Because...it's my money

"...with my mind on my money and my money on my mind."
-- Cordozar Calvin Broadus Jr. (A.K.A. Snoop Dogg)

There are few things I will discuss with people outside of family and close friends. One of those things I'm reluctant to bring up is my money. I've made many mistakes regarding my handling of money, for which I'm still paying. (Talk about irony!) With soaring gasoline and food prices, I'm having to cut some things out of my household budget. I've just canceled my subscriptions to the San Francisco Chronicle and Newsweek. The Chronicle wants $78 for 26 weeks. BAH-HA-HA-HA-HA!

I haven't gone to lunch with my coworkers in recent months because the costs add up -- $5 here, $10 there, $15 in other places. That's money that could go a long way at WinCo Foods, especially with coupons. It's not that I dislike my coworkers. But these days I need every dollar I can get my hands on. I may even have to take a second job in the coming months.

On Thursday, I made the mistake of joining my coworkers for lunch at Vallejo's. Actually, I didn't order lunch, per se. I ordered a lemon-lime soft drink, nothing more. One coworker asked if I was fasting. "No," I replied, tersely. My supervisor asked if I was hungry. I said I had my lunch back at the office. Then the coworker asked if the union had negotiated a cost-of-living raise. (Considering we're represented by the same unit, she could go ask an SEIU Local 1000 representative that question.) Eventually, I became uncomfortable and was about to pay for my drink and return to work. My supervisor said to keep my money since she was paying for lunch.

"You're a cheap date," she said, perhaps half-jokingly.

"Ah, but not easy," I half-jokingly retorted.

I was pretty grumpy on the walk back to the office. How I spend my money is not their business. I don't ask them how they allocate their finances. Lunches like these are under my "entertainment" budget, which has been spent for the month. If they want my company, it shouldn't matter to them whether I eat or drink or just plain hang out.

Maybe I'm calling too much attention to myself. From now on, I'll eat my bag lunch quietly and disappear when they do future group lunches.

Later that day, my frugality (or cheapness, however one wishes to call it) was justified when my air conditioner went out. I'm taking Monday off to get the thing fixed. One-hundred-degree days are coming this week, and I refuse to swelter in my home.

As Bill Cosby said in a commercial for the now-defunct E.F. Hutton: "Because...it's my money."

Writing Diva

Distance Makes the Heart Grow…Who Am I Kidding?

I ride a commuter bus between Vacaville and my workplace in Sacramento each day. Late last year I met a woman who became one of my closest friends, A.J. We would sit together and discuss what was happening in our lives and at work.

Yesterday was her birthday. I gave her a humorous card. During our morning chat, she dropped a bombshell – she plans to move to Maryland to live near one of her brothers sometime next year.

I was shocked. Then, during my nap, I grieved a bit. It almost never fails. I get a good friend to hang out with, and she moves away or I move away.

I’ve had the same thing happen repeatedly throughout my life. I moved away from Leona, my sixth-grade friend from Donner Elementary School. We were going to attend Peter Lassen Junior High School together until my parents found a new, bigger home for our family in south Sacramento. Then I made friends with Kathy, who moved to Torrance shortly before I started ninth grade. When I started my journalism career in Bellingham, Wash., in 1989, I made friends with another Carol, who started a week after I did. Partly due to homesickness and harassment by my supervisors, I moved back to Northern California.

During my 1989-1992 stint at the Daily Republic in Fairfield, I made friends with a reporter named Linda, AKA “Red.” After she worked there a year, she moved to Florida, where she eventually met her true love, married, and had a family. Another coworker, this time at the San Ramon Valley Times, became a good friend. Then Estela left the paper and followed her husband back East, where they eventually settled in Texas with their two children.

I call and write to some of my long-distance friends. But it’s difficult. I realize I could visit them, but I don’t have the money to drive, much less fly, to see them. So, e-mail (when available) is the next best thing. Sometimes I’m envious of those who move away. It seems they’re moving on to better things, while I’m stuck in neutral. I try not to feel sorry for myself, but it’s hard.

So, now another friend is moving away. I don’t handle change well. That’s something I’ll have to change. (Ba-da-bump.)

