Chronicling the Dead Keeps my Mind off the Living

I've been doing all things grave-y lately.  A lot of family history stuff, including scanning old family photos and letters.  I've probably said this before, but I'm going to say it again:

Mark your photographs!

Seriously!  We have stacks of unmarked photos that we'll NEVER really know who they were. We've had a little luck comparing them with records on the LDS Family Search site, but most of them are of folks whose identities are lost.  DON'T do that!

Here are a couple examples:

Zero clue, probably taken in Camden or Philly, 1930s, maybe?

Zero clue--we all agree the lady down front right looks like she could be related.

And my husband's side of the family is no better.  Most of them are more easily traced than mine, but they, too, have a crappy habit of not marking photos:

Mormon Missionaries, one of whom is a relative 

So we know where it was taken, but not who it is.

And then there's this amazing gem:

An actual tintype.  It's not in good shape, I had to "fix" her cheek in Photoshop because a chunk is missing.

So I'm saying it again--MARK YOUR PHOTOS SO YOU DON'T LEAVE FOLKS SCRATCHING THEIR HEADS AND WISHING THEY COULD PUT NAME TO FACE!

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In addition to the family history thing, we've been visiting local cemeteries.  Some of the stones, especially the hand carved ones, are really wrenching.  All backward letters and misspelled words and heart.  So much heart.

Plus, I've been cataloguing some English and Welsh cemeteries as I come across the headstones online.  I started in Herefordshire, hoping to come across something related to my husband's family, but got caught up in the history of it.  I now know that the Caroline Spooner was the largest Barque ever built at Aberystwyth.  That's "A-bur-uh-stew-uth."

If only someone would pay me to archive stuff like this.  Because I'm good at it, I love doing it (I do it for FUN), and it's important.  Except most folks don't think it is important.

Sadly.

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Speaking of cemeteries, headstones, and the like, I've been noticing how, even in death, women are marginalized, they're minimized, they're lost to history because, so often, their "maiden" names are not included on the headstone.  So Margaret Griffiths gets married, becomes Margaret Davies, but her headstone only reads "Margaret Davies," or worse "Margaret, wife of Hugh Davies."  

Like she's just an aside, an afterthought.  As though she never was anything but an extension of the man she married.  Descendants run up against brick walls when trying to trace the women in their family's history.  Maybe, if they're lucky, they'll find a church record or census that relays the woman's birth name, but, often as not, that doesn't happen. 

That's got me thinking just how incredibly sexist the whole idea of "maiden name" versus "married name" really is.  Like a woman belongs to her father until some man takes her, renames her, and turns her from "maiden" to "matron." The historic meaning of "maiden" makes this glaringly obvious.  

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A big "I wouldn't piss on your face if your teeth were on fire" shout out to those teabaggers on Capital Hill who have, once again, decided to slash my husband's transit benefit.  That's another 50+ bucks a month gone, though they've INCREASED the parking benefit (which we don't receive).  In other words, they're doing what they can to reduce ridership on mass transit so they can then claim that mass transit, which isn't supposed to "turn a profit" anyway, isn't turning a profit.  So they can slash mass transit funding.  So their buddies in the oil industry make more money off the increased number of cars on the road in an already devastatingly traffic congested area.

And they think we don't know what they're up to.  These are the same guys who squeal about some dead birds at wind farms, while protesting the fines levied against British Petroleum for oil spills that killed millions of birds and fish.

Luckily, they're going to give my husband his first raise in four years.

NOT!

Mmm hmm.  You can torch your damned teeth any ol' time, guys.

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Still wandering around with a temporary crown in my face.  Which has the other side, where I have no molars, raw and sad because that's where I've been chewing.  Scared to death that, despite all the assurances that we have enough credit with the dentist's office to more than cover this, I'm going to go in on the ninth and be told I owe.

We have no money.  Seriously, none.  Which is why I was so careful to confirm, repeatedly, that this would carry no out-of-pocket cost to us.  But I'm scared.  Scared I'm going to utterly explode on them if they try to hold my permanent crown hostage in return for payment they said wouldn't be due.

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I'm going to close with a picture of a tree.  Because we live in a place with great trees.  Trees that dwarf and put to shame those sad, scraggly things in Utah.

