How I Handled a Horrific Headline: A Little Prep, Some Positive, Then a Poll

16 Wednesday Jan 2013

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Painting by Julie Seyler

“Implosion.” Painting by Julie Seyler.

BY JULIE SEYLER

I go through stages of reading the front section of The New York Times. I find I need to prep myself before I can delve into how the world is fracturing into a thousand little pieces. Once I’m ready, I plunge into the horror show – ready for the one-two punch of being weighed down by the oppressive facts that constitute modern day living, and frustrated by the endless non-answers. However, at least I don’t feel as if I am a complete ostrich with my head stuck in the sand. After I have been brought up to date on the latest wars, murders and irresolvable Congressional disagreements, I retreat and concentrate on the stuff that makes life worth enjoying – movies, books, art, restaurant reviews and recipes. I may have a love-hate relationship with food, but I love reading about it.

On Tuesday, January 8, 2013, I was in the mood to see what’s going on “over there.” The front page of The Times delivered, with the headline “Hints of Syrian Chemical Push Set off Global Effort to Stop It”. This was the opening paragraph:

In the last days of November, Israel’s top military commanders called the Pentagon to discuss troubling intelligence that was showing up on satellite imagery: Syrian troops appeared to be mixing chemicals at two storage sites, probably the deadly nerve gas sarin, and filling dozens of 500-pounds bombs that could be loaded on airplanes.

The article went onto discuss how the near catastrophe of easily distributed killer gas was averted. Countries that usually prefer to stab each other in the back (China, Russia, the Middle East and the United States), in a rare show of cooperation, were in synchronicity that chemical warfare is bad for all of us. Hallelujah for common sense! The article explained that there are actually several factors that need to be in place for a successful dispersion of sarin gas. Therefore, a chemical attack may not necessarily be the easiest way to obliterate the planet. And of course, the denouement of the piece consisted of the pundits warning that just because disaster was avoided this time, doesn’t mean it can’t or won’t happen. Those munitions are still out there, and ready to be used, depending on who gets their hands on them.

I was frightened. I guess that was the purpose of the story, and decided to check in with some of the guys at work to see what they thought. One friend scoffed at chemical weapons, since they can only do damage to thousands of people. On the other hand, take a nuclear weapon – now that can wipe out millions in a second. His biggest concern: Pakistan.

Another guy was much more benign. He figures if a nuclear weapon drops on his sector of the universe he won’t have time to think about it. It will be over, and that will be that. Why worry about it? I said, “But what if you survive? And it’s like the movie On the Beach?” You know that great 1959 movie with Ava Gardner, Gregory Peck, Fred Astaire and Anthony Perkins about the end of the world? Well, he figures he’d find a bridge to jump off of. Geez Louise.

We never even got into the topic of biological weapons. Anybody care to weigh in?

2013? Rewind Me!

15 Tuesday Jan 2013

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Dave and Dad. Where did the years go?

BY FRANK TERRANELLA

2013!!! That’s not a real date. That’s a science fiction date, isn’t it? I think there’s nothing that makes me feel old like writing a date that should still be in the future, but it’s not; it’s here. What contributes to making me feel old, is the fact that, recently, I helped my son move into his first apartment. He’s the first child off on his own. Later this year, he will be the first child to be married.

Over the Christmas holidays, we played some video of my son from when he was a baby. Parents tend to do that so fiancées can see just how adorable the future husband was as a child (and what the children might look like). But after watching close to two hours of my children as infants, I felt depressed. Just as it couldn’t possibly be 2013 already, my infant son could not really be moving out and getting married. Where did the years go? The fact that the memory of those intervening years is hazy at best is quite depressing to me. Fortunately, I did take the time to shoot video of their early lives, and so I have reinforcement of some memories. But taking those videos ended by the time they graduated from grammar school. Where did those high school years go? College was a blur – although I have loan payments to prove it happened. And now they’re about to go off on their own, and it seems like they took their first steps last year. Of course, the problem is that what I really want is a time machine to go back and re-live the ‘60s, the ‘70s and the ‘80s. This time, I would pay more attention to the details.

