Imperfection celebration

We flew to Kansas City last weekend to visit my dear mother-in-law whose health is failing. It was a hard visit, but there were some funny moments. One was at the airport when I grabbed our suitcase off the carousel. It felt like something was vibrating inside. Now, the whole thing with TSA is to make sure there aren't bombs in suitcases, not to put them in there, so I wasn't really worried, just kind of confused. I decided it must just have been picking up a vibration in the airport, since I was pulling it by the handle and it was in contact with the floor.

Eventually it seemed strange enough to me that I picked it up by the handle. Sure enough, it still felt like something was vibrating inside. This was going to be a quick visit, so there really wasn't a whole lot in the suitcase. I started mentally running through the contents: clothes, books, DVDs, walking shoes, various toiletries, and then I remembered my travel toothbrush... Mystery solved!


The fun thing about this experience is that it reminded me of my sweet, Betty White-esque grandma getting pulled off the plane to have her luggage examined years before 9/11, when this little friend got frisky in her suitcase:


Somehow a toothbrush would seem easier to explain... especially since she figured it out as they started going through her luggage and started laughing and announced, "Oh, it's just my vibrator!"

Imperfection celebration

A while back when I was fueling up at my favorite gas station a truck from a state that tends to get on my nerves anyway had parked in what I felt was a very inconsiderate way, so that I had to really pull the hose way over to get to my car. My bubble of self-righteousness burst as I just got the nozzle near my gas tank and gasoline started gushing all over everything. Turns out I was so caught up in how I was being so put out that I unknowingly started squeezing the handle. Thank goodness I was close enough that I was able to pop it into my tank without making too much of a scene, but the smell of gasoline on my hands for the rest of the drive home was a good reminder that I would do better to just pay attention to the things I have control over - which is pretty much just me:)

Imperfection celebration

When I was younger we had to take my mom to the hospital a couple of times because she got stuff in her eye - once I think it was oven cleaner and another time chlorine for the pool. This makes me so nervous about the same thing happening to me that I started wearing goggles when I'm using household cleansers. It hit me recently how totally funny this is - however, it hasn't stopped me from doing it!

Imperfection celebration

A couple of weeks ago I was hankering after a foreign movie. Periodically I crave hearing languages other than English. I like to think this is because my ninth house is, as my astrologer put it, "loaded with planets." Poor astrology chart - I've barely skipped into Canada and Mexico, much less done any serious traveling. Still, from time to time I have to travel via the comfort of my own home and Netflix to places I've never been. And so recently I was in this mood and the description of a film from Singapore caught my eye: "This poetic film weaves together three stories of human connection with a minimalist flair."

Poetic and connection seemed good, but unfortunately I soon realized that there is practically no talking in this movie. And that English is one of the major languages in Singapore - news to me. Plus the main character of one story line is deaf and blind and much of that story appears only in subtitles with no talking and much of another story line takes place through phone texting. A good movie, with its own aesthetic, but sadly it wasn't filling my auditory needs. I found myself asleep about halfway through, shut it off, and finished my nap.

Fast forward to this weekend. I hate leaving things unfinished and this film had great reviews, so I decided to give it another try. Before I started it up, I quickly checked my iGoogle page that I'd just set up with my email accounts, Google Reader, even Pandora and a timer to help keep me focused when I'm online.

With that done, I started up the movie and settled into the quiet, slow pace, connecting much more with the characters, especially the deaf and blind woman. I hardly noticed when after about twenty minutes or so there was a shift in the tone of the movie. As one of the characters started connecting more with the outside world after the death of his wife, a lovely song started playing. The whole affect of the movie changed and it seemed a bold move, but an excellent one. I started to really like this movie, to plan ahead how I was going to give it five stars, recommend it here, etc. I watched the whole rest of the movie, probably about half an hour, really relishing the connection of the action of the movie with this great soundtrack.

