The End of the World As We Know It

And with all of these new beginnings coming to pass, I am pressed to tell you of yet another. One that is not so routine and not so anticipated.

It is a reluctant new beginning. A beginning with far less excitement but just as much trepidation as starting Middle School.

J. and I have begun to slowly untangle our lives from one another.

Pause for reaction.

It has been a less-than-graceful dance for sure. Riddled with fits and starts. Neither of us willing partners in the tearing apart. Neither of us fleeing the other. But on some level coming to terms, inch by inch, night by night, milestone by milestone, with the fact that we are not what we intended to be for each other anymore. However unfathomable that is.

It is the saddest thing I have had to accept. I love J. Adore him. I mourn the loss of the life we’d hoped for and dreamed about having together. But clinging to it will not bring it back. It is truly gone.

I know we’ve thrown away the baby with the bathwater. There are things I’d be naïve to expect to ever have with another person. Facets of our life together that made me feel whole and happy, when the odds on whole and happy were pretty grim. Things that endure even now. Things that are rare and beautiful and coveted.

But we have stopped being a source of peace and happiness for one another – and if you can’t be those, well, what are you? A source of angst and misery? And while I’d love to believe we will remain friends after all this life together, I’d be insane to think that we could. And that leaves me heartbroken. J. is truly my dearest friend. And a friend is a very hard thing to lose.

But I don’t think it would be fair for me to call him and expect him to help me snake my bathtub drain again when it seems an entire toupee or even a live cat has been caught in it. Or for me expect him to care that my garden has been taken over by Deadly Nightshade again. Or to expect him to be elated for me when I win the lottery, or book a great vacation or my child gets into a wonderful school. Or to expect him to empathize when I go on a date with someone I think might be fabulous only to learn that he is a total putz with hellacious manners, and poor grammar and a wife already. Or to act like he gives a shit when my ex-husband takes me to court to demand more child support because I got promoted. No. He loves me but this type of friendship would be expecting too much. All bets are off.

And for that I am profoundly regretful. Because no matter what, I love J. for who he is, and who he has been, and who he will always be. I will always want to tear his ex-wife’s brittle, over-processed hair out of her mishapen head in fistfuls for her unrelenting attempts to take just a little more from him. I will always want to turn a cartwheel, however awkwardly, when he lands a big account. I will always hear his reassuring voice resonating in my dreams. I will always want him to know how much I appreciated all that he did for me, when I was so hateful I would not have done anything nice for me. I will always want to know if he is unwell or troubled so I can be a voice of comfort and reason when the hens are clucking around him making matters worse.

But for now, those will be unpoken thoughts. Private matters. Matters of the heart only.

So I am starting life a-new.
It just doesn’t feel so smooth and shiny.
And it certainly is not wrapped up in a big red bow.

Looking in My Rear View Mirror, I Saw Myself One Car Back

I bee-line it to the back of the lot with my children and get into my car, rev the engine and prepare for takeoff.

But like all things at Our Lady of Condemnation, there are rules about this. It must be done fairly and in an orderly fashion. And provoke a maximum amount of frustration.

So as I sit in my car, listening to my children chatter and argue about all manner of pre-pubescent issues, from who has a pimple to who has B.O., to who likes whom, to whose sister told the entire lunch table that he wets the bed, I am growing more and more frustrated with the Pick Up Line.

It's only fair, that we should be dismissed in an orderly fashion. But it is not necessarily the order in which we arrived.

Where when we pulled in, we populated rows from left to right, we are dismissed in columns, right to left. Which makes no difference at all when you were jammed into the last row barely squeaking in between the next car and the iron fence. But people who made it a point to arrive well before the appointed hour are a little pissed under the best of circumstances. It's like when you wait in the turning lane for a whole light series and the bonehead in front of you has positioned his car so as to not trip the signal to let the arrow people go next.

Completely fair or not, it makes no sense at all. Because while many of us are in our cars, motors running and prepared to get the hell out of Dodge, there are a number of parents, okay, mothers mostly, either still in the gym, or standing in the general vicinity of their cars, carrying on lengthy conversations with other mothers, while the rest of us wait.

Horns are blaring. High beams are being flashed. Obscenities yelled from darkened cars. Still, these clueless parents prattle on and on with no end in sight while my children yawn and fade in the back seat. It is, after all, crowding in on 8:30.

Some of them actually acknowledge that they are holding up the works, point their keyless entry fobs in the general direction of their vehicles and let their kids scramble among the (motionless) cars to get in and take a load off.

Yet the mothers themselves - THE DRIVERS - remain engrossed in conversation, evidently so crucial to national security that it can not be delayed, interrupted, continued at a later date and time, or truncated in any way.

And all the while, those cars who remain BEHIND them in the all-important line, wait with homicidal thoughts that are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.

And if the column next to you should afford enough space for you to go around the unoccupied car in front of you while its driver yammers on oblivious to the mayhem for which they are the root cause, one of the over-zealous volunteer parents will throw himself in front of your car to prevent you from recklessly careening through the lot headed for the exit the like the one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, surely a danger to yourself and others.

And so we wait. And beep and flash our high beams. And swear from our cars not caring if the dashboard lights reveal our identities.

