DISORIENTING

College orientation--for the parents--seems to vary greatly from school to school. After asking around I have heard everything from a parent who did not even know she was invited to orientation (her son's doing) to parents who go, stay in the dorm, attend a sample class, play quarter bounce with their underage kids and try to pledge a sorority. (All of that last one is true but the sorority).

Somewhere between these extremes lies my own experience now with two very different schools.

The Art Institute had a day of activity for the parents that mostly consisted of telling us how fabulous our artistic children are and that we were NOT crazy for paying for them to attend art school during the end of a depression. You can appreciate this is not an easy task for them but they were impressive and at one point I think they got the whole room to shout "The world needs more art not more lawyers" or some such nonsense that I actually believed for a second. 

That was last summer. 

This summer it was time for Grace to attend an overnight student/parent orientation at Valparaiso and we were invited.

I have to admit right here, I am not a fan of orientations. Anyones. Mine or my kids. Kindergarten through college. Don't like em. (And I actually ran the kindergarten one for a couple years).

Too much talking not enough information. Too many nervous parents spilling their fear all over me. Ick. Stop. I barely have it together myself without you raising things to worry about I never even considered!

But we go.

And there is ALWAYS "that woman" sitting behind me. I think she has followed me from Kindergarten orientation to college orientation. I mean this metaphorically, not literally. It is not the same exact woman but someone of her ilk.

You know the one. She is the one who will ask a question that is really a way to brag about her kid. She will frequently ask about the gifted program--when do they get tested? Does it extend into middle school? 

In kindergarten she said, "My son already reads 'Harry Potter' books. What will he do all day?" 

Sheesh.

The teacher was not new and blithely answered, "We have a lot of children who read Harry Potter books and beyond. And we have many who do not know their ABCs. I teach them all." We almost applauded her.

At Valpo, "that woman" sat behind me (by the way this is always a woman, I don't know why, but the dads don't ask this stuff) who wanted to know if her daughter's AP credits would count and how that worked. She asked THREE specific questions related to her daughter's AP classes and something called IB (this is apparently an Indiana thing, not a stomach disorder) and this was in a lecture of over a hundred people. Apparently, she thought it was a private counseling session and we were spectators.

I mentioned "that woman" at a neighborhood grad party recently. Everyone laughed because everyone has heard these "questions". One of the dads (who ironically has a brilliant child he COULD brag about but never does) said that at the "What to expect when your kid goes to college" seminar "that woman" asked the following: "My son never studies and has terrible organizational skills but he always gets all A's. How will he do in college?"

The lecturer should have just said, "Shut up." 

Instead, he gamely tried to answer. I think it would be fun if he called her out on it and said, "Is this a real question or did you just want the chance to tell us your kid gets all A's without studying?"

Anyhoo, despite the questions from "that woman" the orientation was quite nice. We learned a few things and as is our norm, we skipped out early. This is our MO since we attended our first Lamaze class. The teacher went through the basics of childbirth (some details left me with my head between my knees) and then announced we would have a break. After the break, she said, the men will go in one room and the women will go in another and we will talk about our feelings. Jeff and I exchanged horrified glances, and without saying a word, left as soon as the instructor excused us for our break.

So after sitting through orientation lectures on Friday from 9 til 3 (and 5 more hours scheduled!) we skipped out and went back to the hotel.

This gave me the chance to have a mini-nervous breakdown about the fact that my daughter is leaving in the fall. Jeff helpfully suggested that getting a jump on my grief might make it easier in the fall, but I kind of doubt it.

So that's how orientation went for us. Grace got to meet her roommate for the first time, I got to get in an early cry, and we all got to hear about "that woman's" daughter who, if I understand it right, has enough credits going into college to skip to grad school.

As for how this compares to our own college orientation programs...well just like the whole process, I don't really remember my parents there at all. Were they even invited? One friend said she drove herself there. I think I might have too. I don't remember much about it except I thought everyone there was an arrogant ass and I had made a huge mistake choosing that school and cried myself to sleep in South Quad. Six weeks later I met the group of friends I still see annually. 

If you are attending a college orientation this summer I hope you have fun and be sure to say hi to "that woman" as she will surely sit behind you too.

JUST FAKE THE DRIVING LOG

Lilly had her first drivers ed class on Monday and on the way home she asked if she could stop and drive for the first time. I said sure, and we went up to the high school parking lot which was empty and I let her practice accelerating and stopping.

She is my third child so this is the third time I've had the honor of driving with a young person for THE VERY FIRST TIME! This is no small rite of passage, especially in our car-centric society. Just remember how excited you were to finally drive, the doors it opened, the freedom it provided. It's a big deal and I was just happy and honored to be the one who got to share that moment with her.

Except.

I had forgotten the kind of lose-control-of-your-bodily-function inducing fear this "honor" can provoke.

I mean, for god's sake, she kept saying "Is this the 'go pedal' or the 'stop pedal'?" 

No. I really don't like driving with anyone who does not yet know how to drive. Nobody does.

And now, for the love of God, the state requires we drive with these people a minimum of fifty hours before allowing them to even test for their license. Really? And ten of those hours are supposed to be after dark, when I am already in my pajamas.

Who does this? 

Now, unlike the reading log which I confessed to faking, I will not confess to faking the driving log. Because that is against the law. And that has serious ramifications and surely someone will know of an inexperienced driver who came to great ill and they will send me hate mail. So I would never, ever suggest that you fake the driving log.

However, just theoretically, I am suggesting that maybe, not everyone drives the full fifty hours before they get their license. It is possible.

When we went to get Grace's license, we realized we had "forgotten" to log many of the final hours. Now, I knew from when I took Atticus that they "require" this log, but they don't actually ask to see it. So I assured Grace we did not need it. But she panicked and wanted to fill it out right there in the DMV parking lot. I think this is like emptying the bullets from the murder weapon just before going in to the courthouse.

Turns out it is very difficult to "recall" all the trips you have taken and we had a difficult time filling in the form. "For god's sake just make up some dates and times and say we drove to Grandma's" I helpfully suggested. 

Even this was hard, "Wait," I said, as I gave it a quick look-see, "who can believe we drove to Grandma's on a Monday morning in two hours but drove back the next day for six hours? And it took you an hour and half to drive to Dairy Bar?" But of course, as I predicted, they didn't even glance at the driving log when we went in to get the license.

