LA Moms Blog

Baby, I can buy my car

I married a self-proclaimed "car nerd," a product of Southern California's legendary car culture, and I've learned quite a bit from him in the nearly five years we've been together. But I think he's learned that when it comes to a car that I'm going to drive myself, I'm not necessarily looking for car-nerdy things. It doesn't matter to me how fast the car goes from zero to 60. I'm not all that interested in high horsepower numbers, and I really don't care about tires (as long as they're not flat).

I'm looking for safety and reliability; I keep cars for a while, and I'd like the odds that they'll still be in decent driving condition five to seven years from now to be pretty high. I care about getting good gas mileage - I was deeply influenced by the energy crisis during my 1970s childhood. I want a car that's comfortable to drive, handles well, and is easy to park. I don't care all that much about luxury, but at this stage in my life I would like certain amenities. And I like my cars small. I'm small - I like cars that are my size. My dream car is a Mini Cooper, not a minivan.

But since something in me balks at the idea of paying much more than $20,000 for a car - which I guess clarifies that I'm neither a car nerd nor a native Californian - my dream car remains a dream. (And a minivan remains a vehicle I'd never dream of owning - along with not having a Costco membership, it's one of my little acts of rebellion against the suburbs.) I recently went out shopping for a car, and came home with a new 2010 Honda Fit Sport.

It could be her alternative to high school

As a parent with school-aged children, it's not hard to get caught up in the problems with California's public schools (unless you have the means to avoid them by sending your kids to private school, and I'm sure those have their own problems). Tight budgets, tough unions, too-crowded classrooms, "teaching to the test;" the magnet-school merry-go-round; program cuts, burnout, and piles of homework (not just for the kids). We want a lot out of our schools, and along with our kids, we struggle to get it. Knowing these issues, it's easy to blame the schools' shortcomings when our kids don't seem to be achieving what we believe they can. However, like it or not, it's not always the school that's falling short. Even the best schools can't make every student excel; sometimes the school and the student just aren't right for each other.

My stepchildren are in school in one of Ventura County's local districts. My stepdaughter is in the tenth grade at the town's only public high school; it's known for strong academics, as well as its diversity of programs and instructional levels. The classes she's taking this year reflect that diversity; they range from pre-AP English to basic science to first-year Spanish (for the second time). Her grades seem to follow the pattern of the courses, too - excelling in English, barely making the basics in the basic classes. She's a smart young woman, but her effort - and results - aren't really reflecting it overall. I'm not so sure that's all her school's fault, but she feels it is, and she thinks she's found another option in a genuine "alternative school."

The local community college is home to one of California's 13 Middle College programs, and her dad and I recently attended an information session about it with her. It's a partnership between the K-12 and community-college districts, and it's funded as a public school, which means that the college courses it incorporates into its curriculum don't charge tuition to the high-school students. She does seem to fit its typical student profile in many respects:

• Bright and intelligent, but inconsistent in academic effort
• Motivated in certain areas, but uninterested in traditional high school courses
• Capable of leadership, but disengaged from high school activities
• Artistic and creative, but in need of personal attention and encouragement
• Seeking more freedom and independence
• Mature, self-motivated, and eager to join the adult world

It's the online life for me!

"I'm on Facebook, but I'm not on Facebook - it just sucks up your time. And I've never even seen Twitter." I was not the person who said that, but it got me thinking.

Being able to search Google, type a URL into a browser, and get news, weather, and your bank balance from the Internet aren't things that define the online life - they're part of it, but even more, they're life skills that enhance your offline life. There's so much more to living online.

I consider myself far from cutting-edge, but compared to a lot of people I know in my offline life, I'm living in another dimension. I'm always thrilled to see people dip their toes into social networking, and it's so nice when I don't have to explain how a blog works, but it continues to surprise me how many people's lives still don't have much of an online component. I'm not talking about people without access; these are people who use computers daily and are never without their cellphones - they've got the ability to be connected. They just aren't.

For whatever reason, they don't get it...and I must confess that this means I don't entirely get them. (And by extension, they probably don't really get me either.) I'm not saying that there's anything wrong in this, but it's like people who don't read; I know they exist, and I can accept the difference, but it's a big thing that we don't have in common. And given the way the world is moving, the lack of online commonality and community is likely to be a bigger obstacle than the reader/non-reader divide has ever been.

