Once again, it is my fashion honor to proclaim that paisley is one of The Style Wonders of the World—right up there with argyle and polka dots. I’m sure you can tell from how often you’ve heard me rave about it, that paisley has given deep meaning to my life. I can’t explain it. It’s just such a cool design. In a world full of pandemics and hate, paisley never lets me down. Maybe that’s a bit of an overstatement, but I’m stickin’ to it.
Paisley wood Bow Tie o’ the Day is but one more piece of proof for your eyes that paisley rules. Bow Tie is the newest acquisition in my collection, and I’m sure there will be more paisley pieces to come. Even though I feel like I’m pretty much done building up my neckwear collection, there will always be room for one more paisley-pattern item. A paisle (singular for “paisley”) a day, keeps my bipolarity away. Okay, that clearly was hyperbole.
Here I sit, with Bow Tie o’ the Day, in my own loft. I am in my pain doc’s “waiting room” on my laptop, waiting for my doc to show up to my online appointment. Of all the pandemic-related life adjustments that I have personally had to make, the virtual doc appointments have been a pleasant surprise. It has been a pleasure to not have to spend time driving to and from doctor appointments. It takes longer to drive to doc appointments than it takes to have the appointment itself. It worked especially well for my crazy head therapy appointment, which is normally a one-hour drive each way, for a 30-minute appointment. For my last crazy head therapy appointment, which was online, I spent 5 minutes in the virtual waiting room, then chatted with my doc for 30 minutes, and that was that. Saved time, saved gas, saved possible road rage.
Of course, there are some doc appointments that just don’t work online. For example, I had an appointment scheduled with a plastic surgeon in April—to look into getting a breast reduction. It took me forever to get an appointment with this particular doctor. I waited months. And then a week before my scheduled April appointment, I got a call from the plastic surgeon’s office, saying they weren’t doing in-office visits. They wanted to do a Zoom appointment, or reschedule for a few months down the road. How do I put this? I felt like a televisit wouldn’t capture all the relevant information. Plus, going topless online, even for a medical exam, even for a valid medical reason, just ain’t my thing. Yes, I’ve visited a nude beach or two in my day, but this feels to me like a whole different can o’ worms.
Gracie’s both. It simply depends on whether you’re counting by months or years. Either way, it was Grace Anne’s birthday yesterday. Her sparkly butt bow on her birthday outfit is our Bow Tie o’ the Day. Alas! For reasons of schedule and then pandemic, I have not been able to see Gracie or her parents—Bishop Travis and Bishopette Collette—in person since just before Christmas. I do not like that one dang bit.
Anyhoo… Gracie is the perfect blend of blessing and scamp. I hear she started walking a few days ago. I also hear she is already a speedy pro. Based on the library of videos starring Grace I’ve watched over the last few months, I can tell you she lives up to her initials: GAB. She gabs away, often at the top of her lungs. As for her pink bear, which has been a way to chart her growth in monthly pix, she now towers over it. Month 1, she was so tiny she was almost lost in the bear’s fur. Now, she owns that fluffy, pink beast!
Have you ever wanted to eat an entire bottle of maraschino cherries, but you knew it was just plain wrong? Exotic bird feather Bow Tie o’ the Day and I did some thinking, and we decided we might just be able to make this pandemic-thing work to our advantage. I mean—what better excuse to eat whatever you want than a pandemic? We bought a spectrum of somewhat unnecessary food items we don’t ordinarily buy: maraschino cherries (both red and green), cocktail onions, gourmet pickles, and peeled white asparagus spears.
I ate the entire bottle of red maraschino cherries while watching LIVE PD one Friday night, then I started on the bottle of green ones just to see what the difference is. (The only difference between the red and green maraschino cherries is—you guessed it—the color.) No worries! It’s ok, cuz there’s a pandemic out there! The next night, during Saturday’s LIVE PD, I ate most of the cocktail onions. I followed that up on the Sabbath with eating white asparagus and pickles. I was spoiling myself with food-ish food, which is what everyone deserves to do in the midst of a pandemic. In a pandemic, everything makes sense to put on your shopping list, including every different flavor of Oreo you can try. What’s a pandemic for? Best. Excuse. To. Eat. Weirdly. Ever.
