Big Bottom Girls

Hold the phone, y'all.

Stop the presses.

Sit down cause you are never going to believe what I am about to tell you.

A researcher in Australia recently conducted a study that shows..... Wait for it.... Wait for it.....

Trying on swim suits tend to make women depressed. 

Yes, that's right. It seems tugging a teeny, tiny, tight piece of fancy, fake fiber up over your hips can make you feel down in the dumps, objectified, and plain old mean.

Seriously.  Don't we all already know that? I think the earliest study was done in the Garden of Eden when Eve stared at her figure in the reflective light of a shallow tidal pool under that apple tree and wondered if the fig leaves made her butt look big.

Who really needed 102 female grad students, a four page questionnaire, and a forty dollar stipend to uncover that piece of earthshaking news?  Find me someone who just loves, and I mean loves, to try on bathing suits in the crippling light of fluorescent bulbs while  imaging themselves bending over, squatting, running and chasing after kids, a Frisbee, a floppy hat, and/ or a dog day all day and I've got some gorgeous beachfront property in Ohio to sell them.

This is how it really goes down:

After two hours, lots of tears, and a dozen different sizes, styles, and "how ya doing in there”s...most women find a suit that'll do, hold their nose, and surrender some serious cash before marching straight on down to the outdoor food court for an iced mocha and a cinnamon sugared soft pretzel and a serious dose of fresh air.

Though there was one interesting part of the study, that when I read it, made me pause, take a sip of my morning Chocolate Royale Slim Fast shake, and say out loud "well, you could have fooled me".  It was the part explaining that women were more upset and disparaged in the dressing room than wearing the suit out on the beach.  This is because, once they are out having fun in the sun, these lab rats said they get too busy and kind of forget about being stuffed in, tied up tight, and lodged into a garment about as big as a industrial size glue gun.

But I don't buy it for a second.....even if you did have a couple strawberry daiquiris and a Miller Lite before you unrolled your beach mat and sprayed on your SPF 50.  You simply don't fail to remember, especially when a nice easterly breeze flows by, that you don't have a whole heck of a lot on.

See, imbibing or not, I find them both equally terrifying and depressing.....the trying on and then the subsequent wearing of the overpriced slip of shiny looking material masquerading as a slice of artificial second skin.  But hey, that's just me. 

Trying to chase down a seagull (who just snatched my baby’s favorite sand toy) does not make me overlook the fact that I just might have a wedgie the size of one of those Styrofoam pool noodles in my sand packed bathing suit bottom.  Or as I run...well, jog...alright, walk quickly after the pesky bird, I am probably exposing the very parts of me that I have no personal desire for the rest of the world to see....even if I shaved my legs the night before and am sporting on all-over body spray tan.

Cause let's face it, y'all.  When you peel on your one hundred and twenty dollar swimsuit, we all know we're just putting on a more expensive and fancier pair of glorified underwear and no marketing genius from Madison Ave is going ever to change that.

But all this pity and malaise is not particularly fair to me and my self-image.  At least, that's what all the experts keep telling me.

They say I should love me for me.  I should embrace my curves; every hairpin and harrowingly steep-sized one of them.

Better yet I should work it like I own it, strut my stuff, put a little swagger in my step.  Basically, I should show it all off with aplomb, confidence, and a hefty helping of attitude.

I don't do that in my regular clothes.  Most people I know don't do that either.

So as we now enter into one of the most disheartening and irritating times of the year, fear not fellow ladies.  For no fluorescent lightening, flimsy fabric, or forceful sales girl can keep us down.

Go ahead, girls.  Get moving and go gracefully towards that good night ....uh, I mean ....towards that rack of swimsuits at your local department store or boutique. The inanimate and microscopic sack of quick drying spandex might make you testy but it's not going to bite.  That's what the May flies, gnats, and overpriced frozen drinks are for.

See all of you bathing beauties out on the sand this summer.  I’ll be the one covered up to my neck in it.

Unsung Heroes

It happens every year.

And for the life of me, I just can’t figure out why.  Whenever they come out with the Top Ten Most Dangerous Jobs List every year, it always leaves me wondering who “they” actually are and what type of qualifications “they” possess to come up with the list in the first place.

