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Quarrel Sex

A school district in rural California has removed Merriam Webster’s dictionaries from all school shelves after a parent complained that her elementary-aged child read the definition for oral sex (noun: oral stimulation of the genital). School officials felt that the “sexually graphic” definition was not “age appropriate” (here). Somehow I think that a definition for oral sex that is age-appropriate for elementary students would a heck of a lot dirtier, because it would involve words like “licking” and “naughty bits.”

Of course, the issue is not the actual wording of the definition, but rather the fact that an entry for oral sex even exists in the dictionary. Which is a new development, because when I was in elementary school, oral sex wasn’t even invented yet. How do I know this? Because it wasn’t in the dictionary.

Believe me, I looked for it. When I was in fourth grade, I scoured the dictionary, learning all about “breast” and “penis” and “sex” and “intercourse.” And, I admit… it totally rotted my mind. Because those words were no longer just words that my classmates bandied around or that I heard in health class. They had unspoken acceptance as normal, desirable behavior by virtue of being defined. Total impetus for virtuoso vocabulary coupled with precocious harlotry.

These parents should be celebrating the fact that kids are looking up anything in the dictionary. And, they should be taking a hint that if their offspring is looking up sexy things in the dictionary, they should be talking him about sex rather than leaving him to satisfy his curiosity with a Merriam Webster’s dictionary. Because, wait until the kid gets a little older and discovers the Internet. Who knows what he will find if he searches for “oral sex?”

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By Meredith – January 25, 2010

Two Years of Legal Love and Marriage

Today is the second anniversary of our civil marriage. Yes, two years ago on a Wednesday night, Mr. P and I rushed home from our respective places of work to be legally married by a Justice of the Peace in our living room. What a magical five minutes that was!

That day was chosen simply because it fit our schedule, but how auspicious that our civil anniversary would forever be 1/23. Because otherwise, we’d forget it.

In celebration, we treated ourselves to a day of XC skiing at one of our favorite ski areas just across the New Hampshire border. To spoil ourselves a little more and maximize our time on the trails, we stayed at a Bed & Breakfast near the ski area on Friday night. We picked the Birchwood Inn because we dug the British motif that the ex-pat Anglo proprietors carefully cultivated: the Union Jack  hanging on the porch, the rooms named for quintessential English towns, the beer-themed knickknacks, the authentic dart board, and the tiny beds with the dense mattresses — so very, very British.

Birchwood Inn

I liked that the building dated back to precisely 1775, as if the Inn was an alternate universe where the American Revolution never happened and an enclave of Brits carried on calling each other “love” and cooking bangers and mash, bubbles and squeak, and, of course, spotted dick.

Birchwood Inn Porch

Inns that are 200+ years old aren’t necessarily spacious, luxurious, or even comfortable, but they are historic. Thoreau reportedly stayed at the Birchwood Inn for a stretch, and one of the dining rooms featured a mural painted in the mid-1800s by Rufus Porter. Proof, in my opinion, that not all old art is necessarily good art.

Rufus Porter Mural

On Saturday morning, after a breakfast that was thankfully devoid of baked beans, we headed out to XC ski. Supreme conditions, with a luminous bare blue sky, nary a hint of wind, and a mid-20s temperature that felt much warmer thanks to the trusty blazing sun. A soft one-foot cushion of snow provided an excellent surface for skating. The only flaw was that it was perhaps too perfect of a ski day, as it attracted legions of people.

Perfect Ski Day

Mr P. inspiring widespread awe and fear with his pure finesse on skis.

Descending the open slope like it was alpine

Ascending hills like it was cake

After skiing for about 5 hours, we drove home and had a meat fondue. No, that’s not a dirty euphemism, we had an actual meat fondue.

Meat Fondue

Two years of civil marriage, and we can still spend a day together, enthralled with each other’s company, and enjoy a night filled with meat fondue. That’s a successful marriage!

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By Meredith – January 23, 2010

New Year, New to Yoga

It must be January, because the yoga classes are full. Lately I’ve had to cram my mat in between the mats of people who strain mightily to touch their toes and who wobble precariously into Warrior One. They want relaxation, enlightenment, and toned thighs, and they think the 5:30pm Hatha Yoga class is totally their ticket.

