What's the Moratorium on Lost Mates?

There is an epidemic sweeping our nation- our world.

It is untouched by language barriers, economic status, and political beliefs. The facts should unite us as a people: every day in this world 27,375,618 mates are lost.

That's 1,140,650.75 per hour.

19,011 per minute.

317 per second.

I'm not talking about divorce.

These are the hard, cold facts of sock, shoe, and mitten separation. Staggering, isn't it? Especially staggering is the fact that I completely made that first statistic up, and then bothered to do accurate math from it for the rest of the numbers.

The elusive Sock Fairy, genus Canus Elusia

Here's something that is not an exaggeration: In my short 30 years of life, I have moved 36 times. Thirty-six. Northern Michigan, Arizona, Tennessee, Ohio, New Jersey, back and forth between a few of those... now back once more to Northern Michigan. I have become a pro at throwing everything I own into random boxes, mislabeling the contents, and never opening the box again.

I remember being a teenager, moving yearly between Arizona and Michigan. Each time we would unpack I would find odd mates: knee-high stockings, white crew socks, even the odd shoulder pad or two (this was the early nineties, remember, don't judge me). Each time I would save these little mementos of disorganization, hoping against hope that the mate would show up eventually.
They rarely did.
Eventually, losing faith in the system of all things returning to their point of origin, I would get discouraged and throw that navy blue trouser sock away. On a Wednesday. On Friday the trash would come, and on Saturday, inevitably, I would find the other navy blue trouser sock.

Now, fast forward to today. Three children, ranging in age from three to nine years of age- all girls. One husband, with various hobby interests, including the rare game of paintball. Myself, retail career back on track, with a collection of various stockings: thigh high hose with those silicon grippers, thigh highs without the silicon, knee highs for summer- thin and patterned, knee highs for winter- thick and textured... sport socks... plain socks... funky five foot long purple and white striped socks from my days working the Renaissance Faires... socks just to wear outside when it's extra cold...
Oh, and not just socks! We have shoes: rainboots, snowboots, plain boots... sandals, brown shoes, church shoes, tennis shoes... work shoes, shoes that only go with that one outfit that doesn't fit anymore, shoes with sentimental attachments (don't ask)...
Don't forget hands! Mittens, driving gloves, fuzzy warm gloves, gloves that velcro around a kid's wrist, mittens that button down to reveal fingertips, stretchy gloves with sparkly butterflies...

All between size 1 in baby to 9 in men's. Sure, I don't have a kid that fits into a 1 anymore, but I can't just get rid of the little bunny sock! It's cute! And I can't give it to my sister or my friend in Grand Rapids for her daughter, not just a single sock! So, if I hang onto it for just another year or two, unpack maybe one more box of junk, maybe the mate will turn up! Right?

Oh, did I mention the colors? When we dump out our box of mis-mates (this happens approximately once a month, when desperation sets in) it looks like an Affirmative Action handbook: black, white, tan, brown, navy, yellow, pink, blue, striped, dotted, argyle, short, long, thick, thin, holey, sparkly, splotchy where I spilled the bleach, flowered, stripes mixed with dots, and holiday themed.

We have those little lace-topped girls' socks that would do so well with an Easter dress, if we lived in a place where Easter didn't come with subzero temperatures and freezing rain.

We have socks with dingle balls on the back, so the ball kind of hangs out over the top of a canvas shoe. Note from experience: don't let your kid wear these socks with boots, no matter how much they beg. Especially if you're going to be walking a lot.

We have thick winter socks that my husband wears playing paintball. He has played paintball exactly twice in ten years, yet he has 5 pairs of socks for it. That's not a smart ratio, is it? I should just make him play more often.

We even have socks with jingle bells on them. Seriously. These were, of course, gifts from grandparents that don't have to hear the jingle bells walking past their bedroom door at 6 in the morning. On a weekend. In July.

Eight years ago, I bought a pair of denim high-heeled strappy sandals. They are completely and utterly sexy, and now that I have this cool tattoo on my ankle, go perfectly with it. Well, the left one does. The right one disappeared six years ago. But I tote the wretched thing around with me, from house to house to house, hoping against all hope that the right one will show up and I can wear the perfect ensemble once again. I'm not a packrat, but I cannot seem to let go of these lost mates! The box continues to grow- size 3 purples nesting next to size 6 purples of a similar, but not quite exact, shade. My kids don't care whether their socks match, and will grab any random pairing of length and color. But I cannot let them go out like this, fearing that people will judge me by the footwear on my children. There's a little bit of OCD in that, too- for I cannot wear two differing weights, tightnesses, or lengths on my own feet or I go nuts.