Fifty hours. Around here, most of the trips we take are ten to twenty minutes. So if you break that down, well, you do the math. I think that means you have to let your kid drive every day for like the next twenty years. 

And I know a neighbor with 15-year-old quadruplets. What the hell is she supposed to do? Drive around with a teenaged chaffeur full-time for the next six months? There really isn't enough Xanax in the world.

And while I applaud the effort behind this law, (it makes perfect sense to make them practice a lot before they get their license) I just question how helpful it is to have a parent next to you for that long, clutching the dashboard and gritting her teeth trying to stay calm as you jump another curb or barely misses another garbage can.

You see, it turns out, when you first learn to drive you are VERY nervous about oncoming traffic so you tend  to hug the right side of the road. Which is where the nervous parent sits, constantly seeing you are about to drop off the side of the road or hit a pedestrian. 

When Atticus was taking lessons, I mentioned this to my friend Jan asking if her son ever drove too close to the side to which she simply answered, "Mailbox, mailbox, mailbox, MAILBOX!!" I guess that's a yes.

It's enough to drive us to subterfuge to move the process along. Like my friend "Mona" who DID do fifty hours with each of her kids but then confessed that after having a very difficult time getting child number 3 signed up for enough driving lessons realized child number 3 had a conflict she could not get out of. Knowing this put her at risk of not getting the lessons done in the alotted time and aware it was nearly impossible to reschedule, she did what any resourceful mom would do....she sent child number 2 (they look a lot alike, everyone mixes them up) to do the driving time disguised as child 3. I wonder if the instructor was curious at all as to why this kid looked so much more mature and drove so much better than she had the week before.

See what these ridiculous requirements drive us to? Pun. Ha ha.

And how does this compare to how we learned to drive? How many hours were we required to drive with our parents? Umm, well, let me see, add these numbers and then carry the one, oh yeah, NONE!

That's right folks. We took the class, we waited six months or whatever it was and then we went for the exam. I don't remember driving more than half a dozen times with my mom in the car.

However, I DO remember once before I had my license when trying to back out of the garage I accidentally left the car in drive and nearly rammed our mint green Ford LTD through the back wall of the garage. 

It scared the beejesus out of me but not my mom.

She wasn't in the car.

SEASON OF DECEIT

It's May, I have a senior in high school, and EVERYTHING happens this month. Concerts, end-of-year banquets, the award ceremony, Prom, Senior Ditch Day, Graduation, and for our family-- both girls' birthdays.

For me, my main job in all of this, appears to be lying.

First, the girls asked me if they could skip PE (first period for both of them) to go out to breakfast on Lilly's birthday. Now here I should mention, (which is code for I will try to explain my bad behavior) this is the ONLY year the girls have been in the same school. They are very, very close, and they are not looking forward to their impending separation.

So I decided sure, why not. They can miss PE and make a memory for a lifetime.

The only problem was I had to "call them out" by calling the school to excuse their late arrival.

Now I hate to lie outright so I just said the girls had "a family commitment" which is kind of true.

A few days later, Grace wanted to get called out early to get ready for prom. Now here I should mention, prom is on a Friday night.  So really, how can a girl get ready if she waits until after school to start that process (never mind that the entire girls' soccer team managed to win regionals, get their trophy and still make it to prom looking ravishing--the rest of the class needed hours to get ready).

Since I hate to lie outright, this time I said, "Grace has to leave early. She has a doctor's appointment to get her hair done for prom."

Next up, you guessed it, Senior Ditch Day. Now here I should mention, even I, the biggest goody-two-shoes in the world partook in Senior Ditch Day (but I think we called it Senior Skip Day). Never mind, I see no harm in this either. The school year is SO done by now for the Seniors it is time to put a fork in it. She would miss nothing, she has all A's, so I agreed.

And since I hate to lie outright, I called the attendance office and said "Grace can't come to school today because she has to see the doctor about a bad case of Senioritis.

I am relieved to say that I do not have to lie anymore to the school. This year.

But tomorrow morning I have to come up with a lie because I am supposed to leave the house before Grace to attend the Awards Ceremony and for some reason, the school asks that we keep this a secret from the kids. I NEVER leave the house before the girls so--yes --I have to come up with a lie to tell Grace about why I'm leaving the house so early.

I'm thinking of telling Grace I have to go to the doctor to be seen for a bad case of sociopathic lying.

At least that would be partly true.

I hope you are enjoying the Merry Month of May and that you haven't had to lie too much.

MOVING OUT OF THE DORM

Because my friends are such competent, capable, graceful handlers of complicated logistics, they seldom make a fuss over achieving something herculean and difficult like moving a kid out of a college dorm. No, I have never heard any of them really discuss in detail how much of a pain in the ass this process can be.

Like my friend Ann, who mentions oh so casually that she will be flying to Dallas, renting a van, dissembling a loft, finding a storage space for her daughter's belongings, packing up the clothes and flying home with her this weekend. She does not complain and makes it sound like anyone could pull this off in a weekend, no problema.

So I went blindly and foolishly to pick up Atticus from his dorm in the city on Friday. How hard could that be?  I didn't have to fly anywhere or rent anything. Just drive down, fill up the car and drive home. Jeff offered to come help fill the car, then go in to work and take the train home. Even better! Easy peasy!

But when we got there, it turned out, nothing was easy or peasy.

I did not have ID on me (left it in the car, around the block in the parking garage) so the security guard at the front desk was pissed at me.

Atticus had lost his ID and his room-key the night before which meant he had not yet really gotten the administrative part of the moving process moving.

After looking through his stuff for half an hour we decided to give up on finding the key and ID and figure out how to move out without it. Think fees.

Now there was a waiting list for the moving bins so we began to move the crap ourselves by hand.

Three times we loaded ourselves up like Sherpas, waited forever for the elevator (he lives on the 15th floor) carried the stuff through the alley, past the three trucks and the forklift that were being used to load the entire set of the play "Big Fish" from the Oriental Theater that backs up to his dorm and the six smoking stage-crew guys, into the parking garage up eight flights (by elevator) and tried to cram it all in to Jeff's Lexus.

The fourth trip we scored a dolly and managed to put everything leftover on it. We cleaned up, Atticus met with the RA, discussed the fees due when one loses his key and ID on move out day and were good to go.

We pushed the elevator button and miraculously it opened up almost immediately.

Then the fire alarm went off.

