Category Archives: mawidge

family, life in new york, mawidge

"what’s an iPhone?"

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My office gave us a free half day today — to prepare us for the glories of a free day tomorrow, I imagine. I live such an exciting life that my first thought was, “Terrific! I can go to the library!”

But it’s weird, you know? That the library is generally only open during work hours, and I, um, *work* during those hours. To fill my obsessive need for the library (or rather its resources) I spend a decent amount of time trolling its website and planning my Saturday mornings. But today! With my unexpected freedom, I skipped over at my convenience carrying three books to return (Handler, Eisenberg, Sayers), and skipped back, carrying three books that I found on the hold shelf with my name stamped on their spines (Vowell, Ferris, and more Sayers, cuz I can’t get enough). I am not ashamed to admit I was giddy both ways. At least those writers would forgive me for my unrepentant dorkitude, unlike my brother, who rolls his eyes at me just because I occasionally use the word Accio.

In an ideal world, my job would be to read a lot of books and write some of my own, with occasional breaks to shop for shoes. My hobby would be watching movies. To serve God, I would spend time with my friends, encouraging them to read/write books and watch movies. And to disturb the monotony, I would eat excellent food.

Oh, and I’d have a dog. And a lovely apartment somewhere by Prospect Park. And though the city would be Brooklyn, the weather would be Berkeley’s. Is that so much to ask?

Mr. Ben survived his bachelor weekend. I suspect he and his friends spent 48 hours and $30K at Scores, but I will not debase myself to ask. Frankly, even if they did, they could not have matched the fun my friends and I had over my bachelorette weekend: our landlord neglected to mention that the oven had a gas leak and so, in cooking our first night there, we were merrily sauteeing on the range while filling the kitchen with propane. He also neglected to mention that by, “You can boat” he meant, “If you try to boat, the neighbors, who have a restraining order against me, will try to get you to testify as witnesses in the ongoing civil suit.”

No thanks to him, we really did have a lovely time. And last weekend, which I spent in DC with my parents and my grandmother doing wedding stuff and being thrilled that my father seemed much more like himself, was also productive & worthwhile. I am not really, when I think about it, too far from my ideal world. Today I also got to buy a pound of dates from Sahadi’s and Mr. Ben and I get to eat them. Even Scooter “Scot Free” Libby isn’t that lucky.

fuelos, life in new york, mawidge

my party!

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my party!
Originally uploaded by shorterstory.

Look, it’s my bachlorette party!

Just kidding. Actually, my bachlorette party was more like this:


my actual party
Originally uploaded by shorterstory.


Okay, okay, actually it was like this:


oh shit it’s cold
Originally uploaded by shorterstory.


Up in the Catskills, where those oldest wonderfullest friends of mine took me for a weekend escape, the most risque thing I did was sleep in a super bed for debauchery. It was only afterwards, once we’d returned to the city, that we indulged in my newest favorite thing, Yolato, and everyone’s all-time favorite thing, nudity.

The weekend was refreshing and nostalgic and lovely, and I’ve hardly had time to think about it (let alone blog) since. Too much to do! After feasting with a friend n her parents into the wee hours last night, I had to rise at 6:45 for an office day trip to Connecticut: 8+ hours on a bus for 4 hours of New England sun — fun, but an investment in bonding that I’m not eager to repeat anytime soon.

And Friday afternoon I get back on a bus to toodle off to DC for the weekend while Mr. Ben has his bachelor fun in Philly. After that things will calm down for a bit. Or, um, until the wedding, I guess. Which is really *awfully* soon …

life in new york, mawidge, politix

ho hum

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There are things I’m supposed to be doing besides agonizing over Michael Bloomberg. It only makes me feel slightly better to realize that everyone else is agonizing too: now that he’s an Independent, will he run? Will 2008 be a joke that begins, “So an Italian New Yorker (R), a WASP New Yorker (D), and a short Jewish billionaire New Yorker (I) walk into a bar. Who do you want to have a beer with? SUCK IT UP, MIDWESTERNERS: YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE”?

Personally, I’m glad Bloomie (no relation except via the Global Conspiracy) has turned all (I) on us. He was always too good for the stodgy gay-bashers and immigrant-hating Scrooges of the GOP; and now it’s like he’s giving those of us who like him so much license to continue without feeling dirty. You know what I like about Bloomie? Congestion pricing — I’ve walked by three car accidents recently, not counting the one that nearly took down Mr. Ben’s best man. Get the cars off the streets of Manhattan!

Also thanks to Bloomie: no trans fat lurking in the french fries and no smoking in the bars. He’s working on schools and affordable housing and he gives off the sense that if he were running the damn 9/11 monument project the ribbon would be cut already. To me, he combines sensible “big government” policies with intelligent mad managerial skillz, and he does it without incurring the wrath of the unions or the ACLU.

