Sep3

When does a woman become a cougar?

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40? 39? And do you get extra “cougar free” years if you get carded?

Those are the questions I pose in my current Facebook headline. It’s mostly a sardonic observation, but it probably won’t surprise you to learn that I turned 39 on Saturday.

I’ve never really dated younger men. Not sure I’m going to. But evidently “cougar” now means any single woman above the age of 40 (age taken from internet “research”).

OK. So let me get this straight.

My early 30s were all about the stereotypical baby clock. But evidently my late 30s were supposed to be about the cougar clock.

I’ll synchronize my special “cougar” watch. Goodness, I’m awfully behind in my preparation. Good thing I have helpful information like the tip below, taken from an article on msnbc called “5 tips to being a sexy cougar.”

Thanks MSNBC! I’m so relieved to hear that it’s OK to be a cougar just as long as I maintain a preternaturally young appearance.

clipped from www.msnbc.msn.com
  • Age is just a number. That’s the most important thing. These women are redefining what aging looks like. Because they eat well, exercise and do everything necessary to maintain a healthy balance in their life, 40, 50 or 60 never looked so good. 
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    Jun29

    No, Mom, my eggs went bad, remember?

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    Recently I went home to Delaware to visit my parents.

    Over a breakfast bowl of cereal and apropos of nothing, Mom asks:

    “Do you think you’ll ever have your own children?”

    Me: “Um, no. It’s too late. Basically biologically impossible.”

    Mom: “Huh. Is that because of your PCOS ?”

    [PCOS or polycystic ovary syndrome, is an endocrine and reproductive disorder that, among other things, makes it difficult to get pregnant]

    Me: “Um, yeah.”

    What I didn’t say is this:

    “Remember that REALLY IMPORTANT conversation I had with my gynecologist around the time I turned 37? The conversation that kind of changed how I envisioned the rest of my life? It went a little something like this?”


    Me: “So, now that I’m 37, how long until my eggs expire?”Dr. R: “If you really want to have your own biological children and you’re psychologically and financially ready to do it on your own, you need to do it now.”Me: “Financially ready? Ha. On my own? No, I decided long ago, no baby daddy, no baby.”Bing, bong.The reproductive window is closing. I repeat, the reproductive window is closing.

    Whoa.

    It’s not like this was a complete surprise. I’m a health writer. I knew that a normal woman’s—let alone one with PCOS–chance of conceiving goes down rapidly in her 30s. I could feel the biological nosedive. And I knew that I could always adopt. But something about hearing that window creakily making its way down to lockdown was kinda, um, MAJOR.

    And apparently, not only did my family not fully grasp the significance of my retelling of this story—THEY DON’T EVEN REMEMBER!!

    I love my family – they’ve always been a great source of support. But people, come on!!

    Whatever.

    The more I thought about it, the more I wondered if I really wanted kids. And hello, did no one in my family notice the change from the obsessive worrying throughout my 30s: “What if I can’t have kids? What if it’s too late?” to statements like, “I’m not even ready to have kids. Maybe I never will be,” and “Maybe being the world’s coolest aunt to Ethan and Sammie (my nephew and niece) is enough.”

    [Meanwhile, a craven and selfish part of me whispers, “But who will take care of me when I am old?”]
    And honestly, I think that my eggs have been committing hari-kari for years when faced with some of the guys I’ve dated. Like:

    The paranoiac—We met as contractors on a job. When the job became permanent, he wanted to keep things fairly private. “Private” started out (on the work mornings after the nights we’d stayed together) at “let’s not be seen walking up together from the parking garage,” to “Drop me off a few blocks from work,” to “Drop me at the Metro on your way in.” And oh yeah—don’t talk about me on the phone at work—people are listening.
    Um, yeah.

    The neat freak/closet-redneck-cracker—At his apartment, he once asked me to take off a shirt that was shedding some sparkles (don’t ask) onto his carpet. Which I did, after first running into his bedroom and rolling sparkles all over his sheets. And the last time we saw each other, in a Mexican restaurant, a history of subtle questionable remarks bloomed into statements such as “that waitress better get her chalupa ass over here,” and (after I threw a piece of candy at him) “you’re leaving a mess for you’re illegal immigrant friends to clean up.” I all but dragged him out of the restaurant by his collar and that was that.

    The exhibitionist—An old college relationship with a lot of baggage. We’d been out of touch for many years when he popped up to resolve some old issues. Great, but in the meantime he has become obsessed with his own body. He sends me naked pictures of himself. All the time. Even from the South Pole. Seriously.

    My eggs are very smart.

    Besides, I really already have a child. He has curly reddish-blond hair and a cold nose. Yes, I consider my dog my child. Anyone got a problem with that?

    May15

    Free parking space! Not.

