Freedom’s Just Another Word For Work

By: Ann Brown

There’s something that’s been bugging me since Passover. It’s the whole liberation thing. Don’t tell anyone, but…..I am just not all that into liberation.

You know what liberation brings? Responsibility.

So, um, yeah. No thanks.

As a slave in Egypt, what would I worry about? Nothing, that’s what. Room and board: check. Permanent employment: check. Year-long suntan: check. Slaves have all the damn luck. No bills to be paid, no writing deadlines, no having to choose colors for a bathroom remodel, no hours wasted perusing the Internet for vacation houses on Whidbey Island, no asparagus to return to Trader Joe’s because it had a super funky smell, no afternoons at the Toyota dealership reading magazines and eating their free popcorn while they detail my car, and no feeling bloated after a huge meal of eggplant parmigiana.

Yeah, slavery. Man, that would be the life. Sun, job security, a dip in the river. Okay, I will just say it: Why did we leave Egypt?

Was there a vote? Because I think I would have to have cast mine with the Hell No, We Won’t Go To The Promised Land movement. The drones, the slackers, the lovers of routine – these are my people.

But nooooo, we ALL had to be free, and now look at us. Liberated. Stressed. Looking for work. Texting while we drive. Throwing our underpants into the washing machine and not noticing that the used maxi pad is still stuck to it.

That would not have happened to me in Egypt.

Someday, my Pharoah will come.

I hoped Robin would be one of those misogynistic, old school chauvinist pigs who didn’t want their women to work or worry their pretty little heads about anything. I mean, he was all muscly and macho when I met him, and he dressed like Billy Jack. You hook up with a guy who wears a big black Stetson and carries a sword – you make some assumptions, you know?

Turned out, however, that macho, sword-wielding Robin was all about equality and feelings and scented candles and shit. When I told him that I wanted stay home and be a housewife, he laughed so hard one of his fillings popped out. Then we had our first major fight. That was 32 years ago. I’ll let you know when it’s over. He thinks he won because I have a job but joke on him – I go to work for, like, seven minutes a day and then I come home and I just sit up here reading Us Weekly and watching Mob Wives, and every week or so I pump out a blog post and call it a day. So maybe I did okay in the end.

Still, I would totally rock an Egyptian tan.

A Mother’s Day Story About Hemorrhoids

By: Ann Brown

The thing about being pregnant for the first time is that as far as you know, it’s all about labor. The fact that an actual baby arrives at the end of it, and then you have to raise it forever, well, that part is just so unimaginable that it doesn’t exist.

Labor. Contractions. Breathing. Hee hee hoo. Hoo hoo hee. Find your focus spot. Yeah, yeah, whatev. I figured I’d get through it or die trying and either way, it was all all cool. Plus, for fuck’s sake, the Queen Mum had babies and she seems way detached from her lady parts so if she could do it, I could do it.

So, yeah. Contractions. I didn’t obsess too much over them when I was pregnant. For me, it was all about the pushing part of the deal.

Because of, well, you know. Hemorrhoids.

In my family, the word “hemorrhoids” is spoken in the same hushed tones as the words, “Holocaust” or “pork”. Hemmorhoids are feared and revered –the ultimate proof that Our People Suffer. And they are the Purple Heart of pregnancy, for sure. How much do you love your baby? Enough to have a prehensile tail of blood vessels hanging out of your ass for the rest of your life, that’s how much. Now give Mommy a big kiss and go to grad school.

Years before I got pregnant, years before I got my period, I knew that pregnancy brings hemorrhoids. I might not even have been sure at that point that pregnancy brings a baby, but through generations of ancestral knowledge I knew not to push.

My mom said, “It’s a conundrum. They tell you to push the baby out, and you want to, but you have to think about hemorrhoids and be careful.”

Sophie’s choice.

As my due date drew near and the baby’s room was readied and the birth plan was written (my first piece of fiction, come to think of it), I practiced my fakeout pushing. Never mind that no woman in the history of EVER has been able to fake push out a baby; no woman ever had the fear of hemorrhoids put in her like I did.

