How do I know you're you?

I was watching an old YouTube clip of musicians doing an impromptu street concert in New York City.

Then, at :46, I spotted my father in the crowd!

My father died in 1980. I haven’t “seen” him for 41 years, but this man had his build, his eyes, nose, white hair. He was even wearing clothes my father would have worn, clothes my mother would have picked out for him; he was in a leisure suit. (So it would have been before the time I asked why he was dressed like a pimp, and he glared at my mother and never wore it again.)

But it really wasn’t my father. (I’m pretty sure.) For one thing, my mother wasn’t next to him in the crowd. There is no way my father would have been in that situation – an impromptu street concert! – or remained in that situation – without my mother, and she wasn’t there. (I’m pretty sure.)

So there’s this duplicate Dad, and I know it’s not him. (I’m pretty sure.) So it leaves me wondering: what is it that makes someone someone? What is it that would make me sure that man in the movie was my father?

When I was pregnant, I read that mothers could find and identify their babies by their smell. After Sophie was born, I spent a lot of time sniffing her, memorizing her. My postpartum existential worries included whether or not I could pick her out of a crowd of babies.

I’ve read about animals and birds that throw an intruder baby out of their nest, that they can tell if it’s not one of theirs. Yet, in reading The Lost Family by Libby Copeland, a wonderful book about DNA tests, there was one terrifying photo of a cartful of babies in a Manhattan maternity hospital. The babies were collected from the mothers – without little name bracelets! – and then redistributed after baths. Apparently, a big, switched-at-birth mix-up occurred. Aiiieeee!

Well, now, I would know my daughter anywhere. When she was in a play in costume and whirled around the stage, I’d just hunt for the blond ponytail … and end up tracking Seline, who also had a blond ponytail. Seline’s parents had the same problem. And recently, in a photo she shared of her friends all dressed up at a wedding, I asked, “Who’s the one in the middle?” and it was my own daughter.

So what makes us us? How do we recognize each other?

When I would visit my parents after a long time away, I would search the airport as I disembarked with a certain bit of panic pumping my heart: would I know them? Sometimes they’d look different, they’d aged, and I’d hunt for their “them-ness.”

Okay, this may be complicated by my own prosopagnosia, facial blindness. My brain has trouble processing faces into memory unless I can link it with posture, gait, expression, hair style, voice, etc. Unfortunately, my worst case involved a boss: I would show up every Monday after a weekend off and introduce myself to the “stranger” in the office. Sometimes I just stay home because it’s too stressful to run into people I’m supposed to recognize.

One benefit of Covid and mask-wearing is that finally, I can ask people who they are without risking social gaffes. I used to cover my cluelessness by blaming it on sunglasses, bike helmets, hair styles, poor lighting, or anything else I could claim…. Now I just blame it on the mask.

In the midst of my mother’s dementia, she’d often fake it, offer exuberant hellos to friends when she had no idea who they were. So that’s a memory thing; she couldn’t remember them. But I remember my father, and in photos from my childhood, I know that’s him. Is it because I was there, I know the situation, the environment, or is there something I see?

And would I be able to see it and recognize it 41 years later if he showed up in a video on YouTube?

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow?

My hair is in its Third Third. Not just the color, and not just the texture.

It started with sparse bangs on the right side of my head. At first, I thought it was just unruliness, another hair rebellion. My hairdresser thought it was because I slept on my right side, but now it’s yet another sign of Third Third-itis: my head is downsizing my hair.

After my daughter was born, I had little baby hairs sprouting all over my head. They were the signs of recovery from pregnancy hair loss, and I was like a little, furry tennis ball of new hair. Yeah, well, that’s not happening now.

My bangs are getting wispier. (Why mostly on the right side??) I have no idea what’s happening in the back or top of my head. My doctor says it’s only visible to people taller than I. Which I guess is a growing number as I shrink, too.

So first I noticed the bangs problem – which could have been debatable –  but the hair in the shower drain catcher is unequivocal. Instead of cleaning it up with a tissue, I have to use a paper towel. It’s a wad of red.

And then there’s the hairbrush.

My hairdresser suggested Costco’s 5 Percent Extra Strength Hair Regrowth for Men. For men! So I had to think about this: how far was I willing to go to defy age and Nature?

