The Last Baby Shower

Just attended what I hope will be the last Baby Shower of my life. It’s one of those things, like Tupperware parties, that can stay with you for a long time. And like a bad meal, it doesn’t go down well and the memorable parts are generally not the ones that bring back the fondest of memories.

Actually, this one was fine, but the lingering memories of past baby showers, wedding showers, Tupperware parties, or just fashion/jewelry parties where you are expected to buy something and make small talk, are indelibly printed in large neon flashing warning signs in the remotest corners of my brain box.

Someone noted later that we left the party before they played games. Darn, I’m so sorry I missed the games portion of the program. To quote Jack Nicholson, “I’d rather stick needles in my eyes”. There must be a special corner in hell for those who came up with the original idea of having women sit around and not only talk about their horrific experiences in giving birth to their children, but also to tack on some completely inane parlor game just to add insult to the original injury.

The poor pregnant mother-to-be is usually ready to fortify herself with a nice stiff drink, which she is unable to have due to the impending birth. And the mothers and grandmothers all try to be helpful and malicious at the same time as they offer advice and support, along with more horror stories.

Giving birth was never meant to be anything but a momentous occasion, but the ritual of baby showers does seem to be overkill. The best idea is to give the party for the fathers-to-be, and include them in all the fun. Men are expected to do more these days in the diaper-changing and hands-on parenting department, so it seems fitting that they should also be included (subjected) to the perils and pleasures of the obligatory baby shower. 

Notes from a Native

Taylor Swift has made the news! That girl is a miracle of modern marketing. I actually admire her, and the news we hear about her is usually pretty benign. She has tweeted or posted something or has a boyfriend, or wrote some new song or has gone somewhere. It’s never anything really bad or startling, it’s just newsworthy, I suppose.

 We have another shooting, a lone wolf senselessly murdering people….we will have to start numbering them A47 or Shooting #5DKG...

A happier thought: God made Ice Cream because He loves us and wanted us to be happy. Happy National Ice Cream Day!...

The 40th High School Reunion: Turning Lemons into Lemonade...

I couldn’t make it this time. That was a disappointing outcome, as a close friend was sick and we had to cancel the room and arrangements when it was down to the last few days before the event. But, the good news is that in the wide world of Social Media, you can almost virtually attend. As they say, Social Media brings good things to life…Which means anyone can find out who’s going & who’s not, who’s living & who has died, and who is “living large” for the world to see with a veritable avalanche of photos and messages on Facebook.

The whole ambience of the event comes across with pictures and images that takes us back to the fun of “Beach Week” or the excitement we felt before graduation. We were comrades in arms and buddies. So the close ties and unbreakable bonds are still felt after all these years.

“What time do we check out?” comes from a 58-year old teen at heart writing on Facebook. Other messages followed like, “I’d like to start working out now!” or “Sorry I can’t make it-take plenty of pictures!” And boy, do they have pictures, at times it looks like an onslaught of Hallmark photo spreads.

These are mixed with more hilarious messages, and then some poignant ones, “My doctor didn’t ok me to travel so I can’t be there”. And then there’s always the over-eager beavers in the crowd, “We arrived yesterday. I went 5.5 miles on the treadmill, and then had a quick dip in the Ocean before getting ready for the party tonight!”

All of these things bring back memories of high school. Has it been 40 years…really? It seems like only 40 days have passed. A friend & I used to have dreams where we were back in high school. We were racing to finish an exam or we were late to class invariably. Even after College, I had these dreams. What could they possibly mean? Anxiety dreams perhaps, or maybe just a longing for a simpler place and time…

The 10 year Reunion was a high/low point on the Spectrometer Scale of Reunions. It’s an anti-climactic let-down combined with an eye-opening jolt of adrenaline for most of us. One of my close friends was subjected to the “mean girls” syndrome at this event and has never quite recovered. Another close friend has never bothered to go at all. Still others plan for weeks in advance and decide just what they are going to wear because they wouldn’t miss it for the world.

High School Reunions in general remain a big business in this country, and they often live up to the spectacles they create and the drama that ensues. And beneath it all, burned somewhere deep, remains the psyches and sentimentality of a group of homogenous Western teens who were raised in another era- a time of blue jeans & bell-bottoms, of Watergate & pot-smoking hippies, of protestors & the looming shadow of the Vietnam War.

That era is bygone, a remnant of the time machine found buried deep inside each of our heads. But it pops out every now and then when we greet each other at the ritualized American Ceremonial Event known as the High School Reunion.