Steamy Seductions

Okay, I give up. Winter’s won.

I’m not throwing in the towel because it’s the fourth time this winter that I’ve seen significant snow in Georgia. And for all you northerners, the Atlanta definition of “significant snow” is a simultaneous snowflake sighting and a mob at the Publix akin to Black Friday at WalMart.

Neither is my dachshund’s refusal to go outside the reason for my surrender to the season.

The way I know that winter has won? I actually consumed a hot beverage this morning. I risked scalding my tongue to get my insides warm.

It’s like this: I don’t drink coffee. I never developed a taste for it. And why would I sip hot tea when I can gulp Chick-Fil-A unsweetened iced tea? It’s kind of like the old adage that “wine is fine but liquor is quicker.” I drink tea to quench my thirst, and cold goes down faster than hot.

In fact, I’ve estimated that in my lifetime I have consumed enough unsweetened iced tea to float a mid-size cruise ship. My kids have already been instructed that upon my death I wish to be cremated and sprinkled in the drive-thru of Chick-Fil-A.

But here’s the irony: my house has a built-in Miele coffee system, an expensive machine that has a steam nozzle and other features appealing to coffee enthusiasts. I can program it to speak to me in German, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, English, Italian, or French. It has a counter that will display the number of cups of coffee or espresso that have been dispensed since it was purchased. It even has a security system that I can set to keep people unfamiliar with the unit from using it.

Even crazier is the fact that I, the one who does not drink coffee, am the one who ordered the machine. And it’s been used exactly six times in seven years. I don’t know how to set the language or the security system, and I haven’t ever gotten the German warning that means it’s time to descale the unit after 100 coffees.

My thinking in purchasing the Miele coffee system was that it could be used to circumvent my then-husband’s serious Starbuck’s addiction. Why not put in our own mocha machine? I thought. That, combined with the fabulous office he had over the garage, the beautiful pool, the home theater, and the fully-equipped home gym, meant he never needed to leave the house.

My plan didn’t work so well. As it turns out, it didn’t matter what was in this home. He liked to get his mochas elsewhere.

A month or so ago, he began texting me in an effort to have me meet with him so that he could present some options for paying the money he owes me. To my mind, there’s only one acceptable option, and that is for him to pay me the money he owes me. But I guess he needed to try. The conversation went something like this:

HIM: Coffee tonight 630 pm

ME: Excuse me?

HIM: Coffee starbucks

ME: I don’t drink coffee.

HIM: I forgot . . . organic water with a twist of lime

(Okay, you did forget. It’s unsweetened tea. And there’s no such thing as organic water)

HIM again: I bring the lime btw

(At this point, I’m grossed out and stop answering his texts, which strangely continue throughout the course of the day)

HIM: ??Yes?

HIM: Ok I will see u then

HIM: Seriously just biz . . . .

HIM: Seriously if u can’t that’s fine just let me know


Needless to say, I didn’t show up at Starbucks that day. And while winter may have won today, it will be a Kalte Tag in der Holle before I ever succumb to his steamy seductions.

That’s German for “cold day in hell.”

Backhanded Compliments

I did something really stupid. I’ve spent the past three years playing very little tennis, a sport I love almost as much as I love Chick-Fil-A tea. To make up for all that lost time, I stupidly agreed to play winter tennis.

The thermometer registered 27 degrees when I stepped onto the court yesterday morning. But the wind blowing across the chunks of ice on the large lake next to the court acted like a giant natural air conditioner, officially making it colder than a witch’s titties during our match.

Since I’m new to the team, I met my new partner for the first time five minutes before the match. Shirley is a tall, gorgeous strawberry blonde with a powerful forehand. Before introducing us, my captain said to me, “You’ll like Shirley. She’s a good player, but she doesn’t talk much. Just tell her what to do, and she’ll do it.”

Sure enough, Shirley said hardly a word the whole first set. We clicked racquets after good points, and she nodded her approval at my better shots, but she still never spoke.

But when our opponent called out the score indicating they were at set point, I distinctly heard her say, “F*ck!”

Halfway into the second set, something happened that got Shirley talking. It was her turn to serve again, and she netted her first serve. She bounced the ball a couple of times in preparation for her second serve, then stopped and looked at me and said, “These are old balls. We’re playing with old balls.”

“I think they’re just not bouncing because they’re cold,” I said helpfully.

But Shirley was having none of it. She said to our opponents, “We need to open a new can of balls. These aren’t bouncing.”

Now, the United States Tennis Association has a rule stating that if the temperature is below freezing at match time, players have a right to refuse to play. One reason for the rule is that balls don’t bounce well when it’s below freezing. But we’d started the match, so we couldn’t refuse to play at that point. And since our opponents were winning, they were not inclined to open a new can of balls.

Shirley practically had a meltdown. “These are old balls,” she began muttering between points. And I’ve played just enough tennis to know that when a player has a meltdown, the match is pretty much over.

I tried to calm her down, but I had to admit that she had a point. Because I don’t exactly like playing with old balls myself.

For one thing, old balls aren’t pretty. They look bald and worn. And all too often, old balls are discolored, maybe even misshapen.