Yes, I dye my hair. But that didn’t begin as a means to cover gray or age; it began as a theatrical requirement for a particular role. It morphed into an identity signature long before age had anything to do with it. So I’ll keep the color. In fact, I’ve noticed that white roots make hair loss appear worse, so now I have to be even more prompt about coloring my hair. [And if anyone is going to Costa Rica, please let me know and I’ll place an order for my hair dye with you.]

But I’m stopping short of putting Extra Strength chemicals on my head. I’ve decided: I’m prepared to lose my hair. I wonder what I’ll end up looking like?

Sometimes, when my hair is looking particularly bizarre, I’ve said I look like Bozo the Clown. But I just checked images of Bozo, and he was bald on top! He had no bangs! And he was actually pretty scary looking.

On the good and very lucky side, I am not losing my hair because I’m undergoing cancer treatments. I am truly grateful.

And then I remembered the Velveteen Rabbit:

By the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.

My hair has been loved off! I’m becoming Real!

What's your 'resting face'?

My writing pipeline got clogged.

I’d written a piece for Valentine’s Day, and I balked at posting it. I was saying nice things about Tim, about Third Third revelations and appreciation of marriage; and it just seemed so … smug. Even though I admitted to “explosions, terrible ‘discussions,’ voiced regrets, shouted furies, quiet hopelessness,” it just seemed so … self-congratulatory. Like, hooray, we’ve made it!

But then I felt bad about putting aside a post that was so nice to my husband (since “nice” is not an adjective I really own); so I just … ran aground. That stalled post was blocking all alternative and future posts.

Combine that with winning a free two-month trial of Team Training at my athletic club and my discovering how utterly exhausting fitness can be. Basically, I ran around the room zipping through exercises that involved things like kettle balls and medicine balls and sliders for my feet. And big long ropes and elastic stretchy things and hanging from the ceiling. Not to mention jumping up and down and squatting for interminable periods of time. After all that, swimming a mile seemed like a rest day.

I was comatose by 7, asleep by 9.

We’d been on vacation and saw relatives, alligators, and manatees. In Epcot Center, in record-breaking rain, Sophie and I were on Spaceship Earth and somewhere along the line, they took photos of us. Afterwards, cartoon characters showed up in a video with our faces. Sophie’s face was pleasant and smiling. Mine was scowling.

“How’d you do that? Did you know when they were taking our photo? How come mine is so grumpy?”

“I just have a better resting face.”

“Resting face? Who ever heard of a resting face? Do people have resting faces?!?”

Well, I guess they do. And what I thought illustrated curiosity on my face actually looks like confusion if you’re generous and pissed-off if you’re accurate.

So then I had to practice a better resting face. Which is impossible while hauling kettle balls and medicine balls and pushing up. Or just sitting around fretting about that bit-of-love blocking my blog.

Someday, I’ll tell you about the valentines my husband has hidden around the house for me for thirty years, but right now, I’m just going to borrow a little quote from one of my favorite authors, David Grossman. In Someone to Run With, he describes the rotten underworld of the city, but then the wise woman of the novel, Leah, says this:

“You need a man with a big hand,” Leah pronounced. “You know why?” 


“Why?” She knew she would now be painted a picture. 


“Someone who will stand with his hand up, open, strong, steady – like the Statue of Liberty, but without that ice-cream cone she’s holding – only his hand, open, in the air. And then” – Leah raised her square, rough, nail-bitten hand and moved it gently from side to side, like a flying bird – “even from far away, from any place in the world, you’d see that hand and know you had a place to land and rest.”

That is my husband’s hand. And when I think on it, my resting face smiles.

New Thing: Internal Injuries

It’s interesting how far I’ll go in my Third Third to feel fresh, to have new input, to find a New Thing. This time, it meant internal injury.

Not for real! It was the airport’s “2018 Full-scale Disaster Exercise,” and I was so excited when Debora invited me to do it with her. (Debora and I have a history of great adventures with a twist of calamity, so of course we’d do a disaster together.)

The scenario at the airport: two planes had collided and there were injuries. We waited in line to receive ours. Debora got a broken wrist (from bracing herself against the seat in front of her), and I got internal injuries after being flung forward against the lap belt.

