Hats off to my ugly hat

My friend Rickie is reacquainting me with the art of knitting—a craft I dabbled in as a child, but never before with the notion that I might actually produce anything that resembles apparel. She has me whipping out lacy scarf patterns and cable stitches, much to the amazement of anyone who acknowledges my inability to be creative. In exchange, to our weekly meetings I come bearing gifts: a bottle of Merlot, a box of Kashi dark chocolate oatmeal cookies (we strive to keep it healthy), or the nubbin of a Nylabone, chewed too small for my twin King German Shepherds, but just the right mouthful for one of her four Australian Shepherds.

Last week she wanted out of the confines of her own house and so we agreed to sit on my front porch and work on our projects.

“I’ll bring my ugly hat,” she typed to me on Google “chat,” the communication venue we prefer to telephone. She was exercising wisdom; the endless winter here in the wilds of Western Montana was on the cusp of spring and we were enjoying one of our first sunny afternoons of the encroaching season. On several subjects we agree, but in relation to skin cancer prevention, these two: As outdoor enthusiasts, we are blessed to live under this big blue Montana sky, but we’ve been cursed with our Celtic ancestors’ pathetic pallor with skin that snaps, crackles, pops, and then peels like aging wallpaper whenever the clouds part; any head covering that blockades basal cell carcinoma, stops squamous cell carcinoma, or impedes malignant melanoma, regardless of how well it performs its function, is unattractive at best.

I readied the coffee pot and put on my trusty, albeit unattractive sunhat—a veritable force against rigorous rays even if distastefully fashioned. Until I saw hers. Her brim was wider, the drape down her neck longer, the color soft, subtle beige. Next to my neon blue sans stampede string and a poor excuse for protection that didn’t even keep my nose under cover of shade, Rickie’s solar shield was vastly superior. And even uglier.

“If we were out hiking they would look better,” I rationalized. She wasn’t buying.

“We are well-protected,” she determined as the only positive position here.

“You far more than I,” I admitted my jealousy then shamelessly asked her where she’d purchased hers and vowed to seek it out online as soon as she left—how soon would that be? I was frantic to get my hands on one—if you are going for pure function, why stop at merely half-ugly? Besides, there was a certain joie-de-vivre to her longer neck drape and netted crown air ventilation.

Just then my husband strolled past us en route to his workshop—tall, rugged, and handsomely clad in jeans, western shirt, and the quintessential cowboy hat that served as sufficient sun sentinel. Why do men get to look so stylish in their SPF?

“Hi Rickie,” Brad greeted my guest. “Nice hat.” The palpable ping of sarcasm validated our concern over chapeau couture.

“Why do our hats look so much better in the catalog?” I asked aloud and then realized the answer to my own question: quite probably because the models are 20 years old and fly fishing as opposed to 58, sitting on a rocking chair, and knitting on the front porch.

After much machination over color choice, I restricted myself to two from the website that Rickie had recommended. And the more I looked, the better they looked—like when you resist a new clothing trend for only so long because, face it, it’s hideous, but the longer it’s out there, the more adapted you grow until before long, you’ve broken down and are strutting it.

I grew so accustomed to their appearance, in fact, that I had to censor myself after narrowing it down to my favorite pair. Rickie, however, only knows of one and won’t learn of the other until she reads this—I couldn’t break her heart even further by letting her know more than I did. It must have been difficult enough for her to digest that my new and improved style is double hers in SPF, the brim an inch wider, and with a rather rakish ribbon around the base of the crown. Hers is old hat; how could I lower the boom and admit that I bought both the understated beige and an olive trimmed and under-brimmed in basic black for those dressier out-of-doors outings to town?

No sooner had I feared her morals might plummet due to uncontrollable envy, my anguish was extinguished. When I Google “chatted” to tell her that I’d taken my animal-unfriendly Shepherd for a walk and had carried with me a stick in case of “attack,” she responded with complete objectivity regarding my noggin accessory—the sun was shining; it was a given that I’d worn it.

“Wouldn’t your new hat be enough to ward off any attack?” she queried.

Obviously, she thought I’d been warding off humans since any animal in its right mind would be attracted to the flapping bird wing hanging down to my back. Something tells me she won’t covet my collection after all.

