Does This Beach Make Me Look Fat?: True Stories and Confessions (6 page)

“Do I have to have a reason?”

“No, but if you have a reason, I'd like to know it.”

“Why do you want to know? You have to have a reason for asking me what my reason is.”

Now I'm getting confused. “I'm just curious.”

“I like it. That's the reason, okay? It makes me feel good. Is that a good enough reason for you?”

“Yes.”

Mother Mary snorts. “I'm glad you approve.”

I feel heartened. If she's sarcastic, she's fine. “Mom, I have an idea. If you want, Frank can take you to church. I looked it up online and there's a church three miles from your house.”

“No, I don't want to go.”

“Why not?”

“What's it to you?”

“Well, it seems like part of going to church is being part of the community, and you might like it more if you went, instead of watching it on television.”

“I don't want to be part of a community.”

“But it would be fun, Mom. You can get to know the people, meet the priest, and get out of the house.”

“I don't want to meet anybody or get out of the house.”

I switch gears. “Okay, how about this? I did a little research and I found out that there are ministers from the church who will actually come to your house and visit you, if you want.”

“I don't want a minister to visit me.”

“Why not?”

“Why are you asking me all these questions?” Mother Mary blows her top. “Do you want ministers visiting you? Are you going to church? What community are you part of?”

I sigh inwardly. “Okay, fair point. It just seems like it's second-best to watch it on TV.”

“Why? What do you watch Sunday mornings?”

“
Meet the Press
.”

“Why do you watch that?”

“It's important.”

Mother Mary snorts again. “You want to know what's important? Watch church.”

 

Howdy Neighbor

By Francesca

I'm currently sitting in front of my computer not wearing a bra. This is pretty standard for me, not usually an issue, except I just made eye contact with a construction worker standing one foot outside my window.

I've got scaffolding problems.

Construction is a fact of life in New York City. Real estate is to New York as oil is to Texas, it's where all the money is, and for real-estate barons, maintaining and improving their most valuable asset takes precedence over any resident's needs.

Capital capital trumps human capital every time.

Excuse me, Trumps™.

I was used to construction noise, the jackhammering, the beeping as trucks reverse, the once-concerning booms and bangs. I walk through a neighborhood in perpetual semidemolition without a second thought. It's debatable whether or not I need a hard hat to walk the dog.

The sounds still alarm my mother, even when she hears them over the telephone.

“Are you okay?” she'll cry. “What was that?”

“Hm? Oh, they're destroying a preschool to build another Marc Jacobs.”

Alarming, but in a different way.

I didn't fully appreciate how awful construction could be until it hit close to home.

About four inches from my home, to be exact.

Without warning, the management started some surface renovations to the fa
ç
ade of my building this spring. I live in a small duplex on the ground floor, my bedroom sits on the lower level, and the first thing the crew did was rip out the wrought-iron fence outside my bedroom windows.

At first, I was delighted. Food deliverymen serving my neighbors' late-night cravings often chained their bikes on that fence, and the sound of jangling chains would wake me up.

Oh hey, guys.

It was like the ghost of Jacob Marley was coming to bring me vegetable lo mein—dual harbingers of regret.

So, I was pro construction! Until the next morning, when I awoke to steel scaffolding being hammered into the exterior wall.

The noise made a bike-chain sound like wind chimes.

The following morning, I thought my clock was wrong—quarter to eight and completely dark outside? Then I realized my apartment had been mummified.

They had wrapped the outside of my apartment with a thick mesh netting to protect it from whatever Smash Bros. “improvements” they were doing to the exterior.

I was living inside a gypsy-moth nest.

Upstairs, things really got awkward. The scaffolding is level with my second floor, so the workmen look like they're
in
my living room.

Sitting at my desk beside my window, they're so close I feel like I should offer them a soda.

What's the social etiquette here? If I don't acknowledge them, I feel like a snob. If I do acknowledge them, it's like I'm on an all-day blind date.

With six men. For the next eight weeks.

Even closing my windows feels personal, like I'm closing it in their face. For the first two weeks, I said, “sorry” every time.

How about the etiquette on their end? Getting checked out by construction workers is a hazard for any woman, but I'm not used to it when I'm sitting on my couch.

To be fair, the crew has been respectful. They don't smile or interact with me when I'm inside the apartment.

However, as soon as I walk outside, all bets are off.

When I heard one mutter something behind me on the sidewalk, I wanted to turn around and say, “We'll talk about this when we get home.”

So I feel a low level of self-consciousness all day. When I'm eating at my table, I use my restaurant manners instead of my lives-alone manners.

Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about.

And when I'm writing at my desk, I try to look busy and not surf the Internet.

So maybe it's not such a bad thing.

The main inconvenience is I've had to dress better—or, more—during my workday.

Dreams do come true.

