letusdare

Can we start this day over?

This is the story of a burglarized car, a malfunctioning house lock, a nomad cat that pooped in our Asian jasmine and our cat-poop-loving dog Sam being hit by a car.

The morning seemed doomed from the start. First, my visiting brother-in-law Larry returned from taking his dog, Max, outside, and reported that someone had broken the driver's-side window and stolen the GPS during the night.

It was early. We should have gone back to bed.

Instead, we tramped outside to see glass on the street. We called the police. They arrived, took a report, and we ate breakfast.

Then we tramped outside once again to clean up the mess. This is when the bolt on the front door of our house decided it had had enough action and was going to stick. It does this regularly. As we studied that problem, Sam, our fleet-of-foot heeler mix, decided to take the opportunity to bolt through the open door.

His first stop: to scoop up the cat poop he'd snatched from the Asian jasmine during our first trip outside. He had no chance to sample it then because I made him drop it. But memory served him well. The poop sat right beside the sidewalk where he'd left it.   

His second stop: away from human aggressors and toward the car coming down the street. He did not see the car because he was scurrying away with his prize. Or maybe he saw the car and thought he could beat it. 

His third stop was the front bumper of the car. Our 50-pound bundle of dog hit metal, rolled like a tackled quarterback and ran back into our front yard, with me quick on his lowered tail. 

Sam had slowed by now. He'd dropped -– or swallowed -– the cat poop. Its fragrant aroma lingered like an aura. We felt him all over and found no obvious injuries. My sister-in-law Joy and I gathered what was left of our wits, put Sam in the car, and took him to the vet's office. By now all of us smelled of cat poop. It was not yet 9 a.m.   

The doctor was in and his efficient vet techs ushered us to a treatment room, checked Sam's gums and performed a quick evaluation of his heart rate and pulse-oxygen with a nifty gizmo. The doctor listened to Sam's heart, checked out his legs and gave him a shot. He said he believed our active little friend had dodged a bullet. Joy asked if he had any dog breath mints. 

I didn't get a chance to find out whom the driver of the car was, although she stopped and I yelled across the street that the dog was OK. "Really?" I heard her say. After being reassured by Larry, she drove away.

This was not Sam's inaugural visit to the street. As a puppy, he once backed out of his collar and ran across four lanes of traffic in another city. Your first instinct when your dog runs is to chase him. My husband and I crossed the same four lanes in pursuit before realizing we were stupid. We got him back after a car stopped just in time.

Sam has gotten loose since then, too, but no cars were involved those times.

I would like to apologize for scaring the motorist, and to thank her for stopping, and to tell her that once again, it looks like we will get our heart's desire of keeping this lively, happy, and not-so-wise dog until we are doddering old fools instead of slow younger fools.

Unless we die first, which is a distinct possibility. 

What color lipstick for that oinker?

The fad today is for companies to emphasize customer service. It's one of the few ways that big corporations can distinguish themselves from their competitors. Some companies "do" customer service very well, and if any of them are reading this, they will not be surprised by the content. Perhaps they will appreciate it, but this is not for those who already get it.

This is for Giant Corporation. You know who you are. You claim to emphasize customer service but you either don't really care about it or don't have a clue about what good customer service looks like.

First, here's what good customer service does NOT look like: It does not look like a pig wearing lipstick. There is no way to say it more plainly, and if you think about this a while, you will get it. Lipstick, pig, mental picture. Etc. 

Without further delay, here are some things that the Big Guys might want to ponder before they do a new PR campaign about the great importance of customer service:

LESSON 1
This is for banks that have gotten too big for their britches: Do not leave your customers waiting on hold for 20 minutes only to tell them, when you do deign to provide a real person to talk to them, that to do the simple thing the customer is requesting will cost said customer a fee. You could do this for free for most of your customers, and most of us already know it. Furthermore, we also know a bank down the street that will do it for free. And further furthermore, since you have put your customers out recently with computer systems that have failed big-time, and since you often put them out by making them wait on the phone to talk to a real person, you NEED to do something nice for them. Like not charging a fee for a routine request. Additional tip: Customers generally don't like you telling them how they should spend their money.   

