Pardon my French

As my mother Vivien Leigh noted recently, everyone in our family is so unused to all things high falutin' that when something classy our way comes, my siblings, my parents, and I are practically beside ourselves over the chic-i-ness of the experience. Put us on a first-class flight, and we'll take advantage of every offer of a free drink, food item, or warm washcloth. Let us ride business class on AirTran, which now seems to be the only way my brother wants to fly, and we'll go rhapsodic over the satellite radio offerings. And we were to go to a spa--a legitimate one, not something untoward in San Antonio that *some people I know* insist on calling a spa--we'll take the massage, the manicure, the pedicure, and the facial, thank you. With extra cucumbers--for snacking!

Much to our shame and despite a certain amount of boot-strappiness about us, we're all a bit like the Clampetts from The Beverly Hillbillies. You half-expect us to ask at dinner for the fancy pot-passers from the billi-yard room, to check to see if the ce-ment pond is open and whether our critters can join us in a swim, and in our best Elly Mae voice to bid fare-thee-well to our fuss-budgety neighbors with the expression, "This has been a Filmways Presentation!"

A recent case in my point: My job took me traveling again, this time to Philadelphia. Philly not exclusive and chi-chi enough for you? Ah, but you haven't had the luxury of wining, dining, and sleeping on the tab of a major international publishing conglomerate, have you? Which I have now done--and least the sleeping with part (figuratively speaking), as I arrived too late for the dinner and instead just enjoyed the accommodations and the cuisine at the hotel.

And quel hotel! I was put up (with or otherwise) at the Sofitel Philadelphia, which apparently is one of a French-owned chain of luxury (at least to me) hotels, with locations throughout the world. Think sort of a rather high-end Hilton minus the whoring heiress constantly in the glossy mags. Philadelphia Sofi, as I now like to call her, is a looker, a rather large boutique-y hotel near Rittenhouse Square, blooming out of a 1950s international-style office tower on the site of the old Stock Exchange. Much better than it sounds, trust me.

I probably won't do justice to a description of the hotel, nor will the photo I found on their website of the interior of one of their rooms. You get the idea, though, but imagine double the wood paneling, triple the French blue accents on the drapes and wall coverings, and quadruple the free (they are free, aren't they?) samples of posh-sounding toilette items by Roger et Gallet--which for all I know could be the French equivalent of Equate or Suave. The manufacturer of said toiletries was a person/company/brand named Jean-Marie Farina. It might as well be Jean-Marie Buckwheat.

Lifelong resident of Possum Trot that I am, though, I had to check the price of one night at the Sofi, and it was . . . somewhat unimpressive. A mere $220 a night, which, yes, I've got my nerve, is a lot of money, especially when I'm not paying. However, I was really expecting the room to be more in the $300 to $500 downtown range, not a piddly $200 in the outer suburbs. This doesn't mean I think less of the hotel. It's more that I'm impressed by what $200 will get you in Center City--in terms of accommodations, I mean, not the call girl selection in the hotel bar.

Not that there were any, as far as I could tell, but until I knew the price of the room, I was thinking, man, if I were a call girl, I would totally ply my trade in this hotel! Just proves my point that I don't know how to act when I'm around nice people. You can take the boy out of the Days Inn, but you can't take the Days Inn out of the boy. 'Cause once I learned the price, I just figured anyone who would pay $200 bucks for a hotel room probably isn't going to pay the same amount or more to go, well, around the world. And I'm not talking from Philly to Paris and back again.

Nonetheless, it does go to show you what a little more frivolity and free-wheeling with cash and credit can buy you. I figure it's like wine: Once you graduate from the $8 and under, cherubically labeled, preciously named wines (Turning Leaf? How about Turning Slowly Toward the Toilet to Vomit instead?), and move into the $10 and $20 or above bottles, you definitely get a finer octane of beverage.

Just a little tip for you.

Another little tip for you is not to mistake the French-style toilet for a bidet. An extra $50 to $100 bucks a night doesn't get you that kind of luxury.

* * *

But let's get to my favorite part of the stay at Le Sofitel--the fact that on the hotel cable system, they offered "TV5Monde--Etats-Unis," i.e., French TV Network 5--World, the U.S. edition. With a little encouragement, I would have skipped the presentation I had to make the following day, just to stay in the room to watch "TV Cinq," as now I'm going to insist on calling it.

