Hello world, I'm going to be a nana (original title)

Brush up on lullabies, there’s a baby on the way

Published 11/14/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 11/11/2013 01:07 PM

Graffiti the walls, hoist a banner, shout, sing, skywrite it, I'm going to be a grandmother.
Becoming a grandmother is not unusual, it happens all the time, but not to me. To say I am over the moon is putting it mildly because this little one will be our first. She's a girl and I could not be more pleased.
My generation of women is unique when it comes to birthing babies and having grandchildren. It was not unusual for women raised during the sixties to find themselves pregnant right along with their daughters. Not me of course, but some women I graduated with are great-grandmothers. Now some women don't get pregnant until AARP membership becomes a beacon of reality at the end of their next decade.
Today, women have choices. My generation realized a shift in roles. As a young girl I was told to marry a rich man and he would take of care me. As a teenager, the mantra of my parents changed: "Get an education so you can take care of yourself."
My mother often said, "For a long and lasting marriage financial dependence does not a firm foundation make." Sure mom, but now it takes two incomes just to make it from the produce aisle of the supermarket to the milk case.
I was an older mother, (not the norm back then), having my daughters when I was in my mid and late 30s. I remember a school function I attended when my oldest (she's the pregnant daughter) was in first grade. A woman walked up to me and exclaimed with great satisfaction how pleased she was that she wasn't the only grandmother attending that day.
"I'm the mother," I remember saying with a bit of attitude. At the time I felt offended. Did I really look like a grandmother? My definition of a grandmother was based on my own. They both wore aprons with a little chain of safety pins on the bibs. My Connecticut nana always had butterscotch hard candies in her apron pockets and my New Jersey nana had a dust cloth crammed in hers. I don't wear aprons, I don't dust and I never really liked butterscotch. I'm a Werther's kind of woman.
When I mention the impending event, every woman I know, who has trod the path I am now delightedly floating down, has told me that being a grandmother (and they always lean close and whisper this part), is even better than having your own children. You get to enjoy them, spoil them and give them back. You don't have to suffer the effects of a kid up all night after eating too many M&Ms.
I overheard my pregnant daughter talking to her pregnant friend about what they are going through. The friend was asking my daughter's advice because she's been pregnant a couple of months longer.
"Hey, ask me," I said, "I've done this twice you know."
My daughter advised me that everything is different now. Ah ... I don't think so. Whether you give birth in a fancy hospital with your husband by your side or in a cave while he's out stalking dinner, the process is pretty much the same, although you're supposed to let babies sleep on their backs now.
My daughter has registered at two large stores for baby gifts; baby accoutrements can match any kid's haul going off to college for the first time. The whole registry thing is amazing, I mean, you can register for birthdays, graduations, weddings and anniversaries, plus new home and holidays.
I want a grandmother's registry, no aprons or butterscotch candies on mine, just lots and lots of love. Never 'enough said' on love.
CAROLYNN IS STOCK-PILING M&MS AND DISPOSABLE DIAPERS. EMAIL HER AT CP.ENOUGHSAID@AOL.COM.

A temporary electronic slowdown a good thing (original title)

Electronic slowdown a good thing

Published 10/31/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 10/29/2013 01:07 PM

