Things I Learned in 2014

Whether it is the battery in your car key fob or in your car, these items should not be ignored.

Raising young children takes a specific set of parenting tools; adult children require a different set of tools that have very little to do with parenting. 

Shucking oysters is even more of a skill than shucking clams.  Both make me feel accomplished.

Human suffering has very long tentacles as does human kindness, however, I am afraid the suffering is winning.

Having your car towed is a bad experience.  Toss in the fact that you are traveling with your friend who just had chemo and her teenage daughters from whom you have to bum money to pay for the late night towing, and, well, it just takes bad to a new dimension.

Friendship's grace really shows up when you are towed.

Metallic tattoos are fun, temporary jewelry.

A three day music festival with your music savvy daughter is bliss.

I have an FM voice.

First and second graders give you a reason to smile every darn day.

I didn't hate reading a book on Kindle (but still prefer the real thing)

The front row movie seat is no longer awful thanks to reclining movie theater seats.

"No Parking" signs in any US city may as well be written in Greek.  Wait, they already are.

Apparently Instagramming one photo a day is appropriate.  I am Instagram inappropriate.

The Serial podcast has me transfixed (I am late to the listening and am currently "binge listening" - is that even a thing?)

J. Roddy Walston and The Business made me like heavy metal music.

I talk aloud to myself when home alone (also when not home alone, as pointed out by both of my daughters)

Paris + Autumn = more bliss.

My family agrees on this one thing - we are beach people.

 

Thanks so much for indulging me in this vanity project by reading this blog - you are most generous.  I hope 2015 returns your generosity in every way!

Cookie Snob

Now that the great American turkey holiday is behind us, the next item in my culinary forecast is deciding over cookies; not just any cookies. I am thinking about Christmas cookies. 

For me, eleven and a half months out of the year are meant for baking many tarts, pies and such.  But when December rolls around, it's time to brush off those special holiday cookie recipes and ponder which ones will make the cut. 

This is a serious matter.  Well, for me it's serious.  I am a cookie snob.

My Grandmom Elizabeth was the premier cookie baker.  Stacks of tins lined her sideboard in December as she churned out angeletti's, fig/raisin bars, and pizelles.  Struffoli - Italian honey balls in the shape of a wreath - sometimes made an appearance. She also made cinnamon bread as gifts and for Christmas morning.


Yellowed, worn and wonderful-
recipe cards are a comfort still. 

 The magic of what she was able to produce in her little row home kitchen reminds me that spirit and heart (along with gobs of butter) help determine cookie success.  My mom and I took on the cookie baking after Elizabeth, and then, for reasons that escape my understanding,  I began to add to the list in a very, very choosy way.  

I searched for variety and distinctiveness, and deliberately kept away from chocolate chip- I don't know why except perhaps chocolate chip cookies were the everyday cookies made for my kids January through November.   I broke that rule in 2008 when a  friend's Deep Dark Chocolate cookies caught my fancy.  They have been on the list ever since. 

The first issue I face in early December is considering if I will make all ten recipes in my select cookie corral.  Even more vexing is deciding whether or not to add  a new type to the list.   And then, which one do I replace? 

M&Ms in a cookie? Heck no. Hershey kisses sitting in the center of a cookie? I don't think so!  Any peanut butter cookie? Keep It!  Store bought cookies? Really?

See, I told you - big time snobbery. 

In 2003, the mother-in-law of another friend made Raspberry Ribbons that met the dual criteria.  They hold a solid place among the holiday sweets.   Then, in 2004 a friend's Rosemary Shortbreads stormed onto the scene with their sweet/savory blend.  They kicked Nut Balls and Stained Glass Lemon cookies to the curb.  It is rough out there is the Land of Sweets!

Making lists is part of the
annual cookie snobbery

So now I find myself sifting through cookie cookbooks and magazines, (and of course the Internet;) I pay close attention at cookie swaps, always keeping an eye out for that special something which offers a delicious difference.  It's not that I am unhappy with any of my Christmas cookies, but thinking that another special recipe could be floating out there keeps me on the hunt. http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1017031-chocolate-mint-thins-with-candy-cane-crunch?em_pos=large&emc=edit_ck_20141203&nl=cooking&nlid=55357066

I often wish my Grandmother could join me in the kitchen.  I'd love to know her thoughts on the chosen recipes.  Last year, my mom spent a delicious morning with my adult daughters baking cookies here.  I'd like to think they someday will carry on with the baking, putting their own twist (and pickiness!) on it.  