And when we are afforded freedom from the oppression of the Pick Up Line, we do not refrain from glaring at these mothers from our cars as they look back at us with innocent inability to comprehend what the hell you could be so pissed about.

God Bless Us, Everyone

All the catechists stand looking pious near the stage (The gym doubles as an auditorium – and when it does, we are all asked to share our talent for restacking chairs against the walls before leaving the pageant, or devotion, or parent meeting.)

The children are antsy and looking around anxiously for their rescue parents and it is growing louder in spite of Madame Church Lady’s attempts to shush them.

Even though we have just said our closing prayer, we must remain while one final blessing is bestowed upon us all before we dash out to enjoy a week of debauchery and idol worship.

I am standing next to a mother whose demeanor and breath sounds are not unlike a bull that is viciously anticipating goring an arrogant matador.

She church whispers, “This should have been done by now,” and then widens her eyes in disbelief when, after the Amens have been mumbled and we have all Father, Son and Holy Ghosted ourselves one more time, Madame Church Lady begins to remind the children of a few gravely important, last minute things:

- To bring peanut butter or jelly or both to the food drive for the children who don’t have all the gifts we regularly enjoy.
- To remind their (heathen) Confirmation sponsors that their letters and eligibility forms are due
- That October is Respect for Life Month (so don’t go scheduling any abortions!)
- Blah blah blah blah blah. Yakkety yakkety yakkety.

And all the while the children and their agitated parents are thinking:

- I missing Dancing with the Stars.
- I still have to finish my science project
- I have hours of laundry folding and lunch packing to complete
- I am going to pee my pants if we don’t get out of here soon

And then, unable to tolerate even one more sweetly enunciated syllable, the bull-like lady finally comes untethered from her moorings and stomps over to where her child is fidgeting with the contents of his RES folder, grabs him by the sleeve of his jacket, spins defiantly and ushers him out the back door to the parking lot.

I am shocked that some volunteer posse of RES police do not attempt to detain her while Madame Church Lady prattles the last remaining comments about some approaching feast day for St. John the Dwarf.

But human nature is what it is, and once one kid has gone over the wall, there is nothing to stop the others.

It is pandemonium as children race about the gym to find their reconnaissance parent.
And in our effort to avoid eye contact with the catechists who are shaking their heads and clucking in “they know not what they do” superiority, we bolt for the doors to get in our car.

And there, friends, is where the real fun begins.

Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep! His Horn Goes BeepBeepBeep!

Now all the horns are going. The regular citizens are cursing at the RES vehicles. The RES drivers are screeching insults at the frantic volunteers. The volunteers are infighting out of sheer frustration.

It's like when the Titanic crew realized they were a few dozen life boats short.

And then someone gets the bright idea that if each car takes three giant steps forward and Mother-May-I's its way a few feet closer to the building and (gasp!) a few inches closer to the bumper in front of it covered in stickers pleading for your organs to be donated and for you to break for some unfortunate species, we might just be able to squeeze in the last few remaining overheating cars.

Of course, the volume problem would be solved entirely if they'd just unlock the gates to the damn Pit.

But rules are rules.

I park my car where I'm told, slam the door impressively, glare at the spineless volunteer until he turns away, and march into the gym to take my place among the other seething parents. And the parents who have been there for hours and have the blood pressure and heart rate of the Dalai Lama.

It's 8:02 pm and the children have not yet returned to the gym.

In fact, Madame Church Lady has just opened the mike to the ancient PA system and is just now crackling to her charges about a closing prayer.

Which we are encouraged to recite along with them - and which will be completed before the children are dismissed.

Dismissed to be walked in obedient single-file lines into the gym where they will be seated in the same lines in front of the little pieces of paper bearing their classroom numbers, and wait to be dismissed again.

While a string of obscenities takes shape in the boiling head of Pissy Patty Potty Mouth.

Damn This Traffic Jam

Since I only have one child still in the purgatory that is RES, I drop her off and generally I run an errand with my son - eyebrow wax for me, or new gym uniform for him, or maybe a trip to a water ice place before it gets too cold to enjoy a gelato.

But the sense of order and control is short-lived and overshadowed with a sense of impending doom. RES ends at 8 pm - and I must retrieve my child from the inspired madness fueled by untrained volunteers.

A few minutes before 8, I make my approach to Our Lady of Condemnation.

The lot is nearly full - at 8 minutes to the hour! Do these people have nothing better to do than to sit and while away precious moments behind the wheels of their minivans? Are their lives so bereft of meaning that they'd voluntarily spend a free hour idling in their environmentally conscientious hybrid vehicles just to get a favorable spot in the parking lot?

I cruise past the mayhem and around the corner to The Pit - the lower parking lot that doubles as a playground. As if playing were allowed at Our Lady of Condemnation.

It is the Rebel Lot.

Because the RES folks (the BOARD?) want to be able to say they have things completely under control, the gates to The Pit, like tonight, are often closed. A deterrent for lazier rebels.

Not that easily defeated, I do what I generally do - for myself and in service to the other rebels. I put the car in neutral, yank on the parking brake, and go to prop open the gates. (I've broken many a nail moving the trash can in front of the gate that tends to drift...)

