Are you reading this? Good for you! It's a dying art - or so it seems.
It is with a certain amount of sadness that I've watched the demise of long-standing newspapers of record this past spring. One of the papers for which I wrote printed its last issue two months ago. Another scaled its size and staff down considerably.
I can't complain because I contributed to their economic troubles. Subscriptions were one of the first luxuries to go, since there are adequate online sources for news, most of them provided, in streamlined version, by the very paper that used to be delivered to the large puddle in my front driveway.
Naturally, the economy has been a big contributor to this phenomenon, but technology has also had an effect.
Frankly, though, USA Today and its fast-food approach to the news began the slippery slope to the small-bite approach to news writing so suitable for the internet.
Up until recently, the general public's inability to focus on any prose longer than a few sentences or to do anything but skim a lengthy article was just a passing observation. As a collector of old books, I've noticed how larger print and thicker paper make some current hard cover novels appear more substantial than they actually are.
If A Tale of Two Cities was printed by today's bestseller publishers, you'd need a wagon to tote it onto the subway. Not to worry - the only people still reading the Dickens classic are college lit students for whom nice, cheap paperback versions are available, if not those lovely yellow and black Cliffs Notes for those who like the idea of classic literature, but not the actual body of writing.
This disdain for more than a cursory reading became an urgent issue recently when I wrote about a governmental budgetary observation on my obscure little domestic blog.
Let me point out that visitors to my blog consist of my family and friends who have dropped by randomly and liked my point of view. Most random visitors are bored to tears by my fascination with cooking, knitting, birds and, of course, dogs. Every now and then, though, I deign to express an opinion.
In this case, it wasn't even an opinion; it was more of an observation of the long-standing budgetary practice of "using up" (i.e., wasting) money at the end of a fiscal period. Within the scope of the entire budget the amount is usually chicken feed. But in most cases this "chicken feed" would support an entire family or two for a year - and that was the point of my post.
To illustrate this I had taken a picture of a group of government employees who were doing (or not doing, actually) what these particular governmental workers are anecdotally known for doing (or not doing) all over the country. But the reason they were doing (or not doing) this was because of this wonky budgetary system.
I'm not trying to be cryptic. I just don't want to again go through what posting that picture and writing that post put us through that week. Within a day of that post going up, I had a local representative of that state agency on my doorstep; a gentleman who, I might add, had not read my blog.
I explained my position and he seemed satisfied with that, but apparently the news spread like wildfire throughout the agency. Pretty soon I was getting anonymous comments on my blog from local employees accusing me of the very opposite of what my post was stating.
When I'd redirect them to read the actual post, they'd back down grudgingly as if to say, "No one told me I'd have to actually read anything..." (Except for one hanger-on responding to the pictures who refused to do any reading and, as it turned out, was totally unrelated to any of the parties mentioned in the post; a person who, judging by his/her comments, probably has a close personal relationship with Mr. Daniels.)
I relate this only to illustrate that even 500 words was too much conscious reading for most of the visitors to my blog that day - most of whom had a stake in what I wrote.
My husband did not want me to bring up this incident again now that my blog's back to normal. I assured him that he didn't have to worry: there are no pictures here and my Spot-On columns range around 700 to 750 words. I'm guessing most readers gave up at the mention of A Tale of Two Cities.
Shortly before my son's high school graduation, our family's attendance was required as yet another end-of-the-school-year awards "banquet."
I put the word "banquet" in quotes merely because a banquet conjures visions of feasting and reveling, perhaps a boisterous song or two and maybe even serving wenches. It does not speak of green bean boiled gray in ham stock.
Anyway, humor me. The last - dinner - was the largest of the year. It lasted 2-1/2 hours and the lengthy tributes exceeded some Nobel Prize-winner speeches.
In terms of expense and attention, all other awards given at all other dinners paled in comparison.
In a perfect world - in other words, one where I am Empress of the Universe - a ceremony such as this would exist to award those who excelled at accomplishing the goals of the host institution. In other words, an establishment that exists to educate would, naturally, save its greatest accolades for those who best become educated.
