Gathering a wardrobe as well as memories

Gatherers tend to enjoy shopping more than hunters.

If you have one thing in mind, and you’re in and out of one store, and you accomplish your mission, you’re a hunter. My Beloved is a hunter, and that’s why he prefers buying pretty much everything online. Click, click, click and he’s done.

I’m generally a hunter, too, but on occasion, I enjoy a gathering-type of expedition. I learned to shop this way from an old supervisor, with whom I shopped once on a business trip. When I was done with one store we entered together, she was only 5% through the racks. Ever the polite follower, I started over again and really looked at the choices. I ended up finding one of the best suits in which I ever invested (I still own and wear it, nearly 15 years later).

Gathering is an especially good approach in a Goodwill, for instance, when you really have to look at every single item. You tend to find things you didn’t know you needed (at excellent prices). A gathering approach is definitely the way to find good deals on any clearance rack.

I enjoyed a gatherer’s approach to shopping this week with my stepdaughter and mother-in-law as we shopped for some career pieces Morgan can wear in her new job (congratulations, Morgan, on her first “real” job!)

The last time I shopped with Morgan was definitely a hunting expedition in search of an interview outfit. But this time, she played the dutiful paper doll and I got to suggest some mix-and-match pieces to dress her. I learned why personal shoppers love their jobs — nothing like spending someone else’s money to make my stepdaughter look good (Grandma footed the bill).

We invested in a lot of colorful tops to balance her conservative black and navy pants, but my favorite piece in Morgan’s new wardrobe: A cuffed-sleeve python print shell from Express. Python is the trend print this season, and it’ll look stellar with black, gray or taupe.

This afternoon, she paid me a sweet little compliment by calling me from a shoe store she was visiting. “I’ve got a fashion question for you,” she said as she queried the work appropriateness of a certain type of shoe.

Oh! She wanted my opinion! This, I thought, must be what mothers feel like. How fun!

I hope the college admissions rep likes a good mystery

Boy, I’m glad I don’t work in a university admissions department.

Marketing anything to a 17-year-old boy is hard enough without having to market an institution of higher learning to a 17-year-old boy and his parents at the same time.

My Beloved and I visited one of those institutions of higher learning with my 17-year-old stepson today. He’s a junior in high school, and it’s time to get serious about what he wants to do when he grows up.

We extracted the bare minimum of information from him (long distance no less because, remember, he lives two states away with his mother) and determined a small, private university in a non-urban setting with degrees in business, environmental science or history might be appropriate.

Today’s campus visit included a tour, chapel service, lunch and a meeting with a financial aid representative.

At lunch, when Caswell went off to check out the offering of buffalo wings, I leaned over to my Beloved and said, “Well, do you think he likes it?”

He shrugged and looked exasperated. “I don’t know.”

Later, when we had Caswell trapped in the car, he said, “It was like the low leagues.”

Huh? Low leagues? “Do you mean minor leagues?”

“Yeah, minor leagues. And lunch tasted like crap.”

Hmm. Well, we can cross this option off the list and I’m not entirely sure why. But lunch didn’t impress him.

I’m a firm believer in gut feelings, so I support Caswell’s decision. But here’s the hard news for the admissions department: I watched him complete his  campus visit survey (a requirement in order to get a free T-shirt). Everything was rated as “good” or “excellent.”

Somebody in the admissions department doesn’t know enough to ask what prospective students think of lunch.

Practicing the psychology of love on spring break

While accurate, “stepmother” doesn’t have the most appealing ring to it.

If it doesn’t say “wicked” as the fairy tales would have us believe, it certainly says “second class.” In some circles, stepmoms call themselves “smoms” or “bonus moms.”

I’ve been a stepmother for five years, and I’ve learned my place. I’m not a mom, and I’ll never be a mom. But I’m the best darn stepmother I can be.

Still, that leaves me with a less-than-desirable title. Once, my stepson asked me if he should call me “Mom.” He was living with us full-time at the time, and I was doing everything a mom would do, but I was fully cognizant that I wasn’t his mom. I said, “Call me whatever you’re comfortable calling me as long as it isn’t an expletive.”

