If Jesus Was Southern Would We Break Cornbread At Communion?

Nobody likes a church pew. Unless God has granted you the gift of a well cushioned rear end, sitting on a wooden bench for a Sunday service is like unscrewing the seat off of your bicycle and taking it for a ride around the block, uncomfortable. However, in the South thousands of sweet tea drinking, hallelujah shouting, cornbread loving Christians file into these pews one by one to hear the good word. Being a Southern woman myself I recently joined these ranks once again introducing my rear to the dreaded pew. Now, being a carb lover from way back I love any event that features a line to receive bread dipped in wine however lately I seem more interested in my own spirituality rather than my religion.

One might blame this turn inward with my newfound love of yoga. Slap a mat on the floor, filter in a little Eastern meditation music and dim the lights and I’m like a dieter before a flashing “Hot Donuts Now” sign at Krispy Kreme, I see the light. The whole yoga process is just so organic, theres no filter, no mood breaker like the collection plate at church or some crazy woman in the congregation belting out hymns like Aretha Franklin with strep throat. The time spent on that mat is priceless. Granted I have the flexibility of an 80 year old woman with rickets but the beautiful thing is that it doesn’t matter. I can go at whatever pace of process I like and achieve whatever my body lets me that day, somedays my “tree pose” is strong and proud and sometimes my body calls timber. 

The resolution for learning more about myself in 2009 through spirituality doesn’t end when I roll up my mat though, it continues on and can be found at home. Be it a newfound collection of books or a refrigerator full of organic and vegetarian fare it is clear the owner of this home is on a mission. Perhaps its the tofu going to my head but eating healthier and eliminating meat from my diet seemed just as natural to me as yoga. I would feel slightly ridiculous coming home from the yoga studio and picking up a Whataburger value meal on the ride home; it would be like a nun wearing a red Fredrick's of Hollywood water bra under her habit, on the outside I would appear soulful and dedicated to my practice but peel back that layer and you would find an entirely different type of person. 

I don’t think my vegetarianism, newfound yoga addiction, and recent church and Sunday school attendance is going to change who I am, thats not the point of any of it. The new years resolution to learn more about myself is about sifting through my life and thoughts and coming up with not only a better version of myself but identifying, for my own sake, who that self really is. Am I ever going to eat meat again? Its entirely possible, particularly when you take into account that I was a vegetarian during graduate school until a fateful drive thru window purchase and a guilty peeling away of a P.E.T.A sticker off of my back car window. Am I going to keep going to yoga? Stranger things have happened. However even if I don’t attend as regularly as I do now or if my yoga mat comes across a little dust along the way it will definitely stay in my life in some form, even if its just meditation. How long am I going to keep my Sunday dates with the pew and early morning Sunday school? That is entirely up to me, which is a nice change. As a child Sunday morning consisted of white tights being rolled up my chubby little legs like a sausage casing and then kicking me out into the blistering Florida heat only to sit in that pew-o-pain in a dress with more ruffles than Scarlett O’Harrah’s petticoat. Times have changed. I now don’t wear tights or hose to church, a fact that would make my great grandmother roll over in her grave. I don’t only go to Sunday school for snack nor do I look at communion as a chance to stretch my legs and get a better view of how many other children were forced to wear headbands with bows attached to them, despite knowing full and well that I was the only one. I go to services because I want to. I woke up, got dressed (minus frills) and drove there myself. The fact that I still sit in the same church I was dragged into as a youth is just an added amusement that brings a smile to my face each week.

Its going to be an interesting year, with every downward facing dog I feel a little more hopeful and happy about the way things are going in my life. Will I start wearing clothes made of hemp and bragging about my latest colon cleansing, weaving purses out of recycled newspapers or having images of Buddha appear to me on the freezer section of Publix? Doubtful. I’m still the same sarcastic girl with a desire for deep fried foods and an unbridled love of luxury items, I just concern myself more with my health and karma now. Although, odds are if you sneak a peak inside that reusable canvas grocery bag of mine you will still find a box of Quaker instant grits.

* Taken from my previous blog site (from January 09'), my apologies to any of my previous readers who have seen this before. The title alone always makes me smile so I felt compelled to place it on the new site. Plus, it gives you a little more insight into who I am as a person (aside from an embittered spinster)*

Date Adoptions: Do You Want Him?

