TRIAL OF A NOVICE SELLER or I LOVE THAT MY TRACT HOUSE IS CONSIDERED REAL ESTATE

The last time I sold a house I told a prospective buyer she could not look in one of the bedrooms as there was a baby sleeping and thus sacrificed a chance to unload a property in the depressed market of 1983 Michigan. I wouldn’t do that again. Actually, I wouldn’t do any of this again. (Famous last words, right?) Keeping to the baby theme, it occurred to me that preparing a house (with 36 years of skin sloughings, dust, moldering books, furniture, ancient towels and thread-bare sheets) is akin to labor. It doesn’t hurt as much but it lasts longer and you have the same driving wish “I just want to get up and walk away from all this.” I’m sort of joking. The fact is, I’ve met an angel. Bill Moyers said once during an interview that he had been helped in his career by unseen hands. Well, these hands are seen and they are busy. This realtor – a gift from my daughter – is helming the whole, messy process, from getting in competent, efficient repairmen, painters, carpet-layers, etc., to buying new fixtures (updating), to gently suggesting disposal of ancient, rickety things (piano, inherited furniture, broken bookshelves) and then bringing and LOADING a pickup truck to take to GoodWill or the dump – many times, to pruning the bushes, to decorating my house with items I’d never think of in a million years – like a four-foot Buddha. Love that Buddha. I may ask to keep him. My agent (I’ll call her Franci Bissett) offers suggestions, solutions and sympathy whenever they are needed. It was not an easy decision to trade the comfort and familiarity of two generations, the concrete stylings of my children in the driveway, the memories of those family years and a hundred years of furniture passed down from New England to Ann Arbor and Virginia. It was (and is) very, very hard to leave the dearest friends in the world. But Franci and her crew have kept me on track to move forward. And life, apparently, is all about change. Just ask the Buddha.

RE-LOCATE? IT'S EASY THEY SAID

I didn’t have much to do last weekend so I bought a house. Eventually, I mentioned it to my husband. “This online shopping has gotten out of hand,” he complained. “First it was just vitamins and batteries then it mushroomed into shorts and sheets and gnomes (don’t ask) and now you’ve bought a house? Where will it end?” With the house, probably, seeing as I failed to allow for the fact that the funds for it, coming out of an IRA account, will cost us half again in taxes. And because this means that not only do I have to de-clutter/repair/clean the house we’ve lived in for thirty-six years, we now have to move. Yikes. My mandate, dictated by age, infirmity and a desire to hang out with some of my grandchildren, was to find a ranch-style house in a neighborhood near one of my adult children. The closest potential neighborhood was five-and-a-half hours by car (long-distance move, i.e. leaving behind dear friends) and the house in question turns out to have a steep staircase from the lower-level garage to the first and only floor of the house. Oh, yeah. There’s a steep stairway to the basement, too, and another to the front door. Because of it’s yellow siding and red shutters, I have named it the Overripe Banana. Banana for short. “Why did you buy a house with stairs?” The not unnatural question came from my mother, who is ninety-eight. “Because Emily liked it.” “Why did you buy that house?” This question came from son number one, Adam. “Because Emily liked it and I liked it.” “Why did you buy any house online?” This from son number two, Ben. “Because Emily liked it and I just needed to land the plane on some aspect of my chaotic life.” He seemed to understand. “You are gonna love this house,” said Emily, my daughter, who intends to purchase a house a mile away from the Banana. “I knew it the moment I walked in.” She’d called me on Facetime to show me how much I would love this house that I’ve never seen in a town where I’ve never been. “It’s got a great kitchen and a sun porch. And it’s small. You won’t have to bring the ironing board.” I admitted those were selling points. I failed to ask whether it had a bathtub. Or even bathrooms. Or (gasp) air conditioning. “And it’s got a big basement,” daughter continued. “Plenty of room for your books.” For the record, I have never lived in a house with a basement and I usually associate that part of the house with The Tell Tale Heart. I always think there will be a body in the wall. Part of the explanation is my natural competitiveness. This is a quality that has seldom served me well. Hours after I’d facetimed the Banana, someone else made an offer on it. It was a good offer, too, and if I wanted it, I had to act fast. And generously. My excellent realtor (she really is) and I decided we’d have to go well beyond the asking price to have any chance of winning. Naturally, I gave her carte blanche. I like to win. Twenty-four hours later I found I was the owner presumptive of the Banana. Would my furniture fit into the small rooms? Would my books? Would I, as an alum and third generation fan of the University of Michigan be happy in Buckeye country? Could I survive in this cute neighborhood with its ratio of 2 to 1 Republicans? What about the patched Midwest roads? What about the drinking water that comes from Lake Erie? What about my local newspaper? What about my lifelong friends??? Belatedly I asked Emily, the only blood relative who has actually seen the house, other questions. “Is there a sidewalk? You know I like a sidewalk. You know, for my bigwheel.” “No sidewalk,” she reported. “But there isn’t much traffic. You should be able to play in the street.” “What about a dog fence?” “Er, no. But you can put an invisible fence in the backyard.” I caught a quick mental image of Toby’s fat little body leaping into the air from an electrical shock each time he sauntered outside. “It’s a great school district, mom. And the library’s across the street.” I thought about the hundreds, probably thousands of dollars I’d spent buying books from Amazon during the last ten years. Maybe the house would pay for itself. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t happen before my 60-day grace period ran out and I had to pay those pesky IRA taxes. `