Why I'm like that, willing to fob off professional responsibilities for weird TV, I don't rightly know, but on trips out of the country--or even just across the country--I find beaucoup amounts of enjoyment in watching local TV. When I went to Russia in 1985, I got hooked on these glitzy Communist-era variety shows (the glitter! the glamour! the awful 5-year-plan-gone-bad hair dye!) on whatever the TV network was called then (GosTeeVee Raz perhaps?).

Later on that same trip, when I was in Sweden, I marveled at how the evening's TV programming was introduced by a woman sitting in an armchair with a sidetable and a lamp, relating to the audience what the night's offerings would be. Like something off the Dumont network in the early '50s--or perhaps for an artier comparison you would accept a reference to the TV hostess in François Truffaut's film adaptation of Farenheit 451. I'm half-surprised the Swedish TV presenter didn't refer to every audience member as "cousin" or show film on the evening news of my trying to make my way around Stockholm, commenting "Look at him run! Like a scared rabbit!" (Editor's note: You really gotta see the film. And, still, the pay-off on the joke won't be that good.)

When I went to England in 1993, I spent an entire (and lovely, rainless) afternoon indoors watching Alfred Hitchcock's film adaptation of Rebecca on BBC 1, 2, or 4 (no, must have been 1 or 4 because I'm sure the sheep dog trials were on 2) just because it seemed like the thing to do in England on a lovely afternoon.

I've watched soaps in Australia and England, Top 40 music shows in Germany, 'tween and teen programs in Mexico, gay TV networks (pre-Logo) in San Francisco, weird (and homoerotic) weightlifting programs on public access in New York, and more Can-Con in Canada than I care to admit (and god knows, there's a lot of it).

However, my night with TV Cinq is going to rank right up there with the best/worst of them, all because of one TV show, a little something called possibly Fort Boyard (Boyardee?) or Les Petits Princes or maybe something else entirely different. It was kind of hard to tell.

It was also difficult to tell what the program was actually about, even though it was subtitled in English. Some thing's just don't translate well, I guess. But it went kind of like this: Children 12 and under were encouraged to run around a fort perched on a remote rock off of France's western coast (Fort Boyard). The children were then dared to do reality-TV-styled stunts--walk a plank from a tall parapet and jump maybe? try to avoid getting eaten by tigers who've suddenly been released into a pen the children were just in?--in order to earn money (francs? euros?) for some sort of charity, maybe something to do with sick children. One of the sick children was present, and alors, even the infirmed in France look gorgeous and stylish! The child was small and was probably no more than 8 years old, but she had this fantastic asymmetrical bob with a crinkly fringe over her right eye. It was like some sort of 1920s space age 'do, the kind someone in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World might have worn.

Or it's possible that the contestants were trying to earn money for two little people that seemed to accompany the children everywhere--and by little people, I don't mean peasants, I mean dwarves, although they could have been "les petits princes" for all I know. Very confusing. And yet even the little people looked stunning!

It gets worse or better, depending on your perspective: One of the hosts, a sylph-like woman named, I'm sure, Sylvie or Veronique or Chantal--something charmingly and quintessentially Gallic--wore no make-up and her cornsilk blonde hair was held in a simple ponytail. Her clothes were attractive but unimpressive--a flowered, sleeveless top, casual slacks. And yet Sophie looked fantastic.

More to my liking was Olivier (and this really was his name), the hunkiest 40-something rent boy on French TV (or so I would imagine). Black muscle tee, with the muscles to go along with the shirt, a handsome face and friendly smile, tight black trousers, and a great rapport with the kiddies. What is so not to love about this guy?

In Britain, the joke is that every male presenter on BBC Children's TV (BBC 3, I believe) is a big raving showtune-loving gal at heart. And, of course, they are. But on French TV, well, you just hope and pray that the male TV hosts know all the words to Gigi, is all I can say.

Sadly, my local cable provider's idea of international TV is Univision and BBC America, all well and good but not as expansive as I had in mind. They pretty much scoffed when I wrote to suggest that they should consider adding Deutsche Welle TV to their offerings because it has excellent international news and business reports.

Thus, I'm fairly convinced they won't take seriously my suggestion to add any French TV channels 'cause I think the hosts are, well, haute.

Now I can sleep at night

At last! The word we've all been waiting for! Larry Birkhead is the father of Anna Nicole Smith's baby, Dannielynn! Perhaps now CNN and the Fox News Channel can return to their regularly scheduled programming and more pressing matters--like who next will Britney Spears hook up with in rehab? Inquiring minds . . . .