They certainly haven’t stared down fear as they look into their own tired eyes through the bathroom mirror while cleaning their kid’s projectile vomit from their face, arms, and legs, knowing it will be a mere 24 hours before they’ll be right back in the bathroom, but this time laying on the cool tile floor, sick as a dog, in between the toilet and the sink.

Have they ever changed a diaper on a freeway or ripped open 17 juice boxes and served 40 snacks from the front seat without a seatbelt, extra napkins, or a "thank you" and a "please"?

Have they ever been hit in the head with baseball, a Frisbee, a half-dressed Polly Pocket doll, and a fat piece of orange sidewalk chalk- all at the same time-simply trying to navigate their way, in peace, from the driveway to the mailbox for their People magazine?

No.  I don’t think so.  If they had, motherhood would make the Top Ten List every stinking time.

What I do find fascinating about these lists y’all, (besides whoever makes them probably sits around and watches "Deadliest Catch" and "Ice Road Truckers all day"), is how a mother’s job title fits into every single one of these dangerous occupations. It’s actually uncanny. 

Let’s take a look at a few shall we:

Garbage Collector: 

It’s true if your job is to hang off the back of a three ton truck barreling down the road at 60 mph; it’s probably pretty dicey wondering if you’ll fall off and all.  But if you’ve ever emptied a stuffed dirty diaper bail on a empty stomach and 3 hours sleep, chances are greater or at least equal to fainting, then tumbling down the stairs, and hitting your head on a remote control airplane than plummeting of a garbage truck and into the street.

Wild Animal Tamer:

No one wants to tussle with a hungry crocodile; I’ll be the first to admit that.  But y’all can’t tell me wrestling a fifty pound, over-sugared, over-tired toddler out of the pool at lunch time doesn’t require a lot of skill.  Please.  Not to mention, I have seen moms do it with a baby on their hip, designer sunglasses a top their head, and a full glass of iced tea in their hand- without even one spill. 

Truck Drivers/Taxi Drivers/Chauffeurs:

This one to me is a no brainer.  Especially, since we SHARE the same roads with them anyways.  But truck driver’s, well, they’re  cruising solo, for MONEY, in the safety of an air-conditioned cab way up high out of reach of paper airplanes and empty goldfish pouches.  And if they’re taxi drivers or chauffeurs, they have the privilege of rolling up the window partition thingy that separates them from their passengers or can at least kick them out for being rude and yelling at the top of their lungs “please, pull over, I have to PEE! PEE!  PEE!” or “Stop touching me!” over and over and over again while you just trying to make it a few miles down the street.

Fisherman:

I have no doubt that’s a scary job, being out on a small boat in the middle of a vast sea.  But how about being alone with a pre-teen or teenager after school sitting around the kitchen table?

Mom: How was your day?

Kid: Good

Mom: What did you do in school?

Kid: Nothing

Mom: So how did you do on the science test?

Kid: Can we stop talking now.  It’s exhausting and "Deadliest Catch" is on.

I know fisherman put their lives in danger every day so we can eat, but at least they get something on their line every now and then.  mom’s fish all day, every day, and rarely reel in anything but an empty table five minutes after dinnertime, a stack of dirty dishes, and eight loads of smelly laundry.

 So, now do you see what I’m talking about?  Being a mother is one of the toughest, thankless, most mind boggling and exhausting occupations out there.

Moms are the unsung heroes, the battered and the bruised, the very ones who take a licking and keep on kicking.  They are the soldiers that keep marching on.

But if you ask anyone of them, they’d probably all tell you the same thing.  They wouldn’t trade their job for anything in the world.

Happy Moms Day, ladies!  I know it’s a tough job, but someone has to do it.  Actually, literally, the whole world does, or we would cease to exist as a species………

So pamper yourself every once and awhile and keep on, keeping on. 

See you in the trenches.

