ASKING BILL BUCKLEY TO MY SENIOR PROM

"Hmmm...I must remember to tell Pat to have my tux cleaned so I can wear it to take Ann to the prom."

In 1981, while other 15-year-old girls were hanging pictures of rock stars on their bedroom walls, I was amputating the perfectly chiseled face of William F. Buckley from newspapers and magazines and scotch taping it with random precision to my floral papered bedroom wall as if Bill Buckley might just stroll one day through the pastel garden of my boudoir.  Bill Buckley smiling; Bill Buckley in tuxedo; Bill Buckley with his hair askew standing on the bow of his yacht. This was the collage of the man who spoke to me every week with such elegance and erudition.  I was simply in love with a man who was in love with language. 

          Our cerebral love affair (mine and Bill’s, of course) began when I first sat down to watch Firing Line with my union president father.  The first majestic note of Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in F Major, Third Movement, (allegro assai) ushered me into the cerebral cathedral of Compassionate Conservatives.

          Listening to Bill debate with his guests the sturm und drang of world politics; the responsibility of our leadership to retain our position of dominance while extending the rewards of our capitalistic philosophy to Third World countries—all this, made me fall in love with him. 

          Despite the great divide of our ages, I knew that Bill and I could form a perfect partnership. It’s because of Bill that I studied Latin at Paramus Catholic Girls Regional High School. As I sat imprisoned in my archaic wooden desk, diligently concentrating as Sr. Helen Rita dryly lectured on declensions and etymology, my thoughts ebbed and flowed with imaginings of my future with Bill.  Sitting elbow-to-elbow in a darkened corner of Elaine’s fluently whispering our private Latin to each other while Norman Mailer eyed us with drunken jealousy.  I wanted to be Bill’s muse, his tabula rasa, upon whom he could impart the worlds of his knowledge while Pat and Bill Blass did the Paris fashion shows. I didn’t want to have his name, or his child--only his vocabulary.  

          In the spring of 1983, my political science class was awarded an opportunity to attend a taping of Firing Line. As we walked onto the darkened set, I noticed the overflowing pile of notes by Bill’s chair. I lifted one of the notebooks and stared at the hieroglyphics of Bill’s handwriting with the same rush of discovery of a National Geographic explorer who has just unearthed the new tomb of an old pharaoh.

Then there he was, striding confidently into my life. The stagger of his swagger suggested he had sipped one too many gently shaken dry martinis at PJ Clarkes for lunch. He gently collapsed, rather than sat, into his chair. His broad smile metastasized into an annoyed grimace, his lips emitting a barely audible grumble, as he shooed away the make-up person, who was hovering directly above his face with a large black-bristled powder brush that dripped its incandescence all over his dark blue suit. His eyes looked beyond the bright overhead lights as he adjusted his tie—focusing his gaze on the black space beyond the lights, beyond the audience, to that space that held no reflection, only darkness.

After the show, Bill came over to our group. Overwhelmed with anxiety, I stood off to the side. After answering questions from my classmates, he strode away from the circle, approached me and asked about my future plans. I told him that I wanted to be a writer and was reading the ancients, classics, and my monthly subscription to The National Review.

 With a wry eye he proposed that while the ancients would impart to me substantial intellectual footing, his works would endow me with gravitas. And then, utterly charmed, I was moved to ask him to my senior prom.  He tossed his head back and released a sincere laugh while his eyes stared above me in the act of great consideration.

“Yours is the best invitation I’ve had in a very long time; but an old man like me escorting such a vibrant thinker as yourself would be a bore to both you and your friends.

 Before walking away he placed his left hand upon my shoulder and said, “Keep reading and writing and thinking. I expect to be reading you one day.”  And then as quietly and undisturbingly as he had walked into my life, he was gone.

ANNIE SEZ: ALL SHOPLIFTERS WILL BE PROSECUTED TO THE FULLEST EXTENT OF THE LAW UNLESS YOU’RE A CRAZED WHITE WOMAN WHO’S LATE PICKING UP HER KIDS FROM SCHOOL

As my left foot crossed the exit of Annie Sez it sounded as if I had hit the jackpot on every slot machine in the Tropicana. So startled was I by the incessant “beepbeepbeepbeepbeepbeep” of the security bar that I couldn’t move. Once again I had lost track of time and now I was running to pick up the kids from school. An older sales woman gently guided me back so that the noise would cease. Like a patient Brownie Scout Leader spending extra time with that child who just can’t quite grasp the craft of the day (that would be me), she checked my bag that contained a lone pair of $1.99 earrings purchased from the 75%-off sale rack. I had only gone in to browse for five minutes--an hour before.

