I am sick. Really, I am officially sick. I went to GP today. He had a very nice painting ( his own) in the waiting room : it is a winter scene of where I taught Baby how to skate. Ice.  I wonder if Baby would like to have that ?

The Girl and The Boyfriend took me there, for I cannot walk more then 3 meters without pausing. No, maybe it is 10.  Meters.  I am now on Ventolin 200 and Amoxicilline  500 capsules. That Ventolin is really prime.

Tomorrow, I am going to feel much better. I know this. The Girl went into the waiting room with me. She did not want me to talk and when I was about to hack up another oyster, she turned her whole body around. I do not blame her : I am very embarrassing right now. I really am.

One of the strange things that I have learned about myself (  I really never get really sick ) is that I count. All of the time.  I roll my own, and I have a system, 11 each time. No, take one from there. I eat cheese and crackers ( I am not eating very much these days), I cut the cheese- right now, it is some caraway cheese- and I count the pieces. And then I count out twice the amount of those little AH Trio snack crackers, to make a  little *sandwich*.

This gets even more spooky. I cannot walk very far right now, and so, I say, 10 steps. I look down at the sidewalk, count them, and then I look up : 10 steps more, you can do this. This is a f*cking  piece of cake. I get really bored with my chanting. This is not a problem is another chant.

We are going down another level : when I was had to go through *natural childbirth* , much against my wishes, three, count them , three times, I counted. Very loudly. I did the whole 1 one thousand, 2 one thousand  business. If I could get to 10 or 20, I knew it would stop. For a while.

How can my children be so bad at math ?

Or am I wavering towards a Howard Hughes Persona ?

I am going to feel much better tomorrow. I am going to put clean sheets on my bed.

When I was about 11 or12, we lived in Frankfurt- this I know for sure- and I took this Iowa skills test, I also earned little badges for being healthy and athletic. I kid you not.

I blew the charts off on this Iowa business. I was really scared about this. Both of my parents were called in, and I could not have been there. And yet, I can see it so clearly. It was the gym. Now a days, I suppose that my parents were told that I was * gifted*.

My parents did everything  for this oddity that had befallen them. We moved to MA because the best schools are there. They did this, just for me.

They went deeply into debt. Just for me.

This is a horrible thing to say, but in the end, being smart is a curse. I cannot keep my brain straight- I see everyone’s point of view. Everyone is right. I am lost in the nuances  of grey.

I bought rubbers today.

I have never done this before, and believe me this is like looking at a very long row of cereal boxes. What on earth do I know ? I am pre- Aids, we have been faithful ( is that the right word ?) for 30 odd years.

But this has to be done.

The Father and I always agreed that we would have rubbers available in our home. No questions asked.

And so I bought rubbers today. This has to be done and I am the only pony around. ( I did not know what to get. I was reading all of this stuff- that is how I am- I do not know what to buy- does *featherlite* work ? )

I was going to password protect this. But, if I think about it, there is a very clear line going from , Oh ! Babies are so cute ! and them discovering their own sexuality. There really is a point when one must move beyond the advantages of breast milk and toodle down the aisle looking for rubbers. It is really the same difference. A fact of life, handle it.

So, I bought rubbers today. This is a very responsible move on my part.

Now, I am going to be me, not Mummy : the sight of a rubber in use just kills me. I am from another time and place, I have never seen such a stupid thing in my life.  It used to be called a French Letter. I am avoiding the truth. The best laugh in my life was seeing a rubber, ready for use. There is nothing more ridiculous in this world.

But I do have to encourage the use of rubbers. This is very important.

Babies are really cute.

I went into Town yesterday, to get two sourdough buns. I should have bought them in the morning, but I always tell myself that I do not need lunch. But then I got really hungry.

So I toodle over to the bakery. I am 5 meters away, when this really big white van pulls up in front of the baker’s door. I know what this means. I put a little speed into my pace.

And now, I am going to be just one horrible person. Sometimes, terrible things make me laugh. I have no idea why.

They start unloading the van just as I reach the do0r : they are pulling old ladies in wheelchairs out of that van.  I can’t run in front of them. In fact, I offered to help with that first wheelchair, get it over the curb. I am short, I am small, but I have more experience with tossing wheelchairs than the average Joe. The guy pushing that first wheelchair sniffed me off. Then the Baker ran out with the ramp, you know, a wheelchair ramp.

And so I held the doors open for awhile. I know how hard dealing with wheelchairs is.

The second wheelchair occupant is where I started going wrong. Hey, I have been doing this perfectly so far. Really. And I did not say one word. But when that whole Clinton thing was going on, wasn’t it the thought that counted ?

She was a tall woman, I could see that, even in the wheelchair, and she was sturdy, in that Dutch way, rather than fat. And she was crying at the top of her lungs. Non- stop, I mean, we are moving into the Tourette’s zone.