Of scans and smears: or, here's to your health!

I probably should be more scared of cancer than I am. My father-in-law died of cancer four years ago (and, in an odd coincidence, so did my ex-father-in-law, eleven years earlier). My mother-in-law made a full recovery from breast cancer, but both she and my husband have had cancerous and pre-cancerous skin moles removed before they spread. Given that, when it comes to that side of the family, cancer is certainly one of the things I worry about. However, cancer has been blessedly less common among my own genetic relatives. Quite frankly, as the daughter of an early-onset Alzheimer's patient, that particular disease - tricky to diagnose definitively, difficult to treat successfully, and still incurable - concerns me a heck of a lot more than cancer does.

Still, I'm in my mid-forties, and this is the time of year I see my doctor for my annual exam. She asked me some questions, and we talked about any health concerns. She checked my vitals and renewed a couple of prescriptions for me. And even though new guidelines for scheduling mammograms and Pap smears were recently released, as I expected, she took a Pap while I was there, and sent me off with a mammogram referral. In fact, despite the fact that neither procedure is particularly pleasant, I'm actually glad my doctor hasn't changed her routine yet - especially since my insurance company hasn't changed their routine about paying for the tests yet either.

Family portraits

Not long ago, my stepson brought a flyer home from school. It informed parents that on the evening of Picture Day, the photographers would be back at the school to take family portraits for those who were interested. Of course, the flyer came home the night before this was supposed to happen, so there wasn't much time to plan. Besides, he and his sister would be at their mom's house the night of the photo event, but the notice came to his dad and me, since it was sent home on one of his days with us.

Families like ours aren't unusual anymore, but they can - literally - be a bit tough to picture.

We didn't go to Portrait Night, but I think there's a good chance that if this event had been scheduled on one of my husband's nights with the kids (and we'd had a little more notice), we might have tried to have pictures taken - and I honestly would have felt a little weird about it. We have snapshots of the four of us, but formal portraits have a certain significance, and that's what makes me unsure. When my husband and I got married, we did get a few photos done of the two of us together with all three of our respective children - his two, and my one. In my thinking, that's our little family: his and mine, all evened out.

Making it up as I go along

I used to find them rather amusing. No matter how casually they were dressed - even in running shorts and T-shirts - every day these Southern ladies greeted the world with fully made-up faces and perfectly styled hair. The Memphis humidity made this an even more impressive achievement.

Aside from the fact I wasn't a native Memphian, I wasn't one of those women, and didn't think it likely that I would become one. When you're married to someone who repeatedly states that he doesn't like makeup, acts disappointed when you wear it (even if he otherwise compliments your appearance), and says he won't kiss you if you have lipstick on, it's not exactly encouragement to develop your cosmetic-wearing skills.

I no longer live in Memphis, and I'm not married to that husband any more either. And it occurred to me not long ago, as I was applying eyeliner and mascara and putting on some lip stain, that I have become one of "those women" who almost never leaves the house without putting on makeup. Heck, some days I put it on even if I'm not leaving the house. How did this happen?

A lifetime of weight-watching is a LONG time

I became a Lifetime Member of Weight Watchers almost six years ago, not long before I turned 40, after successfully taking off over 25 pounds in six months. I needed to do it: I was having issues with my blood pressure and general health, aside from the fact I'd recently had to buy some clothing in a size 12. (I'm 4'8" tall - 25 pounds may not seem like a lot, but on my frame, it makes a big difference - no pun intended). I was excited about my accomplishment, and I didn't find it terribly difficult to lose the weight and keep it off, once I learned how to approach it. I knew that there were things I could probably never eat again, and that I'd have to stay attentive to food all the time - that's the "lifetime" part - but I was confident that I could do it.

I also had what I considered a somewhat unfair advantage: at the time, I was single. I didn't have to worry about anyone else's eating habits but my own. I lost that "advantage" a couple of years later when I married my second husband, but it was well worth the trade-off. However, it turns out that a "lifetime" is a long time to maintain one's eating and activity discipline, and the pounds have slowly found their back to me. I got lazy, in more ways than one. We dined out too often. Desserts became a daily routine again instead of a sometime treat. My walks with the dog got shorter. The fact that my husband can't stand cooked vegetables gave me an excuse not to make them, and let's be honest - salads just get boring sometimes.