Not that I would vote for him for President in 08. My eyes are not that starry. We need a big D in office, if only for the symbolism. But hang in there, Bloomie — maybe in ’12? ’16?

Meanwhile, I need thoughts of ’08 to distract me from August 07, which is like a giggly little kid crouching behind a door ready to jump out and yell, “Boo!” This weekend I’m going to be Bachlorette-ing with four of my oldest female friends (they knew me when I was angry and bitter!) at a lakehouse in the Catskills. It will be fantastic. We will kayak and go see waterfalls and cook food and talk about our sex lives and reminisce about how I used to be angry and bitter before I had a sex life and oops family members sometimes read this blog. Well, anyway. I’m going to be an honest woman soon, or some feminist approximation thereof.

This chicks-only getaway was one of the few concrete wedding-related things I really wanted. I am super excited. Thinking about the wedding itself makes me palpitate a little bit — walking down an aisle? Really? How surreal. Will everyone be crying? Will I? How will I NOT be crying? — but this trip, and the 2-week trip to Tokyo & Hokkaido that Mr. Ben and I are planning for early September, are much easier to fathom.

DC, mawidge, musing

clean, clear, and under control

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My mother’s thyroid biopsy came back empty. No cancer! One of my parents doesn’t have cancer! I would have thrown a party when I found out if I hadn’t been about to leave for a weekend in DC.

Mr. Ben and I Vamoosed for a mere $25, and if you’ve been craving an alternative to the Chinatown bus, I recommend it highly. Clean, roomy, with working televisions (even if all they did was inform me How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days if you’re the reasonably charming Kate Hudson). Plus, they drop off in Bethesda, close to where my ailing parents reside.

As to my ailing parents, I do wonder a bit what’s to be done. Though my mother was found to be out of danger, the surgeons who removed her thyroid left her with a scar that makes her look like Juno, the chain-smoking caseworker in Beetlejuice played by Sylvia Sydney. For some reason I can’t find a picture, but you remember her — the afterlife expert who exhales through the slash in her throat.

My mom’s had her throat slit, my dad’s been disemboweled. What a year for my parents. My mother is rocking it, though. She looks great — and when she asked the doctor what the condition of the scar would be in early August, he said, “Well, I can tell you one thing that would help.”

“What’s that?” asked my mother.

“A really striking diamond necklace.”

I fear that my father might need more than some frost to distract attention from his situation. Chemo hasn’t been sitting well with him after all; he’s hardly been able to eat or sleep. I can only hope he adjusts soon, or something? What can I hope for?

Probably to keep us from thinking such mopey thoughts, when Mr. Ben and I were in town, they wouldn’t let us stand still for a moment. The weekend whirled by & all I recall looking back are flashes of my wedding dress, about a hundred pairs of silver slippers, a much amended song list, a stack of stamped invitations, a strapless bra, the Rabbi in his office, some really terrific strawberries, and faces made up to look pretend Japanese for a spirited if a bit silly production of the Mikado at Wolf Trap.

I made it back in time to catch the Sopranos with my next door neighbor. David Chase really knows how to gut a viewer, doesn’t he? Except for that overdone bit with the model train, it was an amazing hour of suspense; I think I was whimpering from start to finish. Idly it occurred to me as I watched that it was ridiculous to get all emotionally involved with the deaths of these fictional monsters, whereas I’ve managed to stay relatively calm about the sickness of both of my parents. But I guess that’s what art is for.

celebration, family, mawidge

engaged to the teeth

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locket #1
Originally uploaded by shorterstory.

you can’t see too well but in this picture, taken by ms. tara leigh last night in the village, i’m wearing the locket my grandmother just gave me. inside are pictures of my grandfather and her from the early 40s when THEY got engaged; the locket had been his gift to her, since he couldn’t afford a ring. it’s an incredible piece: she seems like a movie star, and as for my grandfather — tara leigh took one look at him and shrieked, “Spidey!”

Meaning that the oh-so-dignified late father of my mother resembles Tobey Maguire. Personally I think the Yolato must have gone to her head.

The whole weekend was crazy, although largely in the best possible way. Wednesday Mr. Ben finished his VERY LAST FINAL EVER and we celebrated by attending his law skool’s Barrister’s Ball at the Tavern on the Green. I was a bit scared the restaurant’s 14-foot-wide blue chandeliers would swing low and swallow me up; luckily, we spent most of our time out on the patio under much friendlier lanterns, which did not look like remnants from a giant whorehouse.

Friday, Mr. Ben donned a bright purple gown — all the rage in graduation fashion — and crossed the stage to be hooded in a very lengthy ceremony that featured Winner of the Barack Obama prize for Most Inspiring Politican, Mr. Cory Booker of Newark. We celebrated -that- by dining at Tabla with his entire family. Both sides were on their best behavior, as they were again the NEXT night, for the engagement party my aunt and uncle threw us at Pescatore (which was, coincidentally, May 12, the anniversary of our engagement).