Next, it was on to moulage (a new word for me, a whole other New Thing!): special effects make-up. These were the instructions: “Bruising is mottled discoloration using reds, burgundy and some purple.” Having a ring of purple painted around your middle calls attention to the roll of flab that lurks there, sort of a blueberry-raspberry muffin top.

Then we sat around.

Each of us were given a piece of broken luggage to carry. (Debora’s still had the flight tag attached; why hadn’t they returned it?!?) When we were taken out to the tarmac, we saw emergency vehicles and two halves of planes. We boarded ours and took our seats.

Aiiee! My seatmate was dead! He wasn’t even human anymore. He’d turned into something that looked like a guitar case with boots on (both attached and unattached to legs).

Then we sat around. Fire fighters were busy putting out a fire in a giant tin can.

All the other volunteers were very entertaining. One guy played the safety talk on his cell phone for all of us. A “dead” woman did a lot of heavy leaning on her poor seatmate. Someone hoped there were no snakes on the plane. Nope, only the comfort snake.

Then we sat around.

One woman was supposed to die if she didn’t get attention. Her moulage was pretty harrowing, but she was a nursing student so she was trying to time her death. As we waited and waited and waited, we decided we must be the budget airline; they must be working on the other half-plane.

Eventually, fire fighters came on board with colored tape. When assessed, I was supposed to breathe fast and shallow, about 30/minute. I was supposed to say my radial pulse was weak and my “capillary refill is delayed at > 4 seconds.” I learned that if you press on your fingernail, for instance, and the color doesn’t come back when you stop, that means the blood is going somewhere else. Like, internally.

So my guy wrapped a red tag on me. That means I was triaged as “immediate (Red)” Debora’s broken wrist got her a green, and she and the other greens walked off the plane.

Then the rest of us – the Reds – sat around.

And sat.

By now, the humor was getting blacker as more red tags turned black. A woman who was supposed to have been locked in the cockpit ran out screaming. My symptoms (feeling bloated, tired, weak, cold, shaky, a bit confused, dizzy, and nauseous) gave me lots of fodder for humor … which – as the day wore on – was ultimately unappreciated by the other injured parties.

Then we sat around.

Eventually, the fire fighters returned with backboards to get the dummies off the plane. They spent a lot of time on the dummies.

Then we sat around.

Until they finally took us off and left us on the tarmac.

Debora had done this years before and said she’d been transported to the real hospital. My instructions said I was to be sent to “a treatment area for oxygen, IV fluids, and transport to the hospital.” When examined, I was supposed to “stick your belly out (distend) and keep it firm during any palpation. If pressed on your abdomen, hurts worse all over.”

I was really looking forward to my great dramatic role! All I’d done so far was breathe fast and shallow.

But alas, not to be. A bus driver took us away for a barbecue. Then we left.

So what happened? No one told us. My guess is that the EMT types didn’t show up.

Event anticipation: high as a kite
Event participation: a dud
Bottom line: I learned about moulage, got a terrific bruise drawn on my belly, had fun with a friend and made two more. I’m just going to avoid colliding with another plane over Anchorage.

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.”

Musical Memory

If you’re in your Third Third, Carole King’s Tapestry album was the soundtrack to your emotional life. Released in 1971, each song tracked with the phases of our lives. Maybe you’d met someone new and weren’t sure where the relationship was going, and then Carole King sang “Will You Love Me Tomorrow?” so you learned the words and sang along.

Stop right now! Sing it! You know the words:

Tonight you’re mine, completely
You give your love so sweetly

Tonight the light of love is in your eyes

But will you love me tomorrow?

Confirmed in new love and positive no one else had ever felt like that before? Did you feel the earth move? Was that when you felt like “A Natural Woman”?

Yes, you know that one! Belt it out. Even just the chorus counts.

But then you had to head home for the summer from college and the love of your life was “So Far Away.” Heartbreak and the end of a relationship because “It’s Too Late”? And then, as we all consoled each other, it was “You’ve Got a Friend.”

Do you know the words? Do you picture where you were, how your heart was throbbing or breaking? Join the club.

I’ve just seen Carole King in a live concert in Hyde Park, London. Or rather, I saw it at the movies, but I was there. 65,000 other people (plus the ones in the theater) and me. As the cameras panned the audience, their lips were moving. They knew all the words, too (and many of them weren’t even born yet in 1971).