So, watch out because this cookie snob continues to be on the prowl for the next worthy sweet treat.  Let's start with yours - what are your holiday favorites?

What cookies do I bake? Here's the list:

Angeletti

Fig/Raisin Bars

Ricotta

Walnut Crescents

Spritz

Jam Filled Thumbprints

Rosemary Shortbreads

Pecan Tassies

Deep Dark Chocolates

Raspberry Ribbons

2014 Cookies

 

A Frantic City, NJ

Dear Atlantic City,

Oh, how you've changed.

I grew up visiting you during all my childhood summers. My family even spent some Thanksgivings and Easters with you.  You were my first seashore love.  I was blind to all other towns to the north and south of you.  

You've always been a city to me because before casino gambling rolled into town, you contained intimate, vibrant neighborhoods.  You were rough around the edges but pulsed with ethnic life.

We've been estranged over the years, but the most recent news of casino closings, large layoffs, and double-digit unemployment feels like a betrayal.  We were so good together before Resorts first opened its casino doors. In the sixties and early seventies, we romped gloriously and then you ruined things and went for the shinier strangers who came to town in 1978. 

Before becoming a gambling town, you truly were a resort town, albeit in a cityfied way.  My adolescent vacation memories are marked on your wide beaches, 4-mile-long boardwalk, Million Dollar Pier, Steel Pier, old-time blue jitneys, Miss America parade, Ice Capades show, Funcade pinball house, and watching taffy being made and wrapped at James' window. 


LBJ & family on the Convention Hall
balcony in Atlantic City, 1968

In August 1964, you hosted the Democratic National Convention.  I vividly remember standing outside the boardwalk Convention Hall with my grandmother, gazing up at the pillared balcony to see Lyndon Johnson and Hubert Humphrey wave to us below. 

My grandmother's excitement spilled onto my eight-year-old sensibilities, making me very aware of the moment's importance.

Jackie Kennedy stayed at the Deauville Hotel on your boardwalk during the convention. For years after, as we strolled past its Miami-esque front with a pool and cabana, my little girl brain fantasized about "how close" I had come to see her.


My grandparents Elizabeth
& Vincent Labate in front
of their AC home (circa 1975)

 My brothers and I also raced back to Convention Hall for another glimpse of infamy when the Beatles rolled into town that same month.  Our precious view was of their black limousine as it rode to an underground entrance, but our excitement pounded as though we had front-row seats inside!

My grandparents owned a small row house in a neighborhood that replicated their Italian and South Philly roots.  As my dad would say walking down the street on a Sunday morning, "you can smell the gravy being made all the way down the block."  Our neighbor played Mario Lanza records each morning as he made breakfast, often singing along in full tenor voice.

There was a house on the block with a "La Cosa Nostra" sign by their front door.  Of course, it roughly translates into "Our House" but something tells me they were not singing Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young songs there. Families spilled out onto stoops to see the neighborhood's comings and goings - it was a constant reminder that la famiglia stretched beyond the front door.

Best of all, we lived on a beach block.  How little I understood the prized value in that geography until years later when I began spending my own money on beach house rentals with friends in Sea Isle City!  The real estate axiom - location, location, location - became all too clear to my wallet.



AC house, 2014

Oh, Atlantic City, when I visited you this year I ached to feel what I felt years ago, but too much has changed.  Our Texas Avenue house still stands alongside its two adjoining partners on little Chelsea Terrace.

The front porch where my grandfather and friends would meet and play cards is now gone. So is the abundant vegetable garden he lovingly tended which served us and softened its surroundings.  

Texas Ave. view from the boardwalk, 2014

Now, there's a girlie bar at the end of the street, painted hot pink with oversized images of exotic dancers plastered on the exterior walls.  My dear seaside city, you are 160 years old!  Is this your mid-life crisis? 
 
We've clearly gone our separate ways. I watch you from afar, limping along as you struggle with your not-so-new mistress. You are trying the Las Vegas model offering more family-friendly packages at your hotels, but you and I know you are chasing windmills. 