Remind me next time you see me to show you my fake, hemorrhoid fooling, ooh ooh I’m pushing the baby out face. All scrunched from the neck up; below the waist I am as loose as a bowl of overcooked linguine. Luckily my years of faking orgasms gave me a strong foundation in this ruse.

So, the big day arrives. I am in the labor room. It’s time to push. I know what to do.

But there’s an unforeseen problem. No one told me that it’s not that you HAVE to push, like someone is forcing you; it’s that you MUST push, like your body won’t take no for an answer. If you have never had a baby, the only thing I can tell you it’s like is when you get a dozen fresh bagels from the bakery and you have to climb into the back seat (where you put them, you know, to discourage eating them before you get home) during a red light and tear open the bag. And eat them all.

Which, coincidentally, was what I had eaten that morning before I realized I was in labor.

And so when I gave in to my primal urge that afternoon and pushed, pushed hard while Robin held my hand and gave me encouraging words that, frankly, aggravated the fuck out of me (“I couldn’t care less if you love me right now. Just get this baby out of me or go home and clean the house”), I knew that nothing – not even the dreaded hemorrhoids – could keep me from helping my baby be born. So I pushed with everything I had. I pushed so hard that all it took was, like, three good pushes and it was out.

“Boy or girl?” I asked Robin. Before he could answer me, I added, “and you know what? Pushing is not that hard. I don’t know what everyone complains about. I guess I am even more awesome than I realized.”

Robin looked at me with that kinda bemused, kinda disgusted at me face, the face he makes when I say shit like, “I actually look thinner when I gain weight because of, you know, the way my clothes fit me.” Only this look was less bemused and more disgusted.

“Well? Boy or girl? What is it? And why isn’t it crying?” Uh-oh.

“Well,” Robin said, “Because it’s a poop.”

What?

“You pooped. When you pushed so hard just now, you pooped. That’s what’s on the delivery table. A POOP.”

Really? Hunh.

“You still have to push the baby out.”

Really? Hunh.

So I did. And it was fine. No big whoop. And no you-know-whats.

The gift that does NOT keep on giving. Best Mother’s Day gift a child could ever give a mother.

Another Day for Mom

By: Tanya Ward Goodman

I woke up on Mother’s Day to find a note on my pillow. It read “Have fun!” and told me to go to my son’s room to find the next clue. I followed directions and found another note that advised “the love is ithin you. Find the missing letter.” I headed to my daughter’s room for the final clue. As soon as I popped my head through the door, she sat up in bed and shouted, “Get out!” I backed away quickly, but not before I heard the sound of paper being shredded. The last clue was no more. Today, love was going to say “ithin.”

While my husband tried to stage manage this current drama, I went downstairs where my son was engrossed in Minecraft on the Xbox. I’m pretty sure he gave a grunt that could be construed as a Mother’s Day greeting.

I have to admit to feeling a bit let down, but this lasted about three seconds and then I thought about how I could take advantage of the hysteria upstairs and the screen-related zombification downstairs and actually enjoy my morning. I poured myself a cup of coffee and opened the newspaper. After nearly ten years, I think I might actually be getting the hang of this parenting thing.

In what was a nearly unprecedented bout of alone time, I got through the entire New York Times Magazine, the Style section and most of the Week in Review before everyone turned up in a slightly better mood. My daughter brought down a box of cards and letters and signs and drawings that she’d been working on for the better part of a month. On every page were hearts and flowers and sweet words. My son put down his controller long enough to give me a potted plant and a great, big hug and then he came down with a fever and went back to bed.

This year, Mother’s Day for me included a lot of mothering. I mothered my feverish son and my daughter who was angry and loving in turns. But I also went to a yoga class and returned to a wonderful brunch cooked by my loving husband. I looked after my family and felt them return the favor. The love was not “ithin,” it was all around.

