The Wordmistress

Aggrieved

This time of year is always tough. The people who have gone, are so obviously gone. And as everyone flocks to be with their family, the absence of one is ever so clear. And now comes word that John Travolta has lost his child. Whenever someone goes through that kind of tragedy, you can't help but feel empathetic ... and so, that's how it seems this wintry holiday. Mia Farrow's daughter, John Travolta's son ... so sad, so reminiscient of personal tragedy.

I remain, personally, steadfast and faithful to my beliefs that life carries on ... but I do feel sad and weary all the same.

See You Next Tuesday Cindy McCain!

Running out of the Republican's stock in trade, fear, they've upped their ante this year with an oldie, but a goodie: hatred. Ask me why today, on Yom Kippur of all days, I'm a little sensitive to so-called leaders urging witchhunts and hatred. Issues? Please. Check this.

There will be violence and the Republicans will be the ones to blame. I'm off to synagogue. As I pray for peace domestically, I will pray for them to chill. At this point, I have no doubt that the right person will take office come January. Leadership, indeed!

Tears for Fears

I'm getting scared. So I re-designed my website. Cuz I couldn't let everyone know my outrage at the stupidity of the American people on that old looking site. No. I needed to refresh the look and feel of my my little blog first. Does that make me as vapid as the rest of Americans out there? Probably. But first, consider doing one of the following other things I'm doing with my spare time.

• Making calls in the evening in support of Sen. Obama for president. It's so easy, it's ridiculous. Just sign up at moveon.org. They will literally send you a link and you can make calls from the comfort of your home. They supply the phone numbers and the script and you're calling Move On members, so they are nice! You are just asking them to volunteer at a specific time, so you are not asking for money. I encourage all of you to do it. You can do it for ten minutes or ten hours!

• Posting links exposing the stupidity of the McCain/Palin clusterfuck so that people outside my comfort zone of fellow liberals can see it. Let's face it, most of the folks we all hang with feel the same way we do and though it's nice to commiserate with those who are believers, it's imperative that we get the word out to people who are sitting on the fence. This includes elderly aunts, curmudgeonly co-workers and persnickety neighbors. Reach out! Now is the time.

• Considering packing up Mia and hitting the road at least one of these weekends to canvas door to door. Battleground states like Michigan, Iowa and Wisconsin desperately need our help and I, for one, am ready to jump in my car and plead the case to undecided voters in person!

So, what about you? Are you ready to make that difference in the home stretch? Join me, cuz time is running out!!

Toe In, Begin Again

When blogging started, I started. And then I blogged for a while.

And then I stopped. Probably partly cuz I found out I could have been good at it. And partly cuz I'm lazy.

Except lately I haven't been as lazy. So I thought I'd revive it.

Again.

That means more posts about me. And Mia. And stuff that no one really cares about.

Welcome back boring. I have to say, I'm into it.

Large Adult

Those of us who used to post, then didn't, then wanted to, then didn't, then think about it a lot, then really want to, eventually want to write a 'post about posting' when they finally post again. I think that's a bad idea. Instead I want to post like I've always been posting. And so I will.

Recently I went to the doctor. I've got some sort of bacterial throat sinus cough-y infection yuck thing. But what I remember, and what I think about all the time anyway, is that the sort of nervous gal who took my blood pressure had to use a special cuff, one labeled, "Large Adult." Now it's not like I'm so big these days that they couldn't twist the thing around my huge-ass arms, but I am fairly big and they were having some trouble getting a decent reading. I am really bummed about my weight, a fact of life that is most definitely on my mind as I look at my horrible ill-fitting and unflattering wardrobe and get tons of painful reminders of ugh, including my 4-year-olds increasing awareness that mommy might not be a beauty queen.

My mom, however, kind of was. She was extraordinarily unconventional and really quite mad, but at the root of it all, she was incredibly beautiful and she knew it. Partly as a reaction to her, I've always sort of been defiant about not adhering to societal convention when it comes to makeup, certain types of clothing, and I suppose, a type of figure. I've always wanted to prove that it could be done "my way". But I think that there was a part of this that's  just plain laziness.

So I find myself at one of these crossroads, once again, as I have so many times before. But now, unlike so many times in the past few years, things are going quite well. So many good things have been happening in our lives. Mia is an unbelievable child, really an amazing human being. I feel so blessed every day. And we've moved to the North side of Chicago, which has been great for us. Our apartment is gorgeous and we're really enjoying it.

And my work life has changed considerably, something I haven't written about yet but suffice to say that I made some changes that were a long time in coming. I guess I haven't written about work yet because I am still processing it. See, I have been in interactive advertising since the very beginning. Since the beginning, the early days, literally since the pioneer days, which is a very weird thing. And it's been through a lot of ups and downs, as have I. The last few years I've seen some really crazy things that I've had to spend some serious time thinking about and I have to say, I've come up with some interesting insights about the whole thing. You will definitely be hearing more from me about this subject in the future.

So I guess my point is  I am making changes. I'm cutting my hair short on Friday. And I'm trying once again to get more fit, to move more and feel more like myself.  I may be a Large Adult, but I feel like I want to be living large.