The Whitney Chronicles

I don’t think so.

I’m going to buy a bumper sticker I saw last week for my rear bumper: Are You Following Jesus This Closely?

That’s one thing I’ve learned since I found God and He found me. It’s easy to talk Christianity, but not so easy to walk it. Fortunately, I lost track of Ms. Speedy in the church. By the time Bible study was over, I even felt like praying for her. (“Oh, Lord, keep that nutcase off the streets….” Just kidding!!!)

Ironically, I know lots of people who will spend hours at the gym so they can live longer—and then drive thirty miles an hour over the speed limit to make up for all the time they wasted doing it.

Thoughtlessly, I ate one of the éclairs to soothe my nerves.

I had four calls on my answering machine when I got home. Three from my mother—“Whitney, you forgot the dishrags I knitted for you out of scrap yarn.” (Now how did that happen?) “Whitney, do you want me to invite that nice young man from church and his mother over for dinner?” (As if she could even catch him!) And, “Whitney, I don’t know where my mind is these days. I’m so forgetful. Did I tell you that you forgot your dishrags at my house?”

Menopause can be brutal. I know now why women over fifty shouldn’t have babies. They’d lay them down and forget where they put them.

The fourth call was from Eric Van Horne. He’s a very special man in my life. We’ve been friends for years, and I don’t know if a more good-natured man exists. We dated for a while, and I really thought Eric might be the one for me. He’s brilliant, but impulsive and completely undependable. I spent many nights wondering if he had actually asked me out and, if so, where was he? I knew from the outset that no matter whom Eric dated, she’d have to agree to take second place to his love for airplanes. News of an air show in a neighboring state would drive everything else from his mind. He’d jump into his car, sniff the air and head in the direction of jet fuel. And on Monday he’d remember we’d had plans for the weekend.

Ardor fades quickly after sitting by the phone for a few weeks waiting for a call. Actually, we came to the decision together that until either I learned to love madcap spontaneity or he learned to be dependable and predictable, we’d just be friends. So far we’ve managed to navigate the bumpy waters of remaining friends and seeing each other socially.

“Hi, Whit! Sorry I didn’t call sooner. Wanted to tell you about the great air show I attended. You should see my photos!”

“I don’t know if I can stand being dumped for a crop duster again, Eric.”

“What a kidder you are, Whit. I took a picture of a woman and the plane she uses for acrobatics. She reminded me of you.”

“At least you thought of me.” I can’t be too hard on him. Eric is darling, but has what Kim calls “zero mac.” He enjoys life too much to be cool and is way too exuberant to be macho.

Actually, that may be his best quality.

The Bible verse that comes to mind when I think of Eric is Proverbs 18:24: “Some friends may ruin you. But a real friend will be more loyal than a brother.”

Mitzi may be in the first category. Kim and Eric are in the second. While Mitzi spends the day making snide remarks about my age (as if she’ll ever see thirty-five again!), Eric called a second time to apologize for standing me up. He says he just “lost track of time.”

Somehow, I believe him. I’ve known from the start that Eric has the attention span of a flea, a heart of gold and a bloodhound’s nose for airplanes, and I wasn’t going to change him no matter what I did. I’ve never gone into a relationship with that rehab-attitude. I take a guy for what he is, not for what I think he could become.

Eric is actually a much better friend than he is a date. A girl could get old waiting around for a guy like him.

I was too exhausted to cook supper, so I just heated a family-size ready-made lasagna in the oven. It was so big, I figured it would last me for days. Tasty, too. Then I started thinking about work. Ate a little more lasagna. As I put away the pan, I realized I’d eaten quite a little more. Now there’s just one measly portion left for lunch tomorrow.

Tomorrow! I’ll restart my diet, seriously this time. I’ll count calories. To make sure I didn’t forget, I dug out my old calorie counter from previous diets.

I can’t believe a measly portion of lasagna has 230 calories. That would mean the rest of my frozen dinner would have…1840 calories! Feeling a little sick, but driven to find out exactly what kind of havoc I’d wreaked, I did today’s math.

