Rob would like to try a Stephen King book, and has asked me to select one. I am very enthusiastic about this task, but also nervous: I didn’t read the books with a 16-year-old in mind, so it’s hard to pick. I’d like him exposed to the RIGHT kind of horror and depravity.

He thinks he’d prefer non-monster horror to monster horror.

The two I’ve read several times and think of as favorites are The Stand and The Green Mile. But I liked a LOT of others.

I love “Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption”, but our library only has it in a collection with the one about the teenage boy who likes to kill things, and I’d prefer not to introduce that. He might like The Bachman Books, but I’m remembering an upsetting school-shooting story; maybe that bothers me as a parent more than it would bother him as a student, but again, I don’t want to introduce the theme.

The ones I never want to read again were the ones like the one with the cop who went insane. Or Lisey’s Story, which I couldn’t even get more than 50 pages into because it seemed so extremely dumb and had so many of those italicized nonsense asides.

Under the Dome was kind of cool and thought-provoking, but it had one of those powerful-person-going-insane-and-manipulating-the-populace themes and those are not my favorites. (Needful Things also has that theme.) I get sick of hearing the crazy person repeat themselves over and over.

He says he might like to start with short stories, but some of those are more disturbing even than the long books. On the other hand, it might give him a good Stephen King sampler: some monsters, some creepy stuff, some thinky stuff. But short story collections are even harder to remember which ones are which.

What do you think? Have you read some of these more recently than I have? Which are your favorites—and/or, which seem like a good one to start with?

One of Elizabeth’s friends got her first period. I don’t think Elizabeth knows; I heard it from the friend’s mother. This reminds me to review the basics of such things with Elizabeth; I’m trying to remember to do it every 6 months to a year. But she’s so RESISTANT to it! She HATES talking about it! Well, she has a book that covers it. She may be the sort who’d prefer to look up her own information. And maybe she won’t have to worry about it for a few more years, anyway. I hope. (She is 9.) (Her friend is 10.) (I was 12.)

I should also get her Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret, but maybe I’ll re-read it first. I remember that book being part of the reason I wasn’t very freaked when I got my own first period, but I don’t remember how much actual information there was. And don’t they still use BELTS or something in that book? Clipping pads to something? I remember being mystified even at the time.

I didn’t tell my mom when I got my first period; did you tell yours? She had to ask me (and then I did admit it). I wasn’t keeping it a secret, exactly, but I remember not really knowing how to casually bring it up. “Oh, by the way.”

Considering how free and joyful I used to feel when I could go grocery shopping without a child, I’m surprised to find things different now. It’s not really that I want to shop with a child again, but there are two things I miss about it:

1. The feeling of doubled productivity: taking care of a child AND getting shopping done. Both!

2. The company.

But it was that same doubled productivity I miss that used to lead to that harried, crazy, burdened, overwhelmed feeling; I do remember that. And after shopping today and hearing all the “Evelyn! NO! Evelyn! Stop that right now!” (Evelyn: *LOUD WHINY CRYING*) around me, it’s hard to believe I truly feel envious of the company, and it’s more likely that I don’t. And when I DO go shopping with a child, it doesn’t take long for me to say things like “Can you please let Mommy concentrate on this shampoo decision for 10 seconds?”

But I don’t feel free and joyful anymore when I go without a child, either. It’s like when I stop being sick and I think I’ll forever appreciate how good Not Sick feels, but then three days later that’s all done with and it’s back to normal and I don’t even notice feeling well. I’m so used to shopping without children, I’ve lost that intense appreciation for it.

And in fact, sometimes I feel a little inexplicable panic, or existential despair, or inexplicable existential panicky despair. What are we all doing here, with our carts of things, deciding between Pantene and Dove, listening to music made ridiculous by context (“Straight up now tell me do you really wanna love! me! forever!” as all of us non-Paula-Abduls study the laundry detergent choices), someone else’s child whining in the background like a ringing telephone I don’t have to answer, the child’s parent audibly about to lose it from the public embarrassment and frustration, people in matching outfits there to help us choose items and pay for them? What are we DOING here? What IS this? EVERYTHING IS TRAGIC AND SCARY. A child in my cart helped keep my mind off all that, I think.

