Congressional Cat Fight

My two cats, both having resided with me since the beginning of time, hate each other. Actually, hate is too mild a word: They despise one another with murderous and malicious malevolence, each feeling for the other only rancor and a smoldering ill will, each planning harmful, corrosive, and implacable acts of resentment aimed at the other.  Nasty swipes growled in passing often erupt into full-blown fights. Sound familiar?

The other night on national TV, Chuck Schumer, the senior United States Senator from New York and a leading member of the Democratic Party, in discussing the current debt crisis hissed that "the Republicans can't even tie their own shoes." Unless there really are a lot of unshod Republicans running around Washington, his comment seemed over the top.

As for the cats-- and the two political parties-- you would think the jealousy experienced by the first one towards the interloper would have subsided by now, but it seems only to worsen. This morning, enjoying the inherent quiet of a Sunday and looking forward to the Times magazine crossword puzzle, with the enticing coffee aroma filling the air and the birds in the yard chirping happily, piercing caterwauls filled the air. The two were engaged in mortal combat behind the living room sofa. Separating them was difficult, but finally achieved, whereupon both of them were ejected into the surrounding forest so we could get a little peace and quiet around here. If only we could do that with the members of Congress.

Looking for a Shoulder to Cry On

The old joke is that if men were the ones who had all the babies, everyone would be an only child. For indisputable proof I present my husband, a.k.a The Jewish Patient.

When The Jewish Patient has a cold, or god forbid a million times the flu, it's as if he has an incurable and painful and terminal--I know I already said incurable but I cannot stress this enough--disease: The moaning, the wailing, the constant complaining, and that's just when he's coming down with it. By the time it's full-blown, with a fever and upset stomach just to make my life a living hell, his suffering knows no bounds.

Forced into the role of Florence Nightingale on our wedding day by that business about "in sickness and in health," I tend to him with the tissues and the lozenges and the hot tea with honey and lemon and the ice water and the heating pads and the extra pillows, all the while thinking, "Please God, don't let this man ever get really sick." Well, now he needs an operation on his torn rotator cuff and I'm hoping to go deaf before his surgery. The moaning, the wailing, the constant complaining, and this is three weeks before the surgery; what will it be like after?

In hopes of finding a superior physician who will not mess up and cause my husband to A, complain forever or B, always walk with a limp, I have turned my attention towards finding the best shoulder surgeon east of the Rockies. Happily, I located a group of specialists associated with Harvard University-- each one of them God's Gift To Shoulders--a mere two-hour drive from where we live, and suggested The Jewish Patient see one of them. He said that I am making too big a deal about this and that he'd rather see the guy whose office is only 12 minutes away right here in Maine, "America's Vacationland."

Oy vay.

Oh, To Be a Cop in Maine

The following items are printed verbatim from the Police Beat column in our local newspaper, the Northern Forecaster:
 
FALMOUTH, 7/20 at 2:31 p.m. A caller reported a teenage boy missing when he did not return from a paintball trip with friends. An officer responded and suggested the parents call the boy's cell phone. He reportedly answered and said he was OK.

YARMOUTH, 7/19 at 8:45 a.m. A resident contacted police to report an injured porcupine at the Royal River Park. A few minutes later, the resident called police again to report the animal had died. According to police, the animal control officer arrived at the park and identified the animal as a woodchuck. 

FREEPORT, 7/18 at 10:34 p.m. Police were notified of a sick or injured raccoon on Lower Flying Point Road at the L. L. Bean outdoor paddling facility. The matter was addressed and the animal was removed by an officer.

Gatsby Had Problems Too

Members of the middle class who hate the rich hide their jealousy behind good intentions: they worry about the poor, they pity the poor. They declare loudly that the rich are mean-spirited and evil, all the while coveting their lucre. They beseech the government to strip the rich of their wealth, no matter if it was hard-earned. They assume the poor to be generous and loving folk, scraping their fingers to the bone to feed their families, and imagine the rich as heartlessly, laughingly tossing their heads back as they drink their scotch and bourbon on their fabulous yachts or partying until dawn inside their grand summer homes in The Hamptons and beyond. They do this without actually knowing any rich or any poor, instead blindly judging them based on media reports and commentary by TV personalities Jon Stewart and Bill Maher, both millionaires from selling that particular schtick.

I was born into America's lower middle class; like everyone, I had nothing to do with my station in life at birth. (Rich babies are no less innocent than poor babies.) I am fortunate enough to now be on the higher end of the middle class, mostly because I married an overachieving, smart and dedicated, type-A workaholic, also born into the lower middle class, who thrives on productivity and has been rewarded over the years for his innate drive and ambition by generous employers who have regarded him as a valuable asset.

