Mother Mary

Column Classic: Post-Puberty

By Lisa Scottoline

You may have heard that AARP started a dating site.

Now we’re talking.

Get my walker.

And my blood pressure meds.

Mommy’s going shopping.

The site is called, “How About We…”

But I’m not sure what they mean by that name.

“How About We…Compare Our Cholesterol?”

Or “How About We…Have a Cup of Decaf?”

Or “How About We…Take a Nice Nap?”

So, I went on the AARP website to cruise for menfolk, er, I mean, to learn more about the organization. The first thing I noticed was that AARP membership begins at age fifty.

Huh?

AARP stands for American Association of Retired Persons, but if you live in America, you can’t retire at fifty. You can’t retire at a hundred and fifty. I’m thinking that my tombstone will read, RETIRED…FINALLY.

In fact, if you’re a man who retired at fifty, I want to meet you. Maybe you’re on “How About We…Retire While We Still Have a Heartbeat?”

In any event, I read through the website, which was full of articles with titles such as, How To Have Sex Without Intercourse.

Fascinating, but I’ve been doing that for quite some time now.

Sex without intercourse is chocolate cake.

I read the article, but I still wasn’t sure what they meant. There were too many euphemisms, presumably because I wasn’t old enough to be told the truth.

So, I skipped to another article, entitled “Ten Great Cities for Older Singles.”

Stop right there.

I’m not an “Older Single.”

An “Older Single” is a slice of cheese that’s past its expiration date.

I haven’t expired yet. I know because I’m still working.

Still, I read on and found good news. According to the article, Philadelphia was the eighth greatest city for us older singles.

Wahoo!

The article suggested that “icebreaking opportunities for first dates” include a trip to Independence Hall.

What an idea!

When it comes to the forefathers, who doesn’t think foreplay?

The article also suggested a first date to the Philadelphia Zoo.

Another spot that spells romance!

Who hasn’t felt primal at the Primate House?

But of course, the more I read through the AARP website, the more I actually began to find articles that interested me, even though I’m not retired. I started to think that maybe I should join AARP. It felt fraudulent, since I’m not retired, but that seemed kinda technical. And two friends of mine, both my age, joined, and they got discounts at the movies.

I clicked through to the membership page, which said it cost sixteen bucks a year to join, which was cheap enough. I would have saved money if I joined for five years, but by this point I was feeling so old that green bananas were off my shopping list.

Still, I couldn’t decide whether to join.

I felt ambivalent about classifying myself as Officially Old.

I told myself, I may be middle-aged, but I’m not aged.

And after all, Mother Mary is an AARP member. Would I really want to join a club that would have us both?

But that may be a different question.

Just when I was mulling this over, an email request came in from my book publicist to go on RLTV, a channel that I’d never heard of. So, I went online and found out that it was Retirement Living Television.

Me? Fresh cheddar that I am?

It’s a funny thing.

Puberty is a line that’s clearly delineated. Your breasts pop.

But how about old age? Your breasts drop?

Enough said.

I went online to the RLTV website, which had photos of people I admire, like Jane Pauley and Bob Vila. Neither of them are retired, but they’re still cool, even though they’re as old as I am, or even older.

Except that the website did have an article on “Benjamin Franklin – Science Superstar.”

Yikes. 

But still, that kind of thinking seemed mean-spirited and wrong.

So, I joined AARP.

I love being my age, and I’ve learned that age is arbitrary, anyway. So, what if I’m lumped in with sixty, seventy, eighty, and even ninety-year-olds?

I consider myself…lucky.

© Lisa Scottoline

Column Classic: If a Tree Falls in the Driveway…

By Lisa Scottoline

So, a tree landed on my garage, but didn’t damage anything. That would be the good, and the bad, news.

It got me looking at the trees around my house, and there are plenty of them. More good and bad news.