Alas, no. The year-end awards banquets -- academic and athletic -- are ceremonies arranged for and paid by groups of parents. So the larger your group and the more support you can muster for the group, the bigger and better the tribute.
One would think academics would be the largest however, this particular lavish display was furnished by the school's athletic boosters.
There were a few of us who qualified for attendance at both dinners. It is a strange circumstance that, in spite of my side of the family's anti-social attitude, I happen to give birth to A Joiner. Heir 2 is up for anything and when someone came to him and said, "Hey, we really have a good time on the cross country team," he was ready to sign up.
Turns out he was pretty good at it - enough to letter in it. But, as is our familial attitude, he's not particularly competitive in the area of athletics. His desire to win did not extend to changing his diet or his wonky sleeping habits. So our annual invitation to attend the athletic banquet was always a bit of a surprise. We rarely attended, though, since Heir 2 didn't know many of the other people there.
But this year was different. It was his last chance to attend the athletic dinner and we were all feeling a bit sentimental.
I've always been critical about school systems that focus on athletics at the expense of academics and, to be honest, our local school system is not as bad as the nightmare of a school system described in H.G. Bissinger's Friday Night Lights, where all school money and community focus goes to support high school football while the educational facilities and faculty fall into disrepair.
However, those of us who have come from other areas ("outsiders" or foreigners, as we're called when we dare to express an opinion), are well aware of the school systems' short-sighted ambitions for the students they graduate.
I couldn't help wondering, as each athletic dinner award recipient returned to their seat with a trophy the size of the Stanley Cup, what sort of message was being sent by the booster parents, the school administrators and faculty in attendance and the system providing the facilities. "This is it. This is as good as it's ever going to get. So here's this big honkin' trophy to remind you of your glory days that, upon graduation, are over."
To be sure, when a few days later we read the program that accompanied the graduation ceremony, only around five students, out of a graduating class of over 140, were attending college outside the surrounding area.
The argument most often used by the booster parents for encouraging athletics (certainly in a school system that has an adequate phys ed requirement, not to mention a plethora of opportunities for area youth to engage in team sports), is the abundance of scholarship money. But there were no athletic scholarship recipients in Heir 2's graduating class, other than the paltry amount doled out as local money. On a budget exceeding the $300,000 mark, the athletic boosters handed out an amount equal to the academic boosters, who operate on a substantially smaller budget and certainly less than was spent on the toddler-sized trophies.
"Well," a friend of mine said, "the world needs laborers too."
At first I recoiled at the smug, elitist connotation of what he'd said. But the world does need laborers and I'd be proud to have either of my sons become one if that is the work he chooses to do.
For many students in the community, though, that choice is hijacked by a community focused on its own entertainment instead of providing for their children a vision and a future.
Who am I to criticize someone who has won $50,000?
That's what I keep telling myself about 15-year-old Kate Moore winning the LG U.S. National Texting Championship.
I mean, really. What has anyone around here won lately?
Actually, my first thought was, "They compete over that?" followed by "Why do we insist on turning everything into a competition?"
The answer is, of course, money. The $50,000 given to Kate as a cash prize is small potatoes in terms of the amount of advertising generated and viewed on MTV, where competitors had to watch shows and text back broadcasted messages. Apparently the competition had the added bonus of keeping kids glued to the television even more than usual; at least we can hope more than usual.
And I can't get the creepy image of millions of hypnotized teenagers staring at a television screen, mechanically echoing back messages to some Big Brother who is counting how many responded, what they responded to and what got the most response.
Let's take the $50,000 out of the equation, though, since only one kid out of millions of teenagers won what was, by contrast to the bucks generated, a piddly amount. Maybe we should be just a little bit concerned about the . . . uh . . . skills . . . required to be a winner in this particular competition, which amounts to pushing buttons.
Leave out the winnings and what we are left with is a teenager who texts an average of 400 to 470 messages a day and admits to having had her cell phone taken away from her in class. I'll admit that happened once in the Heirs' high school career; the cell phone went from the teacher to my possession and wasn't returned to the offending Heir until the end of the school year. We never again had a problem with Heirs focusing on their cell phones instead of the instructor.
