December 2005 Archives

It's midnight. Why am I not in bed, given how bleak my cocoa always is, eggnog or no? I'm not sure. I just can't quite wind down yet, strangely. Guess that blogging bug bit me again. I'm sure I'll pay for this tomorrow.

I just finished wrapping what is nearly the very last of the hugemongous pile of presents now clustered in happy shiny piles in the general vicinity of our tree. I even sorted them somewhat by event (Christmas vs. Hanukkah). There is, of course, a certain absurdity to having a big cluster of presents wrapped in Hanukkah paper sitting at the base of a Christmas tree, but I prefer to think of it as a creative cultural juxtaposition, a mashup if you will (aren't mashups all the rage these days?)

Speaking of mashups, here's something I've been thinking about lately: I really do feel like "mashup" might be the word that best defines the culture of the "aughts" (or whatever we're supposed to call this decade loosely centered around the millennium). In the 90's when I was in grad school, everyone was all hyped up talking about "postmodernism," which from my perspective now was just an early, ivory-tower snobby form/forerunner of the mashup. Now mashups are everywhere. I mean, fashion, music, art, slang, politics, religion--everything is a collage now, a smorgasbord of options of every sort plucked from different cultures and different eras, smooshed together and recycled into some sort of whole new crazy quilt-like design. Everything old is new again, true. But what's really new is the very way things are juxtaposed, mashed, molded and re-extruded. It's like the whole culture is a playdoh funhouse. Where does it end?

Yikes. I've exhausted myself trying to think actual intellectual thoughts and then attempting to write them down. Who knew thinking would cure insomnia? I'll have to try it more often.

Tonight is the longest night of the year. Tomorrow the light finally begins to return. Here's hoping that it returns in both physical and metaphorical ways...I could use some of that good ol' corner-turning, back-to-the-light mojo right about now. I'm ready. Howbout you?

I'm just hunkering down now, waiting for this whole Christmas thing to be over with so I can go on vacation and then come back and life can get back to its usual crazy but somehow reassuring routine.

Happy Solstice, everyone!

Wow. This interactive link about how they retouch models is absolutely fascinating and educational, if in a somewhat disturbing way. (via Boing Boing) I highly recommend you go take a tour, just to see how it's actually done. I haven't been able to get it out of my head. Watch out, I feel a rant coming on.

I mean, it's not new news that the media (and indirectly, consumers) are increasingly fixated on nearly-or-actually impossible physical ideals of beauty, and that both people's real bodies and images of people are increasingly tweaked to conform to them. What's new is the relative ease with which those images (let alone bodies) are tweaked, and how they are subtly (or sometimes, not so subtly) worked into our daily media consumption, so that most of the time we don't even realize that what we're looking at is impossible (or virtual). We must be constantly vigilant about this kind of thing, and more importantly, we need to pass this knowledge of what's being manipulated on to the next generation, so they won't have to suffer as much (or at least, suffer more than normal adolescents always do).

It's funny, but now that I'm "old" and saggy and retain barely a glimmer of that juicy glow that youth bestows, my self-esteem is actually much better than it was when I *was* young and juicy. And I think that's in no small part to years of relentless feminist consciousness-raising (I was, after all, a Women's Studies major at UCSC, that hotbed of PC hippy feminism). I know those images in the women's magazines and on the WB and on MTV aren't attainable, and I know they're manufactured--manufactured, in fact, specifically to keep us anxious and insecure so that we'll throw our loyalties outside our own selves, to anyone who purports to show us the way to be cooler, sexier, younger, more likable. And this is wrong, it's a devious trap we can't escape except by deciding to opt out of the cycle and love ourselves anyway, warts 'n all (so to speak).

