The Coffee that Broke the Camel's Back

I was knee-deep in one of those mornings.

The day before, a colleague asked for my help covering her class the next morning at the new Design Studio. The Design Studio sat about 100 yards away from the main campus, and it was so brand new that it wasn't connected by phone or intercom system yet. The students needed someone out there with them in order to work on their projects using the equipment; if I couldn't be there, she would need to reserve classroom space for them somewhere else and come up with a different assignment. I told her I had it covered, no problem.

Which of course meant that it turned out to be a problem after all. In spite of leaving early for work, traffic snarled along the southbound side of the Merritt Parkway, and no amount of rerouting through country back roads could undo the time wasted creeping along between Norwalk and Stamford behind the car with the "COEXIST" bumper sticker. Once I could no longer pretend I might be able to make up the time somehow, I sighed as I fished my cell phone out of my purse to text my boss. I told him I would be late, and someone needed to go retrieve the students and find somewhere for them to be until I could get there. He said he would move them to the library, no worries.

There are a handful of things that raise my blood pressure. Being late is one of them. My stomach churns, I fidget, my heart rate increases, and I take fast, shallow breaths until I notice and try to slow things down. This reaction to being late increases exponentially when I know that the person (or in this case, people) on the other end depends on me to do something. Letting people down--even in small ways--makes me question everything about my life and my value as a human being. I sat there and fretted and stewed, imagining catastrophic scenarios unfolding with the students or a disgruntled colleague slipping and falling on the ice after being dispatched to the Design Studio to move the girls inside to the library.

Just as traffic should have started to open up, though, it came to a complete stop. I groaned and swore under my breath when I saw the wreck in front of me. Two lanes and no exit in sight meant waiting out the arrival of highway patrol, emergency vehicles, and a tow truck to move the cars out of the way, and suddenly I went from being a little behind schedule to cover my friend's class to being seriously at risk of not getting there in time to teach my own. I texted my boss again, with a bit more colorful language this time. He told me to calm down, everything was going to be fine.

When I finally got to school, I ran to my office, threw my purse in a corner, and grabbed my laptop and the folder with my students' work to hand back. I balanced my coffee cup on top of the stack and went blazing towards the glass doors leading from the library to the classrooms, moving as fast as I could without actually running. I have no idea exactly what happened next, but as I walked through the doors, something slipped one way while something else tilted the other way, and the next thing I knew, I had coffee cascading from my computer onto my clothes, soaking the papers and creating a huge slipping hazard on the floor in the process. I came to an abrupt stop, gave a silent scream, sucked in a deep breath, and barely managed to suppress a string of expletives.

At that precise moment I looked down the hall and caught my boss's eye as he watched the scene unfold from the doorway of his office. We looked at each other for a few seconds, me in shock and outraged surprise, him trying desperately to keep it together, and all of a sudden he lost his internal battle for composure and started to laugh.

He laughed so hard tears ran down his cheeks within seconds. He laughed so hard he turned several shades of red and gasped for air. He laughed so hard and so long and showed no signs of stopping as he stood bent over at the waist with his hands on his knees.

Finally I'd had enough. "I'm glad you're enjoying this, but are you just going to stand there and laugh or are you going to help me clean up this mess?" I demanded with all the impudence of a five year old. I might as well have stomped my foot.

He laughed harder. His secretary came away from her desk to see what in the world was going on. The college counselor and her assistant poked their heads into the hallway to assess the situation, but when they saw me staring him down while coffee puddled around my feet, they quickly ducked back into their office. We stood there like that until the Head of School's assistant came up the stairs with a candidate for an opening in the History Department, and my boss finally had to get himself together enough to conduct an interview. He gestured for the young man to wait in his office, went into the bathroom for some paper towels, and helped me mop up the mess on the floor, all without looking me in the eye lest he start laughing again.

He tried to explain later why he found it so hilarious, but I think it was one of those things you had to witness to really understand. It had something to do with knowing what a crap morning I'd had and the comedy of errors when the only thing that could have redeemed at least part of it--making it to class and handing back papers with some semblance of dignity--went completely out the window.

He hired the guy for the history job, though.

Here are this week's prompts from 642 Things:

• That relationship that ended: when did it really end?

• Your worst enemy writes his/her memoir. There's a whole chapter devoted to you. How does it begin?

• When did you not realize you were being hilarious? What was everyone laughing about?