I snuck into the crowded class two minutes late and splayed a mat in the back of the room next to a young couple. I knew they were a couple because I saw them in the parking lot, toting yoga mats under their arms, and because they were both so fit and healthy-looking, I assumed they were yoga veterans. But after 5 minutes of Sun Salutations, it became clear that this was their second, maybe third class ever. The guy’s muscles were tighter than a hipster’s jeans; his knees were so bent in Downward Dog that he was almost in Child’s Pose. The girl was slightly more flexible, but lacked the functional arm strength that would enable her to pull off any sort of graceful chaturanga.

The yoga mats over which they labored were so new that the ends curled. I imagined them making a New Year’s resolution to take yoga together, and purchasing the mats to solidify their commitment. It must’ve sounded so easy and good and healthy at the time, but there they were, suffering physically and looking as stressed as mice in a maze… in front of each other.

Not that I was any better when I first started yoga. By virtue of my sporting lifestyle, I thought that yoga would be a breeze. In fact, I was initially hesitant to give up a “real workout” in order to attend yoga class. But just because I could run 6 miles or cross-country ski all day didn’t mean that I could hold a lunge for more than 30 seconds without searing pain in my quadriceps, and it certainly didn’t mean I could sit in pigeon pose and think calming, happy thoughts.

It takes work, and no yoga beginner is exempt from the initial physical acclimation. I call “bullshit” on the author of the ” Om my!: Introduction to yoga is a breath of fresh air,” an article in the Boston Globe by a yoga novice who attends various classes in studios around Boston. Her first yoga class was a 90 minute Baptiste class — an intense ordeal; it’s like someone who has never run before doing a 5K. She claims after the class she “felt a little more awesome than before.” While that might be true, I marvel that she neglects to mention the agonizing physicality and constant bewilderment that yoga beginners always experience. No one was born doing vinyassas.

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By Meredith – January 22, 2010

The Catcher in the Rye Misses One

Last Monday, a teenaged boy robbed my town’s local bookstore (a disheveled arsenal of mass market books that I do not frequent.) According to the clerk, the suspect showed her a crowbar, demanded that she open the register and give him the money, and said “I’m sorry I have to do this.”

I am very curious as to why the teenager just HAD to rob the bookstore. What all-consuming need was he satisfying? And was he really sorry that the trajectory of his young life left him with no alternatives but to menacingly brandish a crowbar at some dumpy local bookstore employee?

He made off with $200, which struck me as an exorbinant amount of money for a sleepy bookstore to keep in the till on a Monday night, but then again, I have a background in convenience stores, where the first thing they teach you is that at some point, you probably will be threatened with a weapon, so you better keep less than $60 in your drawer at all times. Standard loss prevention, though it may piss off the guy who is menacing you with a blunt object.

The reluctant robber allegedly mingled around the store for 15 minutes before approaching the register with a copy of “The Catcher in the Rye,” the iconic novel for teenaged rebellion. Perhaps young man was trying to signal that, like Holden Caulfield, he was disaffected, disgruntled, alienated, isolated, directionless, and sarcastic, and therefore had no recourse but to express himself through precocious petty crime. “I’m sorry I have to do this. Goddamn money. I hope to hell I don’t get caught.”

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By Meredith – January 20, 2010

WTF, Martha Coakley?

Last December, when I blogged about the primaries for today’s special election to fill the US Senate seat laid void by Ted Kennedy, I made it sound like Democratic candidate Martha Coakley would be a shoo-in. Because this is Massachusetts, where the only good Republican is a Democrat in a business suit.

But oh, boy, Martha. You blew it. Scott Brown, a Republican — a real one — is sitting in Ted Kennedy’s seat.

Holy shit, how did that happen? I’m not sure. Nobody really is, although the local pundits will talk themselves to death trying to rationalize this stunning upset. While I find some explanation in this month’s Harper’s Index, which revealed that only 6 percent of Americans think that women make better politicians than men, the truth is, Martha Coakley ran a miserable campaign.