He settled on calling me by my first name.

That holds a certain intimacy (a person’s name is music to one’s ears) in our little circle, but it didn’t erase the title. Always when introducing myself, I say “stepmother.”

I ran across a new parental title this week in a book I’m reading: “The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth.” It’s an amazing book with new insights in every chapter which I may share in future posts. I’m reading it, perhaps ironically, because my stepdaughter is reading it.

In it, the author M. Scott Peck describes the transformation of biological parents which comes with the commitment of sticking with the being created at conception. Biological parents transform into psychological parents.

While I don’t hold the title of biological parent, I believe I’ve transformed into a psychological parent. (I joked with my Beloved that that would make me a psycho parent for short. Just kidding! That’s worse than stepparent.)

In any case, I’m exercising my psychological parent muscles this week.

My 17-year-old stepson, who lives in Minnesota, is visiting for spring break.

After spending the weekend with my sister’s family which includes three little boys ages 12, 8 and 3, he asked me today why I didn’t want to be a mom.

“I thought I’ve shared that with you,” I said.

“You have. Just remind me,” he said.

“I just never wanted to have a baby. I don’t have that maternal instinct,” I said. “And since I didn’t ever feel compelled to have a baby, I didn’t want to take on all the work a baby represents.  I wasn’t into 2 a.m. feedings and getting up at 6 a.m. on Saturdays.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

I turned around in the front seat of the vehicle to face him.”But I love you,” I said. “I’m just glad that when I met you, you already knew how to feed yourself.”

So if I’m lacking in the instinctual and physical sacrifices necessary to be a parent, I embrace the psychological challenges of being an effective parent. I especially embrace the challenges after reading Peck’s definition of love, which demands effort against the “inertia of laziness”: “Love is always work or courage. If an act is not one of work or courage, then it is not an act of love. There are no exceptions.”

So call me whatever amuses you. But don’t call me lazy.

Raise your hand and be counted (or, possibly, tackled)

The cover of the program for the high school football game two weeks ago featured a shot of a huddle cheer, players’ arms thrust in the air.

I grabbed the program on my way into the Edina, Minn., football field and immediately opened it to Page 16 to find my stepson listed as 5-foot-10. Yup, he’s finally as tall as I am, and he’s pretty stoked about that (a lot of men aren’t as tall as me; if you value height, you’re getting somewhere when you’re as tall as I am). He also outweighs me by 30 pounds, and he’s a sleek football machine. Pretty stoked about that, too.

The game was as exciting as regular season high school football games get. The stadium was packed, nearly 100 testosterone-flooded young men roamed the sidelines, the marching band featured at least 300 musicians, more than 30 cheerleaders filled the track, the Hornettes pom team did a little ditty after the band’s halftime show and the team beat Minneapolis Southwest handily — 38-0. As a middle linebacker, Caswell played a lot for an 11th grader, and we saw him cause a Southwest fumble. A great evening under the Friday night lights.

When I got home to the RV in which we stayed during our visit to Minnesota, I threw the program on the table and forgot about it.

When I was cleaning up the next day, the hand most prominent on the program cover caught my eye. The distinctively wide hand was attached to an arm that was the right shade of flesh with just a hint of reddish hair. It was holding a helmet at just the right angle to show off “Edina.”

“This looks like it could be your hand, Caswell,” I remarked.

“It is,” he said nonchalantly.

The featured hand on the cover of the Edina football program belonged to none other than my stepson! Of the hundred young men holding helmets in a hundred huddles last year, the photographer captured Caswell’s distinctive hand and put it on the cover of the program.

He got those hands from his father, and since I love his father’s big, meaty hands, I love Caswell’s hands, too. Besides heft, their structure has a certain elegance, too. A formal wedding photo of Caswell’s deceased grandfather — Tyler’s father — shows he had those broad, strong hands, too.

Caswell’s characteristic hands will be put into service again tonight high-fiving it, roughing up jerseys and pushing defenders aside when Edina (2-1) takes on Minnetonka (3-0).

Let’s get fired up! Can I get a big hand for Edina? [Spontaneous applause! Yay!]