Now as any good city boy knows, you do NOT get on an elevator when the fire alarm goes off. Atticus told us to drop everything and head down stairs. Which I did. At the 9th floor I realized Jeff was not with us. He texted: It's a false alarm I am staying here. Elevators working, come back up.

So Atticus and I turned around and trudged back up several floors.

Then the nice men from the Chicago Fire Department came running past us in full gear with their axes out.

We texted Jeff to get his ass out and headed back down a dozen flights with a gaggle of art students.

Standing around outside we watched the Fire Department come and go with little urgency. The kids speculated it was another kitchen fire. The guy from Channel 7 (their studio is right there) came out and tried see if there was a story.

At last they let us all back in. We lined up obediently to wait for the elevators. A lot of the kids took the stairs. A small group took cuts. Atticus told us later they are from the Arab Emirates, royalty, and don't ever stand in line. Hmm.

Another half hour went by and we finally found ourselves with our last load at the car.

It became apparent that this final load was not going to fit.

"It will fit if there is only a driver," Jeff said.

So we gave Atticus a train pass, Jeff went back to work, and I drove the loaded car home by myself.

Which is how I managed to come home from my first time of moving my kid out of the dorm without one key element--my kid.

Ann on the other hand did just fine and even managed to buy some kitchen stuff for next year. She of course made it sound easy. Which I am quite sure it was not.

COLLEGE VISITS

It is official, child number two, Grace, has decided to attend Valparaiso University. She will be studying Choral Music Education so she can be a high school choir teacher.

Now to get in to a good Music Education program you have to audition--as in sing opera-y type songs in Italian and German and stuff. Luckily, Grace actually knows how to do that but I have to admit, until this year, I had NO idea our choir teachers were so gifted.

Anyhoo, now that she knows where she's going my fun has ended for a while because I don't get to do any college visits until Lilly goes in 2015 and frankly, she's so sick of being dragged along to some of the visits, she is threatening not to go to college.

Which would be a shame because it turns out, I really, really liked the college visits. What's not to like about a road-trip with one (or more) of your kids who are at an age when you barely see them let alone TALK to them?  I loved it all and consider it a perk of parenting.

Between March of 2011 and February 2013, first with Atticus, next with Grace, I visited more than a dozen colleges. Some of those were quick, informal drive-bys, but most were official visits. And since I am the only one in the family who went on ALL those trips, I am kind of the expert here.

Which makes me qualified to write one of my "what to expect" essays. So here goes:

Nail down a date for the visit: Good luck with this one. I am not sure there is anyone on earth busier than a high-school Junior unless that is a high-school Senior. But sometime between dances, concerts, school plays, exams, practices, and lessons you might find a day or two for a college visit. If you have to pull your kid from school to do this, surely the teachers will understand and be sympathetic, right? Wrong. They do not care why your student is missing school, they just hate it and will try to make your stressed out kid a little more stressed out.

This means you will make several of the college visits in the summer. Sounds nice but of course, who knows what a school really looks like without students? So you will probably end up having to come back during the year anyway. At least that will only be for the one or two schools that make the final cut.

Ask your student to register for a visit: If you have a slacker-child, skip this step and do it yourself. Really. If you have a responsible kid, this is not a big deal. I am speaking from experience.

Fly or drive to your destination and spend the night there so you will have plenty of time in the morning to get to find the Admissions Office: No matter how many times you do this, no matter how early you leave your hotel (or your home) no matter how many maps you have printed from the internet, you will somehow still be late for your campus tour. 

Except for the final visit when you FINALLY realize you not only have to get near the campus you have to drive around it repeatedly the night before until you are sure you can re-create the route in the morning. 

If you are traveling from home do not try to make up any lost time by speeding on the Tollway because you will get a ticket and then your child will really panic as she is being made late for her singing audition while the nice officer writes out your ticket and you will lose a day of your life when you have to go to the Daley Center to traffic court to get your license back. I mean, not that it happened to me, but it could.

Show up late for the campus tour: You would think it is not a big deal to be 10 to 15 minutes late for a campus tour. As a margin of error, it seems quite small when you consider the 24 or more hours you spent trying to get there. But It kind of is a big deal. Especially for your non-slacker child who hates to be late for anything. 

Your slacker will shrug it off and even laugh as you run back and forth between the parking structure and wherever it is they make you go to get the parking voucher (this is never the same in any of the schools and it's not clear at all when it matters or not and when you might get ticketed or towed but you will be a little paranoid if you went to school in Ann Arbor where ticketing and towing visitors is a municipal sport.)

Join the group wherever they may be: Sometimes they are still milling around over the coffee and donuts and sometimes they are already in the middle of the quad. No worries, you really can't miss a crowd of adorable (if anxious) high school kids, their dumpy (and soon to be poor) parents, led by an overly-eager college kid dressed in school colors and talking animatedly while walking backwards.

Take the tour: You will see lots and lots of buildings (which don't really tell you much about the quality of education do they?) and one sample dorm room (most of which are pretty much the same as when you went to school), and be invited to eat in the cafeteria (that  is not exactly fine dining but is SO much better than where you ate during your college years that you will start to get resentful) and the fitness center (ditto).

Ask your questions: You will get surprisingly candid answers sometimes even though you are asking people who are supposed to be selling their school. My two favorite were the weary financial advisor at one small conservatory-type college in Ohio who pretty much told us there was no money for our kids unless they were quite poor, and the K-College professor of photography who more or less said there was no reason he knew of why someone would want to pursue a career in photography.  In both cases, I am fairly certain these gentlemen had smoked something semi-legal before meeting with us.

Feel nostalgic and resentful: You are only human if being on campus (your own or anyone else's) brings back vivid and fond memories of your years at the old ivy-covered alma mater. However, you will quickly remember too that nearly every vivid memory involves boys or alcohol or both. Even if the boy in your memory is now the father of the very child you are with, resist the temptation to share ANY of those stories. The last person on the face of the earth who wants to hear about your college escapades is your own child (or perhaps your mother). So zip it and share it later with your hubby.

And finally, let the bitterness go: You may feel some regret or resentment that your child actually has a plethora of colleges to choose from. Some of which look like a whole lot more fun or a better fit than where you went. Let this go. It was the 70s and no on was taking college visits (unless you were a Kennedy). Most of my peers have shared that their first "college visit" was something called "freshmen orientation."  And we all turned out just fine.

If you have the privilege of taking a child to college visits, I hope you have as much fun as we have. And remember, don't speed on the Tollway, and don't talk about that game of quarters at Dooley's and you'll do just fine.