Ten Places NOT to Visit Before You Die

By: Ann Brown

Who thought of that stupid Facebook thing, anyway? You know, that app where everyone lists all the places they’ve been and shares their bucket list and seizes the day and puts pins on the map and shit? What a load.

100 PLACES TO VISIT BEFORE YOU DIE. Fuck that shit. No one needs to go anywhere. Everything you need is here. Plus, when you stay at home, time passes slowly. Which is like you are living longer. And you are not part of the clusterfuck which is the Santa Monica Freeway. On which a person could die on their way to LAX to visit one of the 100 places. Has no one else thought this thing through?

Being an intellectually curious person, however, I decided to check out the list. Let’s take a look at the first 10:

1. Los Angeles –oh. Well, that one is okay. Because I’ve been there so there’s no further travel involved on my part. Also, they have El Pollo Loco in LA. Which, as far as I know, they do not have in actual Mexico.

2. Lake District –I don’t even know where or what that is. I have been to a few lakes, however. Not a fan. I don’t enjoy swimming in standing water that isn’t chlorinated. Or that houses life forms other than humans swimming by me. I’m barely okay with humans. Because you totally know they are peeing. Naturally occurring warm current, my ass.

3. Ngorongoro Crater — Wikipedia advertises it this way: “The main feature of the NCA is the Ngorongoro Crater, a large, unbroken, unflooded volcanic caldera –” Yawn. I don’t even want to finish reading about it. Also, the words “large, unbroken, unflooded volcanic caldera” sound, I don’t know, vaguely vaginal. Yuck.

4. Loch Ness — Another reason to avoid lakes. I do, however, enjoy the gutteral “ch” in the name because it’s like Yiddish. Which would make the monster Jewish. Which would ROCK. A treyf-eating, college-eschewing, rugby-playing, Navy Seal-joining, mother-estranging, hairless back-sporting, tattoo-ed spendthrift. Run for your lives! Hide your blond daughters!

5. Republic of Seychelles — I like that its name is also a command – “say SHELLS”. Every time someone says the name of the place, I could say, “Okay, SHELLS”. And I’d laugh merrily. I could probably stay there for two weeks on that joke alone. I would kill in the Republic of Seychelles.

Seychelles. Okay, SHELLS. Hah.

6. Ibiza –people wear bikinis there. Pass.

7. Patagonia — A few years ago I ordered moisture-wicking socks from the catalog. They refunded me TWICE. And they never realized it. What a bunch of boobs. Still, I better keep a low profile and stay away. Don’t want to wind up in some Patagonian prison getting funky moisture-laden crud on my feet.

8. Great Barrier Reef — Again, I suspect that bathing suits are required. Again, pass. As God is my witness, I am never holding my stomach in again. EVER. Unless I meet Theodore Bikel. Or I am interviewed on CONAN. To promote my novel. Which I have to finish writing. Which is why I cannot visit any of these places. I have real work to do.

9. Nine Hells — Of course I was drawn to this place. I Googled it but the only description of Nine Hells was about Baator, from Dungeons and Dragons. And frankly, I lived through one of my kid’s obsession with D & D; I really don’t ever need to hear one more thing about it. I imagine this Nine Hells place to be the back room of a huge comic book store where dorks in capes ridicule you with elvish insults. And you have to wear a bikini.

10. Ring of Fire Volcanoes — Oh for fuck’s sake, do the creators of this list even know what a vacation is? A destination called Ring of Fire Volcanoes does not sound relaxing to me. I bet they don’t even have a chlorinated pool there. Also, any place called Ring of Fire Volcanoes makes me worry about hemorrhoids.

I tell you what: I am going to get working on my own list. As soon as I get dressed, run to New Seasons Market and pick up a couple of cranberry panini rolls. They are to die for.

Adventure Everywhere

By: Tanya Ward Goodman

Today, wearing a hooded sweatshirt, old jeans, and a headlamp, I scaled a cement wall, shimmied under a heating duct, and crawled across rubble. Up until the very moment I did this thing, the thought of doing it made my heart beat a little faster, but once I was under my house, making my way toward the damp spot waaaaay under the far wall, I just felt calm.

