She loves to lie

When my husband was a kid, he and his sister fought like siblings do. To really know my husband is to understand his formerly-evil streak. Some call it mischievous, some call it “just being a boy,” but I call it using his powers for evil instead of good. For instance, he once ruined his mother’s bridge club party by going around, bridge player to bridge player, and whispering every four-letter word he could think of in his mother’s friends’ ears. They thought it was hilarious, and in typical five year-old boy fashion, he decided that he could top that in so very many ways. (Did I tell you about the time he was kicked out of preschool and his mother took him to a child psychologist because she JUST COULDN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE?)

Anyway, his career as a trouble-maker went on for years and during one such trouble-making instance, his sister tattled on him to his mother. And when confronted, he looked at his mother, looked back at his sister and said, “Nuh-uh. Look at her. She loves to lie.”

This is a favorite story to tell in his family because it kind of encapsulates Brian at that age, but it’s also funny now because Brian is the type of person who drives 33 mph in a 35. He’s the kind of person you wouldn’t DREAM of telling about how last week you found a lottery ticket and claimed the winnings as yours. Or about the time you called in sick to work when really you just wanted to watch a “Project Runway” marathon. He can’t stand to break the rules.

So imagine then how interesting it’s been in our house this week. Me, the middle of the road sometimes-conservative but more than a little liberal gal who skipped the presidential address because I wanted to watch Melanie Oudin advance at the U.S. Open (it didn’t happen; she lost to Wozniacki). Brian, the always-conservative Rush Limbaugh-listener who gets upset at the mention of poor, underinsured, hungry students of mine but who can’t bring himself to vote for a Democrat. He listened to Obama’s speech out of one ear, but was mostly focused on his statistics homework.

Both of us missed Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” cry the first time around. We caught it the next day though, on Good Morning America, and it sparked a healthy debate: Was Joe Wilson out of line? Should he have stood up for his party on such a public platform or should he have respected his Commander in Chief (and all of Congress) and held his tongue? I know where I stand, but Brian wasn’t so sure.

“Yeah, you shouldn’t really have an outburst like that on live television in the gallery like that,” he said. “But I mean, really, this whole healthcare debacle is just a trainwreck. Joe Wilson’s right.”

I didn’t respond to him, mainly because I absolutely can’t bear to talk politics with his bull-headedness. He stubbornly refuses to listen (most of the time) and believes what he reads in the Wall Street Journal, what he hears on Fox News or what the butcher at the Piggly Wiggly says.

But I’ve been thinking ever since: What if we, like Joe Wilson, called people out every time we thought we smelled a lie? Do politicians love to lie, as Brian claimed his sister did? Sure they do, unless you believe everything they say. Do we, everyday folks, love to lie? Sure we do. Think about everything you said yesterday and how many little white lies you snuck into your conversations.

I’ll go ahead and admit mine right now: I can’t think of the last time I told the whole truth and nothing but the truth all day long. No, sorry, I can’t walk with you after work because I have to get home and cook supper, knowing full well it’s take-out night. Or I totally loved that precious invitation you made for your party! when actually I think that your four year-old could’ve done a much better job. In my case, Sorry I had to sneak out of the meeting early, but I had way too much coffee this morning, when actually I just can’t bear to be confined for another second.

What does that say about us? Are we a country full of liars, cheats and thieves, or are we just humans trying to make it through another day? I don’t know exactly, but yes, this DVD I’m about to burn was downloaded completely legally and through the proper channels, and no, I don’t plan to show it to large groups of people.

Yet.

The one where I re-introduce myself to society

I’ve started writing this about three different times now, mainly because I have a few things I want to say, but only one of them I don’t want to sound flip about. The first, and most important, is THANK YOU. Thank you for your kinds words and your suggestions and for opening yourselves up to me so that I know you’re here. Thank you for introducing me to More Women, for reminding me that I’m not alone, and most of all, for reading. Please don’t leave now. I have huge news. HUGE.

I went out in public on Friday night.

I know, this is either a) not news at all or b) completely uninteresting to you. But for me – FOR ME! – it was big. My girlfriends and I had been planning a night out for a while and since lately I’ve been experiencing more panic and anxiety than usual, I was apprehensive. It was Restaurant Week in downtown Raleigh. It was Friday night. It was pouring rain. Our reservations were later than we would usually go out, so already in my mind I’m thinking, Great, my blood sugar is low, the service is slow and here I am packed into this crowded place GET ME OUT OF – Wait. I didn’t think “get me out of here.” I tried really hard to concentrate on sangria gulping and people watching and whaddaya know? I distracted myself and didn’t panic. HUGE. Maybe not for you or for anyone else out there, but for me, it was a small victory.

We ate a fabulous meal, drank some delicious sangria and talked about all the things girls talk about. I tried very hard not to look like a fish out of water; after all, we don’t go out much anymore and is it just me, or are these pre-schoolers sitting over there at the bar? Don’t these girls need a chaperone to be out this late at 10pm?

image by Elizabeth

You don’t have to say it: I know full and well how geezer-y I sound. Every year – every MONTH – I vow to be more social, to go out more, to actually experience the city I live not far from, but every month my house seems to cushion me more and more, like a cocoon, to protect me from what’s out there. You know, like…people. And…stuff.

Anyway, afterward we drank more sangria and I attempted to wear every piece of jewelry my friend Kathy owns. It’s a good look for me, no?

image by Katherine H.

Yesterday morning I FINALLY got over to Kathy’s new place to see what beautiful things she’s done. Y’all, this girl has colors in her house that made me drool, and I know exactly what she’s getting for her housewarming gift…but I can’t tell you yet. It’s a secret. Then I visited my MIL in her temporary house, The Fanciest Hotel in the City, and bought Pop Rocks for BB at The Lollipop Shop. It was a good day. I went out in public, had not nary a freakout and will chalk that as a one-up for me.