The young woman pushing her wheelchair was taking this in stride. I am holding the door open. The young woman had beautiful auburn hair ( I am holding a door open, I like details, I need something to do and I am hungry), in a braid, not one hair out of place.

So Boo-Hoo and Beautiful Hair are wheeling by me. Hair says to Boo- Hoo, doesn’t this look like a charming place ? And then the crying stopped. Boo-Hoo said to Hair, this looks like an absolutely miserable place. And then she started keening once again.

This is not funny. It is me in a few years. But it made me laugh. In fact, in my mind, Boo Hoo  swore, she said, as she paused in her oh-so-audible weeping about the dregs that her life had become, you can’t fool me, this is one f*cking miserable joint. Spirit. Thumbs up.

I had a good lunch.

I am having one hoot of a time, fuddling about with The Oscars. This is Karan’s thing. I cannot watch it though , for the timing does not work. Yup, I am Europe. I have The Boyfriend offering to fix that DVD recorder, but he cannot, for it is all involved in that fool surround sound system. The Boy says that he will wake me up, if I call him in sick the next day at school. Not going to happen.

I would like to watch it, for, in the end, I am bored. And I also once had a glimpse beyond the veil.

We are now going to go down memory lane. I went to Smith, everyone here knows this. Fine. And I had a roommate. Lauren. They always hook up people from MA with people from far, far away. OK, She was sortof from Chicago, and maybe Santa Inez, CA.

Nobody is going to believe this, but perhaps this is why Lauren and I became roommates :  her father wrote a moderately successful book called * Kane’s World*. I would not make this up. Go to Amazon, go to Google.

And with the money he made ( I guess) from this book, he went on to make a film, called *Corn Bread Earl and Me*. I think that my brother is the biggest fan of that film. Look it up. I am not lying.

Lauren never told me about this, at first. She wanted me to like her for what she was. And I did. She was the best friend that I ever had. But my brain snapped when I went to visit her in Santa Ynez ( this is Michael Jackson territory) one summer.

I could go on about this, but back to the Oscars. Lenny ( I could never call him Lenny) and Barb always went to ( or does one attend) the Oscars. little to do with the quality of acting or the film.It was so political, or something like that.

We all know that Leo is not going to get an Oscar, and *The Aviator* was more than good. Any film that he is in, is not going to get a major Oscar. I do not know why. Cameron wrote the crappy dialog for Titanic, we all know this, look what happened to Winslett, a superb actress in that film.

But I did indeed have that glimpse under the veil, once. And the Oscars are not the truth ( I am big into truth), there are layers and layers of options , like who can get more awards then Katherine Hepburn ?

Karan, back to the mundane. I need to buy sheets. I do not want to iron and they should feel cold. And I hate pilling ( those little fuzzy balls).

The Father left at 8 am yesterday morning. For India. For about 10 days.

About 10 days ago, he told me that he would have surprising news for me. And I knew it would not be good news, whatever it was. I really thought that he would hit me with a lawyer and that whole divorce business.

But that is not it.

It is the place in India . ( Mahaneco look it up)

For the last 4 years, we have given up everything for this concept, this project. Money, time, family.  And neither of us likes where we are at the moment. We are both saying, is this our life ?

Last Sunday, he told me that things were going to change. There were numerous scenarios, all depending upon if this and then that, until I had a hard time following it any longer. I told him this. You are talking about step 10, when we do not know if step one will work. I am talking trustworthy personnel, bookkeepers, lawyers, and he is moving on to the this-is-all-solved- next step. You have to start at one. That is all that there is to it, I have been in this business for almost 30 years.

Worst case scenario : we are going to dump it, he says, and he will become a primary school teacher once more. ( I am doing the math here, what are our assets in India, do we own a percentage of the land ? )

And I tell him, Baby, this is not you any longer, you are not a school teacher. You are what you are and that is all that there is to it.

Of course, the cherubs were absolute beasts that morning.

The first was The Boy : he just got that f*cking phone back, after we were hit with a 408 euro bill ( 998 sms’s).. He comes down at 6.50, as is his mode, asks Baby to turn to RTL4, as is his mode, and then spends the next 10 minutes on that phone. Two SMS’s. I finally told him to can it, and he was…very rude. I told Baby to put her wedding dress show on.

Then The Girl comes down, wearing The Baby’s new jeans. Another sh*t fit. Baby is right. And this is all before 7.20am.

The Father comes down at 7.30 and I do not breathe a word of all of this trivial crap. Kiss kiss, have a good trip.

The day did not improve.

That heavens for Karan’s Oscar thing. I actually took some pictures today because of it. Really.

But I do not know if I can go through the whole business behind putting a photo up.

Rule number 1 , as concerns the camera- take the photos in the morning.