Kate also insists, in response to the obviously softly lobbed reporters' questions, that she maintains her grades and social life and that her favorite use for texting is "studying for exams." Yeah. And my son and his girlfriend go for long nature walks to observe the bird life.
And, of course, "maintenance" and mastery are two very different things, rather like the difference between achieving the Virginia Standard of Learning and actual proficiency in the subject matter are two very different things.
I know I sound curmudgeonly, particularly in view of my own ineptitude with texting. My sons won't text to me anymore because it takes me too long to answer and, up until recently, my messages were ambiguous because I didn't know how to add punctuation. For instance, when answering a text that an Heir won't be coming home because he's going to watch a movie at the house of a particularly unsavory character, there is a big difference between "Don't come home" and "Don't. Come home."
With the help of my sister-in-law I managed to send Heir 2 a particularly effusive text right after his principal declared him "graduated." A few seconds later I got back a text from him stating, "U found out how to add an exclamation mark, huh? You only needed one. UR not 13 yrs old."
But even Heir 2 admits he's not half as fast as most of the people he knows and even they average only 30 to 40 texts per day - that's only about 10 percent of Kate Moore's average, so you really have to wonder exactly when she finds time to look up, let alone maintain her grades and social life.
The thing that made me shudder, though, was this direct quote from Kate herself: "Let your kid text during dinner! Let your kid text during school! It pays off. Your kid could win money and publicity and a phone."
I just can't help but wonder what would happen if Kate put all that texting energy into paying attention in school and maybe doing something other than watching MTV. She won $50,000 by sending over 400 texts a day. A full academic college scholarship is worth upwards of about $200,000.
You do the math - your phone has a calculator, doesn't it?
Are there still some people out there that missed the memo about the devaluation of property values due to the housing market bust? I mean, are there really some people who didn't know that when housing market busts, it affects everyone's housing prices - not just the people of which you disapprove?
Recently I read a local story in The Winchester Star about housing assessments putting existing home owners into a "negative equity" situation where the mortgage on their house is greater than its assessment value. This is messing with the financial planning of many a baby boomer who smugly thought the economic crisis would only affect the irresponsible spendthrifts who bought houses way above their "station" they couldn't afford.
The article offers the example of the Bochers, who bought a nice house several years ago, knowing they were going to retire when they were both over 64 years old, at which point they planned to refinance, lowering their monthly mortgage payments to make retirement affordable. That was the plan back when housing and real estate appreciated in value; an investment so safe, the couple didn't see any problem with spending $30,000 in improvements. The house would be worth much more when they were ready to refinance.
That's what they thought.
Well, Mr. Bocher, that's what we all thought.
"We did everything right," Gordon Bocher told The Winchester Star, citing the fact that he put his son through college and takes care of a disabled daughter. "People who can't pay are getting all the assistance in the world."
People who can't pay. . . Oh! You mean us - the ones who were affected before you.
Here's a reality check: We thought we did everything right (we take good care of our children also) and, frankly, like thousands of other families who were forced into foreclosure prior to President Obama's stimulus package, I'm not getting a penny in assistance.
The Bocher's attitude is common and a nasty turn of human nature. I knew all but the very rich would feel the economy's bite. There are people who a year ago were harshly judging my family's economic downfall are now calling to apologize and asking, "By the way - ahem - how did you handle you husband's depression?" -- since he didn't do the "right thing" and get a job with the federal government with a fairly secure pension (Mr. Bocher is a retired air traffic controller) and instead chose to work in a field that, by the way, built the very house Mr. Bocher now occupies.
We're all learning the economy is always a gamble. You may want to call it "financial planning," but you are still relying on events outside your sphere of influence to increase your assets. Sometimes you win. But sometimes you lose and, when you do, it's bad form to blame the dice or the croupier and downright misguided to blame the other losing gamblers.
I suppose I was naïve to imagine that once the economic dominoes reached a larger portion of the population, we'd all come to realize the profound philosophical change that we should have initiated a long time ago about how we plan for the future, how we direct our children and how we live in the present.
I forgot the annoying American tendencies toward self-righteousness. Your domino falling is the result of your irresponsibility; my domino falling is an injustice.