Parking Violations

Trumbull, Connecticut takes great pride in its parks, for good reason: they are beautiful and inviting, and the residents love everything about them . . . except when people from other towns try to use them. Hence Draconian parking restrictions (I used to joke that you had to submit DNA along with soil samples from your backyard to qualify for a town parking pass) enforced to the letter, and woe be unto you if you dared challenge the $25 parking ticket.

Parking and taking guests to the pool created all kinds of community stress, and one summer I happened to notice a post on the Moms of Trumbull (MOTS) Facebook group from a woman whose brother was visiting from out of town. He was disabled and needed to drive his van to the pool, but when they went to the Recreation Department to get a guest pass (for the pool--there was no such thing as a guest pass for parking), the woman working the counter told him he wouldn't be able to park his van in the parking lot without getting a ticket. His sister turned to the Facebook group to figure out what to do; she just wanted to be able to take him and her nieces to the pool.

I thought of my brother and his wheelchairs and modified vans with their mechanical lifts and other equipment; I thought of my old boss who signed the Americans with Disabilities Act into law. Reading that post made me really, really mad--mad enough to look up the specific rules about parking in the ADA and post a link to that section in a comment on the Facebook thread, along with my own commentary: he can park that van pretty much wherever he damn well pleases. Tell the park ranger to call me if he has any questions.

Later in the weekend, she posted a photo of her brother in his wheelchair watching his girls splash in the pool and said they didn't have a single issue with parking. That still makes me smile.

Here are this week's prompts from 642 Things:

Think of a time you stood up for a stranger. Write a 10-line story about what happened and why you intervened.

Describe the first time someone relied on you, and how you felt.

Describe a place you've been to that's least like your hometown and explain why.

Le Baiser

https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3188/3030277206_6cbf71826f_z.jpg?zz=1

This is my favorite poster I had on my wall in my high school bedroom. I wasn't yet a photographer when I fell in love with the photograph, but I remember catching my breath when I stumbled across it on a postcard in a bookstore. I think I bought the card or maybe showed it to my mother, and I must have mentioned wishing I could have it as a poster, too. Or maybe Mom just decided I needed to have a larger version and surprised me. Either way, it showed up under the Christmas tree--this exact version by Éditions du Désastre--in a metal frame with glare-free glass, and I wasted no time putting it up on the wall. I borrowed my stepfather's hammer, but I can't remember if I used a picture hanger (most likely) or a simple nail. I do remember standing on my bed and lowering it into position, then flopping down onto the mattress to admire it.

Over the next couple of years, I studied that photo at least a thousand times during reading breaks or while sitting in the floor listening to music or talking on the phone. Doisneau's combination of the intimacy of the kissing couple, the motion and hubbub of the street, and the range of detachment and suspicion from the passersby shaped my love of street photography before I ever picked up a camera with artistic intention. On a more subconscious level, the photograph predisposed me to like cities where people move past one another and around cafe tables on sidewalks between office buildings and busy streets. I will always love this photo, and this writing exercise convinced me I need to go find another one to hang somewhere in my home. I wrote a love letter about this photo once. It takes up a lot of space in my mind, still.

I took the poster to my college dorm as a freshman, and it kept me company during all the transitions of that year. When I packed my car to move home that summer, though, I dropped it and shattered the glass. The poster itself ripped in a couple places, and after a few minutes of trying to talk myself into believing I could salvage it, I gave up and carried it to the dumpster where all the other broken stuff from people's dorm rooms had started to accumulate. I added it to the pile, turned on my heel, and walked back toward my car with the flashers blinking and a whole lot of stuff left to load.

Here are this week's prompts from 642 Things:

• What's the largest block of time you've ever had to kill? How did you go about it?

• Recount the day you put your favorite poster up on your bedroom wall. Then write about the day you took it down.

• Describe the supernatural experience you had (or never had but wish you did).

Goodbye to All That

I have probably done my last back flip. Also my last front flip, or for that matter, any other kind of flip. The days of me hurtling my body into a 360-degree rotation through the air ended sometime in college, though I couldn't tell you exactly when. I used to be able to do a flip on command as a kind of party trick, but one day that wasn't entertaining anymore. So I stopped doing flips, and I don't know that I could get them back if I tried. I did one on a trampoline a couple years ago and instantly regretted it (I don't remember my head spinning like that when I was younger); I could probably still do one off the diving board at the pool. But on the grass of a football field or the wooden floor of a basketball court? Nope.

I miss being able to laugh at gravity.

My youngest wearing a cheeky gift from a friend.

