The Big Five-Oh: The Face I Deserve

I turned 50 today. 

It's very strange to consider. 

I mean, I don't feel fifty. 

Okay, well SOMETIMES I feel fifty, like when I squat to put away dishes and my hip doesn't want to let me get back up, or when I get winded climbing a big hill. I tell myself it's not the years, it's the mileage (and maybe a bit the baggage as well). It makes me feel more like Indiana Jones and less like Miss Marple. 

But mostly, I don't even feel like a real grownup yet…yet here we are. Fifty. 

Coco Chanel famously said that when we are fifty, we get the face we deserve. So, here's the face I deserve, picture taken first thing this morning when my hair was still shower-wet and I hadn't yet had any caffeine. 

So far as faces go, it's fine. Neither glamorous nor off-putting. Pleasant, and sometimes quite pretty, in the right light. 

The lines and creases don't bother me much, and any age spots just blend in with the freckles that were already there. I've started to get a little gray around the crown of my head which I confess I find a little startling when I notice, but otherwise, I still just look like me, a little rounder than I would maybe choose, given all the options, and way more like my Grandma Liz than I expected, given how much I always thought I looked more like my dad. 

So, do I deserve this face? 

When I look at this face, I see bright curiosity and a spark of adventure, a curve at the corner of the mouth that comes from laughing a lot and a squinty-ness about the eyes that comes from spending time smiling in the sun (and maybe from time behind a screen). The teeth are a little yellow from drinking lots of tea while reading and the jawline reveals a fondness for cookies. The woman in that picture looks like a lady who knows surprising things and has a kind heart. 

If I didn't know me, I think I'd be willing to talk to me, based on this face. 

It'll do. 

Life in the Aquarium

As I write this, I have been sick for eight days. I have a 101 degree fever and I feel as if I'm underwater. My poor husband has been doing his paying job and the jobs of both parents all this time. 

I'm not nearly as cute as that cat. In fact, I just had to call in the calvary. 

No, not her. This is not the kind of fighter we need for this. We've sent for Grandma. The husband has to leave on a business trip, and I'm not up to being me, let alone being me and him. So Grandma to the rescue!

For the record, our Grandma is much younger and never wears spandex. She's a jeans and paint splattered tee shirt sort of gal. And we are incredibly lucky to have her! Thanks Mom!

R is for Redhead: A to Z blogging challenge

Redheads run in my family on my mother's side. Many of us have at least some red to our hair, and one of my cousins inherited the beautiful carroty shade I always coveted to go with my freckles. 

My grandmother was a redhead. I can even kind of remember her as a redhead, though she eventually had to stop dying her hair because the natural white beneath made dyed red hair look Bozo the Clown orange. But Grandma Liz was proud of her red hair, and she remained a redhead her whole, by nature if not by appearance. 

I always liked the idea that having red hair was indicative of your temperament somehow.  My grandfather definitely seemed to think that Grandma's stubbornness, quick temperedness, and impulsive nature all had something to do with her red hair. 

So, that's part of why Patricia O'Neill, one of the main characters in Going Through the Change, is a redhead. 

Real redheads are relatively rare compared to other hair colors. It's my understanding that it's a kind of mutation of the genes that makes it possible. I liked the idea that the mutation of the genes that made Patricia a redhead, and may have contributed to her fiery temperament, also made her susceptible to the superheroic sorts of changes she underwent. I think Grandma Liz would have liked that. 

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!

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click the image to preorder on Amazon!

Q is for Queer: A to Z blogging challenge

Gender and societal roles is an integral part of Going Through the Change,  nowhere more obviously than in the marriage of Linda Alvarez. 

Linda and her husband have been married for thirty years. They've raised three daughters together and seen all of them married. They have five grandchildren. Linda and David are a solid, devoted couple when the story begins. They've weathered many storms together. 

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Still, when Linda is unexpectedly transformed into a man, she's sure it means her marriage is over. She dreads having to tell her family, especially since the changes are so hard to explain. She knows that the truth is going to be hard to swallow. She worries that her daughters won't accept her as a man. She is especially worried about Carlitos, the grandson she is closest to. 