For the record, I can't pretend to be above it all; I was slightly interested in the outcome of this episode of As the DNA Sample Turns, much in the way that I can't ever seem to turn away from an episode of Maury entitled, "I've Slept with So Many Men, I Don't Know Who My Baby's Daddy Is," or more/less explicitly, have to watch the news anytime there's a pile-up on the Harrisburg-area Capital Beltway, as I'm always curious to see what bodies they pull from the wreckage--and, more importantly, what they are wearing.

All along, my wager was on ol' Hello Larry. Of all the major actors in this Greek tragedy (and let's face it, there was a Cecil B. Demented chorus of thousands who could belt out in unison that they had slept with Anna Nicole and thus could claim possible fatherhood of lil' DL), he actually seemed interested in the child, not just the money or the publicity. A radical approach to celebrity fatherhood in this day and age.

All told, Larry was the cutest of the suitors we knew about, so under American popular cultural law, he should win the award for Best Gamete in a Supporting Role. I do still find it difficult to believe he could actually participate in a procreative, not just recreative, act that might result in parentage, however. The blond highlights in his hair concern me, as does that voice. It could be the David Beckham factor at work here: Looks like Tarzan, talks like Jane, yet, nonetheless, only swinging one way in the jungle. Being that Hairy Larry is a celebrity photographer, though, I suspect, ultimately, it's as the sage of our time Cheryl Crow once sang: "This ain't no disco, this ain't no country club either. This is L.A." The phrase "Larry's gone Hollywood" may explain the hair at least.

Still, what a disappointing denouement. I was so hoping for a surprise twist in the script, one especially in the form of Zsa Zsa Gabor's husband, Frédéric Prinz von Anhalt, being revealed as the Baby Daddy. Imagine the Zsa Zsa-rific, extreme slapping action and terrorist orange-level of drama it would bring to the courtroom. I would have also accepted the frozen semen of the late oil billionaire J. Howard Marshall in the understudy/under the ground role of DL's father.

Unfortunately for Larry, though, being the father of Dannielynn also means owning up to the fact that you had unprotected sex with Anna Nicole Smith. Good golly. There are petri dishes with fewer spores growing in them. There are grease traps in low-rated, Health Department-inspected hotdog stands with less gunk. There are collapsed Pennsylvania mines with lower levels of noxious fumes and fewer chances of a cave-in from overuse. You get the idea.

If I were Larry, I'd proudly proclaim my fatherhood, but I'd also be producing deposit slips for the First National Sperm Bank of the Bahamas as a way to prove my excellent physical health to future mates.

Probably too late for him to prove excellent mental health, though.

Death and taxes

* * *

Death

Obviously, I've been abnormally quiet lately, not having posted since March 20th and only posting twice during March. Although most of Blogtucky's regulars know the story, let me explain.

After nearly 83 years of life, including 1 marriage of 54 years, 4 children, 3 wars, some 30 years in the Marine Corps, 6 years living with Alzheimer's, and numerous other life achievements and events, my father passed away on Wednesday, March 14th, 2007.

Gratefully, I was home at the time, just having made it to Kansas the previous evening. Not that my being there changed anything or stopped his passing. Maybe it added a little comfort to his final hours. I'd at least like to think so. Still, I'm glad I was there for him, for my family, and for me.

Initially, after he died, a weird sort of adrenaline kicked in. In addition to making an excessive amount of origami flowers, I started thinking through a play-by-play of my emotions and reactions to this (at least for me and my family) cataclysmic event. I thought I would post word of my travels to and from Kansas (surprisingly and gratefully seamless for a change), my family's reactions and emotions, as well as my own. I'd talk about the many friends and neighbors who came to visit with my family and let you know about the food they brought and the kind words and thoughts they shared. I would consider telling about the lovely cards, notes, flowers, gifts, and prayers my coworkers and friends shared with me before and after. And, of course, I would also pay tribute to my Dad.

But, soon after the adrenaline rush subsided, I realized that it just may be too personal and too raw right now for me to tell you all that, especially in an open forum like this blog. Blog's are a funny thing, anyway. How much is too much to reveal? And who cares besides me what my thoughts are on any given topic, especially one as sad as my father's passing?