About 25 people came to salute us and wish us well over the four hour meal. I can finally attest to the fact that the food was delicious since I’m eating it right now for lunch. At the time, all the speechmaking and toasting in our honor left me too overwhelmed to eat.

The next day, of course, was mother’s day. Luckily my mom and my grandmother were still in town, and Mr. Ben and I hung out with them in the city until they headed back to DC and then went to meet Tara Leigh for church! Because what better way to cap off a weekend? I’d never been to a Protestant service before and I didn’t like the idea of Jesus Camp being my representative experience of an American Christian religious service.

No wafers’n’wine (the Presbyterians don’t do that) which is cool since I’m still off sugar. I sort of bowed my head when everyone else did and waited patiently for the songs to be over, and otherwise listened intently to the sermon that made up 75% of the service. I think it helped me realize how starved I am for textual analysis and also maybe for religious instruction. Even if I’m not a religious person by the standards of religious people, it’s how I grew up and I miss talking about and reading about the Bible sometimes in an intellectual way.

The easy answer would be to go to shul, our synagogue in Brooklyn Heights. That seems more threatening, though, like it would mean increased devotion or religiousity on my part, and that’s not what I’m looking for. Maybe I just need to get back into full-speed writing of the novel.

anxiety, family, mawidge

who’s holding the other shoe?

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I have a decent amount of generalized angst at the moment. Yes, it’s all manageable and under control; travelling to & from DC this weekend didn’t unleash the torment, for which I am grateful. But I’m beginning to marvel, myself. Shall I count the ways?

– My dad is sick. He has [the word] — I hate saying the word. It’s such a babyish word, too, full of such straightforward, primary-color letters that, rearranged, spell DEATH. Except, of course, that they don’t. My dad is fine. What he has was caught early. He was artfully disemboweled then put together together again, the evil removed. Even his staples have now been taken out. His doctors give him an excellent chance of full recovery after they finish applying their strategic poisons. (Medicine is a bit scary, isn’t it?)

– Someone else very close to me is going into the hospital for a procedure as well. Shhhhh. I think it’s supposed to be kept under wraps.

– The wedding is a mere three months away and it turns out I can’t carry lilacs, because in this modern age of instant gratification, of narcissism and conspicuous consumption, of the internet and QVC, in this 21st century Westernized globalized capitalized world, you can get absolutely anything anytime except lilacs in August.

GOOD NEWS:

– Mr. Ben is about to graduate from Law Skool. Graduate! I am so excited for him, so excited and so proud. Considering that I shared one room with him through the entire three year ordeal, I also feel somewhat accomplished myself, even though I am chagrined to realize that while he has achieved a JD (and others of my friends have rounded up or begun to round up other letters: MA, MS, MD, MFA, MBA) all I have to show for my post-college life is a savings account and an MRS.

– My grandmother seems wonderful. There’s something so infinitely inspiring about her. At 94.5, she still lives by herself in her own apartment. She walks, she talks, she laughs, she reads, she does physical therapy, and as far as I’m concerned she flies in the face of modern science. She still has her own teeth!

– My mother and I got some very good wedding planning done over the weekend and it wasn’t onerous in the least. Everyone we worked with, from the hair guy and the Russian makeup lady to the French dress shop clerk and the florist, was sweet to me without being didactic or overbearing. We made decisions — good ones! As the ceremony gets increasingly concrete, I find I like it and can handle it better. Maybe it’s just that as an abstraction it was frightening.

– It’s springtime! New York is in bloom. I can never be sad when there are trees to admire. And, thanks to Katie, I’m reading this really fun book about zombies.

mawidge, swatties

baby’s first wedding!

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I didn’t mean to write about Ann Coulter the last time I sat down to blog; I meant to say Congratulations HeidiRob! Mr. Ben and I spent two packed days in Delray Beach, Florida counting BMWs, enjoying the sunshine, and celebrating with our Very First friends to tie the knot. As you can tell from Mr. Ben’s pictures, they did so in old world style.

Our friend K. Ross, much improved since getting knocked around by that renegade car several months ago, joined us, as did several other college folk I hadn’t seen since graduation. We had an all-around lovely time, except for that moment when I let my guard down and was shanghaied by a drunk pot-smoking, menopausal relative who proceded to regale me for what felt like hours with stories of her pot smoking and menopause.

Still, overall, it was a vast improvement over the last wedding I attended as a nine year old, when I saw the priest keel over and die in the middle of the ceremony. The imposing Catholic Church had already been spooking me a little, what with those Stations of the Cross murals on the walls; seeing a man go down, and then a whole congregation fall to its knees while my family remained awkwardly seated in our pew as if we were somehow to blame, was nearly traumatizing. The HeidiRob wedding had no body count at all. Way to go, guys!

Obviously their wedding made me think about mine, but I won’t bore you with those details. I just hope I remain as graceful under pressure as they did.