle Chris's 8x10 senior picture in a thin wood frame (taken from a shelf in the basement); an elaborate matching pair of worn-out-fake-gold frames holding 11x14s of my dad and Uncle Chris when they were about four (taken from the upper stairwell).
I gently tried to discourage him from putting these together on the wall, but secretly I wanted to see what the wall would look like when he was done. We pulled three nails from the wall and left the top center one in to mark the middle of the wall, and it was time to work.
He'd bought a package of tiny plastic suction-cup hooks to hang them up. I pressed a dry suction cup against the white paint and let it fall, but I was disappointed to find out that my grandfather was not so easily discouraged. He explained that suction cups don't stick unless they're wet, so I lightly licked one while he soaked another like an excited puppy. We pressed them onto the wall. Neither stuck.
"I think your best bet would be to use nails," I suggested. Determined to get his money's worth from the tiny suction cup hooks, he told me he had some gorilla glue and asked if I'd heard of it. My eyes got real big.
He spread yesterday's newspaper on the kitchen table to protect the ratty old tablecloth and leaned over the suction cups, dabbing them with glue that was the nasty yellow-green color of hydrochloric acid.
I knew I had to prevent him from gorilla gluing the tiny suction cups to the wall because the tiny plastic hooks attached to the tiny suction cups didn't look strong enough to hold these heavy, decades-old pawnshop frames.
He finished dabbing glue onto one suction cup, and he stuck it on the wall. I was happily surprised to find that the glue didn't hold any better than our saliva had.
He tried again, this time with more glue. Again, the glue didn't hold.
I had an idea. I picked up one of the tiny suction cup hooks in my hand and hung my dad's senior picture from it, but it didn't break. I swung the picture back and forth a bit, but it didn't break. I twisted the hook back far beyond its normal range and it snapped with a pathetic little sound. The frame fell to the floor.
"Grandpa," I said, "I don't think these hooks are strong enough to hold the frames. Look." I showed him the broken hook.
He set down the glue and looked. "Well I'll be--" he started, and tried hanging a frame from a hook in his hand. The hook split almost before he started swinging it. It was time for nails.
Scotch tape from the kitchen drawer, hammer from the coat closet, a Gerber jar of nails from the basement, and he began.
I sat in Grandma's chair, watching him and laughing silently. One by one, the pictures went up.
"I don't care if it's symmetrical or not. I just want to blast a buncha pictures up there," he said. He looked at me as if asking permission. "Deal?" he asked.
I looked into his eyes. "Deal," I told him.
Oh, man. I just betrayed my entire family and pretty much anyone else who sees that wall.
"Glad you come over 'cause I wasn't sure if I 'as gonna do this or not, and you come over and I decide to do it. See what kin'a influence you got over me?"
My insides cringed. I should have sucked it up and driven home on the freeway.
I sank back into Grandma's chair. We small talked for a bit while he fiddled with the pictures, and, remembering his World War II exploits, I asked if he'd ever been to Thailand.
"Thigh-land?" he asked. "No, I never been to Thigh-land. Why do you wan' know about Thigh-land?"
"I have a friend who went to Thailand for a year," I told him.
"Why would you go to Thigh-land?" he asked, stepping around and back to the pictures. He answered the question for himself: "Study Chinese. It's not a very healthy country to go to right now," he said, maybe to himself.
Four pictures hung in a nearly-straight row on the wall. He looked at me and there was an instant of eye contact before his eyes danced into laughter. He, too, saw how ridiculous the pictures looked.
"They aren't even," he said.
When he turned around, I facepalmed and wondered what my parents would say when they saw the wall. I could hear my dad saying "what on earth?" The wall looked so bad that no one would notice that the pictures were uneven, and if they did, they would assume it was part of the lack of design.
There was still a nail hanging in the middle of the wall, between my dad's and Uncle Steve's senior pictures. He wanted something small to hang there, so I gave him a horizontal 4x6 picture of my immediate family (my parents and siblings and me; his son and daughter-in-law and grandkids) at Uncle Joe's. Framed in black, it fit snugly between the foiling brown frames.
He put another nail in directly below this one and asked for the picture of him and my grandmother. A vertical 4x6, it sat on the shelf in a simple fake-gold frame. There was no hook to hang the frame with, and he mentioned gorilla gluing the whole thing to the wall. "Can't see, can't hear," he muttered and distracted himself with a Cole Porter casette tape.