Or maybe I already am nuts. My sock collection is older than my marriage. Somebody help me.



PS: there are actually websites for lost socks. Who would have thought?

What Your Choice of Pizza Topping Says About You

It's Friday night, you're burned out from a tough week at work, and dinner is an immediate necessity. Calling up your local pizzeria, you casually place an order for your favorite pie, never dreaming that the guy on the other end of the line is judging you by each item you choose.

How do I know these facts to be true? Have I walked the hallowed halls of Domino's? Have I kneaded the bread of the gods at Little Caesar's? Have I crouched for hours in a Pizza Hut?

I have done none of these things. I just know more than you, which is why I write this blog, and you read it.
So without further ado, I present to you
What Your Choice of Pizza Topping Says About You:

• CHEESE

Come on, just plain cheese? Are you four? Of all of the wonderful things on God's green earth, things that can be diced and sliced and baked into nummy cheese, and you pick- just. the. frickin'. cheese.
Cheese eaters not only would make a cool name for a band, but are more often than not afraid of change, afraid of challenge, and afraid of their own shadow. They tend to like partners as bland as their pizza, but secretly envy people who sky dive and aren't afraid to eat jalapeños. Cheese eaters will never get beyond careers as accountants, pencil counters, weed-pullers, and subway sweepers.

• PEPPERONI

Plain ol' pepperoni. A little spicy, a little greasy, a little run-of-the-mill. Just like you. Pepperoni eaters tend to be on 'default setting', often too preoccupied with inanities to break out of their box and choose a more interesting salvo. One thing that I have noticed in this lifetime is that you pepperoni-only eaters are not without hope! Things can be added, slowly and over time, to make your life more interesting. Next time, break out the big guns and have the pizza dudes throw on some, oh, I don't know- ONIONS!! Bwahahahahaah!

Sorry.

Next up,

• SAUSAGE

Sausage eaters are typically perverted, nasty little twerps. Why else would someone eat something that looks like giant rabbits pooped all over it? Sausage is greasy, feels like eating knuckles, and leaves you with heartburn for approximately two weeks. Therefore I must conclude that people who prefer a sausage-only pizza are stuck in dead-end jobs, wear thick glasses with scotch tape on them, and live in those apartments that us normal people pass up because of the funny smell inside. Not that you have no redeeming values, sausage eaters. Someone out there needs to keep making rainbow animated GIFs for their grandma's website. You know who I'm talking about.

• Supreme/Deluxe

Supreme or Deluxe, depending on where you live, generally features an eclectic smattering of meat, black olives, green pepper, onion, mushrooms, etc. Supreme fans are usually fairly well-rounded people, although cheap, with an eye towards variety and fun. They usually take a yearly vacation to somewhere like Mount Rushmore or Yosemite Park, and would be happy being married to the same person for many years, if only that person would content to stop sticking their dirty socks in the clean laundry bin. You, the Supreme pizza eater in your household, try not to wince as your ungrateful wretch of a ten year old picks his onions off of his overpriced pie. Those onions cost an extra $1.50, dagnabit. You eat your pizza, his onions, and then you swallow another Prilosec and guzzle down another root beer. Bowling night's gonna be tough this week.

• HAM

I'm going to go out on a limb here and hazard the guess that you're not Jewish. Or Muslim. Or, for that matter, Seventh Day Adventist.
You could very well be a Mormon, or you could be a Dago. I use the word Dago in the purest, least offensive form of the word, being one myself. There is something about ham that attracts certain Europeans: Italians, Greeks, Poles, Orinthologists. Ham eaters are generally high-stress, analytical, hypersensitive, and manic depressive. Oh wait, that's my family...
Ham eaters tend to be just a tiny bit more health conscious than pepperoni or sausage eaters, in the way that spiders are a tiny bit less scary than tarantulas. You like to trick yourself into thinking that your life is better than it is, that your skills are more than they actually are, that the only reason you've been passed over this time for that promotion is nepotism (it isn't). Ham eaters are destined to live a life of social unrest, due mainly to the fact that think they are better than others.