Now, don't get me wrong--it took YEARS of suffering, social anxiety and fat-girl angst before I could even approach a reconciliation with my not-even-remotely-close-to-ever-being-a-model body. I still wish I could wave a magic wand and get rid of certain bulges, bags, blemishes and wrinkles. And I still get flashes of "fat-n-ugly freakout", especially whenever I'm exposed to too much "beautiful people" media, or when I'm trying on clothes, or when I'm at the beach in a bathing suit. But now I'm able to get back to equilibrium quicker, because I know that it's not just me who has these freakouts--all of us do (yes, men too), it's the nature of the society we're living in (whether we like it or not). I have enough life experience now, and enough gotcha notches in my metaphorical belt (or should that be gold medals in the suck-it-up Olympics?), that I can really convince myself that there are many more valuable things about me than the way I look.

But not everyone has learned this lesson, or wants to. So I just thought I'd say it again. We need to practice radical self-acceptance, people (myself included, I still backslide alllllll the time). It actually *is* a radical political decision to NOT listen to the media-manufactured din of "you're ugly/you suck", and to not judge other people on those silly unattainable standards either. I'll sum this up with a pop-culture mashup of Stuart Smiley from SNL and Billy Joel (yeeeesss I'm dating myself, what of it? I'm old and I don't care): "you're good enough, you're smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like you...just the way you are." (Or as my oh-so-wise mama always told me: "to thine own self be true". And screw whatever anybody else thinks. ;) )

I'm still just so exhausted these days, because I'm still not getting anywhere near enough sleep (let alone uninterrupted sleep), but I think I may have whupped that persistent sense of elephantine overwhelm that's been dogging me for the last few weeks. (For now, anyway. I'm sure it'll come back, it always does. That's the pendulum-like story of my life.) Despite the holiday season being in full flower, along with all the attendant space-shuttle launchworthy logistic-ing and planning that it brings with it, I feel like I'm mostly in a good space with it. Our holiday gift shopping is nearly all done, the gifts are nearly all wrapped, our big Black Turkey holiday party is behind us (good food, good people, good times, for the 9th year in a row). We went to Eli's first production of the Nutcracker (the Marin Ballet's--Eli's comment during the show: "When is all the dancing going to be over?"), we went and saw the Bear House (a local family's over-the-top holiday decorations in their front yard, including a huge model train setup and several boxed in animatronic displays), we attended pre-school holiday parties complete with cookies and "caroling", we watched "It's A Wonderful Life" (I admit it, I totally love that movie. And Jimmy Stewart is a God).

And since I am (and therefore by extension, Eli is) apparently the single token Jew in our preschool crowd, a couple days ago I went to Eli's school and did the oh-so-PC "How We Celebrate Hanukkah" presentation to Eli and his classmates. I brought my Little People Hanukkah set (featuring a family eating latkes and opening presents at a table with a light up menorah that plays "I Had A Little Dreidel") as a visual aid and our family menorah and candles which I lit (fire always get the attention of preschoolers) and then I gave out chocolate gelt--I was very popular. I stayed away from the story of Hanukkah itself--there's only so much a preschool crowd can take, and talking about religious oppression and guerrilla fighters just didn't seem to be appropriate. It actually went really well, and Eli was so proud to be my helper and to be showing off both his mom and his special holiday in front of his class.

We still have several holiday events to go (a holiday dinner at my boss' house, Xmas eve dinner for Josh's immediate family at our house, Xmas Day festivities with Josh's extended family at Josh's sisters' house, and Boxing Day Hanukkah latkes for my family at our house), but despite their close proximity, none of those events individually nor collectively is "freaking my out" (as Eli used to say). And then we get to go out to the beach for a whole week with my parents and the Nevada City Dvorins...I believe it may well approximate what some people call a...whatsit...oh yeah, vacation. (Our first in over a year. Woo!) I haven't made cookies this year, and I somehow doubt we're going to actually get holiday cards or newsletters or even an email out, but something had to give and at least it wasn't my sanity. Yet.

I'll leave you with a couple seasonally appropriate pictures, since it's been awhile since I've posted any:

^ My overly adorable boys with their Santa hats on. (I think if we did manage to get out a card, this would have been the picture I used.) We all got hats this year, but so far I haven't managed to get a picture with all 4 of us with our hats on yet. Asi es la vida loca.