A Mother's Mind is Mush

         previouly written July, 2010 for blog only

Mush has never been one of my favorite words.  Especially now, since it reminds me of all the things I have tried real hard to forget since my husband and I decided to procreate some ten years ago.  Things like strained peas, regurgitated peas, dirty diapers and the “stuff” under the car seats that can only be identified with a culture and a bio-hazard lab at the CDC.  I could go on, but I won’t, seeing as it could trigger something in my brain and make the memories of the mush come flooding back in. 

I don’t know what it is they do to you at the Maternity Ward, but the ID bracelets they tether you and your newborn to must have some sort of electromagnetic mind zapping device in them or something.   What else could single handedly erase (along with your privacy and the hope of ever fitting back into your size 26 jeans) every last one of your remaining brain cells?

Gone, like that.  Just when you need them the most, you’re no longer able to remember dates, times, appointments, ages, passwords, street addresses, birthdays, or names. 

“Is David feeling any better,” I ask my friend after I literally bump into her at the grocery store with my shopping cart.

“Oh, he’s fine,” she tells me as she waves a hand with what looks like one of those Henna tattoos all over it, but on closer inspection, seems to be her grocery list and a reminder to pay the power bill and get the oil changed.  “His fever broke the night it rained.”

See, events are no longer referred to by date, but by catastrophic events and changes in the weather.  For example, the summer of 2008 might be replaced by the summer it was so hot the air conditioning blew up and Junior broke his arm falling out of his bedroom window.

But let’s get back to the grocery.

Earlier in the frozen food section, I witnessed an exchange between a sweet, unsuspecting elderly lady and an overtired Mom with crazy hair pushing one of those stock car grocery cart thingamajigs with a bunch of tiny arms and legs sticking out of it.  It went down like this:

“What a cute little boy! What’s his name?” the elderly lady coos over the toddlers head. 

“I’m not really sure seeing as he’s number three, I think.  It’s Jimmy, Sonny, or Spot,” overtired mom tells her has she pushes s few stray hairs out of her face.  “ All I know is that he likes Lego's but I can’t give him the small ones ‘cause he’ll stick them up his nose, he throws up on long car rides, and he’s allergic to penicillin.  Basically lady, your guess is as good as mine.  Anymore questions?’

The elderly lady, as you can imagine, walked off in a huff.  But the one I truly felt sorry for was overtired Mom.  See, I feel her pain.  As a mom, we don’t have a lot of time for idle chit chat and reminiscing about things we can’t even remember anyway.  We have better things to do, you know, like keeping them fed, clean, and out of the ER.

I can’t remember my own phone number, but I know the number for Poison Control by heart, the genus and toxicity of all wild, liver-killing mushrooms, and how much laundry detergent one 50 pound child can drink before he’s gotta get his stomach pumped.

There does seem to be one exception to this mom’s mind is mush rule and that would be Martha Stewart.  Now don’t quote me on this, but if you open up her brain….I’m pretty sure you’d find a tea strainer or two, a rolodex, and one of those all purpose labeling gadgets.  Oh and let’s not forget Hilary Clinton, seeing as she’s got a whole village or something up there helping her plug away through life while trying to achieve world peace.  I just want to know where you get one of these villages, seriously y’all.  Can you download one from the internet or Pinterest or something?   Or better yet, make a bid for one on EBay?

Now in the case of my husband’s brain, you’ll definitively find some mush that’s accumulated on account of all the video gaming, beer drinking, and ESPN watching, but it’s quite cleverly concealed under a rather larger button, that when activated, makes it look like he’s paying attention to everything I’m saying when he’s really not.  He also has one of those selective hearing buttons, not to mention the ability to keep a whole strain of code intact, that when broken, reveals twenty years of stats for the SEC.

I can’t help it that I’m jealous of all the cool gadgets he has going on up in the big noggin of his, but what really burns me up is my kids (who haven’t hit the double digits by the way) are now smarter than I am.

“Where are my sunglasses,” I ask no one in particular, as I dump the entire content of my purse and the three kitchen junk drawers directly onto the floor. 

“Mom, really,” my youngest rolls her eyes without taking them off the Disney Channel and True Jackson VP.  “They’re where you always lose them….on top of your head.”

Here’s another example of my inferior intellect:

I find myself wandering around the house with a knot in the pit of my stomach, wondering aloud what it is I should actually be doing instead of burning holes into my Orientals.