However, I want A.J. to be happy. Life is too short to not try something, to not fulfill one’s potential while on this Earth. I’ll adjust. That’s what change is all about.
Writing Diva

Bobby, I Hardly Knew Ye

Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up over the hill,
With Abraham, Martin and John. -- Dick Holler, 1968

I was only 8 years old, but I remember Senator Robert FrancisKennedy’s assassination as if it was, perhaps, a week ago.

It was only two months after the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed at the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, so King’s assassination and funeral were still fresh in my mind. Sen. Kennedy was running for the Democratic nomination for presidentafter President Lyndon B. Johnson declared that he “would not seekanother term as your President.” Kennedy had just won the California Primary and was celebrating at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

I began my interest in politics at the age of 8 after I had a talk with Mom and Dad about the 1968 presidential election. I learned the difference between Democrats and Republicans, at least from their pointof view. Republicans didn’t like taxes, big government, or black folk.Democrats believed that government should help people, believed taxes were the way to do it, and at least tolerated black people.

“So, which are we,” I asked Mom. “Democrats or Republicans?”

“We’re Democrats,” Mom replied.

School had just let out for the summer when I was watching the electionreturns for the California Primary. (Oh, I long for the days when ourstate had just one primary – in June!) So, I was allowed to stay uplate to watch TV. I liked the Kennedy family. I remember when Mom told me she cried when President John F. Kennedy was shot in November 1963 in a motorcade in Dallas. I thought the Kennedy era of support for civil rights and hope for a brighter future was over.
But when JFK’s younger brother, former Attorney General and then-New York Senator Bobby Kennedy was running for President, I thought that maybe the Kennedy era could come back to life. And with the California win, Bobby was on his way.

But shortly after midnight on June 5, 1968, that victory was cutviolently short. Sirhan Sirhan, a 24-year-old Palestinian who objectedto RFK’s support of Israel, shot the senator in the head at close range. I was so naïve. I thought maybe doctors could take the bullet out of Kennedy’s head, and he would just be paralyzed. “You’ve got to save him,” I kept saying to the TV set as Iwatched the news.

But it was not to be. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy died of his wound on June 6, 1968. He was 42. When I heard of his death, I moaned, “Oh, no, not again!” I cried while Mom tried comforting me.

So, the nation endured another funeral of someone in which we hadplaced our hopes. I didn’t let RFK’s death deter me from following political issues. But I’ve often wondered what our nation would have been like had he lived.

Although the quote was attributed to George Bernard Shaw, I will close with RFK’s version: “There are those that look at things the way they are, and ask why? I dream of things that never were, and ask why not?”

Writing Diva

Ghost of lovers past

In a way, I did see this coming. I remained in denial until tonight.

I saw one of my former boyfriends, Helmut, again.

First, I don't use real names when it comes to friends, family, even ex-lovers. So, even Helmut is protected. That doesn't mean I like him, though.

A few weeks ago a colleague from Solano Christian Singles, of which I was a core group member, asked me if I would take over hosting an event tonight, April 19, at Trinity Lutheran Church in Fairfield. I was hesitant because I had left the group on New Year's Eve because I wanted more time to focus on my writing. But Tess, who is dedicated to the group and understood my time constraints and frustrations with the group, was the one doing the asking. So, I acquiesced.

The party had a '60s theme. I bought some sodas, Chex Mix, Lil' Smokies, and barbecue sauce. I also bought three 1960s music compilation CDs with me. The games, decorations, sound system, candies, and cake were handled by other core group members. By 6 p.m., the start of the dance, people slowly began to arrive. Shortly after 6 p.m., as I was preparing the orange sherbet/7-Up punch, I heard a familiar basso profundo voice -- Helmut! My heart sank to my stomach. Whatever appetite I had vanished.

But it wasn't as if, in a way, I wasn't warned. For the past several weeks, I've had dreams of seeing Helmut again. We had dated from October 1990 to August 1991. We broke up shortly after a mishap in which I was supposed to meet Helmut at a restaurant before attending a Diana Ross concert at the then-Concord Pavilion. I forgot where I was supposed to meet him. So, I went to the concert, hoping Helmut might have went there to wait for me. He wasn't in front of the gate. So, I watched the concert alone. The next day, we got into a fight on the phone about my forgetting where Helmut was. Feeling cornered and guilty, I hung up on him. He broke up with me soon thereafter. It was ugly.

