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When the house is full of noise, and the kids are asking "Why" and "What" and "Who", and the dishes need washing, escaping to a favorite memory would be like a trip to a tropical island paradise. Favorite memory is today's challenge in the 30 Day Non-Facebook Prose-Instead-of-Pictures Challenge. In an effort to keep you up to date, here are the last three challenges.
3.A picture of the cast from your favorite show - Check
4.A picture of your favorite night - Check
5.A picture of your favorite memory - Today
So come escape with me. Imagine being on the island of Puerto Rico. The turquoise Caribbean Sea rolling onto the white sand. The warm sun (even in November) caressing your skin. The shadows of the palm leaves dancing across the pages of your book as the breeze gently moves them. And huge iguanas scurrying underneath your hammock. Nobody on the beach but me.
It was my first sabbatical after becoming a full-time mother. Time away just for me. Alone. No kids, no husband, no dishes to wash, clothes to iron, carpool to drive. Just me and my book and the beach.
Typing this tonight, Finola was reading over my shoulder about today's topic.
"Mom, do any of your favorite memories involve us?" she looked up at me from the floor where she lay petting Thing 1.
My mind raced through all three of their births and how happy I was. I paused and heard the other two and Mr. Gaelic arguing about who ate the ice cream. The brand new container that was full last night but was now half eaten. Out of the container itself!
I looked lovingly into Finola's eyes and assured her, "Not right now."
She rolled her eyes at me.
*Title taken from this.
Boobs or hip bones? What's more attractive? C'mon, fellas. Inquiring minds want to know what y'all think. It started over the weekend with pictures of two celebs on two beaches. LeAnn Rimes in Mexico and Christina Hendricks in Italy.
LeAnn tweeted a photo of herself in a string bikini. The paparazzi caught Christina stepping out of her cover-up. Those two pictures ignited the body wars again. "She looks anorexic." "That's obese." Women can't win. Either we're too thin or too fat.
It's been reported that Christina is 5'8", approximately 154 pounds, and a size 14. When you remember that the average woman's dress size in the 1950s was an 8, you also have to remember that in the 1950s, the average woman was 5'3", 120 pounds, with a waist size of 24" to 25". Today, the average American woman is 5'4", 150 pounds, with a waist size of 34" to 35". And her dress size? 12.
Don't forget that the U.S. Department of Commerce abolished the uniform sizing system for women's clothes in 1983. A size 8 in the 1950s is a size 4 or less today. A size 12 today would be a size 16 or larger in the 1950s. For anyone who sews, we know our "true" size because the sizes on patterns didn't change to fit our vanity as our waists expanded.
My mother was plump from her early 40s onward. At her largest, back in the 1970s, she was a 16. Granted she was only 5'2". Having inherited some of her nicer vintage dresses, it's surprising that they fit me. Me? A size 16? Okay, so I'm 5'10" and don't look as plump as my mother did.
Shockingly, my secret is that my dress size is the American average. Yep, just one dress size smaller than Ms. Hendricks. Hurray for us hourglass-figured women! Other than our figures, Ms. Hendricks and I share the same hair color. But I was born this way! [WARNING! Do NOT click the last link if you are offended by over-the-top music videos. If so, click HERE instead.]
There are more than three senses. Yet there are only three sensory blogs on my list of non-Bucket-List lists. Sight, sound, and smell have been covered already. Time now for the all-important taste factor. No, this will not be a Fear Factor-type list of tastes. Just things to taste before I die.
- The best cup of coffee. Check. Already done. At a breakfast shack in Destin, FL, on the last day of a girls' weekend.
- Champagne at my daughters' weddings.
- Perfectly sautéed soft-shell crabs. Check. That was the main course at a dinner party at chez Gaelic.
- Blood pudding in Scotland. Haggis can be quite good if made by someone who knows how. Unfortunately, on our holiday in Scotland, our innkeepers didn't serve blood pudding.
- The fruits of my gardening labor. Last year's garden produced: beets, carrots, onions, leeks, spinach, tomatoes, peppers, pumpkins, corn, strawberries, and figs. For this year, add to that okra, eggplant, watermelon, raspberries, potatoes, garlic, zucchini, and three types of winter squash.
- Acacia honey with bread at an inn on Lake Como.
- Sauteed fiddlehead ferns.
- Blinis and caviar after touring the Hermitage.
- The perfect crème brûlée. It's all in how the sugar is burnt.
- S'mores dark chocolate pudding. Check. This was the dessert for a private Valentine's Day dinner at chez Gaelic.
Guessing at things to taste before I die is difficult. How does one know about all the different flavors in the world until one is exposed to them? My eyes, and mouth, will be open for new taste adventures. But no shots of horse semen.
In the past few months there have been a few things in the newspaper that have been interesting to me, not for what the article says but for the accompanying photos.
First there was the front-page article and photo of people celebrating the summer solstice at Stonehenge. Smiling, happy faces greeted the morning sun. I took one look at the picture and gasped in horror. My children looked at the picture but didn't see anything that could have bothered me so.
"Look at what they're wearing," I instructed.
"Jackets and scarves," they replied.
"This picture was taken yesterday. Stonehenge is in the south of England." They nodded. I continued, "We'll be there in two weeks and we'll be well north of Stonehenge."
Blank looks. Then the Aha! moment when they realized it would be much, much cooler in Scotland and England than it is here. Time to rethink the wardrobe choices.
A second photo in this Sunday's paper caught my eye. It accompanied a full-page ad from BP with Robert Dudley saying that he knows the beaches very well since he grew up in Mississippi. The photo showed a whole line of what looked like only men wearing blue jeans, tee-shirts, gloves, and wellies. They were filling plastic bags with debris while three foreman-looking people either looked on or were handing out more plastic bags.
In shock and skepticism I showed it to Mr. Gaelic. "Can you believe how racist this is?"
He looked closely. All the men at the water line were black; the three "overseers" were white.
"Is it racist or reality?" he asked. "Maybe it's the only job they can find and maybe nobody else wants the job. But also, contrast this to the other pictures we've seen of cleanup crews wearing full body jumpsuits and heavy-duty rubber gloves."
It wasn't until I went searching online for a copy of the photo from the ad to include in this blog that I discovered what I consider to be the truth behind the picture. I never found the picture online. What I did find were article from such widely read sources as The Root, AlterNet, and The Stranger all noting that, while coastal residents are out of work, BP is using prison work crews for cleanup. What BP gets by hiring prison crews is cheap labor, people who won't talk to the press, and a hefty tax write-off.
I jumped to conclusions about a photo without having all the information.
Sometimes a picture is worth more than a thousand words. Sometimes it's just the tip of the iceberg.