The wall had pretty much gone to hell, and I felt like I was responsible for it. What could I do? If he had twine, he could tie it around the shelf-stand and hang the frame from there, I suggested.
He didn't have twine, but he had packaging tape. He looped it around the shelf-stand on the back of the frame and hung it from the nail below the family portrait.
To recap, this is what the wall looks like from left to right:
.elaborate fake-gold frame with 11x14 of either my dad or Uncle Chris at about four years old
.dark brown rippling wood frame with 11x14 of Uncle Steve at eighteen (looking slightly left)
.black frame with horizontal 4x6 of my family, below this a simple fake-gold frame with 4x6 of my grandparents
.light brown smooth wood frame with 11x14 of my dad at eighteen (looking slightly right)
.matching elaborate fake-gold frame with 11x14 of either Uncle Chris or my dad at about four years old
"Okay, if I keep messing it up, it won't matter, will it?" he asked me. He straightened my dad's senior picture and for a second I thought the whole thing didn't look half-bad.
Suddenly he realized he'd forgotten Uncle Chris's senior picture, the lone 8x10 sitting in its simple medium-brown wood frame. He decided, with some egging on from me, to put it on top in the center. He dragged a dinette chair into the living room and stood on it. I knelt on the couch, handing up equipment and spotting in case he fell.
"Scotch tape and duct tape. You can't live without 'em," he muttered. I wondered where the duct tape was.
I thought it strange to display the middle child in such a ridiculously prominent location, so I handed him his 50th anniversary frame with wedding-day photos of him and my grandmother. Well now he needed a place for Uncle Chris's picture, and he fit it snugly between the two other senior pictures, hanging down below. He found a spot, stabbed at it with his finger, marked it with Scotch tape, and started the nail. "So much for measuring," he said.
The 4x6 of him and my grandmother slid out of its frame. He knocked it around a bit, trying to straighten it, but without any luck. Finally he gave it to me.
"Get the picture straight and put that sucker back on," he instructed me.
I took it to the kitchen table, emptied the frame, and taped the photo in place. The shelf-stand was in the way. Grandpa stole a guilty look at me and ripped it off.
"Why didn't we think of that before?" he asked me.
I sat back in Grandma's chair, watching him, and then I realized this wasn't as ridiculous as it looked. It was his house, let him have it how he likes, I thought. I've spent a lot of time in college going out of my way to be tacky because I've had a nagging feeling that once I grow up and settle down somewhere, I'm going to have to look respectable and my house will have to look respectable and my picture frames will have to match and hang symmetrically from the wall. It was kind of liberating to known that I can grow up and still be tacky.
I understood, then, what he was trying to do. He was thinking the same way I thought when I attached a hanger to the ceiling with push pins and twine so I could hang my internet cord up or when I carried an old drumhead back to my room to use as a table. He knew where he was going, and now I knew, too, and I could help him without silently mocking him.
"I shouldn't even be doing this," he muttered into the wall. "Someone smart should be doing this."
He wanted the 5x7s of his five grandkids on the wall on the left side, and I went through each one, Scotch-taping the bottoms so the pictures wouldn't fall out. The shelf-stands on the frames were too big to hang the frames on the wall. "I don't dare rip these off," he said, and so he turned the first one over on the table and began nailing the shelf-stand to the back of the frame. He'd had some success with this tactic before, but this frame was thinner. We heard the glass break.
"Oh, sh-t, I mean, shoot," he said. He didn't mean shoot. The glass had shattered and there was a nail sticking out through Emily's shoulder. We cleaned out the glass and, without it, there was plenty of room to tuck the shelf-stand into the frame. We used either tape or gorilla glue to tuck in the other four shelf-stands, then we realized that Anne's frame didn't have a loop to hang on the wall. I found a paperclip and taped it to the back of her frame.
We were done for the day. He stepped back and we admired our work. He asked me if I liked it, and I told him I did--and told him this honestly. I also told him I didn't think my parents would like it, and he was surprised, but I said it didn't matter. I liked it.
My Thigh-land friend once told me I was endearingly tacky, but he hasn't met my grandfather. He is impossible not to love.
Saturday, I went back to Grandpa's house, and he had more pictures up. It looked better, actually, sort of collage-like. Now I got to run off to Greek, but here's a picture of what it looked like on Saturday:
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
I love him.