No, I take that back: I wasn’t there. I was back in 1971 with a first boyfriend, in 1972, in ’73, in ’74 with long-distance separations, break-ups (several), good friends (several), and new loves (a few). Listening to that concert touched all those old, sensitive places. All those places where Feelings were just so big and new and raw, and then later on, when the Feelings were familiar and recognizable and still big.

And on the stage was Carole King. She was beautiful and energetic and … radiant! Behind her, the very young Carole King was projected on a screen, and that Carole was so very, very young, with smooth, smooth skin. The camera pulled in for close-ups of Carole on stage, and she had wrinkles and a sagging chin and deep lines. Her hair was unruly, her stomach and sides came with flab and bulges, and her upper arms had a life of their own. She was so BEAUTIFUL! She said, “This is what 74 looks like.”

It was an epiphany moment for me: she was beautiful! I abandoned the painting I made; I can’t do justice to her. She shone and glowed and radiated brightness. I was so enthralled, I turned to my friend Robin and said, “Look at her. All you see is her life force. She has lines and aging, but all you see is her life force.”

And Robin said, “Don’t you know that’s what people see of you, too?”

Is that true? Yes, it’s what I see in everyone else. But here we are, looking at ourselves up real close in the mirror, noticing every new hair or spot or line; and no one else sees that! What a miracle!

I thought then that our life force is what makes us beautiful, and I felt … hopeful. Suddenly I could see a life past bad knees, sagging eyelids, flabby upper arms. I could see that I just had to hold on to my life force. Oh, that’s right; she told us that, too: “You’re beautiful as you feel.”

Carole’s daughter, Louise, came out and they sang “Where You Lead” together. Carole just beamed at her. I thought, No one gets to have an adult daughter and still look 25. She looks like a mother, and she loves being that mother, that singer, that 74-year-old.

I’d love to hear the song she writes about that.

Facing our Third Third

Every now and then, one of my adventures could more accurately be called a misadventure. Vanity was the root cause, but de-cluttering and age-defiance made this one a perfect Third Third storm.

A little background: A couple years ago, I participated in an online research study by graduate students at my alma mater. I can’t remember what it was meant to investigate, but I had to submit a photo, and they would “age” it and return it to me. The first photo was rejected; I was smiling too much. Maybe if you’re happy you can’t be “aged”?

The second photo came back and totally freaked me out. I looked OLD, really OLD. I looked grayish – and not just my hair – and there were lines all over my face. Ever since then, I’ve watched the mirror vigilantly, assessing whether I’m turning into the photo.

About a month ago, during the great yarn bombing/knitting vandalism episode, I was interviewed for a news video. Despite being very happy in the video, all I could see was that my face was turning into that grayish, lined face in that old-looking photograph. It haunted me.

When they had me back for a second interview, I actually put on eye makeup. I talked to friends about trying to look better … groomed. But it’s hard because I have finicky skin that doesn’t like most things, and because … well, make-up just doesn’t seem to show up on my list of to-do’s.

Around about this time, I was de-cluttering and came across some very, very old gift bags from Estée Lauder, the kind you get as a prize when you buy cosmetics. As I poked through the bags, I found a never-opened tube of some sort of gentle, luxurious face cleanser.

Tell me, what would you do? Your face has developed lines and you suddenly rediscover a “gentle, luxurious face cleanser”? The only cleanser my face knows is water. Maybe it was time to add some luxury, to make an effort. It felt soft. Luxurious.

Until the red bumps appeared. Bumps that didn’t go away. Bumps that eventually got crusty. On my face.

I pulled out all my ideas of a cure: alcohol, lotions, soaps. A face that knew only water, moisturizers, and sunscreen was now a test site for anything I could drag out of the bathroom cabinets. (Smart people are saying, “What on earth were you thinking?!?”) Hey, I stopped before I tried mouthwash on the bumps.

The dermatologist sighed when he looked at my face. Near as I can understand, I’ve disrupted the flora and fauna of my face, and it is going to be very hard to get it back to normal. Like months and months of hard. I have to put tiny amounts of steroid on it, see if it works, stop, re-start, see if it works.