THAT NEARLY EMPTY NEST

Text from my neighbor:

Just watching "The Middle"  
Is it us?

It was funny to get that text last night because I happened to be watching "The Middle" at the same time and it wasn't even on right then: both of us were watching it a day late on our DVR.

I also happened to be thinking the same thing.

For those of you who don't watch the show, it is a family sit-com starring Patricia Heaton as a mom in "The Middle" meaning the mid-west but it could also mean the middle years. It is uncannily accurate in the portrayal of a 50 ish mom.

In this episode, her character, Frankie, was trying to get a job and the employers kept asking her "So who IS Frankie?" which had set off an identity crisis. After 19 years of parenting three kids she was not so sure anymore. (Parenting three kids for 19 years. Why does that sound familiar?)

My neighbor is a true empty-nester--her singlet is a junior in college. I still have the girls at home--but not for long. Now that everyone is in high-school and beyond...well I haven't moved into the empty nest but I certainly need to start shopping for one.

This is a way harder time than other moms let on. Sometimes you catch a glimpse of honesty on the topic. As I re-read (for at least the tenth time) A Gift from the Sea, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh while on vacation last month, I came upon this paragraph I had not recalled, in an epilogue she had added some 20 years after first writing the essay book on parenting and marriage:

"When I wrote Gift from the Sea, I was still in the stage of life I called "the oyster bed," symbol of a spreading family and growing children. The oyster bed, as the tide of life ebbed and the children went away to school, college, marriage or careers, was left high and dry. A most uncomfortable stage followed not sufficiently anticipated and barely hinted at in my book. In bleak honesty it can only be called "the abandoned shell." Plenty of solitude, and sudden panic at how to fill it, characterize this period. With me, it was not a question of simply filling up the space or time. I had many activities and even a well-established vocation to pursue. But when a mother is left, the lone hub of a wheel, with no other lives revolving about her, she faces a total re-orientation. It takes time to re-find the center of gravity."

Many of you have careers outside the home so perhaps do not feel quite so lost or lost at all. For those of us fortunate enough to make the choice to be stay-at-home moms, well, I feel like the reverse of that t-shirt that said "Oops, I forgot to have babies"! Mine could say, "Oops, I forgot to go back to work".

So now what? For many of us, age, health concerns, and ailing parents, not to mention a job market that is not exactly looking for a woman who hasn't worked in 20 years, keeps us from readily re-entering that world.

Many will overcome those obstacles; many already have.

I don't know what's next. Like Frankie Heck, I don't know quite how to answer that question, "So who IS Judy."

But at least I know I am not doing it alone. Because if my neighbor feels that way, and the writers of "The Middle" know it, and Anne Morrow Lindbergh in 1975 wrote about it....it's pretty universal.

Best wishes to us all as we seek to "re-find the center of gravity."

SHOPPING FOR BIG BROTHER

My fashion plate. Notice, no winter coat but it was very cold that day.

Yesterday Atticus (who was home for Easter) spent most of the day in his boxer shorts. He did put pants on when Grace's boyfriend, Billy came in. I said, "Hey maybe even a shirt?" and he glanced down at the pile of clothing on the floor and said, "Oh, yeah, here's a shirt."

I should mention the pants he did put on were pajama bottoms my mom made him for Christmas because he prefers a sort of lounge-wear look.

Later, as we set the table for Easter dinner he said, "I think I'll put regular pants on," and went upstairs to change into jeans. He did this on his own. So proud of my big boy.

His baby sister commented, "Hey, you're wearing big-boy pants. They look good. Did I pick those out for you?"

"Yep."

To say my son does not care about clothing is clearly an understatement. There was, as you may recall, the unfortunate 7th grade incident in which he accidentally wore his sister's jeans to school. Perhaps that is why he prefers pajama bottoms now. Yes, that's it--it's not that he's a lazy slob--it's because he suffers from PTSD. And there's the fact that he doesn't wear (or even own anymore, I stopped buying them) a winter coat despite the fact that he goes to college in downtown Chicago but that perhaps is another blog altogether.

Anyhoo, over Christmas break I asked his sisters to take him shopping. "Buy him some new jeans and maybe a shirt that is NOT a black t-shirt with an ironic saying."

The girls leaped at the chance to play "What Not to Wear" (which is our FAVORITE show) and one afternoon, when I was not feeling well, they grabbed the credit card and their brother and took off to the mall.

While they were gone I got a frantic text from Grace, "He has NO idea what he's doing. He does not even know how a dressing room works." Hmm, maybe all those years I ran into Kohl's and grabbed two pairs of jeans and three new shirts for him while he was at school did not serve him well in the real world. For him, that was the extent of his "back-to-school" shopping.

They came home successful. The girls proudly showed me their acquisitions. Two pairs of jeans that were actually in fashion (as opposed to the carpenter jeans he's been wearing for four years), a few nice shirts and even a cardigan sweater.

Then they showed me the two tops they had bought themselves as a "reward" for their trouble. Ahem. I had to reiterate the house rule that all unauthorized purchases must be returned or mom must be reimbursed.

It was a full month later I got Atticus's version of events. He told me his sisters were ruthless and even--get this-- MADE HIM TRY THE CLOTHES ON! The nerve. He begged them not to try anything on but then, as he tells it, "Grace got those crazy eyes and said Mom would not pay for anything if I didn't try them on. You know I do anything she says when she gets like that."

God bless Grace and her crazy eyes. If you know her well you've seen them. Wonder if Billy has seen those yet?

I digress. The point is, well as usual there is no real point, it's just funny but let's say the point is this--when you have kids it's fun to get the ones who like to do something to make the one who doesn't like do something do it. (Ha ha, I can just see Laurent my English as a second language friend puzzling over that awful sentence). Then you can just lie on the couch until you feel better.

And in the end, you might have someone who voluntarily changes from pajamas to jeans for a semi-formal dinner.

Baby steps.

TURNABOUT AND THE PHOTO SHOOT

Saturday Lilly went to the Turnabout Dance in Glenview. That is the dance where the girls ask the boys. We called it Sadie Hawkins where I grew up but it's just another reason to have a formal dance and that's all good.

There are a lot of customs and rituals to follow for THE BIG DANCE and I realized that between our three kids and all the high school dances this was the 13th time around for Jeff and me which one might think makes us kind of experts.