I feel like I ought to apologize for what I did today.
At first I tried to talk him out of it. But then I realized he was just like me, and he was probably sick of people trying to talk him out of things like this. I know I'm sick of people trying to talk me out of it. I guess the difference is that I know it's ridiculous, and I'm not sure he does.
If someone at home finds out what I've done, I'll post the story. Else I'll wait until I'm safely back at Hillsdale. Look for it Sunday night.
At first I tried to talk him out of it. But then I realized he was just like me, and he was probably sick of people trying to talk him out of things like this. I know I'm sick of people trying to talk me out of it. I guess the difference is that I know it's ridiculous, and I'm not sure he does.
If someone at home finds out what I've done, I'll post the story. Else I'll wait until I'm safely back at Hillsdale. Look for it Sunday night.
Monday, March 16, 2009
I hate shopping for clothes.
I had a package to mail, then I was heading out to Miller Road. I hoped to return with a pair of jeans and a Tekiela book, but also in the back of my mind were hiking shoes, spankies (for skirts at swing dance and worn-through jeans), toothpaste, cough drops, and any sort of food I could bring back to college with me.
I went to the post office and spent about $10 mailing the package, feeling vaguely guilty for mailing it the cheapest way so I'd have more money for clothing. They said 5-10 business days, 5 would be right on time. I went to the bank and deposited a check, and then I was off to Miller Road.
First stop: Target. I browsed the clearance racks first, then the regular racks. I found a few pairs of jeans that might fit, checked the prices, put a few back, and walked into the fitting room.
How I envy men and their easy-to-use sizing system! Women's clothing is sized in an utterly arbitrary fashion, probably designed to assure us that we're not fat. In addition to this, we're all shaped in frustratingly unique ways and we all have different ideas on beauty and modesty. The fitting room is one of the most frustrating place in the world. You start with a simple question: do the pants fit? And the answer is ridiculously complicated. I tried to map it out in an easy-to-use flowchart, but I gave up. Try this:
Question 1: Do the pants fit?
++If you answered NO, try a different pair and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered YES, you are a liar.
++If you answered MAYBE, go on to Question 2.
Question 2: How do they fit around the waist?
++If you answered WAY TOO TIGHT, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered WAY TOO LOOSE, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered JUST RIGHT, you are a liar.
++If you answered SORTA TIGHT, remember that jeans stretch out after a while and go on to Question 3.
++If you answered SORTA LOOSE, remember that you can always wear a belt and go on to Question 3.
Question 3: How long are they?
++If you answered WAY TOO LONG, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered WAY TOO SHORT, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered JUST RIGHT, you are a liar.
++If you answered SORTA SHORT, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered SORTA LONG, remember that you can hem them and go on to Question 4.
Question 4: How do they fit around your butt and thighs?
++If you answered PRETTY SURE THESE ARE GUY JEANS, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered MY BUTT GOT SWALLOWED UP BY A DENIM BLUE WHALE, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered THIS WOULD DISTRACT EVEN THE MOST CHASTE MEN, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered I CAN COUNT THE CHANGE IN MY POCKET BY TWISTING AROUND AND LOOKING IN THE MIRROR, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered JUST RIGHT, you are a liar.
Question 5: Do you like them?
++If you answered THEY'LL DO, then go pay for them and leave the store before you get distracted elsewhere.
++If you answered YES, you are a liar.
++If you answered NO, then try on a shirt that you already know will look good. This will make you feel a little better about the jeans. Then go pay for the jeans, because you've already spent three hours at this store and there's no sense in spending another three hours elsewhere.
I tried on a handful of jeans at Target, but didn't find anything. Fashion Bug was a couple stores down, and I figured why not try my luck there? I parked and got out of the car.
Fashion Bug tried to get around this problem with their Right Fit revolution. "Try on a revolution,” the sign said. “What is RIGHT FIT? It’s the revolutionary result of the most extensive fit study in 60 years. Our unique fit and sizing system is based on 3 different body shapes: straight, moderately curvy and curvy. Resized with Right Fit technology, L.A. Blues jeans and Studio 1940 dress pants are now available in plus and misses Right Fit sizes.”