I know that what I am describing is part of being over 50. It’s the time we find out that our parents were right when they told us over and over: “The years go by faster and faster as you get older.” But they didn’t tell me it went into a warp speed out of Star Trek. These days, I am usually wrong when trying to judge how long ago something was. Like when someone asks: “When was the last time you ate at that restaurant?” And I think it was two or three years ago, but it turns out it was in 1998.

Being in your 50s means that the phrase, “50 years ago,” comes out of your mouth more often than you would like. I remember not too long ago (it seems), I was talking to my former law partner and I said: “Remember 50 years ago when we were in kindergarten?” And he said: “I’m not old enough to remember things from 50 years ago,” even though he is. Well the truth is, I can remember things from 50 years ago. But those memories seem no more hazy than my memories of changing diapers, and getting up in the middle of the night to pick up and walk the floor with a crying child. It’s all things I did, but the time separation has collapsed. The 1980s do not seem that much more recent than the 1960s. It’s all a distant memory.

That’s why it’s so tough to come to terms with dates that begin with a 20. Can it really have been more than a decade since we celebrated the millennial new year? Has it been nearly 50 years since the Beatles were on Ed Sullivan? Where did the intervening years go? 2013? I demand a recount.

Were Those Yellow Pants Hot as Venus? Or Cold as Mars?

14 Monday Jan 2013

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which

Which side is real? Painting by Julie Seyler

BY JULIE SEYLER

I received an e-mail the other day from an attorney. He had been opposing counsel in a case that we had settled about three years ago. His reply was in response to a message I had left on his voicemail concerning a completely new matter. We hadn’t spoken in the three years since the other case closed, but his e-mail said, in part: “How can I forget those yellow smoking hot pants!!!” “The sexiest … attorney at … ”

The hot pants were a pair of jeans, not “hot pants”. As background, during the long negotiations we had had a meeting at a crowded business function. The day we met I happened to be wearing jeans that were yellow colored. Amongst a sea of navy suits, pastel yellow stands out and we had joked about it. Anyway when I received the email I was a bit shocked, but not outraged. Really we had laughed about those yellow colored jeans. But, what made me not cast the email banter aside was a conversation I had had with my colleague, “Q.” He led me to see the vignette from an entirely different point of view.

When I told “Q” the anecdote, his first question was, “What did you say on the voice mail?”

“Nothing. My message simply said, ‘Hi, it’s Julie, remember with the yellow pants?'”

“Q” rolled his eyes and shook his head, “You made the first move.”

Huh??? I did not see myself as being at all provocative, but I listened. “Q” was giving me insight into the male psyche. He was helping me to “see” how men “see,” confirming the over-used adage that men are from Mars, and women from Venus. He was telling me that my use of the innocent phrase, “yellow pants,” could be interpreted as alluring; flirtatious. I would love to know what other men and women think, because my boyfriend, Steve, absolutely agreed with “Q”, whereas a female colleague’s eyes popped out in horror when I told her the story. Her immediate reaction was “How dare he!”

And that’s why this thumbnail sketch of male/female interaction is so intriguing. “Q”’s perception, and Steve’s concurrence certainly made me question whether I had (un)consciously sought an acknowledgment as to how I looked. It also led me to wonder whether men read very well, the little movements we make to (not) attract attention. Is it possible that they see right through us? Are women more naive than we like to believe?

And as for my reaction to the comment from the attorney about those “hot smoking pants?” It’s a snapshot of time travel.  In the ’70s when I was in my teens and a rampant and ardent worshiper of Gloria Steinem, I probably would have taken umbrage. Today, at 57, I am embarrassed to admit that what actually entered my mind when I received that e-mail was: “Would he still think that I was “sexy” three years later?” Geez how shallow and vain can you get?