I mean, Massachusetts elected Obama with a clear majority, and yet Massachusetts did not elect an integral person whom he needs in order to put forth his agenda. Is it health care? Is it taxes? Is it the millions of dollars Coakley’s supporters spent on dirty campaign ads that attacked Brown (a tactic that may work in the rest of the country, but that Massachusetts find degrading and undignified)?

Or is it that Coakley revealed herself as baseball ignorant when she flubbed a quip about Curt Shilling being a Yankees fan?

For the record, I voted for Coakley despite her inability to Wow me. I can only imagine that, after she won the primary, she thought herself to be such a sure thing and then panicked when Brown gained momentum. I am sad and a little outraged, but the people have clearly spoken, and they wanted Scott Brown, the Republican Senator from Massachusetts. (How weird does that sound?)

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By Meredith – January 19, 2010

The Morning Drive to PA

We left for a 3-day weekend in Pennsylvania on Saturday morning at 5:50am. The few other cars on the road maintained the speed limit or lower, so I was reticent to be the solo left-lane speed demon. Maybe the other drivers knew something that I didn’t, like that the Mass Pike is riddled with patrols on pre-dawn Saturday mornings. Maybe this is how the state plans to balance their budget. But after humoring the speed limit for 20 minutes, the sight of the wide open highway was too much of a temptation, and I notched up my speed to 75 mph, reassuring myself that the only reason everyone else is driving so slow is because they all have drugs in their cars.

We blew into Connecticut as the sun rose and the highway steadily gained vehicular population. I abused the touchscreen radio — the downside of Sirius satellite radio is that I’m constantly convinced that there’s a better song on another station. “Boy, I’m really enjoying listening to Adam Ant’s ‘Goody Two Shoes,’ but what if the Alt Nation station is playing that Big Pink song?” The further South we ventured, the fewer fellow Volkswagens we saw. It’s funny that, on my daily commute, I can be in a flock of Jettas, Passats, and Golfs, and feel content within my demographically determined destiny. But as we sped down I-95 South, the VWs turned into Chryslers, Jeeps, and Buicks.

I saw a bumper sticker that said DNT TXT N DRV. No, because that would be distracting… kinda like bumper stickers.

At 8:30am, it was time for breakfast. I wanted to clear NYC before stopping, but the prospect of a NJ Turnpike rest stop breakfast was more terrifying than gridlock on the George Washington bridge, so we decided to pull off of I-95 somewhere in Connecticut. Mr. P suggested we stop in a random hotel and raid their complimentary breakfast bar, a surprisingly devious and white-trash plan for my European epicurean husband. Though it was tempting to do a drive-by grab-and-go on some Holiday Inn Express hard-boiled eggs and bacon, I am convinced that there is some sort of safeguard against such unseemly looting of hotel breakfast bars, for surely we are not the first people to be tempted to just wander into a hotel lobby to partake of the substitute scrambled eggs, industrial sausage, and highly-preserved bakery items? So we stopped at a diner.

We pulled off of the PA turnpike at 11 am, meaning that while the trip did not qualify as a Boston-to-Philly driving world record, it was certainly a personal best. We were so early that we decided to take a leg-stretching walk in Valley Forge National Park before descending upon family. We saw deer. Amazing that, five hours ago, I was pushy my sleepy ass out the door, and now I was walking with the wildlife in PA. Oh, deer!

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By Meredith – January 19, 2010

The View From Behind a Tundra

Today I was driving to work behind a Toyota Tundra. One thing that cannot be overstated is the sheer enormity of a Toyota Tundra. This mammoth pickup truck is the biggest thing to come out of Japan since Godzilla.

I seethed quietly at the Tundra because it had sort of cut me off on Route 2, and now I was trapped behind its gigantic rear end, which prevented me from seeing anything beyond it. The driver was one of those people who accelerates until they are riding the bumper of the car in front of them and then brakes, then accelerates again, then brakes again. Meanwhile, I am driving blind, trying to determine whether the Tundra driver is merely tempering his own enthusiasm or whether traffic is actually stopping and I am moments away from plowing into the Tundra’s expansive back fender, an event that would completely ruin my week.

Eventually, the Tundra took a left turn, and I found myself immediately behind a Toyota Sequoia, which is every bit as immense. I barely had time to register my relief before realizing that I had simply traded one obstructive mass for another.