When one couldn’t care less, one can love more

“I just love you. I don’t care what you do.”

Love without caring. How novel. What freedom.

I finally got around to reading Martha Beck’s column in the July issue of O magazine, and her advice on “How to Love More By Caring Less” makes so much sense (click on the title to read the whole column). She took some heat, I see, in the letters section of the September issue, but I think her suggestion is right on target, especially when you love someone with whom you don’t agree.

Take my stepkids. Please. (Just kidding — a little Henny Youngman humor there. If my stepchildren happen to read this post, Henny Youngman was a stand-up comedian in the mid 20th century who made the line “Take my wife — please” famous. It’s a joke.)

They are children, and my Beloved and I want to give them advice, influence them, parent them (that’s what parents do). But they have come to ages when they don’t always do as we would wish. When we imply that “if you do this, I will love you” we are putting conditions on our love. Unconditional love demands there are no conditions. So by caring less, I can love more.

The approach works with parents, in-laws, siblings and friends, too. You want to dye your hair green, eat a banana split instead of workout, buy a minivan, have at it! I just love you, and I don’t care what you do.

That’s not to say you should allow people to hurt you, but if they take actions with which you don’t agree but don’t hurt you, it’s healthier to care less.

Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend discuss this very matter in the fine how-to book “Boundaries: When to Say Yes, How to Say No.” The Law of Responsibility posits, “Problems arise when boundaries of responsibility are confused. We are to love one another, not be one another.”

For me, the supreme role models for this behavior are the mothers who sit in courtrooms where their sons are accused of terrible crimes. When I was a newspaper reporter, I was in such courtrooms and I witnessed such women. They don’t rant and rave, they don’t blame the victims, they don’t disappear. They may be very sad, but they are present, loving their child who made a very, very bad choice.

True love should be unconditional like that.

4 worthwhile resources for wicked stepmothers (and the rest of us who are just trying our best)

“Love is learning how to be patient.”

Chicago Tribune reporter Kevin Pang used this line in a story today about Enrique Calderon, a line cook at Ina’s restaurant who flawlessly flips Ina’s famous pancakes.

It’s good advice for stepmoms, too.

Having been a stepmom for three years now, I have an inkling of how much I didn’t know when I first met the boy who became my stepson and the young woman who became my stepdaughter. I can’t say I wouldn’t have taken this road if I had known all the ups and downs I was in for, but I might have traveled better if I had a few of these stepmom resources:

1. A book: Being a stepmother is “the most difficult role in the family today,” according to Ron L. Deal and Laura Petherbridge, authors of “The Smart Stepmom,” a fabulous guide for a woman thinking about getting involved with a man with children and for women who have been stepmoms for years. The book is written from a Christian perspective, but the principles therein can be adopted by any woman looking for advice on understanding the motivations of their stepchildren, engaging her husband and coping successfully with the biological mom. I wish I would have read this book before I got married the second time; maybe I wouldn’t have made so many mistakes and taken so many slights personally.
2. A magazine: StepMom Magazine is an online magazine that specifically addresses the unique challenges of stepmoms. It’s not cheap ($5 a month), but it is full of relevant well-written stories and useful perspectives. The September issue has stories on loyalty binds, jealousy between stepmothers and stepdaughters, resolving conflict and forgiveness plus regular features. It’s designed so well, I print it out.
3. A website: I found www.NoOnesTheBitch.com on Facebook. If nothing else, it is an amazing case study on using social media to promote one’s book (which is also interesting to me). “No One’s The Bitch” is written by a biological mom and a stepmom who actually get along and do so well enough that they wrote a book about it. I haven’t read the book yet, but the website is well-stocked and features a blog. They also have a fan page on Facebook that puts out inspirational and interactive information.
4. A movie: I cried my eyes out the other night when I saw “The Other Woman” staring Natalie Portman as the character for whom the movie is titled. Lisa Kudrow plays the biological mom. Besides the subtext of adultery and remarriage, the relationship between Portman’s character and her new stepson is center stage, and I found myself alternately wondering how she could be such a bad stepmother (not wicked, exactly, but definitely not good) and rooting for her success. Adding drama to this exceptional character-driven story, Portman’s character loses her biological child. The movie, which I recommend even if you’re not part of a stepfamily,  is based on a book I haven’t read, “Love and Other Impossible Pursuits.”