But her grandson understands right away. She's his grandmother, regardless of how she looks on the outside. 

“Abuelita?” said Carlitos, looking confused.

Linda knelt, putting her face near his and nodded silently. “Soy yo, Carlitos.” The room grew quiet again, all eyes focused on Carlitos and Linda.

Carlitos tilted his head as he always did when he was thinking deep thoughts. He was an old soul, Linda had always said. The boy laid one hand on each of Linda’s cheeks, looking very seriously into her eyes. “Abuelita, did you make my favorite cookies?”

“Of course, I did. Biscochitos y marranitos, también.”

He nodded. “And are you going to be a boy now?”

“Yes, Carlitos, I think I am.”

“But you are still my abuelita?”

“Soy tuyo, querido. I am yours. Siempre.” 

 As I continue to write Linda and David in the sequel and beyond, I know they'll continuing to show that love can truly be about the people we are inside. The rest is just surface details.

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This posting is part of the A to Z blogging challenge, in which bloggers undertake to post every day in April, excepting Sundays, which amounts to 26 postings, one for each letter of the alphabet--preferably along a theme. My postings will all be about my debut novel and my experiences writing it and seeing it published.

Blogging A to Z is a great opportunity to connect with some excellent bloggers and interesting people. I encourage you to check out other participating blogs, too!
____________________________________________

click the image to preorder on Amazon!

I Won't Be Home for Christmas, part 4

Continuing my Christmas story. You can read the first three parts here:

Part One: In which Gillian and her sons get stranded on the way to visit Grandma for Christmas.
Part Two: In which Gillian is befriended by other stranded travelers: Louise and Henry, grandparents.
Part Three: In which Gillian accepts an offer for a four-wheeler ride to the diner with her sons.

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The whole group stopped just inside the door of the diner to stomp as much of the snow off their boots as they could. The diner was packed and a woman wearing a blue apron over a pink dress called out that there was a table in the corner. She gestured at it with the coffeepot she was carrying, then hurried to the opposite corner to pour some of the warm contents for another customer.

They were still removing and stacking their snow gear when the waitress appeared with two hot chocolates and three coffees. "I can bring some juice or milk if you want, but I thought you'd want something warm first." She sat the tray on the table and distributed the mugs in front of everyone. Henry told her she was a genius and a gem and the woman smiled broadly. Within a minute or two, she had taken everyone's orders and run off again, towards the kitchen this time.

Gillian wrapped her hands around the mug. Despite her best gloves and the woolen blanket Henry had provided, she was chilled and the coffee felt wonderful.  When she picked it up and sipped it, she found that it tasted wonderful, too.   Jack already had a hot chocolate mustache, while Steve was rather noisily sipping his cocoa by the spoonful, stirring it between each dip.

"Thank you both so much! That was just what we needed, I think."

Louise smiled. "It does clear the head, moving fast in the cold air. It did us good, too." She gripped her husband's fingers and smiled at him and Gillian felt a twinge of something a lot like sadness at the show of love between them. She ruffled Jack's hair and his smile was a reminder of how much she still had to be grateful for.

The group took a leisurely breakfast, chatting and eating, and, for once, Gillian's boys didn't seem to grow restless. They used the paper and crayons the waitress bought them and played table games like dots and hangman or drew strange scenes together.  Henry nodded at the boys. "Looks like you done right by these boys. Santa should be pretty kind to such good children." The boys beamed at the compliment, and Gillian ducked her head toward her coffee mug to hide the sudden tears that stung in the corners.

She and the boys weren't starving by any means, but neither was she going to be able to spoil them this year, not with the expense of maintaining two households to manage. Her husband's opportunity in New York had been a very good one. "Too good to pass up," he'd said. "The opportunity of a lifetime." And she had acquiesced. Seeking peace even when her heart begged her to argue, just as she always had.

When it was time to go back, Henry offered to take the boys for some extra spins around the hotel lot, "If it's okay with your mother." Gillian didn't stand a chance against the two sets of puppy eyes. She laughed and agreed, making Henry promise to come back as soon as he was tired and not let the boys keep out longer than he wanted.

