Basic Vs. Extra

 “Desire, burning desire, is basic to achieving anything beyond the ordinary.”

---Joseph B. Wirthlin

Remember when “beyond the ordinary” was exciting? This has not been an ordinary year. We flew past ordinary back in April, but as it turns out that’s not always a positive accomplishment. Nothing about 2020 has been basic, but in talking about it with some friends, I found that the word “basic” has a different meaning with younger people, and the opposite of it, is “extra.” These are two very distinct conditions and it was eye opening to see what they mean. 

In a nutshell, I learned that basic is a term often applied to people and the clothing and accessories they have. It’s a look, sort of, and somewhat of an attitude as well. It’s also mostly applied to young women, usually by other young women. Yes, mean girl catty drama is still around, in some places. It might have changed since my high school days, but the cool table is still very much a thing, and there are those who would say no basic girl is ever going to sit at it. That’s rubbish of course, but it was fascinating to hear what the concepts of basic and extra involve for some of us.

Basic can mean that someone has a rather generic look. Jeans, sheepskin short boots, long sweaters, and a coffee card that’s always loaded with enough cash to get a pumpkin spiced latte. In the summer it’s jean shorts, sheepskin boots (Ya I don’t get it either), a hair scrunchy and an iced acai tea. The opposite of basic is called being “extra.” Normally, you’d think extra is good, right? It’s about being above and beyond the baseline, so who doesn’t want to shoot for that? Who wouldn’t want to be more than basic? As it turns out, being extra has a downside as well. 

Extra has the connotation of being over the top. Too much, too loud, too big, too…something. Remember a few years ago when wearing an arm load of jingling charm bracelets was a thing? From what I learned, it’s not a good look anymore. Wearing more than one or two bracelets makes you extra. Brand names are an indicator as well. We all know what the trendy brands are in clothing; the right winter parka with the little patch, the designer purse, the plain, white, flat sneakers that must always stay perfectly white. Those are hot items, but if you have all of them on at once? You risk being extra. Therein lies the problem. No one seems to want to be basic, and yet, taken too far, trends can put you into the dreaded extra category. What about in between though? What’s in the middle? Is there a magic zone of just enough extra to keep from being basic?

I have no idea. Which is a trend in itself, especially this year. At my age, and in this time, basic and extra are far too complex to worry about. Not just in a fashion sense; that ship has sailed, if my shirt is clean and my jeans fit, it’s a look that works. Honestly, that’s how it should be at any age, right? Why are these two ends of the spectrum so important? We’re slowly limping to the end of a year that has been way too extra. Too much drama, too many arguments, too much heartache, and not nearly enough compassion, laughter, and understanding. Before this year, we all thought that going to a movie on a Friday night, or having a cookout with friends were all just regular events that were part of our ordinary, basic lives. 

And then it all went away. 

As we come back from that (in a two steps forward one step back kind of way) we can start to see that having a drink with a friend, or seeing a movie in a theater would be the best kind of extra ever. That a pair of winter boots, or the right kind of beverage, are not the indicators some think they are, but are rather just boots and a coffee. What is extra now is getting to see family and friends around a holiday table. Extra is a meal brought to your tableside, not the curbside. Scoring a mega roll package of the good toilet paper is extra. It’s a whole other debate now between being extra or basic. If there is one part of the pandemic that’s a positive, it’s that we’ve all (ok, most of us) come to appreciate some of what we previously thought was just, well, kind of ho-hum. Who cares what kind of boots or jeans you have on, if you get to sit with a friend over meal, you win. We’re almost at the end of this very extra year, but in the meantime, the basics are what I’m betting will carry me through to whatever comes next. Happy almost New Year. 

(YouTube video of the 2012 Ball Drop, it was a good year :) )

Moments, Not Days...

 “We do not remember days, we remember moments.”

---Cesare Pavese

Are we there yet? This column will publish on December 17^th, which is the 352^nd day of 2020. It might feel more like the 4, 352^nd day, but that’s a pandemic for you. The days blend together because so much of our structure is gone. Friday night used to be date night, maybe dinner and a movie; now it’s takeout and Netflix. Thursdays were often “thirsty,” and it was common to meet someone for a beer after work. Now, more than a few of us are drinking alone, and that’s problematic in a lot of ways. For many, Sunday mornings meant church services and brunch. Now it’s another Zoom log on, a little web worship and a bowl of cereal.

For so many this year, the memories might be more about small moments, rather than big days. This pandemic didn’t last just a day, or even a week. It’s still here. It’s not like Pearl Harbor; there is no one date that will live in infamy, but rather several moments over the course of several months, and each person will have a different set of memories of this time. When major world events happen, everyone seems to remember where they were and what they were doing when they heard about it. My father would tell me often about his mother calling him in from a backyard game of kickball on a Sunday afternoon after hearing a bulletin on the radio that the war had begun. My mother remembers getting laundry ready to hang on the line while an emotional and almost speechless Walter Cronkite announced the assassination of the President on live television. I remember being 8 ½ months pregnant, running errands and chasing after an active three-year-old on September 11, 2001 when the first of four planes attacked the United States. 

These were all days that we remember, but the pandemic doesn’t really have a day. It’s been an ongoing event, stretched out over months and months of uncertainty. Much like the virus itself, pinning it down is difficult. Do we use the date the first US case was diagnosed? The date we surpassed 10,000 cases? The date with the highest death toll? Unlike a bombing or an assassination, a pandemic isn’t just one action, on one day, in one place. It’s so much more, and it’s still happening. So much for the “Just watch, after November 3^rd it will just go away” theory, right? We don’t seem to define the passage of time by days anymore, it’s about which step of which phase we are in, and whether we are moving into the next one or falling back to a previous one. It’s like a game of Chutes and Ladders but we’re all losing in very individual ways. Jobs, loved ones, homes, family vacations, and holiday get-togethers have all been lost these past months; that’s a lot of moments and not all of them are ones we will treasure.

