Playing the Game

Maverick and I have a pretty good system for managing two full-time careers and raising two young daughters. We split the morning routine, each taking care of one kid; and in the afternoons, he gets the girls from school, entertains them for a while and then feeds them. When I get home from work, I finish up the nighttime routine of homework, baths, books and bed.

I do the laundry, he takes the dry cleaning. I do the lunches, he does dinner. He manages the finances, the house maintenance, pest control, the landscaper and the pool. I do the shopping, miscellaneous errands, and daily house straightening. I do the scheduling of doctor’s appointments, vet visits, dental cleanings, babysitter and weekend plans. He does all the “daytime” things that I can’t get to and I do all the other things he deems is “my job.” We share the dog responsibilities and taking out the trash. …And so on…and it works for us, usually.

Every so often we get into a pissing match of my least-favorite game, called “Who does more?” Every married or cohabitating couple plays. All you need to get started is to pick out something in your relationship that feels uneven and you want acknowledgement for. There’s no minimum to how small the uneven “thing” can feel. It can be as insignificant as who cleans the orange juice ring left in the sink.

One player goes first and calls out, “I do everything around here! I did X today and Y and Z!” The other person counters with, “What? I did A, B and C! Not to mention that yesterday, I also did X and Y and Z!” The game continues until one player “wins” by beating the other player down to beg for mercy, ask for forgiveness or thank the winner profusely for all he or she has done.

As competitive as I am, for the first twelve years of my relationship, I always went for the win. Sometimes, I’d even continue “playing” long after my Maverick left the game. Now, I’m just tired of playing it and often accept defeat for peace.

The last few days, Maverick has been grumbling about me under his breath. We're playing the "Who does more?" game in silent mode. I know what he's thinking but I didn't engage him in the conversation. I didn't want to. I'm tired. I'm busy. I've been dizzy. I'm just not in the mood to play.

Finally this morning, Maverick started round one. However, instead of the opening line, he began by uncovering a new strategy to the game. He jumped right in without the usual banter and went right for the kill with the "Martyr" card. The martyr card played out like this:

Me: “I’m going in late to the office so I can register Camryn for kindergarten today.”
Him: “Why didn’t you just ask me to do that?”
Me: “Because I can do it. I thought I'd take care of it first so I don't have to bother you with doing it.”
Him: “Why not? I do everything else around here.”

So now, instead of trying to make me feel guilty and/or thankful for how much he does, he’s offered to willingly “do it all” to play his martyr trump card. And of course, the martyr is an automatic win.

The truth is we both have to do what we have to do to keep our family and house running. We have to stop keeping track and just get it done. Sometimes I do more, sometimes he does more. I hear the same game being played daily with all my friends. And we’re all tired of it, yet we can’t seem to find a way to stop the pattern.

Next time, I’m going to try ending the game before it begins. I’ll say: Maverick, you can pass go, and collect your $200. Thanks for playing. Oh, and can you pick up my prescription while you’re out?

Shopping frenzy

Maverick called me at the office to say he was taking away my credit card. Apparently, he said, I don’t know how to control myself when it comes to shopping. As I pleaded and explained and poorly attempted to keep control of my plastic, in the back of my mind, I know he can be right, sometimes.

Not too long ago, Starr and I were doing some out-of-town shopping. We hit a stretch of unique shops and the two of us started salivating. My saliva was caused by hunger. It was mid-afternoon and neither of us had anything to eat all day, but Starr was drooling over the clothes she saw displayed in the window.

After promising her that the stores would remain open afterwards, we grabbed a bite to eat and drank a bottle of champagne over lunch. Feeling warm and bubbly from the cold bubbly, we hit the boutiques.

We looked like two kids in a candy store. We practically ransacked the first shop, throwing things around and stock piling clothes in the dressing room. Tops and skirts and dresses flew out of the curtain while my poor friend, Jenny, carefully hung up the discarded clothes for us. While Starr paid for her finds, I scoured the jewelry counter and strung several necklaces around my wrist and tossed them on the checkout counter for a last-minute photo finish of a clothes horse-race.