Breakfast: two slices dry toast—140 calories 1 apple—81 calories Lunch: tuna salad with low-fat mayo on bibb and endive lettuce—150 calories 6 hard candies—125 calories 1 ounce M&M’s—140 calories Snack: other 31 ounces of M&M’s—4,340 calories Accident: 1 éclair—500 calories Dinner: 7 portions of an 8-portion heat-and-serve lasagna—1840 calories Snack: Tums—0 calories (medicinal, don’t count)

Seven thousand three hundred and sixteen calories?

I have to stay calm. Running screaming into the street would not help. I ran by it again…. I’m on a 1200-calorie-a-day diet; 7316 divided by 1200 equals…six days. That means I can’t eat again until September 21!

Stay calm. Start over. Tomorrow will be a clean slate. I’ll utilize all I’ve learned so that I don’t make those mistakes again. Can rubber bands stretch enough to compensate for today?

My prayers for tonight: For a successful trip to Las Vegas, for my boss and officemates (as undeserving as they may be—just kidding!), Mom’s hot flashes, Dad’s sanity, Eric’s memory and my life as a thirty-something. Where do You want me in this new decade of my life, Lord? And gratitude—for all of the above and for Your Son, Who loved me more than I can ever imagine.

Humbly,

Whitney

CHAPTER 2

God wants everyone to eat and drink and be Happy in His work. These are gifts from God.

—Ecclesiastes 3:13

September 20

I’m getting the hang of this journal thing. It’s like telling a close personal friend about my day. I haven’t made much progress in the self-improvement area other than managing to get the zipper closed on my fat pants.

I returned the black blouse. Since I’d put the blouse on my credit card, I didn’t really feel I’d spent any money—or gained any when I returned it. So, being financially even, I went shopping, bought shoes and, naturally, charged them. There is something to be said for the tactile quality of cash. It is definitely much harder to pry out of my hand than plastic.

My feet are pretty much the only things on my body that don’t change size. Of course, my mother did tell me if I didn’t wear shoes, my arches would fall and I’d be flat-footed for the rest of my life. She also taught me that if I didn’t quit crossing my eyes, they would freeze that way, and if I drank coffee, it would stunt my growth. It’s a wonder I’m alive today considering all the risks I took.

September 21

Dad has begun hiding out to get away from Mother and her wildly fluctuating body temperature. He offered to come over and fix my plumbing (which isn’t broken), build me a piece of furniture (something he’s never done before in his life) and repaint my ceilings. He is one desperate man, so I invited him over for a visit. I thought I might cheer him up.

“Have you got something for me to do?” were his first words. “Please?”

“What’s Mother up to today?”

“Cleaning closets. She rented a Dumpster and is emptying everything we own into it. I expect to go home to an empty house.”

“Don’t worry. There’s probably a lot of junk you needed to get rid of by now.”

Dad scowled at me. “It’s only ‘junk’ until you throw it away. Have you noticed that as soon as the garbagemen leave the neighborhood, we have to replace everything we never thought we’d use again? Your mother is going to send me into bankruptcy!”

“It can’t be that bad. What harm can she do? Try to be more open-minded about this phase of her life,” I encouraged.

“‘Open-minded?’ Whitney, if I’m any more open-minded where your mother is concerned, my brains will fall out!”

I have the greatest father in the world. He’s odd, unique and one of a kind, but he’s also tenderhearted and very patient where his “little girl” and his wife are concerned. Mom is wonderful, but she can be opinionated, single-minded, stubborn and, these days, totally off-the-wall. If their strengths and weaknesses were blended together, they’d make one amazing parent—and one delightfully wacky one. They met as teenagers and it was love at first sight—on my dad’s part. Mom had taken longer to come around. Tiny, extroverted and beautiful, she’d had men circling her like planes over Dallas, and it had taken her a while to fit Dad onto her radar screen. Dad said she was the most popular girl on campus. Another thing I can’t relate with Mom about….

“Coffee, Dad?”

“Are you kidding? It’s two o’clock in the afternoon! Do you want me to be up all night? Do you know what caffeine does to me? Combine that with your mother jumping up to turn on the air conditioner and me having to go to the bathroom….” He shook his head so dismally, my heart nearly broke.

“It’s not that bad, Dad. She’ll get over this, things will be better soon. Don’t think of your glass as half empty. Think of it as half full.”