For other posts about my stepmother journey, click on “Parenting” in the tag cloud in the right column.

Parents: Is YOUR lesson plan ready?

School is back in session around Minnesota Transplant’s house, so kids must be soaking up lessons in the three Rs: Reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmetic.

Oh, wait a minute. Scratch that. Not writing. Illinois schools are cutting back on writing tests and teaching cursive writing in elementary schools, according to today’s Daily Herald.

Apparently, the elimination of cursive writing lessons stirs controversy across the nation. National Public Radio’s Diane Rehm recently devoted a whole hour to the subject of “Handwriting in the Digital Age.”

I wrote an entire manuscript on computer, and honestly, I think better while typing than while writing. Proponents of cursive writing point out how signatures should be written in cursive. “How will you endorse a check?” they wail.

Huh? What’s a check? I use a debit card almost everywhere I go, and pretty soon, Americans will be using their cell phones to pay for all the junk they buy (just you wait — it’s coming).

Personally, I like cursive writing, but I don’t think it must be part of a third grade teacher’s lesson plan. Teachers can only squeeze so much into the school day, and parents are responsible for teaching what they think is important, including reading and ‘rithmetic. If you are one of those people who complains about high taxes and about what’s not being taught in today’s classrooms, you’re a big, fat hypocrite.

High on the list of subjects that ought to be taught at home are sex education, money management and religion, all matters that carry a moral component incumbent on the parents to impart. Lessons on these subjects should be woven into conversation and activities on a weekly, if not daily basis.

Depending on what’s important to them, parents might consider including other subjects into their home lesson plans:

• Manners.
• Nutrition and fitness.
• Gardening.
• Housecleaning, laundry and cooking.
• Relationship issues (how to get along, how to share, how to disagree).
• Politics.
• Hunting and/or responsible fire arms handling.
• Swimming.
• Sewing.
• Driving and car maintenance.

Kids might learn a little bit about some of these things in school, but they will live more fulfilling lives if they learn at least the basics about all of these things at home. If cursive handwriting is important to you, weave lessons about it into your daily interactions:

• Encourage a child to add items to the running grocery list on the kitchen white board.
• Have children write notes inside birthday cards to parents, siblings and grandparents.
• When a child begs for something, tell him to make an argument for it in writing. Imagine how much less wheedling you’d have to listen to when you demand “Write down five reasons why you think you should have a sleep-over this weekend” or “Write down the top three reasons you should get your ears pierced.”
• Hand-write the annual missive to Santa.
• Give a lockable diary to your child (and respect the kid’s privacy). I kept a diary for five years from eighth grade to 12th grade, and I believe that regular writing is part of the reason I’m a writer now.
• Teach kids to write thank-you notes. (At this point, I’d settle for thank-you text messages, but a written thank-you note is a thing of beauty.)
• At a certain age, time outs can be spent writing, a la Bart Simpson. “I’m sorry I pinched my brother” written 10 times might get the point across.

Public university vs. private college — how to decide?

Choosing the right schooling to pursue after high school affects the rest of your life: Your career, your friends, where you live and quite possibly your mate (or, in a society where divorce is more common than staying married, at least your first mate).

I wrote about this about a year and a half ago in “Big Decisions.”

After writing about our visit with my stepson to St. John’s last week, friend Frank asked:

I’d like to hear a commentary from you of the benefits of a private college vs a public college ie: $120,000 in expenses vs. $40,000. With Kari also being a junior we are discussing our tour schedule for next summer – my smartie little girl says, “Can I live at home if I go to a junior college the first year to get my basics out of the way – and then transfer, it’s way cheaper, Dad.”

Since one of the themes of this blog is that I have two cents worth of opinion on any subject, I am happy to address this matter.

Public or private college?

It depends. At the very least, apply to all the schools you might want to attend.

Live at home or live on campus?