But this time, the RES tyrants have gotten wise to us. They've locked the #%&*%$ gates.

I am swearing on church property.

Pissed beyond the point of redemption, I return to my car, and lay wheels all the way through the neighborhood that abuts Our Lady of Condemnation, circle the rectory, and return to the parking lot "manned" by the volunteers who believe themselves to be doing God's work.

It, like the lot on the Sundays when there is a "special Mass," is jammed to capacity (because no one has ever done the math and figured out that X cars will never fit in a lot designed for X-Y cars. Even if you remove their hats. Popes in a Volkswagon!) The volunteers have directed all of the drivers to park in nice neat columns and rows in the exact order in which they appeared in the lot.

And now, about 6 cars are in various positions half way in and half way out of the lot, or blocking a lane of traffic, or impeding the progress of drivers in the opposite lane of traffic.

While the local police officer keeps a watchful eye, preserving order and preventing road rage.

Pissy Patty Potty Mouth is about to make another appearance.

Manic Monday

And of course, as if there weren’t enough after-dinner obligations, there is the annual return to RES. Like the swallows to San Juan Capistrano only with no festival and no parade and no joyous bell ringing and no guarantee that anyone will be protected inside the walls of the church.

RES – known back in the day as Sunday School, and then CCD (whatever that stood for). I am not even clear what RES stands for. Religious Education for the Spawn of Hell?

RES is on Mondays. No longer offered on Sunday. Which is fine by me because 75 minutes of force fed religious education followed by an hour of Mass is a little too much squirming quietly in the hands of God in our dress-up clothes for my children.

There are two Monday options. There is 4 pm Monday class. Attended only by those children who have a parent at home coloring with them all day and maybe making meals for shut-ins.

And there is 6:45 pm. Which all of the apparent wards of the state attend.

So one night a week, I race from my office and break every traffic convention getting in the door by 6, to warm up a pre-assembled meal I prepared the night before under duress, choke down a plateful while discussing homework, and permission slips, and quiz grades, and what child visited which injustice to the other on the walk home, and then inspecting each of their clothes, hands and faces for cleanliness.

It is one thing to be the spawn of Hell. It is another thing altogether to look like the spawn of Hell.

And then we race to Our Lady of Condemnation with all the other inhabitants of Hell, to be guided through the drop off line by some volunteer parents, so some other enthusiastic volunteer parents can assist the children in getting safely from the car to the building.

Are we in Beirut?

And though the drop off line is a total pain and completely without value, what galls me the most is that it reminds me of what I am in store for with these overly zealous volunteer parents when I return in 75 minutes.

The Three Stooges episode that is The Pickup Line.

School Daze

I am certain I have contracted Black Lung from having navigated the sub-basement halls of the Middle School two nights in a row.

Or maybe it is just some errant germ that rubbed off on me from one of the other parents jammed into the aging hallways that are half the width due to the "renovation."

And they cram a bunch of fast-moving pre-teens with escalating hormone levels in here everyday with 4 minutes to get to class? Better get some of that nasal spray you use to avoid getting an airborne illness breathing the recycled in-flight air.

And once again, I get the full-strength pleasure of sitting with Lars for an evening of entertainment. I am not so entertained, but those around us are, no doubt.

Lars has no discernible ability to go with the flow. I can't tell whether it is blind ignorance or plain old fashioned rude disregard for anyone else. But his agenda, no matter how pathetic, takes precedence over all else.

For instance, we have, as a classroom full of parents, exactly 10 minutes to hear what the teacher feels is important for us to know, and for us to quietly assess how warm and fuzzy or strict and miserable he or she is, how his or her grading system works, what his or her behavioral/conduct/classroom/workstyle hot buttons are, and how best to reach him or her in the event of some kind of earth shattering academic crisis.

Lars, in his unwavering focus on himself, needs to grab the last waning seconds of our time together to monopolize the teacher to talk about our child. He makes his approach just as she has dismissed us seconds ahead of the bell so we might go on creaking knees to the next class.

I am not saying that everyone does not secretly desire to chat one to one with the teacher. Everyone else just realizes that that is what conferences are for.

And since there is nothing of any real substance to discuss 10 days and two holidays into the academic calendar, the teachers have little to say (even when they realize which pupil belongs to this particular lunatic). So Lars proceeds to ask leading questions - questions asked for the purpose of eliciting compliments and reassuring comments about our child's academic potential.

I have been hovering nearby, ready to disrupt any uncomfortable moments, and hoping to muster the courage to cover his face with a Wawa bag to get him to stop if necessary, when I realize in horror, that by standing there, I am an inadvertent party to the assault on the poor teacher.

I close my gaping mouth and turn to go to the next class. I am hoping to find a seat at a table with no room for Lars when he arrives.

Me and Julio Down By The School Yard

The gym is packed and people are standing and sitting wherever they can find a spot that gives them an almost acceptable view of the projector screen, in front of which Madam Powerschool is apologizing for its quality. And the lack of sound equipment.

Excuse me? Haven’t we done this before?

And further, haven’t we had all summer to prepare for this moment?