I don’t know what type of trees they are, because it never mattered to me. I operate on the principle that there’s only so much information my tiny little brain can hold, and it’s already stuffed with things I need to know for work, plus essentials like the words to most Rolling Stones songs and the Empire Flooring jingle.

So, I never learned the names of the trees I own. I’d be happy to name them Mick and Keith, and let it go at that.

But I do love the way they look, especially in fall, when they turn bright yellow and gorgeous orange, or in summer, when their rich green shades the lawn. Bottom line, we can all agree, trees are good.

Usually.

But then I started eyeing the trees, close up, and with the leaves fallen, I could see a lot of old branches, thick, dark, and ending in a point. I’m no expert, but some looked dead. I started to wonder when they might fall, like daggers from heaven.

Call this an exaggeration, but recall that I was raised by Mother Mary, who taught me that even the most mundane items can kill you. For example, knives loaded into the dishwasher will stab you. Blow-dryers will electrocute you. Toasters have murder on their minds.

So, I started to see the trees not as examples of natural beauty, but as lethal weapons.

And they could fall at any second, on me, the dogs, or the cats. And some of my trees hang over my street, and I’d hate to think they could fall on a passing car or person. I couldn’t live with myself if that happened.

I have enough guilt already.

And made me worry about something worse.

Namely, lawyers.

So I called a tree service guy, who came over and started pointing. He knew the names of all the trees. Hemlock. Sugar maple. Red oak. Mulberry. Tulip poplar.

What lovely words.

Then he started in with the numbers.

$450, $340, $540. Not so lovely.

And then sent me a two-page estimate.

What was it that Joyce Kilmer wrote? I think that I shall never see, a poem lovely as a tree…service estimate?

It turns out that I have lots of trees that need servicing. Dead branches have to be trimmed, stumps ground down and hauled away. We’re talking days of work.

For trees?

I expect to pay for home improvement, but I never factored in tree improvement. It reminded me of the time I had to call an excavator to build a swale in my backyard, and if you don’t know what a swale is, it’s like a berm, only more expensive.

No, I don’t know what a berm is either. That’s why it costs extra. Things add up when you start with dirt improvement.

And some of the tree improvement sounded downright exotic. For example, the tree guy told me that it was a spruce tree that fell on the garage, and it would cost $380 to reduce the top leaders.

I didn’t know what a top leader was, but it sounded redundant. Nobody follows a bottom leader.

Can you imagine, a bottom leader running for president? No, we can’t! Give up and go home!

Hmm.

And it would cost $90 for a fir tree that needed cable. I didn’t know trees had cable. Do they have DVRs, too?

And some of it was scary. The estimate read that my sugar maple had to be pruned “to prevent main trunk failure.”

That can’t be good, can it?

Plus, I think it already happened.

To my waist.

© Lisa Scottoline

Column Classic: Reading is Fundamental

By Lisa Scottoline

Mother Mary has a new job that benefits us all.

Before I reveal it, let me explain that over the years I’ve made a few author friends, and I buy their books and get them to sign them to my mother, which gives her a big charge. Last month I shipped her five books, including my newest one, then I called to ask her, “How’d you like my book?”

“I loved it, it was great!. But I have some corrections for it. And for the others.”

“Corrections? How many?”

“About five.”

“Five corrections?” I ask, surprised. “Like typos? That’s bad.”

“No, five pages of corrections. And for the others, too.”

I am astounded. “Five pages of typos?”

“Not typos, corrections, and I have five pages per book. So, twenty-five pages of corrections.”

Now, I officially don’t get it. “Give me an example of something you corrected.”

“Okay, in your book, you use the word ain’t. Ain’t is not a word.”

“Is it used in dialogue?”

“Yes.”

“Then, it’s fine. That’s how the character speaks. That’s not a mistake.”

“Yes, it is. Nobody should use the word ain’t. You know better than that, you went to college. I’ll mail you the sheets. You’ll see.”

“Okay, send them.”

“Ain’t! Hmph!”