There's "real," and there's rude (and then there's Kanye)

Our 9-year-old has become more outspoken recently, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. But he's been showing a tendency to start talking about whatever is on his mind without waiting for others to stop, and that's not a good thing. Most of the time, it seems more like he hasn't even noticed there was already another conversation in progress, rather than an intentional interruption. (But we then have to interrupt ourselves to say something to him about his interruption, because it still is one.)

The problem isn't so much with the talking, it's with the listening, and it's not unique to our house. However, it's still inconsiderate and impolite, and it's not a big leap from not noticing others are talking to just not caring that they are. Besides, how could what they're saying be more important than what you want to say?

Take this to extremes, and you have Kanye West interrupting Taylor Swift's award acceptance speech at MTV's Video Music Awards - an act which really had little to do with Taylor Swift. And while he stepped onstage to declare that he thought the award should have gone to Beyoncé instead, it didn't have anything to do with her either. It was all about him making it all about him, when by all rights it should have had nothing to do with him.

Kanye's post-show apology on his blog included the explanation "I'm not crazy y'all. I'm just real." But does being "real" justify being out-and-out rude? I say no.

It's my birthday too, yeah!

This is a year for milestone birthdays in my family. My father celebrated his 80th back in the spring, my son turned 25 this summer, and shortly before Christmas, my stepson will enter his double-digit years. May he have many of them ahead of him!

I'd like to think that my mother's 34th birthday was a milestone one for her. That's not a number usually associated with anything special, but that particular March 29th, 45 years ago, was the day she became a mom.

Mary Ann had sensed from the beginning that her first child would arrive on her birthday. When her doctor predicted a due date of March 20th, she responded "It can't be before the 22nd, because that's when the insurance kicks in." Apparently insurance companies could count; she and Eddie had married on June 22, 1963, and childbirth wasn't covered if it occurred less than nine months after the wedding date - it was a "pre-existing condition." In any case, she was sure the baby would be born nine months and one week after the marriage.

The day before Easter, March 28th, the young couple moved into their new apartment in the Bronx. When Mary Ann awoke in her new home the next morning, she wasn't sure she would make it to Easter Sunday Mass - going to the hospital seemed like a better idea. They drove to Yonkers and checked her in. Childbirth was a very different process for most women back then, and during a period of "twilight sleep," Mary Ann's first child was delivered at 11:55 AM: a full-term, although very tiny (four pounds, four ounces), baby girl. In celebration of the birth and new mom's birthday, Eddie and his mother came back to the hospital with a birthday cake, but neither mother nor baby could eat any of it. After meeting his new daughter, Eddie told Mary Ann, "She's your birthday present. You should pick her name." The name she chose honored the baby's grandmothers: Mary Ann gave this very small baby the very large name of Florinda Elizabeth (the first was her mother's name, the second was Eddie's). Because the baby was so small, Mary Ann didn't get to bring her birthday present home until two weeks later.

Health Care: Other People's Decisions

My employer is a rare case these days - one who continues to pay the full cost of its employees' health insurance. They're not legally required to offer insurance at all (not yet, anyway), and as a tax-exempt non-profit, they don't get a tax break for doing it. Still, they've made the decision to do it because they know that it's a benefit that helps recruit and retain employees. Granted, what they're paying for is very basic HMO coverage, and it is just for the employees themselves. Staff who would like to insure their families as well, or who want the wider range of choices and coverages offered in a PPO plan, must pay the additional premiums out of their own paychecks. However, since my employer is a smallish non-profit, many employees don't make enough money to afford those options, so they get only what the company pays for.

• "What the company pays for" seems to buy less and less every year, and comes with the added bonus of regular changes in insurance carriers.

In my six years at this job, I've seen open-enrollment forms from four different insurers, and we're currently back with the company who handled our plan eight years ago - for this year, anyway. For many people, these frequent changes in who pays for their medical care also mean frequent changes in who provides it. At the annual open-enrollment meeting, the insurer requires participants to select a primary-care doctor on the spot, and offers a directory of all of the providers who accept their insurance. Since many doctors belong to a variety of insurer networks, this may mean that nothing has to change except for the insurance card you present at your next appointment. However, if your current doctor or group isn't listed, you'll need to decide on a new one - with almost no information to go on - from the list in front of you. If you don't choose, the insurer can - and will - choose one for you.