Rude Thin Guy Hates Stupid Fat People--boy, that's a surprise, huh?

So, let's talk about "fat shaming."  More specifically, let's talk about a man named Geoffrey Miller, who is a professor.  Mr. Miller "tweeted" that (and I'm paraphrasing) "fat people can't finish dissertations because they lack motivation or self control."

Mr. Miller is, of course, slender and really quite handsome.  I'm sorry, that's DOCTOR Miller.

Silly me.

Now, there are many calling for Dr. Miller's dismissal, but I'm not one of them.  What I WOULD like to see is Dr. Miller educated on matters of obesity, diet, and what really goes on in a person's body when they become fat as a child.  It's not opinion, it's not excuses, it's not whining--it's science, folks.  Because I abruptly piled weight on at the age of seven (and no one did a thing to figure out why, though my doctor called me a pig and my father offered to drop me off at the dump with a fork, neither response proving to be particularly helpful, strangely), my body will ALWAYS burn less, store more, and fight my efforts to keep weight off.  I will never be able to eat the way a "never-fat" person can eat.  I will always have to eat markedly less and move markedly more.  Again, that's not opinion, that's not butt-covering, that's just science.  The more Dr. Miller (a University of New Mexico professor who was doing a "visiting professor" gig at NYU) actually grasps about the human body, metabolism, and issues of weight and diet, perhaps the less he mouths off like a snotty, discriminating punk.

Speaking of discriminating, word has it this man has spent time on academic admissions committees.  Boy, if that doesn't just pierce your heart with something cold and scary, huh?  Kind of like being gay and Hispanic and having Niall Ferguson and Jason Richwine weighing your admissions application.  Not saying the man's obvious bias against folks who weigh more than he thinks they should came into play, just saying the possibility certainly leaps to mind.

Here's one of Dr. Miller's tweets:

And here is a nicely phrased blog entry about Dr. Miller, his tweets, and some of the broader issues at play here.  To put a wrap on this issue, let me just say this--I hope, with all my heart, that Dr. Miller finds a way to overcome this awful prejudice before a wife, lover, or child weighs in at more than he finds acceptable.  Personally, even at my thinnest (think a loose size one), I would never have dated a guy like this--after all, even at my thinnest, I was still ME.  And this guy?  Despises me.

This girl never would have dated Dr. Geoffrey Miller

Now, Dr. Miller would no doubt look at the above picture and say, "But see, that's the perfect example of what I mean--you DID lose the weight, and therefore YOU would be the perfect doctoral candidate!"  

My answer?

I lost that weight (135 lbs) in six months through starvation and terrifyingly obsessive exercise.  I was 15 years old, and I quit school so I could spend six-plus hours a day exercising.  When I wasn't doing aerobics at home, I was running.  And when I wasn't running?  I was at the gym lifting weights, riding stationary bikes, taking part in high energy aerobics classes, and swimming.  I ate (and this is no exaggeration) one day a week, and that meal was preceded by a large dose of laxatives.  All other days?  Four ounces of unsweetened orange juice.  My hair began thinning.  My teeth loosened.  My gums bled.  My hands trembled all the time, my head hurt all the time, my stomach BLED while my periods STOPPED for almost two years.  I'm still facing a health backlash over this, decades later--ever wonder what anorexia does to bone density? Yeah, I'll tell you all about it some time.

But gosh, at least Jeff Abbot asked me out.  Jeff Abbot, whose opinions were much like Dr. Miller's.  Jeff Abbot, who, a year earlier, had told me to get my "fat ass" off his car.  It was with a special joy that, the day he asked me out, I was able to tell him to get HIS "fat ass" off MY car.  It was only then he realized I was the same girl.  No, he didn't have the good sense to be ashamed.

Now, Dr. Miller might say, "You should have lost the weight reasonably, you should have taken it slow and made gradual lifestyle changes."  Oh, shut the hell up--like I haven't been doing that my whole stinking life?  The last time I fried a food--ANY food--was 1981.  The last time I added salt to ANYTHING was that same year.  I haven't eaten white bread in 30 years.  I haven't had a sugar-sweetened soda since that one time Don M. didn't have any diet drinks back in 1984.  My mistake, every time, has been thinking that, once I achieve a weight goal, I can start eating like a normal person, calorie-wise.  No, not like a stereotypical "fat" person, but like the lady across the table from me, like my husband, like my friends.  

