London -- Almost Empty Nest and Quiet Chaos

Claire-Adele and I got back from London yesterday. I didn't really have time to blog while I was out of town as we were busy morning til night. In my spare downtime, I was doing puzzles from puzzle books I bought at Bletchley Park, a place I wished I could have worked at despite the frigid conditions in the winter and sweltering conditions in the summer. Bletchley Park was where Alan Turning and ten thousand people worked to crack the German's Enigma code making machine during World War II. A majority of the people who worked there were women. A related observation from my trip: All of the good British monarchs were women: Elizabeth I, Victoria and Elizabeth II. Just sayin.

The estate that was bought by the British government that became Bletchley Park.

Where a high ranking official worked.

Where the women worked.

Where Alan Turning worked. Or maybe he had the other desk? Anyway, he worked in this room.

I think these are old, unrestored buildings used in the war.

So Claire-Adele and I took this trip before she leaves for college. Before I left, I told one of my friends at work that I was glad Claire-Adele and I were taking this trip as things are chaotic, but not chaotic.

Huh? was his response.

I finally figured it out. It is the quiet chaos, the chaos of an impending major change that doesn't come with drums beating or trauma, but the slowly evolving, impending in change. In Seattle, we have slow earthquakes, the kind where the energy of the shifting tectonic plates is expended slowly over months instead of minutes. The slow quakes still reflect movement without the violent upheaval, but the plates still move and things need to resettle. This is what it is like to have a kid leave for college. It slowly builds, one day at a time. And then she'll be gone.

On my last day of work before the trip, I went to lunch with two young women at my company. One is married, one has a boyfriend, neither have kids. They are both super nice and friendly and curious about my life. The unmarried one asked me lots of questions about my career and family and such. I didn't really get it. Why? Why do they want to hang out with me? I can't possibly imagine that my life--so different from theirs--could possibly be interesting to them. I'm almost an empty-nester and they are young, before kids. What could we have in common?

Perhaps the reason they find me interesting is precisely because we have nothing in common--today. Twenty years ago, I was them. I was part of a dual-income, no kids couple, working, going to graduate school, and fine tuning my career. They listened to me carp about my husband and kids. They listened to me complain about leaving my career to have kids. Then they listened to me talk about my posh upcoming to trip London with my daughter.

Oy.

I didn't want to listen to me. I found myself insufferable. I told them the only thing I didn't majorly screw up in my life, the only thing I did well, was managing money. Not that I screwed up my marriage and kids, but those were far more complex or complicated than I ever could have imagined they would be when I was twenty-eight, give or take a few years. Ask me how to pay off credit card debt and invest in mutual funds, but don't ask me the secret to staying married or being a good parent.

But they didn't mind listening to me. They were sincerely curious. Why?

I think I figured it out. Perhaps they wanted to look into a crystal ball and see what is on the other side, see what the next twenty years hold in store, when they cross the family finish line and launch a kid off to college.

Or worse, did they want to see where I screwed up, see the decisions I regretted, the things I would have done differently? I can't imagine these two women are that dark and cynical, but rather maybe they wanted to learn from me where not to fall. I have to admit when I was that age, I was too stubborn to think I could have learned something from a professional woman twenty years older than me. But then when I was in my twenties, middle-aged women slogging away at the firm where I worked were as rare as hen's teeth. Not that they didn't exist, but they were in a small minority.

On the plane to London I watched the movie Blockers. When I saw the trailer, I thought it looked cringe-worthy, as my kids would say. A group of middle-age parents (Leslie Mann and John Cena) and try to block their daughters from losing their virginity on prom night. Leslie Mann is married to Judd Apatow, and the trailer to this movie has more gross-out humor than The 40 Year-Old Virgin. Who was their target audience? I couldn't imagine teenage boys finding this set-up interesting at all.

"What you going to do with the back nine of your life?" one of the dads asked to Leslie Mann. The back nine. The two women I met were just getting to the golf course. Maybe they were still on the driving range. I still have the Boy, so I am not on the back nine yet, but I can see it in the distance.

