Bird Calls

I work in my college’s archives. Today I was transcribing a letter written in 1918 from one our most famous international alumna to her best friend back in America. She was telling her friend how she could no longer be the maid of honor at another friend’s wedding. She seemed most disappointed that she, “would not be able to help her to get off.” Apparently 100 years ago, a maid of honor’s duties were a lot more interesting.

  Now that you have read this, let us all have a moment of silence for the scared little girl who had the sad misfortune of not being named after a car. 

I've finally gotten around to reading Nora Ephron's book, I Remember Nothing and Other Reflections. I vaguely remember it being a Christmas gift a number of years ago from my mother and oldest sister. I think I read a page or two Christmas evening before it was relegated to a bookshelf during a post-holidays clean-up raid. I found it the other day while on a hunt for a completely different book that I've forgotten the name of now. It's a situation I'm sure Ms. Ephron would understand considering her devotion to defending the forgetful in the first chapter of this highly amusing collection of anecdotes. I just finished the tenth chapter, which is about Teflon. It followed a chapter about omelets and next up is something to do with annoying things that happen in restaurants and the evilness that is the dessert spoon. The more I read, the more I can't help but wonder how long it will be before I'm the kind of writer who can write a hundred and thirty-five pages about absolutely nothing that should be of any interest to anyone but somehow still is, and then be gutsy enough to call it my memoir. I would also settle for a new set of Teflon pans.

One of my summer projects is digitizing all the baby movies my parents filmed over the course of five combined childhoods. So far I'm on tape three of forty. Although sitting in my hot room with a computer whose processing power is reminiscent of the proverbial tortoise isn't exactly how I saw my summer going, it does have it's perks, namely reliving the best moments of my forgotten babyhood. It turns out I was quite the little spitfire in my youth. One memorial day evening when I was about two and a half, my family was outside trying to catch fireflies. Apparently I decided that was too plebeian for me and struck out to find my fortune elsewhere in the backyard. My twin tried to come with me, but when she sprayed herself in the eyes with the bug spray, I had no choice but to give her my best "Your bad, sista'" look and waddle on alone. I made it all the way to the other side of the grill before my mother called me back to put on my pants. 

I finally did laundry yesterday. I'd tell you how long it's been since the last time I did it, but I'm not that stupid-- my mother reads this blog. In my defense, there were several reasons it took me as long as it did. Some of them are more reasonable than others (Do you have any idea how hard it is to get enough quarters when the campus ATM only gives $20s and the only thing you buy regularly is stamps?), but because this is Bird Calls, I'm only going to tell you the crazy one: the laundry room is scary. It's down in the dank, dark, and depressing basement only accessible by an old, sloooow elevator and through a poorly lit hallway with vending machines that sound like a Ghostbusters' sound effect. Then-- and this is the worst part-- the other girls also doing their laundry are downright predatory. If I survive the elevator, crawl past the vending machines, and finally make it to the washers, one look from any other occupant in the room and I swear their eyes glow red and the Supernatural soundtrack starts to play. And don't even get me started on the sock-eating dryers! All ye who dare to enter Wellesley laundry rooms, here ye be warned! 

We had a minor crisis in my film class today. The teacher couldn't get the mac to work. He kept waving his hands around shouting, "Who can work a computer?! Who can work a computer?!" He was shouting and waving so much that no one could get a word in edgewise, so I walked right up to the projector, hooked my laptop into the system, and popped in his drive. Five minutes later, he stopped his frantic rant in Italian and turned around to see me for the first time, iMovie open and his teaching clips already laid out. He opened his mouth, bugged out his eyes, and then promised me a reduced sentence in purgatory before proceeding to teach the class as if the little drama had never taken place. While I'm happy this story had such a happy ending, I can't help but wonder what my professor thinks he knows about me that makes him think I'm not getting a straight-shot to Heaven in the first place.

I go to a quant little liberal arts college in the suburbs of Boston. It is relatively well known for it's academic rigor, the propensity of its alumnae to succeed in life and become Secretary of State, and, most of all, the fact that its football team remains undefeated since the school's founding in 1875. So when I overheard a family discussing how many women they kept seeing around campus, I considered breaking in and asking if they were lost, but ultimately I decided they'd figure it out eventually.  

I'm sorry to say I have been somewhat remiss lately in my film-watching duties. Actually "somewhat" is putting it lightly. In truth, I have not seen a single film that was nominated for an Oscar this year. I blame college. It's a doozy. Still, nothing was going to stop me from watching the Oscars even if I was unable to join in on the annual boo-hooing/cheers that always accompany the announcements of the winner in all the good categories (read: best actors and best picture). I can tell you, however, that the host this year left something to be desired-- like tact. In all fairness though, Captain Kirk tried to warn us. And when Captain Kirk finds something sexiest, you know the debate about whether separate categories for actors and actresses is discriminatory is about to be the least of the Academy's PR problems. 

My college shut down the campus for the second time this year. Prior to this, the school hadn't shut down since The Great Storm of 1978, which has lived in infamy in my family chronicles as the year my grandfather came to visit my mother and her sisters when they were students here and got stuck on campus for three days. (It may also have been the year the tradition of sledding down the green on cafeteria trays started, but that's up to debate.) The first time they canceled school this year it was because of Hurricane Sandy. This time it was Storm Nemo. Well you know what they say, it doesn't rain, but it pours/floods/snows. But back to my school. It's shut down. For the second time in 35 years. How bummed would the Mayans be to know they were only off by a month and a half? 