I’m spending a lot of time looking in the mirror.

I don’t recommend it.

What I’ve learned:

• Third Third lines may be preferable to First Third-looking bumps.


• Sometimes clutter shouldn’t be repurposed, recycled, or transformed into treasure. Sometimes clutter just belongs in the garbage.

No Longer 30

Yet again, my friend Marj has given me the meat of a new blog post. This is what Marj sent me:

“I am so glad you are writing about the third third of our lives. It has changed the way I always thought. For years I had thought the thing to do is to pick an age, like 38, and then for the rest of your life make sure NOTHING changes. Stay the same weight, keep your hair the same color, keep wearing mascara when you leave the house, keep your same clothes style, keep doing the same activities – just DO NOT start looking and acting older. If you get health problems, fix them! Fast! DO NOT let any infirmities settle in!

“But as I have gotten older, it became increasingly hard to hold at 38. I was starting to feel like a failure. If only I had tried harder. When did I start to lose it? What can I do about it now?

“Then I started reading what you write about the third third. And I realized life really does have thirds. The third third just can’t be the same as the first. And that crazy second third! Who needed all that? I was aware of the concept of there being a season for everything. But I thought that did not apply to me personally. But now I have accepted that there are irrevocable thirds. And I’m in my third one. I’m no longer 38. Haven’t been for decades. And now I realize, I have not failed. I have simply progressed through life. As one does. If one is fortunate.”

It’s funny that one of the things I remember Marj telling me – years and years ago – was that my daughter thought of herself as a “work in progress.” That seemed so positive, such a healthy way of looking at the world. And yet here was Marj, thinking that we make healthy progress to a point … and then it’s downhill.

How many of us have thought – or still think – that way? What age did you pick?

I used to think I was 33. I don’t know why I picked 33. I was single, in charge of my life, a Big Boss in my organization, open to adventure, free of commitments. Long after, whenever I met people, I thought they saw me as a 33-year-old. If they were in their 30s, we were the same age (in my mind). We were all peers. I was 33 for a long time.

I stopped being 33 for two reasons. One was the crushing realization as I looked in the mirror one day that I looked old. Older than 33. The other was more positive: I was coaching, advising, and instructing 30-year-olds … and I had a lot more life experience than they did.

And I guess that’s the two sides of this whole progression through our Third Thirds: we win some and we lose some. I will never fool anyone into thinking I’m 33. Even cashiers in grocery stores offer me the senior discount unsolicited.

But I have life experience. I’ve been there, done that, and know how to make a phone call and get a reluctant company to remedy my problem. I know how to make a quilt, run a half-marathon, create a website – all things I learned after I was 33. I got to experience marriage and parenting … after I was 33.

After age 60, I got to experience Machu Picchu, re-discovery of art in my life, even the Chilkoot Trail. Less-than-60 Barbara hadn’t gotten to them yet, but less-than-60 Barbara had time constraints, obligations, resource limitations.

I’ve always known I never wanted to be 16 ever again. It’s interesting to realize that I no longer want to be 33 either.

When the Fraud Bomb detonates

You might be cruising along, practically content, feeling like all might be right with the world. Just that morning, you read your picture book to a school full of little kids and they were happy and you were happy. And then a glitch hits and you face the crashing realization:

You are a fake. Not only is your output just not good, but you’re even lazy about producing it. You come up with ideas … and then they sit. Or you come up with ideas … and your execution is pathetic. What you call creativity is really an excuse for not making a living, and your volunteering is insufficient at best. Plus, you’re not very likeable. You are taking up space in the universe.

The Fraud Bomb hits with the power of nuclear Armageddon. Nothing can stand in its wake. And once it hits, it sends aftershocks. Even when you go to the bathroom, you look around and mutter, “Shit, I can’t even keep a bathroom clean.” You look in the mirror and note that the puffiness under your eyes now has dark bags in it, too. How can a puff hold a bag?

Oh, maybe you’ll reflect on a recent social occasion and decide that you’d been socially inappropriate again. Or worse, you reflect that maybe you’re not getting invited to social occasions because you’ve been socially inappropriate. There is no insecurity too insignificant to fuel a Fraud Bomb once ignited.