I can’t decide what this get-up is, let alone whether or not I like it. Bling is always a fine thing, don’t get me wrong. But when all you’re wearing is bling, I don’t know if that qualifies as attire. When I see clothing such as this, my first thoughts are these: What kind of person would buy this for themselves, and where would they wear it? I honestly have no answers to those questions. A “dress” like this does not compute with me in any way. I do not know how to be a person who would think this outfit is a good idea. I have attended some swanky events in my day, but I have never graced a shindig at which this item would be deemed right-on. On the other hand, wear whatever blows your dress up!
It’s amazing what a gal can find when she throws on a wood Bow Tie o’ the Day to clean out a drawer of miscellany. Yup, this is my Senior Key necklace, and I present it here during Pandemic High School Graduation season. The “key” is now 40 years ancient, although it’s still in presentable shape. I didn’t consciously try to save it all this time. It just hasn’t gotten itself lost during my many moves. Here’s a brief history of where it has lived with me, in order: Delta, Ogden (3 different compartments), SLC (5 different apartments), Arlington, VA, Takoma Park, MD (1 apartment, 1 house), Delta again, Ogden again, Centerville. I know people who have moved plenty more miles than I have, but my moves still add up to a significant number of miles—across which this necklace has traveled in one piece. It has had only one owner. It has never been in a lost-and-found box.
If you’re anything like me, you have lots more stuff than you have room for, or need of. It would save time and space to not have to look after the props of our lives, yet we find it hard to let stuff go. Why do we keep things? They’re just things. They have no spirit in them. Are we afraid we’ll forget what’s happened in our lives if we get rid of them?
The memories in our brains are where the time lives. When we tell our stories, our experiences are alive again for ourselves and for whoever we’re sharing them with. We aren’t going to forget snippets of our lives if we don’t keep the props picked up along the way. But still, it so difficult to let material things go. And when we decide what stays and what goes, we each use a logic of our own—which would make no sense to someone who hasn’t lived your life, although it makes perfect sense to you. C’mon. You know you own some items whose significance you can’t begin to explain to people who don’t know you really, really, really well.
Some folks keep everything. They’re the ones who relate better to objects than to people. And sometimes we take better care of our trinkets than we do of the people we love. It shouldn’t be that way.
[Yesterday, after I posted about our pandemic Mother’s Day dinner, I was asked to re-post this gem from last year’s Mother’s Day din-din. If you recall, last year at this time, I was having weekday TMS treatments to my noggin, hoping to get my bipolar brain into its right mind.]
What I did yesterday does not resemble how I am, in the least. When I started writing TIE O’ THE DAY a couple of years ago, I said I would always be as honest as possible about my circus life—good and bad. And I’m here to tell you I embarrassed even my neckwear yesterday. Only Suzanne and I know first-hand I was a jerk, but still… I was wrong.
So….. yesterday afternoon Suzanne and I had a minuscule non-Mother’s-Day-related tiff about when to binge-watch IN PLAIN SIGHT and when to do serious napping before going to dinner. Yes, the set-to was that stoopid! But you know how it goes: One of you says a kinda not nice thing; and then the other person says a kinda not nice thing; and pretty soon you’re both swept up in a huge tornado of immaturity. (Do not pretend you haven’t done it too.) I blame the TMS, cuz I don’t want to blame myself.
Before I knew it, I was in my car alone, driving to SLC to the restaurant where I had earlier in the week made Mother’s Day dinner reservations for us.I sat and ate dinner on the patio at CURRENT all by myself, crying in my halibut. (The halibut was excellent, BTW.) The whole time I was there I kept looking at the Find Friends app on my phone to see if Suzanne’s phone had left the house to come eat with me. Nope. She and her phone stayed home. I understood. Heck, even I didn’t want to be around me.
Thus, today I chose my world map Bow Tie o’ the Day as a way to express my current title of Official Ass Of The World. And I felt my offense yesterday was so childish and egregious that I also deserve to be awarded 1/2 of a trophy—to memorialize my Official Ass Of The World title.