Nonetheless, talking openly about my Dad's death might do me some good. Despite being more of a feeling person (I skew toward being an INFJ on the Myers-Briggs), reacting to situations more with emotion than logic, I have learned to play things closer to the vest over the years. And, let's face it, our culture encourages this, the valuing of thought and logic over emotion and feeling, even in the most intimate of situations and relationships. In the immortal words of one old boyfriend after a painful break-up (underscored by his taking me to see The Virgin Suicides as a parting gift/shot and not really getting why this might be upsetting), "You know, you really should keep some of those thoughts to yourself."

And I'm nothing if not good at taking life lessons from a walking, talking sphincter.

Still, even writing this post is incredibly difficult. It just makes my father's death all the more real, as if I have to admit it, acknowledge it, as a fact. And, yet, I feel the way I'm expressing my emotions and sadness herein is with as flat an affect as I can muster. I'm saying I'm sad, rather than illustrating that I'm sad. Why is that?

A clue may be gleaned from the words of my friend the Gladman, who said to me the other day, "The thing is you've had this major life event happen to you. You know it's significant. You know nothing's going to be as it was. But, in the meantime, you have to figure out what it means and how to deal with it."

Yes, exactly.

Over the last few weeks, I've felt upset and broken-hearted over my Dad's death, but probably more than anything I have just felt numb and in shock, stunned by his very quick passing and having so soon to return to a "normal life." It seems too soon to go back to business as usual, and so I haven't really. Up until the last couple of days, I've purposefully avoided social events, at least the ones I had the option to avoid. And up until Thursday, to give the appearance of mourning dress, I also have avoided wearing bright-colored clothing, a style (perhaps regrettably) I sometimes favor. I certainly haven't felt like writing or taking pleasure from other pastimes or interests.

The other overriding feelings for me of late are anger and impatience. I don't think I'm so much angry over the fact that my Dad died "too soon"--he lived a good life, even with Alzheimer's, one of the cruelest diseases known to us. But I could be kidding myself. Who doesn't die too soon? You always want more time with someone, more time to say the important things, but also more time just to be with them and appreciate them for who they are. It certainly does feel as though he died too soon for me and my family. So maybe I'm just fooling myself into believing that I don't feel anger toward the world over my Dad's death.

I suspect this anger and impatience may come from another place, though, one best expressed by my friend EcoGal, who sagely said to me upon my return to work, "You think all this was ridiculous and unimportant before you left, just you wait." So true. Because while I haven't felt like returning to my usual interests and activities, I have had to go back to work. Attend meetings, supervise, talk, direct, innovate, present, act, show up, produce, and all the rest. It's hard coming back to an environment I felt somewhat indifferent to and more than a little irritated by before my Dad's death. Now it seems intolerable. I feel like I could jump out of my skin at any minute, quit on the spot, turn on a dime, and walk away, never to return.

Not practical, perhaps, but there you have it, my fantasy way of dealing with the loss and the pain.

While I pride myself on not bringing everyone down with me as I make my way through the murky sewer tunnel of grief, it's hard to return to my ol' jokey, we'll-sing-in-the-sunshine self. Writing and humor certainly are ways for me to deal with my emotional conflict and anxieties. And writing and humor, too, may be a way for me to keep expressing the "Dad" in me. My father was nothing if not funny, not to mention highly opinionated, often at the same time. And, golly, lookit, so am I.

Thanks for that, Dad. And thanks for so much more that you gave me over the years. I wouldn't have it any other way.

* * *

Taxes

The other ridiculous and pointless thing I've come home to is tax-filing season.

It's that time again in the U.S., and given recent events, I find I'm behind in getting mine prepped for mid-April's deadline. So, as a result, I spent Good Friday at home, making some progress, finishing my federal and state taxes. Now all I have to do is a recheck, then I can e-file, and wait for the $45 refund from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (woo hoo!) and the $110 payout to the federal government (boo hoo!) to be deposited/withdrawn from/to my bank account.

I've never been one of those no-government know-nothings that seem to have taken hold of our federal social policy over the last couple of decades. I'm probably one of the few people in America that wouldn't object to slightly higher taxes, if it meant that those funds went for a stronger social safety net for all citizens and a serious investment in mass transit over highways. But given that any national discretionary income seems to be going toward a war effort that practically no one supports (except some politicos in Washington and the blood-in-the-water research-and-development and real estate firms in the D.C. area that feed off of them), maybe it's less a case of mo' money for the feds than better spending and management of the income already received.