Much ado about abdominals

“What does it mean when someone refers to abdominal muscle appearance as ‘six-pack’ abs?’ I asked my 25-year old daughter who breathes only to find the next exercise regimen. Kate’s gone from to Bosu Ball Aerobics class to Zumba workout; one might say from A to Z; I knew she would be my optimal information source.

“A six pack of what?’ I elaborated. “Beer cans lying sideways?” “Diet Coke?”

Personally, I’d always coveted the concave belly, since I had inherited my mother’s little “pooch.” No matter how slender I grew while incorporating brutal diet plans into my quest for the perfect figure, I failed to achieve that flat-as-a-pancake tummy in a bathing suit. Once I birthed two children, I christened it “the baby house,” and thereby formed the rationale for its permanence in addition to the reason for my neglect of any sort of abdominal calisthenic be it the dreaded sit-up, that nemesis that had caused me to flunk every Presidential Fitness Test in school, or even the more reserved and recent version of it, the crunch.

“Yes!” chirped Kate. “It’s refers to a six pack of canned beverage, turned sideways—horizontally, and stacked on top of each other in three rows of two. That’s what you want your stomach to look like.”

And why? Is this attractive? Flat I get; bulging aluminum drink cans I don’t.

“You’re so funny, Mom. It means you look fit!”

At 58 years old and grateful to never have to don another bathing suit or crop top, I doubt anyone but my mirror and my husband (who, trust me, won’t notice) will see my mid-section. Oh, and maybe a surgeon at some point, but not a plastic one.

My most recent addition to my daily walk, a form of meditation that will most certainly never culminate in a six-pack for either me or my dog unless it’s what we drink after we get back to the porch, is Mari Winsor’s Circle Pilates. I decided my lower back needed strengthening and my balance required a boost, so my older daughter Clary recommended I check out the DVD. “Brad already has it, and the circle too,” she persuaded.

I was astonished to find that I enjoy it—the quintessential combination of low impact (I lie down the entire time which is always a good thing) and muscle toning technique that isn’t so difficult that I’m struggling in and out of impossible positions. I’d attempted Yoga and was daunted by various dog poses. Circle Pilates, I could accomplish, and painlessly.

One day led to another and another and before long, I was “performing,” as Mari Winsor puts it, the exercises nearly every day. I would hear her speak of “results,” but paid no mind, since number one, I didn’t expect any and number two, was only doing it to stretch, honestly.

Lo and behold when Clary visited from New York recently, she strolled into my bathroom to borrow a blow dryer after we’d worked out together to the Circle Pilates DVD. I had just stepped out of the shower and was reaching for my towel.

“Mom! You have a sic-pack! Look at it!” I glanced in the mirror.

“Is that what it looks like?” I wondered.

“Has Brad seen this?” And with that she waited only long enough for me to pull on sweats and a T-shirt , then dragged me out to the shop where Brad was working.

“Have you seen your wife’s six-pack?” she howled when we opened the door to see him laboring over a project.

“I’ve seen my wife’s…..” he cut off his declaration in view of his step daughter’s possible sensibilities.

When she lifted the T-shirt, his eyes widened. Obviously, the next word wasn’t going to have been “stomach.”

So much ado over so very little, I thought as Clary revered my recent abdominal achievement. I mean, who really cares?

“Impressive!” Brad nodded and tossed me a winsome look.

I guess I do.

Give me the time I need to grieve

In a phone conversation with my sister, I acknowledged that there are still certain people I cannot talk to without breaking down and crying. They are those few who remind me of our father, not because they necessarily spent significant time with him. It can be as simple as a way of placing a word in a phrase or an attitude towards life’s usual challenges. It might be a generosity of spirit or an unselfish heart.

It has been nearly two years since I lost my father, yet when my husband and I are out to dinner with companions at a local restaurant that offers rack of lamb as a menu option, he looks across the table to me.

“You are thinking of your dad, aren’t you?” Ah, how he treads the paths of my mental meanderings, even with my head bowed, glasses on, studying the choices. It is one of those days when it wouldn’t matter if two decades had passed since his passing; I am powerless to dam the flood of tears and stab of heartache because he is no longer alive to root me to the ground I walk on. After Mama passed away, there was Daddy to focus on and care for; now no one remains whose face I gaze upon and see my own.