He gave me a wry grin. “Yeah, and before long I’ll have my teeth floating in it.”

September 22

I thought Harry (and, by association, Betty) would become hysterical when Kim and I outlined the plans for getting a late booth into the technology show in Las Vegas. The ideas were feasible, even downright brilliant…but also expensive. Unfortunately, Harry’s hobby is pinching pennies until they scream. I had to pay full price for airline tickets, and coach was booked, which meant an upgrade to first class. There was only one room left in the conference hotel, and that was a suite. Add to that the cost of the booth, getting signage and entertaining a client list (who, being called at the last moment, would need to be treated with extra—read expensive—care) and Harry might as well have invested in a small gold mine. But you can’t pull something together in a week for the cost of something planned months in advance. Unfortunately we who already knew this had to suffer right along in Harry’s learning curve.

The good news is that his tantrum was short-circuited by an incredibly handsome new client arriving at the office between “Do you know how much this is going to cost” and—my favorite—“Next time plan ahead for these unplanned surprises.”

Handsome Client had a great smile, dark brown hair and eyes so green they remind me of the Emerald Isle. (The one I’ve seen in travel magazines. I want to see it in person soon—add that to Yearly Goals.) And he was six feet tall, athletically slim and wore the best suit I’ve seen outside of GQ. I found myself wondering if he was nice, Christian and single. Mother would have been so proud.

Harry called me into his office to introduce me to Matthew Lambert, CEO of a small but successful firm that roasts peanuts, pecans and the like. Lambert also makes nut butters, glazed and candied nuts and a dozen other calorie-laden items.

Matthew Lambert must have noticed me licking my lips in response to his job description, because he commented on my apparent enthusiasm for the project. Actually, all I’d had for lunch was a pathetic pile of tuna and three slices of melba toast.

Lambert is building a completely automated and computerized plant and wants Harry to design some specialized software. Apparently he wants a computer that can roast peanuts. If technology can provide a way to burn CDs, it seems like roasting a peanut should be a snap.

Harry always calls me in for the preliminaries. This is usually best for all concerned, as I have some social graces. I take over while Harry disappears with his stable of computer geeks to work his software magic. He has a deft hand on a mouse and the ability to memorize all of the numbers in a phone book. I, on the other hand, have a personality.

While I was dreaming up a way to ask Mr. Lambert if he wanted to discuss his new alliance with Innova over coffee, his cell phone rang and he was summoned away. It’s my mother’s fault. She filled my head with all that talk about “nice young men.” (I did glance at his ring finger first, though. It was bare. Promising…)

It wasn’t until I got back to my desk that the cell phone thing began to annoy me. How do people justify thinking they’re so important that they have to be accessible to everyone, everywhere at all times? Humans are so vain. Men in gyms run on treadmills and talk into their cells. I’ve heard women in toilet stalls making luncheon dates and others in dressing rooms at the mall counseling their friends on the latest jerk they dated. Just last week I pulled up at a stoplight beside a guy on a Harley. He was talking on a cell phone and there was a bumper sticker on his bike that said, Thugs Are People Too. Go figure.

September 22, later

Eric has been calling. This boy/girl stuff can ruin a great friendship. Still, if he asks me, I wouldn’t mind going out for an evening. It’s been months since I’ve seen a movie that wasn’t on television.

Just the thought of an evening out inspired a rush of adrenaline through my system. Having recently traded my exercise bike (obscenely expensive clothes rack with wheels) for a bookcase, a yoga mat and a lava lamp, I decided to wax my legs.

Three minutes into the project I remembered why I hate waxing my legs.

Rather than scald off my skin by overheating the wax in the microwave, I heated it on the stove. I forgot about it for just a moment when I spied some leftover potato chips (very rare at my house). Not wanting to waste food (starving children in Beverly Hills and all that), I stuffed them into my mouth before I remembered my goal to lose fifteen pounds. Occasionally I worry about my memory. Some days the only thing I seem able to retain is water.

I tried spitting the chips out into the sink, but accidentally spluttered them into the hot wax instead.