Right Fit was color-coded. There were signs on the walls and tags on the clothing. I perused them eagerly, hoping to cut down on fitting-room time. The signs read:
Do your current pants or jeans:
fit your waist, but are baggy? fit your hips/thighs, but have to be unbuttoned? Try RIGHT FIT YELLOW.
fit at the waist? but are slightly big in the thighs and hips? Try RIGHT FIT RED.
have to be cinched at the waist? or have a gap at the back? Try RIGHT FIT BLUE.
Already I don't fit! I needed Right Fit Green. Sometimes I feel like unbuttoning my jeans, but I have to tie them up and at least two people have made fun of me for the gap in the back. I picked up two pairs, a blue and a yellow, in size 2 and walked to the fitting room.
I swam. For good measure, I put both my legs into the right leg of the blue pair, and hopped around until I saw a mermaid in the mirror. While I pulled my own jeans back on, I glanced at the tag.
Size 5.
Turned out I'd been browsing the plus sizes without realizing it, so I tried the other side of the store. Two full racks of clearance jeans, about $15 per pair, and in all three Right Fit colors! I picked up three, the smallest size I could find in each color, and tried them on.
Yellow 4M: baggy, but waist and length were good.
Blue 6M: I'd wear these advertising a weight-loss product.
Red 4MP: tight around the waist, baggy elsewhere.
"Did you find what you needed?" asked the clerk.
"No," I told her, "but I know where to look now." I put the jeans on the rejection rack and went back to clearance.
Blue 3M: waist was good, but baggy enough to look like guy jeans.
Yellow 3M: I had to suck in my gut to get these on, but I got them buttoned. I could barely move.
The clerk saw me add more jeans to the rejection rack, and she asked if she could help. I told her specifically what the problems were with the jeans, and she told me to try size 3 red.
Red 3M: too tight at the waist, a little baggy but they're clearly girl jeans
I told the clerk what happened and she suggested trying yellow.
"What size?" I asked her. "Yellow 4 was too baggy and I could barely squeeze into Yellow 3."
She tried to convince me that the red ones would stretch out at the waist, but I didn't want to try my luck. I wasn't Straight, Moderately Curvy, or Curvy, so it was time to move on.
Old Navy?
It was the next clothing store in the plaza. I usually don't like to pay Old Navy prices, but I've had some luck with their clearance racks before, so I decided to give it a try.
What luck! Jeans for $15 on the clearance racks! I took four pair, two size 0 and two size 2, into the fitting room.
Size 0 sort of fit, but were ugly.
Size 2 sort of fit, but were ugly.
Size 0 was way too tight.
Size 2 was way too tight.
I tried on almost a dozen pair, almost the entire S/XS clearance rack, and finally found two pairs of pants that I liked. They weren't jeans, but they were good pants that I wouldn't mind getting grass stains on. I hung up the jeans and empty hangers on the rejection rack and carried the pants to the checkout counter, walking past $30 and $40 jeans. I'd found two pairs of pants for less than $30 total.
Hard work pays off.
Next stop, Borders. I found the Tekiela book, remembered the Amazon.com price, and bought the book because it was cheaper in the store. Ten minutes.
Sports Authority was right next door. I didn't want to spend any more time shopping, but they might have spankies. I walked in the door.
Shoes on clearance!
Well, they were all to big for me, but I went over to the regular shoe aisle. An employee was on me like a dog to dropped food. "Can I help you find anything?"
"I need something waterproof and good for backpacking."
I liked the $70 shoes and almost bought them, but then I saw a $55 pair marked down to $29. He found a smaller pair for me and they fit well. Also, if anything went wrong in the first year, including normal wear--soles coming loose, stitches coming out, color fading, etc.--they'd pay for it or replace the shoe.
He brought the shoes up to the counter while I hunted after spankies. I found some, they fit, and I brought them up to the counter.
I didn't realize I had to pay extra for the shoe-insurance. I asked how much it cost.
$4.99, she said.
"How much are the shoes?"
She beeped it with the red laser.
"It ain't even worth it," she said, partly to herself. She looked back at the guy who'd helped me find the shoes. "It ain't even worth it," she told him. "The shoes are only $10."
I paid for them and drove home in the clunky light-blue Olds.
Mission accomplished.
I went to the post office and spent about $10 mailing the package, feeling vaguely guilty for mailing it the cheapest way so I'd have more money for clothing. They said 5-10 business days, 5 would be right on time. I went to the bank and deposited a check, and then I was off to Miller Road.