This movie got me more than Lady Bird, which is saying a lot. The real idea is parents fighting the fact their kids are going to leave them. I laughed. I cried. It was not better than Hamilton,* but the movie was still thought-provoking even though it was pretty gross.

Instead of being a loon stalking my daughter's prom, I was taking her on a trip. I might not have been a perfect parent, but I was making an investment in my future relationship with my daughter. Only once or twice on the trip did I think, "I'll be glad when she's gone." But my main feeling when I came back was Claire-Adele is a good traveling companion and we should do this again. When the guys at work asked about my vacation, I said maybe when Claire-Adele is in college I can meet her some place for a weekend, like...

"Paris?" said one of my co-workers.

I was thinking New York, but that was the general idea.


* Nothing is better than Ham.

London, Jack's Back and Keeping Up with the McGuire's

No, not "Jack is back." I mean the back that belongs to Jack. On our second day in London, Jack crashed on his mountain bike while riding with the Boy.

Text from the Boy: "He's all good. A bit stiff. He ate shit going on jump 11/13"

Which means he crashed on the 11th of the 13 jumps on the Gravy Train trail at Duthie. Oy. I can't load the picture of his scratched up and bloody back, which is probably for the best. You might not want to see it anyway.

I talked to Jack the night of the crash, and he seemed fine. He has been battered and bruised before.

The second night was concerning.

"I couldn't sleep flat on my back because I couldn't breathe because the pain was too bad, so I slept on the couch. I want to make sure I can breathe deeply so I don't get fluid in my lungs."

Okay. Did you break your ribs or something?

"No, I'm a doctor, even if my ribs were broken or bruised, nothing to do, blah blah blah," he said.

The third night was more concerning.

"I really shouldn't be driving," he said. I can't turn my back and it hurt when I turn my head." This was the week Jack and the Boy were going to do crazy outdoorsy kind of stuff.

The fourth night was totally sketchy.

"I took some of the Boy's old percocet from when he broke his collarbone so I could sleep," he said. "I had to stop taking ibuprofen because I was getting a rash. At least three times a year we get kids in the ICU whose skin sloughs off because of a reaction to ibuprofen." This is typical dinner conversation at the McGuire's, the rare but nasty side effects of over the counter meds.

"I called one of the pharmacists in the ICU to see what they would recommend."

Probably not taking your kid's old meds, but whatever. Jack has a license to prescribe narcotics, and while I know I should dump old pain killers at the QFC drug return center,* part of me is afraid the massive earthquake will hit and someone I love will have a broken leg and we won't be able to find medical help but I will have a jar of pain meds from a surgery in my medicine cabinet. Better Jack taking one pill for legitimate pain management instead of our kids taking it for recreational use.

So now I am feeling bad for leaving Jack and the Boy home in Seattle while I am out and about with Claire-Adele eating in restaurants, seeing plays, visiting parks and museums in one of the coolest cities in the world, especially as Jack is seriously injured.

But then I don't feel too bad. Two and a half years ago, I tore my ACL trying to keep up with the kids and Jack. Now he is the one grounded for not keeping up with the Boy.

* PSA: You should get rid of old pain meds. http://www.takebackyourmeds.org I've done it before.

London -- Low Maintenance

Forgive me for being off my blog for the past several days. Claire-Adele and I are on a mother-daughter trip to London before she leaves for college in less than a month. When Claire-Adele was ten, she and I made a trip to London. Now, she is eighteen.

What was she most excited about for this trip?

Drinking.

Every night so far, we've had a glass of wine, beer, prosecco, cider or sangria with dinner. As a very lightweight drinker, I am feeling a little sloshed after a week.

"I don't think I'll have an addictive personality," said Claire-Adele. She's probably right, yet there were nights when she drank more than I did. Which means she finished her drink and I didn't.

"I'm going to be responsible," she said as I bought her a 14 pound glass of champagne, hoping this would be a good investment in her learning to control her alcohol at college. Hoping, because if I am wrong, she cold be screwed.

