Merry Xmas

Time Out

My mother sits at the counter along the front window of Whole Foods, sips on a decaffeinated soya latte and watches the shoppers paying up and checking out at the tills.

I sit at the counter next to my mother and look out the window to the already-shoppers and soon-to-be shoppers driving by each other, swapping parking spaces, carefully and carelessly avoiding fender benders in the cluttered parking lot.

I consider the preponderance of motorised vehicles in this middle-American mid-sized city. Since I have been home, I have personally passed through a drive thru bank, a drive thru Starbucks, a drive thru letter box, and a drive thru dry cleaners. I think about my lack of confidence behind the wheel; I haven't owned a car since I was 17. I wonder if it's a skill that I shouldn't let get rusty. I wonder if I would keep my car neat and tidy or if it would become a 2nd home. I wonder if it wouldn't drive me crazy to have to drive everywhere.

My mother interrupts my thoughts.

"Look at that woman. She's stealing bags."

At the foot of the check out counter closest to the exit, a woman attempts to look nonchalant as she fills up one paper bag with a large number of smaller paper bags.

I think I'm looking the wrong way and decide to adopt my mother's view.

Hallejulah!

My mother says it's a miracle. Even if she's not a follower of any one sect and didn't even bother to have her children baptised because she wanted them to be able to choose their own religion, she's always had faith. Of some sort or another. I'm not surprised by her use of the word 'miracle'.

Her doctors say it's encouraging.

My one brother doesn't put adjectives to it. He's simply relieved by the encouraging, possibly miraculous, news.

My other brother is conspicuously absent - even though he's right here. He's a master ostrich, adept at putting his head in the sand. He's also an idiot.

Not appropriate. Not appropriate at all ... you're supposed to be thankful ... not bitchy.

The breast cancer that resides in my mom's liver is shrinking; she feels good; she's back to her old self. Knock on wood.

I suppose it's one reason I agreed to accompany her to church. The other is that I've been instructed to practice being bored as a stress management technique.



NB: The church pictured above is NOT where we will be going for my mom to be faithful and for me to practice being bored.

First Stop: Stock Up

Despite the fact that the exchange rate isn't what it once was, my first stop is Target where I stock up on Lubriderm and Opcon A. By habit, I reach toward the items (Lubriderm and Opcon A)that have been scannned with the intent to bag them myself. The girl behind the counter beats me to it. I forget that here they do the bagging for you. And smile and tell you to have a nice day. No matter which aisle you go to.

My beating-cancer mother is waiting in the car. My brother and I tried to entice her in, but the prospect of our pushing her around in a grocery cart holds little appeal.

It's exciting to see infinity. Right there in Target. Infinity aisles where infinity purchases will be made. The credit crunch doesn't hold a candle to Target.
My brother cracks up when I take out my camera. He suggests shots and angles that he thinks will have the most impact on Europeans.

Flying Over Ice

Normally, I get an aisle seat.

I don’t care about looking out the window. I like to stretch my legs into the aisle (unobtrusively, of course), and I don’t like to bother people to let me out to go pee as required by a window seat.

I vacillate when I check into long haul flights.

Aisle. No, window. But you always like the aisle. But you might want to rest your head against the window. Ok, ok. Window it is.

When the window wins out, it’s all due to my anticipated desire to sleep. I do not care about looking out the window.

Somewhere over Greenland the first movie finished. I took the opportunity to stretch my arms and swivel my neck. I just happened to catch a glimpse of ice through the open blind of the window next to the seat in front of mine. I craned my neck . Just a bit.

What is that?

I normally care so little for looking out the windows of planes, that the thought to open my blind almost didn’t occur to me.

It looked like ice. Why don’t you open your blind and take a look?

Looking down over masses of white, I wondered at the words that came to mind. Words for which I do not know the precise meaning, but which resonated with the bird’s eye view of gradations of white. Flues, slues, glaciers, icebergs. I recognised these words through the window, I thought, thanks to Planet Earth.

Where the hell are we? Where would we be? Greenland?

A little quick thinking, and I switched the channel of my in-flight entertainment system to the screen that tracks flight progress.