So, Mother Mary mails me the alleged corrections, twenty-five pages of notebook paper, each line written in capitals in a shaky red flair. AIN’T IS NOT A WORD! is the most frequent “correction.” A few are typos, but the rest are editorial changes, different word choices, or new endings to the plot.

Bottom line, Mother Mary is a book critic, in LARGE PRINT.

Still, I read the sheets, touched. It must have taken her hours to make the lists, and it’s really sweet. I call to tell her so, which is when she lowers the boom:

“You need to send the lists to your friends,” she says. “Your friends who wrote the other books. They should know about the mistakes, so they can fix them.”

“Okay, Ma, you’re right. Thanks. I will.”

I don’t like lying to my mother, but I’m getting used to it. I figure I’ll put the sheets in my jewelry box, with daughter Francesca’s letters to Santa Claus. Those corrections are going to the North Pole.

Then my mother adds, “You don’t have to worry about the one set, though.”

“What one set?”

“A set of corrections, for your new friend.” She names a Famous Author who isn’t really my new friend, but Somebody I Wish Were My New Friend. I can’t name her here, as she will never be my new friend, now. In fact, she’s probably my new enemy. Because my mother sent her five pages of unsolicited editorial changes to her terrific, number-one bestseller.

“You did what?” I ask, faint. “Where did you get her address?”

“Your brother got it from the computer.”

“Her address is on the computer?”

“She has an office.”

Of course she does. “And you sent it to her?”

“Sure. To help her.”

I try to recover. I have only one hope. “You didn’t tell her who you are, did you?”

“What do you mean?”

I want to shoot myself for never changing my last name. My last name is Scottoline and so is Mother Mary’s, and the Very Famous Author signed a book to her at my request, so in other words….

“Oh, sure, I told her I’m your mother, in case she didn’t know.”

“Great.” I sink into a chair. “And you did that because…”

“Because I’m proud of you.”

Ouch. I can’t help but smile. How can I be angry? I tell her, “I’m proud of you, too, Ma.”

It’s not even a lie.

© Lisa Scottoline

Column Classic: Clipped

By Lisa Scottoline

If you raise your daughter right, eventually she will know more than you.

Which is the good and bad news.

We begin when Daughter Francesca comes home for a visit and finds me engaged in one of my more adorable habits, which is clipping my fingernails over the trashcan in the kitchen.

This would be one of the benefits of being an empty nester. You can do what you want, wherever you want. The house is all yours.

Weee!

In my case, this means that everything that I should properly do in my bathroom, I do in my kitchen.

Except one thing.

Please.

I keep it classy.

Bottom line, I wash my face and brush my teeth in the kitchen. I’m writing on my laptop in the kitchen, right now. My game plan is to live no more than three steps from the refrigerator at any time, which gives you an idea of my priorities.

Anyway, Francesca eyes me with daughterly concern. “What are you doing?”

“Making sure the clippings don’t go all over the floor,” I tell her, clipping away.  Each snip produces a satisfying clik.

“It’s not good for your nails, to clip them that way. You might want to use an emery board.”

I know she learned that from Mother Mary, who carries an emery board everywhere, like a concealed weapon. “I don’t have one.”

“I do, and you can use it.”

“No, thanks.  It’s too much trouble.” I keep clipping. Clik, clik. Hard little half-moons of fingernail fly into the trash. My aim is perfect, and wait’ll I get to my toenails. Then I prop my foot up on the trash can and shoot the clippings into the air. Now that’s entertainment.

She adds, gently, “You clip them kind of short.”

“I know.  So I don’t have to do it so often.”

“But your nails would look so pretty if you let them grow longer.”

“I don’t care enough.”

Francesca looks a little sad. “I could do them for you, Mom. Shape them, polish them. Give you a nice manicure. Look at mine. I do it myself.”