And that is just not true.  And it never will be true.  And until I can find a way to reconcile what I want with the vastly reduced amount I can actually have, I will always struggle.  I challenge Geoffrey Miller to exist on markedly reduced calories a day FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE and keep blathering on about lazy people who lack willpower.  

Here's an EXCELLENT PIECE in the NY Times on the subject.

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And enough of that!  Let's move on to even more depressing things.

My teeth.

I am the dental health queen in the family.  While my husband has racked up thousands of dollars in dental care costs, I've always been Ms. Wonder-Teeth.  Yes, I'm missing all my molars on the right side, but through no fault of my own--the bottom ones never erupted (and had to be removed surgically in an in-patient procedure when I was 13 years old), and the top ones, which were perfectly healthy, had to be yanked out of my head because they kept sinking lower and lower (because of the lack of a bridge below them), until they were gouging into my lower jaw every time I chewed.  But otherwise, my teeth have always rocked.  I did have a root canal 8 years ago because a tooth broke when I chewed something that turned out to have a hard chunk of rock-like stuff in it.  That aside, I'm the girl who's always being congratulated for my dental hygiene.  I'm the "brush 2-3 times a day, floss repeatedly, rinse with an anti-cavity product every night before bed" kind of person.

So you can imagine my horror at the 600 dollar-plus dental bill I have coming up later this month.  You see, when you chew on only one side of your face, it takes a toll.  I've been chewing only on the left side since . . . well, since the baby molars fell out and nothing new came in to take their place.  And, eventually, that has a deleterious effect.  In me?

It's left one of my molars cracked.  Which is going to necessitate a build up and crown.

Damn.

In addition, I have a new problem.  See, I rinse nightly with a fluoride/anti-gingivitis rinse.  I have for years.  But recently (about a month ago), I ran out of my usual stuff (ACT).  While at Wegmans, I spied a big, purple bottle of Crest Pro-Health Complete Rinse.

It's purple.

It claims to be "no burn" and "clean mint" flavored.

Did I mention it's PURPLE?

 I'd been using it for 3+ weeks when I noticed that my teeth were looking decidedly . . . dingy.  A sort of nasty yellowish pall.  Upon closer inspection, I realized that I had definite BROWN staining starting between the teeth.  In some spots, it was pretty intense.  I was horrified.  I smoked for 26+ years, so my teeth aren't movie-star white, but they're a nice, solid, even light ivory.  For them to suddenly be yellow with brown patches between them?

What the hell?

So there it is-the brown between, the yellowish cast--that's all new.  Again, I brush, floss, and rinse daily, so this was something initially scary to me.  Being the web-junkie I am, I immediately ran out and did a websearch.  And the overwhelming answer?

Crest Pro-Health.  Not only does this stuff contain an ingredient that causes brown stains to teeth (cetylpyridnium chloride), but Crest has KNOWN that this stuff stains teeth for YEARS.  In fact, it turns out, in very fine print, that they say so on the packaging:

Now, here's the rub--they say it's not permanent, and that "adequate brushing" can prevent it.  Wellll, screw you, Proctor and Gamble!  I brush plenty adequately, and the hygienist who went nuts trying to scrape it off?  Said it won't budge.  And she really put some muscle into it.  Fact is, if I want this completely gone, I'm going to have to fork over for a professional tooth whitening gig.

Yes, I contacted Crest.  And after a few days?  Still no response.  I feel me a big, nasty Epinions product review coming on.

Now, I will say that, after a week of NOT using this crap (and it is crap--it smells and tastes like that horrid saccharine-like fake bubble gum air freshener my mom used to bring home from the hospital where she worked), the brown is not as bad.  And I suppose I should be grateful for the brown--with the number of people out there who complain that this product has robbed them of their sense of taste (believable to me--my tongue is still randomly tossing out bitter sensations, and the flavor of this stuff ten minutes after use is horrifically, deeply chemical-y), I guess a little brown and yellow is the preferable bad side-effect.

Now, I was checking in the store last night, and not all Crest Pro-Health products appear to have this ingredient.  So read your labels, and watch for the staining warning.  And remember, the FDA is not your friend here--because they consider these effects "minor" and "cosmetic" and "not damaging," they won't do anything about it.