Impressed beyond description, I traipse through the corridors recently deemed fit for human in inhabitation to the wing which houses my son’s homeroom and science room. There, his teacher has begun to tell other parents that yes, he is the same Mr. Capistrano that they had decades ago. He’s in his 34th year. Retiring in June.

As I am making a mental note that there will be no heavy educational lifting on my son’s behalf during Mr. C’s twilight semesters, my was-band schleps in.

And while Mr. C is reviewing the curriculum in a thumbnail sketch, Lars is stage whispering a bunch of questions to me and scrambling my brain waves as only he can.

As I attempt to ignore him – keeping my eyes on Mr. C and pointing toward him as if to say “He has my attention at the moment, asswipe.” Lars raises his sweaty hand and begins to ask the kinds of questions Back To School Night teachers hate universally.

The ones that are not general and helpful to everyone in the room, like “What is your policy on incomplete homework?” but focused instead on one kid.

His kid.

Our kid.

I want to vanish.
In my next life I will have vanishing powers.

“Ummm – we don’t live in the same house,” he begins with an offhand gesture toward me. “The text book you sent home today – can we get another copy? The other one is at HER house." (Accompanying grimace and hitch hiker thumb thrust disrespectfully in my direction.)

Mr. C. says – more appropriately to the entire collection of parents – that he’d be happy to accommodate any situation like that. Write him a note so he can take care of it promptly.

Lars is pissed. A note? Can’t believe he needs a note. He just told him the situation.

Well, buttstick, because there will be 30 of those questions asked tonight, albeit more privately. How is anyone supposed to remember your idiosyncratic need tomorrow when the whiteboards have all been wiped clean with your son’s sock?

As the bell rings and we file out, I place an already written request for the extra book to be sent home into Mr. C's hand so Lars can lower his neurosis. And I vow to send a nice bottle of wine to Mr. C. at Christmas to make up for the rudeness. One class down. Six to go.

And I'm Never Goin' Back To My Old School

Back to School Night.
Does anyone actually benefit from it?

Let me ask that question a different way.

Does anyone besides the completely clueless, neurotic, not sure they can do anything right as a parent actually benefit from it?

I have two (that I am under tremendous social pressure) to attend this year. One for 6th grade and one for 7th grade. Both in the insane asylum that is Middle School.

And two because there is such an appreciable difference between 6th and 7th grade. And between last year's intro to 6th grade and this year's.

And so for two nights in a row, I am back at the very school that I attended so long ago it was still called Junior High. It is as though I have stepped out of a time machine. Only not in a good way.

First, the place is being "renovated." Renovated instead of knocked over to start from scratch. As a matter of money.

As if there aren't thousands of graduates, particularly from the 70s and 80s who wouldn't happily shell out a king's ransom for a raffle where the prize is that you get to put your name and a smart-assed comment and maybe a few pictures of some especially despised classmates or teachers or coaches on the wrecking ball. Throw in a champagne toast to sweeten the pot.

So we have to gather in the gym because the wing with the auditorium is condemned for the moment. I enter through one of the few doors that is not obstructed by heavy machinery and find myself in what is still known as "The Connecting Corridor." So called because back in the day it connected the Junior High to the High School. Purgatory to Hell itself.

I have traveled that far back in the Wayback Machine.

And to demonstrate just how little things have changed, as I step into the Connecting Corridor, I am face to face with the mural that was painted by the guy I dated in High School who went on to become a favorite local mural artist beautifying depressed neighborhoods across the city. An artist who painted this particular mural as his senior project in Art School. An artist who, like myself, will soon be getting AARP literature in the mail.

I traipse the oddly unchanged route to the gym and am disturbed but not exactly surprised to find the same peeling paint in that same institutional shade of yellow often used to brighten spaces that lack even a single ray of natural lighting. And the same exposed plumbing and wire work that is painted black in an attempt to minimize the assault to one's senses. And the same icky damp gummy-looking spot in the corner where the hallway turns from the cafeteria section to the gym and shop section. The source of dampness evidently still under investigation all these years later.

I am struggling to thwart the impulse to run screaming from the building.

Hell in a Handbag

I leave a message with the secretary.

Msgr. leaves me a message.

I leave another one with the secretary.

Msgr. leaves another one for me.

By now Sweet Polly Purebread is Pissy Patty Potty Mouth.

My last call to the saintly patient secretary begs her indulgence through gritted teeth. Can she pass along a detailed message? Does she have a pen? Does she have it in her hand? OK – here goes.

I edit what I want to say with the talent of a seasoned litigator. I speak as slowly as my escalating blood pressure will allow. I try not to sound too judgy or disinterested in what ever it is that the church thinks is a reasonable commitment to one’s education in the faith. I try my best to sound sincere. All I really want is to earn the right to figuratively thumb my nose at the Church Lady and spike the ball in the RES parking lot when I prance out of 9:30 Mass with a Get Out of Jail Free card.