          “Let’s see if there’s a security sticker on the earrings that we forgot to remove,” she kindly sang.

          As she and my new dangling faux diamond earrings walked past the security bars, all was silent. “Hmm, nothing seems to be wrong with the earrings,” she commented.

I took the bag and walked through the security bars,

“Beepbeepbeepbeepbeep…”

          “Oh for goodness sake!” I yelled. “I have five minutes to get my kids from school!”

          “Maybe it’s your keys or your cell phone. Don’t worry, go ahead.”

          “Maybe it’s my artificial brain,” I quipped as we both giggled. I dashed across the parking lot fumbling for my keys only to have my cell phone smash to the ground.

          “Terrific!” I cursed. This phone has to make it to May 1^st. That’s when my contract is up and I absolutely refuse to cave to that smug Verizon sales guy who informed me when I brought him my fractured phone, “Well, the cheapest replacement phone we have will cost you $300 since technically when you broke your phone you broke your contract.”

          I leaned in close to him and seethed, “Can you hear me now? I don’t care if I have to use Campbell Soup cans to make phone calls! Hell will freeze over before I give Verizon one extra penny before my contract expires!”

          “Make sure you get the Campbell’s Alphabet Soup if you want to text then,” he said as he went back to his Smart *** phone.

          As I drove up Route 5 to Leonia with my left hand on the wheel, my right hand reached over and into the glove compartment, grabbed the duct tape, ripped a piece off, and wound it around the broken back of my Blackberry.  

          With seconds to spare, I made it to the school in time. As I gathered my kids from the front door, I told my son we were going to Modell’s to get him his baseball cleats and run a few errands.

          I beeped both going into and out of Modell’s. I told the security guard “Oh, this has been happening to me all day! I feel like I’m going to be on America’s Most Wanted!” We both laughed.

          I beeped my way out of Mandee’s, Bed Bath and Beyond, Burlington Coat Factory and the library, each time laughing with Security as I joked, “Oops, you caught me!”

When we finally got home I kicked off my shoes and as I removed my jacket to place it over the banister something hard fell to the floor. Then something else. And something else. I looked down and oh the horror! THE HORROR!

          Lying on my floor were two $29.99 August Silk tee-shirts and a $24.99 Calvin Klein bra. All with those rectangular plastic security tags hanging from them, I have since learned are called “hard maxi’s” in the security trade.

“What the hell?” I screamed out loud to no one in particular.

  That’s when I saw another plastic security tag hanging from the lining of my jacket. Inside the detachable lining of my L.L.Bean barn jacket hung yet another Calvin Klein bra.

“Who stuffed these down my back? How did I not feel someone do this? Am I a somnambulant kleptomaniac? Did I sleepwalk through shoplifting?” my mind raced.  

That’s when I remembered the Annie Sez dressing room. When I went to try on jeans someone had left clothes hanging on the room’s lone hook. None of those clothes were on hangars and I remembered thinking that was odd. I had hung my coat on top of that pile of orphaned clothes and when I left I must have grabbed the clothes along with my coat. They must have somehow fallen between the gap in my coat’s removable lining where I’m missing three buttons.

Panic set in. Dear God! Here I am running around Bergen County all afternoon, a mule carrying hot clothes, setting off alarms in store after store, and no one even asks me to remove my coat? It made me realize just how much a white woman with bad hair, no make-up, and a minivan can get away with! Seriously.  

          As I drove back to the scene of the crime I imagined a thousand scenarios to explain what had happened because the truth was just too unbelievable. But the truth was all I had left to give. That and the unintentionally pilfered clothes.

As I beeped my way back into Annie Sez to return the swag I explained to the perfectly coiffed, well-heeled twenty-something childless manager what had happened. She looked at me as if I were insane. Truth be told she wasn’t all that wrong.   

WALKING IMELDA: A BAD DOG STORY

What should I wear on my walk tonight?

I have a bad habit of talking to people in line at the Shop Rite rather than doing what everyone else does—devouring every gossip rag until it’s time to load the groceries onto the conveyor.

“Bad Dog was a serial killer in a past life???” I answered her incredulously.

          “I’m just trying to explain to you that in my religion, animals hold a very special place. Divinity is found in the midst of everyday life and permeates all forms of being. All life forms are manifestations of God as limited beings.”