So now I get to drive a new Saab instead of a beat up old Chevy and my husband drives a used SUV which he is working on beating up. (We have both been labeled as gas guzzlers, although my car does quite well in the mileage department.) Should we feel guilty for this? Should I do more than give to charity and engage in volunteerism? What should I do, what could I do, that would assuage the bleeding-hearts? Should my husband work for less pay, or perhaps give all his earnings to those we call poor? That doesn't seem fair.

Oh, wait a minute, I know what. I could say ad nauseum how much I hate those horrible rich Republicans, that would probably be enough. And maybe I could display bumper stickers on my Prius hybrid telling the world that I, in particular, am against genocide in Darfur, like everybody and their mother doesn't feel that way. And lawn signs, yeah, I could get a lot of lawn signs saying I'm against the war and in favor of wind power and against using pesticides and pro-abortion and against drilling in Alaska and in favor of taxing the rich, yeah, most especially, tax the rich! That should do it.

Calling All Americans

Everywhere you look, America is losing ground: The dollar is a joke, the Russians beat us in space, and yesterday three Chinese deep-sea divers went deeper than we ever have, surpassing us in underwater exploration. What's worse, we aren't even the fattest nation anymore since Kuwait has overeaten us to the top tubby spot.

Depressed by the fact that I no longer live in the greatest country in the world, which is what my parents always told me growing up--"You were lucky enough to be born in the greatest country in the world and you will eat every last one of those beets, young lady!"--I went searching for proof of continued American dominance in any area. Happily, I found it: Besides having the highest documented incarceration rate in the world, we are the leaders in smartphone technology. I witnessed the latter firsthand at a business dinner I attended recently with my husband and some of his colleagues and their spouses, all here for a work retreat.

There were nine of us at a restaurant touted as among the best in Portland. Despite that, it was slow going getting served, but instead of having to rely on old-fashioned conversation, we were treated to a virtual slide show at the table! Within seconds of placing our orders, the three other women whipped out their iPhones and started passing them around like 3-D glasses at an IMAX theater.  I saw fabulous pictures, many worthy of National Geographic, of grandiose vacations and memorable graduations, of weddings inside and out, of children and newborn grandchildren, and a couple of foreign exchange students thrown in for good measure. It was great--I hardly had to say anything clever at all, just nod and murmur things like "wow" and "she's sooo pretty!" And by the time our entrees showed up I felt like I had known them all for years, despite us having just met a day or two before.

Charlene's phone was the best--it even had a flashlight capability so in case you lost your keys or were sitting around a campfire and needed to find the marshmallows, you were good to go. I was so embarrassed that all my dumbphone can do is ring.

The Two Faces of Facebook

I love Facebook because it lets me see what my son, who lives in another city, is up to. Sometimes there is a new photo of him happy and smiling, apparently enjoying himself, and this makes my day. And he has so many friends, which also makes my day, even though I know that among the 713 of them you could count the ones who really matter on one hand-- and you wouldn't need to use the thumb or the ring finger or the pinky.

I hate Facebook because it sows untruth. If you know people in the real world and you know what is really going on in their sordid, seedy, depressing and duplicitous lives, then when you read their perky posts with all the smiley faces and the multiple exclamation points it can actually make you sick.  Facebook World is a happy place where people post great photos of interesting places: Everyone has just had a fabulous time somewhere! They are all living interesting lives!! They love their friends who are the best, and they post positive slogans and uplifting aphorisms and proverbs and quotes from the Dalai Lama to help you get through your day!!!! Their kids are all brilliant and beautiful!!!!!! You never hear about their teenagers smoking pot or getting drunk or failing in school!!!!!!!

I love Facebook because it helps forge new friendships with complete strangers, like former high school classmates who you never spoke one word to back then but who enhance the quality of your life today, or your husband's nephews who are mean Scrabble players and also enlighten you politically. 

I hate Facebook because it lets people pretend they are smarter or funnier or nicer or more athletic than they really are. For example, that bit about the ring finger in my opening paragraph: I did not make that up, I read it somewhere and thought it was clever.

I have tried to quit Facebook but then I feel left out, even though I know that it's mostly a crock, for show, and all about appearances. Another thing I do on Facebook is post my blog, which you are reading right now and found on Facebook so I know it works, helping me feel like I am a part of society even though I am mostly reclusive inside my beautiful house in Maine!! I love it here!!!! I walk to the water every day and there are trees and birds and flowers everywhere!!!!!

Something to Live For

Try as I might, it's getting harder and harder to be funny. About a dozen years ago, back when I wrote a weekly humor column for a Salt Lake City daily, the jokes came fast and easy; all I had to do was look around my house. With an adolescent son and several unruly pets under my roof, everyday life for a Jewish family in Mormon territory provided easy access to humor.