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    So, Friday morning, I’m having coffee in Old Town with my friend Chris, and we hung out for about an hour and a half. Then we parted ways for our respective cars.

    As I approached my car I notice: MY BACK LICENSE PLATE IS MISSING!!

    I can’t swear that it didn’t happen earlier while it was parked on my street, but I think I would have noticed it when I got into the car that morning. The irony, assuming that it was stolen on Cameron Street is that I didn’t park in a garage or even at a meter on a more populated street because that spot was FREE. Not anymore!
    I reported it to the police, so the plates are registered as stolen. But I’ll have to replace them, because even as I type this, I’m imagining thieves in a scary masks on a major heist using my plate on their getaway car.

    Plus the DMV requires it. And I have to go there in person and everything!

    That was one expensive parking space.

    On a positive note, being between jobs means I have plenty of time to stand in line….

    May15

    All we can do is keep breathing

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    I wrote this a while ago, intending to post it to some anonymous depression-focused blog I created, but it’s part of who I am (sometimes) and I think it really belongs on the Chronicles. I don’t feel the need to be anonymous anymore.

    I like “Grey’s Anatomy.” I think at its best, the show can be genuinely moving. It’s no “Buffy”–pondering the nature of good and evil and what it means to have a soul. But definitely glimpses of the simultaneous fragility and resilience of the human heart.

    I also really like its music. I’ll leave it to others to analyze what that says about my hipness or lack thereof, but I enjoy what I find. And sometimes I find pieces that resonate. Like the song I currently can’t get out of my head: “Keep Breathing” by Ingrid Michaelson:

    I want to change the world. Instead, I sleep.

    Wow, did that catch my attention the first time I heard it. Not that my aspirations were ever quite that lofty, but there are things I thought I would do and I haven’t. Projects I want to do, but don’t. Specifically, this current relapse has been all about apathy. A lack of desire and energy to do anything but keep body and soul (and my dog) together. Like the song goes on to say:

    All that I know is I’m breathing.

    Pretty grim, right? And it’s definitely felt like that sometimes. Full on episodes of that scary nothingness that is woven into the fabric of depression–what I like to call “the abyss.” But I also find another meaning in the song–a subtle shift in the lyrics:

    All I can do is keep breathing

    Like, as long as I’m breathing, anything is possible.

    Breath, in various contexts, is kind of a personal touchstone. Like another song I picked up from Grey’s: “Breathe (2 AM).” The tension–musically and lyrically–continuously intensifies, as life throws itself at the narrator, building into a crescendo. The movement and urgency are reminiscent of developing panic attack. Pulse racing, brain sprinting as you try to just hold it together. And then you remember:

    Breathe, just breathe.

    Taking deep, measured breaths has been a major coping mechanism for me for so long, and while sometimes, during really sustained bouts of panic, only a little valium will do, I like the reminder that sometimes it’s possible to just pause and slow it down a few beats.

    Or, as the great philosopher and poet Paul Hewson (aka Bono) would say:

    And if the night runs over
    And if the day won’t last
    And if your way should falter
    along the stony pass
    it’s just a moment
    this time will pass.
    Feb28

    Die, rodent, die!

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    You know your life is seriously out of balance when you keep having to interrupt your work freak out/my-therapist-has-been-out-of-town-for-weeks call to your father in order to yell, “shit!” “get away!” and “goddamn mice!” at a particularly bold rodent headed for your dog’s water bowl.


    All of this while you’re waiting for the valium to kick in.








    Yes, this really is the winter of my discontent.



    Actually it started in November. Darting shadows, seen just out of the corner of my eyes. Then full-on eye contact with a mouse that ran out from underneath the radiator in my kitchen. Yuck.




    Well, I’ve dealt with mice before, I thought. And hey, why don’t I try those special D-Con no-touch, no-see traps.




    I bought four of the hockey-puck looking things. They did not have me screaming GOOOOOAL!!

    OK, back to my basic covered traps.




    But mysteriously the peanut butter kept disappearing without triggering the traps. Finally I started catching some of the sneaky little bastards. But they kept coming. And by January, they were feeling really comfortable with the place. Strolling out from under the couch to boop around the living room, la la la.




    After eight kills, I decided it was time for professional help. Help that wouldn’t endanger Houdini, who by the way, was pretty much oblivious to all of this. I called a place I had used before for other pests. They were pet-friendly. Or so I thought. However, when the guy showed up this time, he was flummoxed by the presence of Houdini.

    “Where do you want to put the poison?” asks Exterminator Man.

    “I’m really not comfortable with poison at all,” I said.

    “We do have really heavy baits that are hard to get into,” says EM. (Then how do the mice get in?)

    “Um, well, could you maybe put it someplace my dog can’t get to?”

