Househusband

“So Jim,” I said, “I finally got an idea for an essay that might actually work.”

“What is it?”

“Well I would need your input. Your side of the story as it were.”

“Yessss?”

“Remember the year I went to graduate school and you were househusband?”

“Vividly.”

“Well I thought it might be fun if we each gave our side of the story.”

“You mean how I worked myself to the bone while you were off hanging around in some library?”

“Not exactly. I mean how I was grinding away at five graduate level classes while you were playing with the kids and reading the newspaper and letting the laundry pile up.”

“You mean how I did all the cooking and the laundry and the dishes in addition to childcare and my awful part-time jobs that fed and clothed us?”

“No, how I did all the cooking and cleaning and washing up in addition to childcare and writing papers and attending class and doing lengthy assignments that required me to work in the library hours on end.”

“While I just dilly-dallied?”

“I wouldn’t say that.”

“Just what would you say?”

“You were always yelling as you went out the door, ‘Don't do the dishes. I’ll do them when I get home.’  Or when I started to clean, you would say, ‘Stop. That's my job. I’ll do it later!’ Later never came.”

“You never gave me a chance. You always went ahead and did them.”

“It was so silly of me I would promise myself not to do and leave the mess but there came a time I would need a pan or a plate or a diaper or just a path to the door through the toys and I would end up cleaning.” 

“You didn't have faith in me.”

“Of course I did. I had faith that you wouldn't ever get around to actually doing the chores.”

“That's cold.”

“You had wonderful intentions. And the kids had a good time. I do remember how sweet it was every time I came home from class to wade through the mess thinking I was going to kill you until I would find you and Amy and Tony hiding in the living room closet. It was always the same closet.”

“It was the only closet big enough for the three of us.”

“You would all yell ‘Mommy’s home! Yay yay!’ And I would forget the mess.”

“Mess?”

“Well yeah. There were toys and laundry and newspaper all over the place.”

“That's not how I remember it. I remember changing diapers and making kid meals and making dinner and washing incredible piles of dirty dishes and going to the laundry with both of them and vacuuming constantly and cleaning bathrooms and going to the park with a bunch of toys and snacks.”

“Funny, that's just how I remember it. Only it was me doing it.”

“Maybe it was both of us.”

“It was pretty crazy.”

“When did you have time for your jobs?”

“When did you have time for your classes?”

“Those were the good old days weren’t they?”

“Yeah. Lets not talk about it anymore.”

And maybe this isn’t such a good idea for an essay.

Marshmallow

The doctor who developed the famous Marshmallow Experiment has died.

I am sorry for his loss, but all I could really think about was how much that experiment has bothered me. 

The test involved offering a four or five year child old a single marshmallow immediately or with the caveat that if he or she could put off eating it for 15 minutes or so, he or she would get a second marshmallow. 

I have long accepted that I would have failed that test. It reveals whether or not a child has self-discipline and predicts success in life.

Now I don't think I am a failure in life, but I know that I have never been one to delay gratification.

The nuns in my grade school were really into delayed gratification.  They tried their best to get me to give up goodies, to “offer it up to God” as they put it.

“Don't eat that cookie. Offer it up to God.” I wasn't good at that. I didn't think God would want my cookie and it would just lie there in the box, so why give it up?

And Lent? Giving up things like candy and television for six weeks was really difficult. I would sulk when my mother suggested I eat something healthy as a snack. “Just have a glass of milk if you’re hungry,” she would say. Who wants a glass of milk without Oreos to dunk in it?

I always seemed to be hungry after school. After all, hadn’t I spent the entire day giving things up for God? The recess snack store wasn't open during Lent and I gave most of my allowance to the Bishops Relief Fund instead. A few descriptions of starving babies and I gladly gave them my money. I was fine with it until I opened my lunch box to a peanut butter sandwich and an apple. Not a cookie in sight.

And thus I failed miserably at giving things up. I began to see myself as selfish and entirely lacking discipline. Or to put it plainly: a weakling.

But here is the part I have always wondered about. The famous test involved marshmallows and I never liked marshmallows.

Marshmallows weren’t worth eating as far as I was concerned. They were overly sweet and stuck to your teeth and made them hurt. They had a slightly chalky outer layer so unless they were toasted or floating on top of hot chocolate I considered them yucky.

I may have been a weakling where goodies were concerned, but I was a weakling with taste.

So I would have passed the marshmallow test with flying colors. One now or two later doesn't mean much if you don't like what is being offered. I am sure I would have said “OK, I’ll wait.” Just because it seemed like what I was supposed to do. I mean it was obvious that I should wait.

So here’s the real issue: if I had passed the test, would I have been identified as a child with self-discipline? Would I have believed it?  Would I have seen myself differently? Would I have given things up with ease during Lent? Would I have been a favorite of the nuns? "Look at Paula. She is always giving things up for God.”

Maybe I wouldn't have come home from school every afternoon with plans to make popcorn and fudge. Maybe I would have done my homework instead of watching Gunsmoke? Saved my allowance instead of spending it on goodies?

Would I have stuck with diets? Exercised every day?

Maybe I would have become ambitious.

Would I now be a slimmer person?

 Or maybe even rich?

Of course, if they offered me a Reese’s Peanut Butter cup…

Named

I just read an essay about the trials and tribulations of having an unusual name like Maeve. In fact the essay was written by the Irish humorist Maeve Higgins.

Americans call her Meeve or Merv or Mavvy even Mauve. I have such a straightforward name I found myself feeling a bit jealous. Maeve got about 3000 words out of her name; I don't think I could get 300.