Louise and Gillian waved off the boys, then went to the coffee bar in the hotel lobby.  Maxine, the front desk clerk, was there talking with a man that turned out to be her husband and the manager of the hotel. Roads eastward were opening back up, but westward, another front had dumped another

blizzard on the roads between here and Gillian's parents' house. Gillian sighed at the news, stirring her coffee with the plastic stirrer and watching the brown liquid twirl around the top.

When she looked up again, Louise was watching her. "I think I might be about to stick my foot in it," she said, "but I have to ask. Where is the boys' father?"

"New York."

"But I thought you said you guys came from Chicago."

"We did. The boys and I still live in Chicago, but my husband has been in New York for a few months now. For business."

Louise frowned. "Aren't you and the boys his business?"

Gillian felt a defensive speech rising to her lips, but bit it back down. In her heart, she felt the same way and there was no reason to try to defend this separation to this woman right now. Instead, she just nodded.

"Do you still love him?" Louise asked.

"Yes, I still do. I'm just not sure he still loves me."

"Have you told him?" Gillian was confused and it must have shown on her face. Louise went on, "I mean, have you told him recently? It can easy to forget to say it, but we all need to hear it. Faith is easy to lose if no one is reminding you of your blessings."

Gillian made a silent promise to herself to call Phillip that night after the boys fell asleep, and this time to talk about her own feelings, instead of only about the boys.

(to be continued)

I Won't Be Home for Christmas, Part Three

Last Christmas, I started a Christmas story. I never finished it. I'm hoping to finish it this month.

Part 1: Gillian was traveling from Chicago to visit Grandma in Oklahoma City with her two sons, Steve (10) and Jack (6), when they got snowed in at their hotel in Kansas City.

Part 2: Gillian remembers better times and meets Henry and Louise Balfour, from Colorado, on the way to Tennessee to see their own grandchildren.

And now, part three: 

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It felt good to laugh. Laughing loosened something in Gillian that she hadn't realized was tight. In the moment of the tension releasing, she could feel in her shoulders, neck and jaw how stiffly she'd been holding herself. Phillip had called her "my stress puppy" when she got herself tied up in knots like that. She missed having him rub the knots out of her neck with his thumbs. He told her she worried too much. After the emotional roller-coaster of his Halloween and Thanksgiving visits, though, she was realizing that she had plenty of reason to worry.

"I'd better get upstairs. I've got to figure out what to bundle the boys in to traverse the Arctic wasteland out there between us and the diner." She stood and held out her hand to Louise. "It was nice to meet you."

Louise shook her hand, but didn't relinquish the fingers right away afterwards. "Henry," she said, turning to give her husband a meaningful look. Louise looked at Henry, too, unable to fathom what his wife might be trying to hint at. Henry had no such trouble catching his cue and responding.

"I've got a four-wheeler and a sled. If you'll accept the offer, I'd love to give you and your children a ride."

Gillian froze for a moment. She thought it was a sweet offer, and it also scared the heck out of her. These people were strangers, and she and the boys were alone here. Four-wheeling and sledding were among those questionable sorts of activities that her mom friends back home would whisper about disapprovingly in the back of PTA meetings. They were also activities she remembered fondly from her own childhood--a safe kind of dangerous and exciting, if done right.

"I bet your boys would love it," Louise said, just a hint of Tennessee in the word love. Tennessee didn't sound that different than Oklahoma. It sounded a lot like home. "Don't you think they'd love it?"

Gillian had no doubt they would. In fact, just thinking about Steve and Jack red-faced and laughing made her shove her fears aside. After all, it was just her and the boys most of the time. There was no reason to think this was any more dangerous than any other day. The boys could use some fun, and she could use the help.

"Thank you so much!" she gushed. "When do you want us to be ready?"

They agreed to meet in half an hour and Gillian flew up the stairs, key card in hand to tell the boys.