“Mom, it’s Sunday,” my oldest tells me, as she holds out a list free hand.  It does, however, have a smudge of chocolate and the equivalent of a five pound bottle of glitter all over it.  “You’d better call your own mom or she’s going to get mad at you.  For that daily piece of advice, please dispense.”

Well, I guess I better get going so I can call my Mom and scrounge under the seat cushions for a dollar in change to pay off one of the precious little lamb chops that helped create the mush in the first place .  The problem is I just gotta remember where I left the phone.

Talk with you soon, if remember my blogger password, that is. 

Rough Waters

Previously published in Coastal Illustrated March 7, 2012

               When it rains, it pours. 

               This expression has turned out to be an almost weekly, if not daily, forecast for my life since last November.  I keep sitting around waiting for the proverbial shoe to drop, and not just drop by the way, but land on my head, knocking me out for the count.

               Recent events have not boded well for my psyche.  See, I am a worrier of Olympic proportions, a gold medalist, if you will; a champion like no other. If worrying was a contact sport like football, I’d be wearing the Super Bowl ring.

               I know it's not good for me, but I can't help it.  I worry if the oven is on and coffee pot is off.  I worry that a suspension cord will snap off the bridge as I drive across it, sending me into the water without ever ordering that window smasher thingamajig I saw on late night TV.

               I worry that reincarnation does exist, and it's John Candy, not my dog that is staring at me with a sheepish grin because I am standing there dripping wet without a towel.

               I worry about wearing leather, weather, traffic, micro-waving plastic, being too sarcastic and artificial sweeteners.

               So, yes.  I will go ahead and admit it.  I am a card carrying, certified sweater of life’s smaller stuff.

               But ever since November, I'd take the small stuff over the big any day.  I'd like to sit down and tell you everything, I would, but I don't have enough room, or time, or emotional fortitude.  I can share one story with you because it is one that had a happy ending.  What happened in the beginning and the middle though, made me miss the small stuff; kind of like how a little kid at camp on the first night misses his mom during a thunderstorm followed by hail.

               It all started two Fridays ago.  My cell phone started to ring that evening and since my "only call here with good news, please" voice mail message seems to be ignored as of late, I asked my husband to answer it.  It was my dad.

               As he told me the bad news, I didn't have time to retreat into a younger, innocent, naive version of me, curled in a ball, wanting her mommy, waiting out a storm.  This time it was my mom who needed me.  Her doctor had recommended a biopsy after her last mammogram.  The labs had come back a few minutes before the call.  It was cancer. And, yes, of course....I'd come home.

               It's funny how, even though you have an idea of where your life is supposed to go and you've clung on to all the wagers you made along the way to get there, there remains this feeling that, sure enough, a road block is coming up around the bend that will derail you from your well thought out, but precarious plan.  How can you forge ahead when there seems to be no way around?

               “I want to see my granddaughters get married.”

               “I know Mom, I want that, too.”

               Now, normally if I am leaving town, as a warrior worrier, I'd have dotted every

“i” and crossed every “t”, but I didn't have time to even worry about how the girls, and my hubby, and the dog and the three cats would get thought the week without me.  Honestly, I didn't have time to run to the store, wash their uniforms for school that week, let alone write their schedules down in a newsy style word document, then paste it on the fridge, my husband’s dash board, and over the bathroom sink.  I had to let it all go.  Like life...real life....We were all going to have to just wing it.

               That week in Augusta, with my mom and brother and Aunt Shirley is still kind of a blur of tests, MRI's, chest x-rays and consultations.  Though now, we know where every bathroom is located in University Hospital.

               "Where are we again?" I'd ask.

               "Out Patient," Aunt Shirley would say.

               “So I take a left next to the nurses’ station, a right at the waiting room, and go straight towards the soda machines, then a u-turn by the big clock and I’ll find the bathroom?"

               "No, that's Inpatient. Take three rights, jog down the hall, and look behind the elevator," she says. “I think you might get there in time if you leave now. Good luck and Godspeed. You’ll know where to find us when you're done."