Hours later, another person who is not Msgr. Gregory or his secretary leaves me yet another message. She informs me that Msgr. completely understands my situation and not to worry, there will be no documentation of absences for missing the two special Masses and they are happy to see us all at the 9:30 (which in my Pissy Patty Potty Mouth crankiness, I interpret as “we will be looking for you at the 9:30 Mass to make sure you are not just weaseling out of a Mass that conflicts with the first Eagles home game.”)

And then just moments later there is an e-mail from Church Lady.

I am kind of excited that she is writing to me to let me know that Msgr. gave her “the business” and she has to acknowledge the err of her ways and apologize for being such a tyrant about all things RES.

But that is not the subject of her e-mail.

No, it is another sugar-coated message to the parents of the RES kids. RES is hosting the next hospitality Sunday. And they need volunteers to serve coffee and doughnuts and clean up afterwards.

Hospitality Sunday is once a month after 9:30 Mass and it is intended to welcome new parishioners to the parish and give them a chance to get to know other members. My kids call it Doughnut Day. I call it Mom’s Opportunity to Avoid a $20 Trip to Starbucks.

The e-mail clearly has an appropriate purpose. RES is the host of the gig so should offer up some service to its execution.

But she can’t help herself. In her indelible belief that RES families do not go to Mass, and therefore would never have seen the giant posters in the vestibule beckoning us to come for coffee, or heard Father’s announcement at the end of Mass, we must all be scratching our empty little heads wondering what in the world Hospitality Sunday is!

And so then she goes, providing an over simplified elementary school introduction to what this enduring tradition involves.

Enlightening the pagans once again.

Church Lady

In all the frenetic back-to-school hoopla I'd nearly forgotten about the conflict over the RES special Mass I was rounding the final turn toward.

But soon enough Her Royal Piousness sends another cheerfully worded e-mail inviting all the boys and girls of t Our Lady of Condemnation to join the football team and the cheerleading squad – which will meet for practice at some inopportune time for any child whose parents hold jobs.

And just as I was muttering an expletive and striking the delete key, I remembered.

Miss Holiest of Holies has never responded to my request for the identity of someone of greater authority to whom I could appeal her (nit-wit) decision.

I find the last e-mail I sent to her and forward it to her again with a somewhat pissy-toned, decidedly demanding second message stating that I would like the courtesy of a reply from her, and expect it by the close of business that day.

I wonder if she knows what “close of business” means.

I am shocked when a plainly worded (not sugar plum fairy sweet) reply message appears in my mailbox moments later.

No greeting. No bestowing of blessings with her signature. In fact, no signature at all.

“You can call Msgr. Gregory.”

You can kiss my a**.
You can drop dead.
You can go to Hell.

That’s sort of the way it sounded.

And I am sure she was thinking that surely I would be put off by the notion of contacting Msgr Gregory. Shiver me timbers!

Well, what Madame Church Lady does not know is that my mother didn’t raise a shrinking violet. I would knock on the door of the Pope himself if that was the way to get this resolved.

Of course, I have to look up his number on the parish website, because the courtesy of her reply failed to courteously provide the information needed to do what she suggested.

I get the phone and dial. I am trying hard to think like a reasonable person when his secretary answers.

I am as sweet as Sweet Polly Purebread as I make my request. This is going to be good.

Be True To Your School

And then the games actually begin.

The first day of school ushers out the last semblance of relaxation and we begin the months long tear through volumes of academic material, reams of worksheets, stacks of required reading material, a gross of No. 2 pencils, pounds of erasers, dozens of glue sticks, and countless notes and papers and reminders and permission slips.

I have received exactly three notes so far on Power School. Power School is a blessing and a curse. It is essentially spyware so you can secretly take a good long look at your kids’ grade book and attendance record from the comfort of your desk at work and never bother the teacher, who swears her door is always open. I liked it better when they just called you or wrote a note. Now I get to go looking for trouble. I got the original mailing about passwords and log-ons in early August. In late August I got a new one stating that the old one was incorrect and to disregard it in favor of the new one (for each kid). And just today, a third telling me there was yet another glitch, and an additional one will be sent and to disregard anything about Power School that has been sent except the one you get on pink paper. And all of this gets to be lovingly copied for my ex-husband so he can butt in as he sees fit.

So much for unobtrusive spying.

It’s the first day of school and no one wants to budge from bed. Even though we all swore on a stack of Bibles the night before that we’d not make the morning a tap dance through the bowels of Hell.

So in record time and several hairstyles for her, 3 different shorts/shirt combinations for him, a pair of burned bagels, the swapping of several items in the lunch bag for other items of equal or lesser nutritional value, a couple of rushed photographs where the children feign being happy to stand by each other’s sides, and one scalding cup of coffee later, they are out the door and into the car, and soon enough I am dropping them off at a nearby corner, far enough away from the gathering crowd of Middle Schoolers that no one will see their mother kiss them.

And I am sadder than you’d think to see them dash across the street to join their friends without so much as a look back.

Accentuate the Positive

The hunt for all the accessories an 11 year old glamour-puss could desire begins at Claire's Boutique.

Have you been to Claire's? It is enough to give you a seizure disorder.

It is also a brilliant concept.

It completely consumes the heart and mind of an 11 year old girl - who is shopping with her mother's money - and her mother's empathy for what it was like to suddenly feel self conscious about your looks and worried that you would not keep up - suddenly the girl you used to swap nail polish with is your competition. Every girl for herself!