LESSON 2
This one is for "service" organizations looking for new members. Do not call and leave a message on the potential member's answering machine commanding them to call you back without giving a reason. Not even in a nice voice. Because of who you are, most reputable companies will call you back. But you already know this; it is exactly why you leave them the message to call you back without saying what the heck you want. When said company owner does call you back, do not try to make them feel swell about the phone call by saying because their are no complaints in their file, you are inviting them to join. This is like getting an invitation to a wedding and then being told where to send the money or a gift. It is not polite to ask for money after you have invited someone to do something. Did your mother not teach you this? Do a lot of people RSVP favorably after getting such an invitation? Are the businesses that you can successfully intimidate or deceive really the "guests" you want?

LESSON 3
This one is for businesses that conduct business via contracts. Could you please make the contracts shorter than a novella and write them in the real language of your country? Once one gets to "ee. The exception to this rule, (see Amendment VI Article 1) applies when you can show that you were insured by a credible..." TWE-E-E-T! Come back, Guys. Let's take that ball out again.You lost most people back on the amendment clause. No one should have to thumb back through 10 pages and forget what she is looking for before she finds it. The best sentence construction includes subject, verb, and meaningful content. No adjectives like "credible," especially if "credible" then needs to be further explored on your definitions page.

LESSON 4
If you truly want to offer your appreciation for a "longtime customer in good standing", then go ahead and do it. You don't need said customer's permission. You don't need to call them and bother them at work. You don't need a commitment from them. Oh...you DO need a commitment? You want them to sign a contract to get said deal? Then it's really not appreciation for being a "longtime customer in good standing" -- is it? So don't say that, please. Just say that you want them to continue giving all their business to you and they can get a pittance off this month's bill if they will only be loyal to you for the next 24 months. Make sense?

The lessons could continue, but that's enough for now. Simply put, what most companies need is not better trained customer service representatives, as they often say in public. What they really need are better policies. For the record, good customer service is not better PR. It's policies that don't abuse the customer. You know...the ones you say come first?      

The Creed of the Cult of the Walker

Two days ago on my early-morning walk, I ran into a neighbor I see often. He collects cans as he walks, cleaning up the neighborhood and donating the proceeds to a worthwhile cause. I said I hadn’t seen him in a while and told him now that I knew he was in town, I’d leave some soft drink cans for him at the end of my sidewalk.

I knew as soon as the words left my mouth that they smashed one of the cardinal rules of the Cult of the Walker: Never imply that he or she has broken his/her walking routine.

“I’ve been out here every day,” he replied defensively.

I tried to make amends by saying that I of course had been walking late, or a different route, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

I know the rules of the Cult of the Walker because I am a walker. I walk in the walker’s shoes, follow the walker’s path. I’ve defended my walking just as vigorously when facing a friendly, “Where’ve ya been? I haven’t seen ya!” To a regular walker, that sounds like an accusation and a challenge.

Walking, especially walking solo, is a personal ritual. Some of us use the walk as thinking time, problem-solving time and dog-training time. Walkers usually don’t mind waving or smiling, but don’t want to engage more than that. This is especially true for early-morning walkers, who might require a walk to make them more sociable, just like a dog that is more relaxed and calm after a walk.

To make things easier for those who don’t know the Creed of the Cult of the Walker, here it is. It also works for those of us in the cult who sometimes forget:

1.Don’t try to strike up a conversation, especially with someone walking early in the a.m. He or she is probably on a schedule and/or trying to beat the traffic.
2. If you walk with your dog, pick up his poop. If you have to ask why, you need a new routine.
3. Savvy walkers face traffic. It’s a safety thing. We want to see the car before it hits us. That way perhaps we can reveal the license plate number to someone before we succumb.
4. If you are a walker or runner who, for whatever reason, prefers to journey through life on the wrong side of the street and you come face-to-face with a walker who is on the correct side (facing traffic), consider crossing to your own side temporarily. You do have your own side, you know. It’s not polite to invade the other person’s space, and doing so could be hazardous to your health if that walker has a dog or a big stick.
5. If you encounter a walker who normally walks with a dog and then one day he walks alone, don’t ask. He will tell you where the dog is if he wants to.
6. If you are a motorist, please don’t honk. Even good-naturedly. Especially in the early morning.
7. If you have a gift to bestow upon the walker, be sure it’s small enough to fit in a pocket. Someone tried to give me a blanket once. I am not kidding.
8. Letting your dog run loose to do his business is not the same thing as walking him. You might think it doesn’t matter because no one else is out either. You would be wrong. We are out here, and it matters. You might have heard me yelling at your dog to keep him from following me.
9. Don’t dump your dog in the hope that a walker, or someone else, will take it home. If you do this and I find you I will haunt you.
10. Finally, never, ever imply that the walker is walking later, earlier, hasn’t walked in a while or has changed anything about her routine. In fact, don’t say anything. Stay on your side of the street and wave pleasantly.

