Twilight

My thirteen year old daughter has become enthralled with Twilight, the novel by Stephenie Meyers. She adores the movie, too, and thinks Robert Pattinson in the character of Edward the hunky vampire, is a dish. (She wouldn't use or understand that word, but I like it).

So... in the interest of understanding my darling daughter's infatuation with the series of novels and the movie and the character, I read Twilight, and watched the movie with her. I recently finished the second book in the series, New Moon, and am on the waiting list at the library for the third book. So I didn't hate it, or think it was stupid or ridiculous.

(Please note that if I had hated the book, or was bored by it, I would not have finished it, and certainly wouldn't have read the sequel.) I did find it engaging. I understand why young girls find it so appealing. I would have loved it when I was a teenager. The writing is not great, but the story is rich with romance and danger and heroism and melodrama.

The most interesting thing to me about the story, is the portrayal of Edward. Okay, so he's a vampire - this is not an new idea, there are plenty of novels featuring vampires. But Edward is a vampire with a romantic heart. (Huge sigh.)
He is immensely concerned about not hurting this fragile human girl, Bella. (Huge sigh.) He loves her, but he can't have his cake and eat her too. (If he eats her, he will kill her.) What to do , what to do....

So Edward is torn. He is a tender, loving, adoring, protective, beautiful (Meyer makes sure we understand how beautiful Edward is by having Bella point this out to the reader about a bazillion times), dangerous, mysterious, communicative, silent vampire. And the most believable part of that description is: vampire.

Girlfriends, I wasted a lot of my life and hurt a lot of people, including some perfectly nice men, with my foolish desires to fall in love with a man who was tender, loving, adoring, protective, beautiful, dangerous, mysterious, communicative, and silent all at the same time. And like, Bella, I wanted to be entirely consumed by the love of this man. Heck, why not expect him to be a bloodsucking Superman too?

I don't know at what point I got fantasy confused with reality in my little head.
It took me until the "twilight" of my own life, or late afternoon at least, to learn the difference. I want my daughter to enjoy her fantasy novels, but I hope she knows that they are just fantasies, and while fantasy is fun, it can't compare to the joy of real life and real love with a real person.

Here's a joke: Why is it difficult to find men who are sensitive, caring and good- looking?

They already have boyfriends.

What kind of god is that?

I must have blocked this from my mind at the time it happened. Some things are too horrific to think about, especially when there is nothing you can do about them. But today on the radio someone mentioned it again. I was driving at the time and nearly had to pull over to vomit. As it was, a huge wave of grief rose up inside me and poured out of me in violent sobs.

A 13 year old girl is raped. Gang-raped. Hurt. Terrified. Bullied. Beat up. Injured. Violated. Treated like meat.

Somebody's precious daughter, somebody's beloved child.

And instead of being helped, cared for, and comforted, she is accused of adultery, dragged out to an arena, buried up to her neck, then stoned to death by 50 MEN, while she begged for mercy.

"Please, please, don't kill me!"

Somebody's precious daughter, somebody's beloved child.

Who are these men? Why are they so vicious, so cowardly, so power-hungry? Didn't God create little girls? Doesn't God love what God created? What kind of God wants little girls to be brutally murdered by crowds of men? What kind of god is that? What kind of god needs to be protected from little girls by a gang of bloodthirsty thugs? What kind of god is that? That is a man-made god, created in man's image to excuse man's vile acts.

Tonight I am going home and taking my 13 year old daughter in my arms, and I'm never letting her go.

Somebody's precious daughter, somebody's beloved child.

Wrong Thong

This is the generation gap: my 13 year old comes to me and idly says, "I don't see why people say that thongs are uncomfortable."

I say, "oh, I don't think they're uncomfortable. I wore thongs everyday when I was a child."

Daughter stares at me. "You did?"

"Sure," I say, "remember I grew up in warm climates. We either wore thongs or nothing at all."

Daughter stares at me, eyes wide. "Wha-a-a-t?"

"Well, except for school," I say, "we had to wear good shoes for school. We couldn't wear our flip flops for school, only for play."

Daughter laughs with great, hilarious relief. "Flip flops! I was talking about thong underwear!"

If I were a lesbian

Sometimes I play a game with myself: If I were a lesbian..what would I find attractive in a woman?
(Not trying to offend anyone here, straight or gay, it's just a quirky mental exercise.)

The way this game came about is a little weird: I was attempting to write a romance novel and I just couldn't get the female characters down. The men were easy - I know what I like about men, I know what's attractive about men. But women - what do men like about women? What's attractive in a woman's style, attitude, face, figure, voice? I mean, I know what I see on TV shows and movies: big boobs, long legs, blonde hair, big eyes, pouty lips, voice maybe a little husky. But most women don't fit that description, and most of us find romance just the same. So no matter what Hollywood thinks is a man's ideal woman, it ain't necessarily accurate. And I didn't want all my female characters to be busty, long-legged, blonde sex sirens. I wanted them to be normal.

So I began looking at women in a different way: I tried to be a man, tried to make my straight female brain think like a straight male brain. It was really tricky. My brain got very tired. You know, boobs just don't turn me on. I can't figure out why men like boobs so much.
Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike boobs - I'm very friendly with my own pair, I like them just fine, but I don't get the big deal than men make over them (in general, not mine in particular).
So then I had to think like a woman again and figure out what it was about men that I like so much: the sound of a man's voice, the lower timbre, I like that very much; whiskers, kissing a face rough with whiskers; the angles of a man's face, neck, shoulders - subtly different than a woman; muscles. I guess I don't know why - the mystery is a part of the attraction, right?