I came downstairs this morning to my family sitting in the living room, drinking coffee and eating breakfast, while staring at a blue television screen like it was a campfire. A message on the screen read, "One moment please."
"What's up?" I asked.
"Cable's out. We're waiting for it to come back on," was the response.
My husband told the kids not to touch the TV because I would fix it when I got up. He said I know about that kind of stuff. Actually, I know nothing about that kind of stuff, but he knows even less.
So I unplugged plugs, disconnected cables and then hooked everything back up. Then I did what every trapped-in-silence and out-of-touch cable customer does, I called (1-800-my-TV-computer-and-phone aren't working). We bundled, so I used my cellphone to make the call.
The familiar female cable company voice electronically promised to send a refresh signal.
When I mentioned that the cable employee said it would take 40 to 60 minutes to complete the channel lineup, the living room squatters scattered like teenagers at a party when the cops arrive.
I sat down with my coffee and a magazine. They had to leave for work but I had a few hours before I had to go in.
One by one they dressed and departed. My daughter, the first one out the door called about a minute down the road to tell me that there were five cable trucks at the end of our street.
I waited in a house almost as silent as the house after Gloria and Sandy. The power was on so I could hear the whir of the fridge and last night's chicken boiling in a pot on the stove for soup. Because online access was compromised I was unable to check my email, favorite blogs and couldn't access Facebook. That is a good thing because those are tremendous time-suckers.
I remember life before electronics. The phone was black, heavy and had a dial. Television was new - we had the first set on our block - and like the phone it was black plastic and huge. There was no remote, we didn't need one. With three stations, two watchable and one snowy, my brother and I were the remote. We watched what Dad wanted to, anyway.
Back then TV stations signed off at midnight. Accompanying a picture of an American flag waving in the wind, they'd play the national anthem. Then the screen would flip to a test pattern and implode to a tiny dot in the middle of the screen. On the rare occasions when I got to stay up late and watch "Sea Hunt" on Saturday night my mother would yell to go to bed when it was over. I'd press my cheek against the screen and stare at the dot and yell back that I'd go to bed when the dot disappeared.
For kids television revolved around "Mickey Mouse Club" at 4:30 in the afternoon and "Sky King" and Shari Lewis on Saturday mornings. That's when it started actually, the television as background noise filling in the empty silent space that was our days. My childhood memories are always accompanied by Western shoot-em-up sound tracks in the background.
Now, life is never quiet and we are rarely out of touch. With network, satellite and online streaming we have ear buds, earphones and surround-sound to drench us constantly in music and news.
The house is still quiet, the soup still boiling and I am loving the temporary electronic slowdown, even though I am drawn to my computer screen like a fly to a light bulb. Enough said.

Ciao, that's hello and goodbye in Italian (original title)

It's time for a new passport

Published 10/17/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 10/18/2013 12:28 PM

We're going to Italy, at least that's what my husband, his cousin and a couple of his friends decided. I'm ready. I'll go. Just sign me up.
Problem - when the decision was made, my husband and I didn't have a passport. In this day and age of global interactive initiatives between cultures, who does not have a passport? Even Elmo has a passport, or at least his picture is on a passport cover.
It's finally time to expand our horizons and travel beyond our borders. The last time we left the country Ross Perot was running for president and we went to Nova Scotia and did the whole Cape Breton loop. We were allowed out and back in on the legitimacy of our driver's licenses. Now we need a universal form of identification which supersedes the legal viability of all current IDs, including our Connecticut driver's licenses, credit cards and every supermarket, pharmacy and other store rewards card hanging from my key chain.
Obtaining the paperwork was easy, it's online and in a little cardboard stand-up in the post office. We can do this, I thought, until we realized we needed to find our birth certificates. No problem, I knew right where they were.
Observation - you know you're getting old when your original birth certificate is so out-of-date you may not use it as an actual certificate of birth and must obtain a new one. The new ones are called the "long form" birth certificates and $20 and remembering which towns we were born in, got us new ones.
So, I filled out the information needed to apply for my passport. I was instructed to use a black pen and only to fill in the designated areas, using my best penmanship. My husband used a black pen but because his idea of written communication looks like the beach at low tide after a flock of emaciated seagulls have been fighting over the same clam, it was barely legible. Then we were off to AAA for our passport photos.
I had combed my hair, applied foundation and even eye makeup. I always do that for a driver's license, I mean really, I'll be stuck with that photo for so long why not primp to get my passport glamour-shot right. Even with a morning's worth of preparation I still looked like my mother subsequent to an afternoon of gardening in the middle of July.
I had an old passport. Barely out of my teens, I got to spend a year in South Africa. I handed the old passport in with my application and photo for a new one. The post office employee gathering our paperwork humorously declared my old passport ancient. He loudly exclaimed to a lobby full of customers who were impatiently waiting behind us, as we declared ourselves non-subversive, that he hadn't seen that color passport cover in a reeee-ally looo-ong time. I got it a year before Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. Maybe I should have slipped it in a nice little Elmo cover.
Once we handed in everything to prove we were, who we said we were, we had to raise our right hands and swear to an oath. Mr. Post Office-funny man recited so fast, that all I could do was nod and say I do or I will. I felt like I was checking one of those little (nobody reads the fine print) "I agree" boxes on the computer. All I know is that I love my country and I certainly won't do anything to subvert her.
Aver detto abbastanz, that's "enough said" in Italian, I think.
CAROLYNN PIANTA IS EXPANDING HER ITALIAN BEYOND WORDS SUCH AS LINGUINI AND RIGATONI. EMAIL HER AT CP.ENOUGHSAID@AOL.COM.