               We did have one day off from the hospital, which was Wednesday.  We had lunch and did some shopping...anything to keep Mom’s mind off her upcoming surgery on Friday.  Mom had fun picking out a few outfits for my oldest to take with her to Camp Ebenezer, her first overnight school trip.  Aunt Shirley even found a new bathing suit, the first she ever bought that she "could fit a leg in and not displace the pool water" with.  She also bought Mom an inspirational book of short stories.

               In the intro, the author recommended the reader should lighten his or her load on their respective ship of life.  It would make for smoother sailing.  We all smiled at the advice, but I couldn't help be a doubter, maybe that’s the worrier in me.   That's all well and good, but if we’re talking in clichés, we might as well run with it.  The truth is it doesn’t matter how light you pack your ship, because you’ll never be able to predict bad weather.

               Mom was so incredibly lucky.  Sure, the week was hell, but she just put one foot in front of the other, and with humor and grace, made it through her surgery.  She had a lumpectomy and they took out the sentinel node for testing.  It, THANKFULLY, came back negative so her tumor never spread.  Six weeks of radiation and this will be behind her, but the tumor made a permanent mark.  It proved we don’t know how to give up, no matter what gets thrown at us.

               My husband, by the way, did a pretty good job sweating all the small stuff back here while I was gone.  He went shoe shopping and bought the wrong girl a new pair of shoes, the one who already owns five.  But he did find the missing tennis shoes of the girl who desperately needed them.  Who would have thought they would be, not under, but in the bed?  He also put them in the only clean school uniforms they had to play golf on Sunday, so he stayed up late doing laundry and forgot to pack their lunch that first day.  But they made it out ago and had a lot of laughs in the process.

               Me, I missed it, the normalcy of the everyday chaos.  I think that’s part of what life is all about.  I don’t think it’s wrong to sweat the small stuff because in the end, I am just happy to be here to sweat it out all the same.

               We might not know how to predict the weather, but we sure as heck know how to open up an umbrella and bail the water out of a sinking ship.

               We are stronger than we think even in the roughest of storms. 

              

               We are, quite simply, survivors.  

Lessons the "Real Housewives" Have Taught Me: An Anthropological Study

Previously published in Georgia’s Coastal Illustrated Jan. 11, 2012

One of the world’s most renowned and influential anthropologists, Jane Goodall, once said simply, but yet so poignantly, that “to be fully human; we need to have meaning in our lives.”

 I couldn’t agree more, so I search daily for that “human” connection to the world that makes this one life I have been blessed with as worthy and meaningful as possible.  For me, in this moment, my “meaning” is to guide my two girls into womanhood with a healthy balance of grit, grace, and gratitude.

Like knitting a pair of socks that turn out to be the same size or making it through a Justin Bieber video without a few eye rolls, this is not as easy as you think it’ll be when you first start out.

Take for instance, their last sleep over.  I had grand plans, I really did.  Nothing too Kardashian like a backyard fireworks display and a thousand dollar designer goodie bag, but I did have a few surprises up my plushy green-grey bath robed sleeve. I’m talking glittery mani-pedis, chocolate covered popcorn, and a 3D movie marathon with extra long red Tweezler sticks.

Alas, it didn’t turn out the way I expected. As soon as I entered the living room, movies in hand, five sets of eyes stared me down as if it were high noon at the O.K. Corral, not seven thirty p.m. in a small, family suburban neighborhood.  Now, my grandmother on my father’s side taught me to play poker before I could walk, talk, and add so I can tell when someone is bluffing.  They were not.

But it's ok, really, I know when I am not wanted… or in immediate danger…..so I quickly retreated to my bedroom and shut the door.  I felt, well, just a bit like Jane Goodall herself, at first shunned by the very subjects she had set out to observe and aid then relegated to the outskirts of the tribe, on top of a hill, with only a pair of binoculars and a notebook to guide her.

However, I did not posses binoculars, or a notebook, or a hill for that matter, so I settled for the next available thing; Direct TV, a remote to mute at will, my super comfy bed, and a glass of Chardonnay behind my slightly ajar bedroom door.  Oh yeah, and a marathon rerun on Bravo of the “Real House Wives of New York” followed by “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.”   