The Bochers and other homeowners whose financial plans now require updating would do better to stop throwing their hissy fits and realize we are all in the same boat - even if they do prefer to stay in their staterooms rather than mingle with us slobs in steerage.
My husband and I admit we made a mistake and bought too much of a house to withstand the devastating blow to the housing market. And - Mr. Bocher - so did you. Only we did it a year earlier and were closer to the blast zone.
And, honestly, be thankful. The market will come back and your home will again start to grow in value. Your wife is employed and you have a secure pension. There are people living in relative's basements or crammed in tiny apartments with no such advantages, whose only sin was their choice of livelihood and really poor timing.
This week, like millions of other mothers in the U.S., I will watch my last child graduate from high school.
His brother's graduation was filled with the excitement of the newness of watching our first born become an adult and moving on with his life. But there is a bitter-sweet finality that creeps in when it's your last child moving that tassel to the other side of the mortar board.
For Joe this past school year has been a happy mixture of beginnings and endings. He turned 18 a month ago - meaning, in our house, the ending of curfews (my husband and I made this decision based on the fact that neither of our sons ever exhibited behavior that led us to believe they couldn't handle this extended bit of trust and, so far and thank God, we've not been disappointed). He celebrated this by staying out at a friend's house until midnight to finish up a movie - an hour past his usual weekend curfew. Yeah. He's a rebel.
His band recital, academic achievement ceremony, baccalaureate service, honors service, sports achievement ceremony - we've attended all of them together for the last time, all of it leading up to Friday's graduation ceremony, which seems to be for Joe, a relief.
For me, though, this past school year has been quite different. It's been a year of gradually loosening the apron strings; of letting him start flexing those independent muscles. There will be no one to nag him to do homework at college; no one to tell him to get to bed or he's going to be exhausted in the morning; no one to order him to stay home in bed when he's not feeling well. For me, this has been a year of biting my tongue and letting the chips fall where they may.
Joe and I have discussed how difficult that first semester of college can be, coping with home sickness, learning to live with total strangers and attend classes where the instructors are ambivalent to your success. I'm hoping I make such misery sound so extreme that when he does feel that loneliness it won't be half as bad as I said it would be.
I tell him all that and, meanwhile, the mother in me wants to tell him that when the loneliness hits, he needs to come home and he will feel better. For me this past school year has been a time of conflicting emotions.
So when he worries, "What if I get a real jerk as a roommate," I say nonchalantly, "Oh, you'll work it out. You'll learn to get along with all kinds of people." But what I want to say is, "You come home and for the rest of the year commute the 2-1/2 hours to Roanoke;" or, better yet, "Give up that full academic scholarship, come home and attend the community college down the road."
Our mother/son dynamics have already begun to change. I feel myself shifting to the sidelines of his life and know that is as it should be. But that doesn't prevent the Italian Mama in me from having the urge to pull an all-out coup for his attention and consideration. I come from a long line of talented and tenacious manipulators and, should I wish, could tangle him in a web of guilt and insecurity, the strands of which would reach from here to Roanoke College. But I want a son who can stand on his own two feet, not a marionette dancing to my tune.
And that, I suppose, is the hardest aspect in all this: he is a project accompli, so to speak. Oh, I'll be called in for random maintenance now and then. But for the most part, my opinions and advice will be one among many and probably not even the most heavily considered. While I've worked at other things while raising my boys, they were always my biggest and most important project. And now I'm done.
So for me this has been a year of asking, "Now what?"
He, of course, can understand none of this. To him I'm just his sappy, sentimental mom who will cry at his graduation, require his appearance at a reception for his family and then quietly retire to the periphery as he takes on the world.
I'm happy to do so. My two projects are rather impressive.
They deserve their own spotlight.
I will join your club, support your cause, volunteer to man your booth; but please, for the love of all you hold sacred, don't make me come to a meeting.
Theoretically, having a meeting seems like a good idea: gather together all the players into one room so everyone knows what their role is and how it contributes to the goal of the project. It appears to be a great way to save time and aggravation, not to mention make a bazillion dollars for Stephen Covey (of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People Who Carry Day Planners fame).
