Time -- Lots of Time -- for Shoes

Walking through an airport, I spotted a zillion people on line. No, not at the security line, not at the gate. They were waiting for coffee. This is a phenomenon of our Third Thirds: people waiting on long lines for coffee concoctions. They didn’t used to do that. And it’s not just airports; it’s everywhere.

I don’t drink coffee, never even tasted it. My parents drank coffee and smoked cigarettes, so somehow those two behaviors got linked in my mind.

So while I don’t stand in long coffee lines, I do waste time. I waste lots of time. I waste time wondering what to do, I waste time procrastinating about doing it. I waste time all by myself, I waste time staring at things. In my oomph-less, sluggish state, I can waste away hours and hours, occasionally enjoying it, mostly beating my immobile, do-nothing self up about it.

But when I finally gather enough oomph to DO something, I don’t like anyone else wasting my time. And I CERTAINLY do not like the Internet wasting my time. For example….

I wear a Nike Air Pegasus running shoe. I have worn it my whole lifetime of running. (The running I have not been able to do because of the knee injury a year ago, but the shoes – like me – were still deteriorating.) I used to go into Sports Authority, pick out the Nike Air Pegasus size 7.5, buy two-for-one, and be set for a couple years. But then Sports Authority went out of business, and online shopping reared its ugly head.

But now that I’m running again – short distances, doctor! – and feeling my psyche lift, I needed new shoes. The first hurdle was with Nike because there are two Air Pegasuses for sale: 35 and 34. Uh, oh. You know what that means. That means Research and Reader Reviews. 35 is the newer version and it costs $120; 34 is last year’s, and it costs $80.

In our previous Thirds, didn’t we just walk into a store and ask for “sneakers”?

Now I have to research whether 35 is a significant improvement over 34. Why did they have to mess with my favorite Air Pegasus anyway?!? So I wander down the rabbit hole of 35s and 34s (just like the rabbit hole of Rummikub versions), and finally decide: go with cheaper.

The millennial daughter – who is not fazed by any of this – tells me to check out Zappos, which I do. I pick my color (Barely Grey/Deep Jungle/Light Pumice), I look at it frontwards and backwards and I listen to Nellie show me about the shoe on a video. Then I place my order. Uh, oh. They don’t have my size.

Next up is Dick’s Sporting Goods. He has a special deal today for $10 off, so I have to speed up my investigations. Dick has different colors than Zappos did, so after looking at all my choices, I pick white/purple. I fill out my billing address, my shipping address, I create an account, I am ready! But Dick says “Only one delivery method is available for this product: Expedited at $24.99.” Oh, I know what that’s about. That’s about living in Alaska. So much for my $10 saving. I ditch Dick.

Then it’s Foot Locker. They have even more different colors. And while “Store pickup not available at any Anchorage locations,” Ship to Home has an asterisk: “*Ships to the 48 contiguous United States.” So it’s clear Foot Locker doesn’t want my business AT ALL.

Two hours later, I’m back with Dick. But this time, Dick is shipping to my friend Sharon’s address in Seattle … for free! I’ll see Sharon in a month, and she’ll have my shoes waiting for me.

As you know, I’m just emerging from a long-enduring state of depression, so you might have thought this might put me over the edge. But despite all this wasting of my time, all this rerun of we-don’t-count-Alaska-as-the-U.S., all this confusion over colors and shoes and 35s or 34s and decisions, decisions, decisions; for a few hours, I had a respite. Instead of inexplicable sadness, I had a REASON. I had righteous frustration. I had FURY. I had faced the shoe lords, and I had taken a stand.

Now let’s see if I end up with shoes.

Bra Ladies

When I was a teenager, my mother used to take me to Dora Myers Corsetry to buy bras, and I HATED IT. Old ladies with glasses strung on beaded chains would poke and prod at me, and – did I mention I HATED IT? Why couldn’t we just go to Macy’s like all the other girls?

But now I’m in my Third Third … and I travel 4,000 miles to buy my bras at Mary Corsetieres on Long Island. I line up with all the other women who are outside on a cold New York day waiting for Mary to open up at 11 a.m. Yes, I’ve come the furthest, but there are women there from Manhattan, from Massachusetts, from Connecticut. We enter and sign in, and we are prepared to wait several hours. Unless you’re not and you’re new, and then you are horrified by the “terrible customer service,” but we Mary regulars know better.