I will share how things usually go from the parents' point of view.

1. For weeks before the big dance there will be much drama about who asked whom and who said yes and how the boy was asked. If you have a girl you will hear about this ad nauseum until your ears bleed. If you have a boy you will not even know there is a dance until just a few days before when he announces he needs a sport coat and a corsage.

2. There will be more drama as your girl searches for the perfect dress, shoes, and hairstyle. If you have a boy there will be much drama as you try to drag his dis-interested ass to the store and get him to try on a sport coat.

If you are lucky, your girl will agree to wear a dress already in the house from previous events or siblings. Just make sure the dress still fits, as in covers all her parts sufficiently. Trust me on this one--this is a mistake anyone can make--even if this is not their first time around.


3. For Turnabout the girls do the planning. Actually, they do the planning for all the dances. If done properly, this will involve restaurant reservations and spreadsheets to figure out who is driving whom (or a party bus ordered).

A wise mom (Carrie O) advised me early on NOT to get involved in any of this process. A bossy girl always takes care of this.

This is excellent advice. Just make sure your daughter did not volunteer to organize rides but did not actually do that and you don't find out until the picture-taking when a mom asks you for the driving schedule that your daughter did (but didn't really). Trust me, this could happen to anyone, even if they've done this a few times.

4. Picture-taking: This is where you go to someone's house or a public venue (like the Park District lobby) so you can take pictures of the 20 or so kids in your kid's group. You will only know one or two of the kids and one or two of the parents.

There is a lot of energy as everyone is anxious, looking around to see if they are properly dressed, and hoping to fit in. The kids are a little nervous too.

You will take a picture of your kid and his/her date as they try to figure out how to put a wrist corsage on or worse pin one on a lapel. Mom will end up pinning the corsage.

If you are lucky, the mother hosting the picture-taking assumes the role of assembling the kids for pictures. If you are unlucky no one will assume this roll and you will stand around a lot until a bossy girl takes over.

If you are really unlucky, the mom-host will see the entire evening as a photo-shoot followed by that annoying dinner and dance. After about 20 minutes of this nonsense (we remember one in particular where the girls were asked to jump up and down, now dance crazy, now put your hands like a train...you get the idea) feel free to leave.

You will take several pictures of your kid and his/her date as they stand awkwardly together because most of them go as "just friends".

Then you are obliged to take a group shot of all the girls. This takes forever as they come up with ridiculous formations to show off their finery.

Finally someone wil have all the kids line up.

At some point you will take a picture or two of the boys altogether. Or not.

You will post one or two of these on Facebook. The rest you will delete.

5. And finally: You and your husband will go for a much-deserved cocktail and discuss how grown up the girls looked and how lost the boys looked. You will note which girl was dressed most inappropriately --as in not proper coverage--and hopefully it will not be your own daughter. But I am not saying that will always be the case, even if you are a veteran.

So that's pretty much how it goes. And even when you think you sort of understand how it goes, things can go awry. Which is true of all great parenting ventures so why would this be any different?

If you got to be a part of this fun ritual last week, I hope you had as much fun as we did. The kids? Oh yeah, I think they had fun too.

FREE THE PRESIDENTIAL APOSTROPHE

This year for the first time I realized that no one can agree on where to place the apostrophe (if at all) in President's' Day. A quick search on the internet shows that the definitive answer is obvious--call it Washington's Birthday.

But since I saw it in commercials for mattresses spelled three different ways I was compelled to figure out which way is correct.

Digression: Why mattresses and presidents? (though JFK and Clinton come to mind when searching for a connection). Can you imagine George saying to Martha, "Some day I hope they commemorate me and all the great men and women (in this Downton Abbey-like revisionist version I am making him a feminist) who hold my job in the future by offering great deals on mattresses!!"

No of course not. He would have wanted the day commemorated by giving our kids the day off of school so we can take them to Nickel City (local arcade) which, at this time of year, as my neighbor Danielle pointed out, could also be called Cesspool.

Or we could honor them by cramming the day full of orthodontist appointments and last-minute rehearsals for the high-school variety show. Whatever.

Back to the apostrophe. I am going to make a case here.

It can't be President's Day because that would imply we are only honoring one president which defeats the whole purpose of changing it from Washington's Birthday in the first place.

It technically could be Presidents' Day for obvious reasons.

But this year I noticed a lot of companies went with the somewhat confusing Presidents Day. I had this explained to me once by a colleague, Mary Brent who pointed out that if you use a noun enough it kind of becomes an adjective and you don't need to worry about possession anymore. Her example was Farmers Insurance.

I also noticed that Sears and BMW went apostrophe-free (in their TV ads anyway) and I choose to believe they have some of the best copywriters left in the world.

Tweeters don't do copy-writing so maybe I need to explain....Well kids, once upon a time there were people who, never mind. It gives me comfort to imagine a room full of smart English majors debating this over at Sears headquarters. Sears' headquarters. Errr...

So I make the case to go apostrophe-free. I have at least two regular readers who are English majors (Amy and Lorri) who may want to thrust and parry on this. Go for it.

And while I am suggesting we let go of that apostrophe, and we are fresh off the Family Christmas Card Season, a gentle reminder that you should not sign the card "Love, the Brown's" It is simply, "Love, the Browns".

Think about it a minute, I'll wait.


Oh, no, I do not think you are a silly goose for making this very common mistake and did it myself for MANY years. But stop it now.


So today's lesson is that with apostrophes, as with mattress sales, less is more and if I ever figure out commas I can share that with you too.

BEAUTY AND SHORT HAIR

The prettiest girl in my class back in the olden days of the late 70s was Amy Fitzpatrick. She had this adorable, short bob, with shiny black hair and a natural white streak just to the side of her face. In fact, when I think about it, most of the pretty girls in my class of 78 at Northville High School had short hair.

I was thinking about this because when I attend events at my kids' high school or when I watch TV shows with teenage girls and young women I almost NEVER see girls with short hair. And that got me thinking about the fact that not only did we have short hair but we didn't really wear much makeup. And we wore overalls, a style I am very thankful to say has not really made much of a come back over the years (although I did think I was adorable in my white painter-pant overalls and YES Andie Conder you WERE adorable in yours too).

Here's a nice example of a cute, short-haired girl who is my age, back in the day. She's Lady Grantham now in case you wondered:

At dinner the other night I mentioned this observation to my two long-haired, well-made up teenage daughters and Lilly said, "So, like what makeup did you wear the day you got married?"