Deciding that the potato chips wouldn’t hurt either the wax or my legs, I carried the pan to the bathroom. Sitting on the edge of the tub, I began frosting my hairy legs with chip-speckled yellow wax. The wax went from being too hot to too cold in a nanosecond. I didn’t dare toddle back into the kitchen to return it to the stove as I was afraid the wax would harden on my legs and become a permanent part of my flesh.

I edged my fingernails under the globby sheet of goo and pulled upward. A rush of tears filled my eyes as hairless pink skin shined up at me. If someone told me I had to do this, I’d call it abuse. As it is, I inflict it on myself and call it grooming.

Since my legs were sticking together anyway and I couldn’t walk, I decided to call my mother.

“Whitney! How are you? Isn’t this weather something?”

“It’s been raining, Mom.”

“But warm rain. I’ve been wearing shorts all day.” I didn’t tell her that I expect she’ll have them on in January, too.

When I broke the news to her that I’m going to Las Vegas for a trade show, she was not happy.

“Sin City? How can your employer send a young girl like you there?”

“I’m thirty, Mom. And I’ve always traveled with my job.”

“It’s a den of iniquity, darling. Tell him you can’t go.”

Kim, on the other hand, was in love with the idea. “Bring me something, will you?”

“I promised Mother I wouldn’t leave the hotel for purposes of a touristy nature,” I reminded her.

“Something from the hotel, then. With rhinestones.”

So much for the good influence of friends.

September 23

I’ve been inundated with plans for the trade show. Whitney’s my name, Creativity’s my game. At least that’s what Harry thinks. Only Bryan knows that today, between brilliant zaps of originality and ingenuity, I figured out which was the longest word I could type with my left hand—stewardesses (a travel-related exercise accomplished while being left on hold by a travel agent who went shopping and had a facelift before getting back to me). And—this one is big—when you rearrange the words slot machines, you can make the words cash lost in ’em.

Of course, after foisting the Las Vegas trade-show problem on to me, Harry promptly forgot about it and began trolling for bigger fish. In this case it was someone from whom he’d already had a nibble but wanted to land completely, Matthew Lambert, the nut-roasting magnate I’d fondly begun referring to as Mr. Peanut.

As I walked toward Harry’s office this morning, Bryan—wearing that panicked look he so often does—raised his eyebrows and pointed frantically toward Harry’s door. Figuring my assistant was trying to indicate that Harry was out of sorts, I strode in expecting to see a man who hadn’t yet had his sixth cup of coffee today. What I did see nearly knocked me flat.

Harry had gotten himself a permanent. Though not yet bald, his hair is thinning except for the thick assortment of hairs that halo his head in the traditional style of medieval monks.

I took a deep breath and attempted to quash the image of an unevenly growing Chia Pet on Harry’s head. No wonder Bryan had looked as though he was about to faint. He’d probably been under his desk laughing himself silly.

“Are you busy tomorrow evening, Whitney?” Harry leaned back in his chair, put his hands behind his neck and fingered the tight curls at his collar.

A working dinner? With Harry? Harry never paid for anything he didn’t have to, and he was married, so this wasn’t a social dinner. Had his permanent given him so much aplomb that he was asking me out on a frivolous whim or were the newly tight curls on his head squeezing his brain? My relief was actually physical when he added, “I’m having dinner with Matt Lambert, and I’d like you to come along. What do you say?”

I was so happy I didn’t have to dine alone with Harry and be forced to admire his Chia Pet scalp that I agreed immediately. That Matthew Lambert would be there didn’t hurt either.

It wasn’t until I was back at my desk that I realized that I was not in any way prepared to go anywhere or do anything with a hunky, single man. I’m a woman who—as recently as six days ago—was holding her clothing together with rubber bands. I had nothing to wear. Visions of pilled and holey sweatpants, stained T-shirts, too-tight jeans and my work clothing—mostly interchangeable black and beige separates and low-heeled pumps—danced in my head. I usually go into a shopping frenzy the week before a big date. It was clearly apparent that I hadn’t had a frenzy—or a date—for quite some time.

It wasn’t until noon that I could discuss the emergency with Kim.

“Don’t you have a ‘fat dress’?” she asked. “I always keep one of those empire-waist corduroy or cotton things on hand for a crisis.”

“Then I might as well pitch a pup tent in the middle of the restaurant and stick my head through the top to eat. I want to look good for this….”