Lady Bird, the Plaid Hat, and me

The photo is 1966 vintage and I am wearing a Plaid Hat. I capitalize those two words because the hat seems to require it. I look at it now and wonder what possessed me. It is like third living presence in the photograph.

Believe it or not, the Plaid Hat, though large, is not the most notable thing in the photo. Lady Bird Johnson is.

There is Lady Bird, the Plaid Hat, and me.

In the era of the Plaid Hat, I was a docent at the boyhood home of Lyndon Baines Johnson. I volunteered at the LBJ home because my mother and my sister did. Mom thought it would be a good thing for all of us to do. I didn’t know the word docent then and barely do now.

In those days we were known as tour guides. We took groups of people through the small home. The parlor still sticks in my memory today, and I think it must be because it held some of Lady Bird’s artifacts.

Back to Lady Bird. And the Plaid Hat. In my defense, that was another era with its own style. The photo was taken at the Texas White House in Stonewall -- the LBJ Texas White House, as opposed to the other one -- for a tea given in honor of the tour guides….er, docents, of the boyhood home. My photo, autographed by Lady Bird, is addressed to me “with best wishes.”

My sister, using her older-sister wisdom, hangs her photo with Lady Bird on the wall. She, of course, has older-sister presence and is looking at Lady Bird and smiling. I am looking at the ground or perhaps at Lady Bird’s shoes -– anything to avoid looking at the camera. My photo went into an album.

Perhaps, though, it’s time to relocate it to a more public space. I am thinking that if this shy, gracious woman who became the first lady of the country (following Jackie Kennedy! as a friend pointed out) could aim her dazzling smile at the camera, then I should have enough grace to hang her photo. The first lady doesn’t seem to mind the Plaid Hat (which seems to be smiling and waving at the camera). At least it’s a muted green Plaid Hat. My sister’s Plaid Hat was and is forever red.

That Lady Bird paid no mind to the hat is a tribute to her Southern gentility and is the epitome of this woman who accomplished so much from her first lady bully pulpit. I could say more about her, list some of her stunning accomplishments. But that’s been done and done, by people who knew her better than I did.

I will just say my silent thanks from this small-town Texan to a first lady who was as big as the great outdoors. The Plaid Hat not withstanding, the photo op, like the first lady’s presence, meant the world to that girl of 15. And to this much older woman.

In my dreams, that girl is doffing her Plaid Hat and not staring at the ground, but looking right at Lady Bird.

Falling on deaf ears

More power to the political blogs. I like them and I seek out the ones that I know are expressive and entertaining or that share or reinforce my viewpoint.

But, and this is important, I always know what I am getting into when I read one. I know the author, or if a link is forwarded to me and I go off on my own search, I know in advance what to expect.

The same cannot be said for unsolicited opinions or, in this case, unsolicited email. It comes into my home just like a phone call, and if I know the person, I open it. And more times than I can count, I have opened up white papers, jokes and all manner of political statements that I neither agree with nor want to read. In this way I have learned what names to look for on emails and which emails to dispatch without opening.

And still the emails come, and with them, a nagging question. Why do these people who don’t know me all that well insist on lumping me in with the rest of their address book and sending me junk that I find offensive? I know, I know…it’s easy to hit the delete key and if I really care why they are sending them, I should ask THEM, not the pubic at large.

But what I am really seeking here are theories because I don’t understand the mindset of people who do this. Why would you send anything that expresses your personal opinion to the personal email address of someone you do not know all that well? Is it possible the senders really know my political beliefs and are trying to change them? Or perhaps they really cannot believe that there are people whose email addresses they possess who don’t believe the same way they do? Or maybe they get harsh email responses back all the time from those on the receiving end, and because I have remained silent, I am the only one, or one of a few, left on the list?

