On the team

My son is trying out for the school basketball team. He's in the 8th grade, has played basketball for 7 years, off an on, for different leagues. He is nearly 6 feet tall, skinny as a rail, and the kid can play. I know, I'm his mother, but I really wouldn't encourage him as much as I do unless I knew he had skills.

So he made the first round of cuts. And as I waited in the school parking lot for him to come out of the gym, my stomach did flips and I found myself chewing on my nails. But he made it through. One more round of cuts to go.

I think I'm driving him nuts with the "It's okay if you don't make it, honey. We are so proud of you for getting this far," and the "Just try out as though you're already on the team. Be confident," and the "Don't let anything stop you. Just do your best. Don't give up..."

Okay, I KNOW I'm driving him nuts because he did the "Yah, Yah, Mom, I know. You told me a hundred times already."

When I hear myself encourage him to "go for it" and "never give up," I feel a certain sense of hypocricy. DO I believe in him. Oh, absolutely. But I wonder if I "walk the walk," with my own life dreams and passions.

As a writer, I talk the talk. I share tips with other writers, words of encouragement, and I write. But do I believe completely in my own skills? Not always. Not enough.

Where my son sees his competition -- the kid that can dribble like a pro -- and automatically starts to doubt his own abilities as a player, I read an article published by a fellow writer and automatically compare my own writing to theirs -- and in those moments, I don't feel quite good enough to be part of their team.

So the final cuts may be announced today, and if he doesn't make the team, I will be right there encouraging him to keep practicing, try again next year, never give up. And maybe those words will inspire my inner voice (the nasty wench that she is) to be a little easier on me.

Presbyopia? Who knew?

My husband told me when I turned 40 my eyesight would start to fail. I scoffed at his callous remark, reminding him that I've passed every eye exam over the past 20 years with flying colors. 20/20 baby. Nothing more, nothing less. I had perfect vision.

Hyperopia, or farsightedness, occurs when the light rays that enter the eye do not focus directly on the retina, but in fact, they focus behind it. This is caused when the eyeball is shorter than it should be. People can be affected by hyperopia at any age.

Presbyopia, on the other hand, also causes one to have difficulty reading close up, but it is age-related, and affects people over 40. It is caused by the hardening of the lens inside the eye. The result is the same as hyperopia: poor near vision.

Hyperopia is not inevitable, and it can be treated surgically. Presbyopia is inevitable.

My 40th birthday came and went. 41. 42. Eye exam: perfecto. My husband's theory was obviously inaccurate. I had super-woman eyesight. I am an anomaly. I was convinced that my youthful eyesight -- my 20/20 vision -- would not let me down.

My 43rd birthday. Nothing. Even in the dimmest of lamplights, my ability to read a book before turning in for the night didn't suffer. No spectacles required.

Then, as sudden as heart attack, my eyes betrayed me. It's not even as though there was any warning. I replaced the bulbs in my nightside lamp, bought myself some heavy-duty eyedrops to take care of the obvious strain that was causing my blurred vision, but the hazy pages appeared to me every time I opened a book. And over the course of just a few months, I was shopping for reading glasses. Yes. Me. Reading glasses.

With a knowing smile, my husband helped me select a cute frame and -- because he's so much nicer than I am -- refrained from sharing the "I told you so" that I know was hanging out on the tip of his tongue during the months he watched me deny my fate.

The bright side? I still have my own teeth? Hey, it's something...

Girls just wanna have fun

Last night I visited two spooky houses. In my entire life I don't recall ever going to a haunted house. I'm a scaredy-cat. I don't watch scary movies and I still have a hard time sleeping in the house alone. My vivid imagination is what does me in. In the dark and quiet house, I hear the sounds of intruders creeping up the stairs and groans from the furnace in the winter keep me up at night wondering when the family of demons will appear in my bedroom doorway. And I never turn my back to the doorway.

But, there I was, feeling my way through the darkness as bloody people with long fangs and bad breath crept up behind me and whispered in my ear.

I was not alone in the darkness. We were a convoy of women. Six of us. We held hands, grabbed onto each other's coats, and made our way through the gore and dripping blood (ok, water) like teenagers. Screeching and giggling at every turn.

It was my first time meeting most of the women, who graciously invited me to tag along on their annual excursion and I had a blast. It was funny and scary and I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard.