I really hate flying, partly because of the whole "Lost"/ Cast Away scenario, but mostly because there's really nothing more ideally suited for an awkward situation than being trapped in what amounts to a giant cigar tube with a load of strangers and recycled air. Take yesterday's flight back to college for spring semester. I was stuck in the middle seat (I can feel you guys nodding right now-- yeah this is going where you think it's going). To my left was a middle age woman reading Cosmo. To my right was a boy about my age doing a Rubik's Cube. And by doing a Rubik's Cube, I mean that's all he did. I'd read a few chapters of my book and he'd be doing it. I'd wake up from my catnap and he'd be doing it. I'd go back to reading and he'd STILL be doing it. And it's not like he didn't solve it the first time; he just... couldn't put it away. Until he noticed I was awake (again, because by that time the cycle had repeated more than once) and he asked if I could move so he could go to the bathroom. Apparently I didn't move fast enough, though, because he decided just to climb over me. As I sat there, pressed as far back into my chair as the laws of physics allowed, purposefully avoiding not looking to see how he solved the front or back crossing solution, it occurred to me that maybe Rubrik's Cubes weren't so bad after all, but planes? Yeah, planes were a bad idea.

When I was little, my older sister had this habit of making ingenious contraptions and leaving them around the house. It got to the point that finding a stuffed animal "flying" from the banister or walking into a bathroom converted into a waterproof fort was no less a part of our daily life than watching a movie after dinner. While the frequency of these occurrences has decreased since we all graduated from high school, it's still not unheard of to reach into the freezer and pull out a bottle of suspiciously colored water whose origin has long been forgotten but is generally attributed to "one of Livy's little experiments" from way back when. Therefore when I came across a potpourri dish decoratively bedecked with a bouquet of plastic snakes from a Pick-Up-the-Snakes game in the bathroom, it's understandable that my first reaction was to assume it was another relic from my sister's days as a misunderstood artist. As it turns out, it was my father's and he genuinely thought that was what the snakes were for. 

There comes a time in everyone's life when not having a driver's license is not only inconvenient, but also, truth be told, just down right embarrassing. That time came around three years ago in my case, but I happen to be an expert procrastinator. Unfortunately, however, my time has truly come-- the jig is up, the train has left the station, the Thunderbirds are go, and low and behold, I have a driver's permit. Personally I feel I deserve some major kudos for this. While I wouldn't say the written test is hard, per se, there is a gigantic billboard right in front of the testing center for some personal injury law firm with half a (hopefully) fake car sticking out of it and the words "Have you been INJURED in a CAR WRECK recently?" emblazoned across it. There's really nothing like a personal injury firm advertisement to get you psyched for your future as a license carrying individual. 

My grandfather came for Christmas this year. Putting aside the fact that he's Jewish, this holiday was special for a few reasons. It began with half the house getting a violent stomach virus four days before Christmas Eve, then on Christmas Day, the worst freak snowstorm since The Great Ice Storm of 2000 (or maybe 1999) hit our city, which is somewhere in the country that should never receive a flurry of snow this early in the winter season much less a blizzard. The power went out for two days, leaving the stove inoperable and the central heating dead, during which time my older sister decided it was her mission to smother our grandfather under several hundred blankets in the living room. This holiday also included two separate hospital stays apart from the projectile vomitus pre-Christmas festivities, several dangerous dizzy-spells brought on by either missing meals or not missing enough on the part of our diabetic guest, and a semi-emergency visit to the one doctor with a worse specialty than a dentist: a podiatrist. All things considered, Poppa bore it all well, but he has lived through worse. Like World War Two. Only time will tell, however, what the future holds. We haven't seen our aunt since the last time she stayed for Christmas.... in 2000 (or maybe 1999). 

My father and I were listening to a radio documentary on the Beatles this morning. One of the commentators said that, after hearing a song called Aftermath, Ringo said their next song should be called Aftergeography. Now I know about as much about music as a deaf person at a Brittany Spears concert, but I'm taking this as proof positive of the Beatles' genius. Aftergeography? Who'd have thunk it? 

She told him she was sick and he sent her to the doctor down the street. (By the way, the doctor was wearing a surgical mask with a surgical light on his head and a white coat and made her sit in an uncomfortable chair with various torture tools on the side while he shined a pen light down her throat and mumbled unintelligibly under his breath like he was thinking of a kind way to say she was dying.) Ten minutes later, she emerged alive from the doctor's office with fifty pills to be taken four times a day for three days. Four days later, she was even more sick and her American friend offered her some over-the-counter pills, which she turned down.... because she's in Asia and that's just not how they do things. 

I found yet another gem of a commercial for you to look for if you ever come to Taiwan. This one is for some new touch pad or other. The Action Pad, maybe? Steve Jobs is the spokesperson. And by Steve Jobs, I mean an Asian in a white wig and turtleneck. He also has angel wings and a halo. Those were a good touch, don't you think? I'm sure the Action Pad is nice, but even if you aren't interested in it, you should still watch the commercial. Who wouldn't want to see proof that Steve Jobs went to Heaven and came back Asian?

My host mother seems to think I don't like soup. I'm not sure how this vicious rumor got started, but it's not true. Actually, I think I have an idea. Taiwanese people seem to pride themselves on the temperature of their food, especially the heat of their soup. In Chinese, the word "tang" means soup. It also means hot. The only difference between these words is the tone in which they are pronounced. I'd tell you which is which, but nearly six months here has yet to cure my tone-deafness, so I just move my voice up and down and hope the right one comes out. So there we go, the reason I don't get a serving of broth after my vegetables every evening. One night I must have said I didn't like things too hot, and my mother understood it as I didn't like soup. Chalk one more thing up to the language barrier.