I mean Paula is a really nice name. I’ve been among those who actually liked her name. I am eternally grateful to my mother for standing firm against Agostina, my Sicilian grandmother’s name. Until I read Maeve’s essay.

I could have gotten a lot of mileage out of my dear Gramma’s name. I can just imagine the trials of being called Gus. The unusual spelling. Wow what a gold mine I missed out on.

I just never had any problems with my name. No one mispronounced it.  There doesn’t even seem to be a nickname for Paula. Daddy would call me Polly occasionally. But nothing else ever came up.

And spelling? A cinch.

There was a slight problem with people who wanted to call me by another name like Pauline or Paulette or even Phyllis. I never understood why but the only time it really got on my nerves was in high school when a certain Mary Lou Prather decided to call me Carol, a name she considered preferable to Paula. We never became friends.

Maeve had a nice section on her namesake, a Maeve of Connaught, a warrior queen and so promiscuous she never made it to saint. Some say her name means 'she who intoxicates.'

Jealous again.

What does Paula mean?  It's from the Latin for 'small.'

Agostina means majestic!

As namesakes go I had a choice between St. Paul - who always seemed to be a grouch - and St. Paula of Rome - a virtuous, married lady with five children.

St. Paul’s falling off a horse and becoming all evangelistic made him a know it all and unattractive. It was impressive that he travelled all that way into Turkey to spread the gospel and write tons of Epistles we had to listen to during Sunday Mass. I was surprised when I visited Cappadocia that he had gotten that far.

But he’s the one who decided women had to cover their heads in church and couldn't teach or assume any authority in the church. So why would I want him as a patron saint?

St. Paula of Rome, who had a happy marriage to a nice man named Toxotius, only became really saintly after he died. They had been rich and happy but when he died she gave up her society life and went to build hospices and convents in Bethlehem. She wasn’t for me either. Five children? It was interesting that she ran off to be with St Jerome but it never occurred to me that their relationship wasn’t on the up and up. This wasn't the role model I wanted either.

I don't come across a lot of Paula’s. So I always wondered where my mom came up with it. 

Apparently there was a movie called Random Harvest that came out in 1942 starring Ronald Colman, who had what was termed a mellifluous voice. The way he said "Paula" with his British accent was quite a turn on for the day. In the movie he loved Greer Garson, who had red hair and nursed him through amnesia. But when he got his memory back he simply forgot her and went back to his lordly estate leaving her a mess in Scotland. I think they got together about 20 years later.

It always sounded like a likely source to me but my mother insisted she discovered the name all by herself. She said the movie came out after I was baptized and had nothing to do with her pushing the name on Daddy and his family who, I may have mentioned, wanted to name me Agostina.

I do know that Saint Augustine was even more of a grouch than St. Paul.

If only St. Paula could have been more interesting … like Queen Maeve.

There is a St. Pauline of the Agonizing Heart of Jesus. I suppose she might be more exciting in a martyrish kind of way.

Or I'll  just look for  a recording of Ronald Colman mellifluously saying my name: Pauuugh-luh.

Museless

I woke up in a panic again this morning. I fear I will never find my muse again.

Muse is such a nice way of expressing the depressing truth of writers block without spelling it out. Say muse and it is immediately understood by anyone who has ever faced a blank page with a total lack of inspiration. Or in my case, the words still appear but they just lie there bored to tears.

It has been almost a year since I have been able to write anything I felt was worthwhile.

I could say writing was a phase that is now over. After all, I am getting more forgetful, maybe I just can’t concentrate anymore.

I have at least 27 aborted essays. A few I thought were successful until I reread them. And quite a number of ideas petered out after no more than a few paragraphs.

My muse is hiding under a rock somewhere or more likely has found a nicer apartment.

I liked some of the ideas, like the beginning of an essay about Harvey the giant rabbit who befriended Jimmy Stewart in a 1940s classic. I thought it might be nice to have a pooka to hang out with. We could just give up on reality and have a good time. But I don't drink as much as Harvey and Jimmy any more and that idea seemed to need alcoholic inspiration to keep it going.

I’ve thought about returning to the subject of college football, which is still overrun by big ten’s and 12s and even some bunch called the gang of eight … or was it nine? But I quickly figured out it was sort of a case of ‘been there, done that’. Besides, Jim dealt so well with that first round of football bashing, I didn't want to risk endangering our Football Saturday Truce.

I wanted to do an ode to the Great British Baking show, but somehow after watching an episode, I am inspired more by the oven than the keyboard. Did make a nice Bakewell tart, a Victorian sandwich cake and a dozen fairy cakes my grandsons rather approved of.

I tried to write about Little Women - about how I preferred Amy to Jo. How I was annoyed with Jo for being so militantly above girl things like makeup and nice clothes and was portrayed as a better person because of it. I thought you could believe in women’s rights in a really flattering dress and the right shade of lipstick. That’s why I insisted on naming our daughter Amy, who is, I might say, a true feminist with a little mascara.

Then there was the one about trying to take photos of birds. That lasted as long as that one sentence. Birds have tendency to be far away and disappear before I can get close enough for a good shot.

Oh yeah, I got going on an essay about the superiority of cannoli in Sicily and another about my travels, trying to keep up with my husband and his 85 year old sister who is in better shape than either of us.

So it hasn't been for a lack of inspiration. It’s just that my muse doesn't stick around long enough for my essay to work out. Kind of like those birds who don't seem to want to be in my photos.