• MUSHROOM

Ah, the mushroom people. You are like a breath of fresh air. Intelligent, creative, articulate and passionate, you go through life inspiring and encouraging, redeeming and helping. No one could ever resent a mushroom eater, after all, they are cleansing the world of fungus! Wait- fungus? On pizza? What was I thinking!?!? I would have to say to mushroom eaters, besides all of the praising litany above, is that YOU ARE INSANE WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO EAT FUNGUS ON YOUR FOOD HOW DO YOU KNOW IT ISN'T STILL ALIVE AND WILL GROW MOLD INSIDE OF YOUR STOMACH AND THE WHITE FUZZ WILL OOZE OUT OF YOUR EYES AND THEN-

Mushrooms rock.

• MEAT LOVER'S

Well, for one thing, if you aren't morbidly obese, your cholesterol is through the roof. When I was a kid, one didn't see the disgusting love affair that we currently have with meat. Supreme, with pepperoni and sausage, was pushing the envelope. A pizza with only meat, and four or five kind of it, at that, shows that you are self-indulgent, greasy, and probably not kind to animals. Since you eat them all. On your pizza. With curdled cow's lactation on top. And smashed tomatoes.
You are probably also unwashed, stinky, and play too much WoW or some other MMORPG. Swilling down a 2-liter of Mountain Dew with that Meat Lover's also doesn't count as a square meal, in case you were wondering.

• HAWAIIAN

You sick, sick freak. You put what on your pie? A food that belongs on top of a banana split, that's what. I'll bet you can't even spell Hawaiian. Your kind tend to be weird- wearing clothes that went out of style fifty years ago, driving Gremlins, living in little hovels on the ground, voting Libertarian. You are as stubborn as the day is long, your hair is ratty, and your thighs have unequal mass. Find a new kind of pizza, and let the pineapple alone, for God's sake.

• 'WHITE' PIZZA
  

People who eat white pizza are either girls, or gay. Either way, you're high maintenance. If you find it in your heart to throw a bit of color on there, such as spinach or tomato, then I suppose you are salvageable. White pizza embodies all that is evil in today's fast food culture: white bread, white sauce, white cheese white toppings. It's almost racist. Is your entire house white, as well? How do you like your life now that you've finally stopped speaking to your mother and gotten that chin job you've always wanted? Guess what, white pizza lover? It's a dirty, dirty world out there and eating all-white food won't make it any cleaner.

• WEIRD CRAP, LIKE BUFFALO PIZZA

You, my friend, are just plain ignorant. There are things that go on pizza (e.g: tomatoes in some form of dessication, garlic, mozzarella cheese, onion, mushrooms...) and there are things that do NOT go on pizza. This would include anything with high fructose corn syrup as a main ingredient, anything deep fried, anything that should normally be eaten for breakfast (I'm talking to you, Japan!) and anything still breathing. You want Buffalo Pizza, with your Sweet Baby Ray's sauce and your thinly sliced buffalo wings, and your cheddar cheese- fine. It's good stuff. Just don't try blaming it on Italy. Just name it something appropriate, like Redneck Barbeque Cheese Chicken Bread.

Or not.

• ANCHOVIES

This one was almost too easy. Anyone who wants to eat a shriveled, salted, greasy, anonymous fish that probably was scraped off the bottom of a fisherman's shoe... well, fine. Go ahead and eat them, with their little slimy silver skins and their little salty brains and- and-
Seriously, what the hell? I'm not against seafood on pizza- I've enjoyed a nice crab and vegetable pie before- but how masochistic does one have to be to eat these things? Oh, I know, once you've tried them you'll understand, you have to develop a taste for them, whatever. I could also, I suppose, develop a taste for road salt, since thats about what they taste like. Or tumors, since that's what they feel like. Or- I'm going to stop now. Pizza truck is here.

A Culture of Arrogance

There is something horrible in our world today. It has been bothering me lately, niggling at the back of my mind, wanting explanation.

Today, I (somewhat) sorted it out. I was dealing with a rather difficult pair of customers, and I tend to sum people up as I'm listening to them. The only word that I could hear in my mind was:

"Arrogant!"

.... which they were. The man had the audacity to think that I would repair, for free, a watch that he had purchased elsewhere, the woman demanded the use of one of our tools that was sitting out of her reach, and together they accounted for my worst customer experience of this week.