Here are suggestions for senders to follow before hitting the ol’ SEND key. To wit:

• People who don’t know you very well probably don’t care what you think about illegal immigration, gay marriage, Democrats, Republicans, abortion or religion in general. Some of us have our own views that we developed as carefully as you developed yours. And they are indeed different from yours.
• Even if those on the receiving end are distant relatives, or relatives by marriage, they probably still don’t care.
• Even if you are in a club or group with them, see above.
• If those you don’t know want to know what you think, they will ask you. Most will not.
• Stick to sending your opinions to those you know well unless people ask for them or unless you are paid to write them. Then the people who agree with you will read them and nod and maybe send you responses like “Yes!” or “I couldn’t agree more!” And the people who don’t agree will tell you why you are wrong and maybe call you names.
• Write a blog if you feel the need to broadcast your opinions. It’s what the rest of us do.

The author writes fiction for young adults with strong heroines and heroes. See more of her work at www.mudpiepress.com

My Secret Garden

With apologies to Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, I have one too. Mine is quite public, though. It just holds some secrets. I have several small gardens in my urban landscape, and all of them are…well…public. I like them that way because they allow me to meet people in a natural way, instead of attending networking events or parties. Suffice it to say I have attended lots of both but for me neither is a great setting for meeting people, especially one’s neighbors. Gardening is perfect if you want to get to know who lives around you.

My most public garden faces a busy street and is really an easement. I got tired of both looking at boring grass and the upkeep of mowing and watering. So I decided about 10 years ago that this rather large rectangular strip would hold Texas natives. In all honesty, the biggest secret of this public garden, which is no secret to any Texas gardener, is that some of the plants growing there are not natives. They are naturalized, however, and thus are quite comfortable sharing the hot dry summers with the natives. So I still call it my native garden and so far no one has wanted to split hairs.

Now to get to the point: Even though this garden is quite public, it harbors many secrets. For example, the history of some of the plants. One is a large showing of purple coneflowers. They came from a neighbor who was quite eccentric and called them “pink daisies.” She apparently gave the seeds to several people in the neighborhood because I see her pink daisies everywhere. She died some years ago, but I think of her often thanks to her generous gifts. (She also left some onion dip at my door once, and at another time, some potato soup mix. I thought this very odd and imagined the dip to be spiked with something, but in fact it was quite delicious and none of the people who ate it felt ill effects from eating it.)

Another secret, or perhaps an “unsecret”: I was quaffing a cup of coffee on the patio early one morning when a woman I do not know swiped a piece of pink skullcap from the garden. The street the garden faces is a popular walking trail, and she barely broke a stride as she snipped. In fact I believe her actions were premeditated, because the stem of the skullcap is pretty woody and the woman would need very strong fingers and sharp fingernails to pinch the stem in two. I believe she was packing scissors. Her action startled me enough to choke a bit in mid-sip. And sort of laugh in surprised delight. As I told a friend later, I’ve given away many cuttings of plants in the public “secret” garden and would have given her one -– even one with roots, had she asked.

Many a tidbit of interest has been passed to me in the garden. I’ve learned political affiliations, how marriages are doing, where kids are going to college and who is ill. It’s apparent that people feel freer talking in the secret garden than in other places. After all, everyone needs someone to talk to, and plants don’t spread your secrets...nor have I.

I’ve thought more about the garden over the years, and I have decided that it’s truly for the public. So I don’t really mind if people snitch pieces of plant. Not that this is an invitation to plunder. But as I told someone recently, who wondered about dogs in it (and yes, I have found evidence of both canine and feline visits), I planted the garden with the public in mind, and that includes four-footed visitors too. Although I would consider it a personal kindness if two-footers would pick up after their four-footers. It’s just being polite, ya’ll.

The author writers fiction for young adults. See more of her work at www.mudpiepress.com

Surreality

The man with the cowboy hat rode not a horse but a wheelchair, and he was wheeling it into Mom’s room at the convalescent center where she recuperates from a broken hip. I walked into to her room right behind him, carrying the morning newspaper. As he spotted me I smiled and asked him “How are you?” It’s a stupid question but he answered with a nod and a smile.  