When I was about 15, oh, to 17, I lived in Concord, Massachusetts. I went to a brilliant high school, CCHS. Really, I did. This was a public school and Concord Academy was right down the road. So was Walden Pond, but I am wandering. But you could never begin to believe how many of my classmates got into the Ivy League and Seven Sisters, I won´t say how few from oh so very expensive Concord Academy did not.  My parents gave me the choice , I could have gone there, I was on the waiting list, they where willing to pony up all of that money. Just for me. But I said, I like CCHS just fine.

And I did. But my life was influenced.. to a large degree…by members of the hockey team.  You really have to be from New England to understand this. I nearly slashed The Father´s throat when we had to go through Canada to get to Detroit, see Frenchy.  I told him not to mention the Bruins. Of course he did. He could not understand this. But you do not do this. I am still surprised that they did not throw  him into that river or large body of water up there at Windsor.

I knew that I was in trouble that first day at CCHS. Drew was sitting behind me. He was on the hockey team and I know his full name but I shan´t write it down.  I was toodling in from Bangkok, Thailand. And he said, Bangah ! I love Maine. And I knew I was lost. I knew that there would never be any point to me even trying.

I really liked that school. They had no idea what to do with me, you see, I did not talk, I still don´t,I provoked, but it was a really good school. And I kept getting the meta jocks as lab partners.

I was good at science. I wanted to go to Brown. That is another story. I followed the path that I have because it was my weakest link. It was a challenge.

I liked my Biology teacher. It is still beyond me that the cherubs are not fascinated by Biology. He had good hair, and he just thought that I was the cat´s ass. His father in law was working with teflon, of all things, to make red platelets. And then we got this fetal pig.

I got this lab partner. I think his name was Richard. He was on the hockey team. He was tall, and except for his eyes, he looked just like an albino.  And he would not touch that pig. Piglet. I did it. I thought that it was very interesting. Really. But it made me a vegetarian for many, many years.  And I still like to say that formaldehyde is the best nail polish remover.

And then I had chemistry. Who on earth decided who my lab partners would be . I had three.  I had the second guy from the hockey team, he had Bozo the clown hair, and that little Italian guy, again , from the hockey team and Jack, the Quarterback. He was an Arrow collar boy. His girlfriend was the head cheerleader. This was high school, this was Janis Ian. And this class was a no brainer. Every test was open book, we did titration. I liked titration. Our teacher was really into the double hellix. Maybe it was new then. He did that whole business with helium, you know, sound like Donald Duck. I spent most of the class laying out tarot cards for my jock lab partners. The teacher did not care. And he was a good teacher.

The fetal pig is why I cannot eat most meats.

Then I took a class in Science Fiction. Bozo the hockey player was in that class.  The teacher was quite honked off with me. She wrote romantic novels and had a large opal ring. This class was for jocks who needed that English credit. She knew me very well. She made me write about Medea. She did not like Science Fiction. I had her for World Lit. and Concord Authors.But she was wrong in the end.  Most people do not really understand what falls into the category of science fiction, we are not just talking androids.  There is Bradbury, Vonnegut, Heinlein, even  George Orwell, Frank Baum and Madeleine L’Engle are considered Science Fiction writers. We are talking Wizard of Oz and A wrinkle In Time here.I floored a very distinguished professor , from North Carolina, oh, the very best accent of all, I had him  for that crap about Arthurian legends, and my last year, all that I needed was that intro to be an English major. That is it. First year class. I have a really bad sinus infection, I sound worse than Donald Duck. And I explain why Robinson Crusoe is like science fiction. Isolation and focus are what we are reading. He does not have to worry about pampers and food bills.  He knew that I was right. And seeing that look in his eyes,worked for me.

I can also talk about furniture in Henry James. I am good at this. But nobody cares. And it is indeed nothing to care about.

What is the last thing that I did at that school. I was taking this philosophy class, and I had to give a… presentation. Ok, I had to stand in front of the class and talk. I decided to talk about Schopenhauer´s theory of the attraction of the sexes. This is actually a good topic if you are talking to teenagers in a philosophy class.  It works. I knew it would.

I wonder what happened to Daniel. He liked my presentation. He was an exchange student from Argentina. And things went really bad in Argentina about the time that he went home.

.

This is my handy, dandy tip, if you are going to Italy, the only word that you really, really need to know is Bagno. This will get you to a toilet. Having a little kid in tow really expedites matters. Eyebrows are the universal language.

Lilliane can´t speak  one word of English and except for being able to read a menu and that whole Bagno business, I  cannot speak Italian. And yet, I always understand her and she always understands me. Of course, we are not doing Saint Augustine… and eyebrows really do work.

I do not want to go to Italy. Again. Not Tuscany.  I would not mind going south, but this is not going to happen. I live in a world where Italy stops at Florence.  I do not have to explain this, do I . But Bari was really beautiful, it was, it still is, I suppose.