The Saturday Blog: Oblivious

12 Saturday Jan 2013

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Sleeping at the flea market, Sunday afternoon. Photo by Julie Seyler

Sleeping at the flea market, Sunday afternoon. Photo by Julie Seyler

These days, it seems that the ability to immerse in undeterred obliviousness has seeped out of the routine, perhaps never to return, or only to return later in life, when we will most seek energy. In any case, we envy this man’s relaxation.

It All Started with a Refused Statin

11 Friday Jan 2013

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lipitor

Phooey!

BY LOIS DESOCIO

At my latest annual physical a few weeks ago, my doctor asked me who my cardiologist was. Cardiologist? I’m way too young for a cardiologist. Cardiologists are for old people with heart disease. She sighed. She shook her head in disgust. She was surprised I wasn’t dead yet.

“Your cholesterol is sky-high,” she said. (She said the same thing two years ago, and I’m still here.) “What do I have to do to get you to swallow that pill!”

That pill is Lipitor (apparently everyone is doing it), which she had prescribed for me two years ago, which I filled, and left sitting, unopened and expired on my dresser. As much as Julie will grasp every word her doctors and friends dole out, and will act accordingly, I rebuff. My quest becomes: “Phooey! I will prove you wrong.” I say no to drugs. And I eat a lot of spinach.

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It All Started with an Abused Chicken

10 Thursday Jan 2013

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P1130118

Drawing by Julie Seyler.

BY JULIE SEYLER

Around April 2012, I was having dinner with a friend at a Thai restaurant, and was pretty excited about ordering some Chicken Pad Thai, you know those yummy rice noodles laced with chicken, a little egg and some peanuts. I asked her what she was having. She has some food quirks and rules, but was never averse to meat. This time though, instead of a beef or chicken curry, she went with something vegetarian. And as she was telling me what she was ordering, I can only describe the look she gave me as enigmatic – basically begging me to ask what was up.

“You’re off meat these days?” I asked.

“Well, I’m reading this book, and if you read it you’d be off it also.”

“Please don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. I have enough concerns. I don’t want to take on the animals!”

“I won’t,” she said.

And with that, I ordered my Chicken Pad Thai, and asked her, “So what else is new?” But of course, the pink elephant was on the table. And as much as my sensible inner voice screamed, “Don’t ask!” my curiosity of the secret knowledge that my girlfriend possessed was 10 times greater, and before that plate of sauteed chicken with slithering noodles was placed in front of me, I had to ask, “OK. OK. Tell me about the book.”

She was in the middle of Jonathan Safran Foer’s book “Eating Animals.” She regaled me with how the chicken industry treats chickens – how they fatten them up with steroids, and stuff them into 2″x4” windowless cages.

“But what about kosher chickens?”

“Worse!”

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Chin Up! To the (Hopefully Enduring) and Alluring Me

09 Wednesday Jan 2013

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Lola
BY LOIS DESOCIO

Is this the year that the allure of “me” begins to wither its way towards unseemly? Or innocuous? Is this the year that I may age-out of being irresistible? I’ve turned 58 years old.

This is my new fear about aging. So far, I’ve managed to not dwell on the cliched, much-mourned about, typical, in-your-50s losses: I no longer look like my 25, 35, or 45-year-old self (Been there. And survived). My cheekbones are starting to form the skyward, upper reaches of a V-shaped face, with my chin and neck falling towards pointy – kind of like going from perky to pelican (I just try to smile a lot to pull it all up). My knees are really starting to hurt when I bend them (Then don’t bend them! Downward dog pose gets you to the same place).

Or even that I’m meandering my way towards dead. None of that really rattled me at 57.

But what I don’t want to become is tired and dull, and therefore done. I hope that I will never, unexpectedly, and without warning or remedy, lose my ability to see the enchantment and delight in life, and will therefore become less enchanting and delightful, regardless of what I look like. Worse would be if I didn’t care. Because, to me, it’s allure that makes someone attractive, and can keep us all going. It’s begot from confidence; spirit. That human magnetism that draws people to you – entices, intrigues, beguiles. I look for that in people. It transcends physical beauty, the eye-of-the-beholder kind, which will not be beholding to you for life.