So I look up, and her hands are lovely, with each fingernail nicely shaped and lacquered with a hip, dark polish. It reminds me that I used to do my nails when I was her age. I used to care about my nails, but now I don’t, and I’m not sure why I stopped. Either I’m mature, or slovenly.

“Thanks, but no,” I tell her.

She seems disappointed. It is a known fact that parents will occasionally let their children down, and this will most often occur in the area of personal grooming or bad puns. I’m guilty of only one of these. All of my puns are good.

But to make a long story short, later we decide to go out to dinner, and since it’s a nice night, I put on a pair of peep-toe shoes, which are shoes that reveal what’s now known as toe cleavage, a term I dislike.

If your toe has cleavage, ask your plastic surgeon for a refund.

Anyway, both Francesca and I looked down at unvarnished toenails, newly clipped though they were. I had to acknowledge that it wasn’t a good look.

“I can polish them for you,” she offered, with hope. “I think it they would look better, with these shoes.”

“But we’re late,” I said, and we were.

“It won’t take long.” Francesca reached for the nail polish, and I kicked off the shoes.

“I have an idea. Just do the ones that show.”

“What?” Francesca turned around in surprise, nail polish in hand.

“Do the first three toenails.”

Look, it made sense at the time. The other two toenails didn’t matter, and no one can find my pinky toenail, which has withered away to a sliver, evidently on a diet more successful than mine.

But Francesca eventually prevailed, and did all five toenails.

Like I said, I raised her right.

Copyright © Lisa Scottoline

I’m a Little Teapot

By Lisa Scottoline

Once again, I learned something from Daughter Francesca.

I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be the other way around.

Either she’s a really smart kid or I’m a really dumb mother.

We begin last month, when Francesca had a cold and comes home with a neti pot.

If you’ve never seen a neti pot, it looks like the small pot they serve tea in in restaurants, which is cute.

Except a neti pot is not cute.

This is where it gets disgusting.

If you’re eating, move on.

But if you want to change your life, keep reading.

When Francesca came home, I asked her to show me how to use a neti pot.

So she fills the neti pot with distilled water, puts in a little packet of God knows what, and screws the cap on. Then she inserts the spout of the neti pot into her right nostril, tilts her head to the left over the sink, and pours water up her nose.

You know what comes out her left nostril?

Water and snot.

I almost threw up. It gave me nightmares.

Until I got a cold.

And I bought a neti pot.

And it changed my life.

My sinuses felt clean for the first time ever.

And my cold went away.

Meanwhile I didn’t even know I had sinuses beside my nose.

But my neti pot did.

I get more oxygen now than ever before.

I breathe like a champ.

My sinuses sparkle.

So I’m addicted to my neti pot. I use it every night, whether I need to or not. I can’t even wait until bedtime to clean my sinuses.

It’s sex for middle-aged women.

Meanwhile I barely shower.

I can’t be bothered.

And my hair never gets greasy like it did when I was young and normal.

It’s straw now.

At this point, I’m pretty sure it repels water.

Anyway to return to point, it’s easy to use a neti pot, once you practice.

All you do is stick it up one nostril and start pouring.

At first you’ll feel like you’re waterboarding yourself.

Don’t worry.

You are.

I forgot to mention, you have to keep your mouth open and breathe.

I forget that sometimes at night.

Basically I drown myself before bed.

If you forget the directions, remember the song:

“I’m a little teapot, short and stout.

Here is my handle, here is my spout.

Now stick it up your nose.”

Okay, that’s not the song.

I remember on the show Welcome Back, Kotter, when Vinnie Barbarino used to say “up your nose with a rubber hose.”

My mother always thought that was hysterical.

But that’s exactly what using a neti pot feels like.

It’s like a douche for your nostrils.

Meanwhile, does anyone even douche anymore?

I found a website for womenshealth.gov, which said that about a fifth of women between fifteen and forty-four still douche.

Why?

Why did anybody ever douche?

Way back when, Mother Mary did. She told me that women were supposed to so they were clean down there.