Most of my really terrible dreams include some moment when I am trying to inch through a low, enclosed space. In the really scary ones, I usually have to squirm through a tunnel, crawl under a fence, and squeeze through some kind of dark pipe to get where I need to be. In the dream, just beyond the tunnel, my kids are in trouble or my husband is in trouble and I am desperately needed. I hate these dreams. I hate feeling so scared and powerless.

The first time I told my husband I was going under the house to check on the musty smell, he sighed. He thought he should probably do it. A couple of days later, I said it again. I wasn’t trying to be passive aggressive. I was ready to do it. I think I had to psych myself up a bit, though. My husband sighed again.

“It needs to get done,” I said. I was channeling the women of my youth, the kind of moms who could bake a loaf of bread, grow a garden of greens, build an addition on the house, and kill a rattlesnake without batting an eye. In Los Angeles, there is no snow to shovel, no wood to chop and feed to the iron stove and some days I feel antsy.

Under the house, I noticed everything and nothing. I noticed the crinkle-crunch of the silver wrapped heating duct, the cracked clay earth deprived of sunlight for nearly eighty years. I noticed a little green rubber figure of Gumby lying forlorn in the dust. There was rat poop and a clump of greyish fur that might have rubbed off a raccoon. I crawled toward the damp spot on the far wall. I held that spot in the glow of my flashlight and shut out all the dark corners around me. Sure enough the wood was damp to my touch, the pipe calcified from a steady seep of water.

“Yep,” I shouted over my shoulder to my husband. “There’s a leak, all right.”

I backed out, away from the wall and guided by my husband’s voice I ducked my head, carefully squeaked under a pipe and reached my toes down the wall toward the safety of the ladder.

“I wasn’t scared under there,” I said. “Normally, I might have had a panic attack. But I didn’t.”

“Well, I’m glad I didn’t stand in the way of your personal growth,” my husband said.

As I travel through my forties, my path seems to bend toward the uncomfortable, the unfamiliar, and the adventurous. I feel more willing to take on the unknown. Crawling under my house wasn’t quite as thrilling as learning to ski or taking a big horse for a fast spin around an arena, but it wasn’t bad for a slow day.

Of course, now I need to call the plumber.

Friends Are Good

By: Danny Thomas

Last night
I watched
my daughter
fall asleep
while my dad
read her a book
that I remember him reading to me.
does it get much sweeter than that?

also, when I came downstairs this morning
the kitchen was clean
because my mother and I
had done the dishes together
last night
does it get much sweeter than that?

also, Saturday afternoon
we spontaneously had a terrific
gathering in our backyard.
A couple other families
some other friends and colleagues
spent the entire afternoon
hanging out in the backyard
playing with kids,
having good grown up conversations
and drinking good grown up drinks.
I ask you,
what could be sweeter than that?

It portends a fantastic summer.

I am looking forward to lots of
fun summer afternoons
sitting in the yard
drinking a big ginger
or a beer
laughing and enjoying the company
of other families
our dear old friends
and delightful new ones.

I am going to make this a priority for our family.
Social time, it is key to my mental health.
It does us all a world of good
and it’s a pretty simple way to feel good in the world.

Born (58 years ago) To Be Aggravated

By: Ann Brown

 

 

My birthday is almost over. Only thirteen more hours. Thank God.

I have a shitload of things I want to do today and they don’t seem, I don’t know, birthdayish kinds of things, so I have to wait until tomorrow. Which, frankly, flies in the face of everyone’s wishes to me to have a great day today. Because a great day is not, at least not for me, a day when I have to hold off on writing a To Do list for Robin. Well, technically, a To Do Alfucking Ready list. Shit I’ve been holding off saying to him. Burying it. Seething. Amassing evidence, making my case. In legal terms, I’ve been in Discovery and now I am ready for Opening Arguments. Well, not arguments, exactly. He doesn’t get to talk.