    “Yeah, I guess I could put some in the attic and in the dropped tile ceiling of the basement. I’ll just have to use snap traps in other places.”

    Snap traps? Open, freaking, wooden snap traps? If I’d wanted to use those I could have set them myself!

    The visit was capped off by Exterminator Man telling me he couldn’t check for rodent activity in my second bedroom, due to all the stuff in there and that it would probably helped if I organized things.

    @#!&$

    Don’t. Bug. Me. About. My. Clutter.

    My therapist has been trying to teach me that my house is not a reflection of who I am, dammit! And who I am is seriously overwhelmed, so back off!

    The bill for all of this?

    $250.

    DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY COVERED SNAP TRAPS I COULD BUY FOR THAT MUCH MONEY?

    50!!!

    50!!!

    So now it’s February, and a second EM visit has revealed that the mice aren’t taking the poison. Or getting near the snap traps.

    He added glue boxes.

    I wasn’t happy, but at least I hadn’t seen any mice in the last few weeks.


    Until Tuesday. On that phone call with my dad.

    Get ready Exterminator Man, because you’re coming back. You will rid me of my mice!

    Otherwise, I’m moving out. Possibly to the psych ward….

    Nov15

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    http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;” >clipped from <a title="http://www.slate.com/id/2177969/” href=”http://www.slate.com/id/2177969/” style=”font-size: 11px;”>www.slate.com

    Those’>http://www.slate.com/id/2177969/”&gt;

    Those of us older than 25 can’t imagine a life without e-mail. For the Facebook generation, it’s hard to imagine a life of only e-mail, much less a life before it. I can still remember the proud moment in 1996 when I sent my first e-mail from the college computer lab. It felt like sending a postcard from the future. I was getting a glimpse of how the Internet would change everything—nothing could be faster and easier than e-mail.

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    Oct16

    Our Daughters, Ourselves

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    Onslaught.

    It’s an award-winning short film from Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty. The tagline: Talk to your daughter before the beauty industry does.

    I don’t have a daughter. But I do have a niece. And more painfully, I have a mirror.

    I don’t like what I see in it.

    Which is ridiculous. I am not hideous, deformed or even just plain ugly. But sometimes I think I am. In the mirror, on the scale, trying on clothes, just walking around. That little voice in my head: You’re fat. You’re getting old. Is that a wrinkle? A new gray hair? Is my neck starting to sag? My eyelids droop?

    I’m 38 years old and in pretty good health and shape for my age. I could stand to lose a few pounds–for my health–but I’m certainly not falling to pieces like some decrepit old house.

    And what if I were? Is it no longer possible to approach 40 without Botox and a plastic surgeon on speed dial? Is youth our only currency?

    These are not just the narcisstic ramblings of one neurotic type A personality, but thoughts that most women I know share. After all, we’re all subjected to this barrage every day.

    The film is a 60-second, turbo-charged distillation of everything advertising and the beauty industry have to throw at us.

    Very cleverly done. It captures our crazy-making beauty culture perfectly. There’s even a split second image of a woman kneeling before a toilet, presumably on the verge of purging.

    Read Advertising Age’s review of the ad–including appropriate calling out of Unilever for also producing Axe body spray and Slim Fast.

    Oct16

    Public reading and writing service announcement no. 554:

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    Words like “synthesize,” “synergize,” “utilize” or any “ize” for that matter, do not make your writing more magically delicious. They do not make you sound bolder, cooler, smarter or more interesting. But they do make you sound lamer and cheesier.
    So please don’t sprinkle these words throughout your compositions like so many pieces of Lucky Charms. They’re plastic, artificial, crappy little colored marshmallows–not gold nuggets.

    And they rot your brain. Or at least your teeth.

    Signed,

    One cranky writer

    Mar22

    Things I won’t do for the sake of the environment

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    Yes, it’s spring, and I’ve finally crawled out from hibernation to add a new post to my “new” blog.

    The number one emailed article at the New York Times today is about a couple and their small child going to eco-extremes in a year-long experiment in living green. To wit: they will not buy any food that hasn’t been grown within a 250-mile radius of NYC and they will not buy anything besides that food. They will also not use any carbon-fuelled transportation (elevators included) or produce any trash (they are composting IN their apartment). Among the food items that are banished (or will be once they run out): olive oil, balsamic vinegar and spices! They dine by the light of candles and one fluorescent bulb. And scooter or walk to work and everywhere else.

    I admire their commitment (and of others who are doing similar things), I do. I’ve been singing the praises of the environmentally-enlightened (and rightful U.S President) Al Gore since 1992. I am honestly seriously concerned about global warming, and as anyone who knows me will tell you, I consider “skeptics” to be the equivalent of people who still believe the earth is flat.