So, like a jilted lover, I sigh thinking of what could have been. I wish you well as you try to re-invent yourself in your odd, gloomy-glitz world. 

We'll always have Steel Pier.  Ciao.

My mom, me (2 years old) & my brother, Joe, on the AC beach

Easter on the AC boardwalk (circa 1966) with some Labate and
Mina family members.  I am the one rockin' the red Easter bonnet,
pink coat, and white gloves! In fact, my sister, mom, and aunt are
also wearing dress gloves - so precious.

Oh No! It's FOMO!

It seems like an dilemma tailor made for adolescence - that bumpy time when feeling included begins to really matter.

But, the truth is, this concern knows no age, gender, culture.  It is an equal opportunity ache.  It's FOMO: Fear of Missing Out.

You know, that hollow moment when you realize you are on the outside looking in.  Hearing about things you missed out on came via word of mouth before the digital age.  There was a certain sting but it was singular, infrequent.  Today, information is flowing so rapidly and fully toward us that things which would have been on the edges  of our world pop up like those tireless little critters in the carnival game Whack-A-Mole - quickly, unexpectedly.

Someone is dining at that new, hip restaurant? Someone is travelling fabulously? Someone is viewing a sunset, sunrise, their suntan?  Yep, FOMO rises up rapidly. 

FOMO's engine, fueled by the numbers, i.e. tweets, retweets, likes, rumbles along ceaselessly daring us to trend; to be on the up side of the seesaw, instead of the down. 

Rain Room - 2013

 I first heard the fear-based phrase when reading about an unusual art installation at New York's Museum of Modern Art last summer titled "Rain Room."  Described as an immersive environment, the exhibit was a room of falling water where visitors did not get wet.  Sensors detected where people were roaming and the rain paused just in those spots.

Weekend wait times in line lasted as long as nine hours (for non-members.) There were those who were singing in the rain with bragging rights, (seesaw up) vs. the detractors who noted it was just another fit of FOMO (seesaw down.)   "Rain Room" became a waiting room.  Yet, I sure wish I saw the exhibit!

Whether it is a teeny pang or full blown envy, FOMO tells us less about the doer and more about the receiver.  All envy exposes our insides. No one likes feeling their nose pressed up against the window, which is why I found "Rain Room's" intention to be precious. 

Technology limited the number of folks visiting the room at any one time.  But, the creators also strictly enforced a 'no time limit' on those inside the room.  Once you were in, you could stay as long as you liked.  This made for those insane wait times. 

Hannes Koch and Florian Ortkrass, members of the London based rAndom International studio (creators of the exhibit) addressed the wait time dilemma with aplomb. In a NYTimes article, Mr. Koch noted the “meditative” aspect of the piece," and "firmly opposed a mandatory time limit; and in the end, MoMA did not make any official changes."
       

“The queue should be part of the work; it should be a social experience,” Mr. Koch added.  My snarky side says, "tell that to the guy in line at the end of hour nine." 

Social media breeds social anxiety when FOMO awakens. How can we tame this rascally itch?  Laying off social media probably helps, though that is more avoidance than real work. The idiom "Live And Let Live" (LALL?) comes to mind.  It's not sexy but it has endured for a reason and it scrapes off the little green eyed barnacles fixed to our psyches. I say the opposite of FOMO is LALL.  

Yes, that feels a little better.

Link to 2013 NYTimes article re: Rain Room: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/18/arts/steamy-wait-before-a-walk-in-a-museums-rain.html

Robin Williams

Robin Williams' jarring death has become a shared experience.  His audience has loved him in life and now aches over his departure.

Over 1,000 comments sit aside the NYTimes article announcing his passing, like pallbearers trying to hold him up; trying to switch roles and keep the comedian in a suspended state of love.  He was the morphing face behind the comedy/tragedy mask. 

After my first glimpse of him as an alien introduced on the TV show Happy Days, I was hooked.  Quick, hilarious, facile with language - he was truly from another planet where time vaporized against his wit.