Truth be told, spending my entire birthday writing this list is just about the greatest way I could imagine spending it. I have three new glitter pens – turquoise for household maintenance projects, orange for special projects, and gold for writing my feelings about his not having gotten these things done – and a pound of cardstock. I am so totally amped. I am going to run out and get a back up gold pen. In case the first one runs out.

All that’s left is for me to wait thirteen more hours until I can buckle down to work.

Which persona will I be when I write the list… Long-suffering martyr? Eggshell-tiptoeing enabler? Nazi work captain? Superior high falutin’ life coach? Workaday bitch? According to Robin, I tend towards the Mt. St. Helen’s school of communication – I spew off a few, unnoticed puffs of steam and then, POW. Next thing he knows, he is coughing up bits of lung and ash and wondering what happened to the sweet 25-year-old girl he married. The one who believed he was perfect just the way he is.

I’ll tell you what happened to her: she got tired of waiting for the fucking den carpeting to be replaced and the fucking deck to be powerwashed, and she got mean. And fat. And, as I glance at today’s circled date on the calendar, old.

Hmm. I might need a few more pens.

Still, if one subscribes to the notion that what one does on one’s birthday sets the tone for the entire year, then, I must put off writing The List until tomorrow. Because I really don’t want to be That person. The person who, on her birthday, presents her spouse of 32 years with a list of his trangressions against her. On cardstock, written in color-coded glitter pens. Laminated. Framed in a 20 x 40 gold leaf frame. With six wallet-size copies.

I want to be that Other person. The one who devotes her birthday to being grateful for the blessings she has. Yes. That’s who I am going to be. It can’t be that hard.

Especially if he brings home a cake tonight.

Haywire

 

By: Danny Thomas

 

oh. my. god.
I have three kids
and a job
and a wife
who is at the beginning stages
of a career that is
the breadwinning career for our family
so she has to put in
the hours
whatever they may be
and she is a teacher
so that means
a lot of hours

my days
during the week go something like this…
if the kids haven’t been in our bed since five
I wake up at 6:45
wake up the six-year-old to get her ready for the bus
prod her along the process of getting ready…
pee, clothes, brush hair, brush teeth
4 simple steps…
which, some mornings, is no problem…
other mornings it is like Hannibal marching elephants over mountains…
on Tuesdays and Thursdays I have to do this with the three-year-old too
Jen is usually nursing the baby at this point
but is sometimes able to lend a hand in this process…
then it’s scramble to get food in the six-year-old…
the three-year-old gets fed at day care on the “T” days… (Tuesday or Thursday)
and after the bus on the other days…
scramble to get everything in the bags that need to go to school…
scramble to get coats and shoes on and get out the door
wait for bus
we usually have some time to play and goof around for a minute while waiting…
good times.
then it’s either walk the three-year-old to day care
or come home…
then I have a couple hours to get house work done
sometimes I fold laundry and watch t.v.
sometimes I do dishes
sometimes I write
sometimes I cook…
sometimes I zone out, listen to music and Facebook or Pinterest…
sometimes I do yoga
or take a shower…
Then, at ten-ish I head out the door
on the non-T-days I drop the three-year-old at the YMCA for 3 hours’ drop-in care
and take the baby to work with me – when I get there I feed her with a bottle
which sometimes goes well
but sometimes she complains about the plastic nipple a lot
and that is uncomfortable for both of us
almost always I spill a bit of sticky breastmilk on both of us…

after I get her to sleep
I work for a bit
checking emails, returning phone calls, updating websites… doing whatever…
then at 1:20 I race to get the baby loaded up
and head to the Y to get the three-year-old
luckily, she is always happy to see me…
some days though leaving the Y can be a tough transition for her
pouting or shouting or just general poopiness…

lets be honest any transition, or dirt, or birds chirping, or air touching her skin
could be cause for nuclear meltdown…
she’s three, after all.