Hopefully, the flimsier the potency of the seen, the firmer the unseen, the inner beauty. Your appeal oozes even more from what you exude, not how you look. Those intangibles – charm, rapture, kindness. People enjoy being around you. We all know the beauty with no personality whose attractiveness is diminished with every spoken word, and the less-than beauty, whose effusiveness and exuberance paints a glorious glow over their physical selves. Their allure is a constant.

Of course, praise for all these inner workings, does not mean that I don’t have my moments of lamenting over the realization that, undeniably, from this point on, only one head (maybe), not all, will turn (sometimes) for a second look. That I will no longer be able to run down the beach with unbounded joy into the ocean without looking like … just picture it.

But I do get a new kind of satisfaction at any comment that may hint at the possibility that “really old, wrinkled, and maybe dull,” is not coming at breakneck speed.

When I told my mom recently that, in two years, when we go to the movies, I will be asking for: “Two seniors …”

“Well, they’ll have to proof you,” she said, without a flinch. “Because they will not believe yours is the face of a 60 year old.”

Yes, it’s my mom speaking. But she’s honest, and is never one to mince words: “You’re nothing but a party girl” (8th grade); “What’s the matter with your hair?” (last Monday). And she would never dole out disingenuous praise.

So that comment will help to fuel my alluring smile at least until 60.

When Print was the Touchstone of Journalism

08 Tuesday Jan 2013

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BY FRANK TERRANELLA

Frank-Journal News Pix

Frank, at the Journal News, working the slot on the news desk.

I am part of an ever-growing fraternity – former newspaper journalists. It has been sad to see the industry implode over the last three decades. Like most people who have worked in newspapers, I wish I was still doing it. But the combination of poor pay, anti-social working hours, and an industry that has been slowly going out of business for a generation, has produced a diaspora of journalists. My journey from newspaperman to lawyer/blogger is typical.

In my junior year of college, I started writing for the college newspaper. I loved it so much that I arranged an internship with the Telegram & Gazette in Worcester, Massachusetts for my senior year. Over the summer before my senior year, I worked on a local weekly in my hometown. This was back in the days when newspapers were printed using linotype machines. These now-extinct machines consisted of a keyboard that created lines of type (similar to the striking keys on a typewriter) out of molten lead. As might be expected by the last two words of the previous sentence, this machine threw off a lot of heat – hence the term “hot type.”

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School Drills, Past and Present, Never Child’s Play

07 Monday Jan 2013

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A civil defense educational video on school preparedness for nuclear war in the 1950s.

BY BOB SMITH

I attended grammar school in Northern New Jersey during the early 1960s when the Cold War was in full bloom, with Nikita Khrushchev pounding his shoe on the desk at the United Nations and threatening to bury us all.

Teachers and schoolchildren, today, live in fear of random attacks by madmen with automatic weapons. Today’s threat is intensely personal – the shooter, often acting alone, stalks the halls and brutally murders innocents, one by one, at close range. The threat in the 1950s and 1960s was entirely anonymous – intercontinental ballistic missiles bearing nuclear warheads would launch from an ocean away and descend from the sky, killing millions.

Some elementary schools now have armed guards or run lockdown drills, in which the lights are turned off, classrooms are locked, and students hunker down in the dark, hoping the door doesn’t open. We were afraid, just as schoolchildren today may be, as we, too, prepared for the unthinkable.

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The Saturday Blog: Ice

05 Saturday Jan 2013

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As we approach the epicenter of winter – snow, ice and bitter chills – we find the ice part particularly intriguing. It freezes, and then breaks apart as the temperature changes. This process creates movement and sound. It’s fascinating to watch – like a waltz.