Kim, the least vain person on the planet, puzzled that one over. “Your mom has been on your case again, hasn’t she? All that stuff about meeting a man?”

“She’s worried about me,” I admitted weakly.

“And she has her own subscription to Bride’s magazine just for the fun of it. Get real, Whitney, she’s a wedding planner waiting to happen.”

“I know, I know, but I still want to look nice tomorrow night.”

“‘Nice?’ You’re already gorgeous! Sometimes I wonder if you ever look in a mirror. That dark hair of yours, those eyes, and no matter how many times you say you’re ‘fat’ you know there are women who would give a front tooth for your curves!”

A front tooth? Scary thought. But that’s part of why I cherish Kim. She actually believes I’m beautiful and isn’t afraid to say it. Bless her heart.

“I know, I know, but I still need to look stunning tomorrow night.”

“Then how about that wonderful black jumpsuit we bought last time you were pre-diet?”

I love Kim’s tactfulness. I grabbed her cheeks between my palms and gave them a squeeze. “You are brilliant. Problem solved.”

She nodded benignly. “Now that we’ve settled that, let’s discuss Harry’s hair.”

I couldn’t help it. I had to go shopping anyway.

When I don’t really have anything to shop for, my default is always shoes. The good news is that there are finally cute shoes that are actually comfortable. The bad news is that nothing looks all that cute on my size nine feet. Granted, they match my five-eight height, and I’m nicely proportioned. I think of myself as the new-and-improved, more-for-your-money package.

I found a great pair of black shoes with strappy backs. These are not to be confused with my black shoes with the little bow, my black shoes with the flat heels, my black patent leathers, my black sandals, flip-flops or slippers or my several pairs of black pumps and my black running shoes. These were different—not different enough, however, that anyone but me would notice. And, of course, they were still black.

After a rip-roaring internal debate, I decided to buy a purse instead. No danger of falling into the I-think-I’ll-buy-it-in-black trap there. Purses have personality these days—flashy colors, weird shapes, sequins and rhinestone thingamabobs dangling off them. My question is, who buys these things? Seems to me a precious little bag that’s shaped like a parakeet, decorated in yellow and green sequins and holds a tissue and a tube of lipstick is doomed to extinction.

Uh-oh. Were those my mother’s thoughts coming out of my mind?

I settled on a slightly larger bag shaped and decorated like a seashell because it would also hold my keys and a credit card and had pretty turquoise sequins. Who buys these things? Me, apparently.

Eric called tonight. He’s so charmingly disorganized that I’ve gotta love him. Today he spent two hours looking for his dry cleaning. Not in the house, mind you, but in his car. He’d dropped off his clothes on the way to an appointment, and when he returned to pick them up, he realized he couldn’t remember exactly which cleaner he’d used. Unfortunately, he’d done a few dozen other errands in the same trip and had a ten-mile radius within which his clothing could be waiting. While he was out scouting for his Laurens and his Hilfigers, he managed to hit an estate sale and a going-out-of-business blowout. It cost him a hundred and seventy-five dollars in unnecessary purchases to find his clothing.

“It’s okay, though,” he justified cheerfully. “I was really hoping to find an Andirondack chair and an Arts and Crafts floor lamp someday. I just ran across them sooner than I expected.” Unfortunately, while we were on the phone, his dog, Otto, managed to chew through the cord on the floor lamp and one leg of the chair.

It’s Eric’s own fault, really. He loves that dog so much that he’s afraid to hurt his feelings by scolding him. I’m not sure Otto has feelings. Bulldogs rarely appear to be in touch with their emotions. Still, Eric is crazy about him, and there is something rather sweet about an airplane buff and his dog Otto-Pilot.

I couldn’t get Eric and Otto-Pilot out of my mind while I was doing my Bible readings tonight, so I looked up Job 12:7-9. “But ask the animals, and they will teach you; the birds of the air, and they will tell you; ask the plants of the earth and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this?” I have a real passion for His creatures. After all, if God set aside two full days of creation—the fifth to create fish and birds and the sixth to fashion animals (including the man and woman kind)—then why don’t we realize how important they must be to Him—and therefore, to us?