Then when we get home it’s more housework
cooking, cleaning…
or playing Barbies, or princesses, or whathaveyou with the the three-year-old…
until the 6-year-old gets home
then it’s a bit of homework…
until gymnastics or ballet…

or if it’s a Tuesday or Thursday…
I head home to tend to the baby about noon – so Jen can go teach…
Then back to work at 2:30 to try to get ahead of the game (which never happens)…
and home at 5:00 pick up the three-year-old..
then home for dinner…
and maybe some relaxed time with the family
a walk to the park
or a movie
Or back to work for Box Office Will Call…

oh. my. god.
this pace is pretty tough.
nothing is ever as clean as i want it to be.
our poor baby sleeps in third generation hand-me-downs with third generation hand-me-down stains… bless her heart…
i am always behind on at least a half dozen things…

I feel like most of what Jen and I do together these days is talk about our schedule and calendar and make arrangements…
updating our Google Calendars together
mapping out the itinerary for the week…
so romantic…

If you add to our agenda any
of the inevitable variables
of life;
illness, car trouble, out of town guests, plumbing, a home project or a board meeting, or whatever…
we go haywire

not to mention the drama of various relationships and acquaintances..

we are constantly haywire…

I’m sure it’s common,
this pace…
I’m sure life is hard for everyone
no matter what the schedule
but I feel like, if I had to keep this up very much longer
my head might spin right off…

luckily
for us
we only have to get through
a couple more weeks
then school ends
for Jen
and we can re-adjust

but then summer camps start
Lil’ Chaos’s first drama camp…
and tennis
and swimming
and zoo camp
and wild buffalo adventure camp
and ballet camp
and all that…

oh god.
I need a drink.

Interview with Danny Thomas

Interview with Danny Thomas by The Next Family

 

TNF: How has it been blogging for TNF?

I love blogging for TNF. It’s been a fun journey into myself, a great way to explore what is important to me as a person and as a father… and also as a writer. I have discovered, through writing for TNF, some thematic ideas that come back again and again in my blogs and in my thinking and that has helped me define and refine my personal philosophy and how I approach the world and my family.

It has been nice to have a reason to write… something that forces me to do it. I love writing and have fun writing, but have lacked discipline as a writer and TNF has been a great motivator… I get wonderful feedback and it has sparked some interesting exchanges as well…

Finally, all of this inspires me to write more, develop my voice, develop my stories, hone my craft and continue the exploration.

TNF: How is your family like every other family and how is it different?

Wow, this is  a tough question…

There are so many different kinds of families, and in so many ways every family is different, and yet, we share common ground. I think I’ll just have to tell you some things about my family and you can decide…

My wife and I share in all of the household responsibilities, however, she is the primary income provider and I am the primary homemaker…

On the weekends we like to have big breakfasts; sometimes we go out to breakfast, sometimes we make it at home… and a lot of times we get donuts.

We live in a two-story three-bedroom house; our two oldest daughters share a room and sleep in bunk beds… they love dancing and singing and Strawberry Shortcake, and also swimming, gymnastics, riding bikes, Barbies, princesses and pink stuff…

the baby has her own room; she likes breast milk and sleeping.

My wife and I share a room, we just got a king-sized bed. We like reading and movies and television. She is a Theatre Professor; I am a sound designer and a musician. I write blogs and poems… some people might say we are artsy, or bohemian… we just think of ourselves as people.

We have a cat named Puss Puss..

As a family we like to make up songs and stories, read books, go for walks, have adventures, play games, and watch movies.

Some things that are important to us are honesty, equality, good food, laughter, and friendship…

TNF: Did your family accept you and your lifestyle? If yes, explain and if not explain what you have done to help them to accept your decisions and your lifestyle.

My family is very supportive of my lifestyle, occasionally throughout my life my mother has encouraged me to “get a real job” or be more “career oriented” and I think both my mother and my wife’s mother have struggled occasionally with how we challenge gender stereotypes… in that each of us is not “being taken care of” in the “traditional” manner they imagined… that is, I am not bringing in the money, and my wife is not cleaning and cooking for me… but these struggles are not persistent.

TNF: How do you juggle the work at home with your jobs?

This is probably the biggest struggle in my life right now.