If you’re going to go to college as an unmarried student of typical college age, then you should definitely live on campus, no matter how much it costs.

Whether your should urge your child to attend a public or private university depends on the child’s intelligence, initiative, life goals, the family’s finances, how many kids in the family are going to be in college at the same time and your view on debt.

The debt I accrued to get a college degree is, hands down, the best debt with which I’ve ever been saddled. Back in 1995, my husband at the time and I consolidated $23,615 in student loans for two undergraduate degrees and his master’s degree. At one time in my life, I had more credit card debt than that (sad but true), and the second mortgage on the overleveraged anchor of the house I’m now living in is nearly three times that much. I’m still paying off those consolidated student loans (2015 is the expected date of debt freedom), but I earned more intellectual value in that education (yes, even the ex-husband’s education) than any other debt I’ve ever undertaken. Worth every penny.

So, in my view, it’s OK for a kid to take on debt for college.

Some kids shouldn’t go to college at all, no matter how comfortable with debt you are. A poor student who can’t get good grades in high school who wants to be a mechanic should be urged to attend technical school, even if the family can afford something more. Nothing wrong with being a mechanic — the world could use more good mechanics. Getting an associate degree at a state school or community college before tech school just to expose the child to a bigger world would be a good idea if the family can afford it, but if the kid can’t cut it in the first semester, go to the fallback position of tech school.

The old saw that you get what you pay for applies to higher education, too. Chintz out on toilet paper, but don’t waste your money on a toilet paper degree.

If I had it to do over again, I never would have attended St. Cloud State. I went there for its proximity to my hometown and because my best friend was there (bad reasons). I didn’t live on campus, and in the end, it took me five years to get my degree (which is statistically not unusual at state schools). I am not proud of my degree, and 20/20 hindsight has revealed how little respect SCSU gets out in the real world. Among Minnesotans, SCSU is known as a party school, and no one beyond the borders of Minnesota knows anything about the school (except possibly in the hockey scene) so “State” in the title does nothing to add credibility to my resume. I feel more affinity to the alma mater where my ex-husband earned his master’s degree (not a state school but a public university with a boatload more class, sophistication and sense of community).

If I had it to do over again, I would have stayed in the University of Minnesota system. I went to the U of M-Morris my first two years and when I decided to transfer, I should have transferred to the Twin Cities campus.

In general, the smarter the child and the poorer the family, the more I think you should urge him or her to attend a private college; there are scholarships galore for kids like this. If I had applied to a couple of private schools back in the ’80s, I might have been surprised at the scholarships I could have earned.

But I didn’t even apply.

Que sera sera.

My stepson is a smart kid who seems to have enough initiative to succeed in school and appears to be more suited to market or sell cars than fix them, so we’re encouraging him to attend college. There is a limit to how much we can help financially, so he will certainly have to take on debt. He may have to work, too. The magic number for me? If he can attend college with less than $50,000 in debt, I think he’ll be fine.

Here’s the breakdown on the costs of public vs. private (tuition, housing, books and $100 a month in personal expenses, according to estimates provided on the respective university’s websites):

• St. Cloud State University: $80,520 for five years  (18% of SCSU students graduate in four years).
• University of Minnesota-Twin Cities: $118,940 for five years (37% of U of M students graduate in four years).
• St. John’s University: $176,600 for four years (95% of SJU students graduate in four years).

Is St. John’s worth twice as much as SCSU?

No.

If my stepson doesn’t get any scholarships, it would be very difficult to encourage him to attend a private college like St. John’s. But the better his grades now in high school, the better the chances he’ll get scholarships.

If he’s still interested in SJU in a year, we are going to encourage him to apply there (and to any other schools he’s interested in, including at least one public university). We’ll see what kind of financial aid packages he gets and try very hard to help him make an informed decision at that point.

My advice to you, Frank: I know Kari is a smartie in a good way. Put a couple of private colleges on your visit list and if she likes them, see what she can get in terms of scholarships.