As I drove, I started turning the names over in my head. Tundra. Sequoia. Tundra. Sequoia.

A tundra is a landscape defined by the absence of trees. A sequoia is a tree, and not just any tree, but one of the largest living things on Earth. It struck me that Toyota has decided that people who prefer to drive enormous vehicles are drawn to landscapes, whether forested or barren. Trees or no trees, the scale is the point.

I find this naming strategy oddly pleasing. After all, what exactly is a Camry? Or a Yaris? Is there any car more sexless than a Corolla? Even a minivan implies reproduction. Station wagons at least suggest some history.

The Tundra and the Sequoia, by contrast, make no such pretenses. They are not named for people or ideas or feelings. They are named for places so vast they dwarf human presence entirely, which feels appropriate for vehicles that make everything else on the road disappear.

Driving behind them, you lose the road, the horizon, and any illusion that you are an equal participant in traffic. You are not sharing the road so much as orbiting something much larger than yourself.

This, apparently, is what passes for rugged independence.

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By Meredith – January 13, 2010

Teacher Delivery Man

Today just before noon, I was deep in thought at my computer — you know, conceptualizing and shit — when a voice behind me broke my reverie: “Excuse me, I’ve got a food delivery here.”

It’s not the first time that a delivery person has tried to transfer their wares to my cubicle instead of to the reception area. I sit next to the secondary entrance to the company space. The door displays a prominent sign saying “Our main entrance is across the hall,” yet maybe once a week, someone will stumble through the door, see me, and assume that I know what the heck to do with their catering order.

But rather than revert to my trademark huffiness, I smile as if I am sitting at the reception desk. Who said technical writers can’t have a helpful disposition? This particular man came bearing Bertucci’s pizza and some bags of salad and condiments, so I helped him transport everything across the office as we searched for the office manager.

The deliveryman spied a marketing collateral poster featuring kids amid various educational scenery. “Are you hiring teachers?” he asked. “I was a private school teacher for 12 years in Lincoln until last May.”

“No, we don’t hire teachers,” I said gently. I was a little surprised that this man was once a teacher, for I would have totally pegged him as a career pizza delivery man based on his scraggy facial hair and too-casual jeans, but I guess those are adaptive attributes. If I spent all day ferrying pizza in my car, I probably wouldn’t groom either.

“Oh, so you’re an education consultancy or something?” he said, a little shine of hope still lingering in his eager voice.

“No, we make software that teaches people how to read,” I said, a little distractedly, for I spied the office manager in an office and was signaling for her attention.

“So you replace teachers!” he muttered, and I was about to give a long spiel about how we don’t replace teachers, we support teachers and supplement existing reading curriculum, but the office manager appeared and whisked him and his pizzas away.

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By Meredith – January 12, 2010

Joining the Community Orchestra

Last week, Mr. P lugged his cello and I my viola to our first rehearsal with the local community orchestra. We had been talking about joining this orchestra for over a year, but it only came up at inopportune moments — during the summer hiatus, or right before a performance. The impetus for this timely decision to join after their holiday concert came because we were discussing how I’d amuse myself after Mr. P began his MBA classes on Monday and Tuesday nights.

“I should join that orchestra!” I said, only to discover that the rehearsals were on Wednesday nights, when Mr. P didn’t have class.

“I should join that orchestra with you!” Mr. P said, deciding that a weekly musical respite would have a therapeutic effect on his esprit while undergoing his soul-strangling business coursework.

In preparation for our first rehearsal, I dusted an actual cobweb off of my viola, which had not been seriously touched in over 14 years since my senior year in high school. I spent 20 minutes tuning the strings back to consonance, bought a new bow, dug out some old music, and spent a few tortured hours reminding myself of the notes and sounds. Mr. P, who played cello at a much higher level in high school (his mother was a music teacher) did even less than that. After all, this was a community orchestra that welcomed all string players without auditions. We were picturing some light Mozart pieces, with strong familiar melodies and relaxed bowing. We thought it would be cake.

The rehearsal started off well. The 6 or so other violas welcomed me and I found everyone to be pleasant, including my standmate, a kindly woman about my age. Us violas divvied up the sheet music, the conductor appeared and welcomed everyone, and then the orchestra began sight-reading the five pieces of music for the next concert.