The place bombards your senses with loud music and lots of hot pink and black and animal print and marabou - to appeal to the emerging and fickle good girl/bad girl image that the prepubescent, hormonally-charged young things flit through the door with.

Floor to ceiling hair notions, locker accoutrement's, stow-away-in-your backpack hair brushes and mirrors and makeup and phone accessories.

Outrageous costume jewelry, scarves, purses, backpack decorations, patches - all that glitters and all that is coveted by the average red-blooded American pre-teen.

And they very slyly provide little pink fabric collapsible buckets - light and comfy to dangle on a little 6th grade arm - and easily capable of holding way more loot than the average pair of 11 year old hands.

A great big sign - BUY 3, GET 2 FREE- beckons my gal to the vast selection of hair thingies.

We simply must have ponytail holders and barrettes and clips and bands of every color and shape and embellishment so that we stand out in every crowd. As if her platinum blond locks on their own do not scream out her Marilyn Monroe-ness when she bops into a room?

And when the little pink bucket is nearly bulging with stuff - a disturbingly pretty young man comes to have a look, and quickly assesses what other things we'd be crazy not to consider in order to qualify for another two-fer, or to get in on two more free things by placing just one more hair extension in the bucket.

No fewer than $52 later, I exit Claire's Boutique and think I have found the latest competition for crack.

Fashion Is Not A Luxury

My daughter's t-shirt tells me so. Courtesy of Sarah Jessica Parker's clothing line "Bitten."

My daughter is about to take a big juicy bite out of my wallet, and girlfriend has her own ideas about style too.

The general rule is: The more embellishment, embroidery, frills, jewels, beads, sequins, bits of off-pattern fabric, appliques and art work the better.

And this year, since we are bent on attracting the attention of a certain artfully disheveled blond sixth grade heartthrob, we are maniacal about the cut, fit and appearance of pants, jeans, skirts and leggings - and have every intention of amassing a shoe collection that would impress Imelda Marcos.

So armloads of jazzy and bejeweled tops, and a dozen or so pants, jeans, leggings and skirts, and about two hours later, she is attempting to fleece me out of suede ankle boots, Ugg-style boots in an outrageous and impractical color, athletic shoes for gym, painted and bedazzled Chuck Taylors that will never touch the gym floor, metallic ballet flats, clogs (since flip flops are banned and we must have some type of slip on!) and fuzzy slippers just for fun.

And of course we must replenish socks, panties, training bras and pajamas that are somehow suddenly in dwindling supply.

I am going to start underfeeding her so she does not grow out of all of this stuff before Halloween.

So, bent over double under the weight of all the back to school loot, we leave the department store.

But we've really only covered the wardrobe.

We have not even begun to prepare for landing in the wild and untamed world of accessories.

The Boys Are Back in Town

And there is always the back to school clothes shopping haranguing experience.

First, the boy.

The sneakers must be high-end and noticeable. (Hello, Outlet Mall?) I manage to get him to buy into a mid-range pair of Nikes in the outrageous colors of his school. (Crimson and Gold, Thy praise we'll ever sing....) That way, when he wears his gym uniform, his sneaks match. Because if he had the ones he'd first eye-balled, in the colors of the Minnesota Vikings, on Gym Day he'd look like he was auditioning for the Comic Section of the Mummers at the New Year's Day Parade.

And the shirts. They must all be T-shirts. No golf shirts, or rugby shirts or (clutch the pearls!) button down shirts. T-shirts. The more irreverent the logo the better. Another parent actually chuckles as I try to explain the Nike shirt that reads "My 'swoosh' is bigger than your 'swoosh' and why it will get Mommy called into the Principal's office if he wears it.

We are at a skater store looking at cool and unnecessary gear. My son wants a rubber bracelet a la WWJD and Livestrong, both of which I think have their place in the American social cause psyche. But this rubber bracelet, which he, in a very practiced defense, claims to be oh-so-very supportive of breast cancer awareness (hello, you're in 7th grade) reads:

"I heart Boobies"

Really? Will you be accessorizing that with the pink ribbon pin I just paid $5 for at the mall because I am sure the minute I don't donate is the minute the breast cancer whammy comes to get me???

He claims that the kids flip it around so that some other innocuous message can be read by little old ladies and priests and college admissions officers the world over.

Does he really think I am that dumb?

"Mom, Dad said I could get it!" he argues.

Honey, Daddy is lost in a haze of alcohol and prescription pain meds, and if you told him you wanted to wear Daisy Dukes and Manolo heels to school he'd nod and say you should live your dream, like his pathetic, self absorbed mother never allowed him to do.

I Mom up and refuse the rubber bracelet claiming that I don't give one good God damn what other kids wear, and their mothers obviously don't care about them either.

My God we've been at the mall for less than an hour. I need a chardonnay and an energy drink to get me through what my daughter has in store for me.

See You in September

When I was in school, Back to School purchases were minimal and consistent across the globe, so it seemed.