I drove home behind a pick-up truck labeling me as an obscenity if I didn't appreciate that particular driver's mode of traveling.

After work, I watched a short newsclip in which an unnamed eyebrowless presidential candidate shot off his mouth about something or other, all the while wearing this grin that made my teeth set on edge.

Later that evening I indulged in my usual guilty pleasure of reading all of the help columns, such as Dear Abby, Annie's Mailbox, and Dear Margo. Something about reading the sob stories of others makes my own pathetic life seem not quite so wretched. One story after another marches across my weary vision, stories of broken marriages, ungrateful children, and unrepentant family members. Not one person is taking blame for an ugly situation, they all want to pin it on others and make them pay for their suffering.

We are living in an age of arrogance. Pride- not the good kind- mocks us from the covers of magazines, brazenly struts across our television and computer screens, and taunts us from every media outlet imaginable. We have come so far from humility that generations of children do not even know what humility is.

People in this day abuse power and laugh over it, steal other peoples' jobs, spouses, and assets and feel no shame, and admit not a single shortcoming or character flaw. To be selfish is good, to be arrogant is normal. How have we allowed society to degrade this way?

I know that arrogance is nothing new. Many evils throughout history have been perpetrated solely from sheer pride. But I really feel that it is becoming epidemic. No one puts misbehaved children in their place anymore, and the children grow up into rebellious monsters. No one takes responsibility for screw-ups anymore, and the liability lawsuit industry costs industrialized nations billions of dollars a year. People allow themselves to have a roving eye- I personally have heard women say that they deserve to cheat on a loving spouse- and the divorce rates soar.

What has happened to us? Is it the shift from religion to humanism? Humanism is a self-centric philosophy, whereas religion tends to be theistic, centering on one or more beings, or others. Humanism is actually, in my opinion, the religion of self, of mankind. How can one project compassion- genuinely- onto another when all one has at heart is the good of himself? Maybe this is not a good theory, for I find arrogance to be almost more prevalent among religious people than anyone else lately. But look at our churches now- rather than preach contrition and absolution, we preach self-esteem and affirmation. We are a people fat on the empty praise of our culture, drunk on the insignificant contributions we have made to our little selfish worlds.

Arrogance strips us of true compassion, blinds us to the faults within ourselves, and sears our consciences. Arrogance is as much in the soul of the unrepentant criminal as it is in the smiling politician on your television.

I don't have a solution to offer. The only thing that I can do is try to remember to be humble, to raise my girls free of the 'princess' mindset, and to do as much good for others as I can in this short life. The only thing that I can hope to impact the world through is this measly blog posting. And I say this to you- as much for me as for anyone- check yourselves for pride today. Search your heart and try to weed out any thought that puts you above another human being. Learn to serve, learn to be quiet, learn to not mock. Find meekness, find humility.

I'll be right there beside you, and maybe together we'll learn how to make the world a little bit better of a place.

Ron Paul- the Good Wizard?

Those Darn Externals

So I'm creating a blog for a client and I thought that I would just use typo. It's simple to use, is now on Ruby on Rails, and I can modify later. So I download it, load up my settings, and then try to throw it into my repository. Nope, not happening.

Apparently typo has a few exports up their sleeves that I wasn't aware of. It's not as simple as exporting the typo dir, because then you freaking miss those libraries. So here's a quick guide to getting your own clean, frozen typo.


svn co http://svn.typosphere.org/typo/trunk typo_stable
svn export typo_stable typo
svn export typo_stable/vendor/rails typo/vendor/rails
svn export typo_stable/vendor/plugins/rspec_on_rails typo/vendor/plugins/rspec_on_rails
svn export typo_stable/vendor/plugins/rspec typo/vendor/plugins/rspec
svn export typo_stable/vendor/plugins/acts_as_list typo/vendor/plugins/acts_as_list
rm -Rf typo_stable


Now just add that to your repository and you're golden. You know what to do from here. Get back to work! :P

Sentence Torture

Here's an image of real torture that has been going on for decades now in the US! The absolute outrage!

[source: Milliard Fillmore's Bathtub]

Somebody has some serious explaining to do! (Seriously, if someone could explain this I'll post it in here)

How Friendliness Can Cost You.

I didn't mean to make her fall down.