No, I’m not holding a pity party. I’m conducting an analysis of speed. Like how FAST the Fraud Bomb can move through one’s psyche. Wasn’t it just a few days ago I was blogging about a life of no regrets? And then bammo: last night, I realized Fraud Bombs can trigger Fear Bombs, too. Fear Bombs are thoughts like: “The man spotted in the neighborhood checking doors; what if he home invasions us?” “What if [loved one’s] health issue worsens?” “What if I have a car accident on the ice?” Aiiieee!

Where does a Fraud Bomb start? Sometimes it’s with a bit of rejection. Like a “we’re sorry, but” for a submission. Or a can’t-measure-up comparison;  a failure of willpower. Or else it’s just looking at your own list of projects and realizing that you’re getting nowhere fast.

No, I don’t think it has anything to do with the darkest day of the year and 5 measly hours and 27 minutes of grayish daylight. Fraud Bombs happen other days, too. Other days that are longer than 5 hours and 27 minutes of dusk, but who’s counting?

So what do you do with a Fraud Bomb? You put one fraudulent foot in front of the other.

You go to a potluck. One of the other volunteer teachers laughs about how rattled she can get sometimes. Another says she panics about misspelling words on the white board. You feel some camaraderie, begin to think maybe you're just like other people (except that they’re telling lighthearted stories and you’re a walking tragedy).

So you stop by on an old errand … which turns out to have passed its expiration date (Bad Barbara). Nevertheless, you remember to thank someone for a kindness and make a donation (Barely Good Enough Barbara).

You say to yourself, “Just finish one thing right now,” but you get distracted because your room is so full of started things and weren’t you once masterful at de-cluttering? At least you know to stay away from Facebook with its terribly distressing news and its terribly happy news that you’re not quite in the mood for receiving. Maybe you should just clean the bathroom.

Stop! You are in your Third Third. Surely you have learned to handle Fraud Bombs by now! Well, all you have learned is that they pass. Eventually. You do something right, and slowly it ricochets through your system and masks the fraud messages and you can get on with things. Brené Brown says sharing vulnerability is a positive thing if people can relate but a negative if it’s just a dump.

Do you have Fraud Bombs? Can you relate? Or did I just dump?

Mammograms, gravity, and The Breast

I am really, really lucky to have my boobs. Not because they require very expensive bras, not because they make it difficult to buy clothes that don’t separate tops from bottoms, and certainly not because they must add ten pounds to my body weight.

I am really, really lucky because I still have them. I have made it to my Third Third with boobs intact.

So I never miss a mammogram. Except that I have switched to biennial ones after the Great Mammogram Controversy over annual or biennial, false positives vs early findings, anxiety vs reassurance. If the experts can’t agree, I took the minimalist option.

Today was the day.

Little-boobed women tell me of the pain of stretching themselves over the table, grabbing skin from their sides to put more skin in the game. Not my problem. I just fling my cantaloupes onto the table and wait for the squish.

When I was growing up on Long Island, my mother took her big-boobed daughters to Dora Meyers Corsetry to buy our bras. I HATED Dora Meyers: all those fitting ladies touching us to make sure the bras fit. What self-respecting First Thirder would go to a “corsetry” anyway? Thank heavens Dora Meyers went out of business.

But my mother found a replacement, and nearly every trip I make to New York includes a stop at the “Bra Ladies.” Mary Corsetieres is a phenomenon: women make appointments and wait on line. Bras are personally altered at the bank of sewing machines, and Mary keeps a file on exactly what alterations are made to my bras. My sisters and I wouldn’t buy a bra anywhere else. Mary saved me from having to wear two sports bras at the same time. Funny how a couple of Thirds changes your viewpoint.

Nevertheless, at the end of a day, the bra comes off with a sigh of relief. And often, the end of a day comes earlier than the end of the day, if you know what I mean. If I’m not going back out, the bra is history. I used to feel that way about pantyhose, but they’re ancient history.

Bra-less big boobs may be comfortable lounging around, but the effects of gravity only worsen with age. There I was, going through security for a recent red-eye flight. If I’m going to be miserable on a red-eye flight, I’m at least not going to be miserable in a bra. So I stash the bra in my backpack and go through security in a bulky sweatshirt. This time, however, I had scored “TSA pre-check,” so I could just wear my jacket.