And that was the first shop.

By the third or forth…or maybe the fifth or sixth boutique…I think I lost count….I realized I also had lost my head. I walked into this store, still rearing to go on the high that everything was on sale, everything was in my size and everything looked great. (And how often do the stars align that perfectly?)

I stood over a pile of beautiful 50% off scarves and was trying to pick out one or two to buy. But I had found six that all looked great and agonized over which ones to put down. So I moved over to the sweater table and picked up three or four cute things. Next, I found another necklace, so I made my way over to the cashier but couldn’t bypass the shoe section and saw my weakness…crystal studded flip flops and found several pairs I wanted…I looked at all the stuff in my hand and started to hyperventilate.

I realized I wanted everything in the store, right now. I’d hit a bonanza. A magic treasure chest filled with beautiful clothes, and shoes, and accessories just for me. I looked down at the packages I was carrying…I added up what I had spent already (justifying to myself I had just bought my own birthday present, Mother’s Day and Hanukkah presents at this rate and it was only March). My pulse was racing and I started hyperventilating.

I realized I was in a full-fledged shopping frenzy and had to walk myself right out of the store to catch my breath. As I stood outside in the cold air, my breathing finally slowed and my blood pressure returned to normal. Jenny, not knowing anything was wrong, came outside to comment that she had never seen two girls do as much damage as Starr and I had. In two hours, she said, we’d spent what she’d spend in a year on clothes. She said she was fascinated by us. But I felt disgusted and ashamed.

I didn’t spend a dime afterwards that day. I did however, continue to enjoy shopping vicariously through Starr, who even managed to find something fabulous at an airport boutique on the way back into town. I’ve been trying to be better since then and not buy whatever strikes my fancy when I see it. It’s hard still sometimes, especially when I see cute $5 t-shirts for the girls at Target. Okay, I admit, I still get them the cute $5 t-shirts when I see them at Target. Now, I just try to pick out one or two instead of one of every kind.

With all the recession talk, I know I should tighten my belt and do better with less. I can cut back on another pair of flip flops or another pair of earrings for a while. I’m good with less shopping for now, just as long as Maverick doesn’t ask me to cut out my daily Starbucks. I have a feeling that request is coming soon too. Especially since we just got a new espresso maker.

What should I wear?

I’m going to a bar mitzvah. What should I wear?
I’m going to Santa Fe. What should I wear?
I’m going to a BBQ. What should I wear?
I’m going bar-hopping for Friday night happy hour. What should I wear?
I’m going dancing on a Saturday night. What should I wear?
My house is burning and I need to leave immediately. What should I wear?

It seems like the “What should I wear” game is one of the most overplayed, exhausting, and intoxicatingly addicting games my friends and I participate in. Every event seems to require at least one of us asking what we should wear. Or what are you wearing? Is jeans okay for a Friday night? Do we have to get dressed up for dinner in at your house? Is sweats acceptable on a Sunday afternoon? Do I have to come to your pool party wearing an actual swimsuit?

When I was a kid, I didn’t care what I wore. As long as it was comfortable. I probably took that mantra to an extreme, and actually got into trouble for wearing my pajamas to school. But it was so much easier then than it seems to be now. Even with a full closet of clothes, I’m in a constant struggle to find the right thing to wear.

Styles change. My size changes. My tastes change. Styles change again. My closet is an ever-evolving rotating door of clothes that comes and goes before I’ve had the chance to get my wear out of any particular item. The absolutely right-now perfect top doesn’t seem to hold up two months from now. The pink cargos went the way of pink flamingos in our front yard. The overalls I loved so much have been donated after eight years of hoping to make a comeback. It’s very frustrating how often fashion changes ever-so-slightly that last year’s version looks so much like this year’s, but not enough to pull it off. I’d rather just chuck it than worry about who’s noticed that I’m wearing “so last years”. And honestly, I care about this stuff as much as the average girl yet it still eats me up.