Looks like I'll be dodging Crest products like I'll be dodging Chrysler.  Sometimes, it's not just what your product does, it's how you, as a corporate entity, respond to what your product does.

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And on a final, happy note?  I was out this morning at around six (I know, some of you are saying, "6 a.m.?  I thought you said HAPPY?"), watering the flowers, veggies, and grass (and putting fresh water in the neighbor's bird bath).  I like going out early when it's cool and green and everything still has that dewy, fresh smell to it.  It's why, when my other neighbor (the atheist-hater) offers to let me use her soaker hose, I don't actually take her up on it.  While she would never understand, fact is, I LIKE being outside with my yard.  I like watering, pruning, and just sitting there enjoying as I give my world a drink.  Anyway (see how I wandered there?), I was watering, and the birds were so loud, so . . . celebratory.  A hummingbird kept coming to the feeder, landing, and taking deep drinks.  Two mourning doves kept landing on the fence and staring, waiting for me to leave.  And the robin on the shed?  Kept coming to the ground, hunting for bugs, then flying off when I'd move, each time giving an offended chirp and casting an evil glance my way.  Obviously impatient for me to get out of HIS yard so he could get his breakfast in.  And then?

It occurred to me.  At 6 a.m., I don't have a lot of birds in my yard.  Instead, the birds have a lot of ME in their yard.  At 6 a.m., I'm the interloper.

It made me happy to see it that way.

It's always something . . . bad.

So, I went to the doc's office today--annual physical.  I was supposed to be fasting, and what did I do?  I popped a damned mint in my mouth while waiting in the examination room!  I spoke to the nurse about it, but, honestly, he seemed sort of . . . dull.  Nice, but only a thin hair shy of "box of rocks" territory.  His name?

Acquilleys.  That's pronounced "Achilles."

I kid you not.

Acquilleys said that the mint wouldn't affect anything, but, looking around online, I see it might.  So I called the office and asked them to make a note that I had screwed up.  That way, if the results are a mess, we'll maybe know why.

The doctor, who seems quite nice, agreed to a "once every six months" visit schedule.  I'm not thrilled about it, but I'm better with that then the "every three months" schedule Madame "There's No Mass/That's Why He's Your Husband and Not Your Gynecologist" tried to force me into.

It'll do.  I'll let you know how the blood work went.

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Next up (in about an hour) is the dentist appointment.  You know what I remember?  I remember the days of my dentist (Dr. Grover Hoopes, and the man ROCKED) looking to save his patients money.  I'd go in, he'd do the x-rays, have his assistant clean my teeth while waiting for the x-rays, and then fill right then if it was only one or two.  These days?  Holy cow, the money grubbing is breathtaking, it's astounding, how broken this system is.  What am I going in for?

I have no idea.  They say they want to see me twice a year.  Except that's for cleaning.  I have to make two more appointments each year for x-rays.  So that's four appointments per year, because they won't clean and do x-rays at the same appointment.  And if I need work?  That's more appointments, and they won't fill more than one cavity a day, so if you have two?  That's two more appointments.  So, for two cavities, they could conceivably have you in for a minimum of four appointments.  

Yes, I "get" what they're doing.  They're trying to maximize the insurance payout by spreading out the billable procedures.  

And it sucks.  It sucks for me, time-wise, nerves-wise, and money-wise, because each visit is a copay.

Universal health care, folks.  Like they do it out there in the civilized world.  And don't give me any of that dippy "I don't want to wait five months for an appointment!"  I had to wait four months for an appointment with the urogynecologist, and I had to wait six for my initial dental appointment here.  And my insurance?  The medical ROCKS (the dental is ehhhh).  Seriously, my husband's employer insures the hell out of us.  Well, there is that pesky 500 bucks a month we have to drop, but the point stands--here, in the U-S-of-A, with grade-A insurance, I had to wait MONTHS for treatment.  FOUR months just to have someone examine an unidentified, growing MASS.  

Yeah, universal health care, baby.  Now.

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So, today's the day I take a day off from the new way of eating.  Not totally losing it, no beef or pork or anything crazy like that.  But Chinese with Chicken (first non-fish meat in over a month) and cupcakes.  What's the bet I feel like utter hell tomorrow?