"Mascara," I replied.

"And what else?"

"Just mascara. But I think I used a curling iron," I said, feebly.

This was kind of shocking and a bit hilarious to them both.

"Not even some eyeliner?" Grace asked.

"Nope. Even the girls who did wear 'a lot' of makeup did not wear eyeliner. Just a lot of blue eyeshadow and  lots of lip gloss."

Now-a-days even the youngest teen girls (not all, but many) have a working knowledge of eyeliner.

And then there is all that hair. Long hair was still popular too in my day but not tons and tons and tons of it. Extensions had not been invented so except for the odd slightly freaky girl who was going for the Crystal Gayle look (below) hair didn't go much past the shoulders.

I noticed that cute little Hayden Panettiere on "Nashville" plays a character who routinely wears her hair in three different lengths--her own (I assume), her longer going-out-in-public extensions, and then her even longer performing-on stage-extensions.

When she wears them at her longest, especially given she is petite, she kind of looks like Cousin It. Actually, so does her co-star, Connie Britton. That is a lot of hair between the two of them. You could coif half of St. Jude's with those extensions.

I believe you are always attracted to the look that was in when you came of age. That is probably why I still find boys with feathered hair kind of foxy. Like Shaun Cassidy. Just kidding, NO ONE has that hair anymore. By the way, do yourself a favor and DO NOT GOOGLE what he looks like now.

And why I think the most beautiful women in Hollywood are Halle Berry, Anne Hathaway (with short hair), and Heath Ledgers girlfriend.

This short hair, no makeup thing was really only a "thing" for a short time and if you look back at the past century really was the only time it was in for women to dress like ten-year-old boys.

Come to think of it, this also explains why I had no idea what a Lesbian looked like until well into my 30s because we all looked like Lesbians.

I'm not saying one way is better or not. I enjoyed the low-pressure almost non-existent grooming days (don't get me started on teeth whitening and body-hair removal) when I was a teen and in college but on the other hand, I kind of wish I had worn a little makeup and not sported a mullet in my wedding photos.

How about you? What look is still adorable to you because it was "in" even though it is most decidedly "out"? And what looks kind of ridiculous but is very "in" right now?

SPARE KEYS and CAPS and GOWNS

I know I have written about this before but that just makes it even sillier that we pretty much re-lived the craziness.

I am talking about the first day back at school/work after Winter Break. It's amazing that it can look even more chaotic and disorganized than the official first day of school.

Here's how ours looked.

It actually started out with some planning and forethought. Sunday night, anticipating a crazy morning, I had the kids move the cars around in the driveway. We have three cars that we have to stack in a small driveway because 1) we do not use the tiny garage except to store junk and 2)even though we no longer have snow in Chicago, we are not allowed to park on the street from November to April in anticipation of the snow-plow needing to get through.

So Grace and Atticus went out and moved the cars in the order in which they would be driven out.
Jeff would be leaving his car for me because both Atticus and I had doctors' appointments at the same time on Monday.

In the morning I offered to drive Jeff to the train thinking it was the least I could do when he was giving up his car.Unfortunately, when the moment came to drive him (with the usual amount of spare time being 0 minutes), we could not find the key to my car. And the fun began.

We tore through my locker, my purse, my coat pockets and then I roared "Lilly wake your brother up and tell him to find my G*#Damned keys!"In the ensuing madness, I found my car key--Atticus had left it in HIS car. WTF How do you leave one car key in a different car of all places?

I went back in the house to find Atticus (who is home from college on winter break) wandering around in a just-woken-up-daze wearing only his boxers pretending to look for my keys.

"I found them in your car!" I said through gritted teeth "But can you all please just put the damn keys back where they go?!" Jeff stuck his head in the door at this moment to yell, "I'm going to miss my train!"And off we roared.

He made his train but barely. I came back to the house to find the girls trying to sneak out to school without having to listen to me rant again.

Later, when I found my spare key in my purse, I decided that perhaps it wasn't ALL the kids' fault. Jeff told me to resist the temptation to confess but I felt bad that I was really more a part of the problem than I had thought.

And when I went to my doctor's appointment and was told I was there on the wrong day, I had the sneaking suspicion that perhaps I am not just part of the problem but I am the problem.

And I thought that again this morning when Grace called from school to tell me it was cap and gown/grad announcment order day and everyone but her had a filled out form and I realized I not only did not have the form but had mistakenly thrown it away a few weeks ago thinking it was just an order for a class ring.

On the plus side, the kids have dutifully hung up the keys in their appointed space for two whole days now.

So if your first full work/school week of 2013 got off to a rocky start, rest assured, it did too for the Self-Righteous Housewife. And if past is any predictor of future it will next year too.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

AUNT DELIA AND THE CHRISTMAS PARTY

Family legend has it that my Aunt Delia (the most beautiful and glamorous of the aunts) was known to host fun parties but when she was done with the party she would just leave and go to bed.

I do not know if this really happened or maybe happened once or many times but it is a good story.

We hosted our annual Christmas party this past Saturday. This is a great bash with about forty of our best friends and neighbors in Glenview we have hosted for fifteen years.

At about 9:30 I was talking to someone and thought, "Oh my gosh, I'm not sure I can stay awake all night." I said, "Excuse me, I have to check on Lilly, " whhich is a preposterous statement as Lilly is fourteen and was sensibly holed up in her bedroom ignoring the noise below.

I went into my bedroom and emboldened by thoughts of Aunt Delia lay down on the bed. In a few minutes Jeff came up the stairs. I thought he came to check on me but he was surprised to find me there.

"I just need to lie down a minute," he said and did.

We lay there holding hands wondering how long we could be gone from our own party without being missed. We figured hours actually.

We listened to the roar from below and it was quite festive and comforting like when you were a kid and your parents had a party and you could hear it all. It was a little annoying when their bursts of laughter interrupted your Partridge Family but otherwise it was fun and reassuring.

All those voices talking and laughing were so lovely. I thought about all those friends downstairs who have been there for us over the years through the good times and most recently the challenging times and I thought about how much I love them all and I may have gotten a little weepy--in a good way.

After about fifteen minutes I rose, refreshed. "Come on," I said to Jeff.

"I love martineesh," Jeff declared. I suggested maybe he had enough martinis but he waved me off.