Even when they're warm, old balls have no bounce. And that makes them nearly impossible to play with. In fact, experienced players often can just give a ball a good squeeze and judge its fitness by its firmness.

But having entered into an agreement to play tennis that morning, we were stuck with old balls. So I said to Shirley, “They’re playing with old balls, too.”

As if a light went on in her head, Shirley laughed and said, “I guess I can’t blame my game on a set of balls.” And just like that, she was back in the game.

My new friend is, quite literally, a woman of few words. But they’re kind of profound.

An Open Letter to Those Who Crossed My Path Today . . .

To My Dachshunds: We’re moving to Florida today. Although your brains are the size of walnuts, I have to give you credit for the incredible intelligence you’ve shown in choosing to move with me. Trust me, Benadryl will help you sleep comfortably during the drive to St. Augustine. And for your future entertainment, the new invisible fence is configured so that the UPS guy will have to get by you to reach the front porch.

To L’Donna in the fancy fuschia Cadillac: Your car is lovely, and I’m envious of the vanity plate with your name on it, but I feel compelled to tell you that driving 80 miles per hour on I-75 while scratching your braids with those 3” nails and talking on the cell phone leaves no hands on the steering wheel.

To My Children: I love you. I stayed married to your dad when I knew he was cheating on me because I didn’t want to break up your home. In the years since the divorce, I’ve tried to keep as many things in your life the same as always. But as much as I try, I can’t live in your father’s path. I’m afraid for my health if I don’t get out of his orbit. It breaks my heart that you’ve chosen to live with him, but I understand that you want to avoid change. All you need to know is that the day you call and tell me you want to come live with me, I’ll be in the car on my way to get you.

To the Rednecks in the jacked-up F-350: Today’s race is at the Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, not on I-75.

To the Woman in the Hyundai Santa Fe: Violently yanking your steering wheel while trying to change lanes at 90 miles per hour is what’s causing your SUV to careen onto two wheels. Ease into those lane changes, sweetie, and you won’t flip that damn piece of aluminum.

To the Woman at the Chick-Fil-A- in Tifton: Asking for five orders of bacon at a crowded fast food restaurant is not going to win you any friends. And saying to the sweet teenager waiting on you, “I want five orders of bacon, and don’t interrupt me until I finish giving you my order,” made me want to yank all the hairs off of your head. Here’s the problem: Chick-Fil-A doesn’t have “orders of bacon” on its menu. They cook bacon for their Club Sandwiches. Buy five sandwiches and take the bacon out of them if you must have bacon. You want only bacon? Marry a pig. Chick-Fil-A doesn’t have someone in the back cooking bacon just for some nitwit on the Atkins Diet.

To the Teenager Who Ran His Car off I-10 into a Swamp: Can you please talk to the lady in the Hyundai? She’s about to do what you just did.

To My Ex-Husband: I kind of understand your wanting a younger, tighter, stupider woman. She makes you look smarter and wealthier. I also kind of understand your hiding money in Costa Rica so that you don’t have to pay me the settlement I deserve. But here’s what I don’t understand: you got what you wanted, so why can’t you leave me alone now? Why do you torture and harass me more than two years after the divorce was final? You remind me of the woman in Chick-Fil-A today, someone with irrational and unreasonable ideas of how other people should accommodate you. Here’s the deal, you stupid man: I have bacon. And it’s good bacon. But you can’t have it, not at any price. It’s going to someone who wants the whole club sandwich, someone who will appreciate the value of a combo meal. Someone who doesn’t ask for the bacon in exchange for a little sausage.

To the Dachshunds: I told the UPS guy you can be bought with bacon.

Color Coding

One of the things I love about little kids is the lack of inhibition when it comes to what they say. But I only love that trait in other peoples’ kids. Mine regularly embarrassed the hell out of me when they were young.

Morgan, for instance, was enthralled with black people. When she was only three, my brother, Beau, and his new wife, Kim, wheeled her in her stroller up to the Chick-Fil-A at Southlake Mall to order lunch. When they reached the front of the line, Morgan stood up in her stroller, pointed at the server, and shouted, “Look, Beau! She’s chocolate!” My new sister-in-law was mortified.

Two weeks later, Morgan and I were in the elevator right in the middle of Southlake Mall. The doors opened, and a young black woman entered, pushing her baby in a stroller. Morgan turned to me, and pointing back to the baby, said, “Mom! That baby’s chocolate!” Fortunately, the mother had a sense of humor. She burst out laughing and said, “You’re right, sweetie. He IS chocolate.”

How do you explain racial etiquette to a young child? I wondered how to tell Morgan that she couldn’t call people “chocolate.” I knew what she would say – “But they are chocolate.”

I finally just started telling her and her little sister, Lauren, that it is not good manners to talk about what color people are. Some people have darker skin than others do, but we’re all people, and God loves us just the way we are. I said it enough that Morgan finally stopped calling people “chocolate.”

Lauren handled the situation a little differently. One afternoon, a friend of her father’s came to our house. After she warmed up to him, she grabbed him by the hand and led him to the glass door that opened out to our backyard. Knowing she would get in trouble for talking about his skin color, she pointed to our little dachshund and said in her most matter-of-fact voice, “That’s my dog, Betsy. She’s black, too.”