Why did we come here instead of going someplace new? I wrestled with this, and here are my thoughts:

1. It is London. Seriously, how could it be bad? I love big cities.
2. They speak English and the food is predictable.

Most importantly,

     3.  This is an easy planning trip. London is the perfect low-maintenance destination for high maintenance people.

Compare to our two week trip to New Zealand a few years ago. It took us months to plan the logistics of that trip. We stayed (if I am remembering right) seven different towns on two islands -- Auckland, Pohara, some cute spa town with a hot springs water park, Christchurch, Queenstown, Manapouri, and Hamilton. We took three plane rides within New Zealand.

For this trip, all I had to do was book theater tickets (Ham for me, Harry for Claire-Adele), book airline tickets, and find a place to stay. In that order. Done. I was ready. Need to get from destination to destination? Buy an Oyster card for the Underground. Done. Easy-peasey, lemon squeezy.

Jack and I went to brunch last weekend with Carla and her husband who met in London while they were working there.

"What are you going to do while you are there?" she asked.

"I dunno," I said. Then she told me 300 things we could do, and I wrote down about 150 of them. I didn't open a guide book until the third day of our trip. Why? Because there is so much to do here that in Central London you can walk five minutes in any direction and find a castle, palace, museum or place of cultural or historical significance. With the Internet and a printer, you can find train schedules and print tickets for taking tours of Parliament or Bletchley Park.

Plus, Claire-Adele already had a ton of ideas in her mind of what she wanted to see and do, which made my life much easier.

Can you imagine how little I would write if I had to plan a trip, too?

Egads.

Maryland! Part 2

Last week, I took Claire-Adele to freshman orientation at the University of Maryland. This was a day of drinking from an emotional fire hose.

It started Tuesday night at dinner. I was watching CNN at a pizza place and Claire-Adele was facing the other direction. They were flipping back and forth between stories about the Thai boys in the cave and the Mexican immigrants separated from their parents. I saw the rooms where they were detaining children, and I got a little emotional.

Eleanor glanced over her shoulder at the television. "What's the matter?" she asked.

"I'm watching those kids on television," I said.

She looked puzzled. "Mom, they are fine. They are safe and it's going to be okay."

Now it was my turned to look puzzled. "Those Mexican kids are taken from their parents."

"Oh," said said. "I thought you were talking about the Thai kids."

On the other side of the earth, 2,000 people from thirty countries conducted a military operation to get twelve kids out of a cave while we 'Muricans are keeping kids apart from their parents on purpose. This was not a good emotional starting point for the next two days.

Unlike the detained immigrant children, Claire-Adele and I stayed in a pretty posh hotel and we swam after dinner. I got a brochure about the spa and planned to swim Thursday morning and get a massage while Claire-Adele was continuing her orientation activities. I would be on my own Wednesday night as she would be staying in a dorm with a bunch of other freshmen.

The next morning, the two of us headed off to the Alumni Center for orientation. I wasn't really thrilled about this whole thing. The university wanted me to come along instead of flying Claire-Adele out there by herself. Why did I have to go? I was happy to support Claire-Adele, but she would have been fien without me. And I've been to college already. I know the drill. But whatever. I took three days of vacation from work to go to this thing.

Claire-Adele and I sat together while a majority of the other kids grouped up with friends from their high schools. Claire-Adele blanched at the stat that 81% of the kids from her program are from Maryland. She overheard a girl say she was rooming with her best friend from high school and she didn't want to make any new friends. Twenty minutes later, a girl across the room waved at Claire-Adele. My daughter perked up in recognition--it was someone she from her online chat group. Another boy waved at the two girls. He was in the chat group, too. She relaxed.

They had the parents and students together for the first hour, and then they carted the kids off.

Here are my bullet point observations:

• The guys were pretty short. I don't know why I noticed that, but I did.
• The campus has shuttle buses. When I went to college, we didn't have shuttle buses. We had to walk. Wimps.
• I saw a sign that said "C's get degrees but A's get paid." I need to share that with the Boy.
• One of the people at orientation said "Y'all" ten times in three minutes. Welcome to a Border state.
• Being from Seattle is exotic to people on the East Coast. And I have no idea about the local gossip, like who are the major donors to the University. (Hint: The dude that started Under Armour.)

I only started to cry twice. I can't remember when. Was it when they were talking about the different between your life's work and your job? About how to cope with anxiety by thinking "WAIF" -- what am I feeling? and knowing that whatever it is will pass.