We went back and I was just fine, fully alert and ready for the rest of the party (and so was Jeff by the way--he took a walk around the block with his BFF Dan instead of having another martini)  In fact, I made it all the way to 1:00 a.m. and I did not feel the urge to gather everyone's coats off the bed and hand them back to the few stragglers like I did in 2005 (or so). Nor did I have to put my pajamas on which is how I signal my dear friend Beth that it is time to go when she is visiting.

So next time you are at a party and need a little break go lie down. Even if if is your own party.

If anyone gives you a hard time about it, tell them Aunt Delia told you to.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

MY BOOK AT LONG LAST!!!

Okay loyal readers, just in time for Christmas gift-giving, I announce my book, a collection of my greatest hits and essays is now available for purchase!!

Simply click here and you will be directed to Amazon.com where you can purchase my book for yourself or as a gift!!

This is a real book in print with a soft-cover. Soon, VERY soon you can also purchase this for your Kindle so check back in a few days if that is your preferred method of reading.

I also HIGHLY encourage any of you to write a  nice review of the book when you've read it and that will really help with getting me noticed by someone other than my mom!

To all my readers I thank  you for getting me this far!
Happy Holidays!

MY DOG TELLS YOU ABOUT THE SKUNK

Today's post is written by my dog Molly.

Oh my gosh it was the most awesome best super coolest thing that ever ever happened to me. I call it "the night I finally caught an animal in my mouth."

I'm not saying I've NEVER caught anything but well, okay, I've never caught anything.

Every day I try. I really do. There's this squirrel that lives out on the woodpile and if I can get Mom to open the door at just the right time I can scare the crap out of that thing, chasing it through the yard while it chatters and yells at me up top of the fence. But I can't catch it. It's too fast.

Mom always says, "Go get her! Go get your squirrel friend," she thinks that's really funny. But I never catch her.

Once I caught a delicious dead thing from behind the shed. I took it to Mom but she did not like it and screamed and made me drop it. She called it a mold or something. Dad just went out and took it away so I did not even have a chance to grab it by the neck and rip it to shreds the way I practice on all my stuffed toys.

But that night, last August, I caught a big black thing with two white lines on its back and it was ALIVE!

I almost didn't get the chance. Mom quit letting me out after dark unless I'm on a leash for some reason late this summer. I heard her tell my human brother and sisters I couldn't go out after dark. I don't know why. I'm not scared. And I see great in the dark. But she said it was a bad idea.

So I just waited until she was having one of those drinks Dad makes her in a triangle-shaped glass. After she has one of those she kind of forgets things. It worked. I waited until Dad something real funny and she laughed and then I asked real politely to go outside. She got up and opened up the door to let me out like she did not even remember she just told the kids not to do that an hour before.

I took off like a shot to the back of the yard where all the animals hide at night. Mom started screaming then but nothing could have stopped me. She was screaming "Molly, NOOOOOOO. SKUUUUUNKKKKK!!"

I could see it out by the back bushes. Kind of fluffy and pretty. All tempting with it's big black and white tail. I caught it easy. It was not fast at all and it couldn't jump up on the fence like that squirrel does.

I had it in my mouth so of course I took it right to Mom on the patio. My plan was to shake the hell out of it, break it's neck, then tear it's throat open! I don't know what I would do after that, but I practice doing that ALL the time on stuffed animals and I knew it was just what I was supposed to do with that thing. It was all wiggly in my mouth and I liked that even more. Those dumb stuffed animals don't move when I grab them at all!

But then something really weird happened. Some kind of yellow, stinky wet stuff got all over me! I have NO idea where it came from, but it was so smelly and so yucky I had to drop the stripey animal I finally caught. That stuff (it was yellow and got in my eyes and on my neck!) must have come down out of the tree I was standing next to. Or maybe Mom threw it at me or something to get me to drop the stripey live animal. I don't know but it was NASTY!

Mom was screaming. Dad was screaming. Man were they excited and proud of me to finally have caught a real live animal IN MY MOUTH!

But because of that really weird spray thing that came from nowhere I had to go in right then and take a bath. A really long bath. Then mom gave me another bath. Then Lilly gave me a bath. Then they made me sleep in the bathroom all night. I didn't want to sleep in the bathroom but I could tell everyone was kind of mad about the smelly yellow stuff so I didn't complain.

The next day I went looking for my stripey friend but I have not seen it since then. Maybe it moved to someone else's backyard. I wish it would come back. I would LOVE to catch it again. IN MY MOUTH.

I had to have about eleventy dozen more baths and you know what I still smell a little like that weird tree smell or whatever. And it's been weeks now. I don't mind the smell anymore because it reminds me of the best night of my life ever. The night I finally caught something LIVE IN MY MOUTH!

And I can tell you too, if I EVER get the chance to catch another stripey thing in my mouth LIVE, I will totally try it again. 

Because that was the best thing that ever happened to me.

SMILE FOR THE CAMERA

If you think the family portrait is hard to pull-off just try the intergenerational one. Here are the Ludwig kids and their Rahn cousins with Grandma and Grandpa Ludwig, summer of 1998. 

The baby is Lilly. L to R: Atticus, Grace, Sarah, Brian, and Michael

"I don't see you on the schedule," I said frowning at my list of names.

It was church-directory picture-taking week last month and I had offered to help register families as they came in all shiny and well-combed and neat.  I was talking to a long-time parishioner so I was confused as to why her family's label was missing.

She waved my concern away, "Oh that's because we were here earlier in the week and it didn't go well. The boys had a meltdown, my husband complained, and I ended up in tears so we had to just leave."

Ah, the family portrait. Good times.

If you want to see a middle-aged mom roll her eyes, just ask her about the last time she tried to get her family together for a formal photo.

As every mother knows, it is exceedingly challenging to wrangle all the members of your family for this seemingly simple task. Whether you are dealing with colicky babies, cranky toddlers, or busy, busy, teenagers, it is a Sisyphean chore to get them all in one spot at one time looking well-dressed and well-groomed and not crying.

I don't know why we even try.

Yes I do. It's because one of our jobs is to curate an archive of the family history and a formal family portrait every few years is a big part of the exhibit.

When the kids were little I went for the old dress-em-all-alike look which involved weeks of scouring Target for similar outfits. What a colossal waste of time.

Even after making sure I had something that fit each and every one of us (sometime this process took so long someone outgrew something) and finding a time when no one was napping and dad was home, I would still meet with resistance from the crowd.

Really? Is it so much to ask that you people put the outfit on that I laid out for you on your bed and go smile at the camera for half an hour?