Twenty minutes later, Gillian was standing in the lobby with two boys wearing all their snow gear over their pajamas and jeans.  They were a comedy of growing patterns. Steve's jacket sleeves were too short and his skinny forearms hung out between the sleeve and the top of his puffy gloves. He'd grown that much since last winter and, since Grandma bought him a new coat that he'd receive for Christmas, Gillian hadn't replaced his jacket yet. Jack's snowsuit, which used to belong to his brother, was so long on him that Gillian had folded the legs up twice, making an extra thick layer on her son's lower legs. He had to stand with his legs spread wide because he couldn't rest his feet next to one another.

She stood the boys in front of the hotel lobby Christmas tree and took a picture with her phone to send to Grandma. Maxine, the hotel clerk, even came around and took another one for her so she could have one of the three of them. Gillian squeezed both boys and grinned for the camera. She had to admit that she was looking forward to the ride, too.

A moment or two later, Louise and Henry pulled up on their four-wheeler. Louise was so bundled up that she was only recognizable by her hair, but Gillian knew her voice and introduced her boys to the Mr. Henry and Ms. Louise. Her boys offered gracious thank yous and stood waiting to be invited to climb aboard, though both of them were eyeing the giant innertube sled with obvious excitement.

"So, you first, Miss Gillian." Henry stood next to the innertube and held out a hand which Gillian used to balance herself as she climbed in. She took a spot in the middle back, remembering that the innertube moved better if the heaviest person sat in back. Both boys climbed in quickly and Henry helped to tuck a thick woolen blanket around them. "You all hold on tight now!" Henry said, then hurried back to the four-wheeler and climbed on.

Henry climbed back on to the four-wheeler and his wife wrapped her arms around him. He revved the engine twice, and they were off.  Gillian squealed and both her boys grinned at her as they grasped at the rubbery handles of the innertube and bounced agains the sides and each other. Mr. Henry took the long way around, driving around the hotel twice before heading across the lot to the diner. He circled the diner, too, before parking and Gillian and her boys laughed as they were flung to one side and then the other of the innertube. They were laughing so hard when they stopped that Gillian had tears in her eyes. She hadn't had that kind of fun in years.

E: Elegance (A-Z Blog Challenge: Evocative words)

I am not an elegant lady. I am a Converse and smart-aleck tee shirt sort of gal. I like my clothes to allow

for a walk in the woods, some housework, crawling on the floor after legos or other such endeavors at any time. When the wind blows, so does my hair and if I laugh until I cry, I just wipe it with the back of my hand. There's no makeup to smear across my face.

I just can't stay interested in things like hair, makeup, clothes and fingernails. There's a lot of other, more interesting things out there.

Mostly, I'm comfortable with this. It's who I am.

But I admire elegance in others, and sometimes I wish I knew how to be elegant.

Some women just seem to have an automatic elegance. Especially women of my grandmother's generation. Women who are now in their 80s, if we're still fortunate enough to have them. They knew a kind of style that I just don't get. How does one even get hair to do that?  How do you walk in shoes like that and make it look like something other than a weird balancing exercise?

Take Audrey Hepburn, for example. She was elegant, even when she wasn't trying, or seemed to be actively trying not to be elegant. It wasn't in the clothes alone, though she wore some beautiful things. She could make a bath towel with frayed edges elegant.

Is it something in the bones? If I had aristocratic cheekbones and a super long neck, would that turn me from a cute and fuzzy duck into a swan?

Is it money? Elegance often seems expensive. Pearl earrings and flowing gowns are hard to come by on a schoolteacher's salary. As are occasions on which one might wear such things.

Is it something more physical? A way of holding yourself? A grace of movement and gesture? If so, I don't think there's any hope for me. I am clumsy and charmingly awkward at best.

My grandmother would have said it was poise. She also claimed that could be learned, even though she herself couldn't define it for me well. When she tried, she talked about self-respect and a unruffled, serene demeanor. But she agreed that it wasn't cold or distant from others. We both knew elegance when we saw it, but can't explain it.

At times, I have tried to put on elegance, but it doesn't fit me well. I feel and look like I'm trying. My unease and discomfort shows. I pull at the clothes and pick at my nails. Elegant people never seem to be trying. It just happens, as simply and naturally as growing taller or having a certain color of eyes.