CASEY'S BIG ADVENTURE

“Mugs was always sorry, Mother said, when he bit someone, but we could never understand how she figured this out. He didn’t act sorry.” This James Thurber observation is my favorite of all time with the possible exception of this one from Jean Kerr: “Now the thing about having a baby – and I can’t be the first person to have noticed this – is that thereafter you have it.” But this column is about a lost dog, not parenthood, except that the lost dog in question belongs to my daughter and her family and that we (Pete and I) rescued her. Unfortunately, it was not in time to prevent her from having a rap sheet complete with mug shot. This is not my first rodeo with a delinquent dog. During the 13 Bandit years (aggressive Aussie) we were gifted with three – count them – THREE – drop-ins from the local cops. The subject was biting. Once she bit a baseball coach on our front porch who was trying to deliver a cabbage. Once she bit a kid playing flashlight tag in our backyard. And then there was the time she took a nip out of a cyclist’s leg and he and the baby in the carrier seat, sprawled on the ground. Oh, and once Bandit bit our eight-year-old son on the head. After each incident we (Pete) decreed we were going to send her back to the breeder. But other (I won’t say cooler) heads prevailed. Okay, so this is the story of the recent rescue. Pete and I were sitting in a doc’s office (a common location for us these days) when our daughter (I’ll call her Emily for the sake of the story) called to announce that her eleven-year-old lab mix, Casey, had run away. To tell the truth, while I was worried about Casey, I didn’t mind postponing the opportunity to schedule a colonoscopy which is my least favorite medical event, including childbirth. As I wheeled out of the doc’s parking lot my husband said, “when there’s someplace you want to go you’re like a teamster) and headed for the neighborhood around Emily’s home. It’s a planned community full of townhouses and good Samaritans so I figured someone had already rescued Casey and I was right. We found the rescuer PDQ and jetted off to pick up the scofflaw at the animal shelter down by the dump. After about forty-five minutes of red tape this very nice young man produced Casey who flew past us toward the door. Outside she raced for the car so fast I was flying behind her in the breeze. Needless to say, Casey learned her lesson about leaving the backyard. But then, she’s a smart doggie. Several years ago when our golden retriever, Lucy, got out of the house I walked/drove around the local streets asking folks if they’d seen a golden that looked like an Irish setter. One neighbor laughed. “Yeah. She ran by here about twenty minutes ago,” she said. “If it’s any consolation to you, she looked really happy.” I don’t want a reward for the rescue but I have decided to take it as a sign that I don’t need a colonoscopy this year. Or ever. Feel free to call me in the spring about your lost dogs.