She asked me to consider the idea that animals were people who had made mistakes in their life as a human and have come back to earth as a lower life form in their quest for enlightenment.

          “So, Bad Dog did something bad in her life as a human and now she’s back as a dog to repent for past mistakes? Newsflash: she’s failing miserably,” I said as I thought of all the times she snatched my husband’s steak from his dinner plate, purloined the Sunday loin, and managed to claw open the refrigerator door and chow down when left alone in the house.  

          However, my conversation with this lovely lady has made me look at Bad Dog in an entirely new light. At night as Bad Dog snuggles up to me from Jim’s side of the bed I wonder if I’m really snuggling with Jeffrey Dahmer or Saddam Hussein.

          No, there’s no way that Bad Dog was ever a man. She’s entirely too smart in a cleverly manipulative way. No question—her karma just screams WOMAN! But which woman? I made it my mission to find out. There is no doubt in my mind that her Pomeranian friend Bitsy was Marie Antionette in her previous life. Her perfectly pouffed coif could display a naval ship, or a birdcage, no problem. Also, Bitsy’s regal carriage possesses a “Let them eat cake,” air of superiority. Of course,  Bad Dog carries a “Let me steal cake” air ala Les Miserables.

          I tried to see what Bad Dog gravitated towards that would help me to discover what notorious woman in history she was. You all know her recent penchant for drinking day old wine if she can get the bottle to fall to the floor at the right angle when she knocks it off the refrigerator shelf. Well, there’s an ancient Persian fable that credits the discovery of wine with a woman. Could this woman have been Bad Dog?

According to the fable a princess lost favor with the King and the shame was so overwhelming that she ate some table grapes that had spoiled in their jar in an attempt to end her life. Instead of dying she got so silly and giddy passing out. When she awoke she found that all her troubles had disappeared. She decided to eat more of the spoiled grapes and the more she ate, the more her mood changed for the better. So much so that she regained the favor of the King. Wine had solved and dissolved all of her earthly problems. Could this be Bad Dog?

          No, because no matter how much wine she drinks, she never regains the favor of King Jim who threatens to return her to the pound every time she pilfers his dinner. In fact, no matter how much wine I drink I seldom regain the favor of King Jim who threatens to return me to the pound—in his dreams!

          Then one day I walked into my bedroom and there, cuddled around the pile of my shoes that she had haphazardly, yet carefully, pulled from my closet slept Bad Dog. She looked so comfortable and peaceful dozing amongst the Madden’s, Weitzman’s, Edelman’s, BeBe’s, Dolce Vita’s, and Puma’s.  Then it struck me. Since the day she arrived from the pound, she has regularly feasted upon Jim’s two pairs of shoes, and gnawed on the kids’ rubber-soled sneakers like she was eating salt water taffy. However, she never touched my shoes. Not even my furry slippers. I now knew Imelda Marcos was living inside the body of Bad Dog.

Technically, Imelda Marcos is very much alive, but I believe that her old unreformed self, the Imelda of the martial law years, has taken up residence within Bad Dog’s body. It all makes sense. The disregard for Jim’s dinners, the wine, the shoes. The shoes, the shoes, the shoes.

          So now when we have a playdate with Marie Antionette, Bad Dog will fit in just fine. However, despite the fact that Imelda Marcos has attempted to transform her life within her lifetime, I fear that Bad Dog never will. 

PREPOSITIONAL CLAUSES ARE NO RELATION TO SANTA CLAUSES

"Learn to Listen and Listen to Learn"

About, above, across, after, against, among, around, as, at, before, behind, below, beside, between, beyond, but, by, down, during, except, for, from, in, into, near, of, off, on, over, through, to, towards, under, up, with.

          If your chest just tightened because you recognize those words are prepositions, then there’s a good chance you had Sister Lawrence in the fifth grade at Holy Trinity School in the Coytesville section of Fort Lee. And if you had Sr. Lawrence, you will not only be able to diagram every sentence in this entire column, but you will also have been through, or are in desperate need of, deep psychoanalysis or rehab. The emotional scars she inflicted for your inability to retain and repeat the memorization of said prepositions as she paced up and down the standing line of your class in an exercise of terror makes the stories of  Guantanamo Bay seem to pale in comparison.  