********

I watched another movie with older people (40s, it looked like to me) being attracted to each other. It was called Le Declin de L’Empire Americain (The Decline of the American Empire), and I enjoyed finding I remembered more high school French than I’d thought. But the movie felt kind of plotless, and the fashions and hair were so extremely 1980s. Isn’t it funny how hard it can be to tell if someone from another time period is good-looking or not?

For 40% of the movie, we watch the four women talk to each other about sex while they seriously spend the entire day exercising and attending to their appearance. For 40% of the movie, we watch the four men talk to each other about sex while they get dinner ready. For 10% of the movie, we see little flashbacks/asides that tell us more of the story than is being talked about. For 10% of the movie, we see all eight people having dinner together.

There is nudity just all over the place, but done in an interestingly frank way, so that it doesn’t even seem sexy, just sort of ordinary. Everyone is SO sexually adventurous, it was a little depressing: it made me feel inexperienced, while simultaneously making the more adventurous way of life unappealing. The way some of the men are so casual about cheating on their wives made me feel nervous and upset. And there’s a part where they say “And what’s with women always wanting to take classes?,” which made me feel red-faced and like I wanted to put the course catalog in the recycling—but also indignant, like “Yeah, your trips to the happy-ending massage parlors are a MUCH better way to spend time! Jerk!”

So you’d think I was not recommending the movie, and actually I’m not (I’m not ANTI-recommending it either, but I am not pushing you to see it)—but on the other hand, when I saw on Wikipedia that there was a sequel, I immediately added it to my list, so that tells another story.

I bought a REALLY cute, REALLY pretty, REALLY expensive (travel-size bottle for price of entire bottle of boring lotion) EOS hand lotion for my purse, since when my hands are dry they look even more like old-lady hands. The container is a pretty spring/Easter-egg light turquoise color, and it’s an interesting worry-stone-like shape, and I’ve used the lotion three times already in “Oh I’m so glad I have lotion!” situations.

In fact, I love everything about the whole purchase except the smell of the lotion, which is reminding me of something I can’t place. Not something positive, though not exactly repulsive either. “Store-bathroom hand-soap”? “Motel”? “Bathroom air freshener we used to have”? I think it’s the hand soap. Well, I will refill the bottle with something else when it’s empty.

I donated blood today, and I see it’s been close to two years since I last did it. That’s how long it took me to stop being mad about [long boring story about how they routinely kept me waiting 1-2 hours for an APPOINTMENT to DONATE, and then responded poorly when I finally addressed this politely, and then started calling me DAILY even after I told them to take me off their phone list], plus how long it took me once I’d decided to go back (to a different location, which today at least went WAY better, but was New and Different).

I felt happy and relieved to be back there again. Though also anxious because I realized halfway through I’d somehow forgotten deodorant. I really didn’t want to put my arm up in the air as instructed.

After writing yesterday’s post about attractiveness waning with age/fertility, it seemed fitting to spend the afternoon watching At Middleton, a movie that appealed to me because it is about a less-than-one-day affair between two people, Edith and George (not as old as they sound; SWISTLE, NAME-CONSULTING SERVICES, LET’S DO LUNCH), each of whom is old enough to have a college-aged child. Bonus: the actor playing Edith was 40 in real life, not, say, 8 years older than the actor playing the daughter. The actor playing George was more than 15 years older than the actor playing Edith; I will mention that without further comment.

Boy. I really didn’t like the movie. I am struggling to come up with adjectives. Forced. Fake. Embarrassing. There is a scene where Edith and George sit in on a college theater class. The class is doing one of those things where two students go up on stage and improvise a scene, pretending to be a married couple. It is, as you might expect, forced, fake, and embarrassing. Edith, unrealistically, speaks up in the middle of it, saying no married couple would talk to each other that way. The teacher, mistaking George and Edith for a married couple, tells George and Edith to give it a try. They produce a scene SO forced, fake, and embarrassing, I almost couldn’t watch it. At the end of their horrifying scene (“When did you stop loving me? Did you ever love me?”), there is slow, impressed clapping. Two of the students WORDLESSLY JOIN HANDS. It is the worst.