To Downsize or not to downsize, (original title)

House stuffed with family memories

Published 10/03/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 09/30/2013 05:26 PM

A friend of mine went from a large home with four bedrooms to a more manageable smaller house with three. Another shed four acres, a formal dining room, five bedrooms, three-and-a-half baths and a two-car garage, for a double-wide with a carport.
It's called downsizing and it's something I want to do - now. Problem is my big house is full, not only with rooms of furniture but with people. The people, children with spouses, I'm not worried about, they're looking to upsize just as soon as they can, it's the stuff we have accumulated which concerns me.
We have lived in this house going on 10 years but a lot of the stuff we brought with us has been around for the more than 30 years we have been married. Do we really need my husband's beer stein collection stored in Huggies diaper boxes? They were packed away when the spare room in our old house became a nursery 29 years ago. To be fair, somewhere there's a demitasse spoon collection of mine which has more than 300 spoons from all over the world. I haven't seen them since before I was married but I feel an odd kind of comfort in knowing they reside somewhere near the beer steins.
My attic looks like the local town's transfer station on a Saturday morning, without the big green dumpsters.
It's like an archeological dig up there, the floor sectioned off by kid and college year; books and bedding tells me who and when, by how far back the piles reach. I have half a dozen sets of extra-long dorm sheets for the years our children actually lived on campus; a new set each year was mandatory because color tastes changed and lack of laundering habits did not. There are comforters, clothes baskets and enough plastic bins to fill the storage aisle at Wal-Mart - actually they came from Wal-Mart.
We have funky multi-colored lamps and a papa-san chair that went from dorms, to apartments, and back to the attic so many times that I'm not sure where it is now, probably in one of those big green dumpsters.
Adding to the college flotsam and jetsam are the good, the bad and the totally unnecessary detritus of four households. Our daughters and their husbands have stored their accumulations up there while their upsizings have been put temporarily on hold. Our mound of still-sealed boxes from our move a decade ago remains stacked in a corner alongside a few leftovers from my mother-in-law, may she rest in organized peace.
I want to rid ourselves of our stuff.
The plan each year has been for all of us to proceed to the attic to peruse, sort, throw away, and organize. Attic cleaning is tricky though, it cannot be effectively accomplished in any season other than late fall, although late spring might work. Summer is too hot; the decorative Christmas candles became lovely red and green blobs sprinkled with silver and gold glitter. Spending time up there in July would be deadly. Winter is too cold. I'm sorry but wearing my down parka, gloves and a scarf are more conducive to snowshoeing than attic cleaning; three pair of snowshoes are hidden up there, too.
If I think about what actually has to be accomplished regarding the cleaning, editing and organizing of the attic, basement, closets, cabinets, drawers, cracks and crevices we have filled with the tangible collected memories of our lives, the task is daunting. I might actually consider staying put until my leftovers are stacked next to those of my dear departed mother-in-law, may we rest in peace in hoarders paradise heaven.
Enough said.
CAROLYNN PIANTA HAS ORDERED A DUMPSTER. EMAIL HER AT CP.ENOUGHSAID@AOL.COM

Hello, is anybody there...press 1 (original title)

Patience is a virtue when it comes to customer service

Published 09/19/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 09/16/2013 01:06 PM

 