I have also probably nursed a baby for the last time. My hope is to have so many grandchildren that I can hardly remember all their names, so I think I still have many more diaper changes and bottle feedings and rocking chair sessions in my future. But nursing a child--feeling nourishment leave my body and watching it soothe and sustain another human being--those days have most likely come and gone. Nursing taught me reverence and respect for my body and the bodies of my children. Nursing showed me the impossible wonder of how humans are designed and the symmetry in the needs of mother and child. But I was bone tired almost all the time. I restricted my diet to bland, unexciting food so as not to upset little stomachs. I had limited time in between feedings to do everything else that needed to be done, and since my children all refused bottles with remarkable obstinance, no one could ever pitch in to give me much of a break. I remember bursting into tears in the baby food aisle at the grocery store after my youngest's four-month check up. I'd been so sure we would get the green light to start cereal that afternoon, but our doctor wanted to wait until six months. The prospect of two more months of being the sole source of nourishment for an already 20-pound baby almost did me in. (We did make it the full six months, though.) I am grateful I was able to nurse my three children for almost a year each, but I really won't miss it.

I still hold my children close and feed them in other ways.

Here are this week's prompts from 642 Things:

The time you went to bat for someone, and wished you hadn't.

Do you remember the first time you felt you had won an argument with a parent? Does that still feel like a victory today?

Make a list of things you've probably done for the last time. Say your good-byes.

On Bugs and Heights and Stuff

Great Wednesday classes start back tonight, and I hope to see many of you there! I know several will be joining different classes for the spring semester, so I hope this blog will be a way to help you stay connected to the group.

Here are this week's prompts from 642 Things:

• Write about your first vivid memory. Then write about all the ways you might be misremembering or mistaking it.

• Tell a family story that you think will be passed down and told generations from now.

• Think of someone you know well. Write about what you'll never understand about that person.

Right before I lost it at the Empire State Building

My Kryptonite and my Superpower

In family legend years from now, I will probably be remembered for two things: my fear of heights and my lack of fear of bugs. The reason I believe I will be remembered for these things (and also for my mashed potatoes, but that's a skill I hope to pass down and thus not unique to me) is because both qualities fascinate and delight my children to no end.

There is nothing more entertaining to them than watching me sweat and hyperventilate on the Ferris Wheel at the State Fair or Rodeo. Every year I consent to go with them in a blaze of optimism that this time I'll be fine, and every year I spend most of the ride cursing my bad judgment and ignoring their laughing and finger-pointing while I pray to return safely to the ground. Woe be unto the child who thinks it would be funny to rock the gondola during the ride, but it's a temptation they can't seem to resist. My son made a bucket list of New York City sights he wanted to visit before we moved, and one of them was the Empire State Building, which I am convinced was solely because he knew I would freak out. It is a testament to my deep, visceral love for him that I ventured out onto the open-air observation deck at all, and I can't help it that I eventually had to drop to my knees and crawl back to safety in the interior of the building.

The look of disgust mixed with pity from my mom and daughter as I finally cried uncle and went back inside.

My lack of fear of bugs makes me legendary with family and my former students alike. Every once in awhile something will catch me off guard, but even then, it's mostly the unexpected motion that startles me, not the bug itself. Even when I was married, any time a situation involving something with wings or multiple sets of legs arose, "Mom!!!!" was the alarm that went up. Once the trouble-making creature is dispatched--either removed to the outdoors or sent to its Maker via the nearest magazine or sole of my shoe--they look at me with such awe. My son was moved to reverence when I rid the world of a particularly audacious cockroach; he turned to me with his big brown eyes open wide, and there was respect in his voice when he said, "I can't believe you just did that."

I hope to also be remembered for my love of learning and sense of humor, for taking them on road trips and other adventures, for helping them grow to be confident, loving human beings. Maybe some of that will get passed down, too. But I'm almost certain my grandchildren will know that even if a bee didn't make me blink, the very thought of skydiving could make me cry.

Disclaimer: no foolish photographer was stung at any point during the making of this image.

New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone!

I hope you all enjoyed the holidays and are ready to tackle a new year.  I'm an unabashed optimist about fresh starts. I love the sense of having a blank slate to fill with a mix of all that seems new and exciting balanced by the best of the tried and true.

Here are the three prompts for this week followed by my response to the last one:

• What's the most confused you've ever been? Tell that story.

• That time you tried to do a job well, even though it was stupid.

• Write everything interesting you can about your worst scar (literal or figurative).