In fact, that is how I would describe it: THE ENTIRE MOVIE IS EXACTLY LIKE THAT SCENE. It feels as if the whole thing were produced by students sitting in a theater class trying to come up with Meaningful Emotional Scenes—as warm-ups, before doing real acting with real scripts. I kept being reminded wincingly of poetry I wrote in high school. A SETTING SUN SHINES THROUGH A KISS.

The dialogue was. It was just. I mean. I wish I’d taken notes so I could give exact quotes, because believe me when I say I am not going back for any. An adult says to a college student, “Not bad, kiddo. Not bad at all,” and the kiddo beams. One character asks another character “Are you happy?” One character insults another character she just met that morning by saying, “I know you better than you know yourself!” A college student says to his dad, “You were right, Dad.” I mean seriously. At one point, one of the parents briefly and politely interrupts a tour group to ask directions to a building her daughter is in. A parent in the group says, “Excuse me, but those of us who DIDN’T abandon our children would like to continue with the tour?” Why did that happen?

The meet-cute is NOT CUTE.

About half an hour in, I was pretty sure I was not going to like it. An hour in, I was actively suffering. But I COULDN’T stop watching it, because I was DETERMINED to see someone attracted to someone my age. Well. And what I saw was someone famous for being able to pretend to be things and feel things he isn’t/doesn’t, get paid to pretend to be attracted to someone my age, while I winced and suffered.

More movies to try, please. Actors who are, say, 40 and up. (Bonus points if the male lead is not 15-20 years older than the female lead.)

Recently I’ve encountered several reminders (attractiveness studies, comedians, remembering that Anne Bancroft was only 35 or 36 when she played the desperate older woman in The Graduate, etc.) that someone my age is lucky men can see her at all. After a time of moping, I identified the specific emotion, and it was “hurt feelings.” The next step with hurt feelings is to figure out WHO hurt the feelings, and so I also identified the two culprits: “biological imperative” and “the survival of the species.” It’s not going to be easy to get an apology, let alone a promise of changed behavior.

It makes sense that as I reach an age where my fertility is getting iffy and my chance of a baby with birth defects is ever rising, that my body would stop bothering to divert resources to maintaining all the signals that I’d be a good candidate for mating. I’m NOT a good candidate for mating, not anymore. Men looking to continue the species would be right to let their eyes skip past me.

But isn’t it sad? Isn’t it pitifully, pitifully sad for us all (those of us whose appearance is no longer linked to the continuation of the species; the men who don’t even want to continue the species but still have Fertility Goggles on; the women who are currently getting looks but will soon stop getting them; the children who start getting looks from grown men at age 12-13) that we haven’t yet managed to restructure our animal brains to equate fertility signals with FERTILITY, instead of with beauty? And isn’t it also sad that beauty is so important? And isn’t it BEYOND INFURIATING that Paul is HANDSOMER THAN EVER??? *pant pant*

It’s not even that I want “to be looked at.” Automatic looks from men are of low value. I think what bothers me is knowing that if Paul and I were to split up, he would have very little trouble finding another spouse, but I would have an increasingly difficult time. Even men who didn’t want children would hardly be able to SEE me, let alone be attracted to me, EVEN IF I WOULD BE AN EXCELLENT MATCH, and it would be mostly because of irrelevant fertility signals.

Well. It’s a senseless topic. It IS the way our brains work. It IS the way biology works. I don’t know why I even brought it up.

I don’t know how to say how I’m feeling about Rob having his driver’s license. Actually, I do know how to say it: That I am certain he will die in a car crash. Yes. That puts it nicely.

But look at all of us! Almost all of us drive cars. And yet almost none of us sitting here right now have died in car crashes. It gives me some hope.

********

A couple appointments ago, the nurse-practitioner at my OB/GYN mentioned the word “perimenopause” and recommended a book by Christiane Northrup called The Wisdom of Menopause. I wrote a post on my initial impressions, and I think I stopped reading the book right after writing that post: I couldn’t get through it at all. I know a lot of people love it and find it essential, and so if you’re at this stage of life I think you ought to give it a try to see if you like it too. But I think I can sum it up by saying it was not my style at all, and that what I remember every time I think of the book is her asking if it’s any coincidence that the word menopause includes a PAUSE from MEN, and me thinking, “…Yes. Yes, that is in fact a coincidence.” I also remember feeling as if she were spinning out and trying to take me with her. No, I am not going to leave my husband in order to give birth to my creative self. But thank you for offering.

Oh, I know how I can sum it up: it felt as if The Wisdom of Menopause were written by and for the Baby Boomer generation. It wasn’t a world view I identified with, but I could see how other people would find it a perfect fit. But I’d prefer more of a Gen-X version: less talk about feeling shackled/fulfilled/empowered, more snark. Perhaps Janeane Garofalo could be persuaded to write it.

All of this is to say that I found a book I like better:

(screen shot from Amazon.com)

The Madwoman in the Volvo, by Sandra Tsing Loh.

There were only two parts I didn’t like: (1) the part where the author talked about how much she loved and recommended the very book I just mentioned was not at all my style (this is similar to when a blogger you love raves about a blogger you can’t stand), and (2) the part where she talks about her weight using numbers. I know we all have our own everything, but reading how appalled and shocked someone is by a number I haven’t seen since high school is…a barrier to communication/empathy. I did get past it and identify somewhat ANYWAY.

I don’t want to oversell the book: I think one reason I liked it so much is that I picked it off the library shelf on a whim, and with the assumption I wouldn’t like it. If I tell you I laughed often enough to annoy other members of my household, the increase in expectations could lead to a decrease in enjoyment. For another thing, it’s not in the same category as the Christiane Northrup one. The Wisdom of Menopause is trying to include EVERYTHING: its apparent goal is to be a complete reference book for all the signs and symptoms and reasons and metaphorical interpretations and so forth. Whereas The Madwoman in the Volvo is like reading a blog or a series of essays about menopause: it’s for laughing and relating and feeling normal.

I’m going to buy a copy of it and send it to someone. U.S. mailing addresses only. You can leave a comment without being automatically entered; if you do want to enter, just say something enter-y with your comment. The winner can choose a new paperback or a used hardcover (if you pick used, I’ll choose one that claims to be in good condition). I’ll pick a winner on March 31st.

Update! Winner is Maggie, who thought she might be too late to enter but wasn’t! Maggie, I’ll email you!

I am very happy to report that not only was yesterday’s experience at the DMV successful and Rob now has his driver’s license, but also the clerks were NOTHING LIKE the one we had on a previous occasion.

When we arrived, the line was long, but after about 5 minutes I didn’t even mind waiting, because I COULD HEAR THE CLERKS. AND THEY WERE BEING NORMAL AND NICE AND HELPFUL. A man was applying for a handicapped plate, and the clerk asked him if he wanted one little card to hang on the rearview mirror, or two. He said, “Well…we just have one car, so one I guess,” and the clerk said in a helping, friendly voice, “Some people like to have two: that way you can put one in your car, and your wife could carry one in her purse in case she goes out in a friend’s car. And it’s no extra cost for the second one.” And he said, “Oh! All right, then! Two.”

The other clerk had the unpleasant task of telling a customer that she (the customer) had just waited in a 20-minute line for a service that required a stop at Town Hall before it could be done at the DMV. Instead of brusquely dismissing her and making her feel stupid for not knowing, the clerk’s tone was sympathetic. Like, “Oh…I’m afraid the Town Hall has to process this before we can do our part.” When the customer responded, ungraciously, “How was I supposed to know that?,” the clerk did not get rude in response.

I didn’t hear another customer’s situation, but as he finished up he said “And thank you for being so nice,” and the clerk said, “Hey! Don’t let word get around! We have a reputation to keep up!” It made me feel as if maybe I had something in my eye.

So all of this is to say that as we stood in line I felt quite certain that whether or not we were successful in the day’s attempt, we would at LEAST not be dealt with unpleasantly by someone who was glad to be taking us down. And indeed this was the case. The clerk took the whole pile of papers and looked through it in a relaxed way, like a normal person looking to make sure everything was all set, rather than acting rushed and barking demands for particular papers and acting as if she hoped to find problems. And then there WERE no problems! And then Rob took the written portion and passed! And then he took the driving portion and passed! And then we had to wait in line again for half an hour, but that wasn’t anyone’s fault: it was just a long line. And when we got to the front of the line, the clerk said, “Yay, you made it!” And as we left, other people in line said to Rob, “Congratulations!”

In short: a completely different experience. I’ll bet these clerks HATE working with that other clerk.

Trying to get email frequency changed, and trying to get Rob tested for his driver’s license at the DMV, and trying to find out from my health insurance where I am allowed to take William for an x-ray, and trying to understand my tax forms—all of these things are making me feel helpless and frustrated to the point of violence. I am TRYING to do things RIGHT, and it feels like everyone who ought to be motivated to LET or HELP me do things right is SHRUGGING while they MAKE LIFE HARD ON PURPOSE. Other people POSSESS the information for doing it right; they allege that they WANT to help me do it right; their very JOB DESCRIPTION is to help me get things right; but when I ASK THEM FOR THE INFORMATION, they decline to give it out. *pant pant*

Like, the insurance. Again and again and again, the insurance company cautions us that we MUST check with them to find out where we can have tests done. “Check with us! Check with us! JUST CHECK WITH US!!!” So I check with them, and they say, “Hm, I don’t see anything within 50 miles.” I check back, because surely this can’t be right. I live in a small town, but we are within half an hour of two largish cities. There is not ONE SINGLE PLACE within 50 miles I can take William for an x-ray? I receive the response, from a different person. Of course there are PLENTY of places! I can take him to either of these cancer-specializing x-ray places in a neighboring state. Well….but this is just an x-ray to take a look at his ribs, because one side is sticking out weird.

You know what would make SO MUCH MORE SENSE? If my DOCTOR were the one to tell me the best place to take William for the kind of x-ray the doctor wants. Wouldn’t that be SO MUCH MORE MAKE-SENSEY?? So why are we doing it this STUPID way, where I have to talk to a customer service representative who tells me to use their web site for this, and then when I use the web site I get “no results within 50 miles,” so then I use their “Email us!” button and get “Don’t be silly, you can go to the oncology department in the next state!” Wouldn’t it be better to use the x-ray machine that is part of our pediatrician’s practice, in the same building? No, that is not covered. Do it the REALLY REALLY EXPENSIVE AND DIFFICULT OUT-OF-STATE UNNECESSARY-SPECIALIST WAY.

What makes it worse is that I have now tried to get my question answered THREE TIMES, and yet I am certain I have not yet received the correct answer. I am certain my insurance company does NOT want me to go to a cancer specialist in another state to have my son’s ribs x-rayed for non-cancer-related reasons. I am certain of it! I am certain that this is an issue of lowest-level customer service not caring very much about getting me the right answer, and/or not knowing how to access the right answer. But having to go back AGAIN and AGAIN just to try to get the answer they should be giving me in the first place is what makes me feel like smashing my coffee mug into the mouthpiece of the phone.

Or let’s talk about the DMV. A teenager getting his driver’s license is such a big and important and exciting and scary milestone, and I would like to non-thank our DMV for making the process as hellish and horrible and frustrating and lie-awake-at-night-processing-the-clerk’s-startling-brusqueness as possible. Really: exceptional work there.

Today we are going back for our THIRD ATTEMPT to have Rob tested. That is, he has not yet been tested. This is our third ATTEMPT to get him tested, which turns out to be like solving an impossible level of a video game: first double-jump on the blue square, then a jump-flip over the alligator, then bounce off the walking mushroom, aiming for the next floor where you have to punch-smash the tree, and…shoot, small error, start all over at the beginning.

And this is with a parent (I am talking about myself here) who goes online, studies all the instructions on the DMV’s site, makes lists of every piece of paper we need, prints out all the forms, fills them all out, puts them in order on a clipboard, makes a master list of everything that should be on that clipboard, checks the master list against the contents of the clipboard. TWO TIMES we have been sent away anyway. Today is our third chance. If we don’t make it today, you will know because you will think your ear is ringing. But that will be me.

Here is a sample interaction with the DMV clerk:

Clerk: Let’s see your forms.
Swistle: Okay, here is the….
Clerk: This box needs to be checked.
Swistle: But it says to check it if he’s applying for a REPLACEMENT li…
Clerk: We need this box checked.

No explanation. No “I know, it seems misleading, but for some crazy reason that’s also the box they use for new licenses.” No listening to my reason for not checking the box. Just a brusque interruption in an unpleasant voice. She seriously interrupted me EVERY TIME I TALKED.

Clerk: Where’s the birth certificate.
Swistle: Let’s see, here’s the…
Clerk (taking the wrong piece of paper out of the pile Swistle is looking through): Nope. This is a copy.
Swistle (who hasn’t yet noticed clerk’s error): It’s a certified copy! It said it could be a…
Clerk: Nope. See right here: it says VOID.
Swistle (seeing problem): No, you’ve got the wrong…
Clerk: Nope, won’t work.
Swistle: HERE is the certified…
Clerk (no concession, just moving to next form): You need the driving school written here.
Swistle: They told us we should first ask you…
Clerk: We need it written here.

She was HAPPY to turn us away. She was HOPING to turn us away. I wanted so badly to shove her to the ground. Just one really sharp sudden SHOVE. Or I wanted to record the whole exchange and post it on the internet, and then send her a link to the comments section.

I feel as if I am just NEVER going to get the hang of scheduling appointments. I am continually looking at the calendar and thinking, “Oh…wait. William has a doctor appointment at the same time as Rob’s piano lesson and also that’s when the little kids’ bus gets here.” I think it’s one of the reasons I dread calling to make appointments: I just know I’m giving myself a little pocket of trouble for the future.

********

I talked a little about this on Twitter but now let’s talk about it here. The Children’s Place is one of my favorite places to buy clothes for the kids. I WANT to receive emails from them. I signed up for those emails ON PURPOSE. But they started sending 3-4 emails PER DAY, and that is KRAZY. I followed the unsubscribe link, because sometimes that leads to a place where you can choose to receive fewer emails, but no: it’s either MANY EMAILS A DAY or NONE.

So I emailed them. I asked if this situation could be changed. I explained it the way I explained it just now: I WANT emails, just not so MANY. I don’t WANT to unsubscribe; I WANT to be marketed to. I got an email back: they suggested I follow the unsubscribe link and choose to receive fewer emails. I checked that link again, to see if they’d changed the options since I last checked, but no: it’s still all or nothing. I emailed back; there has been no reply. I followed the unsubscribe link and unsubscribed.

Gymboree recently followed the same pattern. They were sending a couple emails a week, and I was good with that. Then recently I noticed it had crept up and I was routinely getting several a day. I did the same procedure: checked to see if there was a way to reduce frequency, then emailed the company. They sent an email thanking me for my input; I unsubscribed.

This seems BEYOND stupid to me, from a marketing/PR standpoint. Why would a company take the people who are ASKING TO BE MARKETED TO (and then RESPONDING with outlays of MONEY), and alienate them by extremely overdoing it? This is not a matter of “I wonder if the customers would respond better to one email a week or two emails a week?”: NO ONE IN THE WORLD could possibly think a customer would want 3-4 emails a day. Seriously: NO ONE. And yet here we are.

This is goose that lays the golden egg stuff: if they would send one email a week, I would love it and give them more money than if they sent zero emails a week; when they send four a day, they lose that marketing path completely.

Edit: Just heard back from my SECOND email to Children’s Place, the one where I thanked them for their advice about reducing frequency, but that the link they’re talking about actually leads to an all-or-nothing subscribe/unsubscribe option, not to a reduce-frequency option. Their reply: Explaining that I can find the link at the bottom of emails from Children’s Place. I VERY NEARLY screamed with frustration.