“Do you know him?” I asked my mother.

“He’s from _________ __________,” she replied, naming a rural community nearby. That meant she knew him. And she seemed not at all perturbed that the man had wheeled himself right into her private room – an act that in many places would get a person shot, or at the very least, yelled at.

“Would you rather he left?” I asked. Mom waved off the question and began reading the front page of the newspaper, untouched by the surrealism of the event.

Here, surrealism is the antidote to boredom. It’s a place where names are forgotten, speech is fleeting and hearing is often a faraway memory, but where people form bonds all the same. A place where cowboy hats and tennis shoes go together, and you occasionally see a bob of flirty red curls in a sea of mostly white or gray heads. Where few people “walk,” but still take strolls in their wheeled transportation. Where nobody complains about really loud rock music in exercise class, and where people still look you right in the eyes.

A worker wheeled our cowboy out with a smile and an apology, but he was to come back two more times to sit in our midst as we read the morning paper. “Here he is again,” Mom said each time he returned.

Anyone longing for a world that makes sense should visit a place like this, where the residents have forgotten more rules than the rest of us will ever know. If tolerance isn’t rule number one, it’s pretty high on the list, right behind patience.  

The Alien Commander solution

     One of the burning, unanswered questions of our time (April 2007) is, can we blame allergy-causing pollens on something, please? Like global warming? Maybe then we could figure out how to get rid of them.

     OK. That’s a political statement, but I would take any sound reason, political or not, that someone could give me for this abundance of pollen floating around. Because I have not been able to work in my gardens much this year, I have to blame the pollen on something. The air debris has increased over the years, right? I think so. I am celebrating another spring in which I can neither taste nor smell, and my ears feel plugged up.

     My allergy doctor, who has an out-of-left-field sense of humor and a great accent to match, actually had a suggestion for me. After a recent breathing test in his office, he asked me how I was doing overall.

     “Fine,” said I, “except for the stuff in the air. I wear a pollen mask when I work outside, but I can’t tell that it’s helping.”

     “You should use a painter’s mask,” he replied. “Pollen masks block some of the pollen, but painters’ masks are much more effective. They have a carbon filter.”

     My protest was immediate: “I already look like a space alien! I wear eye goggles to protect my eyes, ear protectors when I use my Leaf Hog, and this gigantic white pollen mask over my mouth and nose.”

     No stranger to shallow objections, Dr. Allergy didn’t miss a beat. “They come in colours,” he said, with a delightful emphasis on the “u” in colours (I vote for spelling it that way when he says it). “You would look more like Alien Commander. Wear it in the back yard first.” He didn’t even crack a smile, then only a slight one when I started chortling at the image.

     Ever since, I have delighted in replaying the word “colours” in my head. My friend Karen helpfully advised that she has such a mask -- green -- that she uses when she works on her carvings, and I am welcome to borrow it.

     Thanks, Frog, but I am thinking of asking for several for my birthday, in different colours. I have an Alien Commander image to maintain and lots of yard-wear to coordinate.

A Christmas adventure

I glanced at the clock as I grabbed the phone. Eleven forty-eight. Almost midnight on Christmas Eve.

“Hello?” I said. Then I heard the familiar speeding voice at the other end and realized my quiet holiday was about to become more interesting.

Let me back up. We are spending Christmas at home and making plans to visit family after the holiday. We opted out of holiday driving only recently, noticing how much more we enjoyed not spending hours in the car.

After a calm, relaxing and warm Christmas Eve, despite persistent drippy weather, I went to bed about 11, saying goodnight to my night-owl husband. When his presence startled me from sleep 45 minutes later, I mumbled something barely coherent. In the darkness I didn’t see at first he that was apologetically holding the phone.

“She says it’s sort of an emergency,” he said.

Then I saw the phone. I took it and said hello while I tried to locate a room with more light. The voice at the other end apologized for waking me and sped on. My slow brain didn’t process all the information. Finally, I understood the problem. Two cats were alone in her house, as both she and her roommate were out of town. They were the roommate’s cats, and accustomed to staying alone.