First stop: Target. I browsed the clearance racks first, then the regular racks. I found a few pairs of jeans that might fit, checked the prices, put a few back, and walked into the fitting room.
How I envy men and their easy-to-use sizing system! Women's clothing is sized in an utterly arbitrary fashion, probably designed to assure us that we're not fat. In addition to this, we're all shaped in frustratingly unique ways and we all have different ideas on beauty and modesty. The fitting room is one of the most frustrating place in the world. You start with a simple question: do the pants fit? And the answer is ridiculously complicated. I tried to map it out in an easy-to-use flowchart, but I gave up. Try this:
Question 1: Do the pants fit?
++If you answered NO, try a different pair and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered YES, you are a liar.
++If you answered MAYBE, go on to Question 2.
Question 2: How do they fit around the waist?
++If you answered WAY TOO TIGHT, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered WAY TOO LOOSE, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered JUST RIGHT, you are a liar.
++If you answered SORTA TIGHT, remember that jeans stretch out after a while and go on to Question 3.
++If you answered SORTA LOOSE, remember that you can always wear a belt and go on to Question 3.
Question 3: How long are they?
++If you answered WAY TOO LONG, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered WAY TOO SHORT, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered JUST RIGHT, you are a liar.
++If you answered SORTA SHORT, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered SORTA LONG, remember that you can hem them and go on to Question 4.
Question 4: How do they fit around your butt and thighs?
++If you answered PRETTY SURE THESE ARE GUY JEANS, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered MY BUTT GOT SWALLOWED UP BY A DENIM BLUE WHALE, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered THIS WOULD DISTRACT EVEN THE MOST CHASTE MEN, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered I CAN COUNT THE CHANGE IN MY POCKET BY TWISTING AROUND AND LOOKING IN THE MIRROR, try a larger or smaller size and go back to Question 1.
++If you answered JUST RIGHT, you are a liar.
Question 5: Do you like them?
++If you answered THEY'LL DO, then go pay for them and leave the store before you get distracted elsewhere.
++If you answered YES, you are a liar.
++If you answered NO, then try on a shirt that you already know will look good. This will make you feel a little better about the jeans. Then go pay for the jeans, because you've already spent three hours at this store and there's no sense in spending another three hours elsewhere.
I tried on a handful of jeans at Target, but didn't find anything. Fashion Bug was a couple stores down, and I figured why not try my luck there? I parked and got out of the car.
Fashion Bug tried to get around this problem with their Right Fit revolution. "Try on a revolution,” the sign said. “What is RIGHT FIT? It’s the revolutionary result of the most extensive fit study in 60 years. Our unique fit and sizing system is based on 3 different body shapes: straight, moderately curvy and curvy. Resized with Right Fit technology, L.A. Blues jeans and Studio 1940 dress pants are now available in plus and misses Right Fit sizes.”
Right Fit was color-coded. There were signs on the walls and tags on the clothing. I perused them eagerly, hoping to cut down on fitting-room time. The signs read:
Do your current pants or jeans:
fit your waist, but are baggy? fit your hips/thighs, but have to be unbuttoned? Try RIGHT FIT YELLOW.
fit at the waist? but are slightly big in the thighs and hips? Try RIGHT FIT RED.
have to be cinched at the waist? or have a gap at the back? Try RIGHT FIT BLUE.
Already I don't fit! I needed Right Fit Green. Sometimes I feel like unbuttoning my jeans, but I have to tie them up and at least two people have made fun of me for the gap in the back. I picked up two pairs, a blue and a yellow, in size 2 and walked to the fitting room.
I swam. For good measure, I put both my legs into the right leg of the blue pair, and hopped around until I saw a mermaid in the mirror. While I pulled my own jeans back on, I glanced at the tag.
Size 5.
Turned out I'd been browsing the plus sizes without realizing it, so I tried the other side of the store. Two full racks of clearance jeans, about $15 per pair, and in all three Right Fit colors! I picked up three, the smallest size I could find in each color, and tried them on.
Yellow 4M: baggy, but waist and length were good.
Blue 6M: I'd wear these advertising a weight-loss product.
Red 4MP: tight around the waist, baggy elsewhere.
"Did you find what you needed?" asked the clerk.
"No," I told her, "but I know where to look now." I put the jeans on the rejection rack and went back to clearance.
Blue 3M: waist was good, but baggy enough to look like guy jeans.