When I share my story with a group of retirement home residents for whom I manage a book club, one woman looks at me askance while the others look down, either unsympathetic or unwilling to cater to such nonsense after all this time.

“It’s been how long since he died?” she quizzes, her eyebrow raised. “You need to move on—death is simply part of life.”

I agree and disagree: Death is part of life, but I do not need to stride away from these memories. In many other cultures, I could still wear black. I might hide out in my home with family who understand. I would have permission to feel whatever I feel, given the day or the hour. Not here, not now. In our frenetic paced, with ever independent pride, I am expected to shelf my first 56 years in the library of life, check out a memory now and then, return it, ready and anxious for the next chapter.

It occurs to me that families are so broken in so many ways that for some, the absence of parents may be not altogether unwelcome. The disappearance, for those who have been abused or left unforgiven, can open the prison bars and signal a freedom to be an adult at last. But what is there for those of us who, despite having shouldered the responsibilities of adulthood with aplomb, never really cared to “grow up” apart from the ones who carried us through an altogether nurturing childhood? And what do I have to prove by “dealing with it,” without them?

So I hide my continuing breakdowns because according to standards set by someone, somewhere unbeknownst to me, it has been long enough and I shouldn’t surrender to such emotional instability. I don’t have them every day, mind you, and by nature I am a positive and happy individual. I cherish grown children, adore a loving husband, and am grateful to God for the sturdy roof over my head during times of trouble. Still there are days. That’s a good thing. Remembering so it hurts reminds me just exactly who I am.

Chug it or chew it: How do you like your greens?

When I open the freezer, out spill Costco industrial-sized bags of spinach, blueberries and chopped bananas. Blocking access to cereal and crackers in the pantry cupboard are large sacks of “supergreens,” protein powder, and barley. My husband, whose idea of a nutritious lunch is goopy grilled American cheese, potato chips, and a chaser of gummed spice drops, and whose fantasy fruit juice is Dr Pepper, has experienced a conversion: He is swallowing large green smoothies for his midday meal.

“At least it’s not red convertibles and younger women,” commented a friend when I was explaining my theory that this is Brad’s version of an age crisis; he turns sixty in a few months and is concerned that he never ingests enough fruit and vegetables. Suddenly, whispers like “cancer” and “heart disease” –the current subject of his breakfast reading material--are seeping in through the cracks of his resolve to remain oblivious, forever young.

It’s not only a harmless acknowledgment of age, but also a healthy one; as we all know by now, produce fights all sorts of fatal disease. That’s the reason Brad is certain I am silently simmering with jealousy—green with envy, you might in this case say.

I am the queen of dark leafy green; my daily ceremonial salad occurs in a wooden bowl that serves eight. It brims with organic cabbage, spinach, collards, kale, cilantro, mushrooms, and broccoli. A day doesn’t pass before some seasonal addition appears on the supermarket shelf and it’s in my mix. Needless to say, I invest a substantial amount of time both in preparation and ingestion of the contents of this behemoth bowl.

I must admit that when the first bag of super greens arrived UPS, I was intrigued. I hated to confess; didn’t care to succumb to the trendy. But any food product carrying a label with the word combination “super” and “green” was impossible to ignore. My daughter was visiting at the time and chided, “Oh Mom…can you really resist such powerful antioxidants?” I assured her I could.

“She won’t be able to stand it; she won’t hold off for long before she’s dipping into the bag,” challenged my husband who at last felt the right to wield nutritional superiority over my healthy eating habits. I vowed that I would.

You see, I like to chew my food; I garner a great sense of satisfaction when I masticate—the more the better. What does that say about me? Oral fixation? Tension release? Grinding to gain power over?

Brad, on the other hand, couldn’t be bothered. He would rather swirl soft and soupy than chomp down on substantial. He claims it’s a saliva thing—that he produces little of it and hence, most food seems dry. I have determined that it’s an outcropping of his calm demeanor; he refuses to succumb to the sort of anxiety that generates the gnashing of teeth.

“I couldn’t eat your salad to save my life,” he groans. “But I can drink it!”

On the bar counter rests the high-powered machine that pulverizes anything that grows. He shops for his own ingredients, makes and cleans the mixer himself, and his sense of pride reminds me of the day I made my first monster salad.

Shhhh….Don’t tell him I’ve been topping my veggies with a sprinkle of his supergreens.