I saw Helmut twice since the breakup. The first time was at a festival in Oakland around 1994. He was with a female friend when I arrived to sit down to enjoy some jazz. When I saw the two of them, I hurriedly left the park, took the BART train back to Walnut Creek, where I was living, drove home, and cried. The second time was 2001 at a Sade concert, also at the now-Sleep Train Pavilion, where I was writing a review as a freelancer for The Oakland Tribune. Helmut was one of the ushers. I sneered at him whenever he'd pass. But I had never seen him at the Danceasy ballroom in El Cerrito, where I had resumed classes in 2002 and had been going there on and off since. (We had taken ballroom dance classes together, which made some tense moments. He lacked rhythm. I wouldn't follow someone who lacked rhythm.)

So, when he walked him saying "Hello" in that booming bass voice, I wanted to run. But I was in the corner of the church kitchen. And when Delilah had to return to the kitchen to cut the bread for sandwiches, and Helmut offered to help, I felt trapped. Again.

Delilah introduced Helmut and me. At first, I said "Hello" as if I hadn't seen him before. He admitted to Delilah that we had met. I said that we had met at different social functions. I never admitted to her that he was once my lover, the man who said he wanted to marry me someday.

I excused myself to see if my former core group colleague and friend Lisa was coming with the ice. After a couple of minutes, Lisa drove her Civic into the driveway. As I strode up to the car, she rolled down the passenger-side window.

"My ex-boyfriend is here!" I said. "And I can't leave because I'm in charge of this thing! And I can't curse here."

"Go on the sidewalk and get it out there," Lisa said.

I said every curse word I could think of, but quietly so I wouldn't disturb the neighbors across the street. Before we entered, Lisa took my hand and we prayed The Serenity Prayer: "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

"I pray that prayer a lot," she said.

Then I helped Lisa in with the ice.

During the evening, Helmut would talk with other guests and eventually sat at a table across from Lisa and me. He asked about my life and where I attend church. I didn't want to seem too rude, but I hesitated to say where I worked, at first. He teaches at Vacaville High School, around the corner from where I live. He bought a home in Vallejo. I said I bought a townhome in Vacaville. He occasionally attends the Methodist Church in Napa.

Why the #$%@ did I say what I did, where I worked, or where I worship? I wanted to kick myself.

Then I would go off in the kitchen and have temper tantrums with God. I asked Him why he would bring Helmut into my life now, of all times. And why did He bring Helmut to a place where I can't kick him in the cojones, punch him in the jaw, or crush his instep. And what did Delilah do with that ginsu knife?

During the evening I walked around checking the music that was playing, nibbling some snacks, if only half-heartedly, dancing to some favorite tunes, and sitting with guests chatting. Helmut was his usual charming self to the guests and was being friendly to me. I was in too much shock to take much notice.

Around 7 p.m., he finally left. Before going to his truck, he approached me and said goodbye to me. "Take care of yourself," I said. "You too," he said, patting my shoulder.

I told two other female guests that the guy who left was my ex-boyfriend. I said nothing to Delilah, who seemed to enjoy Helmut's attention. I chose not to mention my previous dating status. I figured that if the two dated, that would be Helmut's story to tell, not mine.

I did have some fun with the few people who were there. About nine people showed up for the dance. But core group members Mike and Delilah took pictures of some of us dancing and clowning around on the digital camera and printed copies for each of us. By the time we finished cleanup, it was 10 p.m. I arrived home at 10:20 p.m.

After I let one cat outside, I began bawling. I remembered all the physical and emotional pain that Helmut caused me. How could we possibly be friends after all he put me through? I can accept that we weren't good for one another, that our relationship was emotionally unhealthy. But the aftereffects were awful.

Maybe I still have some work to do toward forgiving Helmut and moving on with a future relationship.

And wouldn't you know? There was a full moon tonight.

