Month: April 2024

Years ago, we would pick up our son downtown after he took the Megabus home from college. He would get in the car and we would routinely ask, “Where’s your luggage?” He would respond by holding up a small brown paper bag most people use to pack a lunch.

The kid was a walking definition of “travel light.”

These days he occasionally travels internationally for work. To our knowledge he has never checked a bag. We’re not sure he knows how.

I had a grandma who gave up her home when she was in her 80s and went from one adult child’s home to another. She never brought more than one suitcase when she came to stay for weeks at a time.

There was a time I traveled light. In my younger days, when I went somewhere overnight or on a short trip, I could easily get everything I needed into a small green bag the size of a bowling ball bag.

All these years later, my husband and I are both fond of saying we travel light—but we don’t. We travel like we are heading out for the Oregon Trail.

Seems we take most everything we own with us except for salt pork, beans and a spare wagon wheel.

We took an overnight trip out of town last week and I packed four pairs of shoes—high heels for my speaking engagement, flats for when the heels became excruciating, flip flops, because I have a phobia about walking barefoot on hotel carpets, and running shoes.

I looked at that bag of shoes and realized I have officially become high-maintenance.

I also packed an entire cosmetic bag with nothing but moisturizers and lotions for my face, neck, arms, hand, legs and feet. What I really need is a showerhead that shoots out moisturizer, not water.

When I traveled with that little green bag, my only cosmetic was a tiny jar of Noxzema. I didn’t pack a blow dryer, curling iron, two hairbrushes, mousse, gel and hair spray years ago—I simply channeled Carole King.

My husband packs light in the way of clothes but weighs in heavy with all the extras. He throws in a computer bag, two cameras, a camera bag, a tripod, at least three hardback books, old issues of the Wall Street Journal he’s been meaning to read and several file folders with loose papers falling out.

He has finished loading the covered wagon, I mean car, when I yell, “Wait! One more!”

“What’s in this little lightweight bag?” he asks, tossing it into the cargo hold.

“My clothes,” I say.

When our kids were young, I briefly considered homeschooling. Then I was teaching our son to play piano, found myself with the John Thompson Book for Beginners rolled up in my hand, ready to swat him on the arm, and realized I was not homeschool material.

We paid a neighbor for piano lessons. She taught all the kids in the neighborhood and never once swatted one of them with a piano book.

Here I am these many years later and homeschooling. Sorta.

For several years we have been homeschooling three of our grands on Tuesdays when their mother works.

We refer to our school as Old School. At Old School, we often begin the day developing culinary skills—as in making a coffee cake. Welcome to home economics. “Careful with that crumb topping, girls! It’s all about even distribution!”

Coffee cake won’t be on a standardized test one day but give these girls a box of blueberries and pantry staples and they will deliver the goods.

Following Baking 101, our three students heave their 90-pound book bags (which should count for P.E. credits) onto the kitchen table and unload books, books and more books.

Our primary function is to check their work. Their primary function is to check us checking their work. Then we check why they checked our work, and they usually go mum, which indicates they have had instructions from home that Grandma and Grandpa sometimes veer off the path.

Someone checked me this week asking, “What is a homonym?”

“You. Ewe,” I said.

“Me?” she asked.

“No, I said you. And ewe.”

“Who?”

“YOU-WHO!” She laughed and we had our first knock-knock joke of the day.

Humor is one of the many electives we offer alongside cooking.

She giggled but resumed quizzing me, asking me to define synonym and antonym.

“Why are you quizzing me?” I asked.

“I just want to see what you know.”

It’s always good to vet the language arts teacher, even if she is a writer.

Math has taken a sharp turn as two of them are into algebra. They are solving for every letter of the alphabet to the power of 6 or 7 or 12 with random parentheses and fractions thrown in to increase the fun in “showing your work.”

One of our students writes somewhat large; showing her work for one problem can fill an entire page.

The Old School superintendent (the husband) loves math and numbers. His handwriting is small, but he could fill 20 pages showing his work for the many ways to solve 5 plus 5. He helps the girls solve problems and then offers multiple variations of the problem until the girls crawl under the table to see if he notices they are gone.

I prefer doing problems in my head. That way nobody can check my work. I tend to be brief and succinct.

At Old School, we insist students demonstrate they have mastered a concept by teaching that concept to one of us.

One of the girls recently learned a new math concept, after which her detail-loving Grandpa said, “OK, now teach it to me.”

To which she said, “Can I teach it to Grandma?”

 

I took the bait and I’m not even embarrassed to say what the bait was.

It was a fishing scam. Not trout, bass, anything you throw back in the water, or cook on the grill—fishing with a “ph.” Phishing.

Phishing is when online fraudsters try to scam you out of money by enticing you to open an email or text without first checking the web address to see who sent it.

It’s a “too good to be true” concept. It’s the powerful lure of F-R-E-E.

The truth is, we can all be hooked with the right bait.

What’s your bait? Sometimes you don’t know what your bait is until it appears on a screen before you.

The husband, who frequently lectures others about not falling for scams, took a tumble himself. The email was from a chain drug store we frequent. The bait was a free Ring doorbell.

The doorbell we have doesn’t even ding half the time. Naturally, the thought of a doorbell that would ding, show who was at the door and record video of people not picking up their dog poo, was simply too good to be true. Is this a great country or what?

He clicked. And then he kicked himself.

A young man we know who is extremely sharp and very tech savvy, fell for free concert tickets.