I just don’t know how to do it; as a family we are working on it and trying to come up with some systems of time management, but I don’t have an answer for this question because I don’t know…

I mean, the only answer I can give you is that everyday I let at least one or two balls drop.

TNF: What lessons do you feel are the most important to teach children in this day and age? Are there any lessons they, or perhaps we as parents should unlearn?

Be open to new things and enjoy learning. Know yourself. Be true to yourself. Trust yourself, and find at least one group of people besides yourself that you can trust and depend on. It’s okay to make a mistake, that’s how we learn. Work hard, but have fun and laugh as much as you can.

TNF: Any words of wisdom to pass on to our readers?

I don’t feel qualified to impart words of wisdom… I am just bumbling through this life trying to find balance and peace, trying to laugh and absorb as much as possible.

I guess one thing I have learned about being in a relationship, and being in a family is that it is a choice; my wife and I make the choice everyday to be committed to each other and to our family. It’s not always easy, or fun, or beautiful, and it means a lot of sacrifice and a lot of tough conversations…

TNF: Anything you want our readers to know about you or your family?

I am a terrible driver; my wife is a terrible passenger.

Her favorite food is potatoes, mine changes moment to moment, right now it’s falafel. ‘Zilla’s favorite food is peanut butter toast, and Lil’ Chaos’s favorite food is probably Top Ramen, although she may be like me and it may depend on what is right in front of her at the time… Zuzu’s favorite food is breast milk.

For What It’s Worth

By: Ann Brown

Right at this very moment, even as you are reading this, the penny is losing value. It has lost almost 97% of its value so far. That’s what they said on NPR. It is shocking, right? I cannot believe it.

I also cannot really understand what it means since a person needs math for this issue. And not only am I woefully clueless about math, I am quite against it. So I must weigh in as against this devaluation business. Even if it occurs during a Democratic administration, I am against it. And I make it a point to never be against anything in a Democratic administration.

I had decided to keep my disapproval to myself. You know, because it’s an election year and the world is watching me. But now, economists and NPR commentators feel that because of the devaluation, we should stop making pennies.

And this is where I have to get involved.

Are we going to discard everything that has lost its value? Because I have a bad feeling about that. Frankly, I worry that after they’ve wiped out the pennies, they will be coming after me. Because, well, talk about your rapid devaluation.

Time was when I could get, I bet, five hundred dollars for me. At least. But just like the penny, in the past decades I have been passed around, lost in couch cushions, discarded into Ronald McDonald House coin boxes at the drive-through window, used to steady an uneven card table and given to homeless people on freeway exits. Who snort derisively because they know worthless when they see it.

The irony is this: the less value I offer, the more money it takes to keep me going. For fuck’s sake, my bras alone cost over $200.00 a year. And even that’s only if I remember to not put them into the dryer. There was a time when I could fashion a workable brassiere for myself out of two handkerchiefs and a sprig of dried rosemary. I was not a drain on the economy back then.

And there’s the matter of my shoes.

In my youth, shoes were optional. At best, they were a five dollar pair of Chinese embroidered slippers. These days it takes the Army Corps of Engineers working with Dansko and Mephisto to figure out how to not make my feet hurt in shoes.

I need about three hundred dollars a month to keep me in Xanax and Zantac. Which I often get mixed up, resulting in a calm stomach during anxiety attacks and falling into a stoned stupor after I eat Indian food. Which reminds me, I should get some more reading glasses.

Oh, and let’s not forget the plethora of root canals ahead of me. It takes a whole lotta cheddar to keep up with my devaluation.

Well, cheddar and Kegels. Although lately, I have not been keeping up with the K’s. I figure when my bladder gives way to complete incontinence, I will simply stop laughing so hard and that will keep my underpants dry.

I know. No chance I will stop laughing. Not as long as Ann Romney keeps calling herself a typical working mother.

Despite my devaluation, and in defense of my economic worth, however, I want to offer this: soon I will be pretty much single-handedly keeping Depends in business.

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