And in my experience, senioritis is a real disorder (as I am quite sure my mother would attest). Both of you will want her to get out of the house by the time she graduates from high school. Whatever money she saves by attending a junior college won’t be worth the hassle of living with a rebellious teen-ager. “Absence makes the heart grow fonder; familiarity breeds contempt.”

My two cents. And it may cost only 96 grand (ha, ha). What a deal!

How a college visit is not like gazpacho

Simple math:

• My 17-year-old stepson, a junior this year, is interested in attending college.
• My sister works in the admissions department at St. John’s University in Central Minnesota.
• A visit of my Beloved and I coincided nicely with a tour day at the university.
• A suggestion to my stepson to visit the university was met with agreement. “Yeah, sure.”

Adds up to success, right?

Today, the day of the tour, arrived, and my stepson dragged his feet. “Oh, I’m only a junior.” “Oh, it’ll be boring.” “Oh, I don’t want to attend St. John’s.” “Oh, I’m tired, sore, hungry … .”

“OK,” I wheedled. “It’s a benchmark. You’re not committed just by touring. If you hate it, we’ll leave early.”

We got him to the initial presentation with this approach. The schedule called for touring the College of St. Benedict’s first (the girl’s school — ugh). I thought for sure we wouldn’t make it to that tour. But we did. I kept my mouth shut so I wouldn’t ask some question that would embarrass him. And then, to tour St. John’s required a bus ride. Again, I thought the hurdle would spell failure.

I remember a meal our first summer together. He was 13. I was a new stepmom trying to please and nourish at the same time. I prepared homemade gazpacho. Hey, the kid liked catsup, didn’t he? I was using fresh vegetables. Why wouldn’t he like cold tomato soup?

Well, he didn’t (I’m sure that shocks the veteran moms out there). That meal ranks as the top most awful food he’s even encountered, right up there with his aunt’s glorified rice. Totally disgusting.

I began worrying this afternoon that I was serving a gazpacho-like lesson that might turn him off from college altogether.

“No. Hmm. This is interesting. Let’s get on the bus.”

OK. Good. Whew.

Every building at St. John’s was better than the last in his eyes. I was literally witnessing him falling in love as we walked around campus. The football field cinched it.

“I could go here.” And later, “Thanks for making me go to the tour.”

Wow. Even if he doesn’t ultimately attend St. John’s, our little jaunt through the campus succeeded. My stepson now knows the GPA requirements, the costs, the majors offered and what the dining facilities and weight room look like (these are very important services in a college, don’tcha know).

Not a gazpacho day. A good day.

First job, fresh from the oven

July 28, 1983

Dear Diary,

The reason I couldn’t go to golf practice today was because I worked at Ben Franklin’s for Crazy Daze. And I got a permanent part-time job there for this coming year. On Thursday nights and Saturdays. It will be nice to have some (a lot!) of money for a change. Anyway, I worked hard and am tired.

The minimum wage in 1983 was $3.35 an hour, and I was rich! Rich! A few days earlier I wrote, “When I babysat last night for 5 hours and only got $4, it was a bummer.”

Um, yeah, paying your babysitter 80 cents an hour was a tightwad move even in 1983.

Stocking shelves and cashiering at Ben Franklin was my first “real” job where I actually earned a paycheck instead of a few dollar bills for mowing the lawn or watching over some kids I hoped would entertain themselves. I had to dress well and punch in and smile at the customers and take scheduled breaks. This was the big time!

I’m reminded of my first place of employment because my 16-almost-17-year-old stepson snagged his first real job today. He nailed the in-person interview (he can be a charmer, like his father), and he’s destined to become the wittiest, best schmear-er at Bruegger’s, a bagel shop near his mother’s home in Minnesota. He’s so excited to be paid $7.50 an hour. “They’re even paying me $7.50 for my orientation!” he told me (I am honored I was among the first people with whom he shared his good news this morning).

I’m excited for him. This is the job he’ll look back on in the decades to come with a mixture of pride, because it’s his first job, and relief, because he’s no longer working an entry-level job in the fast food industry. Or, maybe he’ll find his calling nourishing the public with good-for-you bagel sandwiches and a smile.

Whatever the future holds for this young man, I’m excited for him. Yay, Cas!