Because once you’ve been fitted at Mary’s, you can’t go anywhere else.

The fitters at Mary’s – my sisters and I call them the “Bra Ladies” – can just look at you and say things like, “Now you’re a 36 F … in your left breast. So we’ll have to go up for that but adjust it for the right breast.” And this is what distinguishes them, this is why we return like salmon to our spawning grounds: they alter the bras right there, on their sewing machines!

They add a dart here, a line of stitching there. If those straps are uncomfortable, put in different ones. If you’re between sizes, let them take it in and make it a size just for you. The bottom line: you leave with a bra – or three or four because when will you be back? – that fits you and only you perfectly.

Now that I’m in my Third Third, I know the value of that.

I’m sending my Aunt Evelyn there because she needs to have front closure bras. I asked the fitter about that, and she said they can make ANY bra into a front closure for her. Women came with the dresses for their daughters’ weddings so they could get the bra first and have the dress fitted after, only with the right bra.

Unfortunately, I can’t remember the name of my Bra Lady because I was too scrambled remembering the names of my bras, Anita and Freya and Dominique. But as she ran up and downstairs searching out bras for me to try, I eavesdropped on the conversations in the other fitting rooms.

Have we made it all the way into our Third Thirds to be so utterly embarrassed by, ashamed of, and angry at our bodies? Every woman didn’t like her flab or her fat, her breasts or her butt. They didn’t like the sag or the slump, the blob or the bumps, the skin or the hair. Hearing that cacophony of disgust and self-loathing was enough to shut my mouth tight (although I’ve been known to say the same things).

One of my other New York adventures was an exhibit at The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology on “The Body: Fashion and Physique.” The exhibit focused on the lack of diversity in and the deception of fashion advertising. A video showed a live shoot with a live model … and then the photo manipulation afterwards – lengthening her thighs, narrowing her waist, lifting her breasts – that would be impossible for a real human’s anatomy to match.

Mary should show that video to all her customers. Through it all, the Bra Ladies were consoling but tough New York psychologists: “You’re 60; you want to not be 60?” “They’re called thighs. They hold you up.” “This is the size you are; you want to be happy in a bra or miserable in one?” And then they would provide a bra that held and supported and made someone look and feel great. And women left restored.

Who wouldn’t travel 4,000 miles for that? I even went home with a swimsuit.

But just in case, Mary’s has my whole bra history – with size, style, and altering notes – on file. If I’m desperate, I can order by mail.

The Hair Rebellion

My hair has declared its independence from my head.

My hairdresser says, “Our hair changes texture over time,” but she’s being nice. My hair is in its Third Third, and it’s become a behavior problem.

My expectations are not unreasonable: I don’t expect to have cheerleader hair. You know, the hair that falls magically into place after the high school cheerleaders twirl and tumble. My hair snarls if I turn my head quickly. I’m used to that. And yes, I know if you look at my self-portraits, it looks like I’ve always had a wild head of hair. The color is deliberate. That’s not the problem.

The problem is the direction my hair has taken. As in, it aims away from my head instead of lying down on it. It has become very, very straight, with no bend or curve to match my head. Bangs stick out like porcupine quills. I look like Raggedy Ann. (Comparisons to Bozo not appreciated.) Observe.

So my hairdresser recommended a leave-in hair conditioner to “nourish” my hair. As with all things food, there’s a line somewhere between nourishment and obesity. My well-nourished hair got lazy and listless. It no longer flew off in all directions; it just laid itself out on the couch and declined to move. It hung from my head, flat and apathetic, as if it had been trapped in a bike helmet for two thirds of my life (with no intention – ever – of getting on a bike). It is the helmet.

The option of mechanical aids came up. While I may not, in fact, be a technological dinosaur when it comes to computers, I am a resoundingly inept dinosaur when it comes to … curling irons. I hold the hair up, look in the mirror, and proceed to burn the daylights out of my hands. My brain might correct for the reverse mirror image, but my motor skills don’t get the message. Too many welts and not enough motivation, and I abandoned the curling iron.

Which leaves my hair styling equipment of choice: electric rollers! Yes, me and Barbie. You put them in, wait a bit, and pull them out. Drab, flat, fly-away hair is transformed into bouncy, peppy, springy curls! Just seconds and you’re a Sandra Dee/Gidget/Donna Reed facsimile.

Since the flip went out somewhere in our First Third and even looking in the mirror you know the word is “dated,” you have to do something. You shake and shake your head till it’s a jumble of … hair.