I'm a pretty easy-going person. I smile at old people, which means I smile at people my own age. And I'm nice to little children and animals, having had my share of both. At the Motor Vehicle Department I show respect for the people behind the counter who must deal with an arrogant public, we have a chip on our shoulders because we're on-guard against the difficulties inherent with anything smacking of government bureaucracy. I don't have a chip. I'm not like that. I'm nice. I follow the rules and if someone treats me badly I write a scathing letter no one reads.
A few minutes ago I got off the phone with a very nice lady named Michelle at the Social Security call center in Baltimore. I know it was Baltimore because I asked. I like talking to Americans when I have a problem, frankly I like talking to anyone if I can understand them, especially if their aim is to provide service to this customer.
I once had a nice conversation with a guy named Rich at a call center in Texas. I can't remember why I was calling him, to me cable, utilities, government services and Peapod all sound the same. All I know is that I could barely understand a word that sweet Texan was saying. I told him I'd call back. I never did.
Because the wait time was over 45 minutes, Michelle, the Social Security agent, was calling me via the Social Security call-back service. I needed her to explain my Medicare status. Yeah, scary, I qualify now. Let me be clear here, if you want an example of government bureaucracy at its finest, just try using Social Security's automated phone system. It has a menu of options twice the length of a Ruby Tuesday's menu; you don't get garlic biscuits while you wait either. Michelle was helpful sort-of. I have to call back in two weeks because she didn't have an answer.
A few months ago my husband and I were getting phone calls originating from Vermont asking that we answer health questions for a survey sponsored by the state of Connecticut. If the state of Connecticut needs health questions answered by its citizens then why don't they have Connecticut citizens asking the questions? I'm sure they can find a few unemployed college students with cellphones and free time that would love to call. I'm not college-age, but pay me and I'll call, I'm great at being nosey.
Years ago when we were setting up a computer for the first time we had to call the company's help desk.
Let me tell you, help desk is a misnomer.
The wait was an hour. No call-back service from them. My husband held the phone to his ear until someone finally came on. He handed the phone to me, I asked the question. The operator guy said he knew what the problem was and he could solve it promptly, but that he was not allowed to answer because his job at that moment was to route incoming calls to the correct departments. One of those departments was actually his, when there was lower call volume.
"Please answer, we've been waiting an hour on the phone."
He said he'd lose his job because all phone calls were being monitored for training purposes. I handed the phone to my husband. The call got rerouted. Twenty minutes later guess who picked up? In less time than it took him earlier to explain why he couldn't answer, he answered, problem solved. I think his name was Rich and he probably works for Social Security in Baltimore now.
Enough said.
EMAIL CAROLYNN PIANTA AT CP.ENOUGHSAID@AOL.COM

A natural casing full of homemade tradition, (original title)

Family tradition moving from one generation to the next

Published 09/05/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 09/03/2013 01:07 PM

 

They took over my kitchen, five men, cutting, grinding, spicing and packaging 115 pounds of homemade sausage.

It's a big deal, this sausage making, not because the process is laborious, though it is, and not because it's touchy, because it can be - it's a big deal because it is tradition times three generations.

I first witnessed the whole sausage-making process more than 30 years ago. My husband and his cousin, plus a couple of friends, took over the basement in our former home. A meat-cutter by trade back then, he directed the well-oiled, or should I say very lean, series of steps creating one of our family's favorites.
Knowing what goes into your food is a big deal nowadays. It was back then, too, until an evening of sausage-making ended with one of the sausage-makers minus a Band-Aid and no way of knowing which batch it went in. The mini-patch was never found and the four families involved some 20 years ago all survived. Now the makers remove rings and scrub to the elbows like a specialist prepping for surgery.
The meat grinder is a microwave-sized piece of machinery weighing well over 100 pounds. Now that the sausage making takes place in our kitchen, the grinding behemoth has to be carried upstairs from the basement, and that's what the young son-in-laws are for. Those strong young men, both cognizant of the importance of tradition, watch and participate, and get sausage, because they know they are the ones who will eventually carry on the ritual.

My daughters and I use the sausage in a myriad of sauces, stir fries and stuffings. On its own, or slathered with onions, peppers and mushrooms, it makes a grinder like no other. We give some away, when the ties to the receiver are close. Like a fire built with wood you've cut, hauled, split and stacked, there is nothing quite as wonderful as consuming something you have worked so hard to create.