My Worst Scar

This is my pregnant belly at 38.5 weeks, the day before I gave birth to my youngest daughter. You can tell I was kind of arching my back to make my stomach protrude as far as possible; I spent the last three months of my pregnancy reassuring acquaintances and total strangers that while I was carrying relatively small, the baby was a completely normal size. Their eyes would usually dart toward my belly as they said something like, "If you say so..."

You can imagine the general surprise when my bundle of joy turned out to be 8 pounds, 2 ounces and 21 inches long. She was my third born via C-section, which makes her partially responsible for my worst scar.

Mira Nicole Moore was born 2/21/11 in Bridgeport, CT

When I took classes at Methodist to prepare for the birth of my first child, I remember stopping to cry near one of the windows on the bridge to the parking garage because I was so afraid I would need a C-section. I didn't want the risks and recovery from major abdominal surgery while caring for a newborn, but more than anything, it was the first taste of the fear that comes with being a mother. Those videos and lectures from the nurse practitioner leading the classes brought home the reality that something could happen to me or--God forbid--to my baby that would negate all the careful preparation and planning for how I wanted to give birth.

Sure enough, after about 12 hours of labor, my little girl's heart rate started dropping with each contraction, and the nurse called the doctor. While we waited for him to arrive, I looked her in the eye and said, "Is he going to tell me I need a C-section?" She said probably so, and I decided right then I wouldn't argue or ask for more time to wait and see how things would develop. Ten minutes later I was in the operating room, and three days later I left the hospital with a healthy newborn and a six-inch incision across my lower abdomen.

After three C-sections, I've learned a few things about scars. For one thing, it's a different scar each time. The first scar was pretty nondescript. The scar after my son's birth was bumpy in the middle. The one I have now is flat and smooth on my left side where the doctor started her sutures. Things must have been harder to manage as she got closer to the end, though, because the right side has a rise and fall to it with a little divot in the spot where she tied off the stitches. I don't have much feeling in the area, and for awhile my daughter's head hit right in that spot when she would give me hugs (which she does about fifty times a day), and it felt odd to see her bury her face in my body and not have a sensation to correspond with the visual. I feel self-conscious about the way it makes my abdomen look a little Frankenstein-ish when I wear bathing suits, but for the most part, I consider it a badge of honor for having brought three children safely into the world.

Christmas Eve Eve

From Christmas Eve Eve 2015

For as long as I can remember, my mother has referred to today (12/23) as Christmas Eve Eve, and at some point we developed a tradition of driving around to look at Christmas lights while drinking hot chocolate and listening to Christmas music. We've made a few modifications from time to time--some years we wear pajamas, other years we wear Christmas sweaters; some years we buy the hot chocolate at Starbucks, other years we make Hershey's cocoa at home with special marshmallows from Whole Foods--but we ALWAYS drive around and look at lights on Christmas Eve Eve. No matter how difficult or wonderful a year we've had, no matter what losses, anxiety, or joy we're carrying around, we look at Christmas lights and listen to songs of hope found in unlikely places and families gathering from near and far to celebrate and hold each other close.

Though the tradition originated with my mother, it extends far beyond her. Tonight I will observe Christmas Eve Eve with my brother, two sisters, one sister's boyfriend, and my father and step-mother. We'll drive around in my father's new minivan (do not ask me why a 64-year-old man would buy himself a minivan; we just accept my father's quirks and marvel at how little it takes to make him happy), and my brother will guide us to neighborhoods that none of us knew existed, neighborhoods he discovered during his years as a landman in the early days of horizontal drilling in the Barnett Shale. There will be a lot of personalities in close proximity in that minivan, so my siblings and I are adding an element to the tradition: a closing beer/drink at a nearby bar. Our parents will drop us off at the end of the Christmas light expedition, and we'll walk home together under a dark, starry sky, grateful and relaxed in the last few moments before the chaos really sets in.

I hope all of you are looking forward to favorite traditions over the next few days, and I hope the light and life of the season find their way to you, no matter what kind of year you've had/are having. If you find a few minutes to sneak away and write, here are the prompts (two weeks' worth) from 642 Things:

1. Your family pet starts talking to you. What exactly does he or she think is going on around here?

2. You knew they were lying. You chose to pretend you believed them. (Santa might provide a lot of material for this particular prompt!)

3. What's one way you might become eccentric in your old age? How might you go in another (but equally batty) direction?

4. How did the way your parents felt about their bodies or physicality affect you and how you feel about your body and physicality?

5. What was your favorite trip as a child, and why?

6. What is the object that belonged to your parent that you associate most strongly with him or her, and why?