Where?

The sinus of the south.

Are you throwing up yet?

I remember there were commercials for douche on TV, telling you in sneaky ways that your vagina was stinky.

But I’m pretty sure it smelled like a vagina.

I checked online, and all the websites I found recommend unanimously that women should not douche.

Your vagina is self-cleaning. Like your oven.

But not like your sinuses.

It reminded me of another memory of my mother, and I have so many I think of them as mommaries.

Mother Mary was in a hospital gown being wheeled into surgery, and when the orderly moved the sheet aside, there was spotting underneath. The orderly hastily covered it up, embarrassed for her.

Mother Mary shrugged. “Don’t worry, it’s rust.”

Copyright Lisa Scottoline 2024

Peach Forever

By Lisa Scottoline

There’s something worse than losing a dog.

Losing two dogs.

Which just happened in my family.

But this column isn’t about death, it’s about life.

By way of background, Daughter Francesca lost her wonderful Pip during the holidays. He succumbed to cancer at the age of fifteen, and we were able to be with him at the end, which was blessedly peaceful. And then, unexpectedly, my dog Peach fell ill last week when her kidneys failed, and we were able to be with her at the end of her fourteen years, which was also peaceful.

It was the worst instant replay ever.

But losing both Pip and Peach got me thinking that the sadness over their passing is part-and-parcel of the unique happiness they gave us, as the older generation in our dog family of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. Pip, Peach, and the late Little Tony were the older generation, and Pip and Peach were even half-brother and half-sister, having the same father. I still have Peach’s two sons, Boone and Kit.

At two human beings and five dogs, we were outnumbered.

Leg-wise, that’s four to twenty.

Though my legs are hairier.

People say dogs are a member of their family, but in our case, the reverse was true – we were members of their family.

And it was a hoot to watch them relate like a human family.

Peach was the smallest, but she barked nonstop, keeping everyone in line. If she smoked, she could have passed for Mother Mary.

Every night starting at 7:00, she would stand at the window overlooking the backyard and bark until 11:00 at night. The window was in the family room, so it was impossible to watch TV.

Bottom line, there was too much family in the family room.

Most nights I would let her out in the front yard so she could bark at the backyard, and the only thing missing was a side yard so she could bark at the front and the backyards at the same time.

Like stereo agita.

All of this barking kept squirrels, birds, deer, and passing clouds in order.

In fact, I’m pretty sure the world is safe from atomic warfare because of Peach.

And don’t think my neighbors hate me, because they’re too far away to hear.

Even as she got older, she never stopped barking. She had heart issues severe enough for the vet to tell me not to walk her anymore, but she barked forever.

Meanwhile her barking never bothered me.

I have nothing against a woman speaking up.

And she bore two terrific puppies, then got to live with them all her life, a terrific mother from day one. All of her feistiness was reserved for anything or anyone who tried to mess with her puppies. We whelped them in my bedroom, and just once Uncle Little Tony stuck his head in to see what was going on.

Peach got busy.

Mother grizzlies have nothing on mother cavaliers.

And she barely slowed down as she got older, except that she got mitral valve disease, which caused her heart to enlarge.

She was a little dog with a big heart, literally.

She slept on the pillow next to me, and because her heart was too big, I could actually hear it beat at night, in the stillness of my bedroom.

And I could feel its vibration on my pillow.

It was a comforting sound that lulled me to sleep, like nature’s lullaby.

To love a dog, or any animal, is to fully realize what it is to be a human being.

And how connected we are to animals, and honestly to everything in the world.

I have a dog family, but I believe there is a much larger family we all belong to.

That family includes people of kinds, and dogs, and trees, and various bugs and even the sky and the stars.

It was my little dog with the big heart that brought me to that realization, every night from my pillow to the sky entire.

I will miss my little Peach.

But I will always have her with me.

And so will you.

Love each other.

Copyright Lisa Scottoline 2024