^ Josh (in *his* Santa hat) shows off the black turkey, which looks like a ruined cinder but tastes like a little piece of heaven. (Read the recipe, it's really pretty funny.)

Hi there, oh faceless and generally indifferent internet. Did you miss me? Well I apparently didn't miss you either. So there.

Sigh. Tired, tired, so I prop up with caffeine during the workday, and then spiral down into half-speed crashville by the time the kids are actually in bed, so that the last thing I feel able to do is blog (I can barely even bring myself to read and far too occasionally comment on other blogs).

Overwhelm, overwhelm. Too much filling up the brainspace: daily get-out-the-door logistics, house care, kid care, pet care, oh-yeah-I-think-maybe-I-myself-need-a-doctor-appointment-or-hair-cut personal care, and then the holidays (with their attendant party throwing, gift buying/wrapping/giving, and multiple social events to manage) on top of all that? Oh my poor, poor brain. I try to be nice to it--make lists to relieve it, (occasionally) go to bed on time, eat relatively good food. But it's a crashing tidal wave of overwhelm, and I'm running out of fingers to plug this dike with. (Maybe I should move further inland one of these days...but I so love this coastal climate. So yeah, it's partially my own fault.)

And speaking of overwhelm, can I just say that I'm getting really, really, tired of dancing through and around all the split-second timing that my life entails? I know I'm not unique in this. I'm talking about the way every day is so scheduled, with everything bumping up back to back so that I'm always rushing from this! To that! To the next thing! On work days, it's wake up at this time, so that I can get the kids out of the house at this time, so that I can get to work at this time, so I can leave work at that time, and get home in time for kid pickup/dinner prep/baby feeding, and then have dinner in time for baby bedtime, and have baby down in time to then eat dinner/do things with Eli, and then go to bed at that time so I can get up again the next day at the appropriate time. On non-work days, it's all about baby schedule--making sure that we go run this errand before that time so that the baby is home for his nap, or making sure that I nurse him at this time so that I can feed him solids at that time. Every day, every week, every weekend is packed, and all of it requires balancing other people's needs and temperaments, along with a keen awareness of how long things take, what's coming up next, and when to stop any given activity in order to move on to the next one. There's no flex time (ok, well, very little) to just chat with someone, to stop to peek into a store window I happen to be passing, to move slowly, to stare into space and fantasize about lying in a hammock in the sun with a book (not that I ever do *that*, oh noooo). When any part of the tightly packed schedule is messed with, it has a ripple effect on the other parts, like some damn Chinese butterfly flapping its wings and causing an earthquake in Canada.

Now, much of the time I take justifiable pride in the fact that I manage to move fairly gracefully from one thing to the next (practice makes perfect, after all!), but there are often days that are not so good. Where I just can't find the rhythm and everything moves in herky jerky spasms. Where one little misstep or unexpected obstacle throws the whole intricately choreographed dance number into snowballing disarray. Where I wind up disappointing others I care about because on that particular day I am unable to sustain the stretched-thin skill of being all things to all people (or at least most things to some people) and I wind up inadvertently (or sometimes purposely, I'm ashamed to say) stepping on the other dancers' toes. And no matter how many excuses and "sorry"s I leave sprinkled in my wake as I twirl jerkily by like some rookie Vegas showgirl, I can't change the fact that I've messed up other people's dancing as well.

But like the rider who falls off the horse and has to get back on again before the fear of falling sets in and paralyzes future riding, I have to keep pressing through to the next dance, keep practicing so that next time things will be better (or at least feel better on the inside). I know, I really do, that even when there are bad days, there will be good days again, and that the dancing will not always have to be so vigorous (maybe it would help if we moved back a few rows from the thrashing punk mosh pit).

As always, I think when I start mixing my metaphors like this it means I'm tired and need to go to sleep. Maybe I should rename this blog Mixed Metaphors instead of Parentheticals. Maybe I should just rename it Lord of the Dance. Maybe I should just quit typing and go to bed.