I also almost fell asleep a few times as about six parents asked in six ways how their student could double major.

I am trying to figure out why this was so emotionally taxing. I think it was because there was a high volume of information so I had to concentrate and this same information reinforced the point: this is real. My kid is leaving.

And I have to admit this, too--I am a little sad Claire-Adele isn't going to my alma mater. I can't be pissed at NU because she didn't even apply. I am even sad she isn't going to UW. While the Maryland campus is certainly lovely with all of its red brick Colonial buildings, NU is special and UW is gorgeous. UMD doesn't have a college town next to it even. But this isn't my college experience. It is Claire-Adele's.

I am not sure sure how I feel about this yet. It is still unreal. I still feel like a parent, especially with the Boy around. I have one friend who cried and cried at the thought of her son going across the state, and I could feel her pain. I had another friend, a dad who I've seen at every Roosevelt Band Concert for the past four years say, "I know this might sound bad and I love my kids... (multiple caveats, blah, blah, blah), but I can really see myself enjoying being an empty-nester."

I think I swing between the two--where I am is not static. Which made it all the better that I took the evening off to hang out with my old Chicago friend Kendra. We met for dinner at the Kennedy Center and then went to Hamilton. We stayed up until three a.m. talking. Hanging with my friend was a coccoon in an otherwise emotionally raw time. It was like sitting in a hot tub after a long day of skiing or hiking. Sure the skiing and hiking is good and fun, but it is awesome to seriously chill afterwards. This was my chill. It washed away the emotional residue and reminded me of me before I had kids. I had a life before kids--I will have a life after.

Somewhere along the way I learned Jack signed me up for the student-led campus walking tour that started at 9:00 a.m. Thursday. So much for spending the morning sleeping, swimming and spa-ing. I was kind of gagging at the idea of the tour. When I got there, there were a dozen other parents. They were all really nice, but nice in way that I know I will never see them again.

Most all, the kids who led the tour were really exceptional. One of the kids is a government and politics major, like Claire-Adele will be. I asked him about his interests--he wants to manage the messaging for candidates and elected officials--and I told him how I ran for School Board and I worked with a campaign strategist and manager. His eyes lit up. Suddenly, I wasn't just a mom on a tour, but a regular person to this kid. Another girl and I talked about "Parks and Rec." Another guy was there, just hanging out and having fun.

And then I felt for the first time that this was all going to be okay. I know NU and I know UW, so they feel safe and familiar. I don't know much about Maryland--I am taking it on faith. Talking with the kids at lunch made it familiar, they made it safe.

After lunch, I ran into a mom from the tour in the campus bookstore. We were each we looking at t-shirts. The tour was over--we didn't have to be nice to each other, but we talked for about ten minutes.

Was this more for me than Claire-Adele? Perhaps. Claire-Adele is going to be in good hands, as are the kids of the other parents I met. Claire-Adele is going to be okay, and so will I.

Final Draft

This isn't my last blog post, in case you were confused.

Last week when Claire-Adele and I were at Maryland, she critiqued my blog.

"That's not what really happened," she said. "I need to edit your blog posts to correct the errors. Or I should write my own version of what happened and post it on your blog.

"I'll call it Final Draft."

Maryland!

It is hotter than fuck here.

Seriously.

If I lived here, I'd be like super skinny because I would sweat five pounds off every day. Even the squirrels here are languid from heat. The move so slowly, as if they have given up and don't care if you catch them. Not that I want to chase a squirrel in this heat. Claire-Adele and I walked around the campus for an hour without a water bottle. Mis.Take. I was parched at the end.

I am further convinced that the Pacific Northwest has the best weather in the continental U.S.. Rainy and cool while at times can be emotionally bleak, it is at least livable. In the fourteen years I've lived in Seattle, I never thought I might to die because of the weather. I can't say the same for the Midwest, with its heat waves, freezing spells, blizzards, tornadoes, floods, etc. I am sure four of the six of my blog readers will agree with me about the Pac Northwest. The other two live in the Midwest.

Anyway, Claire-Adele was excited to show me around. It looks lovely.