The reality is quite different. At best a meeting makes official what has already been determined via e-mail and phones calls. At worst it's a two-hour unfocused idea free-for-all. I'm 51 years old and I've yet to attend a meeting that accomplished anything that could have been accomplished without annoying 95 percent of the attendees by requiring their presence.
Admittedly the absolute best meetings I ever attended were in high school. At the beginning of the school year, we'd pick what clubs we wanted to join. Then we'd attend a meeting, elect "officers," and then chat a bit, some of it even on topic (thanks to whatever poor sap of a teacher got suckered into being the club's faculty sponsor). Then we'd adjourn. The next meeting was in the spring when an announcement came over the loudspeaker about yearbook pictures of club members. If a club time fell during gym period, we'd show up whether we were members or not. That's how my picture ended up in my yearbook under Secretarial Club.
Once I entered the workforce I had to endure real meetings called by real bosses and requiring me to carry a pen and pad to create the illusion that I was going to write down important points. I would exit the meeting with a fairly realistic sketch of my left hand and not much else. They did have donuts, though.
I had hopes that when I entered the field of journalism, the loftily-termed "Editorial Meetings" would be fruitful. I figured, if you're churning out a multi-paged publication on a regular basis, you've got to know what's coming if you are going to meet your deadline.
I did enjoy editorial meetings - if I wasn't busy. We'd all gather with the editors and talk about local politics and gossip, banter around a few running jokes about local celebrities and discuss what dish we were bringing to either the Christmas party or the summer picnic, whichever was seasonally appropriate. And, of course, donuts. Then someone would look at their watch, announce the time with alarm, everyone would call out some pressing task they had to do and we'd all disperse. Then we'd go back to our desks and type out our list of stories and estimated length, which we then hand delivered (back in the day before e-mail) to our respective editors.
These days I'm out of the organized work force and into more dangerous meeting territory: social club meetings. Publicly, these common-interest organizations look like it would be a lot of fun to join: a group of people who all like to do the same thing. Oh, but there are meetings lurking behind that brief moment of frivolity: general membership meetings, committee meetings, board meetings.
A meeting in the hands of such novices is a dangerous thing, especially when someone utters the words, "Roberts Rules of Order," and the only one who doesn't know what that means is the person running the meeting. The result is either chaos or the proceedings being hijacked by the one person in the room who has a lengthy, boring story to go with every issue being discussed, usually involving grandchildren and whatever disease they have.
So I weigh my affiliation with any organization against the amount of meetings they hold and the president's knowledge of parliamentary procedure. If there are any lawyers among the membership, I give it a pass. Lawyers can bring a meeting to a screeching halt over a technicality that occurred five years ago.
The weird thing about meetings is that everyone - everyone - now admits they hate them. It used to be merely dislike, but now it has become outright hate.
I think it's that donuts have stopped being a feature at every meeting. Now there are things like vegetable platters, fruit baskets and bottled water. No one should have to endure healthy eating and a meeting at the same time.
I was blithely driving down the interstate one day when, looking ahead as I topped a hill, I noticed a line of cars stretching a half mile long in the right hand lane behind an exceptionally slow-moving vehicle. They were stuck there, the poor saps, because those of us who had looked ahead had already formed a steady stream in the left lane to pass all of them.
I could pretty much guess what was holding up traffic. Fifteen years ago I would have guessed either a car in trouble trying to inch its way to the next exit or tiny little old lady attempting to look through her steering wheel and over her car hood. These days I know it's someone on a cell phone, the use of which causes drivers to glide past (read, "cut off") everyone going at least 15 mph over the limit or to languish cozily at 15 mph under the limit, leaning on the door oblivious to the world around them.
In Virginia, until July 1 adults can pretty much do anything while driving, including all the various options open for cell phone use including using the handheld set and texting. I assume juggling and balancing your cell phone while driving are also still permissible, though the legislation never mentions these activities specifically. I use hyperbole in this situation because those activities are just stupid and selfish as the other more common forms of driver inattention.
Beginning July 1 Virginians will no longer be permitted to text message while driving. Attempts to put other limits on cell phone use either died in committee or were tabled indefinitely by a snickering General Assembly. Okay, I made up that snickering part, but I'm sure a proposal to ban use of all electronic devices during driving met with considerable opposition from a legislative body that was probably at the moment of the vote twittering and texting everything from the controversial to the insipid (Disclaimer: no one is charging that any of the twitters? tweets? twixts? were submitted while the sender was driving).