Writing Diva

A (Too) Public Tragedy

Over the past week I've watched the scandal over New York Gov. Elliot Spitzer's hiring of an expensive call girl unfold over the media. Various network and cable news outlets have aired the two press conferences of Spitzer, dragging his wife Silda Wall Spitzer with him, first apologizing for his actions (which he did not detail, probably on his lawyer's advice), then announcing his resignation from the office he assumed in January 2007.

Then The New York Times revealed the name of the 22-year-old woman with whom Spitzer was involved -- Ashley Alexandra Dupré, an aspiring singer. Two days later, she was besieged with offers from Penthouse and Hustler magazines to pose nude.

Spitzer has been the butt (Definitely no pun intended) of jokes on the late night talk shows and will be parodied tonight on Saturday Night Live. The tabloid newspapers and television shows have referred to the outgoing governor as "The Love Gov" and detailed the lurid scandal incessantly.

What the media and "entertainers" seem to forget is that this is a tragedy, albeit a too public one. Because of Spitzer's actions, the crusading attorney general known as the "Sheriff of Wall Street" for his pursuit of corporate corruption, his career is ruined, his marriage is in jeopardy, and his three teenage daughters are probably enduring embarrassment and ridicule in a period of their lives when they should be spared such things.

Yes, I realize the freedom of speech is guaranteed under our nation's First Amendment. I've heard the repeated adage "Sex sells." But I ask the media for restraint at this time. Granted, what Spitzer did was thoughtless and destructive to himself, his family, and New York state. However, the media should also consider his wife and daughters. They didn't ask for this. I'm sure Silda Wall Spitzer didn't ask to be trotted out to play the role of the loving and supporting wife and scrutinized by the media for "standing by her man." Although she and her daughters became (somewhat) public figures when Spitzer ran for public office, they didn't visit the "Emperor's Club V.I.P." They trusted a husband a father to do the right thing. They are innocent victims in all this.

Having said that, I will turn off the TV if I see any coverage, any jokes, any parodies involving the outgoing governor and his call girl, who, from what I've heard from news reports, is stressed out by the media wolf pack. Instead, I will pray that the Spitzer family (yes, even the governor) gets through this trying, hellish time. Peace.

Writing Diva

Oscar armchair quarterback

I don't think any of the Oscar observers have said it yet, so I will: Oscar skewed young this year. Forget about Oscars for older sentimental favorites like Ruby Dee and Hal Holbrook. (Needless to say, I was disappointed Ruby Dee didn't win.) The (reportedly) relentlessly violent "No Country for Old Men" took home the most Oscars. The song from "Once," "Falling Slowly," beat out the Disney juggernaut and the gospel-influenced "Raise Me Up" from "August Rush." (Nice touch from Jon Stewart offering the female co-writer of "Falling Slowly" to finish her acceptance speech!)

I thought that if Ruby Dee didn't win, Amy Ryan from "Gone, Baby, Gone" would take it. Tilda Swinton from "Michael Clayton" was a huge surprise. (Next time, Tilda, wear something other than a Glad garbage bag.)

Marion Cotillard from "La Vie en Rose" was a wonderful surprise. Too many Oscar observers thought Julie Christie would take it for "Away from Her." But from what I saw of Cotillard's performance as Edith Piaf, she earned it. And she was so refreshing in her acceptance speech.

I'm glad Daniel Day-Lewis won for "There Will Be Blood" and Javier Bardem (¡Qué caliente!) for his portrayal of one of the scariest movie villains in film history in "No Country."

Diablo Cody earned her Oscar for her crackling dialogue in "Juno." I'm not going to ding her for her leopard-print gown. She's glad to be accepted as she is.

Well, that's my take.

Writing Diva

Holding My Nose at the Polls

Four days ago I cast my vote in the presidential primary for Sen. Barack Obama. My trek to the polls was one of the few times when I didn’t have to hold my nose while casting a ballot.
I have voted in every presidential election, primary and general, since 1980. I believe in the adage, “If you don’t vote, don’t complain.” When I was an idealistic young college student, I thought then-President Jimmy Carter was doing a terrible job with the economy. So, I voted for Sen. Edward Kennedy in the Democratic primary, who lost to Carter. Then I made a big mistake. I switched to the Republican Party briefly so I could vote for U.S. Rep. John Anderson for president in the general election. (He later switched to being an independent. It took months for me to get off the Republican Party’s mailing list.) In the end, actor and former California Gov. Ronald Reagan won, launching eight years of neo-conservative policies.