As women we wear so many hats - wife, mother, daughter, sister career woman, house cleaner, baker, grocery shoppe-- but no matter where we are in our lives, or how well we even know each other, women connect. Maybe it's because we all want the same thing: to be loved and to be happy. And along the way -- between car pools and staff meetings -- we just want to have some fun.

Going Home

Just about a month ago, I went home. It had been several years since I visited my hometown of London, Ontario, Canada. More than 10 years ago, with four kids in tow, ranging in age from 2 to 13, we left family and friends behind and headed south. We've lived in the suburbs of Atlanta ever since.

During the past decade we've had plenty of visits from family. Escaping the cold winters of Canada, my mother-in-law enjoyed spending Christmas here with us. My sister has declared Thanksgiving the perfect time to visit Atlanta, as long as she can sneak away from the rigors of her own busy life to come and stay. My mom enjoys Atlanta in the spring. After a long winter, she loves to come and plant my gardens and go for walks through the neighborhood. Everyone comes to me, and I love sharing my life here in the U.S. with them.

I thought I was pretty "caught up" on my family time this year as everyone, except my dad, was here to see my oldest son get married.

Just about a month ago, my mother-in-law passed away suddenly. Before we knew it, we were on our way home.

The lyrics to a well-know Bon Jovi song say:

"Who says you can't go home?
There's only one place that call me one of
their own

Every step I take, I know that I'm not alone
You take the home from the
boy but not the boy from his home
These are my streets, the only life I've
ever known
Who says you can't go home?"

Breakfast with my dad. Sitting outside my mom's new home, watching the world go by. Going dress shopping with my sister, Michelle. Dining out with family at my favorite chicken place, Swiss Chalet. Going to Tim Hortons for the best coffee in the universe.

Just walking through the familiar streets of downtown London, visiting the Garden Market, strolling through the parks, I was overcome with the feeling of home. A feeling that all was right in that moment.

Familarity is a funny thing. I left home all those years ago in search of something new and exciting. And my life is good. But when I was home, surrounded by the sights and sounds of my past, I felt like me. And, like the song says, there is this feeling that you are not alone. That you are in a place where they call you their own. No matter how long you've been gone.

The people who knew me when, they embraced me just as though I had never left. Without hesitation we fell into the familiar rhythm. And the streets. They are mine. They may be a little run down now (aren't we all?), but they hold the memories of my youth. They provided me the path to something new, but always welcome me home.

What I don't know for sure

I've decided that instead of writing what I know -- which is what we are told we must do -- I should write about what I don't know.

I'm almost certain that what I don't know is far more intriguing than what I do know. For instance, I know that you can fit four kids, one Christmas tree, and a week's worth of groceries into a Ford Taurus station wagon. I know that Spanx were invented by angels. I know that it takes longer to dry my hair than it does to dry a load of towels. I know that you can't shake a steaming thermos of hot chocolate with the cap screwed on tight. I know quite a lot of stuff.

But I don't know how to belly dance or what it's like to be a professional singer. I don't know what it feels like to walk a marathon or build a house (though I'm sure I could do that, with a little more time in at the gym.) I've never climbed a mountain or saved anyone from a burning building. I don't how to rob a bank or what it was like to live on a farm. What would it be like to live my days on the sea or drive a big rig across the countryside? I don't know!

So why, when given the opportunity to create something from nothing, would I write what I know? You know?

Coming up for air

Like most people, I've been through some changes at my job in the past year. Between the hundreds of layoffs and multiple company re-orgs over the past 11 months, employee morale is in the toilet. Everyone is struggling to stay motivated, with the rumor mill churning out weekly reports of gloom and doom yet to come.

Although I escaped the company cuts (so far), I did fall victim to the effects of the negativity and uncertainty that still permeates the air. It's very easy to get caught up in all of it. The worry about losing your job. Seeing good people walked out of the building, knowing that they have small kids to feed and elderly parents to care for at a time when jobs are scarce. Thankful that it wasn't me.

And I started taking it home with me, which is something I promised I wouldn't do. I filled our home with the negativity of it all. And seemed to matter, seemed so important to gripe and wallow in all of it, until just a few weeks ago when I turned on my cell phone to read "EMERGENCY" - a text from my 23-year old daughter.