“Empty your pockets, please, Miss,” said the TSA agent.

“There’s nothing in them,” I replied.

“No, you missed something,” he said. “I can see there’s something in your pockets.”

I poked around. “They’re empty.” I looked down. Uh, oh.

“Those are my boobs.”

(sob) Third Third boobs no longer leave the house without a bra.

Living in a (Bad) Fantasy World

I used to have a nightmare about growing older. I called it The Bag Lady Fantasy. I imagined – feared – that I’d spend my old age destitute, homeless, roaming the streets.

Way back when – in the ’70s, I think – Ms. Magazine did a survey on women and money. At the end, we could write in additional comments. I wrote about my Bag Lady Fantasy/Fear. When Ms. published the results, they were astonished at how many women had volunteered their fears of being a bag lady. There was no prompt for that; everyone just added it to the survey.

I could manage this fear by being financially responsible, saving for the future, holding a job. Ultimately, the fear dissipated. Was it after I performed the part of Trudy the bag lady in The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe? Trudy was so wise and witty and sort of bonkers, but I really, really liked her. I wouldn’t mind being a Trudy … but I’d make sure I managed my financial resources.

But then I saw Hello, My Name Is Doris last night, and a whole new fear grew up: the fear of being pathetic – or viewed as pathetic. As the theater roared with laughter around us, my friend Robin and I were sliding lower and lower in our seats, pained with the characterization of Doris. (Not mind you, with Sally Field; she was truly extraordinary and brave and wonderful.)

Why did Doris have to be a cat lady, a hoarder, a garishly dressed and out-of-date woman? Doris had a job; she had a computer in her home. She had a loving circle of friends. We didn’t see this competent, capable, involved woman. No, we saw her reduced to stalking a younger man and totally humiliating herself. We see her dismissed as a dinosaur on the job.

My mother worked till she was 72. When we talked to her about retirement, she said, “Right now, I’m the head of a department. The day I retire, I’ll be a little old lady.” No matter how professional, upright, or honorable we might be, the world is ready to look at us as little old ladies. As Dorises.

For goodness sakes, I have orange hair! Am I practically a Doris already?

The AARP review is titled, “Sally Field Makes an Adorable ‘Doris.’” Adorable?!? Did they miss the portrayal of Doris as out-of-touch, eccentric, and shabby? Is “adorable” even the adjective we want for our Third Thirds? Doris was not adorable. Doris was every stereotype of an older woman: baffled by life, gullible, unfashionable, incompetent. Sorry, her big turnaround at the end doesn’t save the image of aging we’ve watched for the whole of the movie.

My Bag Lady Fantasy was a fantasy. It resided in my imagination. This new fantasy – the pathetic old lady – is not my imagination. It exists and lurks in the real world. People are ready to see older women that way. And to laugh at them. At me. At any of us.

The Pathetic Old Lady Fantasy is the stuff of nightmares.

Skin Well-lived-in

One day I woke up and my eyelids sagged. Bammo, just like that! Sudden onset eyelid sag. I met with my women friends, and all of them said their eyelids had started sagging, too. We examined each other’s eyelids. We denied the sag in others – except Lori, we got worried about hers – but still remained positive our own eyelids were still sagging.

This is how aging seems to work: all of a sudden, the years show up. Wrinkles or odd necks or furrows between our brows aren’t a gradual accumulation. SUDDENLY, they’re there.

Lately, I’d been noticing a new thing. I look down at my thighs while I’m running, and I notice jiggle. That’s not new. But this thin, crackly-looking, spidery skin is new. I know Alaska is dry and non-humid. I know our winters leave my skin dry, flaky, itchy, and parched; but I pour lotion on my whole body all the time, year-round. Now what’s happening? Oh, no, it’s at my elbow bends, too!

And then I’m on Facebook and a Suggested Post pops up: ‘Here’s how I tighten & lift “crepey skin.”’ I looked up from the computer horrified, as if someone were in the room examining my body. That’s what it is: skin the texture of crepe paper. But why did someone suggest this to me??? Are they looking at me?

Now, what to do? Do I click on the post and risk getting crepey skin posts for the rest of my life? But what if there really is a do-at-home remedy? I wouldn’t want to have missed out on the best way to de-seed pomegranates or use silica gel packets or peel ginger with a spoon – those were good hints. So I clicked.