You know that expression “It’s like riding a bike.” There are many things to which this saying can be validly applied. Swimming, for example, or kissing, or singing, or blowing bubblegum, or playing skeeball, or jumping rope, or eating with chopsticks. But on Wednesday night, I discovered that there is one thing that is absolutely nothing like riding a bike, and that is playing the viola.

It didn’t help that all five pieces of music are beyond the level of anything I ever played in high school, especially Bedřich Smetana’s The Moldau, in which the viola part consists of 16 minutes of scale-like sixteenth notes with few patterns and no melodies. “Goodness,” I said after the first run-through, and my standmate assented her agreement that this piece was pure murder despite having played admirably throughout. Me, I was completely lost for an entire page.

Some of this comes from musical disuse, but I’m convinced that even at the height of my youthful viola powers in high school, I could not play the Moldau. I’ve been practicing all weekend, and though I’m improving with the notes, I still can’t play it up to tempo.

Mr. P is finding the cello part as equally challenging, but he’s a little more relaxed about it. His standmate assured him that this is a very “forgiving” orchestra. I hope they are forgiving enough to accept a viola who only plays every other note.

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By Meredith – January 11, 2010

Alping in the New Year 2010, Part 3

So I talked about the lovely little French village of Montchavin where we go (click here for Part 1), and I talked about the skiing and other activities in which we participated (click here for Part 2). So there’s really only one thing left to talk about: The food!

Two years ago, while perusing t-shirts in Montchavin’s souvenir shop, I saw a t-shirt that glorified the primary three attributes of a skiing vacation in the Alps. It said Ski, sex, et tartiflette (no translation necessary, although tartiflette is a regional dish, a casserole-style conglomeration of the mainstays of French Alpine cooking: Potatoes, ham and cheese.)

“That’s the best t-shirt ever!” I screeched, and would have promptly bought it had the design not included a crude illustration of two stick figures engaged in vertical lovemaking. Of course, it wasn’t the sex bit that made the t-shirt so great. It was the tacit acknowledgment that, along with sports and leisure, food is an essential part of the skiing vacation. And because France is so tied to this notion of regional cuisine, there is not a single bit of, say, seafood to be found in Montchavin’s restaurants or markets. Even the most chic Parisians do not come to the mountains and expect haute cuisine. No, in the cold and rigorous Alps, even the most sophisticated palate craves little more than potatoes, ham, and cheese.

The majority of our dinners were with my in-laws, but the most memorable meal was in a restaurant with some friends. We ordered a raclette and were amused to be presented with an extremely antiquated contraption that used burning hot coals instead of electricity. Mr. P was tasked with scraping the melted raclette cheese onto a plate for each of us to spread onto our ham and potatoes. It’s a very slow, very involved meal that is totally focused on cheese.

Raclette has definitely usurped fondue as my favorite cheese-overload meal. I almost bought this place mat but decided a photo would suffice.

We had fondue, too… a regular cheese fondue, plus my first ever meat fondue. Meat fondue is grapeseed oil heated in the pot, with diners spearing raw meat to cook in the oil. My proclivity for rare beef served me well during the meat fondue, as I had much higher meat turnover than those who can’t tolerate a lick of pink in their steak.

Midweek, we went to Montchavin’s farmer’s market. The farmers lure prospective customers by distributing glasses of home-brew wine. Honestly, it was probably the nastiest wine I’ve ever drank in France, but we bought their sausage and cheese anyway.

On New Year’s Day, we had a la galette des rois. This is a cake with a trinket baked inside, and the person who finds the trinket is king for the day and gets to wear a paper crown not unlike the one at Burger King. It was the first piece of cake I’ve eaten in over 6 months, so I was in such sugar bliss that I scarcely cared when my brother-in-law came upon the trinket.

Traditionally, the trinkets are of a religious nature, but obviously we got a secular trinket.

So that concludes my culinary review of my trip. Also memorable but not pictured: the tartiflette on Christmas night; the slabs of braised ham on New Year’s; and the fancy restaurant meal in Geneva with some cousins, the night before our plane returned us, alas, back to the US.

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By Meredith – January 9, 2010