My husband and I had just arrived in Michigan, far from our home in the suburbs of Atlanta, when I read the message. When I called her back, I could barely hear her over the pounding rain. She was crying hysterically, but what I heard was, "I lost my car. A wave of water hit my car. I was in it. I thought I was going to die."

When we left that morning, parts of the city and surrounding areas had flooded, but we thought it was over. By evening, when my daughter was driving home from work, the swell of the rivers and the overflow of water due to clogged-up sewers, caused the road she was traveling on to suddenly be overtaken by a wave of water. I still don't know where it came from but within seconds the water was high enough to flood her engine. The door wouldn't open and the windows wouldn't open.

Hearing all the details, after our return, terrified me. Thinking of my child trapped in a car, with water rising, feeling helpless, feeling as though she was going to drown, was too much. Watching her as she told the story, I could see she was reliving it. I could see how scared she must have been.

To make a long story short, she managed to get out. The ignition turned once, enough for her to get the window down and get out. I don't even know how to explain how scared I was, and still am when I think about it, at the idea of her trapped in that car. In the moment that she recounted the horrific events of that evening, I held my breath. The thought of losing her too much to bear.

It's easy to tell that there is a lesson for me in this. My focus has been on the wrong things. I've snapped at those who love me because I had a bad day at work. I know it all sounds very corny and cliche, but you really do have to live in the moment because just when you think that you have it all figured out, that you're coasting along, things change. It's the only thing that's constant. That, and breathing. I'm going to start appreciating both just a little more.

If the pants fit

You're only as old as you feel.

Getting older is better than the alternative.

With age comes wisdom.

I've read all those age quotes, and have even come across books where the author raves about how great it is to be old. How wonderful it is to be so wise and confident and calm; to be at the point in her life where you don't care what people think and understand fully what life is all about...yada, yada, yada.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for growing old gracefully, and all that. And I do think that the alternative sucks, but am I embracing my age? Loving all the changes that have taken place in and around my body in recent years? Don't think I'm quite there yet.

It's the maintenance. The time and money spent on maintenance, specifically. That's where I'm having some trouble. In my 20s, I never wore makeup. Night cream? Who needed it? I didn't die my hair, or even get it cut more than a few times a year. I could buy clothes just about anywhere, off the rack, without even trying them on. And I didn't need monthly massages to remove the kinks in my neck and stiffness in my lower back. I could eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. Didn't have to spend hours at the grocery store analyzing the percentage of fiber or calories in the can of pasta sauce I was buying.

A dear friend of mine, after cleaning out her closet, was in need of several new pairs of pants. Pants shopping, for me, is right up there with bra shopping, as I have yet to find a pair that fits where it needs to fit (now that I'm older). So, my friend, who is a beautiful woman in her 50s with the most positive attitude toward life that one can imagine, is loaded down with 17 pairs of pants in the dressing room at JC Penney. After trying most of them on, without any luck -- too tight here, too short through here -- a sales clerk comes by to see how she's doing.

"Having any luck," says the saleswoman.

My friend, "You would think so, seeing as I have 20 pairs here. But, no."

The woman leans a little closer. "Honey, I know. When you get to be our age, it's tough, isn't it?"

My friend glances at the "older" woman, thinking. Our age? Bitch, I dont' think so.

"You know where you oughta look? Over there in that back corner, there's an entire rack of pants that I think will work for you. Comfy, comfy, too."

My friend graciously thanks the woman, wondering how she could have missed an entire rack of pants. As she approaches the back wall, she sees why.

Pull-on pants? Seriously? That woman thought I needed pull on pants?

My friend flips through the rack. They look comfortable, for sure, she thinks. She pulls out a couple pairs -- one black, one navy. She figures she may as well give them a try.

To her surprise, the pants fit perfectly AND the way that they were designed, no one would ever know that she had graduated to pull-on pants.

She showed me them at lunch, smiling as though she had this huge secret. Now, my friend is the epitome of the beautiful southern woman. Class, all the way. And if SHE can wear pull-on pants, and be proud of it, I guess I can get used to some of the inconveniences of growing older.

On a bright note, she did send me a quick note this morning, further convincing me that there truly are SOME benefits to growing old.

"By the way, these Easy Care Pull On Pants are great timesavers when you have to pee!"

Growing old is mandatory; growing up is optional.