Anyway, what it comes down to is that Virginia drivers can continue to glide through stop signs, ignore oncoming traffic at a yield sign, cut people off and cause major interstate collisions for the privilege of ordering a pizza to be delivered to them as they step out of their car at home.
Virginians 18 and under are the only drivers prohibited from using their cell phones in any way while driving. Because, you know, 19-year-olds are so much more responsible than 18-year-olds.
Our small-town version of rush hour is rather comical, what with all the honking and waving and apologizing that goes on as legions of SUVs operated by drivers with cell phones immediately glued to their ears bump bumpers, screech to a stop at red lights and pull in front of each other, never missing a beat in their conversation. It's a friendly sort of chaos that would be tragic were it not for the 25 mph limit and the fact that the farm-use vehicles also clogging the roads can't get over 15 mph.
I know what you're going to say: "I know exactly what you mean, Jeanne. There are some drivers who just can't handle the distractions of holding a cell phone to their ear and driving with one hand. But I'm experienced. I don't pull those kinds of boners you described."
Um. . . yeah, you do. You're just too busy talking to notice.
Every single person I've ever heard make that claim - no exceptions - has, while talking on the cell phone, made a major driving error that could have caused an accident were it not for the defensive driving of the other driver - with me on the passenger side (the "death seat"). This is usually accompanied by a nervous laugh and an elaborate explanation involving amazing feats of complicated physics: "I saw the yield sign and I really did look, but the sun hit the sign in such a way that the road over my shoulder looked completely devoid of traffic, even back further where the sun probably hit their windshield..."
No. You were explaining to your friend about getting your dog to the groomers and your son to soccer practice without mixing the two up. You almost got me killed over logistics.
As for me, I just drive defensively and hope for the best
Oh - and the driver of the vehicle holding up interstate traffic? I got a sick feeling as I drove past him - it was my husband.
I was seven years old when a nun told me that any sins I didn't admit to in confession I would have to reveal at the end of the world to everyone who ever existed.
Everyone.
My parents would be there, my teachers, my brothers, The Pope - every Pope - Captain Kangaroo and Paul McCartney would know the horrible sins I'd committed.
The nun's point was that there were worse things to fear than seeking absolution from the shaded figure of a priest in a dark cubicle. Easy for her to say. . . she was a nun. Nuns don't do anything worth confessing unless it would be scaring the crap out of small, innocent children, but that was kind of their job description.
At seven years old, one has to wonder what it was I was so worried about revealing. All I can think of was the time when I was five I found a statue of a reclined deer in my neighbor's bushes and took it home and put it in a box with a bowl of water and some grass clippings (a child's universal idea of animal food). That afternoon there was a minor flurry over the fence when the neighbor found her lawn ornament gone, the words "thief" and "delinquent" and "calling the cops" being thrown about among the adults. I stealthily slipped around the back yard, climbed the fence and returned Bambi to its former resting place, relieved my burning desire for a pet hadn't landed me in jail.
If only I'd been offered the opportunity to confess online as at St. Miriam's Church, I would have saved myself nights of sleeplessness and worry. St. Miriam's is a part of the Catholic Apostolic Church of Antioch and normally practices in the Roman Catholic tradition. But it takes a huge leap from the R.C. norm by offering penitents the opportunity to confess via e-mail instead of before the physical presence of a priest.
This would have been a godsend to one seven-year-old, terrified at the idea of speaking out loud to another human being all the horrors I'd committed. Because even as a child I sensed I wasn't confessing to the real sins - the thoughts and prejudices that flash in the mind before rationalization and conscience take over: the flash of envy I felt when for Christmas my brother got the Kodak Instamatic Camera I had coveted; the jealousy I felt when my little brother was born; my resentment when I was expected to change his diaper or rinse out the really messy ones.
Instead: "I lied three times, forgot my morning prayers seven times, talked back to my mother nine times..."