Dating is a lot like adopting a mutt from your local animal shelter. You can’t quite tell what it is or where its been but you genuinely hope the two of you will get along, and that he won’t hump your leg. After swearing off men for life my hormones have once again granted me parole and allowed me to date yet again. I can’t say whether or not this is a good turn of events, technically there is something to be said for solitary confinement (not to mention the fortune you save on razors and lingerie), but I find myself once again at the mercy of the aforementioned mutts. One can only hope that putting myself out there again will lead to meeting interesting and well-mannered men and not leave me silently wishing for the ability to neuter my date.

To add extra fun to an already anxiety producing situation this is the first time in my life that I have dated outside of my safety circle of college friends. Collegiate dating was very similar to high school, just with a much larger senior prom dating pool, the very same pool I had been fishing in for the past eleven years. Outside of the safety circle you have to know your date based solely on what your date tells you about himself. The fact that I am having to rely on a man, a gender who would sooner sell his soul to the devil if promised that it would ensure him an eternal resting place with 4,000 virgins, scares the bejesus out of me. However, I’m trying to trust my instincts and hope for the best. Could he be lying straight to my face? Certainly. But I try to keep things in perspective. We, as women, aren’t the most honest dates either. Men have no idea that they are oftentimes talking to a pushup bra, Spanx wearing, foundation spackled, hairspray lacquered date. We don’t apologize for that do we? When was the last time you took off your 36C pushup bra in a moment of intimacy, tossed out two silicone inserts and said, “By the way Sam, I’m really a 36A.”

Theoretically the point of dating is to lead to finding, “the one”, and in such getting married. As a self proclaimed spinster I clearly have a strong lack of belief in that fairy tale. I figure if I’m going to start believing in the idea of some wonderful man getting down on bended knee and asking to spend a lifetime with me I might as well start believing in unicorns. In which case I’m going to sell my SUV and start riding my newfound mythical creature to save gas and protect the environment. Forming relationships though, despite my sarcastic ramblings of female empowerment and self preservation, remain an important part of life. A date isn’t just the occasionally free dinner, although that is a bonus, it is also a means to finding conversation and a feeling with someone in which you would have never known if you had stayed in solitary confinement. Sometimes you discover the mutt you’ve adopted is a fantastically faithful labrador and collie mix, oftentimes its a disturbing hybrid of hyperactive chihuahua and pudgy pug. Take what life throws at you, just make sure you give your new “pet” a trial run before you sign any commitment papers. Nobody wants to accidently fall in love with a leg humper. 

The Dog Days Of Spinsterhood

At a certain point in a woman’s life it becomes socially inappropriate to openly inquire about her age. Uninformed men who often make the mistake of asking find themselves in a number of situations ranging anywhere from being ignored, slapped or even lied to. Baffled by trying to calculate in their heads how their girlfriends could possibly be celebrating their third twenty-ninth birthday one can only hope that they eventually keep quiet and try to understand their loved ones plight. Whereas men age gracefully and single men are referred to as playboys and bachelors. Women simply age. Single women are not called playgirls or bachelorettes, rather we are called spinsters. The aging process itself even changes. One human year is the equivalent of seven spinster years. Sound familiar? It should, its the same aging process used to gage dog years. Nothing could be more appropriate then linking a spinster with a female dog, as the whole process truly is a bitch.

Every time I turn on the television I’m assaulted with commercial after commercial for wrinkle creams, stretch mark reducers and hair dye. I don’t mind the products. I even own some of them. I intend to be a trophy spinster after all, trophy wives do their part to maintain their image, I do mine. I just get the satisfaction of knowing that my preening and oftentimes senseless hours of grooming are because I want to look good for myself, not my husband’s boss or friends. Trust me, self-righteous smugness helps when your having to sit still for thirty minutes with a wrinkle reducing mud pack on your face. The fact that these companies advertise is fine by me, hell my possibly now prevented laugh lines are thankful for them, but its to whom they advertise that really rubs my mud mask the wrong way. To women. Only women! Think about it, when was the last time you saw an Oil of Olay ad or a Garnier ad with a man preaching the wonders of the product? Why? Are bachelors not wrinkling? Because the last time I checked, you could stick quarters in some of the lines on George Clooneys face. Why doesn’t Biore hire him out for an ad? We have Cover Girl, can we have a Cover Boy?