Isn't this great? I am sending my cosmopolitan, nose-ringed daughter to a farm school.

Ha ha. Not really. But they do have a little farm in the middle of campus. The colleges we looked at in NYC and Philadelphia didn't have cows, sheep or horses. The campus has a dairy and the student union sells its ice cream. That's kind of cool. You don't see that every day.

The rest of the campus looks like a regular college campus. It has a bit of southern influence, but not that much. Technically, the university is south of the Mason-Dixon line, but there is enough Yankee influence and sensibility here that I can tolerate it. I hope. This college didn't let women attend until 1916 and African Americans in until 1951. Seriously? WTF? Wait. I did some googling and it seems that that was fairly common. And some people don't believe in institutional racism. This institution (like many other universities) was racist, which is the definition of institutional racism.

Tomorrow is new student orientation where Claire-Adele will meet other students and I will learn all sorts of administrivia about the college. Goodnight, University of Maryland. I look forward to meeting you tomorrow.

Do or Die, and My Favorite Drug

Friday, I was having kind of a shitty day at work. I was the only one in the office from my team, which by itself wasn't bad, but it wasn't great, either. I was also having a rough time at home. The Boy was scheduled to come home from camp Saturday, which was good but also stressful. Jack informed me of work schedule for the rest of the summer and September, and it totally sucks. When the three pistons of work, kids and my marriage (notice I don't include anything about my own personal life in this list, because it doesn't exist) all down at the same time, it is it a huge drag.

I didn't pack a lunch on Friday, so I had to punt for food. I could have ordered from Peach and had something delivered, or I could have bought food from the little refrigerator we have in the lunch room. 

Fuck that, I thought. I want a burger. I trekked over to a Belltown pub.

"Do you want a seat at the bar?" the host asked as I was dining alone. The World Cup Brazil versus Belgium was on the three televisions behind the bar.

"Sure," I said. I sat next to a couple who was watching the game. Brazil was down 0-2. The woman's ninety-four year old mother lived in Belgium during World War II. The mother was watching the game from her home in Iowa. I didn't have the heart to tell this woman I was rooting for Brazil. 

Watching this game felt familiar. Two weeks ago, the Boy's soccer team played a tournament in Burlington where they played five games in less then forty-eight hours. The first three games were qualifiers, and the last two were elimination rounds. The Boy's team made it to the finals for their group. For the last game, the boys (young men?) played an equally matched team from Portland sponsored by the Portland Timbers, the MLS team. The Boy's team was sponsored by the Sounders, Seattle's MLS team. Civic pride was at stake.

Both teams played hard. I've never seen a youth soccer game where there was so much heart from both sides on the field. The ball went back and forth, the players charging and sweating and grimacing. Every kid was fully engaged with the game. Parents on the sidelines dropped their usual conversations about life and kids and vacations to focus on the match. It was do or die for both teams.

It was awesome.

So there I was, in a bar on a Friday, watching the same thing play out in Russia between two of the top ten teams in the world. There was no holding back, no doing "just good enough." To lose is to die. These grown men, among the best athletes out of 7.4 billion people on earth, reminded me of the Boy's team in that last game. The size of the audience and the number of people who cared about the game was different, but if you were a parent on that sideline in Burlington in June, it might as well have been the quarter finals of the World Cup.

I am so glad the world has found a replacement for gladiator sports in soccer. Instead of people actually dying, they just feel like they have died when they lose. Sports Illustrated reported that

"Neymar has admitted that suffering elimination from the World Cup with Brazil was the 'saddest moment of my career' and claims he is having a hard time 'finding the strength to play again'."

To paraphrase, he felt like he died. I am sure something in him did die--the dream that he probably had since he was a little kid that he would lead his country to a World Cup victory one day. The dreams of his country died, too.

But Neymar lives, and will play again, even though that doesn't diminish the pain he feels today.

Sometimes life sucks not because you just lost the big game, but because of the thousands of smaller details of your life add up and weigh you down. It isn't one, big, terrible thing like cancer. As a mom, it is the lack of control over everyone else's mood and schedule, being at their mercy, and having no way to escape.

And then my favorite escape came to the rescue...