          For me, as well as the many others whose older siblings brought home the horror of experiencing the fifth grade, entering Sister Lawrence’s class was a ritual akin to moving from the general population to death row. The actual physical move from the fourth grade classroom to the fifth grade classroom required that you relocate to a new corridor and enter a world known as the “upper grades” with the eighth grade standing at the very end like a winning spot on a game board.  

Sister Lawrence’s philosophy was to strip you down forgetting about the building up side, which many of us found through alcohol or drugs in the ‘80’s. The result of her reign of terror was that you became bonded to your classmates in a way that only those who are in a hostage situation understand. There was no “cool,” “jock,” “weird.” We were all equally capable of incurring her wrath.  

The only thing that gave anyone joy was the wall of windows that looked out across the front yard of a rogue house that came before the building of the school and onto the curve of road that leads cars from 9W to Linwood. I used to spend entire mornings staring out those windows imagining a life without fear. My best friend Rosie used to stare out the windows dreaming of becoming a truck driver as she envied the18-wheelers as they tipped around the bend of road.  

That year was also the year that my mother became the school secretary. This tidbit of vital information came directly from a disliked classmate who took great glee in informing me of this during the summer before entering fifth grade. I nearly started a fist fight with her for telling such a lie, but when my mother confirmed it to be true, but had not yet told me, I knew it was a portentous beginning to an already discouraging year.

          As luck would have it, my mother became very good friends with Sister Lawrence, much to my horror. I not only had to suffer through the school day with her, but off-hour visits to the convent and more-than-the-once-in-a-while-occasional drop-ins at my house. The first time my mother dragged me to the convent and I saw Sister Lawrence out of her habit, wearing a snappy housecoat and slippers it was like seeing porn. I couldn’t look, but I also couldn’t look away. There was something so unholy about it, yet oddly fascinating. Add to that her terse conversation informing me she was intentionally harder on me because of her friendship with my mother and didn’t want the appearance of playing favorites. Fantastic!

          So each day in school I had to balance the horror of withstanding her class with the uncertainty of when our social circles would intersect and I had to pretend I didn’t want to run screaming. 

Which brings me back to prepositions. As she stopped in front of me and barked the order to recite, my mind went blank. I could feel the discomfort of my classmates who stood shoulder-to-shoulder with me on the line before the window. After what seemed like an eternity of silence, she screamed, “Idioms are a dime a dozen, but idiots appear to be free in this class!”     

           If you’d like to take a trip down prepositional memory lane, Holy Trinity is having reunion for all classes at the school on April 30^th at 8pm following an alumni mass at the church at 7pm that will be celebrated by Father Dominic Lenoci, class of ’78.  If you know of an alumni, please pass it on and contact me for more information.

MAD-LOVES FOR COUPLES WHO'VE BEEN TOGETHER A REALLY LONG TIME

          The other day, while our family was playing Mad Libs, that timeless word game where you fill in the template with specified nouns, verbs, adjectives, places, body parts and other grammatical phrases in order to create a comically absurd story, I realized that Jim and I were engaging in the most effective communication we’ve had in years.

It’s funny how a word game made me think back to the early years of our marriage. As a newlywed I used to write cute little erotic notes and stick them between the bread in Jim’s sandwich. I knew if I put the note into the lunch bag he’d never see it so I stuck it between the bread and cold cuts. I’ll tell you, the notes became an instant hit with the boys in the construction yard. They loved to see him pull the chewed paper remnants from his mouth and try to piece together words that he hadn’t swallowed in an absurd game of Porno Jumble. But then came kids, and no privacy, and the notes began to change; at least the messages did. “Guess what I’m going to do to you tonight!!!!” turned into “Guess what I’m going to do to you tonight if you don’t get that goddamn (fill in the blank) out of my dining room, now!!!!” Yes, the passion of the papyrus fell by the wayside as so much often does when we get distracted. Anyway, if I stuck a note between his sandwich at this point in our marriage, the only thing I’d arouse is his indigestion.

I joked with Jim that maybe Mad Libs was the perfect communication tool for us—we can leave templates around the house and fill them in quickly to spark the spontaneous flames of passion (and humor) that playing the role of responsible adults and parents has dulled.

          So here’s my Mad-Love to Jim. As of printing, he’s still working on his to me.

Dear ­Jim:

Because we have so little ­­­money to spend together, I thought I'd pour my ­bladder out to you since after all these years my body still breaks down every time you come near me. Still, what we lack in the bank we make up for in unpaid bills.  Remember when we first met and you couldn’t keep your seatbelt buckled? And here we are 20 years later and your seatbelt is still unbuckled every time I slink into the driver’s seat.  Since we’ve had children our relationship has only been tested in ways I never thought imaginable. Parenting children together has brought out the gray hairs, bald spots, and frown lines in us. I couldn’t parent without lots and lots of wine and drugs. Nor would I want to.