Greenland. We were right above Greenland. An almost full moon hanging over Greenland’s icy morass made it an almost special moment. So almost special that I nudged my neighbour with whom I had been carefully avoiding conversation. I had to share the special moment with someone.

“Look. There’s Greenland out there.”

She looked at me cautiously, peered out the window, gave me a condescending smile, and acknowledged my uncharacteristic enthusiasm with a “Yes, yes it is.” before going back to her puzzle book.

I thought about how cold it would be if the plane crashed. I comforted myself with the thought that I would be dead and unable to suffer the temperature.

Forgive Me

I’m standing on the platform of the Roodebeek Metro station in Brussels and waiting for the 1B heading towards Erasme. I am struck by how wide the platform is and how few people there are milling about waiting for the next train. I don’t mean to go down the path of comparison, but here I am, in my head, comparing the Brussels Metro with the London Tube. One comparison leaps to another. From their respective underground train systems, I move on to a much grosser conclusion. Brussels is, I imagine, a more liveable city than London.

This thought leads me back to Saturday night.

I went to a party.

I didn’t know anyone at the party except My Man and the couple who brought us to this party, a Dutch couple --who used to live across the river in Putney, but have since moved away, like so many of our London-made friends.

The hostess was a German born in Australia. The only traces of her Jamaican ex-boyfriend lay in the creamy caramel skin of her two daughters.

The other guests were comprised mainly of artists. A photographer was there. My Man and I spent some time flipping through the pages of his book, which was unabashedly on display. Photographs of Orlando Bloom and Kate Blanchett and Joseph Fiennes and bunch of other actors and actresses I didn't recognise, backstage, captured in moments, prepping to perform.

“George is a pianist.” I overheard the girl who brought George bragging to one of the other guests. I wondered if he would tickle the ivories of the piano in the corner.

The German Australian hostess’ new boyfriend and I began to banter. At first, it seemed a solid conversation, but the longer I stood their, the more I listened, the more I realised he wasn’t very interested in anything I had to say. I did a lot of nodding before my turn was called to receive a shoulder massage from the Chinese masseur who had come to meet potential new clients.

It was the scientist at the party who brought me back to the party from the platform in Brussels.

“But, London is a forgiving.” He had said.

I had been commenting on the hardship of London; I think I’d been influenced by Leonie’s post. London is hard.

“but, London is forgiving.” The scientist repeated.

“Especially compared to New York where everything is money and fashion.”

“London is forgiving.”

Hard, but forgiving.

Running for Work

If I'm not stressing out about work, I'm thinking about this 1/2 marathon I've signed up for. Thinking about how I ought to be training when I'm not or thinking about the next run I need to take when I'm still mid-way through the current one.

Right now I'm thinking about why I signed up.

I ran a real marathon. Once. A. Long. Time. Ago.

So, when my customer and I were chatting about this and that and he mentioned that he and some of his co-workers were doing one, I showed sincere interest. We began talking about the training, the commitment, the discipline. He told me that the group at work were running for a charity; the man who organised the group run has a 2 year old daughter who has been diagnosed with Leukaemia. At the tale end of my conversation with the customer, he suggested I sign up.

I didn't immediately think I would. But then I got to thinking how it might prove I'm not just trying to sell them something. So, I signed up, not for the little girl with Leukaemia, but to possibly better my relationship with my customer.

Don't exaggerate for effect. You didn't really consciously plot to improve customer satisfaction through charity.

Now I'm in, and I'm too proud and too stubborn to drop out, which is a good thing because I do enjoy it (once I motivate my lazy ass off the sofa), it is for charity, and it just might improve my god damn relationship with my god damn customer.

Apples & Oranges

I walk by the fruit stand where an Asian man shorter than myself has just asked for two apples.

"I would like two apples please."

The fruit geezer with the cigarette hanging from his mouth asks, "Sure mate. Which one do you want?"

"The best one please."

Slow that Bitch Down! (Time)

Did December just drop out of the sky?

How did this happen? And when?

Just yesterday it was the end of August.

And now I'm thinking about the contents of my closet and wondering, "What will I wear to the Christmas party?"