Granted Cover Boy is a bit of a reach that I’m not even sure I’m comfortable stretching out for but the double standard remains. Is it not bad enough that we have to lie about our age and spend our nights involved in a series of elaborate grooming rituals to decrease the signs of aging? Do we have to be the only ones targeted by the media too? The commercials and magazine adverts, one after the other after the other, start to hit you and before you know it your running around buying everything short of a Indian tribal dance to ward off wrinkles. Meanwhile men watching t.v, men the same age as the women watching, aging and wrinkling at the same pace (despite my beloved dog year theory) seem immune. They don’t worry about any of it. In such, they don’t lie about their age when people ask them. You will never find a man celebrating his third twenty-ninth birthday. They don’t go home after a night out at the bar with the boys and use their new cellulite reducing body scrub. People even tell them how well they are aging. The same people that wait until we’re out of the room to point at our ovaries and question our sexuality. Personally I told my ovaries to take a vacation years ago, but thats another story entirely. My point is this, because less pressure is placed on men by society regarding their age and relationship status they age with more grace than we do. Granted they wrinkle and grey the same as women, that is when our secret Indian tribal dances don’t do the trick, but they do it with dignity because they never truly cared about it in the first place.

Media never told men that they needed to be young forever and look like a walking talking model of fertility until the day they lay you in the coffin. Bonus points for continuing that look at your open wake service. Media and society in general impress upon women and young girls on a daily basis the importance of beauty and youth. The importance of marriage and motherhood. Its an unjust world. Its no wonder I feel like seven years have passed for every one year of my life. But then again, I’ll take any excuse to liken spinsterhood to being a bitch. The important thing to remember is to always sit up straight, put your eye cream on every night before bed, and never ever celebrate the same age more than three times in a row. Men are slow enough to be duped by a push up bra and girdles ladies, but not about everything.

The Wonders of Wal-Mart

What is it about the local Wal-Mart that instantly brightens my day? Is it the abundance of fresh fruit and veggies? The wide selection of paper towels and glade plug-ins? Perhaps the array of various lawn and garden tools. No, no...Wal-Mart brightens my day because I know that no matter how bad off I am, there will inevitably be some overweight, middle-aged man buying a cubic zirconia engagement ring at 9pm on a Monday night that has to be worse off than me. Walking through those automatic doors you know that you will invariably run into at least half of the seven deadly sins. Gluttony demonstrated by the three hundred pound woman in her do-rag and flip flops fighting over the "best" piece of fried chicken at the deli counter. Slothfulness shown by the middle-aged seemingly healthy man insistent on using the 10mph electric chair with basket. Greed from the elderly woman single-handedly harboring the cities entire supply of Aquafina bottled water. You get the picture.

So there I am amidst the grocery store section pushing the saddest most blatant example of the "single-girl shopping card" ever (half gallon of milk, bag of lettuce, three oranges, tampons, diet Dr. Pepper, and three Lean Cuisine cheese pizzas). You would think this would get to a girl. A woman of twenty-five surrounded by other women shopping for their families...kids in tow...husband lost on aisle 12, but the opposite occurs. You start to realize that even though your going home to an empty house to heat up a frozen lean cuisine for dinner - these women have a multitude of other things they are going to have to be confronted with; diapers, bills, children fighting, faking headaches to their significant other, etc. You on the other hand need only walk your dog and eat your pizza while watching TCM. Plus your not nearly as sad a sight as the group of Mexicans on the toilet paper aisle counting out Charmin coupons in Spanish and throwing 12 pack after 12 pack of toilet tissue into their carts. These were carts that should merit questioning....not mine. I started to look at other carts....the fifteen year old girl with a mid-drift top, where no mid-drift top ought' to be, carrying a handcart containing Cosmo magazine and a large box of condoms. The thirty-something girl with a basket full of cat food and frozen dinners. The woman in the middle of the store (past the grocery section) seemingly ecstatic over the concept of getting "anything she wants" airbrushed onto a white cotton t-shirt. These are baskets and individuals to question, not mine.

There you have it....a moment of single-girl realization that could have been depressing, rescued due to the increasingly more tragic lives of those around her at the local Wal-Mart. The grocery trip was not a total brightening of my day, there was still the awkward whistle and mumbled Spanish encountered when walking past the Mexicans on the toilet tissue aisle...but all the same Wal-Mart was just the pick-me-up I needed on a Monday night. Because even if I'm an unemployed graduate student, unmarried, no kids, and am only going home to an overweight black cocker spaniel named after an alcoholic beverage....at least I'm not the lazy moron in the motorized basket-cart backing up (complete with obnoxious "beep-beep" sounds) to grab a second bottle of Hydroxycut off the diet/exercise pill aisle.