This fine trophy is actually my 1980 Miss Liberty 1st Attendant trophy, whose top statue has long since broken off. I don’t know why this little treasure hasn’t been lost in my life’s moves. I have lost important documents and photos in almost every housing move I’ve made, but this broken trophy always finds its way to wherever I live, making itself at home. Perhaps it has stayed with me since 1980 just to fulfill its ultimate destiny as my Official Ass Of The World trophy, which I’m sure will stick around until the minute I die. I might as well get it re-engraved with my current title.
Even though many events have been cancelled or postponed recently, we find ourselves in a year of unusual and/or extraordinary events. Some, we saw coming—like a presidential election. Some caught us by surprise—like a pandemic. As human beings, we want to know the truth about whatever goes on around us, and we want to know it NOW. We should want that. And that’s when the hullabaloo begins.
My bigly point is this: The most difficult time for ANYBODY to find the “truth” about a humongous historical event is when we are smack-dab in it. Why? Because it’s still going on. It ain’t finished yet. So I advise that we keep an eye out for slicksters who offer up the “truth” about all of it—the truth only they can see. I submit that the opposite of faith might not be doubt, my friends. The opposite of faith might just be certainty. If a slickster claims to be absolutely certain about any aspect of the pandemic, they most likely don’t know the answers they are peddling. They might have access to a fact or two, but facts alone often do not get us to a comprehensive Truth, with a capital T.
If you know me, you know I am not a blind follower. But at some point, we have to trust the people in charge—whether we want to or not. They know more about some things than we do. And besides, they’re all we’ve got. Want me to wear a mask? If there is one scintilla of a chance my mask-wearing will keep even one person from getting COVID-19, it will be my pleasure to wear it. Because I still remember my 7th grade science, I was wearing a mask and gloves before it was suggested. Conspiracy? Will this go down in history as The Great Face Mask Conspiracy That Destroyed The U.S. Economy? I kinda don’t think so. Want me to stay home? We could call this plot The Great Conspiracy To Force Us To Spend Time With Our Families And Clean Up The House. As part of that conspiracy, we blindly gave up our right to ignore the people who live with us. And who wants to live in a world where we don’t have the right to neglect our families?
As for the conspiracy theory that the pandemic has been constructed for the purpose of certain people making a ton o’ money, I offer this bit of wisdom I’ve accrued during my 56 years. The rich do not need a pandemic in order to be rich. The rich will always get richer, no matter the prevailing world conditions. (There are barely any exceptions to that, but the rarity of exceptions proves the rule.) And those who were born into poverty, will likely live in it until they die in it—no matter what the economy is doing, and no matter how hard they work to better themselves. Statistically, this is how it is. It does not make me cynical to say so. It does make me heartbroken to say so.
Until a chunk of time has passed, and until we have ALL the numbers and various statistical analyses, and research, and documents, and records, personal accounts from doctors and nurses and survivors, etc. about an event, we’re just guessing about the particulars. COVID-19 will ebb. Historians and scientists will research and write from a more informed perspective as they look at the information accrued during the pandemic. But the pandemic is so bigly, it will take years of work and research before we get anything close to a comprehensive narrative of exactly what is happening to us right now. We have to wait for the research to be done, before the history gets written. We’ll have to be patient. We should probably listen to those in charge of our predicament. We must do our own investigation and thinking, and use our own common sense. We will eventually find out what hit us, and how.
Until then, let’s fight to regain our rights to pass along deadly diseases to one another in public places, and to keep our own family members out of our houses!
Going out to dinner for Mother’s Day during the pandemic looked like this for me and Suzanne this year. I pre-ordered PAGO’s Mother’s Day Dinner feast last week, then Saturday we drove in to SLC to pick it up at the curb—where the masked woman in the background brought our fixin’s to the car. Suzanne drove us directly home to finish the final food prep, and then we ate until our bellies were full of braised chicken, salmon corn cakes, asparagus, potatoes au gratin, and carrot cake muffins. Magnetic wood Bow Tie o’ the Day presided.
Mom’s a woman o’ many faces, and whatever face she presents, it unfailingly draws people to her. She’s got that rarest of personal traits: charisma. Even here, in our 70’s-orange kitchen, in her 70’s-orange slacks, with her sassy smile, Mom captivates. TIE O’ THE DAY gives a bigly Merry Mother’s Day shout-out to all of you who who do the complicated work of mothering—with your whole, thinking hearts. Mother on!