Much a similar argument could be made toward the way I handle my personal finances. Some cases in point in the form of a couple of big reveals from this year's resignation to taxation without decent representation:

• I made slightly more charitable contributions this year than last, but it still seems like an awfully pathetic amount. I can do better.
• I made slightly more income this year than last (a whopping $70). Which, again, seems like an awfully pathetic amount. And, again, I can do better.
• I really have to get a better handle on my retirement accounts, not to mention my spending, but you know, laugh today, cry tomorrow, we're all going to die someday (see above), and whose life is it anyway? So I suspect it's going to be bidness as per usual with the Raplicious family accounts ("Party of one? There's ample seating in the debtor's prison, sir") over the next year. Or ten.

Ah, but what is this letter from the West Shore Tax Bureau that has been hanging around my desk for the last month or so?

Apparently, in Pennsylvania, we have an additional tax "opportunity," if you will, and that is the local, school district tax, which is something I have to admit to being fairly unfamiliar with and ignorant of until this year. Oops.

The year 2006 was my first full year of living in the Keystone State, and thus the first year that 1 percent (and please pay attention to this number, as it's about to rock my world) was subtracted from my pay for local school district taxes. When I lived in Maryland a full 5 percent (or more) was subtracted from my Pennsylvania-garnered pay to fund the Free (?) State's coffers. While Pennsylvania state income tax is currently around 3.07 percent--an incredible bargain compared to Maryland's--things get more complicated in the Commonwealth because of the addition of local school district taxes, which run the gamut from under 1 percent to, I dunno, maybe 3 or more percent, depending on your township/school district/municipality/whatever. And there's a whole 'nuther layer of complication if you live or work in Philadelphia and environs, but we just won't go there until we have to, girlfriend.

It's all relative, I guess. I mean, in Texas I didn't pay an income tax at all, but I was often brusquely shook down for various and sundry--for example, state park entrance fees, which were in the $30+ range for a carload of folks. I'd like to be able to confirm this--it may indeed cost more--but when you go to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Division website and try to search for entrance fees, well, interestingly enough, the information appears to be top secret. Homeland Security dontcha know.

In Pennsylvania, my experience so far tells me that state parks and game lands are free. So, all things considered, I can live with the local school district tax.

However, a problem arises with the fact that I don't happen to live in the local school district where I work. And because of this geographical reality, my employer apparently is only required by the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue (or so I'm figuring) to collect taxes of 1 percent for "out of county" (and thus out of local school district) residents.

All well and good, except that the school district in which I reside charges a local tax of 1.7 percent, not 1 percent.

Thus I find myself a week or so before tax-filiing day needing to pay an additional 0.7 percent or $300 to $400 to meet my tax burden.

Cripes. Talk about tax-and-spend socialism smacking you in the face with a dead Soviet-style communist fish of reality. Ugh. And it's not even Lent anymore. (Is it? Easter traditions--something else I can proclaim to be ignorant of, for good or for ill.)

I can both meet the deadline and pay the burden, although plans for that new home stereo system--oh, and groceries--just got set back by a couple of months. Hey-ho.

Still, bitter misanthrope that I am, I can't help but feel that this is a part of a plot by my employer to impel all worker bees to live within five to ten miles of the company hive. (And just one part of the plot, mind you. Oh, I have other examples, believe you me . . . .)

After all, the local tax rate where I work is the same as where I live. Why not charge me the full amount instead of having to cough up bitter cash during tax season? Who knows? Maybe I'd even get a refund! If you can pay 5 percent to Maryland, why can't you manage an additional 0.7 percent for my Cumberland County school district?

Because, my somewhat suspect reasoning goes, my employer hates the fact that I'm not willing to drink the corporate Kool-Aid, to take a ride on the tail of the comet Hale-Bopp, to get Sirius, to run my dedication up the Mount Carmel flagpole and see whether I salute it appropriately. Instead, it holds it against me that I am not the Borg and I am unwilling to assimilate into the institutional ethos.

Or it could just be an accounting nightmare to deal with--hundreds and thousands of potential school districts and so many employees--not to mention a subtle imperative to get me to save more and often throughout the year. But where's the sturm-und-drang in that approach? Personally, I've never seen a tree of logic and rationality that couldn't be felled by a strong ax of drama under any circumstances.

And INFJ that I am, I couldn't have it any other way.