And was subjected to a long – very long – promotional thing by some Beverly Hills plastic surgeon. It didn’t have the progress bar at the bottom so I had no idea how long it would go on, so I ended up quitting before the big reveal. I don’t know how anyone lifts and tightens crepey skin at home, but I do know why the post got lots of “angry” marks.

I know all these suggested posts are based on my Third Third demographic and our secret worries or obsessions. That must explain why I’m targeted with “The Heart Attack Culprit” or “Symptoms of Adult ADHD” or knowing my metabolic type. But I’m a little confused about all the college posts: “21 Colleges that are losing applicants.” Do I care? Do women with crepey skin still have kids applying to college?

Way back when, I was in a hair salon reading a Ladies’ Home Journal. Mysteriously, Anchorage had been profiled as the Beauty Capital of the U.S.: “Anchorage, Alaska comes out of this at the head of the class, largely due to its spectacular skin-index score.” The women in the salon were astonished: “Do we win a prize for dry, flaky skin?” I was dispatched to get to the bottom of this. I phoned the editor.

According to the editor, Anchorage is cloudy. According to the National Weather Service and based on altitude, cloud cover, and humidity, we are high on the “complexion-kindness index, based mostly on UV radiation levels.” “Ultimately,” the editor said, “on hair days alone, Anchorage may not be the most stellar performer,” but for skin, you’re THE BEST.

So there.

The crepey skin on my upper thighs covers muscles that run long distances. My skin is only skin-deep. It’s crepey, not creepy. (I’m practicing affirmations.)

And my latest Suggested Post: “The more intelligent you are, the easier it is for cults to brainwash you.” Hmmmm…

Is "New Yorker" a DNA thing?

Am I like a little duckling that was imprinted at birth? I was born in Brooklyn but while I have no memory of it, does it somehow reside in my DNA? How else can I explain this overwhelming feeling that I am surrounded by “my people”?

I never even had a thick New York accent (except when angry, under the influence, or on the phone with my mother), but I understand every word that’s said to me. I can even understand the public announcements on the subway when they’re made by the operator with marbles in his mouth and static in the system.

I walk down the street and everyone is so gloriously, unabashedly ETHNIC. All colors, all kinds of clothes, but they are somehow all New Yorkers, and I fit right in. I dress a little differently than they do, but there’s something in me that feels like I’m swimming in the same school of fish. Something in me feels like I’m not sticking out. The Italians here are REALLY Italian, the Greeks are REALLY Greek, the Puerto Ricans REALLY Puerto Rican.

I walk down the street positive that my hair is frizzy, the way it was when I was younger and when my self-image must have been stabilizing. I feel like I look like the other people around me, big boobs and all, and not just the Jewish people. When I talk to a burly Italian guy in the Hayden Planetarium, I feel like we’re related. When I joke with the African American woman in the elevator, I feel like we’re sisters.

This is such a bizarre feeling. It’s like feeling part of a majority culture that includes me, a New Yorker culture.

I went to a comedy show tonight, and the woman was riffing about rude strangers. When a stranger tells her to “Move!” she wants to move to another state. But I seem to find smiling people, people at the same event who start conversations, store employees who engage me. I wonder if it’s because I’m not in any rush and am just so observant of everything around me? Still, I used to say New Yorkers were the kind of people who, if you sat next to one on the Long Island Railroad, you had their life story by the time you got to Penn Station. They don’t just like my hair; they want to know the name of the dye I use. Their boundaries are just so deliciously fluid.

Okay, there IS one big qualifier here, and it has to do with class. (In my world view, everything has to do with class….) I don’t share any DNA with rich New Yorkers, and this trip is the first time I’ve seen where they live. I’ve passed stores named after the clothes I’ve only heard about from the Oscar’s red carpet. The friendliest thing about those people are their nannies.

Yes, it’s true, there are still New Yorkers walking around the streets talking to themselves, but this time, they have wires dangling from their ears….

Yesterday, I went to a second program at the Library. As I walked in, the woman at the information desk looked up and said, “Oh, it’s our visiting library lover. How is it going for you?” I felt remembered! In a city of eight million, I wasn’t even anonymous.

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.