I call this the “rumpled but smoldering” look. I actively sought this look in my 20s. I aspired to look as if I’d just jumped out of bed after sex.

Other people might just have called it “bed head.”

Moving muscles: A to Zumba

Way back in October, I publicly announced my plan to try out all sorts of exercise alternatives. I was going to embarrass myself into fitness.

It didn’t work. I had two days of skiing in November, and then I just vegged until I started ice skating. But ice skating the way I do it is outside-in-the-air more than it’s exercise.

Then I signed up and committed to hiking the Chilkoot Trail this summer with a group of women. Not only does that mean 33 miles, Golden Stairs, and a 3000-foot elevation gain, but also a pack on my back. Mostly, my camping involves kayaking or rafting and the boat carries the load. Carrying a pack uphill? This would require Training.

And this scared me into my first Zumba class, last week’s New Thing. The good thing about Zumba is there’s no partner so your errors mean you’re not bumping into and stepping on someone. The bad things about Zumba are that there are choreographed steps and it’s heavy on rights and lefts. If motor coordination is not your thing, then it’s pretty obvious when you’re headed right doing something no one else is doing as they head left. The great thing about Zumba is nobody cares.

The other thing about Zumba is fashion. Yet again, I seem to have missed the world’s fashion instructions. Everyone is wearing stretchy, black, yoga pants. I am wearing my blue running shorts.

So on Monday, Tim and I Zumba-ed around. Then I did some heavy-duty leg lifts and tricep things on the machines. Distance running keeps my legs strong, but while I’m at it, I’d like some Michelle Obama upper arm definition, too. Visions of sleeveless tank tops danced in my head.

Then I came home and couldn’t walk easily for two days. I couldn’t lift my arms to brush my hair.

Uh, oh, this is when you realize you’re not 25 anymore, there are more than 650 muscles in the human body, and a whole batch of them have not been taxed for a very long time. You’re lucky you have six months to get in shape. So on Wednesday, we were back at Zumba again. Except the people looked different, and there were more men there. And the instructor was a guy … who said this was “Insanity.”

Oh, no, not Insanity! I’d seen that through the doors of the athletic club once. Those people were nuts. They didn’t just jump; they leaped two feet into the air. “Don’t worry,” the instructor said, “I’ll modify.” Ha, ha, ha! He didn’t have a speck of fat on his body. He was an anatomical model of pure muscle. If he tried to swim, he’d sink. His “modify” is a whole other vocabulary word from my “modify.”

I actually lasted a half-hour before bailing. Later on, I couldn’t lower myself to a toilet seat without crash landing on it.

A couple days later, I found Zumba again. This time, it felt more like dancing, and I remembered some of the steps. If I just listened to the music, my legs sometimes went where they were supposed to. Nothing is sore in my body any more. I’m trying to map out a calendar of how strong I have to be by when. When do I have to strap on my backpack with weights and do stairs?

Back in the ’80s, I was a big Jazzercise fan, and I still can’t hear Beat It or Jump or Girls Just Wanna Have Fun without moving into aerobics mode. They got imprinted in my head as aerobics songs, and they instantly trigger bouncing. I had a punch card and there were Jazzercise outlets all over town – in churches, schools – and one two doors from my house in San Francisco. I remember when the dancing stopped and we did the abdominals. We’d screech and shriek lying on mats on the floor. Zumba doesn’t have mats on the floor. Hmmm, maybe I’ll have to try Pilates again, too.

Even back then, I missed the world’s fashion instructions. Everyone was wearing leotard-type outfits. I wore my purple running shorts. Why do people wear nice clothes to sweat in?

I hope this isn’t just a burst of fitness that dies. I don’t think so. When you have to make a change, you need inspiration, and sometimes the best inspiration is fear: as in, I’ve got 33 uphill miles ahead of me, and I’d better be ready.

The last vestige of teenage angst

This is how I know I’m in my Third Third: I wore my glasses out in public.

I didn’t explain it. I just showed up. No groveling about putting drops in my eyes and not being able to wear my contact lenses. No qualms beforehand about how I looked. No nervous skulking in the shadows hoping I wouldn’t be seen.

This is a far cry from the teenage Barbara who actually coined the term “Be Ugly Days” for the days when she didn’t put in her contacts and stayed in glasses all day. Granted, eyeglasses back then were a little weird. Funny little pointed things. I can’t remember if I still wore the ones with the silver speckles in the frame, the ones that earned the “Four Eyes” title. The day I got my contact lenses I was set free!