People who go to an office every day may not understand, but I work at home; dressing like a homeless person who may have a gym membership is not just my choice, it's my right.

Believe me, if I wanted to wear pants to work, I'd have a job that offered health insurance.

I should have a needlepoint pillow that says, “Home is where the bra comes off.”

So, I decided, screw it. Deal with it, boys. I'm working here.

And as if by magic, my super told me the scaffolding comes down tomorrow.

Because nobody wants to see that.

Home improved.

 

Fight the Power

By Lisa

Now is not the winter of our discontent.

Now is the winter of our stressed-to-the-max, pull-out-our-hair, if-we-get-more-snow-I'll-move-to-Florida. Because we have lost heat, electric, and Internet, and we have salted, shoveled, and plowed through snow, sleet, and ice.

But to me, the problem isn't heat.

It's ventilation.

As in, we need to vent about how much this winter sucks.

Who says talking about the weather is boring?

All I want to talk about is the weather.

I'm lucky enough to have a generator, but it didn't work in the beginning even though it cost a small fortune. Then when I finally got it working, I had light and heat only in the kitchen, where I had a laptop and a refrigerator.

And a burglar alarm.

To protect the refrigerator.

Also I had a book deadline, because I arrange my book deadlines to occur at the worst possible times for my continued solvency.

I got enough propane refills to keep me working for six days, during which I had no Internet or cable, no communication with the outside world except when I called my electric company, which was very concerned about my power outage.

I know, because their recorded message told me so.

All monopolies have recorded messages that tell you how much they care about you.

It's like the worst marriage ever.

To a really controlling robot.

Who can only estimate how much he costs you, but it's still way too much.

Every night I called and followed their mechanical prompts to plug in my phone number, tell them I was still out of power, and find out when my power would be back. And every day, the recording told me that my power would be restored in two days. Then I realized that no matter when I called, they always said the power would be on in two days.

It wasn't a deadline.

It was a dead lie.

Two days turned out to be like the twenty minutes they tell you to trick you into staying on the phone for technical support, or into waiting for a table in a restaurant, or into filling out this simple and easy credit application.

We are all rendered powerless by our power company.

They win every power struggle.

Because they have the power.

Day after day, I stuck it out, living in my coat and forehead flashlight, like a demented gynecologist.

When the eighth day came, I made my deadline but I still had no Internet connection and couldn't email my book to my publisher.

So I packed my laptop and fled to Daughter Francesca's apartment in New York City, which always has power.

It's a powerful town.

You know why New York always has heat, light, and shoveled sidewalks?

Lawyers.

Every building owner knows he will get his ass sued if you fall on yours.

As a result, snow is salted, shoveled, and plowed before it hits the ground. Really, people are hired to run around and catch snowflakes in their cupped hands.

The lawyers keep New York hermetically sealed in a cushioned bubble, like Planet Manhattan, and the only problem with Planet Manhattan is that no one there wants to hear you vent.

They will listen for about one minute.

The proverbial New York Minute.

So I emailed my book to my publisher, met my deadline, and kissed my beloved daughter good-bye.

I came home to Pennsylvania.

Where I'm happy to listen to you vent.

Go for it.

Your feedback is very important to us.

 

The Truth Tastes Delicious

By Lisa

I'm trying to lose weight and I wonder if I need a nutritionist.

Or a miracle.

Our story begins when I notice I've gained seven pounds over the winter.

This can't be my fault.

I blame the snow.

Don't you?

Let's all blame the snow!

And instead of running around with yardsticks, we'll use tape measures. In fact, we should redo the snowfall maps on the TV weather report and put up the inches we gained on our waistlines.

Six inches in Chester County?

Wow!

And it's sticking?

To my butt!

I didn't even realize I'd gained weight until I had to get dressed for a speaking engagement, which meant I had to unpeel the fleece sweatsuit I'd worn through November, December, and January, and put on clothes that had actual seams.

Not possible.

In February, seams are not your friend.

Turns out, neither are zippers or buttons.

I guess I was fooled because my fleece sweatsuit is black.

So slimming.

In it, I look like a licorice jellybean.

Delicious.

Anyway, to stay on point, I was going to wear a wool blazer with my nice jeans, but neither fit at all. Even my boots didn't fit, because my calves had gotten bigger.

Here is what fit:

My gloves.

Luckily, my fingers retained their girlish figure.

It was a foregone conclusion that I couldn't get into my jeans, because I can't get into my jeans unless the stars align, but I knew I was in trouble when my boots wouldn't go on.

And then I couldn't button my blazer.

What's a jellybean to do?

I changed into a double-breasted jacket and buttoned it on the outer button, so it looked like a maternity wear for the menopausal.

But after my gig, I got serious and wanted to start a diet, but I didn't know which one. Also, at the same time, I wanted to stop eating anything unnatural, like fake sugar.