After Vatican II there was the kinder, gentler Roman Catholic Church and we no longer had to fear getting yelled at by the priest after a confession. When I was a teenager the Sacrament of Penance became a sort of poor man's therapy, illustrated by a penance given to me by one priest who said, "You need to not be so scared of everything, Jeanne," destroying the myth of the uncaring priest and the anonymity of the confessional all in one sentence.
Confession was one of the issues that contributed to my ultimate break with the Roman Catholic Church. What really ticked me off was when our extremely large, crowded parish initiated the practice of the Penance Mass. Basically, it was a church service held on a Saturday during which there was a moment of silence where you confessed your sins through prayer to God and were given a general purpose penance to perform and mass absolution from the priest.
All I could think of were all the sleepless nights I'd spent as a child, convinced I was going to hell because I couldn't bring myself to admit to the priest the hate and revulsion I felt for the boy who insisted on calling me "Jeanne Beany." This was all it really took? A mass, a prayer and bada bing! Absolution?
Of course I no longer worry about having to confess in front of anyone who has ever lived. And, really, it makes absolutely no sense. Sure, it would be uncomfortable for the confessor. But what about everyone who's got to sit there and listen to each other's boring confessions? Sure, we'd get to listen to, say, Mae West or Larry Flynt, but for the most part we'd be listening to the same boring people we avoid at Christmas parties.
And that would be hell.
It is not often that I get to gloat.
I mean, it's not often that I get to gloat about something I, personally, accomplished. I can't gloat over Heir 2 graduating next month with a grade point average over 4.2 or that he will attend Roanoke College on an academic scholarship. That's his accomplishment and I mention it here only as an example of how much I'm not gloating.
For we Domestic Goddesses, this is truly our time for gloating. Having taken it on the chin for over thirty years about our decision to focus on home and family at the expense of a career, we suddenly find ourselves having the very skills needed these days to survive on dwindling or non-existent incomes.
I sympathize - really I do. I made a conscious decision to be a homemaker so the things we had to give up to make that happen really didn't bother us much. We learned to finagle reasonable facsimiles of the things we were sacrificing. Sure, not everyone takes a vacation to Pittsburgh (where there just happened to be a state-paid conference), but the hotel had cable, air conditioning, an indoor pool and free breakfast (for Heir 2 this was the highlight of the trip, since the breakfast bar included Fruit Loops).
It must be agony, though, for someone forced into domestic toil by a layoff. Staying at home put you in the land of no Starbucks; where "doing lunch" is reheating last night's leftovers no matter how sick of it you are; where there are no Christmas parties or office sports pools; and everyday is Casual Friday. The other day I attempted to wear heels and almost killed myself trying to walk around.
It can be very isolating, especially if your hobby is recreational shopping or you like dining out a lot.
In my bloggerly travels I've noticed a huge crop of frugality newcomers searching for the domestic skills necessary to cutting expenses. The result of this is that formerly helpful websites featuring discussions on guerilla miserliness are now recycling the tired old advice to "skip that $5 latte and carry your own coffee" or to "use the library instead of purchasing bestsellers." These days the only ones still buying $5 lattes are former AIG executives.
You will have to pardon me, though, when I get a chuckle out of how quickly product advertising retooled itself from everything being "fast and easy" (luxuries for which you pay) to the same item being "cheap" (only as compared to eating out). Any cheapskate worth his salt knows you can't have both (ramen noodles being the exception that proves the rule).
Sooner or later, if you want to save money, you're going to have to learn to cook. Throwing prepared frozen lasagna in the oven is not cooking - it's reheating. And it's expensive. And, if you love food, it's unsatisfying.
Now this is another concept that baffles me. Everyone has to eat. Why would anyone not know how to cook? It's not a "housewife" thing or even a "girl" thing; it's survival. That t-shirt that says, "What did I make for dinner? Reservations!" sounds downright decadent these days.
I'm aware I sound smug, but for so long I've had to defend my frugal idiosyncrasies like washing out plastic bags and drinking straws (this, specifically drives my brother crazy, so I'd do it even if it didn't save money). One Christmas at my brother's house I kept confiscating the things he was going to throw out that I usually wash and reuse (the aforementioned bags, tin foil, supermarket plastic serving trays, etc.). As we were getting in the car to leave my brother followed us out with a bag of trash. But instead of tossing it into the garbage can, he ran up to the car, knocked on the window and, holding up the bag, said, "Here! You can take this home and restock your kitchen!"