I saw him perform in October, 2009 at Upper Darby's Tower Theatre.  Here is what I recall:  laughing so hard my cheeks ached as did my stomach.  I cannot remember one joke he delivered, but know each was fired machine gun style for 90 minutes.  No intermission.  I wish there had been one so the comedy snippets could settle in somewhere in my overloaded brain instead of skimming off. There was no rest for him or the audience.   He had returned from heart surgery like a rocket.

His tour was titled the "Weapons of Self-Destruction." 

My favorite Robin Williams bit is during his appearance on Inside the Actors Studio when he asks to use an audience member's "little shawl" and proceeds to give four minutes and thirty seconds of manic improv, with shawl in hand, as a Bollywood director, an Irani woman, a rabbi, a contestant on Iron Chef,  a matador, a police officer making an Amish house arrest, and as a car wash soap brush   Here is the YouTube link - the shawl portion begins at the 5:00 mark.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGhfxKUH80M

He made sure comedy did its job in grabbing the laugh and then dropping it for the next laugh.  Old material had no space in his world.  Yet, old demons set up shop and apparently dug in within his life.  Who lifts up those who lift us up?  Jimmy Kimmel's tweet touches this:  "Robin was as sweet a man as he was funny. If you're sad, please tell someone." 

We play roles in our lives.  We typecast ourselves.  But when we get boxed in, do we have a safe exit strategy? I bet each one of us mourning Robin's death would gladly reach for his hand to keep him with us.  Ultimately, though, I believe the first hand to reach out must be our own.

I love to laugh and am sad to feel the end of Robin's humor.  He made sure we craved more.  Thanks, Robin, for your generous gift. 
 
Link to "Weapons of Self Destruction" performance in Washington DC - full concert:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiCxqbT2Ru8

On The Radio ~ Whoa~ohhhhh~oh~

We said it really loud, we said it on the air, on the radio....

 

The only thing this post has in common with Donna Summer is that the topic takes place in the summer ...on the radio.  I just could not resist her lyrics because my book club has gone audio!

We've been chosen to discuss Karen Russell's latest effort, "Sleep Donation," on WNYC's radio program The Takeaway. The discussion airs noon, Wednesday, July 9 on your local NPR station.  In Philly, it is WHYY 90.9 FM.

Through some website scrutiny and quick action (not to mention salesmanship, Joanie!) by a couple of book club members, show producers chose our group as the second this season to chat with host John Hockenberry about one of their summer picks.

L to R:  Me, Lou, Joanie

Sadly, logistics  allowed for only three of the nine  members to tape the segment, so tough choices (members voting by 'secret ballot') were made and Joanie Badyna, Lou Elder and I recently headed to WHYY studios in Philadelphia to tape the session.   

Electric may best describe our energy level as our trio drove to the radio station; it was powered by robust virtual support from fellow bookworms: Karen Albaugh, Lynne Dore, Leslie Dudt, Karen Fleming, Laura Smith, and Nicole Valentine.    

Our book club, informally called by some (as in me)  Book Babes, has been 'on the books' for 17 years! We have over 190 novels checked off in the Read and Discussed column.  Classics, current fiction and non-fiction, young adult fiction, poetry, song lyrics, and even children's books are represented among our diverse picks.  Whether or not a book resonates becomes secondary once we dig into themes, characters, and relatability.  The discussion trumps taste each month. 


At WHYY studios, Philadelphia, PA

Once the radio taping date was secured, the Babes met a few days earlier to talk about the novella for June.  As usual, everyone came armed for discussion.

Questions about why we grieve and how  it can deny its own purpose, the consequences of lying for a common good, the power of  blind devotion, and the blurred lines of technology overuse peppered the conversation as we wrestled with the author's ability to prick at our fears.

"Sleep Donation" introduces a world where unexplained, deadly insomnia spreads rapidly. Citizens who can sleep are urged to offer up the treasured commodity to help the sleepless.

The non-profit Sleep Corps hungrily recruits sleep donors. Its most effective recruiter, Trish Edgewater, uses the awful story of her sister Dori's death as the tool to gain precious donations. Her potent tale brings in a sole universal donor - the holy grail in the fight against the epidemic.  This pure provider is a powerless six month old baby.

Issues with grief, technology, parenting, non-profit entities, trust, greed, and human connection swirl around this believable world. 