"Do I have to go get my picture taken! I don't wanna. I don't wanna wear jeans and a black t-shirt like everyone else," the whining would begin. The kids were worse.

So in recent years I've adopted the "I don't care what you're wearing, just comb your hair and let's go" policy. Which you think would take care of all the problems and resistance but no, just as you get to this point, the kids will be teenagers and have all kinds of school and after-school activities to conflict with a scheduled photo time.

This year I rescheduled our time slot three times to accommodate the work-choir-horseback riding commitments of my brood. I wasn't quite ready to adopt my friend Laura's policy-- "I just scheduled a time and figured it was like dinner on any given night--whoever shows up is in."

This time around I was introduced to a new wrinkle in the whole process--with kids headed off to college it is even less likely you will be able to pull off a complete family portrait.

Mom friends told me their college children had expressed disbelief and even outrage that they would not be in the church directory. One mom said she had a different shot of the family taken and submitted it to accommodate their college kid. Another one submitted their college student's picture separately.

So as we four who were once five stood fake smiling I said a little sadly, "This is weird without Atticus."

But Grace was more pragmatic, "This is who we are now. Let's just take the picture."

Which I think is the perfect sentiment of any formal family picture and a gentle reminder of the ever-changing nature of family.

This is who we are now.

TWO BUTTONS DOWN, TWO TO GO

Nice skirt.

Most of you know I just dropped number one child off for college and may even be expecting me to write something sentimental and insightful about that experience but all I can say is man that sucks.

And if you are struggling with it like I am you might want to read my friend Christie Mellor's latest book, Fun Without Dick and Jane which is so very cleverly titled you just know it is full of helpful coping advice, which it is.

Instead, I want to write about how much I love back to school time and especially the clothes we wear for the occasion. I have loved back to school since I was in grade school and I would wear a plaid dress with a big white collar (had to be plaid, my favorite; had to be a dress, we were not allowed to wear pants to school back then). I love my first day of school photos with my gap-toothed grin as I stand clutching my pencil box. Remember those?

As far as I remember I wore the same version of that first plaid dress up until about junior high. I clearly remember my 7th grade outfit. By then we were allowed to wear pants to school and I wore purple bell-bottoms with laces on the side. I had a matching purple body suit (snapped at the crotch) that laced up the front and even though it was all one piece it was supposed to look like you were wearing a short-sleeved shirt over a long sleeved shirt which was the height of fashion in 1973. The bells on my purple pants were so wide they covered my shoes. That is how we measured if they were big enough. I could make a joke about that outfit but I think it speaks for itself.

And I loved going off to college in Ann Arbor with my THREE Pendleton wool skirts my mom made me especially the red and black plaid one. They looked fabulous with my shetland sweaters and my penny-loafers which were back in style in the late 70s after having been mothballed since the 50s.

Since I have had my kids I wear my own red and plaid skirt every first day of school when I get my picture taken with the kids--see above. I have worn that skirt for the past 14 years.

Except.

Except that this year, I had to unbutton not one but TWO of the buttons on my skirt to fit in it. I know, I could buy a new one but really, I am much too old to wear a plaid skirt to begin with let alone buy a new one.

Several years back, Barbara Brotman of the Chicago Tribune wrote a whole column on being too old to wear a plaid pleated skirt which I literally read while wearing my plaid pleated skirt. I am sorry to say I cannot find that column and if any of you do, let me know (Maria?).

Anyhoo, I pointed out to Lilly that I had two buttons unbuttoned and that maybe it was time to give up on the skirt but she loves tradition more than any of us and looked at me with horror at the suggestion. I guess I have two more buttons to go so I don't see any reason to get rid of it now.

And by the way, speaking of tradition, I did get to read "Kissing Hand" to all the kids even Atticus on the day we drove him to college but I had to sneak in his room and read it to him while he was barely awake so he wouldn't hear me cry and I also had to change some of the words to nonsense like, "Chester skipped off to school and did not look back the little bastard," also so I would not cry too hard.

So, if you have any back to school memories of particularly fetching or ridiculous clothes you wore or wear still, let me know.

Cute girls. Some day their fashion may be funny too!

DON'T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU

Well here we are. August 1st and that means tuition bills are due and (for many of us) our eldest child is getting ready to go to college for the first time.

I feel like we've prepared for this for a long, long time. We watched our friends do it, we've listened to their advice and now it's our turn.

So far they have been right: This is a difficult, sad, often grief-filled time in which you struggle to deal with the impending separation--but most of the time you will be thinking--hey can you get out of my house now?

Yes, just as I was counseled by the wise women who have gone before me, a young person between his or her senior year of high school and first year of college is umm, well, kind of a pain in the neck. This is nature's way of making it easier to say goodbye.

I'm not sure what it is a mom might find annoying....Maybe it's the way he sleeps until noon then spends the early evening hours with his girlfriend and the late nights on the computer until the wee hours. Could it be his general attitude that he no longer has any family obligations but is still entitled to the whole free food/free laundry thing? Or the way he leaves his socks on the kitchen floor and sometimes his pants and shirt too when he comes home hours after you have already been in bed. Perhaps it's that he's taken to showering in your shower (it's closer than his) so when you go to shower there are no clean towels.

It's true, I will cry when I leave him at the dorm but he's virtually already gone. I only see the back of his head as he plays on the computer or leaves the house yet again to "hang" with someone. 

His sisters and I have taken to talking about him as if he's gone. "Hey, can I put my bunnies in Atticus's room now?" one asks. "I'm still here!" he cries indignantly.

The other sister (and I) can't wait to clear out the hovel in the corner of the kitchen that has been his computer/work space. We pour over Houzz online and pick out new furniture to fill in the space. (That corner below...what do you think?)

I remember when my mom went to parent orientation at Michigan State for my sister (the eldest) and came back and said, "They told us not to turn their bedrooms into sewing rooms. They need to know they're welcome at home." So at first I said no to the bunny hutch idea. But then a wise friend suggested, "Why don't you just move the rabbits back out when he comes home? You can enjoy the extra space while he's away."

Good idea.

So we're all a bit sad that Atticus will be leaving soon (in twenty-four days, three hours, and six minutes).

But we're also looking forward to an actual kitchen table, a sock-free floor, and clean dry towels.

(A special shout out to Kelly and Wendy who have been there from kindergarten...can you believe it's really happening?)