In the early grades – a school bag, a cool lunch box (my sister had a Twiggy one!), a 1st day of school outfit, and a pair of new shoes that doubled as church shoes (until you dragged the toes of them trying to stop the wagon careening down the hill and left the suede in shreds…Joe!). Sneakers and haircuts were on an ad hoc basis.

At 4th grade, the list expanded to include a 3-ring binder of our choice, loose leaf paper in any new-fangled color but blue, and a blue pen or two, preferably housed in an optional pencil case.

In both cases, we got set of two No. 2 pencils and a steno pad-sized tablet with ruled paper with a grayish cast at the outset of each new semester.

By Junior High the list was not a list at all but at the discretion of the kid who needed to organize him or her self during the chaos and mayhem that are puberty and increased responsibility.

All that freedom of choice has gone out the window. We are not free to be you and me. You can no longer have it your way at Burger King. There is no way to hold the pickle hold the lettuce.

Because stuffed in the backpack with all the year end projects, and workbooks, and HOMEWORK, and the final report card is a lengthy list of required items that need to materialize at school when we return in September. Sometimes the list bleeds into a second page.

The list is comprised of items such as:

A backpack which complies with the mandate that all super duper multitasking, ergonomically beneficial backpacks be restricted from use due to the fact that they won’t fit into the skinny little locker-ettes that have replaced the full-sized-can-stuff-a 6th-grader-into-it type.
A 3-ring binder that complies with the teachers’ union boycott of one particular type with too many bells and whistles.
A specific number of No. 2 pencils –sharpened at home, please.
Pens – specific colors and quantities, and not erasable, thank you.
Folders – specific colors
A clean white sock – for the clean white board. Thankfully there are plenty of unmatched ones that were divorced in the dryer and came out single. Clean but maybe not convincingly so, and I am not buying a new pair, thank you.
Erasers and compasses and rulers, oh my.
Fat markers, thin markers, colored pencils.
A minimum number of glue sticks.
Scissors – preferably the brand endorsed by the bargaining unit that bans the notebook type.
Loose leaf, graph paper, dividers with labels and pockets
Sticky notes – specific dimensions and any colors except neons
Crayons – no fewer than X and no more than Y
A couple of inexplicable metric measuring implements (Didn’t we decide in the 70s that this was pointless?)
3X5 cards
A pencil sharpener capable of catching the shavings (isn’t there one with a handle screwed into the molding by the door?)
Paper towels
No fewer than 3 boxes of tissues
Hand sanitizer
Disinfecting wipes (What is with all the germophobia?? Are we going to school in a Petri dish?)

And at the end, a little disclaimer.

It notes that this list is not intended to be exhaustive; my children’s teachers will provide an additional list of teacher specific required survival kit items.

There will be no pad and No. 2 pencils provided for free. Not in the school district budget.

But added with out my consent to mine.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

So Mom has fired a shot over the bough, and since it was a little scattered (more buckshot than cannonball) it was not a shot that inflicted any mortal wounds.

Good thing. I have Back-To-School to deal with.

Summer just isn't what it used to be for school-aged kids. Not only are they not careening around the neighborhood all day on bicycles (sans helmets, natch) without the burden of adult supervision or the overbearing reminders about sun screen, or without the threat of pedophiles, kidnappers, rapists or drug dealers who have infiltrated the suburbs, they are also not free from worry about cyber bullying, cell phone envy, West Nile virus, texting drivers, obscene television and prepackaged foods with killer trans fat.

Nor are they free to while away the hours laying on a freshly mowed lawn looking at the clouds taking on this shape or that, sweaty from a game of kickball and enjoying a grape soda loaded with red dye #2.

Because they have homework.

Reading - two to three books from particular genres, by specific authors and limited to a selective list of acceptable titles.

Projects - based on the reading! Usually a written project and some form of creative obligation. Like an artfully decorated cereal box depicting the characters and plot elements of one of the books. Preferably in 3-D. Using dry food products like macaroni or Lifesavers - but please no nut products so the allergen-free kids can be in the room when the projects are on display and not be constantly reaching for the Epi-pen.

And a Math packet - because nothing says "Summertime and the livin' is easy" like endless rows of challenging ways to solve for X.

And since the books on the list of accepted literature are rarely in the library, and since the books from last year's list are rarely if ever on the current list, thereby squelching one of the few advantages to having kids 13 months apart, we get to order them all on line and pay shipping to boot.

And since the kids are in camp now instead of being randomly supervised on a day full of nothing but fun, they are tired. It's like they have jobs. And who wants to read the biography of a pioneer after 8 hours of planned fun with kids you would have otherwise never befriended, and supervised by college kids with out sufficient talent to get better jobs?

So having taken the books on every long car ride and on every vacation, we are prepared to start the projects.

Safety scissors, contact paper, Elmers Glue All and markers in hand, we take tot he craft table to create something that is doomed to fall apart in the backpack on the way to school on the first day.

Mostly because it will be competing for space with all of the dozens of items we purchase dot satisfy the Mandatory School Supply List.

Operator, Oh Can You Help Me Place This Call?

I am not sure what compelled me to listen as long as I did.

