Bluetooth

I don’t like those Bluetooth earpieces. When I was in college, one of the physical education classes I took was Self Defense for Women. In that class, along with useful moves, I remember learning (or perhaps just thinking) that if we ever are walking along the street alone and see some unsavory character (ain’t that a great phrase?), you should pretend to talk to yourself out loud, perhaps also waving your arms around. Anyone considering doing something to you will think you’re crazy or something and move along. Now, that is offensive in several ways, but that wasn’t the point; maybe it’s rude to stereotype crazy people’s behavior, but the point is to take advantage of the stereotype and stay safe. But these days, people won’t think you’re crazy; they’ll just assume you’re on the phone. But then again, maybe that will keep you safe too – who’s going to attack someone who’s already on the phone with someone and could ask for help? Maybe the Bluetooth isn’t all evil. Maybe I’m just jealous that I don’t have one – or an excuse to act crazy.

9/11

I just threw away a sour cream container with an expiration date of September 11. And I just saw something else with that date on it. Each time, I remembered THE 9/11 - you know, 2001, twin towers, terrorist attack, the start of it all.

I confess, 9/11 made me get cable. I was horrified by what happened, and spent that day on the computer trying to find out about my friends and relatives, on the phone with my mom and sister as we kept each other up to date on who we had heard from or about, and in front of the television trying to make sense of what happened. I remember that day clearly, and was definitely struck by the stark contrast between what was happening there and my own comfortable, cushy life safe in Cleveland. My husband called from work and woke me up to tell me what had occurred. Until then, my day was like any other as a new mother.

My first born was less than two months old that day, and it saddens me that none of my kids have ever known the world before 9/11. And unfortunately, in those days of new motherhood, I eventually found I couldn't watch anymore. Everyone I knew was fine, despite some close calls (including a close childhood friend who worked across the street and took a ferry back to her place in New Jersey after the first plane hit. She also happened to miss the Tsunami in Asia by a day, and was recently in London during the foiled terrorist plot. This girl has either the most incredible or the absolute worst luck, but either way, I think I might hold off on vacationing with her. I'd love to make her a character in a story, but it would seem contrived; what's amazing is that it's true). As I was saying, everyone was fine, and I needed to move on. I felt overwhelmed as a new mom, and watched t.v. to feel less isolated. Unfortunately, network televisions showed only The Aftermath 24/7 and so we got cable. It sounds shallow, but it's true.

But what saddens me - nay, what angers me - is the liberties the government has taken (both meanings apply) in the name of 9/11. 9/11 has become an excuse. I wonder, if seeing the date stamped on the bottom of a plastic tub can spark such memories for me, how does it affect those who survived it, or who lost someone that day. And sadly, I seriously wonder if the president will try to push legislation declaring that date off limits. Goods will expire September 10 or 12. No beverages can be born on September 11. Library books may not be due that day, The post office should be closed so mail cannot be postmarked on that date. By making the day a national holiday, it could free everyone up to hold or attend fundraising run-a-thons or visit memorials. Maybe we could bring back Hands Across America to show those terrorists that they could not break us.

Man, why am I so cynical? I may as well blame it on 9/11.

Darwinian Parenting

Cuteness, I believe, is inversely proportional to compliance. Darwin’s theory of natural selection – survival of the fittest – certainly proves true for children.

My two-month old, generally pretty innocent and well-mannered, has not let me sleep through the night yet. Do I resent him for it? Not in the least. I mean, one look at his wide brown eyes, tiny knobby nose between those chubby cheeks, or the little butt in his chin and I melt, even at four o’clock in the morning.

My five year old, when told that he’s cute, replies, “I’m not cute.” He says the baby is the cutest, because he’s the smallest. Then his two-year-old brother is next cutest. He’s just a little bit cute (“five-year-old cute”). His dad, however, being old, is not at all cute.

Sometimes, when my two-year-old is in the middle of his third huge tantrum of the morning - refusing to wear any clothing whatsoever while blocking any food from entering his mouth – I have to actively remind myself how cute he is and how adorable he really is (and chant “this too shall pass”) while trying to devise the best strategy to handle the errant behavior in a manner that will have the least number of undesired repercussions (if I bribe him with candy now, will he throw a tantrum tomorrow and expect candy; if I let him go to school wearing just a diaper, will he be emotionally scarred by the taunting of his classmates?)