My sisters and I grew up in a rather repressive household. My father was, I believe, severely bipolar. In his 'downswings' he hated to hear noise of any kind, especially laughter. So in those times we learned to keep quiet, stuff a lot inside ourselves.

Then he would have moments of rage, where there would be frenzied activity, arguing, yelling, etc. Because of his charismatic personality, this would rub off on all of us and we'd all fight and holler.

But during his 'upswings' there was a general air of hilarity and noise. Laughter was suddenly ok again, the dam would break on our emotions, and we'd all go a little nuts with jokes, pranks, whatever we could get away with until his next episode of melancholy.

All of this conditioned us to be just a tad unstable. We have this freak humor that bursts out of us, often at inappropriate times, and frightens people around us. Unfortunately (I think) we feed off of that startled reaction and have come to look for it.

I guess all of this is more or less a pack of excuses for my inexcusable behavior. After prank calling got boring, we got into the habit of what I like to call 'drive-by prank assault'. It's stupid, really, and quite common. Driving down the street of our small town, we'd spot a group of people waiting in line outside of the movie theater and that emotional glitch would kick in. Rolling the window, we'd lean out and scream in our best lunatic voice,
"WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!"

Heads would turn, blank startled faces momentarily visible through the window would send us off into peals of maniacal laughter. We'd drive on down the road, laughing at our own stupidity, snorting at the memory, coming up with new ideas...

From chicken clucks directed at random pedestrians to undecipherable apocalyptic prophecy, our immaturity knew few bounds. To our credit (and probably due to the sheltered upbringing that we mentioned) I don't think we ever unleashed any profanity or coarseness. I don't even think we actually injured people or insulted them directly, just scared the crap out of them while they went about minding their own business.

This habit morphed into the usual goon prank of waving at a complete stranger, eliciting the 'huh?' response. We could never predict when it would strike, but the urge would hit, and there would go that irrepressible idiot urge.

One day as I was leaving the mall that housed our current failure-in-the-making, I was a bit wired and needed to blow off steam. I cannot remember who was in the car with me- might have been a sister, my mom, a friend. There was a woman crouched on the curb, tying her shoelace.

She was a simple enough looking soul, wearing a pink sweater, pastel purse strapped around her torso, ready to go shop. As I pulled up near her, I beeped the horn and waved frantically. She half turned her head, grinned, and lifted one hand up to wave back, not actually knowing who in the hell I was. As her body- perched on one and a half feet- left its center of gravity in order to move her right arm, it began to tip. I remember watching, hoping it wasn't actually going to happen. But it did, ever so slowly, she tipped over and kind of rolled clumsily onto her side, one hand still clutching her shoelace. I was several lanes away by that time, and didn't know what to do. Red-faced, I drove quickly away, alternating between hysterical laughter and complete chagrin.

I've felt bad about this for over a decade now. I have more or less stopped doing scary things to people, content with the occasional inhuman screech out of the side of my car. That woman, whoever she is, I hope she has forgiven me.

But I'll bet she doesn't wave at people anymore.

Mom Days

There’s a cloth doll lying facedown on the laundry room floor, looking vaguely like a crime scene. I wonder briefly if I should draw a chalk line around the poor thing, but then think better of it. The kids wouldn’t get the joke, and Mike only notices things in his immediate range of vision.
The canning funnel isn’t in the laundry room, either. I’ve been searching for it for nearly two weeks now. You see, I haven’t been able to afford a decent canister or Tupperware set, so I save every spaghetti sauce jar, washing them out for reuse. They make excellent storage, but present a slight challenge to fill. The blue wide-mouth funnel would be perfect, but I haven’t seen it since canning season. I’ve been using a rolled up paper plate for dry goods, but that won’t work quite as well for wet, gloopy chili.

“Mommy!” my 3 year-old calls from the dining room, “I have a cut on my fingew fwom the bad, bad icicle thing outside and then I fell and it huwted weally, weally bad and can you kiss it please?” Her words come out in a tumble, her face full of the innocent consternation the young possess.

Tripping over the menagerie of toys, books and clothes, I locate a bandage and duly wrap and kiss the tiny affliction.

Now, what was I doing? Oh, yes, the chili. Its only ten minutes until I have to get to work, there’s no time to keep looking. The chili will have to find its way into the recycled jar and I’ll just rinse off the edge. Running towards the crockpot, I spy a dirty dish I somehow missed last night, holding scant remnants of yesterday’s curry. I run water in it and fling open the dishwasher, hoping there is room for just one more bowl.