This is also a far cry from the Barbara who brought a DOME HAIR DRYER to college so she could sit under it with giant rollers and tame the frizz. And who wouldn’t answer any knocks to her freshman door until she was properly smoothened and out from under. Whose boyfriend never saw her without what he called her “finely lined” eyes. And he meant eyeliner, not crow’s feet.

There are two sides to this “not caring what you look like” issue. On the one hand, there’s the self-confidence and maturity that mean you’re not stressing and worrying over appearance. On the other, there’s the downhill-slide schtunk problem (which I’ve already clarified here) and my promise to stop wearing slogan T-shirts in public.

Actually, it’s not really a two-sides issue; it’s a continuum. At the far end – things I swear I will never do – is – oh, wait! I have worn sweat pants in public, but I was just on my way to the athletic club. And yes, I have gone out with dirty hair, but that was just for a run and I was going to shower afterwards. And I did spend the entire time in New Orleans in a bright blue “Anchorage Beautiful” slogan sweatshirt, but that was because it was unseasonably cold and I didn’t have any other layer. (Or rather, the other layer – a stylish gray jacket – well, that was too dressed up for just sightseeing, right? And this was a sweatshirt, not a T-shirt, so technically it wasn’t covered by my pronouncement.)

Maybe I need to be more specific: Today, I intentionally went out in public – expecting to be seen, interact, and socialize – with my glasses on. I wasn’t just slipping out on an errand hoping not to run into anyone on my route. I’ve done that before and it doesn’t count because I’d still feel compelled to explain if I did run into someone I knew. I’d still start fumbling around about drops in my eyes.

These drops in my eyes – it’s for five days. I had a little twinge about a social event on Saturday night, but that was about my vision, not about wearing glasses. I am in my Third Third; I don’t have to feel self-conscious about how I present myself in public!

But why is it I can imagine my daughter looking at me, her eyes sliding down my clothes, hair, giant pink sunglasses, and green-purple-pink felt hat, thinking, “You’ve been self-conscious about your appearance???”

Yes, I was a teenager. Now, in my Third Third, I’m not.

Technicolor hair

My hair color doesn’t occur naturally. On the planet.

It takes planning. And intent.

And right now, it takes the Internet. I am peeved. For about the fourth time in my hair color history, manufacturers have changed their colors and mine has disappeared. But this time, I moved fast: I immediately ordered a 6-month supply. Technically, Clairol is just changing its number, but practically, that number is hard to find. So far, I’ve only been able to order it from Target online because for some reason, Amazon won’t ship hair color.

There’s a lot here I don’t understand. I used to have such passionate colors. Things like Ravishing Rio Red. Now the wildest I get is Bright Cherry, and that’s translated from Cereza Intenso because my favorite color is only available in South America. Clairol? I was Spiced Tea, but after renaming, I’m just plain old Light Auburn. Now tell me, if you were me, would you buy a color named Light Auburn?

It all started with a play I was in. My character was fierce and formidable, and the director wanted the lights to make my hair glow fiercely and formidably. Off he trotted me to a hairdresser, and I’ve been there ever since. I alternate months with doing it myself at home (hence the need for Clairol).

Each time I went back to the hairdresser, I asked her to notch it up. At one point, after seeing an ad somewhere, I went to a different, “trendier” shop and asked to have my hair done like fire, brighter on the tips. As I sat in the chair, sniffing, I asked the hairdresser, “Is there a swimming pool nearby?” That should have been the clue that I’d been bleached.

And boy, was that some color! Afterwards, I walked into Fred Meyer, and the other shoppers parted, mouths agape. Anchorage hadn’t seen color like that! For a while, during that period, I had to buy my hair color in San Francisco and bring it home.

One regular colorist got the idea. After finishing my hair, she said it wasn’t radical enough. She wanted me to come back the next day to “fix” it. My present colorist laughs over her co-worker who thought my hair was a mistake: “Are you letting her go home like that?”

When I was the Storytime Lady in the Botanical Garden, the kids LOVED my hair. They would touch it and murmur, “Pretty.” Later on, the Covenant House kids loved my hair. They would talk with me.

Then my kid said, “Don’t you think you could tone it down a little?” We were out walking somewhere, and three different people passed and called out, “Love your hair.” I said, “My hair makes people happy.” She said, “I’m just saying tone it down.”