Plus, I never can seem to get ahead of the fashion and actually have the right thing to wear, so I’m constantly at the mall looking for perfection. Of course, I never find it when I’m looking for it. Only when I’m in a rush or shopping for a gift for someone else.

I try not to kill myself with keeping up with the styles and stick to my tried-and-true favorites. Most of my clothes are my staple favorites that you’ve probably seen me wear a thousand times. They’re like the PJs of my childhood. Three kinds of items are my standard-issue uniform. I can wear strikingly similar black or white t-shirts and never get tired of wearing them. I have twenty variations of the same t-shirt shirt: v-neck, deep v-neck, scoop neck, boat neck, three-quarter sleeve, long sleeve, gathered, cap sleeve…. I should buy an additional color or two when I refresh the uniforms but I wind up moving those to the back of the closet and focusing on my favorites.

I also have my standard issue sweats. They’re shoved in a drawer with eight other pairs, but I always seem to reach for the same gray pair over and over. Now they have a hole right below the knee, thanks to Casey. But instead of tossing them, I’ve decided to roll them up, hip-hop style.

Flip flops round out my third standard-issue uniform. Pink, white, black, red and every color in between. I have flips with rhinestones and flops with bows. I have crystal ones and stone ones and plain ones and denim ones and high heels and low heels and some I have multiple pairs of the same kind. I have a whole basket of flip flops and can wear a pair every day for over a month with out duplication.

What's your standard issue uniform?

The terrible twos of puppyhood

At 4am this morning, I was standing in my driveway, staring up at the full moon and the bright night sky. No, I didn’t sleepwalk my way outside nor awake from a bad dream. I was watching my new puppy, Casey, pee. Even at that ungodly hour, he was so awake and chipper. He sniffed in endless circles until he found just the right blade of grass with the right scent to leave his mark. Then he followed it up with a healthy poop. Of course, I have to watch each poop to ensure it’s the right consistency, much like a new mother inspects her newborn’s poop.

And that got me thinking about how much a new puppy is like having a new baby. For the longest time I had a magnet on my fridge that read, “Once you have a baby, you can’t give it back.” Unfortunately, at times, I wish this weren’t also true for dogs.

I love my dog, don’t get me wrong. I love that he still looks like a large, fluffy cream-colored marshmallow. He’s a love bug. He loves me to scratch his belly. He’s fun to watch as he chases a bug or can’t maneuver going down the stairs and falls. I love his silly antics. I love watching him run: his back legs run almost perpendicular to his front legs, his ears flop and he has a lopsided smile on his face with his long tongue hanging to one side. Often, when he’s running directly to me, he can’t slow down fast enough and crashes into my legs. He’s hilarious.

I love how eager he is to please me. How I can train him to sit or come when I call. I love how he loves to hang out with me all the time. He’s great company. He doesn’t talk back. He’s a great listener. He keeps a good secret. I love watching him have fun with an empty paper towel tube. If only I could find such joy in something so simple.

On the other hand, I’m tired of getting up to walk him every night. Damn it, pee in your crate or hold it, I think when he wakes me. He also likes to dig in the dirt and bury things. Usually as I’m walking out the door, dressed for work, I have to stop and clean muddy paws and then my own muddy pants. He finds everything I don’t want him to find and eats it, like my dirty panties in the laundry basket. He’s like a Mexican jumping bean now, jumping up on my couch too. Each time I push him off. Then he jumps back on like a broken record. On, “Casey off!”. On, “Casey off!” On, “Casey off!” You get my drift…

Casey chews everything. My baseboards, my rugs, the girls’ stuffed animals, my robe, my pants legs, my shoes, and most deliciously, my arms and hands. Apparently, I’m a delicacy. Maverick and the girls are tasty treats but not so much as his favorite person, me. And when he gets fixated on teething on me, I have a hard time keeping my cool with him…it hurts! When I reprimand him, he thinks it’s a game, which leads to more human chewing. So much so that I toss him outside for a reprieve, which leads to freedom in the back yard and digging and dirty paws again. It’s a nasty cycle.