* Apologies to my previous blog's readers who have read this piece before. Its an oldy but a goody and in such I felt compelled to put it on the new site *

Once You Go Alpaca, You Never Go Backa

Hindsight. No. No, not the view you get when you crane your neck around your shoulder to see if your rear looks too big in your new jeans. Hind is not referring to your behind, although I’m sure you did the best you could with what God gave you (as well as with what Spanx selection was offered in the lingerie section of your local department store). Hindsight is realizing something after it has already occurred. Perfect example, my forty-year old neighbor who used to wear leggings every day was mortified when she finally picked up a copy of Vogue (presumably left by some meritorious and thoughtful neighbor. Perhaps a member of a neighborhood style watch I was unaware of). In hindsight she realized that not only were leggings no longer in style but neither was her Victoria Beckham haircut. All in all it was a bad day for Mrs. Ritzger, but thats an entirely different story. My story revolves around my ex-boyfriend, an alpaca and a graduate program. 

A few years ago, amusingly enough when Mrs. Rizger’s leggings were in style, I was dating a truly decent guy. The relationship ended pretty miserably, a story I won’t go into, sufficient to say I learned that chocolate chip cookie dough is my favorite type of ice cream. Its not a state secret. Anyone could have learned that flavor was my favorite should they have counted the ice cream pint containers in my recycling bin those first few weeks. The relationships that end with confusing breakups are always the worst. You’ve seen, heard about or experienced them. The “need some time apart” morphing into “not the right time” lapsing into “I’m too busy for a relationship” breakup line. I know. Confusing, right? Singularly each of these break-up lines are understandable but when mixed together like some kind of complex breakup cocktail it becomes downright disorienting. Perhaps that confusion was what led me to my next move. 

A month after the breakup I phoned my best friend and asked if I could stay there for a while to emotionally regroup and, lets face it, get sloshed in a variety of pubs and whine about the cruelties of the world, my breakup and Star Wars vs. Star Trek (it was excusable, one could hardly expect intellectual conversation at a time like that in my life). The problem wasn’t the liquor though, luckily I never had to pick up the tab, it was the fact that the best friend I’m referring to is a guy and the location of the pub where I was whining was in Toronto. I’m still not quite sure what the thought process behind that trip was, I just remember being vaguely out of it and wanting to get out of my house for awhile, suddenly I was in Canada. 

Taking a “vacation” post-breakup is a lot like buying your dress two sizes too small and then vowing to go to the gym relentlessly until it fits. It seems like a good idea at the time, but its a bitch to deal with after you make the decision. Toronto and my friend (whom we shall call Mr. X) was great, so great in fact that I went to and from my home  and back so many times I was starting to wonder if I even needed my passport anymore. The problem? I was avoiding my graduate program by not studying for my comprehensive exams, (the last test I needed to take to receive my degree) although I would bring books on the plane to read, I never read them. Months passed, seasons changed (highly noticeable when your traveling from Florida to Toronto) and eventually Mr. X and I began dating. Our relationship was a lot like the movie When Harry Met Sally, except for the scene at the end where they kiss on New Years Eve and the credits roll. Apparently only Meg Ryan gets happy endings. Mr. X was recovering from a six year relationship and I was recovering from my (measly in comparison) 7 month relationship. It was inevitable that we would have ended up together at a time like that in our lives. It might has well have been printed on my passport so I would have known ahead of time and saved myself a lot of trouble. Thats the thing about hindsight, there’s no warning. Its as though someone rang the fire alarm and everyone knows where the emergency exits are but you. If only you had some kind of advanced notice. Irritating isn’t it? 

In hindsight I did not need to travel across the U.S to cry into a beer over my failed relationship. Also, I shouldn’t have put off my exam so long, particularly considering I aced it the second time I took it, meaning I could have graduated a lot sooner if it weren’t for my Canadian exploits. I also shouldn’t have fallen into a relationship with Mr. X. when, in hindsight, we both knew better. I’m incredibly fortunate that we’re still best friends. I guess if I could offer any form of advise it would be this; Pay close attention to your life each moment that you live it. I’m not saying you can escape not realizing mistakes until after you’ve made them, that would be like sitting a dieting woman inside Krispy Kreme and just giving her a glass of water. Eventually, that woman is going to dive over the counter for a glazed donut just as fast as your going to realize that you missed something that you should have caught in your own life. For myself its things like realizing that the confusing breakup might have had a reason for its mismatched meanings. Maybe there was something more there? However, I’m also the same woman that believed capri pants looked good on every woman no matter what her figure was. They don’t of course. Thats hindsight. 

As for the alpaca I mentioned, thats a domesticated South American hoofed mammal, I saw one at the Strawberry Festival in Bowmanville, Ontario. No real connection there. I just wanted to see if you were paying attention. Attentiveness, as I’ve learned, is always important. It’s much more enjoyable to spend your life looking forward than always having to look back.