However, when my friend left town and boarded her dog, she left the doggie door unshielded. Her roommate, who had departed days earlier, was beset with worries that the lonely cats would escape via the doggie door. “I hate to ask,” said my friend, “and I would NEVER ask you to go over tonight. But first thing in the morning would you go and check on the cats?”

I agreed and got the address and directions to the house, asking for repeats many times. As I said, my friend talks fast. Finally, I asked, “Now, how do I get inside the house? Did you hide a key?”

“Here’s the thing,” she began, and paused. I knew the answer would be…how to describe it…a bit beyond the pale. “You’ll have to go through the doggie door. Iknowyoucandoit.” Her words tumbled out, each more quickly than the one before. “I can get through it and you are no bigger than I am.”

She seemed certain of it, so I agreed, got her phone number and pledged to call her as soon as I assessed the situation. I stumbled back to bed.

“Has she been drinking?” asked my husband.

“I doubt it,” I mumbled.

I returned to the warm bed, feeling only slightly guilty for not going to check on the poor cats at drizzly midnight.

Before leaving the next morning, I put the phone on the bureau near my slumbering spouse. “I’ll call you from jail if I get arrested for breaking and entering.”

“I’ll tell them you’re with the CIA,” he muttered.

The streets were pretty empty, but I did notice two police cars at a shopping center. I was relieved when they didn’t follow. I passed near another friend’s house and considered borrowing her young son to crawl through the doggie door. Too early, I decided.

Soon I found the house and went to the back yard. I spotted the doggie door. “Is that a standard size?” I muttered, staring at the small rectangle and thinking about my claustrophobia. There was another back door and I looked at it hopefully. Maybe there were two doggie doors?

Nope.

I wondered if it would be worse to get stuck and have to call for a rescue, or to get arrested. I crawled halfway through the door. “Kitty kitty kitty,” I called, hoping both cats would appear and I could then back out and block the door with some large object. I heard a jingly bell, but saw no cats.

So I inched forward, wriggled sideways, and pulled my bottom half through the door. I’d done it! Who knew crawling through a doggie door would lead to such feelings of accomplishment? One more thing I knew I could do if I had to.

I found the two cats, the gray one with the jingly collar in the hallway and the orange one curled up on the bed. He appeared irritated. I called my friend and told her to tell her roommate that the cats were fine and only slightly annoyed. She directed me to the shield to put over the doggie door and we wished each other a Merry Christmas. “You are such a blessing,” she added. “I am going to bring you the biggest present.”

No need, my friend. Holidays go better with adventures. And I don’t mean traffic.

Be careful what you wish for

Here’s a gem from a magazine on how not to gain weight during the holidays: “You can still eat your favorite foods; just eat less.” 

Here’s one on exercising effectively: “Commit at least 30 minutes a day to physical activity.”

Here’s a tip on horizontal stripes or patterns: “They make you look wider. Wear them only if you are thin. Wear vertical patterns or dark solids to look smaller.”

Duh.

I used to wish for advice I’d never heard before. That was before I got my wish on a subject that actually affects my daily life. Allergies.

This advice is about maintaining a dust-free, pollen-free bedroom. It doesn’t focus on entombing your mattress in plastic, avoiding stuffed and live animals or keeping the humidity level at a certain percentage. Its concern is a sterile sleeping environment.

Ready for it? Here it is:

You must dress in another room and at all times brush your clothes and shoes before crossing the threshold into Dust-Free Utopia.

Are you actually thinking about doing this? I’m not either, although I briefly tried to get the picture in my head. I just can’t get beyond where I would keep my clothes (I have already stored the clothes I really don’t wear in the extra closet in preparation for the garage sale I have been thinking about for two years). I also got snagged on where to keep the sterile brush I’d need to use before entering sterile territory. And what about my husband, or more specifically, his clothes? It’s hard enough for both of us to find our clothes now. I can’t see either of us dressing somewhere else.

I now have a more open mind about articles that give advice. I believe they exist only in the spirit of compromise, to get us to think about doing things that are good for us.

Because now I am thinking about how nice it would be to have a dust-free home and I’ve gone beyond fantasizing about teaching Sam the dog to wipe his feet on the doormat. Maybe I could attach a dust cloth to his tail…