Well guess who called this weekend to ask what type and brand of plastic bag is most suitable for reuse? I hated to tell him that I rarely use them any more since I've collected enough infinitely more reusable glass containers. Ya gotta keep up with the industry, ya know?
So, smugness aside (I wish the word was "smuggery, but it's not), I do want to welcome all you refugees from the corporate world to the world of domesticity and leave you with this:
Baking soda and white vinegar. It's the solution to everything. Stock up.
Since the economy tanked, most Americans are so over buying Stuff.
In fact, just talk to anyone: They never were into buying Stuff. They know other people who were into buying Stuff - usually an in-law; but they were always frugal and thrifty. Those others were the ones who led this country into economic disaster. According to everyone I've spoken to, the entire economy prior to the bubble bursting was bolstered by 25 daughters-in-law who "just had to have everything new."
New is so yesterday; because Americans are done buying New Stuff. Now they're buying Old Stuff. Judging by the crowds at flea markets and thrift stores, old is the new black...or the new new...or something.
I used to be able to wander into my favorite thrift stores any old day of the week and be treated to a cornucopia of good, gently-used items, from clothing with the tags still attached to dishes in their original packing box. These days I follow an exacting schedule listing what store puts out which items at what time on what day. Otherwise all that is left on the shelves are chewed up silk daisies, yellow patent leather shoes in a size 13, a disturbingly-stained Thigh Master and a several copies of the biography of Mary Baker Eddy.
Sources of used Stuff vary, depending on the nature of what you are looking for. While there are no hard and fast rules, I can almost guarantee that in this Shenandoah Valley where everyone is steeped in history and their own family trees, you will not find mint condition Depression Glass for under book value at a yard sale (but if it's there, my mother-in-law will find it, know someone who collects it, buy it for their Christmas present, then lose it in her house by the time the holidays roll around).
Thrift stores are good for finding newer items, especially clothing. I have this fear when I go to a thrift store that I'm going to repurchase clothing I gave away after the previous year's diet. So I do my clothing purchases in another county.
Flea markets are a thrift shopper's paradise and also where you can go to buy back your childhood. Awhile ago I bought a cookie jar identical to one I grew up with, something my brothers couldn't understand. 
They said the Humpty Dumpty on it was "creepy." I have nothing but fond memories of that cookie jar. If you saw a picture of my brothers and me, you'd see for yourself how this particular memory played out.
At 51 years old, there isn't a whole lot of Stuff I need. But I do have a list of things I'm looking for and there is the kismet of finding the One Thing that solves one of those niggling day-to-day dilemmas.
For instance, for the past few months I've taken it into my head that I am through with coffee makers. In 22 years of marriage I've gone through approximately ten coffeemakers, not to mention the uncounted number of glass pots I've had to replace. I wanted to go back to a plain old metal drip coffee pot - nothing to break or go bad. I can be without electricity and still make coffee over a grill. Nothing can keep me from making coffee and I can't stress how important this is.
Any thrift shopper will tell you that, if you are patient, you can find just about anything at a price you can live with. Eventually, there it was: at a flea market - 8 bucks and clean as a whistle.
But then, just a few stalls down, I saw It. I grew up with It, though most people who saw It didn't know it was It. Most people saw an old castoff juice squeezer. As a matter of fact, I needed a juice squeezer that worked just like this one - it was on my list. 
But I was the only one who knew that this juice squeezer, when sitting upright in a dish drainer, looked like some sort of creature that, when I was three, I spoke to on a regular basis. My mother called it It, as in, "She's talking to It again."
The dealer seemed happy to be rid of It. Two bucks and a day later, It was back in my kitchen, contentedly squeezing orange juice for Heir 2's birthday orange pound cake. Sure, I have an Artisan mixer that has a handy-dandy juice attachment, but It doesn't require electricity.
So if the power grid is ever bombed out by aliens, I've got the whole beverage thing covered. That's security you can't buy at Wal Mart.