Finally, I have to wonder out loud whether or not DJ AM was sucking on the crack pipe when he was dating Mandy Moore. I hope not, because that would kind of change my opinion of her, except not all that much because hello? she married Ryan Adams, the weirdest of all the weird musicians to come out of NC. And I have to say that Vicki Kennedy was absolutely beautiful at the services for Ted Kennedy yesterday – but someone needs to tell Michelle Obama that her god-awful blouse should die an early death.

via Huffington Post

1) You don’t wear the same blouse you wore to the Vatican to Ted Kennedy’s funeral, especially since you delivered the dying man’s message to the Pope while you were wearing it. Moschino or not. And 2) a funeral is not the time for your interpretation of couture. A funeral is a time for a tasteful but beautiful black suit, and surely somewhere in your giant White House closet you’ve got one of those.

I’m just saying.

Healthcare Reform? How about Wallet Reform.

I started a post yesterday about the healthcare debate, and how I was so ashamed of not just my fellow Americans but my fellow North Carolinians, who have turned up on television all week long at town hall meetings, shouting obscenities at one another and at elected officials. (Okay FINE. The elected officials probably deserve it.)

My post was going to be about how we should all just CHILL THE FUCK OUT and realize that a) nothing’s going to happen overnight, and b) unless your name starts with Sen. or Rep. or POTUS, your opinion isn’t really going to count right now. But then I changed my mind.

Brian gives me an (undeserved?) hard time pretty much all day every day about the amount of MTV I watch. Specifically about how I watch “The Real World” and keep up with all the drama and the ridiculosity (YEAH, IT’S A WORD) and about how he’d love to show them the real world, the one in which you get a job and pay some bills. He has a point, I guess, but then last night’s episode was all about (okay maybe a little bit about) this charity, DIF, which is basically an orphanage. The Real World kids went out and hosted a “charity event” (they charged drunk people $5 for a strand of Mardi Gras beads) at which they raised $11,o00. Not bad for some MTV flunkies. Then they all went to Costco, bought up some bikes and trikes and see-saws and donated it to DIF. It was really sweet, I have to admit, to see these impoverished orphans so excited over some new shoes and a toy water gun. Seriously.

And this morning, I found the Global Rich List, which kind of made me feel like shit. Apparently, according to global statistics, I am in the top 3% of the richest people in the world (which isn’t saying much, I swear). All you do is enter your salary, and then this is what they tell you:

“All you have to do is make a choice.

$8 could buy you 15 organic apples OR 25 fruit trees for farmers in Honduras to grow and sell fruit at their local market.

$30 could buy you an ER DVD Boxset OR a First Aid kit for a village in Haiti.

$73 could buy you a new mobile phone OR a new mobile health clinic to care for AIDS orphans in Uganda.

$2400 could buy you a second generation High Definition TV OR schooling for an entire generation of school children in an Angolan village.”

So what is it that needs reform again? Us? I think maybe so.

Crises averted

What is it people say? “Don’t sweat the small stuff.” “Be grateful for tiny victories.” I think that I shall today. I’ve been tweeting about it all morning, but today is on-campus registration and I’m telling you, Internet, I have never in all of my life seen people show up in droves like they did today. They came with backpacks and babies, toddlers and textbooks and all I can tell them when they show up at my door is “I’m sorry, but be patient and keep waiting in line.”

I know they’re panicked. I know they are unsure and don’t know what they’re doing. The majority of students are laid-off workers coming back after years and years of line or factory work. I hate it for them, but we can’t help the economy and all we can do is accommodate as many people as we can as quickly as we can.

My tiny victory came about 10:30 am, when the line to get into financial aid wrapped itself three times around a “square” of office space. The halls were so clogged with people, already hot from the record heat outside, that even when we brought in fans to circulate the air, it was still hard to breathe. Children were crying, diapers were being changed IN LINE, cell phones were ringing incessantly (I’ve never heard so many dirty ring tones in my life) and as they stopped in front of my door, they either sat on the floor of my doorway or came right on in to deposit trash in my trash can.

And Internet, I want you to know that even when I felt trapped inside my office, even when there were bodies piled three deep outside my door, with knuckles rapping on my door handle, I didn’t panic. I DID NOT PANIC. I kept myself busy with IMing my officemates to make sure they hadn’t dug tunnels and escaped (like I wanted to) and by, you know, doing some actual work.

I’m kind of proud of myself.

Right now there’s a lull, but this will begin all over at 5pm today and again all day tomorrow, or at least until there’s no more money and classes are full. We will have the largest enrollment this year of any year, oh, EVER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD. I’m glad because that means we’re helping a lot of unemployed folks, but at the same time, it’s another reminder of how overcrowded and underserved we are. But I’ll continue to be patient, be glad for my own job and be proud of my ability to distract myself – at least temporarily – from my anxiety.

Things that should have warning labels but don’t

1. Annual conferences for bloggers

2. In-laws

3. Lime tortilla chips

4. Home ownership

5. Waking up before 7:00 am

6. Children (but only other people’s, not yours)

7. Some reality television

8. Money

9. Sex (but only other people’s, not yours)

10. Amateur “photographers”

11. Restaurants that serve cheese in its hot, melted state

12. Graduate school

13. Marriage

14. Reading other people’s blogs

15. The “premium” TV channels

16. Courtney Love’s tweets

17. New friends

18. Sarah Palin

19. Massachusetts cops

“Listing” is inspired by ABDPBT: