Category Archives: friendship

July 7, 2008 · 9:44 pm

Top Ten Ways to be a Perfect House Guest

1. Bring steamed lobsters for dinner (over 2 lbs) check

2. Buy clever lobster forks and citrus slicer from Crate and Barrel. check

3. Empty the dishwasher when you wake up. check

4. Bring 3 Stooges DVD for husbands to watch (with hands down their pants). check

5. Ride to the market to get supplies. check

6. Take ferries at convenient times. check

7. Bring a dog that does not shed. uhhhhh, sorry. thought the grooming would handle that! (labs have a tendency to shed full puppies in the heat.)

8. Bring dog that does not bark incessantly. really, she never barks like this at home. honest.

9. Don’t break the rod when you go fishing. hmmm… jews are not great fisherman. we prefer the fish market, “i’ll take a pound and a half of salmon…”

10. Don’t break the plumbing when taking a shower…

Yeh, well, that one didn’t work out all that well. My poor husband. Everyone else was using the outdoor shower (who wouldn’t). But no, he thought he would just jump into the seldom used indoor one before dinner. Seems when he turned the faucet… it kept turning. And turning. And would not shut off!

Ok, so now we have dinner ready in 20 minutes, a ferry to catch in an hour and a half and the scene in the bathroom would be:

My husband in a towel, the homeowner and his Sharper Image toolkit (only Jews own these – and they might be a collector’s item these days. honestly, would an Irish or Italian guy be caught dead with these metrosexual tools?), the homeowner’s brother-in-law, the neighbor and HIS brother-in-law (why so many in-laws?) inside the shower TOGETHER (calling this the beginning of a porn film) and of course both of the dogs trying to get in on the action. (mine finally not barking, thank goodness).

Needless to say the only solution was to shut all the water in the house and only turn it on (and the shower of course) when needed. And a plumber on a barrier island on the Saturday night of a holiday weekend? Non-existent.

Thanks, Sam and Katie, for being such good sports during our Annual Fourth of July Visit. Only dear old friends like yourselves would be so cool about all this. I promise by July 4, 2012, when you decide to invite us back again we will be sure to work on items 7-10 above.

Then again, as Sam said, “What makes you think you will be invited back so soon…”

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June 30, 2008 · 7:12 pm

Sleepaway. 10 for 2.

As I mentioned in my Jeep packing post, BOTH my kids left this time.

Sleepaway camp, that kidtopia in the mountains of upstate NY that they dream of all year. 10 for 2 translates into living 10 months in anticipation for the 2 that they are at camp.

For anyone who has never experienced this, and certainly parents who did not have sleepaway in their childhoods, it sounds absurd to send your kids away for the summer. Mine both started at 10. It is his 7th summer and her 10th! She is a third year counselor and group leader and he is a waiter. Waiter/waitress summer is the ultimate summer at this camp. They define themselves by this year, he will forever be an ’08 and she an ’05. I met someone recently who went there and he told me he was an ’88. I had to explain to others what that meant.

At breakfast yesterday a friend asked me to explain this camp. What was the lure that kept these kids coming back year after year, some well through their college years, others through grad school and sometimes beyond if they are teachers.

This friend happens to be the grandmother of 2 ‘legacy/legend’ counselors at the boys camp. One of them is 24, has graduated UPENN and taught in South America for the past year. My point being, this is no lazy slouch. In trying to explain, I told her this:

To start, I went to this camp. I know first-hand what keeps them going back. My husband, brother, in-law siblings, cousins and even my mother and aunts went there. My kids are known as third generation (a prized status, I might add). There is actually a fourth generation family. We are very jealous.

So what is the IT? The best explanation would be the sense of family, of belonging to a place and it to you. A culture of acceptance that no matter who you are or where you come from, this place is yours. Athlete, musician, artist, actor, outdoorsperson, offbeat personality, wise-ass – they are all accepted and embraced equally for who they are. This place is the level playing field where kids form relationships with other kids they would otherwise never hang with. Relationships there last a lifetime. Our kids are friends with the children of our camp friends!

Many camps can make this claim. But when you see generation after generation sending their kids, the proof is in that action. Some claim it is a marital dealbreaker. If the spouse does not agree to send their unborn kids to this camp the wedding is off (you think I am kidding, don’t you?)  A few years ago I asked my son why one of his counselors did not come back and he said, “oh mom, he had to be a lawyer” This kid had been in law school and still going back!

30+ years later when I step foot on that turf I have a sense of coming home. Of being somewhere that makes me feel that I have finally struck a balance.

There is no greater joy than to watch your kids experience that kind of childhood euphoria that you have known. When they tell you about their time there, they know that you fully understand. It is a bond that transcends the parent-child relationship. You are them and they are you. What a gift!

It is bittersweet when they leave us now. They are at an age where they do not compromise our lifestyle, rather they enhance it. When they were younger (and needier) we counted the days to have our time to ourselves. Now we feel the void in a different way, maybe one of foreshadowing.

But we still have the same response when other parents ask us what we do all summer without our kids…

Whatever the hell we want!

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June 24, 2008 · 1:35 pm

The Thread (vol 1)

i know many of you out there have ‘a thread’ or two that you participate in. but this… THIS is is the mother of all threads. (threadnocentric, am I?)

this sucker is populated with all sorts of people that would not otherwise find themselves in a social network. certainly not all together. most do not fit the profile of online community members. and yet, we find ourselves there and we cherish it as if we are a family. the thing that ties us together is that we all went to the same college. we live all over the country, have drastically different lives, come from varied backgrounds and yet we all relate to each other. some of these people were friends of friends and i first met them on the thread. now that i think of it, i have never met some of them in person!

this is another place where i have laughed so hard i could not breathe, gotten infuriated with a post as if these were my blood relatives and sadly cried like a baby at the loss of one of our own – way too young (this one is for you, Janie B, up in that big blogfest of the cosmos, oh how you would love this).

the picture in this post was taken at a party one year after the thread started. one of our more creative members saved a list of what people said throughout the year and then wrote the top comments on pool noodles, throwing them in the pool when she arrived. (yes, she is a genius).

our conversations range from family, business, art, politics, current events, sports, music, nonsense/jokes and everything else you can imagine. sometimes the banter is so great i will feel the need to post some excerpts here. some of this stuff is really priceless.

a few weeks back this came from one of my favorite members (thanks DN, you rock):

Gay Marriage – Why do “anti-gay marriage” people believe they have the moral high ground? The newspapers of every city are full of stories about heterosexual couples physically, emotionally, sexually abusing and even killing each other or their children. Not that gay couples don’t do that, too… I just don’t know of any that do.

Right to Choose – If men got pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament

Euthanasia – It is amazing that people who are in terrible pain and knowing they are going to die in a few months can’t take their own life with dignity. It doesn’t surprise me that religious (I use that loosely) people want to make sure everyone gets as much suffering as possible.

Am I kicked off the thread yet?

of course he was not kicked off. we wanted more! it is not that we all always agree, but there is always something said that makes you think.

and thinking is something we ALWAYS have time for.

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June 20, 2008 · 9:56 pm

Time to cry

I know this blog is about laughter, but sometimes we have no choice but to cry.

Yesterday a dear friend and neighbor lost her life in a tragic traffic accident. She was only 58 years old. This post is a tribute to woman who personified the word family.

Every so often in our lives we come across people who lead by example. We are fortunate enough to live across the street from such a family for the past 20 years. They have 4 grown children, all of whom moved back to the area. A magical grandchild who I have joked about being the third grandparent to. And a circle of friends so wide and deep it is illustrated by the never-ending stream of cars that have lined our street since the hours after the accident.

This morning I heard a 12-year-old boy and a grown man ask the same thing. “How can you be here one minute and gone the next?”. Of course, there is no explanation that could satisfy either. This is the unfathomable.

We all leave behind a legacy of sorts. I would like to think of hers as our neighborhood guide to motherhood. She taught us all how to be parents. My husband joked with her and asked what she fed those kids to keep them coming back. She knew how to live life to its fullest and spread love through her work as a teacher and the way she presided over her beautiful family. A tireless woman who always had a way of making everyone feel special. A friend said that their family was like 6 degrees of separation in our community. Probably less in my estimation.

The last time I saw her was the day before she died. It was late in the day and she, her husband, daughter and grandson were walking down the street. I looked in my rear view mirror as I passed and waved, and thought to myself how lucky they are to have raised such a beautiful family and be so young to enjoy the next generation. Her daughter is pregnant with her second child… a girl.

A bittersweet cycle of life.

To you, my friend. I can only hope that wherever you are, you are able to see the impact you made on this world.

Some days time loses out over crying.

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June 16, 2008 · 10:00 pm

First Thursday

If you live in my house, or that of 6 other outrageous women in my zip code, the first Thursday of the month means a night out with ‘the girls’. I will use that term only in the cliché of ‘girl’s night out’, for the seven of us are certainly w-o-m-e-n. In all its positive (and not so positive) connotations. Our husbands may like to spell that b-i-t-c-h. (or more affectionately… bee-otch).

It is hard to describe this group and do it any justice. Were we born out of the need to be heard and not judged? Perhaps. I do know that this is a table where I can fool absolutely NOBODY. And if I try to, I am called on it… big time!

Our mission, if there was to be one, is to BE THERE, no matter what. And to laugh, laugh, laugh.

We started in the most haphazard of ways. We met riding the train, through carpools, as neighbors or running partners. There was no rhyme or reason to who was in… we just happened. We measure the time we have been together by the age of the youngest of our collective 18 children who was born 2 weeks before we started. (12 years ago!) We have shared each other’s joys and heartbreaks ever since. There have been many of both, which makes us all realize how important it is to have your girls.

Our beginning was the essence of the title of this blog, we all could cry but we just had no time. Funny…but not. We were all working mothers with children ranging in age from 0-10 when we began. We come from all fields: medicine, finance, design, merchandising, real estate and entertainment. We are business owners, consultants, full time employees… you name it. Some have stopped working (for pay), some have scaled back and others have ramped up. We are the embodiment of how to juggle at any cost. And we were all beginning to realize that ‘the cost’ was ourselves.

Now that the kids are older life is easier on a maintenance level, but way harder on a life issues one.

There is no table I have ever sat at that is more entertaining. The following is the list of topics discussed at one dinner:

hillary vs. obama, SAT vs. ACT, big 10 vs. private universities, medical neutering of men in power (sorry guys, but this COULD keep you focused), career paths, time off, homeopathic vs. western medicine, botox, tennis, pilates and yoga, 10 lbs. on your ass doing wonders for your face at ‘a certain age‘, social media ruining the focus of our kids or are they just learning in a new way, multi-tasking, facebook, study habits, glass ceilings,  spreadsheets, iphones, the choices of our kids, the ailments of our parents, south beach, vegas, perez hilton, dave matthews (how did those two get in the same conversation?), the right to choose… EVERYTHING in our lives, the size of our asses and our egos, face creams, bad dreams, edging towards, turning and passing 50… and everything in between. (And that is just the list I dare to publish).

Thank you my dear sweet First Thursdays, for keeping me laughing, and yes crying too! You make the good times more joyous and bad ones easier to endure.

I love you all. (admit it, you are tearing up a bit ; )

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