Yellow 3M: I had to suck in my gut to get these on, but I got them buttoned. I could barely move.
The clerk saw me add more jeans to the rejection rack, and she asked if she could help. I told her specifically what the problems were with the jeans, and she told me to try size 3 red.
Red 3M: too tight at the waist, a little baggy but they're clearly girl jeans
I told the clerk what happened and she suggested trying yellow.
"What size?" I asked her. "Yellow 4 was too baggy and I could barely squeeze into Yellow 3."
She tried to convince me that the red ones would stretch out at the waist, but I didn't want to try my luck. I wasn't Straight, Moderately Curvy, or Curvy, so it was time to move on.
Old Navy?
It was the next clothing store in the plaza. I usually don't like to pay Old Navy prices, but I've had some luck with their clearance racks before, so I decided to give it a try.
What luck! Jeans for $15 on the clearance racks! I took four pair, two size 0 and two size 2, into the fitting room.
Size 0 sort of fit, but were ugly.
Size 2 sort of fit, but were ugly.
Size 0 was way too tight.
Size 2 was way too tight.
I tried on almost a dozen pair, almost the entire S/XS clearance rack, and finally found two pairs of pants that I liked. They weren't jeans, but they were good pants that I wouldn't mind getting grass stains on. I hung up the jeans and empty hangers on the rejection rack and carried the pants to the checkout counter, walking past $30 and $40 jeans. I'd found two pairs of pants for less than $30 total.
Hard work pays off.
Next stop, Borders. I found the Tekiela book, remembered the Amazon.com price, and bought the book because it was cheaper in the store. Ten minutes.
Sports Authority was right next door. I didn't want to spend any more time shopping, but they might have spankies. I walked in the door.
Shoes on clearance!
Well, they were all to big for me, but I went over to the regular shoe aisle. An employee was on me like a dog to dropped food. "Can I help you find anything?"
"I need something waterproof and good for backpacking."
I liked the $70 shoes and almost bought them, but then I saw a $55 pair marked down to $29. He found a smaller pair for me and they fit well. Also, if anything went wrong in the first year, including normal wear--soles coming loose, stitches coming out, color fading, etc.--they'd pay for it or replace the shoe.
He brought the shoes up to the counter while I hunted after spankies. I found some, they fit, and I brought them up to the counter.
I didn't realize I had to pay extra for the shoe-insurance. I asked how much it cost.
$4.99, she said.
"How much are the shoes?"
She beeped it with the red laser.
"It ain't even worth it," she said, partly to herself. She looked back at the guy who'd helped me find the shoes. "It ain't even worth it," she told him. "The shoes are only $10."
I paid for them and drove home in the clunky light-blue Olds.
Mission accomplished.
widowmaker makes no widows
There's a tree in our backyard that's been leaning dead for as long as I can remember. It's rotted so there's about an inch or two between the wood and the bark, which slides off like a sleeve. My dad wanted it taken down, so he called some of his friends over--this was several years ago--and Mr. Gallagher called it a widowmaker and wouldn't touch it. The tree has survived windstorms, tornadoes, heavy snow, lightning storms, animals, children, and all sorts of things that should have toppled it.
But not last week's windstorm.
Instead of mostly vertical and leaning against a healthy green tree, it's mostly horizontal and lying next to that healthy green tree. So now we have two trees to clean up and tons more firewood, although it's all either rotten or green.
I wish my camera could see what I see. This is what my camera saw:
But not last week's windstorm.
Instead of mostly vertical and leaning against a healthy green tree, it's mostly horizontal and lying next to that healthy green tree. So now we have two trees to clean up and tons more firewood, although it's all either rotten or green.
I wish my camera could see what I see. This is what my camera saw:
Friday, March 13, 2009
nine-year-old's twins aborted
I've read or skimmed a zillion different takes on this story. It sounds like a Brazilian man sexually abused his stepdaughter for three years, and when she was nine she became pregnant with his twins, which were aborted. Following this, there was great confusion about excommunication.
As I understand it, there's a latae sententiae for abortion or assisting with an abortion--this means if you do it, you're automatically excommunicated.
Time for a lesson on excommunication.
Few church leaders like the idea of being dropped in the sea with a millstone around their necks (cf Mt. 18:6), and they realize how important it is to teach correctly.