Y’all I swear, this program can make even a novice in the study of human behavior fill up their field notebooks, scratch their heads, and then redraft even the sanest of cultural assumptions and theoretical suppositions of societal norms.  Even those that have been touted as fact since man and woman were able to walk in an upright position, negotiate a fair price for bread, or hail a cab.

Before I get into my own anthropological study of modern day “domestic” women, it’s important to note here exactly what Jane Goodall did and how her forty five years of studying and interacting with the chimpanzees in Tanzania changed the way we look, not only at the early socialization of pre-hominids, but at evolution as well.

Three important discoveries were found behind those binoculars on foreign African soil.  One, she discovered that chimpanzees were, in fact, meat eaters much like early humans.  This went against the conventional thinking of her time that primates were only vegetarians.  It seems they liked to indulge in a smaller monkey or two from time to time when the inkling hit….or they were trying to impress a date, or stick to the one of those new fade paleo diets or cannibalism....whatever you called it back then, I’m not really sure.

She also noticed they were able to use “tools” to procure food; for example, using small sticks to retrieve tiny termites out of mounds in the dirt.  This challenged the theory that man was the first creator of food gathering/hunting apparatuses. I’m not so sure what is appetizing about termites but they could quite possibly have also used the sticks as early back scratchers while their mate was down the road a piece and couldn’t scratch it for them.

Lastly, Goodall discovered those cute, furry alpha females could, on a dime, turn into savage and destructive beasts.   As in kill the young of other chimps and then head up a few camp time activities like female mutilation if they felt the hold on their own turf was in question, still making sure to be home in time for dinner.

It seems to me, especially after watching my Bravo marathon that these women have evolved by leaps and bounds in some regards.  Who needs a male to scourge for food when you have a driver, two maids and a personal assistant?   But sadly, it seems that in close and influential communal quarters like New York and L.A., the alpha female doesn’t fall far from the African banana tree, if you know what I mean?

 Here are the top three things I learned NOT to do from my “study (a/k/a eight hour straight viewing)” of the “Housewives”:

1.)    Never come to a party/fundraiser/lunch/fundraising planning lunch/or any get other together LATE (especially if it involves Pinot Grigio.) This is because you will, without a doubt, be talked about in a catty way before you eventually show up.  Upon arrival, you will be showered with kisses (on both cheeks), after being told you look fabulous, then gawked at as you eat a small piece of food from a tray as if it were a mortal sin that surely involves a membership to Jenny Craig and a group intervention.

2.)    Never come to a party/fundraiser/lunch/fundraising planning lunch/or any get other together EARLY (again, especially if it involves buckets of Pinot Grigio.)  This is because you will inevitably be set up to “talk to” one of the other housewives you upset at the last party/fundraising/lunch even though you don’t know what you did to make her angry or take a valium or threaten a law suit.  Besides, a finger in the chest is never fun even if its a hundred dollar French manicured one.

3.)    Never take three Xanax and then drink a bottle of champagne and two mojitos….ever…. even if you hate to fly and particularly if you plan to wear a bathing suit made out of three crochet men’s pocket squares.  Trust me.  It’s just not smart, especially if the other women’s husbands are around.

I could go on and on but chances are you have already seen all the episodes anyway (not to mention Atlanta, Orange County, D.C., etc.). At least that’s what my girl friends tell me seeing as I was the last one of us to jump on the “Real Housewife” bandwagon (or town car so to speak).  There is something strangely addictive about it: the realization and then requisite relief you feel knowing your life may not be as “fabulous” but is just fine without all the drama and self-absorption.  You don’t need fame, money, expensive clothes, cars and boats to have class or, like I want to teach my girls: grit, grace, and gratitude. 

The opposite is actually true.  It’s the search for meaning, as Jane would tell you, that make us human, not all the other superficial stuff.

I am probably being way too critical or over analytical.  The “housewives” are just people after all and who I am to be a voyeur into their world, while judging them all the same?  Because  maybe, just maybe, there is a little bit of Jane in all of us, poised on top of a hill, looking down from a distance, trying to make sense of something that puzzles, perturbs, and excites us all at once. 