I'll just have to hope that not being easy in my own skin serves me well on the page. Maybe I can write someone elegant instead of trying to be someone elegant.
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This post is part of the Blogging from A-Z Challenge.

Letter to Grandma Liz

Dear Grandma Liz,

Nice trick, dying on your eighty-eighth birthday.  A nice symmetry to that.  And the two eights, like infinity symbols. Very cool. I’ll have to remember that when my time comes.

I kind of wish you could have taken the very end more slowly, and let my mother arrive at the hospital. She was at my house, where she’d been helping take care of my kids, your great-granddaughters, in the week before Kindergarten started up full time for the youngest. She was at the airport, two hours from your side, when she got the news. That was hard.

When it’s time, it’s time, I guess.  I wouldn’t have wanted you to suffer, but Mom would have liked to have held your hand and heard your voice one last time.

She’s staying really busy right now, sorting your belongings and papers, making sure the money and legal details are in place. She’s really pretty amazing.  You’d be proud of her, I think. She’s stubborn like you.  And like you, she’s fiercely proud and doesn’t want to let us help her.  (We’re making her let us help, though).

I miss you, Grandma. I’m glad I got to see you so recently, even if you were kind of angry at the world that day. I can definitely understand being angry. I think I’d be angry, too. Getting old sucks.

There’s all the things you didn’t do yet and it was becoming clear that you were running out of time. Your body wouldn’t do all the things you wanted it to do. And there’s all the things you knew we were going to do that you wouldn’t like. That feeling of not being in control of the things you wanted to be in control of. As you thought back on your life in those last weeks, I hope you thought about the happy things, too, and not just the slights you felt you had received.

I was at your house today, helping sort things and clean up, making it into the space it will next be.  You wouldn’t like the changes we made. We got rid of your gray rug.  We took the pictures off the walls (we’re planning to scan the old ones for all to share and let your children take the ones that apply to them).  We took down about half of the draperies and let the sunshine into your front living room.  I think it looks pretty good!

I hope you understand that none of that was a lack of respect for you.  I think you’ll be happy to know that your old house is going to be home to two young couples in our family as well as to your youngest son.  I’m happy that it’ll still be lived in by people I love. Letting your old house become something different makes it less sad, makes it possible to be there without wanting to cry.

We all really do want to cry. Some of us are holding it in. Some of us don’t hide it as well.  

Looking around at all your pictures today made me both happy and sad. How much you loved us all really showed. After all, you wanted images of all of us around you all the time. So much so that you couldn’t really see the walls at your house for all the smiling faces framed on them. You found something to be proud of each one of us for, and the evidence was everywhere.

Mostly, I liked finding the pictures of you. You as a teenager, taller than the other girls in your class picture, your head ducked down. I had a feeling you got caught about to laugh.

You as a young not-yet-married woman with flowers in your hair, and lipstick on. I imagine the lipstick was red, even though the picture was black and white and I couldn’t really tell.  

You with two babies on your lap, one of them my mother. Already they were pulling in two different directions, my mother and her oldest brother, and you were trying to hold them both at the same time.

You with the big sombrero on. You were so beautiful, and glamorous.  

The ones where you started to look like the Grandma I remember from childhood, your dark-framed glasses and dyed red hair, more orange than your natural red had been, before you decided to let it go white. I liked the one from someone’s wedding where your hair was a big Jackie-O type helmet all around your head.  You were grinning. You must have approved of the match.

And that one of you and me and Mom sitting at Grandma Lena’s grave and eating fried chicken.  That was such a good day.  One of the first ones when I felt like a grownup, included with the other grownups, all three of us missing your mother together.

It was a pretty amazing life, Grandma. I know you sometimes lamented the timing of your birth. That you wished you could’ve had a career like me or my sister and had more independence.  You should know though, that your belief is us is why we can.  We wouldn’t be the women we are if you weren’t the woman you were.

We were lucky to have you.

Enjoy heaven, Grandma. Try not to raise too much hell up there.

Love,
-Samantha