HEY WEIGHT-WATCHERS-WATCH THIS

You know how a song gets into your head and seems to just lodge there among the synapses, playing itself over and over again? Songs like Baby Shark and Memory from the musical Cats and the William Tell Overture? The other day, just before a long-awaited lunch with friends, another song from the past presented itself, not while I was standing on the bathroom scale without a stitch of clothing in sight but immediately after. Anyway, it was that old Gene McDaniels song from 1961: “He took a hundred pounds of clay, and he said, hey listen. I’m gonna fix this world today, because I know what’s missing..and he rolled his big sleeves up and a brand new world began, he created a woman and, lots of lovin’ for a man. Yes, he did. Whoa whoa. He took a hundred pounds of clay.” Except in my mind, prompted by heaven knows what, the lyrics came out with a slight variation. “He took two hundred pounds of clay…” There are those in my life who grow impatient with my fixation on weight but they are not the people who have to keep buying larger sizes of jeans. My 100-pounds of clay hairdresser, Jen, who says, unsympathetically, “who is it that keeps shoving the wrong kinds of food in your mouth?” My 100-pounds of clay mother, Helen, who says, “any luck on the new diet?” My 100-pounds of clay daughter, Emily, who says, “could you please stop serving Boston cream pie, chocolate fudge cheesecake, and salted milk chocolate caramels for dessert on Sunday?” (Answers: me. No. I don’t think so.) Okay, so I get to lunch at Panera and, out of the blue, Judy says, “when my husband goes into a doctor’s office and is told to get up on the scale, he just does it, without removing his shoes, or his jacket or his wallet or his keys!” We gasp, momentarily suspending the intake of food, although it was fake in my case. My husband does the same thing. “My husband always challenges the nurse,” Bev said. “He tells her he weighs five pounds less at home.” Yeah. Like five pounds would make a difference. “No matter where I am weighed,” Susan says, “I take off my glasses.” “I take off my watch and earrings,” said Bev. “I take out my hearing aid,” I said. “Or, I would if I had one. As it is, I take off my wedding ring.” “Well, at least we’re all eating vegetables,” Susan says, looking with satisfaction at her soup and not at her hunk of bread. “Especially you, Ann, with all that lettuce.” I glance at my salad, a bowl of thick, ranch dressing and the BLT on the side. “And we’re having diet sodas,” Judy said. I remained silent on this, since I’d chosen lemonade. “And we had to pace around the restaurant for a good six minutes waiting for this booth,” Bev pointed out. “Think how many steps that is.” I checked my Fitbit and found the number still in double digits. “We should celebrate our efforts,” Judy said, producing a large baker’s box. “They’ve got a new fudge brownie and I got one for us to share.” “I got one, too,” Susan said, producing her own box. Bev and I said nothing but we set our own boxes on the now-crowded table. Everyone was silent for a moment. “I know,” I said, “we can make up for the brownie by walking back to the beverage bar for lattes to go with.” “Great idea,” Susan said, looking at her Fitbit. “And listen to this, girls. We’ve already been here for three hours. Just a couple more and the brownies will count as supper.” “Good plan,” Bev said. “It’s not so much what you eat as when you eat.” I wasn’t so sure. “We’ll probably be pretty hungry in another two hours,” I pointed out. “Why don’t I pick up a dinner menu when we go back to the line for coffee?” “Excellent idea,” Judy said. “And we can get another brownie, too.” On the drive home I consoled myself with this thought. By 1961 I’d already weighed more than a hundred pounds. Bring on the sculpting knife. And the Baby Shark.

CRIME SHOW CRIME

An egregious thing happened last night. It was six-thirty and spouse and I had finished our healthiest meal of the week (under-cooked salmon, leftover green beans, pre-made mashed potatoes and Boston cream cake) and, left over because I had failed to serve it to company on the weekend). Having had enough of the Trump melodrama, I clicked to Amazon Prime and a jolly little series I'd found. It's called WAKING THE DEAD.” I am okay with death and murder and blood. I’m a big fan of police procedurals and all kinds of mystery, from cozy to grim so I was not fazed by the shot of a lone gunman in three-story garage who massacred a dozen or more people on the street in the opening scene. The problem came when the cold case unit re-examined the case of the convicted murderer seven years later and, in a flashback, showed him romping on the heath with a golden retriever. The dog bounced off into the woods and there was a blind gunshot. I felt a clutch of fear and glanced at spouse who was, of course, asleep. A moment later we, the viewers, were treated to a vision of a dead golden retriever. I repeat, A DEAD GOLDEN RETRIEVER. Spouse woke, briefly, when he heard my outraged shriek. In the shock of the incident, the dog owner picked off a dozen people from a third story perch and, you know what? I did not blame him. It’s bad enough that dogs have short life spans (including the one in the television show who, while not really murdered, is no doubt dead by now of natural causes since the show was produced in 2003.) It is completely unnecessary to remind us about this evolutionary mistake. Dead dogs are out. Verboten. Unacceptable. In fact, if the show's writers had wanted to redeem themselves, they could have woken the dead dog. I am not alone in my conviction on this. I am currently reading a writing process book called Save the Cat Writes a Novel. The title comes from a universal truth which is that readers want to root for a hero and if that hero is danger of becoming unlikable, the easiest fix is to have him or her rescue a cat. I don't think it's too much of a jump to apply the same thing to golden retrievers. Always save the dog. I supposed I could send a copy of the book to Britbox. Or maybe just a strongly worded tweet: KILL A PET, LOSE A FAN #Nomoredeaddogs!!!!!