Russell's brief tale echoes the early paranoia that surrounded the start of the AIDS epidemic as fear and misinformation rattled lives. Sleep (just like blood) is a universal need now tainted, and the author describes Trish's sorrow in sanguine terms as a "grief hemophiliac."

While a specific cause for the epidemic is never noted, possible reasons include the abuse of sleep aids, a 24/7 news cycle, and "glowing device" overuse. Ironically, the fiction is only available as an e-book, so the author simultaneously warns us and baits us as we turn on our luminous devices to read.

Show producers conducted phone pre-interviews with each of us.  They were interested in the book's impact and themes that triggered something within us.  And they encouraged us to be lively (ha! no trouble there) and conversational, commenting on each other's remarks (again, no issue there!)  

Taping the segment at WHYY was an utterly satisfying experience from start to finish. 
 (Once our head phones were on, Lou and Joanie worked out some nervous energy before taping began and broke into song.  Microphones are powerful teases.)   From his perch in New York City, John Hockenberry seamlessly posed questions and invited our impressions about the book for 30 minutes.  Half of that time will be used for the July 16th airing.  I hope you'll be listening!

To steal the sign-off from CBS Sunday Morning's Charles Osgood, we'll "see you on the radio."  Oh, and sleep tight!

Here is the link to our book club discussion on The Takeaway:  http://www.thetakeaway.org/story/takeaway-book-club-sleep-donation/

Here's the link to WNYC's The Takeway book club page: http://www.thetakeaway.org/bookclub/  Check out all the books for summer reading!   

Like A Girl

 

Ten things that surfaced after watching this video recently released by Procter & Gamble.(The P&G survey found that out of 1,300 American females ages 16 to 24 years old, only 19 percent have a positive association toward the phrase, "like a girl.") 

 

1. I have used the phrase "I throw like a girl" to criticize my inept arm when I played intramural sports in high school and college.  I sadly saw my poor softball throw and volleyball serve as irreversible, and, apparently, my gender as the reason. 

 

2. I recently used that phrase when talking with college friends about my athleticism and I wasn't bragging. 

 

3. How thoughtless of me - right?  Wrong.  I used the gender crushing phrase with full thought to give myself a poor grade. It hurts to write that.  It's not the phrase that's bad; it's the negative intent. 

 

4. My husband recalled a female executive he worked for around 20 years ago whose harsh management 'skills' relied on figuratively stating (with hand gestures) her personal mantra, "I will squeeze balls until I get that person to do what I want."   Apparently, her female power needed male parts for fuel. 

 

5. What do you think when you hear/say someone is "a pussy?"  That they are a kitten?  Hardly.  Female parts, regardless which raw descriptor chosen, are again used to mean weakness.  As my friend Nicole, who posted the P&G video on her FB page, stated, "I've never understood it. There is nothing about a woman's anatomy that says weakness to me."

6. "Girly Man." Again, a put down made famous in an Saturday Night Live skit with buffoon body building characters Hans (Dana Carvey) and Franz (Kevin Nealon) describing a man's physique before their training: "That's right, and we have proof!  We've taken the world's most pathetic girly-man, and turned him into the embodiment of perfect pumptitude!" ('Pumptitude' cracks me up)

7. The door swings both ways.  I once heard a dad say to his pre-school son who was sobbing after being dropped off for his first library story time, "Stop crying - boys don't cry!"  Maybe if boys could cry without criticism (especially from males) they could relax about expressing sadness.  Tear ducts are universal.  So is their use.

8. In the video, ten year old Dakota's response to being asked to "run like a girl" captures
her intact self-esteem.  Offering an older female a second chance to "run like a girl" makes me tear up in gratitude because it reminds me we all have second chances. 

9. I wonder what messages my two daughters have internalized when they hear the "like a girl" phrase and it makes me consider what role I've played in sending them. 

10. The Hawaiian word "imua" (E-moo-ah) means "forward."  Today and beyond, I use imua energy, like a girl.

Link to P&G's 'Social Awareness' experiment and the methodology used:  http://news.pg.com/press-release/pg-corporate-announcements/new-social-experiment-always-reveals-harmful-impact-commonl

Link to the SNL skit transcript:  http://snltranscripts.jt.org/88/88thansfranz.phtml