It was an unforgiving rant about why on Earth I would ever create such a situation between my brother and sister. Why on God’s green Earth I would share the juicy little tidbit about my sister being described as a self righteous beyotch. Why I did this, and I did that, and eventually getting caught in a maze of meandering thoughts about various and sundry slights I’ve delivered to her personally over the last decade or so.

I am sure it comes as no surprise at all that I remembered nothing at all about the perceived slights.

One involved something about not making plans to visit the almost beach house of a favorite dead uncle some unspecified weekend in an undetermined year based on an idea she thinks she may have told one of us.

I didn’t listen to the whole thing. It gave me a throbbing headache along the side of my head…in the general vicinity of my ear.

And besides, she would have lost me at hello, if she had said as much. Because the lead off statement, the rallying cry for the big campaign was about my causing the current ruckus between my brother and sister.

A madwoman says what?

Recall if you will, that at the opening scene of the Open Door/XBox/Cat Poop debacle, I was sitting peaceably in my beach chair watching my children try to drown each other at our swim club, while the narcissist-posing-as-lifeguard took no notice whatsoever.

And when called upon to assist with a situation for which I was the most suitable candidate to be of assistance, I went, observed and reported. And yes, I did state the obvious, however unnecessarily in this case: My brother is an ill-mannered idiotic boob.

And in all conversations on the matter since, I was direct and honest and refrained from insulting anyone in my assessment of the situation and did not waver from my position that what my brother had done was wrong to have done, and at a minimum, an apology was due to my sister’s family. What has transpired between them since that time is none of my business. I have relationships, albeit very different relationships, with each of them, no horse in their race.

And yes, I did repeat the nasty comment my brother had asserted that he’d made and further claimed my mother had endorsed.

But she does not know that. Because when Charlotte called Joe to tell him his fight was with her not anyone else in the family, he offered up a repeat performance without solicitation.

How the finger came to be wagging at me is something I’ll have to look up in Dysfunctional Families for Dummies. I have no Earthly idea.

Party Line

Moments later, my phone rings and I scramble to get to the table in the hall where the phone sits. Or should sit. I have two pre-teens who can never quite grasp the idea that everything has a home and everything likes to go home after work, including the phone, and keeping it in your room where it gets buried inadvertently in a pile of stuffed animals is just mean.

I press the “find handset” button and race about the house, in my socks, sliding along the hardwoods my daughter so lovingly polished with Pledge, finding and turning off the alarm on each handset as it is located. I secretly long for the long, curly cord that dangled precariously close to the toaster from my parents’ wall mounted telephone. Olive green to match the appliances, natch.

I find the phone and see that I have missed a message from the squirrel guy, who is supposed to help me figure out if and how the squirrels are getting into the space between my floors.

Hoping that he’s left a message that he’ll be by that day, I dial into my answering system. (My parents never, ever had one. And they had a little spiral bound address book melting by the same toaster instead of a directory in the phone too. Loved the 70s. Shag hair cuts, Dr. Scholls and inferior technology. How quaint.)

Before Bucky the Squirrel Guy’s message cues up, there is one other.

The message from Mom.

I can tell from the opening “It’s Mom” that this message is not one of her “I put a little something in the mail for you” messages, or her “go onto this website and enter to win a lighthouse” advisories, or even a “I was going through some things and found a letter from you from when you were in college and it made me smile” communiqués. (Are you paying attention, sophomore nephew at college? Send your mother a letter. Not an email, not a Facebook message, not a text. A real honest to goodness letter. Written in your handwriting, not typed and printed. Years from now when you are a successful whatever jet-setting about the globe enjoying the fruits of your labor and unable to make it home for holidays, she will read it and smile knowing it was her sensational works of motherhood that placed your feet on that path, and make her smile. Smile, and reach for the Pinot Grigio.)

I brace myself. This is going to be a howler.

Popes in a Volkswagon

Apparently not finished with her pontificating, Madame RES Director zings off another e-mail to me. Not, of course, responding to my inquiry about to whom I can appeal her decision, but to further endeavor to make me feel as though I am in the minority with my opinions.

I highly doubt it.

She fortifies her position by stating that the Masses were requested by the families and approved by the RES Board. (There is a Board? Who, pray tell, comprises that merry little band of idiots?)

She notes that many families enjoy these special Masses. (Who are these families? They are either lying or are the types that also enjoy mosh pits, political rallies, riots and stampedes.)

She also writes that all of the (offensive, patronizing) information had been requested by the Board, the catechists and the families.

Really? They just stepped up and volunteered their opinions and spoke for all of us? And their voices count so much that in deference to them we’ll choose to insult the entire RES community because some idiot can’t remember that the Solemnity of Mary is celebrated on New Year’s Day and needs to be reminded in writing that he’ll need to plop plop fizz fizz and take his hangover to church?

I offer that I have been a RES parent for 7 years and I have never been consulted about such matters. I have never had my bright ideas solicited.

How is it that now that I have shared my opinion, she is choosing to discount it?

And while I am distracted by the Holy Wars, I am nearly unaware that the blinking light on my phone means I have a message waiting.

A long, haranguing message from none other than my mother, who is finally weighing in on the events of the weekend my brother came a-calling.

Heaven help us.