Every time I look at you all I see is your father staring back at me. It makes me want to wrap my head in a noose and give you a big box of Grecian Formula 44. If I knew 20 years ago that in 20 years I would be married to my father-in-law’s twin I would have still kept in touch with that 20 year old indie drummer from the East Village.  And let me not forget to add that opportunity I passed up with the lesbian lawyer with a summer home on Fire Island.  Sometimes I have to kick myself to make sure this is really our life.

Though children have stripped us of any and all carnal desire and made us into the cranky sexless people we swore we’d never become we must pray to God everyday that their real parents will come and get them soon.  

Remember when we were dating and we’d sit in the back row of the movie theater where I would gently nibble on your popcorn with extra butter and you would unzip my wallet?   Now when we escape to a movie alone you still can’t help but fall asleep and snore and I can’t refrain from sticking my elbow into your rib cage to wake you up every five minutes.

Your talent for not hearing a single word I say continues to amaze me. Remember all those cheap motels with hourly rates we used to go to for fun when it was just the two of us? I never thought then that those would be our vacation destinations and the only places we’d be able to afford 20 years later.  But, if I had to do it all over again I would still be connected to that East Village indie drummer because after all these years real estate in the East Village is worth a mint. After all, if I never met you I would be absolutely and completely drinking margaritas at happy hour on South Beach with my gay hairdresser and his buff bff’s without you.       

Love, Ann          

DAMN DEMOGRAPHICS GOT ME AGAIN

Hola kids! Since your mom's wearing diapers, isn't it time you got out of yours?

Lately, my ten year old daughter has become obsessed with watching cable news. Her favorite stations are NY1 and News 12 New Jersey. Considering what kids can become obsessed with today, the news seems harmless. And at least with NY1 and News 12 New Jersey she’s not being exposed to the more salacious stories that the network news stations and less censored cable stations are promoting. 

          At least that’s how I was feeling until she became more obsessed with the commercials than the news stories. And here, again, we get into demographics. The demographics of the viewers of these news programs must be seniors since most of the commercials advertise senior products, at least during the times that my daughter is watching.

          Last week, after I stubbed my toe on the end table and I limped my way upstairs, she suggested I look into the Acorn Chair Lift that she saw advertised on T.V. “This way, you can just ride up the stairs instead of limp up them.” After noticing the gray that has begun to populate her father’s hair she announced that he is a senior citizen since all the men who appear on the commercials for NY1 have gray hair and introduce themselves as a senior citizen. The look on Jim’s face was priceless, and laughing, I asked her what that makes me. She replied straight-faced, “A pre-senior citizen, of course.”

          Jim started to laugh, but frankly I could not find the humor in it. A pre-senior citizen? I have 20 years before I can be classified as a senior citizen and they’re an important 20 years! I mean, think about it. 20 years comprises a whole infancy, adolescence and adulthood. It’s an entire generation. In other words, it’s a long, long, long time. And I still need to have my mid-life crisis and act like a teenager all over again, only this time not get grounded. (Although with Jim, I’m not so sure. I think he’d love to tell me I’m grounded. Then again, like my parents when they grounded me as a teenager, he’d be stuck under house arrest with a very petulant me.) However, Katie insists that I am a pre-senior and even produced Jim’s AARP card that had my name listed as “Spouse” to prove to me that if I want to reap the benefits of pre-senior status I have to own up to that status. She even asked if there was a status on Facebook for pre-senior.   

          I’ve always joked that Jim is deaf because he’s always asking, “What?” after I say something. Well, maybe I’m not joking, but now Katie insists he buy the hearing aid she saw on a commercial between news segments. She even left a note on his pillow that showed a picture of a Jim wearing a hearing aid and exclaiming in a bubble over his head, “I can hear you now!”

          But wait! There’s more. She asked if we could buy one of those motorized scooters she saw on T.V. for Jim so that he didn’t always have to take the car when he went to the firehouse. “Look,” she pointed out, “It even comes with an attachable orange flag so that cars can see him.” I had visions of Jim riding up Fort Lee Road with a blue fire light blaring on the handlebar of his sporty red senior scooter with attachable orange flag on his way to the firehouse.