Even in my Third Third, even knowing better, I caved. I asked my hairdresser to adjust the recipe … and the compliments stopped, even in bright sunlight. My hair wasn’t cheering anyone up, including me. No one recognized me in dark movie theaters. No one called out on the bike trails. No little kids’ eyes lit up on spotting me. So I notched it back up.

My friend Rieva has long hair. Our younger, imperious selves were having a conversation about obtuse old women wearing their skirts above the knee. (me: “Mom, I don’t care what the fashion is; you’re 75!”) Rieva was worried about passing the point where long hair was acceptable. I didn’t worry about my color because at the time, I just considered it “auburn gone wrong,” not some potentially unacceptable mutation. Now it’s 15 years later, and Rieva’s hair is still long and mine is still its mutation. And we’re both happy.

I don’t believe this: I just this second made a connection between my criticizing my mother and my daughter criticizing me! How could I have missed that?!?

My friend Diane is vacationing in Costa Rica. Of course I texted her to ask, “If you find Cereza Intenso, can you bring a lot of it back?” It goes with all the purple I wear.

The Adult Daughter: A Total Treat

A few weeks ago, Tim and I got a phone call from Sophie: “I haven’t been back to Alaska in a while. I’d like to book a flight for a visit.”

Delirium! Not only was she initiating a visit – INITIATING a visit – but she was booking it herself. She’s arriving today!

And recently, we’ve been getting phone calls. Phone calls! Sophie has been at her job one year now. She loves it, but she’s discovering the world of work. And she solicits my advice!

Ironically, one of her calls came just as we were hosting a freshman send-off for kids going to college. Later, I found this on my computer – the story of Sophie’s departure – and it still triggers tears.

Much of what she tells us is like a message from another world. (She does, after all, work for a company with an onsite chef preparing their meals; she did work recently in their London and Berlin offices.) This is not the employment world Tim and I know.

And she wanted our advice!

My father used to say the only thing he wanted from his children was naches. That’s Yiddish for “pride.” I hated naches. I felt like it made demands on us to achieve, to produce. Whenever he was proud of me and talked about naches, I’d blow up. I vowed I would never expect naches. Let Sophie be whatever she wanted to be, however she wanted to be it.

But to be wanted for advice! Ooh, that feels good.

And this advice giving is a two-way street. Right off the bat, Sophie told me that if I bought underpants cut lower than my jeans, they wouldn’t stick out the top.

Love moments in our Third Third. Maybe we did something right.

Wearing Purple

“When I am an old woman I shall wear purple

With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.”

This is what happens when you take the Jenny Joseph poem too literally, which I have done for most of my life, previous thirds included:

In Yiddish, this is called a schtunk. It is my normal attire. It consists of a slogan T-shirt and an odd pair of Bermuda shorts that are made of some fabric that stretches out a lot. At least now I wear a belt. I used to put my hands in the pockets and the pants would slide down. I roll up the legs under the illusion that makes them seem more fashionable, and this whole get-up is what I wear when I need to be more “formal” than regular shorts. My daughter tells me I can’t wear socks-that-show with shorts, but sometimes I disregard that fashion advice.

When I was in college and wore only overalls for a long period, I used to think I was a pleasant surprise for a boyfriend: schtunk transforms into beautiful naked woman.

And recently I looked at myself and thought,

Who am I kidding?

Even the slogan T-shirts have gotten boring: 50% of them are Mayor’s Midnight Sun Half-Marathon T-shirts. I have drawers full of T-shirts. Some of them are actually the right size with an appealing cut, but I wear them even when they’re too big or shapeless. After all, how many can I relegate to the sleeping shirt drawer? I once described them in archaeological layers based on the era of acquisition.

So I marched myself off to J.C. Penney (armed with my $10 off for a purchase of $10 or more coupon – free money!). Miraculously, I actually found, tried on, and bought three shirts. Practically a Ralph Lauren makeover! Now I am vowing not to appear in public in a slogan T-shirt again (except if I’m camping, orienteering, being athletic, or doing messy, dirty work). I am going into my Third Third … attractive!

I am going right to those drawers and toss the ugly shapeless ones. Will I really need 15 of them in case I’m painting? Would I really paint for 15 days without doing laundry?

Choke.

Watch this space to see if I actually do it. (I mean, why do I need to dress up to take garden pots in for recycling?)