As many do at this time of year, I’m thinking back to all that’s happened and while no particular day stands out, there are moments that will stay with me forever, but I have no idea of the dates any of them occurred. There was the time I spent 45 minutes in line outside the supermarket, chatting with a nurse from Salem hospital who was telling me about the shortages of masks, gowns and gloves and how she feared what could happen if cases continued to go up. Another moment happened when I heard a friend had passed away from the virus, and how chilling it was to realize it wasn’t just other people; my people were in danger too. There was the day my daughter learned that her high school track career was over and there would never be another meet, another team dinner or another chance at getting to states. Thankfully, not all of the moments of this past year are awful. I celebrated when friends who had trouble getting home from Italy finally got back safely. When we stepped on the field, safely distanced, for a high school commencement ceremony it seemed the first time that there was a teeny bit of hope for a return to normal. When I sat at a newly-created sidewalk café and had a glass of wine while listening to the ocean waves on the beach across the street it was a small moment of joy after several difficult days of lines and shortages.

It’s been, for the most part, an awful year. Everyone has had their mini-meltdowns, cranky times, and frustrations. For most of us though, if we really think about it, woven in among those times there have been a few small victories, a couple of moments that had us stopping, for just a second, to revel in them. Perhaps the pandemic has shown us that nailing something down to a specific day isn’t the point? If we step away from the calendar, and just reach back in our memory, we may find moments that lifted us up and carried us through dark days. Ive spent more nights than I can remember curled up with my pug Penny, and those moments have carried me through. The pandemic will pass, but these moments will always be here. We shouldn’t ever forget them. 

Small Cheer and Great Welcomes

 “Small cheer and a great welcome makes a merry feast.”

---William Shakespeare

It’s Thanksgiving, but no one is cranking up a chorus of “We gather together…” Gatherings this year will be much smaller. There’s no high school rivalry football game, no Powderpuff game, and probably no honking horns racing around town. Wait, can we still have the honking horns and kids in cars? Please? Windows open, masks on, can we at least have one tradition remain a little bit the same? 

Traditions comfort us because they’re familiar. A tradition is an anchor to our past and a harbinger of hope for the future. We need to know that a holiday with family and friends, or a celebration of faith, or even just a birthday or anniversary party, will be a constant. The problem is that the only constant is change, and while many of us will still have a nice dinner, and maybe see a few loved ones, this year is going to be unlike any other year. 

There is so much that won’t be happening in the same way this year. Families that are used to having 25 people around a table are likely not going to be able to do that. Going “over the river and through the woods” might be more like going over the Internet and through the Zoom. One friend of mine normally cooks for about thirty people on the holiday, and her numbers are down to six. She said it’s been hard to scale back, because she’s just used to picking out the fattest Butterball birdzilla she can find in the grocery store. Her list in the past has included a dozen loaves of stuffing bread, fifteen pounds of potatoes, a vat of gravy that a small child could swim in, and more pies than should be allowed. 

Travel isn’t happening much this year either. The TSA numbers show that at this time last year there were between 2 and 3 million passengers in airports across the country. This year? It’s less than a million. That means that there are more than likely a few of our neighbors that are looking at  empty chairs around the table. It’s not just about the logistics of scaling back grocery trips and meal prep; what’s missing is more than a couple of pies and some extra gravy. 

There’s no way to change it, no way to make this virus just disappear, so we can carry on with serving mass quantities of food and crowding around the kitchen for clean-up duty. This is the hand that’s been dealt this year. Nothing has been traditional, nothing has been the same and there’s no way around it. So, since we cannot change the way this holiday is going to go, what can we do? Here are a few suggestions I’ve heard from friends.

1. Go rogue. Do something you’d never have thought to do because it wasn’t part of your tradition. Ever wanted to have a prime rib roast on Thanksgiving instead of turkey? Do it. Also, I have a great recipe for one, so call me if you want to try it. If your tradition is to go to a game as a family, take a walk on the beach instead. Not enough people for a touch football in the yard? Get out last summer’s cornhole set and start tossing. Is there a more perfect game for social distancing? The boards are supposed to be placed 27 feet apart, front to front. The only real danger is getting beaned in the head with a bag.
2. Give someone else a bit of “small cheer.” Bake the three dozen cupcakes or cookies you would have had on your table and drop them around to the neighbors. A little Tupper full of cookies, with a nice note just might make someone’s day. For the record, I like chocolate chip and snickerdoodles, but I’m not picky and surprise treats are always welcome.
3. Reach out and touch someone. No, not with your gooby snoogery hands, but with that little thing we all carry around or have in the house. You know, a phone? Cousin Edna couldn’t come dinner? Giver her a ring. You miss your grandparents? Well, unless you are trapped under something heavy, or you live off the grid, pick up the phone. It doesn’t have to be FaceTime, or a video chat, or some live streamed event, just hit the digits and tell someone you’re thinking of them. 

Nothing will be the same this year, and that cannot be helped. So, like the song says, “Love the ones you’re with.” 

It’s a business theory, but if something is in very short supply (loved ones nearby) and in very high demand (our traditions) it becomes very valuable. The small cheer we offer each other is that much more precious because it’s so limited. Thanksgiving isn’t cancelled, it’s just downsized, but welcomes can still be great, and the feast will still be merry. Happy Thanksgiving

 to you all.