          I guess I shouldn’t complain because last month she was fixated on the fact that I had bald spots. When she first commented that I have bald spots I brushed it off, but then I became paranoid. Holding a mirror in one hand, I’d stand with my back to the bathroom mirror trying to see if there were any bald spots peeking through the back of my head. Even though I couldn’t see any, she had me convinced that I was losing my hair. It took me two weeks to realize it was because she saw a commercial for women with thinning hair and balding.

          Oh how I miss the days of my youth when television was filled with all those cigarette and booze commercials. I’d rather have my daughter announce to the world, “My Mom lights up a Camel and drinks Budweiser all day long!” rather than “She can’t hear, she’s going bald, and she carries adult diapers in her bag. Wanna see?” 

POISED IN SHIFTING DEMOGRAPHICS

What the hell are you looking at? I'm Wonder Woman, dammit!

We wrestled each other with a fury that came from some reserve of vengeance deep inside; both of us holding on with a death grip refusing to yield; the sinews of our muscles straining to keep from giving in to the will of the other. Finally, she yielded, more likely grew bored, and I was able to pry the mail from Bad Dog’s clenched canine jaws. I ran my fist-pumping victory lap around the porch. YES! I AM ALPHA DOG!

          And so this is our daily ritual. Each day when the mail truck parks in front of our house the dog and I race to the porch and jockey for position in front of the mail slot. This must be done for if I’m not there to collect the mail when it comes pouring through the slot then all my bills will be shred into confetti and eaten by Bad Dog, and although there’s nothing more festive than confetti bills, it’s no picnic watching the dog howling to extract them from her intestines at two in the morning or explaining to Time Warner that the dog ate my bill.

          In today's mail there was a promotional give-away box from CVS. I love getting free samples from CVS. What could it be? Shampoo? Hand sanitizer wipes? New hand lotion? I ripped open the box like a kid on Christmas while Bad Dog gnarled and shredded the PSE&G bill before ingesting it. I reached my hand deep inside the box and pulled a clear plastic package that contained…wait a minute. This can’t possibly be meant for me. I checked the box’s address label and sure enough, it was addressed to me. Then I got furious. In my hands was a sample of an adult diaper! Poise for those moments when your bladder just can’t pause.

          WHAT? How do I go from birth control one birthday to adult diapers the next? I was so furious that I actually looked up the phone number for the main headquarters of CVS which I discovered was in Woonsocket, Rhode Island. After suffering through Dante’s Fifth Circle of Hell also known as the automated answering system, my thumb just kept pressing zero until a human voice answered. After airing my complaint I was switched to about three other people until finally I was transferred to a man whom I’m sure was the janitor put up by the rest of the office staff to act like a customer service manager and handle my complaint so they didn’t have to deal with a freak like me.

          “Mam,” he said trying to placate me, “we are so happy that you enjoy our free samples.”

          “No, no; I don’t enjoy this one. I’m not old enough for adult diapers!”

          “They’re not diapers; they’re liners.”

          “Don’t try to spin it on me. I’ve seen the commercials!”

“If you don’t mind, what is your age?”

Reluctantly, I told him.

          “Oh, that explains it. Since your last birthday your demographics have shifted, and that’s why you may be noticing a difference in product samples that are being sent to you.”

          “My demographics have shifted? What does that mean?” I cried. (True, my body has been undergoing seemingly seismic shifts, but that’s none of his business!)

          “It means that for promotional purposes you’re now contained in a group whose needs are more maintenance than restoration, if you will.”

          What?  I missed my own restoration period?

          “Mam, as I’m sure you found with our past samples, not every product is aimed at you—it’s aimed at your demographics. And that group constitutes over 25 years.”

          He was right. Not every free sample was for me like the K-Y Body Gel Tabasco Sauce or the Legg’s all in one thong panties and pantyhose, but at least they were life-affirming. At least they oozed possibility. At least they screamed "DESIRE!" rather than "Oops I crapped my pants!" I mean, am I wrong to suggest that the implication of adult diapers is, “Don’t worry. I’ll do my business right here on line so we won’t be late for that sunset buffet. Here’s a coupon.”

          I hung up the phone, dissatisfied and feeling old. However, to look on the bright side, I would still be considered a trophy wife if I dated at the top of my demographics. (And at this point, I don’t think Jim would even notice.) Anyway, I took the packaged Poise and threw it…well, truth be told I threw it in my purse because frankly there may come a time when I just can’t pause. And at least I’ll be poised.