His brother, meanwhile, doesn’t have to get by on his looks. He is still, I believe, so incredibly adorable, but with his wonderful behavior and his ability to reason, he’s got more assets in his favor.

So clearly, the older you are, the less you should have to rely on your cuteness to survive. For example, Bart Simpson is evidently not cute enough for Homer to tolerate his smart mouth. With that in mind, maybe people should be weary of voting for good-looking politicians.

Which makes me wonder: is the two-year-old lucky to have his big brother around to remind me that this phase will pass and that I just have to stay the course, or is it worse for him because I’m comparing his behavior to his brother’s? I suppose it really depends on how much sleep his younger brother let me get the night before.

Wait a minute. I learned about Darwin in Biology class. When did this turn into an Algebra lesson?

Faces

I have a theory. Is it possible that there are only a finite number of faces? And that these n number of faces are recycled again and again? I mean, I know that sons can look like their fathers (I know all three of mine will look just like theirs), and daughters like mothers, but what about beyond that?

There’s a saying that everyone has a double, and maybe that’s just a glitch in the space-time continuum. Perhaps each face is only supposed to exist once at a time, but sometimes, accidentally, two people in the world at the same time have the same face. This, of course, does not include twins. Those, by definition, must exist at the same time, although perhaps part of the definition is that that particular face then does not exist in a different time.

The Earth is finite, to that I believe we can all agree. The environmentalists in this world (and hopefully most others) realize that the resources provided by this planet, while quite plentiful, cannot last forever. I wonder, for example, what the consequences are of creating a void inside the earth from pumping or drilling out its natural resources. What fills the holes left behind where the oil used to be?

But I digress. The water we drink today is the same water drunk by Cleopatra, Shah Jahan, and Genghis Khan. If you followed a particular droplet of water through its lifetime of liquid-gas-solid, cloud-rainfall-lake-slushie-sweat, the same droplet will have passed through countless people over countless generations. The same droplet that was inside a rain cloud during the Great Flood in Chicago could also have participated in the tsunami a few years back in Asia.

So why can the same not be said of faces. Statistically speaking, given two eyes, two ears, a nose, mouth, cheeks, forehead and chin, and five different face shapes (round, oblong, heart, square, and diamond), the number of distinct permutations of faces is absolute (I believe the equation would be “n choose k” and would probably take ears out of the equation since they’re on the “outside” and don’t really make two people look significantly different from someone else with every other feature identical). So if I wanted to do the math, I’d figure out the probability equation for the distinct number of types of each feature (eyes: round, almond-shaped, close-set, deep-set, narrow-set, wide-set; lips: full, narrow, wide, etc.) and could calculate the total number of faces that could possibly exist. If that number is greater than the number of people that have ever existed or will ever exist, then my theory would obviously be proven wrong. But if, as I suspect, the number of people in existence over all the years of human existence exceeds this mathematical figure, then clearly my theory has some validity.

In 2000, a group of friends (including myself) went to Italy for vacation. While there, in Florence, I stayed in a room featuring the art of Botticelli, and one picture was of a woman (the woman just right of center, wearing a garland) from his Primavera painting. I wondered about the woman who posed for that painting. She was obviously someone who lived in Botticelli’s time (1445-1510), but she could just as likely be someone living today.

The Girl With A Pearl Earring (Vermeer) looked somewhat like Scarlett Johanssen, or at least enough like her. Although, when I looked at the picture, I thought she looked more like Anne Heche. But anyhow, back in the days of the great artists, people lived in small communities. Their circle of acquaintances was not very large. Artists painted a face, and the face belonged to one person. And the time of the painting is given away by the clothes being worn (clearly, an expert could tell the exact age of a painting, but the lay person would look at a painting and, if the painting were done today, would say that subject was in costume).

But now, we are exposed to so many more people, so many more faces. Through television, world travel, and the Internet, we are familiar with far more faces and people than ever before. So we can see when two people – in our own time – seem to resemble each other. I think people seek comfort in the familiar, and like to see new faces and associate them with people they already know, even if they only know their characters in a television show. When we meet new people, we may compare them, file their images away with the association with someone familiar. For example, there’s a mom of one of my sons’ classmates that looks like the brunette from Sex and the City. My neighbor looks like Rachel Ray.

How is this possible? Clearly, there are only a certain number of faces out there, and one particular combination of features was duplicated in two distinct individuals with no shared DNA. It’s bound to happen. It’s only noticeable now because we can apply the theory to a larger subset of the human population.