Oh yes, the chili. I grab a Barilla jar from my top shelf, cursing once again the kitchen designers who must have been eight feet tall. One of these days, I remind myself, I’ll have a kitchen made for the five foot four that I really am.

The chili has been made with free-range beef, and resents the confines of the glass jar. What smelled so good cooking all night now churns my stomach as it spills over the edge of the jar and onto my hand.

“Mommy!” a tiny bandaged finger is waving at about the three-foot mark “It still huwts!”
“Oh, honey, I must not have kissed it enough. Come here.” Kid #3 advances for the proffered lips, then recoils from the chili on my fingers,
“But, you’we diwty, mommy!”

So I am. Conveniently enough, the kitchen faucet is still running, filling and overflowing yesterday’s overlooked bowl. The moving water has filled and rinsed the curry away, except in the one corner angled away from the water, where lentils still cling stubbornly to the earthenware. Sighing in frustration, I flip the bowl around, rinse my fingers, and remember to turn the water off. Kid #3 gets her finger kissed again, (“It’s all bettew now!”) and then requests something completely unintelligible.

Mike returns from dropping the kids off at school, but there’s a bit of a problem- he still has the kids. Our school called a snow day, again, and forgot to call us. This is why normal people use TVs and radios, I suppose. Now we have two choices: drag all three kids to work with us, or let Mike work at home, again, with the tinkle of children’s voices all around him. I can’t stay home today because I have customers coming in to see me, and my wonderful husband knows that without asking. He looks at the kids, who are gleefully stripping off all vestiges of the indignities of a school day.
“Guess I’m staying here.” He sighs, unwrapping his scarf.

I guess so. I finish stuffing chili through the mouth of the jar and dig through the drawer for a matching Barilla lid. There is not one. I have four empty Barilla jars and not one single lid, whereas I own three Classico lids and not one jar. I slam the drawer shut, setting off a chain of protest from Kid #3, and wrap the jar opening in Press’n’Seal.
The dishwasher is ready to run, the dishwasher gel makes fart noises as it escapes the plastic container. My kids are just old enough to be completely devastated by this and fall over themselves in laughter,
“It farted!”
I grimace, but keep my mouth shut, remembering the days when I would torment my own mother with similar crudity. The dishwasher must be propped open with the spare table leg; otherwise it fills up and stops.
“Stupid rental house,” I mutter to myself, “one of these days, I’m going to own my own house, and then-“

And then what? Would I have had the extra money to replace or repair the dishwasher? Probably not. I un-curse the wretched machine and house, and realize that I have one minute now to get to work, and I’m not even all the way dressed- work slacks but a dirty tee-shirt. I trip over someone’s backpack on my mad dash to the stairs, then keep vigilantly to the right on my way up, because we have that silly habit of putting ‘things to go upstairs’ on the left, and they never quite make it up.
Upstairs, there is a mountain of clean laundry. I have been meaning to get it ALL put away for about five months now, but there is always something better to do- work, cook, play with the kids, run errands, write stories. Every time I get almost to the bottom, another 3 loads seem to get washed simultaneously, and the pile never ends! Somewhere on the bottom is probably that one black knee sock I’ve been missing since autumn.

Frustration with the perpetual mess boils over inside of me, and I storm downstairs, haranguing the kids with promises of money if laundry is folded, threats of death if it isn’t. With choices like these, I’m sure their childhood will turn out just fine, no?

Dressed, packed, car started finally, I kiss everyone goodbye and dash out the door, almost ready to wait on a never ending succession of people who need their watch batteries changed, their rings sized, or their junk jewelry ‘appraised’. Maybe, if we have a lucky day, we’ll sell something!
I glance back at my children, waving at me through the living room window. They are standing in the scattered detritus of a life lived fully. I didn’t want to raise my children in a messy house or a mad-dash life like this. I didn’t want to have this daily struggle over money, the never-ending march of errands and chores and juggling.

But they’re happy kids, and we all chose this lifestyle. In the end, I can either say I’ve had a clean house for fifty years, or I can have a body of literary work, a gallery of jewelry designs, and three children and a husband who are happy and well-fed.

I think I’ll pick the latter. It’s a good life.