This week, I am taking Claire-Adele to orientation at the University of Maryland. I have to take three days off of work for this, which I really don't have. I wasn't dreading this trip, but I wasn't exactly thinking of it as a full-filled, exciting vacation as the main gist would be how I am going to part with my first born and approximately fifty thousand dollars. Seems kind of lose-lose. I texted my old friend Kendra who I knew from Chicago who now lives in Bethesda, Maryland to see if we could get together. Kendra is loads of fun.

"Want to see Hamilton?" she texted me back. This summer, Hamilton is at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts.

Hell yeah I want to go.

"My husband said I should go with a friend, but he said I couldn't spend more than $300 for a ticket."

I was so excited I couldn't sleep Thursday night. Kendra and I both searched online. The cheapest tickets I could find for Wednesday night was $500. Ugh. I was still hopeful.

This morning when I woke up, Jack was sitting at his computer. "There are Hamilton tickets for $299."

"What?" I said, looking at his screen. Saturday, seats in the first row of Tier 1 were $500. The Kennedy Center must have dropped the price as the day of the show was getting closer. I texted Kendra. She wasn't there. Did everyone know about this last minutes drop in prices? If they did, these tickets wouldn't last. I bought the tickets. If for some reason Kendra couldn't make it, then I'd figure something out. For an hour, I sat waited for her text.

In the meantime, I had to two tickets to Hamilton for Wednsday night. The problem of getting rid of an extra ticket was peanuts compared to the thrill of having them. The escape is what I imagine what a shot of heroine is like, when it creeps into your veins, and nothing else matters except the high.  Jack and Claire-Adele were screaming at each about her getting her driver's license. Suddenly, I was less pissed off about Jack's schedule, about my son staying out super late last night, about the crap at my job. I was floating in my Hamilton glow, the anticipation of seeing it again.

Just as the grit in of life's gears was wearing me down, sometimes things fall in my direction. Two weeks ago, the Boy's team won the tournament with a goal scored in the last ten seconds. And Kendra can join me for Hamilton.

Doctor Dinners

Last night, Jack had another Doctor Dinner. (I've written about previous Doctor Dinners here.) Generally, I loathe and despise these events. As the trailing spouse, my role is ambiguous. Part of it is: "Hey, we want to invite your better half to dinner and we'd look like a jackass if we didn't invite you!" The other part is "Hey! There are going to be a bunch of other spouses there and we decided we couldn't have just one spouse, so invited them all!"

This Doctor Dinner was at one of my husband's colleague's home. Melvin is an executive at the hospital, and was hosting two physicians from Kobe, Japan to visit Seattle. I had met the doctor and his wife at a fundraiser a few years ago, but I haven't seen him since. While Jack doesn't work with this guy closely enough to have direct experience, rumor on the street is the host is extremely difficult to work for. 

The short version of what I was up against: The host is an asshole and the guests of honor won't speak English. And I couldn't cheat and read the menu ahead of time online and pre-plan my meal because this was going to be at someone's home. Oh my god this was going to suck. Why do I agree to these things? If I were a novelist writing about this, I'd have to ask the question: what is at stake?

1. My pride
2. Three hours of my life that I can't get back.
3. My pride

Since my last dinner, I've adopted the strategy of talk to the other non-physicians at the event. Sometimes this can be challenging since doctors marry other doctors. The trailing spouse could be a geneticist or endocrinologist versus a normal person. This strategy was going to be hard given the other guests might not speak English. 

Given the track record of most of the physician leaders and executives, my pre-dinner guess was that Melvin was on wife number four. I was pleasantly surprised when I got there that he and his current wife have lived in their house for thirty years. It was rather shocking, in fact. Linda, his wife, was remarkably nice, considering all of the gossip said her husband was a jerk.

Aside from Linda, there was other non-physician spouse at the event. He is in tech and we discussed work before he had to go off and chase his twenty month old daughter.

That left me with the non-English speakers.

One of the doctor's from Japan brought his mother along on the trip, along with his wife, his five year old son, and his mother-in-law. I introduced myself to the grandmother, who spoke about as much English as I speak French, which was great. Tokiko said when she went to the market, the checkout person spoke so fast, she couldn't understand a word the woman said. I laughed and said the same thing happened to me when I went to France. I would put together a great sentence in French, and they would talk back to me as if I were fluent. (And correct my grammar. Gotta love the French for that!) I guess that was better than the sales person just jumping to English, but still. I could understand this woman's struggle. 