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So, we were at the Farmer's Market the other day, and found ourselves smack in the middle of a railroading festival.  The usual parking was full of additional booths, and so we hit the nearby parking terrace.  Now, there are very specific rules about parking here--Monday through Friday, the entire terrace is reserved for permit and city-worker parking.  However, on weekends, the top level (level 5) is for non-permit, non-city folks who are hitting the Farmer's Market.  

As we pulled in, we marveled at how crowded the first two levels were--every spot taken.  As we ascended, there were more and more open spots, until we reached level 5, which was almost empty--aside from us, there were, perhaps, a half dozen vehicles.  All bearing hippy-dippy stickers, Obama stickers, "COEXIST" stickers (I'll talk about my problem with those someday), and other nuevo-peacenik-type things.  Noting the stickers, I decided to keep an eye open on the way out, see if there was, perhaps, a trend there, politically-speaking.  We hopped on the ELEVATOR (yes, elevator--so parking illegally downstairs didn't really save any time or walking distance) and hit the market.  And when we got back, laden with our treasures?  Even fewer cars up top, even more on the lower levels.

And the stickers?

Of the ten cars parked closest to the entrance?  The "most illegally" parked, if you will?  One had a Romney-Ryan sticker.  THREE had Cuccinelli stickers.  There were two NRA stickers.  One strongly anti-Obama sticker, and one Tea Party sticker.  And some various sports team stickers.  

Certainly not a scientific sample, but it sure does make you think.  Makes you wonder about the mentality that can't be bothered to park where they're supposed to.  It's clearly marked, it's not like they missed it.  It's not like the free parking up top was full and they had nowhere else to be.  No, this is an oblivious sense of entitlement, a "don't you tell me what to do" kind of bent that I've commonly observed in the bagger/right crowd.  

Maybe there are some research dollars in that, huh?

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And finally, I did good.  First I did bad, but then good.

Friday night, the lice-kid from down the street, the one who pathologically lies?  Showed up after 9 p.m., wanting to do a sleepover.  This kid blew our boy off for months, and even before that, made it clear our kid was a "last resort."  This boy and his brother brought LICE into our home!  Most scarily, this boy has been hanging out with the frightening animal killing/kid beating group.  

Oh, and he's three years younger than our boy.

Anyway, he shows up and wants to overnight.  Wanting to save my boy the discomfort of having to beg off, I sent him upstairs--and it got ugly.  I had no idea why, so when the lice-kid had left, I asked.  And our boy said, "I wouldn't mind if he came over."

Understand, our boy can't stand this kid, which means he must be really desperate for companionship.  

Problem is, I'm not willing to have the kid over here.  When he comes, he's not here for our boy, he's here to walk through our house inventorying our possessions while he makes up stories about his rich grandpa and rich uncles who have stuff that's so much better than ours.  Instead of hanging with our boy, he hangs on the adults, telling whopping, incredibly stupid lies about things like "electroid soundproofing curtains."  The kid proudly proclaims that he's gone over a year without reading ANYTHING, and every time he's come over, it's been followed by a return visit claiming he's lost some expensive bit of electronic equipment over here.  

That's the bad.

What our boy didn't know is that I had scoped out an open house for a local Radio Control Flying club.  See, since we moved here he hasn't been able to fly because the laws are pretty nasty around here on flying in parks and the like.  He's missed it.  Terribly.  In fact, I was reading a writing assignment I gave him recently, and he was describing flying, and then how much he missed it.  So, when he was yelling at me on Friday night, he didn't realize that his Saturday was going to be RC Flying.  We've made arrangements now for him to fly most Saturdays.

That's the good.  I hope I redeemed myself.  Hubby said there were a lot of kids there, and I hope that brings him some joy, too.

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And that's that.  Oh, except we got an email from the landlord, a very vague "The HOA says there's a problem with the fence, fix it."  Yeah.  Some clarification, please.

Oh, and here's something ugly:

And finally, the bad news.  The small cavity in the lower left canine?  Not a problem, 27 bucks to fill.  The crack in the molar on the only side of my mouth I've been able to chew on since I was 13?

Over six hundred.  Over six hundred, and that's if the tooth doesn't break between now and the appointment I have no idea how we're going to afford.

Oh, and that's six hundred-plus AFTER insurance.

And that's my day.