It wasn't until the closing credits were rolling and I heard "This is Jewel. If you like this song, click here to vote for it," that it occurred to me that anything was amiss. Slowly it dawned on me what might have happened and I clicked over to my iGoogle page. Sure enough, part of the way through the movie the page had refreshed and Pandora had started up again. So much for a bold cinematic statement!

Imperfection celebration

I think these pictures pretty much say it all.

High school:


And then about this time a couple of years ago my dermotologist did a surprise biopsy (with my blessing!) on the same day I was to have an evening gallery reception at work. So this was the face all my guests got to see:


Ho, ho, ho!

Imperfection celebration

This is a legendary story that you may have already heard, but humor me:) So I took ballet when I was in elementary school. One day in class I was very pleased with myself at the end of an exercise I thought I'd done quite well at. When the instructor said "Good job, Anne!" (my middle name was Ann) I said "Thanks, but my name isn't Ann." And of course, he said that he'd been talking to my classmate, Anne. Oh, that was a bad one, although it's funny now.

I love this photo where I'm playing violin in my ballet outfit. My husband has one where he's playing piano in his football uniform. Hilarious. But it also reminds me of a sad violin story. My parents came to my violin recital in which I just totally faked playing. Afterwards my mom said that it had been very good, but that one person didn't really seem to be playing. I bluffed at the time, but if you're reading this, Mom, it was me. Although I think you may have known it already:)

Imperfection celebration

This is the wall by our driveway that I drove into when the folks came to trim our trees a few years ago and left me I'm sure enough space to maneuver around, but I miscalculated. The best part of the moment for me was right after I hit the wall thinking that maybe I could just drive over it. Needless to say, it wouldn't have worked and I didn't try it. But I like that the idea briefly popped into my mind. The moment of impact was not lost on the tree trimmers, but I did manage to speed away after adding (yet another) point to the turn...

Imperfection celebration

Some of my most imperfect moments have related to my car. Here are two of my favorite car repair descriptions from my old days at Saturn:

"Mud on rear tire gives appearance of blowout"

"Customer states hesitation when driving"

Imperfection celebration

I don't know about you, but I'm really enjoying this imperfection thing. All week I've found myself a lot less worried about doing things perfectly, thinking that if I did something embarrassing it would be something funny to post here. And so it was a pretty uneventful week. I was sort of amused by my odd, informal way of interacting with the speaker and mayor at the Billy Collins event last weekend. I was in charge of the VIP door, which meant opening it when I felt someone pulling on it and not letting anyone from the auditorium in. Billy Collins got a jaunty, silent wave from me, and the city's mayor got a "Well, hello there!" Not exactly what they were expecting, I don't think, but not really that embarrassing. Even earlier this week, getting ready for the library's Board meeting, I thought "Well, maybe this will give me something to write about," but it went off without a hitch.

So I thought I'd share one of my favorite stories from a couple of years ago. I was working in the phone room, answering reference questions, and I got a call from a woman with a pretty strong accent. The title she was looking for sounded a little unusual, but I'm constantly surprised, so I told her "I'm sorry. I'm not seeing Where's the Ladies' Room? in our catalog." She started to laugh and corrected me. The book she was looking for was Where the Lilies Bloom. We both got a good laugh out of that one!

Perfectly imperfect

I'm playing around with having more sort of regular features here, since I enjoy them on other people's blogs and I'm realizing that I do well with a little structure. I thought it would be fun to have a regular bloopers feature, since I'm always doing embarrassing things. And it seemed like it could be a nice follow-up to the Perfect Protest.

So last week it was rainy and much darker in the morning than it's been and as I pulled from my street out onto the main highway in our town I realized I'd probably misgauged the distance and speed of a vehicle now coming behind me. As I guiltily gunned the engine and glanced in my rear-view mirror, suddenly I could see that they had flashing lights on and I thought "Uh-oh, busted. Better pull over." It was too late when I realized that the flashing lights were in fact orange and just sat there by the side of the road while the garbage truck passed me, suddenly very grateful for the darkness.