January 1, 2008

Happy New Years to all of you: friends and family! And what would the New Year be without...resolutions. So I'm going to get straight to the point with the number one New Year's resolution of all time...

1. Lose weight. And I know many of you are putting that way high up there on your list. It's a perenial favorite of mine. And if you're not, you probably should. I'm sure we could all stand to lose 5 or 10 pounds and thanks to my last year's resolutions, I can now say that is the case for me. I can now stand to lose 5 or 10 pounds.

For those of you out there who are still struggling with weight loss and even struggling with how to drum up some enthusiasm for losing weight...something different than last year since that didn't work too well, I can only tell you what I did. I read "Never Be Fat Again," by Raymond Francis. The title sounds gimicky but I can assure you this book is serious. We've all heard the nutritional reasons for losing weight ad nauseum. There's nothing new in that department. Stop eating sugar, processed flour, and bad fats. Eat more fruits and veggies. But this book also delves into the physiological, the environmental and political reasons for losing weight. It makes you want to learn more and from there I went to "The China Study" and "The Omnivore's Dilemma," among others. But "Never Be Fat Again" is the place to start. So get started.

2. Clean out closets (drawers, attic, cabinets too). I really went at it this year and got rid of a whole lot of things. When I lost weight I thought I would wear all those old clothes I had hung on to but found most were out of style. I should have given those away a long time ago. Let someone else enjoy them. Same goes for old books, dishes, toys, furniture. Don't worry, your kids aren't going to want that old stuff you've been saving. I even took all my old vinyl albums (yes, even the Beatles and Led Zeppelin) to Waterloo records and sold them for $239.00! And I felt great afterwards. It's a wonderful feeling to have empty drawers and closets. Now for another round of filling them up!

3. Learn a new language or brush up on one I already know. I learned Italian from the "Pimsleur" CDs and they're excellent. Brush up on that Spanish. You learned it in school. If you put these CDs in your car stereo every day and listen during the commute to work, by this time next year you'll be speaking it again.

4. Stretch more.

5. Try to integrate more low impact exercise into my program.

6. Avoid squats (Have you heard this from me before?)

7. Listen better.

8. Change out at least one toilet to a "comfort height" model. You'll thank me for this resolution.

9. Learn or do something new. Pick out a period in time to study. Start with an interesting video or historical fiction and let it guide you into new learning. Teach yourself a card game. Learn to cook a vegan dish...every day for a week. Become an expert in something...anything.

10. Write more. Get your name in the Library of Congress.

Have a wonderful 2008.

December 21, 2007

I can't believe I haven't written in my blog for 6 days. So much for habits. I'm also biting my nails. So much for trying to break habits. To be honest with you, most of the blogs I read are not kept up with on a daily basis so I don't feel too bad. But the thing is, if you get regular readers, I think they stay with you better if you write frequently so I'm going to keep trying to enter regularly. And that's all I can promise...is that I'll try.

Coming up with material is a problem. I'm not doing Heimlich maneuvers on pets every day and there's not always something interesting happening. And if there's something really interesting to write about, I start considering it for an essay rather than a blog entry so I end up saving it. That's selfish isn't it?

Today I want to talk about boilers. Yes, boilers. Not the boiler some men sport over their belts. Not a large pimple or a small abscess. I'm talking about the old boilers people used to have in their houses...like a heater. I mentioned a boiler in Endings. There was a story about a house that had an old scary boiler in the basement. About a week ago I spoke to a group of older women at a local country club. They were a delightful group and I had a lot of fun there. I have three readings I like to do at book signings and one of them includes the boiler story. One of the interesting things about readings and giving prepared talks is listening for the phrases which make people laugh. Every group is different and this group giggled when I mentioned the boiler, where other groups didn't. It wasn't a particularly funny entry. It just struck a chord with this group. They knew about scary basement boilers because they grew up with them. And once in my childhood we lived in a house that had a boiler. Believe me, it was scary. It was dark, and old. It was hidden in the back of our basement. It made noise. It was alive and because of it I would not go down in the basement without turning on every single light on the way down there. The previous owners must have felt the same way because it was walled off in its own little room so you didn't have to see it unless you had to do something to it. But it was there. Waiting. In the dark.

So what's my point? The point is that I'm probably the last generation to experience "the boiler." My children have never seen a boiler and would only know a boiler from a Stephen King movie. But they probably wouldn't write about a boiler because to them that wouldln't have come to mind as an item in an old house. Maybe a land line telephone would be something typifying an old house to them. But not a boiler.

So still, what's my point? That certain things that seem common and stimulate a common response in people of a generation, pass in and out of literature like falling leaves. And if we don't write about them, they're gone. Who will remember boilers and the fear they struck in those of us who had them? Just think of the many little every day things that are passing on without recognition as our octogenarians and nonagenarians leave this world. Who will remember what it was like to play jacks? Or ring-o-levio?

I encouraged every one of those ladies at the club to write. Write their stories. Even the most common story. Because when they're gone, the memories go with them. Keep a diary and each day remember something that happened to you when you were a kid. I don't want to forget the boilers or the way they made me feel. And I want my kids to know them too.