Red, White and Pink Grinch

I am a Valentine’s Day Grinch.  It was 7^th or 8^th grade when my heart shriveled to two sizes too small.  Before that it was about making cute Valentine boxes with doilies and buying corny tiny cards for everyone in the class.  Of course there was always the random girl chasing a boy around the classroom trying for a kiss, but that was really more about cootie tag than kissing.

It was all good until the mind shift of 7^th grade where Valentine’s Day suddenly becomes about romance.  In 7^th grade I had braces (the old horrible kind that wrapped around every tooth so that you really did have enough metal in the mouth to broadcast am radio), glasses and knees that looked like giant orbs attached to toothpicks.  Plus, I was just as socially awkward on the inside as I was on the outside.  There was no romance headed my way.  All Valentine’s Day did was reinforce in the candy box of life, I was not a red hot.  I was a gummy worm.

Even once I got a boyfriend, I found the whole thing annoying.  The poor guy would break out in a giant slew of zits trying to afford dinner, flowers and candy.  It isn’t even most of us women who demand that much, it is the pressure of not measuring up to what men think is expected.  Marketing has done a better job than any female has ever been able to do in creating Valentine’s Day guilt.  Come on housekeepers of America, Unite!  Get every average Joe out there thinking they are lacking in the rugged provider department if they do not have a house keeper come at least one a month.  Use Valentine’s Day as a case study.  I am sure you will up business by 70%.

With this in mind, you will understand that Friday I stood on Mt. Crumpit expecting to feel nauseous from all the hearts and the red and the sugar coated sappy love of the day.  Instead I woke up to a pleasant family, not to sweet, not too grumpy, just right..  John took the kids to school (a most wonderful luxurious gift), my friend Nicole invited me over and bought me coffee and my favorite kind of bagel.  The Valentine’s Day parties at the school were relaxed and Helen came into Lauren’s classroom where she plopped on my lap, Lauren tucked herself into my arm on the left and we watched part of a Care Bear movie.  I sat there very still as my cold black Valentine’s heart started to unshrivel.   Maybe Valentine’s Day isn’t all phoney, maybe just maybe it is a little bit more.  

This point was driven home at the Girl Scout meeting, Adriane convinced me to have some of our  parents who are in the health care industry help the girls earn their First Aid badge.  I was lazy and just wanted to go to the park and let them play.  Wow.  I am so glad I didn’t push my agenda.  This was one of our best meetings ever. 

“Girls, today is Valentine’s Day and part of love is caring for yourself and caring for others.  Today we are going to learn several things we can do when someone we love is hurt or sick.“  Adriane said more, I wish I could remember exactly because it was perfect.   The nurses who worked with the girls kept them completely engaged for the entire meeting and over.  That was without snacks or anything (end of day pizza and cupcake party, we had stuffed little girl scouts).  Their generosity in spending time with the girls was the best Valentine’s gift I could have asked for…….or so I thought.

As almost everyone who knows me knows, we have been in the middle of GS cookie sale time.  This is not my favorite thing about girl scouts.  The above bits where girls learn interesting valuable things from interesting valuable people, that is what I love.  I do not like asking people to buy cookies.  I hate feeling like a pest.

Anyway, we are getting close to wrapping up but we had not gotten any donations to the charity we had selected, a family shelter in McKinney.  I broke down and sent a message to three people I thought might be able to steer me in the right direction.  I got in my car after the meeting and there were 3 bubbles on my phone.  All three donated a case of cookies each to the shelter.  I just wanted to cry.  It was the nicest thing.  I have not seen these three ladies in so long, but I send them a note and like the Three Musketeers, they come to my rescue. 

The day was topped off by my Brother and Sister in law and their four kids coming in from Baton Rouge and bringing Rudy’s for dinner.  Happy kids.  Happy parents.  Happy bellies.

Maybe it is just coincidence that so many fantastic moments were shoved into one Valentine’s Day.   Maybe it was time for me to get over my grudge.  Whatever it was, I realized that Valentine’s Day is no longer taunting me.  It is a big red, white and pink chocolate covered beacon telling me to pay attention to love; all love, because life is better when it is stuck to everything.  

Say cheese! Cottage cheese that is.

Today I did one of those studies.  You know the kind that pays you a certain amount of money to try a new migraine medicine or anti-fungal foot cream.  This one was right up my alley because it is a cream that should miraculously make my fat look less squishy and lumpy.   I am all for anything that minimizes actual exercise time.  I don’t care if it is an illusion, I am happy just giving the impression that I am firm and toned even though I am not.

It was a nice cross section of people.  I would say a 30’something, 40’something, 50’something and one of the next two decades was represented as well.  They were stylish, attractive, pleasant, with an amused and hopeful attitude about our little endeavor.  The elephant in the room that we were all ignoring?  The before pictures.

Yes indeed, studies like this involve a before and after picture.  Since most cellulite resides in well-hidden places, we were required to wear a bikini for this expose.   Apparently I was not the only one who had difficulty scrounging an actual bikini from the back of the closet.  Sure, I have tons of tank-inis.  The age appropriate way of hiding a tummy more effectively then a snug one piece.  With a proper tank-ini, boobs are pushed up and out while behind the curtain safely hidden from view lies all that bonus belly that comes from too many cheetos and binging on Downton Abbey.  Somehow we all managed to find something that would work.  Free product is a powerful motivator.

Step 1 accomplished.  Bikini is found.  Step 2; removing the winter coat.  This took so long I was actually 5 minutes late.   Step 3; take several tablespoons of pepto bismol.  I have had some horrific stomach bug since early Tuesday morning.  Posing for a before picture in a bikini is not when you want to have the bug rear its ugly head.  I know, I should have canceled.  Again, free product.

They take us back to the studio and introduce us to the photographer.  OH.MY.GOD.  Our photographer is the guy every girl wants to marry or date or just mug with all night in college.  He is of course arty; he is a photographer.  But he is also model caliber good looking.  YES!  YES! YES!!!!!!!  We are product whores.   Why else would we stand mostly naked and point out to Mr. Hunka Hunka Burning love where the most unsightly parts of our body are so he can photograph them.   I am so ashamed.  So ashamed that I signed up for another study that starts Friday.  With another before picture.  Sigh.   

Sochi! Sochi! Sochi!

I am a giant unapologetic Olympics junkie.  You can expect all sorts of commentary from this peanut gallery over the next 17 days.  When the girls and I got home, I happened on a golden Olympic Moments documentary on Cozy TV.  Within 2 seconds, all three of us were hooked.  It happened to be about Petra Majdic, a Slovenian cross country skier who earned the country's first medal in that sport at the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.

First of all, let me explain that I am a big wimp.  I got one ear pierced and almost kept the pirate look because I did not want the pain of ear 2.  Petra did 4 races I think in a row to earn a bronze medal.  She had been injured and was in excruciating pain.  I could barely watch.  It literally hurt just to watch.  Not to mention, it was very, very close in the final race, she barely got the bronze.  I couldn't stand to think that she had endured all that and could loose in the last split second.  I should have realized that she had worked for 20 years and was not about to give up on her dream.  Right after she crossed the line, she collapsed.  

Her trip to the hospital revealed that she had crossed the finish line with 5 broken ribs and a collapsed lung.  She raced 4 races with a collapsed lung and still won.  That is why I am an Olympics junkie.  Because of the Petra Majdic's all over the world.  Of course I am proud when America does well, but I love cheering for someone from anywhere who has the tenacity to follow their dream.  Particularly when the athletes do not have state of the art facilities, equipment, and funding.  When someone like that wins, it is......damn cultural phrases for overusing this word.......epic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petra_Majdič