As Ms. Goodall also said, “Every individual matters.  Every individual has a role to play.  Every individual makes a difference.”

Whether you agree or not with our expert, it’s hard to argue that these alpha females really don't make for some pretty, great T.V.

Sister Friends

I didn't grow up with a sister. I often imagined what that would be like as my little brother smacked me upside the head with his Darth Vader lightsaber. Like my own two daughters, we would certainly always support one another, no matter what:

"One day, I want to travel way up in the sky and bottle up some clouds to bring home in a jar so I can watch it rain next to my bed," my youngest told us one day. I couldn't help but smile.

"That's the silliest thing I have ever heard of," said my oldest. "Don't you know that water vapor floating in air would condense? Go ahead if you want to, but I'm telling you right now, all you'll end up with is an old mayo jar full of air with a few drops of water in it."

"Thanks for crushing my dreams," the little one sniffed.

"Well, I didn't sit throughout thirty six weeks of fourth grade science for nothing," came the reply.

When my brother would get mad at me, lock me out of the house and then turn on the sprinklers, I would think that surely sisters had their own secret language and would never let anything get in between them.

"Punch buggy, no punch buggie," my girls scream in unison from the back seat, scaring me senseless. I narrowly avoid the yellow VW bug that's pulled out in front of us.

"American jinx," they yell again directly into each other's faces.

"No fair! I said it first," says one.

"Ouch!!!" spits out the other. "Why did you go and hit me again?"

"Because my mind told me to!"

"Meanie!"

"Dork!"

"Baby!"

"Whatever"

Growing up, I figured I had missed out on that most precious and coveted relationship dynamic called sisterhood. As a child, finding solid friends that were girls was a tough prospect. We moved around a lot and attended way too many schools. The fact that I was shy, awkward, and lived in my own head didn't help matters all that much. And let's face it ladies, in middle and high school, girls can be just plain, awful mean. It's easy in hindsight to say, “Hey, those were their own hang-ups and insecurities coming through, not mine,” but mean words and rumors still sting and are hard to forget. I did find though, that once the Jordache jeans wore out, the friendship pins retired, and the hormones settled, everything changed for the better.

Friendships are precious. You have to seek them out, put in the time, open up, and hold on to them. Only some of them are simply serendipitous, kismet . . . meant to be. I call these my sister friends: the women who, if I were lucky enough to have a sister, would most definitely fit the bill.

One in particular, wandered into my life quite by happenchance, after a yoga class almost five years ago. Her extended family quickly became my extended family, her children like my own. Even our kids fight, laugh, and play like cousins together.

She has such generosity of spirit, grace, and most importantly, one wicked sense of humor. One of the things I have learned from her is that no matter what happens, to stay strong, stay on course, and never give up. From time to time, I still pull out my acorn bracelet she gave me after a particularly stinging personal rejection of my work. It still helps stop the flow of self-doubt that is always there around the edges, trying to find its way in. She is right, you know.

True friendships aren’t meant to bring you down, but to hold you up. I know without a doubt I am stronger with her in my life, just by knowing her. She might not be down the road anymore, but she will always be a part of my life.

I am going to miss you, Stacey, so much. And I know, I know. Buck up, Atlanta isn't that far away.

Alicia, another one of my “sister friends,” gave me the book “Love You, Mean It” four years ago for my birthday. It is a heartbreaking, tear-jerking, honest account of four 9/11 widows who came together in the aftermath of such despair and destruction to form a beautiful and unbreakable bond of love and friendship. Soon, they began to end their conversations, emails and texts with those very words: “I love you. Mean it.” They wrote, “what had started as a lighthearted goodbye . . . became something much more. The more we said the words, the more we realized how much we did love one another and how grateful we each were to have the other women in our lives . . . To us, the message was clear: Love is a gift. Share it.”

I hope my girls find this in each other, as well as in the many friendships with other women that they will form over their lifetimes. After all, no matter where you go or where you end up, with great girlfriends, anything is possible. We just have to love each other. And mean it.

LUMI, Stace. See you real soon.