You want what you want. Somehow fraudsters know exactly what you want.

A friend recently received notice that a package she sent could not be delivered because it was short $1.10 in postage. Concerned that she had sent a package to a loved one that would not be delivered without additional postage, she took the bait.

Hook, line and sinker.

The thing about good bait is that it can stir your heart, spark your emotions and create unquenchable desire that overrides your brain.

The bait that almost reeled me in? Tupperware.

That’s right. I could be bought for Tupperware. A 26-piece storage container set, to be specific.

If I would just take a short survey sent to me by a well-known big box store, I would receive a free set of Tupperware.

Be still my heart.

A 26-piece set of storage Tupperware meant I would organize my kitchen and my life. I would never go to a dollar store again. I would never have to tell grandkids where to dig for the cookies or pretzels again. They would be able to see the cookies and pretzels!

The first question on the survey was a giveaway. It asked how often I shopped at the store. I have their store credit card; they know how often I shop at the store.

After I glanced at the address of the sender, I knew there would be no free Tupperware. (A moment of silence, please.)

One of my most vivid memories as a teen is of my dad sitting at the kitchen table, saying, “There’s no such thing as a free lunch.” Over and over. “There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

Or a free doorbell.

Or free concert tickets.

Or free Tupperware.

Sigh.

Some lessons take a lifetime to learn

My husband and I have experienced some hearing loss. The most frequently heard word at our house is “WHAT?!”

More pressing than our physical hearing loss is our selective hearing loss, something that happens to couples who have been married a long time.

Just the other day, the husband was working on his laptop at the kitchen table with his back to me as I was scurrying from the stove to the fridge to the cabinets, making dinner and simultaneously telling a riveting story.

I’ve forgotten what the story was about, but I remember that it was a good story. I know this because all my stories are good stories.

I suspected he wasn’t listening to me, and that wouldn’t matter, but he was missing a good story.

I told him as much.

No response.

I continued with my riveting story and still no response.

I was quiet for a few minutes and then I said, “Your hair is on fire.”

Still no response.

I then walked around to where he could see me, got his attention, and said, “I just told you that your hair is on fire.”

To which he said, “Huh.” So there was some response, but not much.

The man is not easily riled. That’s OK, I can make up for that deficit, too.

Our hearing issues boil down to a frequency problem. I talk frequently; he talks infrequently.

The are only two things he hears 100 percent of the time. The first is, “Dinner is ready.”

It doesn’t matter if the man is upstairs, outside mowing the yard, or blowing leaves off the garage roof, if I say, “Dinner is ready,” he is front and center.

The second statement he always hears is, “The car needs an oil change.”

His priorities are clear: food and car maintenance.

I have learned that if my opening line involves something about food, I exponentially increase my chances of holding his full attention.

There is a concert series I’d like to go to, so I say, “How does bacon sound and what do you think about tickets for the summer series in the park?”

Bingo! BLTs and a concert series just like that.

He has gone so far as to say my hearing is worse than his. The other day he told me I should get a hairy chest.

“Why would I want a hairy chest?” I snapped.

He looked shocked then said, “I didn’t say hairy chest—I said you should get a hearing test.”

To which I said, “WHAT??!!”

I left home without my phone the other day. I considered turning back but decided against it.

As I continued on my way, I felt a growing sense of euphoria. It was as though a weight had been lifted—a small electronic weight that would fit in a pocket, a purse or rattle around in a cup holder in a car. It was freeing. For a short distance anyway.

Then came a moment of doubt. What if I needed my phone? What if I was in a fender bender, or worse?

Surely, I could run a few errands untethered. I’ve lived two-thirds of my life without a cell phone.In my 20s, I criss-crossed the country without a cell phone. Everyone did. And yes, it was after the covered wagon. If you needed directions, you stopped at a gas station. A guy pumping gas with a grease rag in his back pocket could get you where you needed to go.

Gas stations were where you stopped for amenities like bathrooms. ‘Round back. They were often filthy bathrooms that you had to ask for a key to use. It was survival of the fittest. And, looking back, we may have been more fit.

My dad made sure that I knew how to change a tire. He had me practice in the driveway. Today, I could no more change a tire than I could leap the Empire State Building or throw a rock across the Potomac. But I do have our insurance company’s roadside assistance number—in my cell phone. Which is back home.

I decided to forget about the phone and walk on the wild side. The new me—fearless nonconformist.

It was invigorating. I felt as though I were 16 again, armed with a new driver’s license and about to drive on the interstate for the first time. Alone. Windows down, hair whipping in the wind and “Wild Thing” blaring on the radio.

I ran my errands with a lighter step. I glided in and out of the UPS store, sashayed through the grocery and floated up and down aisles of a big box store.

Then I stopped at our youngest daughter’s house to return some things. “Where have you been?” she snapped, hands on hips.

“Running errands.”

“Well, you need to call my sister, because she’s called me twice, frantic because she’s been trying to call you forever and you don’t answer, and she’s tried calling Dad and he doesn’t answer and she’s wondering if something happened to both of you because neither of you answers!”

All that in a single breath. She’s good.

If I walked on all four and had a tail, I would have tucked it between my legs.

I said I would call her sister and explained that their dad was working outside.

The bubble of freedom burst before my eyes, not to mention the eyes of three little granddaughters alongside their mother looking at me like I was incorrigible.

Once again, I felt like I was 16 – and about to be grounded.