So then I tried looking at women as if I was a woman attracted to women: and that was interesting to me. I - the imaginary I- am not attracted to famous Hollywood sex symbol starlet types. (Probably because I'm not a man.)

What I am discovering (because this is an ongoing game), is that the women who are appealing to my imaginary other self, are women with soft, gentle personalities, some of them are women that might be called "mousy" (in another time and another generation). They are not beautiful, according to modern standards, but they are pretty in their own way. They are modest, they are not overdone with stylish clothes, hairstyles or make up - although they dress neatly and nicely, and wear make up. I've only seen these women in public places and did not know them personally, so this is really an incomplete experiment. My very brief encounters with them include exchanges like "Paper or plastic?" and "Have a nice day," and "Here, let me get that door for you..."

Then there are my friends, the various women I've known throughout my life - and none of them are women I would be attracted to if I were a lesbian. They've been great friends, but I can't imagine a romantic attachment. My best friends in my life have been women who were gregarious, joyful, big-hearted, funny, world-embracing types, the opposite of my own shy, wallflower, vuja-de (see my other blog), shrinking from the world type personality.

Anyway, I have no idea where this post is going, just that it's always interesting trying to see things from a different perspective. I have to go rest my brain now and watch a Russell Crowe movie.

"What's wrong with you people??"

So my son now has his driver's license. Off he drives to run a personal errand, so I give him a list, "while you're out shopping....please buy some milk, bread, peanut butter and jam." How nice for me, that I won't have to go shopping after work.

Several hours later.....my son pulls the milk out of the fridge, "Whaaaaaat???" he exclaims to his sisters, "It's already half gone??? I just bought this milk at noon!!! What's wrong with you people?"

I can't help it - I smile. Oh, the satisfaction of hearing those words from someone else's mouth - someone else's mouth which was frequently drinking up all the milk I had just bought. I feel a wicked laugh coming on. Hahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahaha

The Uterus as Tracking Device

One of the funniest comedy routines Roseanne Barr does is about how husbands and kids think moms know where everything is. "Honey, have you seen my crescent wrench?" "Mom, where' s my backpack?" As if a uterus is also a tracking device.

Recently at work one of my coworkers received a frantic call from her 11 year old daughter, "Where are my swim goggles?" My friend tried to talk her daughter through the problem to help her find the goggles, finally hung up the phone. Then she told me her husband was home with her daughter.

I recounted my experience: when I was driving to Texas in a dense thunderstorm after learning that my mother had had a stroke, my 15-year-old son called me on my cell phone, "Where's my gameboy??" he demanded. For some reason he thought I had his gameboy with me, maybe he'd left it in the car, and seriously expected that I would turn around and come back to return it.

Meanwhile, while I'm telling my coworker about this incident, the phone rings again, and another coworker answers it and begins talking to her frantic young son, "I don't know where it is," she tells him, "where did you see it last?" Her husband, by the way, is also home with the child.

Apparently dads don't have tracking devices embedded in their bodies.

I made a dinner late this afternoon, before I left for work at 4:45 p.m. I was using a Rachel Ray cookbook, and was really hoping this would be a tasty meal. Before I could finish it, I had to leave. I left the beef simmering in its sauce and told my 18 year old to turn if off after ten minutes ( I also set a timer). I told her there was cauliflower already cooked and in a pot at the back of the stove. Then, feeling like a virtuous wife and mother who has provided quality sustenance for her husband and children, I went to work (to earn the money to buy the bacon which I then will cook up in a pan, blah, blah, blah).

About 7:30 my youngest daughter called and I asked how she liked the dinner I had cooked. She said, "Huh? What dinner?" I reminded her that she had been in the kitchen while I was cooking. She denied knowledge of me cooking or her eating anything. I asked to speak to her father.
"Did you eat?" I asked brightly, hoping for compliments on a fine meal.
"Um, yeah." he mumbled. "
"How was it?" I asked eagerly. "Was it good?
"Huh?"
"The food I made! I cooked dinner, I left it simmering on the stove!"
"Oh. No I didn't get any of that."
"You didn't get to eat?" I asked, confused.
"Oh, don't worry about me," he said, obviously trying to reassure me that my hubby had not gone hungry. "I made myself a sandwich."

Another 2 hours in the kitchen wasted. I could have been taking a nap, or reading a book, or walking a dog in the bright autumn sunshine, instead of stuck inside my steaming kitchen, trying to read a recipe and chop vegetables and slice steak all at the same time. I could have saved the eleven dollars I spent on the steak and spent it on chocolate for myself. I could have taken a bubble bath and gone to work smelling sweet and flirty instead of greasy and meaty.

You know, I really wanted to be one of those very domestic women who cook fabulous meals, whose kitchen is always filled with the aroma of baking bread and hearty soup and brownies.
A woman whose family troops in, tired after a hard day, and is comforted and uplifted by the sight of Mom standing in the kitchen, ready to dispense hugs and plates of warm, wholesome, delicious food. But to fulfill that fantasy, and it is a lovely fantasy, I'm gonna need a new family.

PS - To be fair and honest - later that evening when I got home, I filled a plate with the meat and vegetables I had made from Rachel Ray's recipe, and I was not impressed. That was a lot of work to make, and it was boring. At least the dogs loved the gravy.