An excommunication essentially says "Do not listen to this person and think that's what the Catholic Church teaches." It does not send you to hell--no mere human, not even the pope, has the authority or power to do such a think. It is not permanent--with proper repentence, you can again become part of the Church.
Most of teaching is by example, and when there is a particularly bad example, it's important to let people know that this is not what the church teaches.
So if you have an abortion or help someone get an abortion, you are automatically no longer a part of the church.
Now, let's look at the situation.
It is morally wrong to rape your 9-year-old stepdaughter. In the first place, the situation shouldn't have even come about (that's gignomai for you deponent Greeks).
But it did. In Brazil, the articles say, abortion is only allowed in cases of rape or when the mother's life is in danger. The girl was definitely raped, and the abortion was legal. But was her life in danger?
I was unimpressed with Time magazine. The article reads:
The case has caused a furor. Abortion is illegal in Brazil except in cases of rape or when the mother's life is in danger, both of which apply in this case. (The girl's immature hips would have made labor dangerous; the Catholic opinion was that she could have had a cesarean section.)
The reporter assumes that the girl's life is in danger but does not tell the reader where the information came from. Did the reporter talk to a doctor? Then he writes what the "Catholic opinion" was, again without a source. Did he talk to a doctor and find out if a c-section might be possible?
I don't remember reading a doctor's voice on the c-section possibility in any of the articles I read, just what church leaders said. I'm sure these church leaders are wonderful men and intelligent theologians, but they are theologians, not physicians. I want to know what a physician has to say, and so far, no one has told me.
So what's the morally right thing to do?
Abortion is wrong, and this abortion was wrong, even if the girl's life was at stake. But I don't think she's culpable.
First: We don't know for sure that she would have died. It's not okay to kill two people because you're almost entirely sure it will save the life of another person.
Second: Love is willing to give its life for another (John 15:13). It would have taken a tremendous amount of courage and heroism to do this, though--can we expect this from an abused 9-year-old?
Third: I don't think she's culpable. I don't think it's right to "blame her" because she can't have had a mature understanding of what was going on.
Still waiting on that physician.
As I understand it, there's a latae sententiae for abortion or assisting with an abortion--this means if you do it, you're automatically excommunicated.
Time for a lesson on excommunication.
Few church leaders like the idea of being dropped in the sea with a millstone around their necks (cf Mt. 18:6), and they realize how important it is to teach correctly.
An excommunication essentially says "Do not listen to this person and think that's what the Catholic Church teaches." It does not send you to hell--no mere human, not even the pope, has the authority or power to do such a think. It is not permanent--with proper repentence, you can again become part of the Church.
Most of teaching is by example, and when there is a particularly bad example, it's important to let people know that this is not what the church teaches.
So if you have an abortion or help someone get an abortion, you are automatically no longer a part of the church.
Now, let's look at the situation.
It is morally wrong to rape your 9-year-old stepdaughter. In the first place, the situation shouldn't have even come about (that's gignomai for you deponent Greeks).
But it did. In Brazil, the articles say, abortion is only allowed in cases of rape or when the mother's life is in danger. The girl was definitely raped, and the abortion was legal. But was her life in danger?
I was unimpressed with Time magazine. The article reads:
The case has caused a furor. Abortion is illegal in Brazil except in cases of rape or when the mother's life is in danger, both of which apply in this case. (The girl's immature hips would have made labor dangerous; the Catholic opinion was that she could have had a cesarean section.)
The reporter assumes that the girl's life is in danger but does not tell the reader where the information came from. Did the reporter talk to a doctor? Then he writes what the "Catholic opinion" was, again without a source. Did he talk to a doctor and find out if a c-section might be possible?
I don't remember reading a doctor's voice on the c-section possibility in any of the articles I read, just what church leaders said. I'm sure these church leaders are wonderful men and intelligent theologians, but they are theologians, not physicians. I want to know what a physician has to say, and so far, no one has told me.
So what's the morally right thing to do?
Abortion is wrong, and this abortion was wrong, even if the girl's life was at stake. But I don't think she's culpable.
First: We don't know for sure that she would have died. It's not okay to kill two people because you're almost entirely sure it will save the life of another person.
Second: Love is willing to give its life for another (John 15:13). It would have taken a tremendous amount of courage and heroism to do this, though--can we expect this from an abused 9-year-old?
Third: I don't think she's culpable. I don't think it's right to "blame her" because she can't have had a mature understanding of what was going on.
Still waiting on that physician.
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