When President Reagan ran for a second term in 1984, the best the Democratic Party could do was Carter’s former Vice President Walter Mondale. He wasn’t my first choice, but I didn’t want another four years of “Bonzo.” So, I voted for Mondale, holding my nose. Rats! A landslide and four more years of Reagan.

In 1988, I became an independent because I had become a newspaper reporter and didn't want to show any biases should anyone investigate my party affiliation. But Ivoted as a Democrat. I thought maybe there was light at the end of the presidential tunnel. George H.W. Bush was the Republican nominee that year. Whom did the Democrats come up with? A reserved, somewhat wonkish Gov. Michael Dukakis of Massachusetts. (I couldn’t vote in the Democratic presidential primary then because decline-to-state voters in California were not allowed to do so then.) Then his biggest claim to fame was his cousin Olympia Dukakis, who won the Academy Award for best supporting actress that year for the film “Moonstruck.” It didn’t help that an independent political action committee that backed Bush Sr. hurled Willie Horton into the voting public’s consciousness. Dukakis supported a prison furlough program in his state that resulted in the release of convicted murderer William Horton, who committed a rape and assault in Maryland after being freed. The ad the committee aired used a mug shot of Horton, who is African American. The Bush campaign did nothing to repudiate it. Voters overwhelmingly elected Bush Sr. over Dukakis.

In 1992, I thought Bush Sr. would easily get another four-year term until Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton came on the scene. He was one of the few candidates for whom I purposefully strode to my polling place and cast my vote just before I went to work. I didn’t have a lot of hope back then. (Clinton kept referring to his former hometown of Hope, Ark.) But I felt I had to try to get Bush Sr. out. I was overjoyed when Clinton, along with California’s first elected female senators, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, were swept into office.

I walked briskly to my polling place again in 1996 when President Clinton ran against Sen. Robert Dole of Kansas. I thought Dole was a dour conservative who threatened to push back much of the progress made during the Clinton presidency. Had I known that Dole actually has a self-deprecating sense of humor, I might have considered voting for him. (NOT!)

I thought in 2000 maybe the Democratic streak could continue with Clinton’s Vice President Al Gore. He, like Dukakis, seemed stiff and reserved, but I preferred him to the doofus running for president – George W. Bush. (The late Molly Ivins was right to refer to Bush-whacker as “Shrub.”) But having been fed up with Clinton’s peccadilloes (such as his affair with intern Monica Lewinsky while in office), voters came out against Gore. Actually, it was the Republican-packed U.S. Supreme Court that handed the presidency to Bush-whacker.

The former Texas governor who promoted himself as “a uniter, not a divider” was anything but. Backed by a Republican Congress, he pushed for an invasion of Iraq under the guise of the “war on terror” to get rid of dictator Saddam Hussein. From unwise tax cuts to his momentary freezing when he heard about the 9/11 attack of the United States to his neglect of the poor and middle class and people of color, Bush-whacker earned the dubious honor of a song by Green Day – “American Idiot.”

Desperate to get rid of the “Emperor with No Clothes,” I supported then Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina in the Democratic primary because I liked his stance on addressing poverty in this nation. (That year, I was allowed to vote on a Democratic presidential primary ballot for the first time.) Instead, the Democrats ended up with an earnest, yet rather ineffectual Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts. Again, I held my nose in November 2004 because I didn’t think I could bear another four years of Bush-whacker. This time, Bush-whacker won by about 3 million votes.

This year, the Democratic presidential nominee may be a woman, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, or an African American man, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois. I voted for Obama because I want a president who is not as polarizing as Hillary (She has baggage from her husband Bill’s presidency.) and would be more able to bridge Democrats and Republicans. Whoever becomes the eventual nominee, I won’t have to hold my nose at the polls this November.

Writing Diva