These days my son is grown, my dog is dead, and there's nary a missionary in sight. Mainers pretty much keep to themselves and the post-9/11 world is hardly amusing. Terrorism, global warming and world-wide economic woes reinforce a shared downward spiral of the spirit. This past weekend's horrific mass shooting, in peaceful little Norway of all places, spotlights the fact that things are bad all over and getting worse.

So I was greatly relieved to read in today's Wall Street Journal that plans are afoot for a new daytime TV talk show that will surely be side-splitting. I can hardly wait for September 12, when "Anderson" debuts on CNN. Its producers promise it will "persuade America that Mr. Cooper has a softer side" and prove that he can "dig deep into the emotional side of stories and do more than simply cover breaking news," and isn't that really what we want from our journalists? I'm marking my calendar, how about you?

Dead Celebrities

Amy Winehouse was a British singer with big hair who wore a lot of dark eye makeup. I never heard her music or saw her perform, yet her death from a drug overdose made the front page of the New York Times. No doubt her music will now be played much more frequently, at least for a few weeks, and we will certainly read more articles and see footage on TV news shows about how great she was.

Honestly, I don't care a whit about her. I did care about Janis Joplin, another 27-year-old singer who overdosed long ago, back in my own youth, so I understand that Amy's fans are sad today. But I care much more about all those young people murdered on that Norwegian island by a crazed shooter with a political agenda, and we will never know anything about them.

I hope Amy will just die, and not hang on or even gain strength posthumously, like many celebrities do. Some of them, like Elvis and Marilyn, Anna Nicole Smith and Princess Di, and even James Dean, who was only famous for less than a year when he crashed his car, keep hanging around here. There's nothing worse than a dead celebrity dominating the news, if you ask me.

Other People's Problems

I just read about a man whose wife and three young daughters were swept away in a flash flood while he looked on. Then I read about the shooter in Norway who took the lives of about 90 people yesterday, with the death toll still mounting. Then I read about a woman who was driving home in a thunderstorm and a tree crashed though her windshield and impaled her in her right eye and exited behind her left eye. Then I stopped reading and decided to make another pot of coffee.

What can we do about the horrors that befall others? Nothing. Not one thing. And crying about it, which is my standard reaction, doesn't help. The worst part is that hearing all those terrible things does not make my allergic reactions to mosquito bites any easier to bear, or make my hot, un-air-conditioned house any cooler, or make my husband's impending shoulder surgery any less frightening. And shouldn't it?

And speaking of my husband--Mitch is relatively new to running and he ran his first official race this morning. It was great fun to cheer him on and see him cross the finish line. It's a little less fun now, but still I'm sure I'll remember his first race long after I've forgotten all those bad things that happened to other people. And that's really a shame.

Happy Friggin' Birthday Again

My husband's birthday is this Sunday and all I have to say is "big whoop." After 25 years of marriage, I won't be pulling an all-nighter with the homemade cards and the baking. As for gifts, I already got him everything he needs years ago. Fortunately--for both of us-- our dear friend Gabby is a sensational baker and she's coming through with a cake, and I love her for that. But I must say that after a while birthdays get old, no pun intended. I mean, every year on that same date, you have to say "happy birthday," as if that's so original. And if you don't say it you are scum, and then the next day or a week later you see the person and you have to say you're sorry you forgot their birthday, like it's a federal holiday, and you hope it was happy.

Also, I have never understood why we celebrate the person who was born that day and not the woman who gave birth. In this particular case with my husband that woman is dead, so I would be totally off the hook, but many women with children are still alive and I think they deserve the gifts and the congratulations just for going through the whole ordeal.

Anyway, I got Mitch some presents I know for sure he won't like but too bad--it's a long story--and a card he might actually like, but none of that matters; at least that cake will be dynamite! I know because Gabby made the same one for my birthday. She's the greatest--maybe I'll get her a gift.

Disaster in High Heels

With so many great minds excelling in the fields of medicine, science, business, education and entertainment, it's sad that we are forced to consider the possibility of Michele Bachmann as our leader. In desperation, her opponents are now attacking her high heel-induced migraine headaches, suggesting they could interfere with her carrying out the duties of the President. How ridiculous, when she has so many other flaws that make her unsuitable to spend one more second in pursuit of this lofty goal.

Perhaps the most offensive one was foreshadowed in 2004, when Bachmann stated publicly, "We need to have profound compassion for people who are dealing with the very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life and sexual identity disorders.” I suppose that means she is extra nice to her own husband, a prancing flamer who could be Harvey Fierstein's understudy in Torch Song Trilogy. Together, the couple owns a Christian counseling center with a focus on curing homosexuality.

Media reports say Bachmann's anti-gay stance "has outraged liberals and alienated moderate Republicans, while endearing her to many conservative Christians."  As for the rest of us, there is still time! Surely we can do better than scraping the bottom of the political barrel by inducing others to run for office. I'm not proud of this, but I must make the old headache joke: Sorry Michele, not tonight. Not any night.