    But it’s hard to walk the talk. 



    I do what I can–I’ve stopped being a huge-ass hypocrite by switching to Metro instead of driving to work. I telecommute one day about every other week. My car is 7years old and has not-quite 50,000 miles on it. There are now new windows in my house, which means I can actually open them and not used the “fan” setting on my AC (more on that later). I have central air now instead of two noisy electricity-hogging window units. I recycle! And I kinda hate fast food and massive chain operations.

    However, there are some things that I refuse to give up for the sake of the earth. Here’s my list–I tried to rank them, but honestly, they’re all pretty important:

    I will not stop eating meat–I try to buy organic and local if I can and I don’t eat veal (OK that’s really about the meanness of it), but dammit I love me some good lamb once in a while. Or a big juicy grilled steak (charcoal not gas).

    I will not stop eating seafood—I’ve done the swordfish ban, and I know most of the world’s fish are being rapidly depleted, but I’ve gotta get my protein somewhere! I’ll try to focus on the less over-fished species, but don’t take away my omega-3s.

    I will not sweat it out without air-conditioning–OK, I know this is a big one, but people it is hot and so fraking humid in DC in the summertime. I can cut down but don’t cut me off! It’s a shameless excuse, but I really do get light-headed when it’s really hot out (I know, lame.)

    I will not wear ugly clothing    –Look. I’m not extravagant. I can’t afford designer clothes (which actually is probably less energy-intensive), which means relatively mass-produced off the rack. But I’m working on the whole “less is more” thing. And I don’t know which is less energy-intensive to produce: natural items or synthetics, but I do know this: it can’t be tacky and I am not wearing hemp.

    I will not stop buying music–But I will cut down on waste by buying virtually (ha) all of my music online. And I am keeping all of my forms of Bono and the boys–all the CDs with cracked cases, the concert DVDs and duplicate online files. Yes, I did actually download AND buy the physical CD of “How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb.”

    I will not give up my TV–Something has to distract me from the destruction of the Earth and the sick joke that is the Bush administration. And my TV isn’t very big–just 24 inches and a little tiny one in my room. Yes, I do read–a lot, but a world where I never experienced the X-Files or Buffy? Veronica Mars? Scrubs or the Office (UK and US)? Be reasonable.

    I will not stop drinking wine    –Actually, wine is produced within a 250-mile radius of my house. However, if you know anything about wine, you’ll know that much of Virginia’s wine is not just bad, it’s damn near unrecognizable as wine. And I really like a lot of wine from New Zealand and Australia. And Argentina, Spain, Austria…OK, I’ll try to mix some Oregon and Washington wines in there. And one of my Italian great-uncles used to make his own wine…

    I will not stop traveling to far-flung places–I want to see New Zealand and Australia. Bali and Southeast Asia. Argentina and Brazil. Maybe India. Various parts of the US. And how can I not go back to Italy? It’s in my blood! I’ve seen the stats on how wasteful air-travel is, but honestly I don’t get to do it that often. In the past few years it’s only been a few times a year and in some years, none at all. My only excuse is that seeing the rest of the Earth leads me to want to save it. It’s a whole balance thing, I know.

    And finally, I will not stop using toilet paper–One of the most fascinating and awe-inspiring parts of the Times article was that these people have stopped using toilet paper. I cannot. If forced to chose, I would give up toilet paper for some of the other items on this list, but I don’t see it happening any time soon. Don’t have room for a bidet. Don’t think they are all that effective anyway.

    Forgive me, Al. I remain your dedicated but deeply flawed supporter.

    Nov14

    Pelosi to Bush:”You’ll be getting me coffee, bitch!”

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    At least that’s how it goes in my fantasy. My friend Sadie was recently offended by a fairly sexist comment Dubya made about helping Nancy Pelosi pick out her drapes. God he’s an idiot.

    So I said, “She should have been like, ‘You’ll be getting me coffee, bitch!’ and then slapped him on the ass and called him sparky or something like that.” (Apologies to my childhood friend, Jenny, who goes by the name Sparky but is decidedly un-Bushlike.)

    Speaking of idiocy, check out this blog rant about how the mainstream media made poor George “Macaca” Allen lose. Waah! Waah!

    And newsbusters.org has a piece about how the evil U.N. is “promoting global warming fear” in our children.

    Oh, you stupid, stupid, flat-earthers…

    It’s called peer-reviewed science. The theories of a few cranky “experts” does not a debate make. Where are the scientific studies that cast serious doubt on the human impact upon our planet? In case all this actual science–not funded by fossil fuel industries–is too much, here’s a clear and consise explanation of the reputable scientific consensus from Science magazine. Note the part where it talks about 928 studies appearing in refereed scientific journals that agree–humans are changing the climate.