I was patient as Tokiko asked me questions. Her English was very good. When dinner was served, I sat down next to her. I was the only American at one of the tables with one of the Japanese families. I figured that was my job, right? To entertain these people who came from a few thousand miles away and make them feel welcome. 

Tokiko was delightful. She asked me if I ever ate "orange raspberries." No, I have only seen them, but never ate them. Next time I see them at the Market, I'll have to try them. She talked about the hot springs in Kobe and asked me about earthquakes. She had never eaten a meal "American Style" aka a buffet. Do we do this all of the time when we have dinner parties? 

After we began to eat, Melvin joined our table. I maintained my strategy of talking to the non-doctors, even if it meant struggling to converse with someone whose language I don't speak. If Tokiko can try to speak English, the very least I could do would be to be patient and listen. This dinner was probably much harder for her than for me, after all.

My favorite part of the meal was when this sixty- or seventy-something woman took a picture of her dessert, likely to post on social media. The pound cake with raspberries, blackberries, blueberries and whipped cream made a cute picture. She looked a little embarrassed that she was photographing her food until I gave her a thumbs up. Then she giggled, and asked her son to take a picture of the two of us.

At dinner, Melvin was actually nice. He smiled and was polite and cleared everyone's plate from the table when we were done eating. Maybe he was nice under Linda's watchful eye, or maybe he was playing nice for the international guests. Either way, he was far more civilized than advertised.

I realized my non-position at these dinners actually gives me power: the power to ignore. I didn't have to suck up to Melvin like everyone else at the hospital does. Because I wasn't sucking up to Melvin, there was no reason for him to be a louse. I could easily give all of my attention to the charming and funny Japanese woman sitting next to me. 

And I did. And I had a very nice time.

Starbucks & Me

As anyone who has read the news in the past few months knows, the Starbucks corporation came under fire when an employee in Philadelphia called the cops when two African American men came into the store and didn't order anything. They were waiting for a friend, who happened to be white. Starbucks closed all of its stores in the afternoon on May 29 for inclusion and racial awareness training for 175,000 U.S. based employees.

This morning, I read an article in the Seattle Times about Starbucks' continued efforts to decrease racial bias in their stores. Two experts in racial equity gave Starbucks a report on further ways to make inclusion a major part of their company. I began to wonder how much of this is a Starbucks problem versus an American problem. Of course, Starbucks was caught in a dramatic example of racial bias when their employee called the cops. Small companies don't make the national news when that kind of shit happens. Starbucks employees come from every state in the U.S. and there are probably people from every demographic working there, likely with a higher rate of young people and urban dwellers.

Yet, these people weren't born Starbucks employees nor did Starbucks give them their biases. They were hired by Starbucks with all of their biases already in place. Is Starbucks right to continue to work on anti-racial bias training? Absolutely. Is this just a Starbucks problem? Hell no.

As a result of the Philadelphia incident, Starbucks is now opening their bathrooms to anyone, regardless if they make a purchase. When I read this, I thought about the time I've spent in big city libraries where the bathrooms are open to anyone. There you will find lots of homeless and addicted people hanging out, staring blankly at a newspaper, suffering the internet or trying to bathe in the bathroom. The Seattle Times article says Starbucks will train employees to deal with patrons in crisis, telling them to call 211 for resources instead of calling the police:

"'This police alternative is essential,' McGhee and Ifill wrote. That national option should be augmented with local resources and programs, they added. Damodaran said the company’s new 'Third Place Policy' spells out ways for employees to help 'de-escalate disruptive behavior.'"

All of America could use this number where people reach out for a range of help, where people need help but it isn't an immediate crisis where someone's health or safety is at risk.

I read the article to the last paragraph:

"The Seattle company also recently revised its financial forecasts to reflect slower-than-expected sales growth, some of which was attributed to the training. Then Starbucks announced that chief financial officer Scott Maw is leaving later this year, sending the company’s stock to its lowest point in three years."

