the pieces of my life

The world is a cruel place. And I know that as a mother I now need to learn how to help my child through some of life’s rougher moments. The Boston Globe understands this, and to help beleaguered parents, there was a front page story on Monday on how to deal with the newest, harshest loss that has come to pass. They consulted with a child psychologist so that good parents everywhere can guide their young ones:

“Rather than saying this is the way things go and there will be someone else, say, ‘I see you’re upset. I know this is upsetting. Do you want to talk about it? Because I’m upset, too,'” [Dr. Carolyn Newberger, a Brookline child psychologist] said….

“The reality is awful,” she said. “But this is a reality that will help the children understand a little more how the world works.”

I hope that you will show the same sensitivity, the same kindness, the same empathy in talking to your children about this very important issue. Because with everything going on in the world today, everyone knows that what really is hurting children today is … the freakin’ trade of Nomar to the Cubs!

Ohmygod, people, get over yourselves!!! Front page coverage? Child psychologists? Of course, as the Globe reports, “Garciaparra’s trade to the Chicago Cubs arguably has been hardest on his youngest fans — 5-, 6-, and 7-year-olds — who don’t understand contract disputes, free agency, or soured employer-employee relationships.”

Look, I love my husband and I support him completely in his passions, but puh-lease! If these kids want to be Red Sox fans they’re going to have to learn to deal with heartache and disappointment! If the parents were truly smart, they’d say, “Toughen up, sweetie. Welcome to the fellowship of the miserable.” Welcome to the real world, kid. Life sucks, and then the Yankees win.

I’m normally loathe to clean out my books, but they’re multiplying at too rapid a pace to keep up with. And, I have to face it, I own a lot of crap. So any book that I’m not going to read again, don’t think is good enough to lend out, or that I’ll honestly never read has to go. Out of the hundreds of books I own, I could find about seven to get rid of. Not the most thorough of cleanings. I can’t help it. I just find I become attached to books. I was able to get rid of the Kathy Acker books I have because an ex-boyfriend raved about them. I’ll never get through them. And I now have a suspicious hunch he never read them either but thought it was cool to be po-mo. That boyfriend is gone, and now so are my Kathy Acker books. I also own a lot of books I haven’t read from my Amazon days. A magical shelf lived in a corner of editorial called the free shelf. When editors were done with their review copies, they migrated to this shelf for the rest of us to pick over. Oh how I miss the free shelf.

With the exception of the Acker books, the books are certified trash in that it’s not even worth it to sell them used on Amazon. For instance, there’s Amy and Isabelle : A novel by Elizabeth Strout, which I bought for a book club. It’s selling for a penny. This was a horrendous book I wouldn’t inflict on friends so into the donation pile it goes. Along with other winners such as Honeymoon: A Novel by Amy Jenkins, selling for 34 cents, which seemed like it would be a better read when I picked it off Brookline Booksmith’s remainders table (their remainders are usually so good!); After Life by Rhian Ellis selling for a penny, another book club book; and Amanda’s Wedding: A Novel by Jenny Colgan, going for 78 cents, which I came from the free shelf. If only I had a free shelf now to put these back on. Maybe one of these days I’ll make an actual dent in my cleaning out. Then again, maybe not.

I got a letter from Citicards saying my card was being upgraded to whatever it is they upgrade you to. I wasn’t to do anything; they’ll just send me my new card. However, it required getting a new account, which I didn’t want to do. So I called to decline the new card.

“That’s fine,” the customer service rep said, “but this card has a negative option, meaning if you don’t take the new card, we’ll close your account when your card expires.”

“Okay,” I said.

The rep seemed surprised. “You understand that we’ll cancel your account?”

“I understand that,” I said.

“If you don’t accept the new card,” she repeated, “when you’re card expires, your account will be closed.”

“That’s fine,” I said.

“May I ask why?”

“My card doesn’t expire for another two years. So I can keep my account number for two years. And if you really think that within the next two years, Citibank isn’t going to send me at least 110 offers to upgrade/change/modify my account, then you haven’t been working for Citibank for very long. Like Citibank is going to let a customer escape.”

Negative option my… Well, I was going to write “my a*ss,” but I’m trying to clean things up for the wee one, so I’ll just write, Negative option, my tushie. These companies and their little machinations are just annoying.