It’s reminiscent of all my new-mother suffering I had to endure when Maya came, especially the first few months. Luckily, one human year is equivalent to seven dog years. So this stage should be end much more quickly than with a human baby. However, that also means Casey is almost two human-years old. A toddler. Great. Now I’m beginning the terrible two’s. I’m in trouble.

A star chart for lip plumper

I decided tonight that I need to make myself a star chart, just like the one I had as a little girl. My mother made it for me and it tracked certain responsibilities I had to do on a daily basis. Do my chores, get a shiny gold star. The chart was intended to reinforce good behavior, so a certain number of stars equaled a wonderful prize, such as a new Barbie or some stickers.

I'm frustrated because I can't seem to get going on certain things I know I need to do for myself. I wonder if the star chart would help motivate me like it did so many years ago. Like remembering to take my eye makeup off at night. I want to do it every night. I know it will only take two minutes, but when I’m ready for sleep, two minutes feels like two extra hours, and all I want to do at that point is get into my bed. So, yes, I skip it many nights.

Honestly, I really don’t care if I wake up in the morning with raccoon eyes. It shouldn’t feel like such a big deal, to admit that I stink at being a responsible woman who takes care of my skin as well as I should. But admiting that fact make me feel like I’m wearing a scarlet letter. No woman in her rightful mind says it aloud either. And when we do admit it to our close girlfriends, we giggle at the relief to know we’re not the only ones.

There are those girls who wouldn’t dream of sleeping with their makeup on. Those girls have hour-long rituals of mud masks and toners, lotions and potions and bottles of hopeful magic. Those girls have drawers full of the latest and greatest in skin-care who-ha and all the latest rage they learn about from their shiny Vogue magazines. I’m definitely not one of those girls.

Sometimes, however, I long to be that girl… who sits on a chaise in front of a well-lit mirror, in a long silky robe with kitten heel slippers at her dressing table, dressing for dinner. The woman who has oodles of time to pay attention to herself. I am that woman when I’m on vacation. Then, I allow myself a whole hour and a half to get dressed in a beautiful marble hotel bathroom, vino in hand, jazz on the radio. I take my sweet time to pluck, shave, trim, inspect, moisturize, glamorize, spritz, curl my lashes, flatten my hair and otherwise enjoy the rituals of womanhood.

But in my reality, I wash and brush with one hand and tear my puppy Casey off my robe with the other. I’m an on-the-go kind of mothery-professional-sort-of-career-girl who wears cargo pants and flip flops to work just because I can. Dressing, like I do on vacation, is a luxury. In my daily life, reality is only getting the fuck dressed and out of the house, kids washed, brushed and fed, shoes on, backpacks packed, and oh, yes, there’s lunch to be made this morning too, plus I’m ten minutes late. I’m tossing the waffles in the sink that my kid asked for and microwaving a second breakfast of pancakes that she didn’t because she changed her mind. I’m getting the dog walked, poop scooped, and sufficiently hydrated and energized. I’m running back into the house, maybe once, usually twice, because I’ve forgotten something. All before 8am.

So when I say looking in the mirror while applying mascara is a luxury, you can see the picture. But there are some things I should do to take better care of myself, like remove my makeup at night. For once, I should make myself a priority again. Because only then will I take an extra minute to do something nice, and god forbid, healthy, for myself.

I had that brilliant epiphany the other weekend. Tonight, though, days later, after all that self-insight, I still have yet to do anything about it. I figured if I reward myself for completing the goal, not only will my chart be filled with lots of gold stars, but I’ll teach myself a new, good-for-me habit. My skin will thank me for it too. And then I can reward myself with that cute lip plumper I saw online at Sephora, because I always wished I had a pouty mouth. Then, as my motto goes, I will deserve it.