Which got the capitalist in me thinking--maybe this is a good time to buy Starbucks stock and keep it for the long haul.

Yes, I boycotted Starbucks for about a week (likely less) after the Philadelphia incident, and now I am licking my chops because the stock price dropped? What is wrong with me? Does that make me evil?

My Great Uncle Tom would tell us at holiday dinners to "buy low, sell high," obvious and common wisdom. He followed a collection of stocks and would buy when there was a dip in price. "I bought Coca-Cola before I went to Florida and when I got back, the price rose and I paid for the trip!" No, this guy wasn't simply a gambler. He and my Great Aunt Kay were frugal and savers. They paid cash for their Chicago bungalow in 1940-something house and lived there until they died in the 1990's. They couldn't have kids, so they saved and invested most of their income.

Will Starbucks crumble if they let everyone use their bathrooms, or can capitalism bring about social change? Can capitalism be good, or do good, or is it just about making money? As my new millennial co-worker would say, "yes." If this racism is an American problem and capitalism is the foundation of the American economy, then perhaps corporate America can help to solve the systemic issues of racial biases and homelessness. Is it their fault these issues exist? They cannot solely be blamed, but they can help create an open, fair and equitable place to work. They can create economic opportunities for employees and they can treat their customers with dignity and respect. Will they be perfect? Probably not. Can they make a sincere and focused effort and make measurable improvements? I hope so.

Is it something I can buy? Sure, I can pop $4.25 for a tall decaf mocha which will give me a fifteen minute break from work and give me 250 empty calories, but is $48 a share going to pay social and financial dividends?

Shoes

I think some of the people I work with think I have an excessive amount of shoes. I was showing my collection to one of my co-workers and I pointed out my Prada's. He blanched.

"They cost way less than a thousand dollars," I said. I am sure he thinks I am a princess. I am not a princess, by the way. I am a queen. Claire-Adele is a princess. I took a feminine archetype class where we learned princesses are women with little to no real responsibity, nothing to look after like kids or pets. Motherhood is the next phase. Women who survive motherhood become queens.

I digress.

They are probably right--I probably do have too many shoes and I have probably spent more money on shoes this year than I did on rent my first year out of college. (I just did the math and its not even close. I spent more on rent.)

So why? Why do I am I spending so much money on shoes? Why?

First, I used to not be like this. Really. My financial hero is my friend Carla who saves so much money. She bakes hew own hamburger buns, paid cash for her house. She wears old, not fancy clothes but has traveled (and travels) all over the world. Whenever I think of money, I ask myself, "What would Carla do?"

Carla would not own a pair of Prada red velvet shoes. So why do I?

A few years ago, Jack worked too much. It was intolerable. If the shit hit the fan and our marriage imploded, Jack would probably marry some chick in her thirties who didn't have kids and wouldn't care how much he worked. The chicky would get half of the nest egg I spent twenty years saving, which would piss me off.

How do I know this? I've seen several divorced guys in their mid- to late-forties get remarried to younger women. The new women don't have kids, so the new couple has time to take awesome vacations and decorate their new home.

Basically, I didn't want Jack's next wife to spend my money on Prada shoes and trips to Paris, so I decided to buy Prada shoes and take vacations myself.

Ibex and Name Dropping

Jack, Claire-Adele and I were at a political fundraiser this weekend where we met Sally Jewell, former President of REI and Secretary of the Interior. Jack knows Sally's son so they chatted about their common connections.

After a few minutes, Sally pointed at my black sweater and asked, "Is that an Ibex?"

"Yes," I said. Ibex makes wool clothes for work and outdoors.

"I thought so," she said. "Did you get it at REI?"

"No. I got it at the Ibex store in U Village," I said.

Only in Seattle could I be at a posh party and someone would recognize an Ibex sweater. People here wouldn't necessarily recognize Chanel, Versace or St. Johns, because so few people get that dressed up out here. Ibex? You bet. And I could wear Ibex to a fancy party and no one looked at me askance.

Driving home, Jack and I thought it was hilarious that Sally Jewell recognized my sweater.

"She really knows the shit on the shelves," he said.