The batch this time, (the guys usually do this three times a year), was so large it had to be split into two sessions. So on a recent evening, the process started with the first grind. Everything was stored in the old beer fridge downstairs until the serious making of the meat began the next night. As each batch was spiced, one of the men cooked a sample to see if the ratio of salt to garlic to fennel and wine was right. That's what the women-folk are for, the tasting of the sausage, the drinking of some wine and for reminiscing and solving the problems of life.

We sat at the table watching the men and suggested step-saving procedures, which were not acknowledged, and advised techniques, which were ignored, and we laughed, a lot, because that's how it's done.

For a few minutes I sat in my rocker with my mouth shut, which is unusual, just observing the next generation learning the process of carrying on the tradition. The older guys talked about how when the time comes, they will sit back and watch the young guys do all the heavy work. They're almost there. What makes me grateful is that our daughters have chosen men who genuinely appreciate the importance of sustaining tradition.
As the evening deepened and the ropes of sausage in natural casings filled huge containers waiting to be packaged, and as patties sizzled on the stove, a friend tipped his glass to me and said, "I smell an article."
"That's garlic you smell," I answered.
Enough said.

Time with family trumps cleaning

Published 08/22/2013 12:00 AM

Updated 08/19/2013 04:21 PM

Years ago I remember driving home from my grandmother's house in New Jersey and listening to a discussion between my mom and dad about how Nana wasn't keeping her house as pristine as she used to.
Back and forth they went about her diminishing cleaning habits, until they finally came to the consensus that she either needed new glasses or she was just too old to care about maintaining a spotless home. She was 10 years younger than I am now.
I don't think age or eyesight had anything to do with her new lived-in look, it was about finally letting go of preconceived female obligation.
To me a sink full of dishes is not that important unless you run out of something to place your food on; isn't that what paper plates are for? I'd rather play gin rummy with my daughter than vacuum, and go for a ride with my husband instead of scrubbing the microwave.
When our daughters were little if they wanted to read a book, play a board game or share time with me, the dishes sat, the laundry piled up and dog hair tumbleweeds gathered in the corner. Spending time with family trumped cleaning for two reasons: I was a perfect mother and I didn't care if I had to vault over the pile of shoes in the front hall as long as I could open the door.
When our oldest was a toddler she woke up one night upset because she believed monsters could get in through her bedroom window. Explaining that no one was coming in her window because it was on the second floor did not allay her fears. So I told her I had sprinkled special fairy dust on the window sills which would keep the monsters out.
"Oh no you deh-ent," she said in that way little kids speak when they think you are lying to them.
"Oh yes, I did." She ran her hand along the sill, palm coated in dust, she smiled.
"It's everywhere," I whispered. She went back to bed.
The next day she checked every window sill and never feared monsters again.
There were times when the detritus of everyday life became so overwhelming I would rant and rave and play drill-sergeant until the house shone. Those moments were a direct result of hormone levels which at my current age no longer drive the need to elicit control.
With our empty nest temporarily very full I am amazed how relaxed I am with the exercise bike and camping gear in the upstairs hallway. That our spare bedroom/office is stacked with my daughter's still boxed wedding gifts does not faze me. Living with stuff out of place is about as upsetting to me as raking leaves - if they don't kill the lawn I'm fine with them.
I did recently replace my 10-year-old mop. It was one of those attach-a-cleaning pad and spray models. It didn't wear out, the cleaning solution was discontinued ... three years ago.
It's not like we live knee-deep in a hoarder's paradise, it's just that cleaning has always been low on my life-list along with sky diving, motorcycles and lima beans. A spotless home isn't lived in, messy homes are an anthem to activity.
When our daughters were away at college, graduated and living elsewhere, our house stayed clean. Was it nice? Yes. Was it quiet? Yes. But it was way too quiet - I'll have eternity for quiet. Now I opt for camping gear, dog hair and a pile of shoes in the hall, which though formidable, still allows me to open the door.
Enough said.
EMAIL CAROLYNN PIANTA AT CP.ENOUGHSAID@AOL.COM.