WHO SAYS MARCH IS THE WORST MONTH? NOT ME

The Ides of March have nothing on March 5. Consider this: March 5, 1948 – my cousin Bob’s birthday. (Happy Birthday, Bob!) March 5, 1977 – my first and only wedding to a shaggy-haired Associated Press reporter March 5, 2001 – birthday of the late, much-lamented golden retriever, Lucy March 5, 2019 – the release of A DOUBLE-POINTED MURDER, the second (or third depending on who is counting) book in a cozy mystery series set in the Finnish-American community in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. This one is my favorite so far, possibly because it includes Nazis. Accidental detective Hatti Lehtinen is all set to investigate the murder by knitting needle of a barmaid who was found in the bed of her ex-brother-in-law, Lars, when a television company comes to Red Jacket to film a pilot for an Antiques Roadshow knock-off called What’s in Your Attic? Hatti, recently elected temporary head of the local chamber of commerce, frets that she won’t have time to clear Lars of the murder rap AND host the out-of-towners. But a series of clues, including another shocking death, lead her to suspect that the TV people and the barmaid’s death are connected. Here’s another fun fact: A DOUBLE-POINTED DEATH is listed NUMBER ONE on Amazon in the competitive category of cultural, ethnic and regional humor (new releases.) Check it out. Meanwhile, I’m going to spend the day celebrating an anniversary with my

FARE WARNING

Now that I am firmly lodged in the Sunset Years (my age? Let me just plagiarize a character from “Mame” and say, oh, somewhere between forty and death), I am surprised and frankly disappointed that I don’t look more like Jane Fonda. After all, I have her 1980 workout tape. I have enrolled in a yoga class that always seems to get pre-empted by snow or skipped by me for some excellent reason (too tired, too lazy, my friends aren’t going) and I have a rowing machine, as yet, unassembled. As you can see, I take this weight thing seriously, even though it has hit me, avalanche like, out of the blue. One day I was tipping the scales at ten pounds more than when I was married and the next, I was ten pounds over my nine-month pregnancy weight. What in the H-E-double-hockey sticks happened? As soon as the most recent (and most appalling) number appeared on the scale at my nurse practitioner’s office (and right after I lifted her off the floor) I started to research and absorb information about diets. Especially those written by celebrities of a certain age. (I don’t count Oprah as she has made it clear she has a personal chef.) I read Sheryl Crow’s “If It Makes You Healthy,” Kris Jenner’s “In the Kitchen with Kris,” Dolly Parton’s “Dolly’s Dixie Fixin’s,” and “Entertaining with Kathy and Regis” and I still don’t look like Sheryl, Kris, Dolly, Kathy Lee or even Regis. (I considered “Kill It and Grill It,” by Ted Nugent who is not only my exact age but from my exact state but I decided it was a bad idea to mix diet and politics.) The bottom line (no pun intended) is that I don’t look like any of those celebrities. I don’t even look like their children. I suppose it would help if I’d cook the recipes and do the exercises but that seems like a stretch, and, anyway, these books are supposed to work like magic. I paid my $19.95. Where’s my magic? I’ve ordered probiotic pills, skinny tea and protein bars and I’ve fantasized about joining weight watchers. The trouble is that you have to swallow the pill and skinny tea must be accompanied by scones with clotted cream, protein bars taste like dog food (don't ask) and the prospect of getting weighed every week in front of a roomful of humans is unpalatable. If they had a weight watchers for dogs, I’d go. We'd both go. Toby is too fat, too. And that brings me to another complaint. Everyone said, “get a dog! A dog will force you out of doors. A dog will need (multiple) daily walks and you will automatically exercise!” Well, everyone was wrong. I managed to get the world’s only dog that isn’t interested in walks. I’m not kidding. He will run after a bicycle in front of the house or fetch a thrown ball which is more than can be said of me. The ridiculous part of all of this is that it shouldn’t have happened. Genetics are on my side. None of my grandparents was fat, nor were my parents, brothers, cousins, aunts and uncles. None of my children is fat. It’s too early to tell about the grandchildren. Everybody’s cute at four. Even I was cute. I mean adorable. We’re talking Shirley-Temple cute. Nowadays I don’t look as good as her, either, and, well, you know she’s dead. I think about food and my problem with it, all the time. (Except when I’m thinking about other worries.) Last night hubby and I were watching a Scandinavian film noir in which a coroner removed bits of tree bark from the body of a victim and it sparked an idea. “Say,” I said, “Think I’d lose weight if I went on an all-bark diet?” “All bark?” Just then a police dog appeared on the screen and Toby, as always, responded with a set of hysterical yelps. “It could work, if only because I’d shut you up in the basement and there’s no food down there.” I gave him my Mona Lisa smile. Obviously he doesn’t know about the leftover Snickers bars and the tin of Christmas cookies I stashed down there and, until now, had forgotten about. That’s another delightful aspect of ageing. My thighs may rub together when I’m taking a walk but when I’m in my favorite position, cross-legged on the couch bingeing on “Waking the Dead” and munching on salt carmels, I don’t care. Luckily, that’s most of the time. Here’s a “diet” verse from my late, great, not-fat father, Dick Emmons. FAREWELL FUDGE My diet makes me give up cakes, All sorts of tortes I’ve quit Meringue-topped pies said their goodbyes And the banana split.