My girfriend Lexi

The other day, I had a long conversation with my friend Lexie. I thanked her for being one of my best friends. She’s always there for me when I need her. Sometimes, I rely on her to calm me down when I get all out of whack. I have a tendency to overreact, over-think, over-analyze, over-process, over-over-over everything. Talking to her helps bring me down from the ledge (or cave) I want to jump off of or crawl into. She helps me sort through the clutter and find reason. She reminds me that I’m not Superwoman or Woman of the Year, and that’s okay. She holds my hand when I start to panic that I can’t finish it all, be the best, find perfection, and overcome every challenge I throw in my own way.

Through our conversations, I realized how much I’ve been able to breathe deeper lately and not care so much about everything. Not sweat the small things. In planning my girls’ trip this year, the group is debating where to go. Planning a girls trip should not be so difficult. Usually I care and I care a lot. This year, I realize it doesn’t matter where I go, if I’m with my girls. I’ll even go back to the place we swore off in the first place. It just doesn’t matter because I know I’ll have fun. Lexie, however, was asked to stay home. If she can’t contribute to the conversation, she’s not welcome in it.

Being as laid back as Lexie has wonderfully therapeutic benefits. If you don’t put too much time into agonizing over every single detail, decisions are easier to make. It doesn’t have to be perfect, the best, the greatest. It doesn’t matter so much because it will all be good. Wherever we decide to go. Letting up on just a little frees up quite a bit of stress. Allowing others to help—or take charge of things, even—doesn’t mean it’s not going to get done right, as I always believed. It may not be done just so, like I would do it, but it will get done in another equally good fashion. I sort of like the vacation from it, actually.

Lexie reminds me that life is too short. I have to enjoy the life I was given. The body I live inside. The mind’s space I occupy. The cards I was dealt. She helps me dispose of the unproductive thoughts and focus on what matters. It’s much more productive for me to focus on a few important things at once than endless unimportant things all at the same time. I’ve learned from Lexie to stop fixating on the bad stuff I can’t change and work on the good stuff that I can make great. I’m not saying I’m all the way there yet, but I’m sure trying.

I’m lucky to have Lexie in my life. Hope all of you have your Lexie too.

39 is better than 29.

Today is my 39th birthday. I was dreading it, but now that it’s here, it’s not feeling quite as painful as I imagined. A few weeks ago, when I was wallowing in my dread of this day, I wrote a about ignoring my birthday. Today, feeling happier, I thought I’d follow up with some good news about turning 39. In no particular order, here’s why 39 is better than 29:

I smell the roses. A decade ago, I was so busy chasing my dreams and trying to fulfill my life’s purpose, I never stopped to enjoy it. Once I reached a hurdle, there was always another one around the corner. Something else to tackle. Another goal to pursue. Now that I’ve reached the major life milestones, career, husband, family, home, I allow myself the opportunity to sit back and appreciate all the good things in my life.

Acceptance is easier. I’m more accepting of my strength and weakness. I tried for three decades to improve my weaknesses with marginal improvement. Now, I’m focusing on making my strengths shine. I am who I am, good with the bad. I have to accept that, as I’m doing more so now, than constantly trying to better myself at the sake of my sanity.

I’m more comfortable in the grey. Life for me was always black and white, highs and lows. Life revolved around drama and I thrived on it. Because without drama, life moved in the grey. The mundane, boringness of everyday life. I didn’t like being there. I wasn’t comfortable in it. I always needed ups and downs to keep me going and something to look forward to. A dinner date. A vacation. A deadline. Now, I’m more okay with just being.

I’m calmer. If you know me, that’s huge progress. To relax, to do nothing, to just be. To take things in stride. To not over think. To not dwell. To not read into something that wasn’t there. To take things at face value. To not question everything. Even when my body was still, my mind would race at every moment. Now I have more peace in my brain and in my life. Grey is a good color on me now.

I have better relationships. My connections to my family and my friends is what gives meaning to my life. My bond with those that I care about runs deep and is my lifeblood. In my teens and twenties, it was about volume, now it’s about quality.

I’m thankful. I’m thankful for every one who’s impacted my life positively and hope I let you know it. Often. Because if not today, then when? Why wait to say I love you when I’m thinking it now? Maybe I’m mushy. But I consider that one of my strengths.