The Best Kept Secret Blog - Where Am I?

I felt like a subject in a cognitive behaviour experiment, someone who's thrown into a foreign environment and is forced to figure out a whole new set of survival skills pronto if there’s any hope of making it out alive; or Paris Hilton being asked to collect pig manure on The Surreal Life; or Mrs. (Lovey) Howell realizing that coconut milk doesn’t “just come” in crystal glasses with little umbrellas propped in for presentation.

When I started back to school, I knew getting into the rhythm of reading textbooks and writing papers would be challenging after a long absence from the classroom but I was up to the task.

I suspected I might be the oldest student there and that my age and experience would give me a different worldview from my fellow students but I was hopeful that might turn out to be a good thing.

What I didn’t expect was waking up in a middle-aged Twilight Zone and the unwelcome realization, like a cold and unforgiving smack in the face, that the world had changed an awful lot since I left the full-time workforce to stay home and raise kids.

I thought I’d been keeping up, that I wasn’t like “the other moms” who baked and cleaned and were overly invested in their children. Anyone who knows me could tell you what a crappy cook I am, more apt to go for quantity than quality.

Didn’t I prefer to spend my days reading and having enlightening discussions with my friends (“You got that at Winners? Do they have any left?”), instead of pursuing frivolous decorating and housekeeping?

And while I adore my kids, I’m careful not to live my life through them. (“I don’t care if Sasha’s mom home schools her. Not only do you need to be with other children but Mommy’s busy with her own life. Now get to school. I’m going to be late for my manicure.”)

So when Mommy took her own life back to school and enrolled in a course at a local university, I didn’t think it would take me that long to get up to speed. Mommy was mistaken.

Last Wednesday, we were asked to break into small groups and find something we had in common with our fellow students.

My “peers” – all in their early twenties – and I tried. It was obvious the usual common denominators – do you have children, are both your parents still living, did your husband get a good severance package when he was layed-off from his senior management job – just wouldn’t work.

But even more generic things – What kind of a car do you drive? (they don’t own cars); Do you hate the sky high property taxes we’re forced to pay? (they don’t own property); What’s you’re favourite TV show (them: Gossip Girl, me: Sex and The City reruns) – didn’t work. The best we came up with is that we all had relatives who had been in World War II. Their grand-fathers, my father.

Things got worse.

Our instructor, who had asked us to bring in a copy of a magazine we read, had us go around the room and present our choices.

As their hands held up copies of artsy issues of Wallpaper, Stop Smiling and a host of other publications I had never heard of, I felt my cheeks get hot.

As they waxed on about the sophisticated use of metaphor and the sharp and beautiful cover shots of bored-looking, young metro-sexuals sporting all manor of piercings, I was in a full-out sweat.

By the time it was my turn, I thought I might pee my pants as I feebly held up my copy of Homemakers magazine, it’s warm pink and red cover a perfect counterpoint to the vegetable lasagna recipe featured prominently on the front.

We huddled to discuss magazine writing style and give examples from our favourite publications. My fellow group members got into a lively debate about the merits of particular stories in magazines I had never heard of, let alone cracked the cover on. The ones, I suspect, I gave a superficial glance at as I passed them over in favour of Canadian Living or the latest issue of Oprah’s O Magazine. Finally I had the answer to the question that always flickered through my mind whenever I noticed one of these periodicals – “Who reads these things anyway?” Now I know.

I tried my best to be part of the conversation but it became painfully obvious I had nothing to contribute. I toyed with the idea of offering to go get everyone a coffee but eventually opted to just shut-up and try to learn a thing or two.

And it was while I was listening to the debate, I realized how sheltered I may have become.

Author Leslie Bennetts, in her bestselling book The Feminine Mistake, argues that women pay a heavy toll when they choose stay-at-home motherhood over being a working mom. Like many middle-aged women who stayed home to raise their children, I'm apt to argue against Ms. Bennetts point. My husband hasn't left me, I'm not impoverished and I've got a good life.

But as my classmates have taught me, there's a world out there that keeps going on and, shame on me, maybe I haven't kept up with it enough. Maybe I've gotten a little too comfortable.

I've got another class tonight and I suspect I'll once again be stunned by just how much I don't know. The obvious upside is that isn't it great I still have so much to learn at my age. And hey, maybe I even have a thing or two I can offer "the kids" in my class. Maybe I can give them a ride home.

The Best Kept Secret Blog - And Then I Returned To School

This is not another story of a middle-aged woman returning to school, only to discover that, despite a brain that's slightly mushy and fellow students who are young enough to be her children, her experience running a household and holding down a job for the past couple of decades has equipped her with the skills necessary to excel at her studies.

This is the story of a middle-aged woman returning to school only to discover that the key to academic success lies in sucking up to the administration staff - a.k.a. The Registration Ladies.

Our story begins on a cold, snowy day in early January. I'm standing in line at Ryerson University, waiting my turn to register for night school.

On one side of the counter sit the Registration Ladies - grim faced, thick skinned women whose fashion sense seems to have stopped evolving sometime in the mid 1990's.

On the other side are the students, mostly young, a jumble of damp fleece, back packs and iPods.

The Registration Ladies seem to take great pleasure in making us wait. There are long pauses between one student leaving and the next one being called though there never seems to be an apparent reason why.

I'm almost to the front of the queue when I realize the magnitude of the power the Registration Ladies wield. One false step - "I said I need to see TWO piece of ID." - could send someone to the back of the line just like that.

Verifying my own ID situation, I decide I need a plan. I have to get the Ladies on my side if I have any hope of getting my course and walking out the door in time to get home and start dinner.

Then it comes to me. I'm not like the other wet behind the ears, barely out of high school kids who are easily intimidated. I'm a mature woman and my tuition pays the Registration Ladies wages. I, in fact, am their client and I should get the same respect I get from the other women who occasionally work for me, like my cleaning lady and the girls at the Vietnamese nail studio where I go for manicures.

I will speak to the Registration Ladies clearly and directly and they will respond respectfully in turn.

"Hello", I say confidently as I approach the counter and offer my form. "I'd like to register for this course."

The Registration Lady ignores me and walks to the back of the office where she appears to be adjusting her cardigan while staring at a closed filing cabinet.

Am I supposed to wait? Is she leaving for a smoke break?

The other students glower at me as if it's all my fault that she's left her station and thanks to my dim-wittedness, they're going to have to endure even more time in the line-up.

I'm about to start calling, "Hello? Hello?" when she returns. She grabs my form and begins punching information into her computer.

"Two pieces of ID?" she barks. I'm ready and push my drivers license and SIN card at her.

"Have you ever registered for a course here before?" she asks.

"Well yes, but it's been some time since I took it. I have two children and find it really hard to balance work and family and everything else. But the youngest is turning 9 and I decided that I just really needed something for me. Do you know what I mean?"

She looks at me like I'm an idiot then selects "Yes" on her screen.

"That'll be $535."

I hand her my Visa card.

"We don't take Visa - just cash or cheque," she informs me.

"What? Everyone takes Visa."

"The system's down. It's just cash or cheque until things are back up."

I rummage in my purse accidentally spilling loose Tic Tacs, my cell phone and a tampon as I try to find a cheque. There is no way I'm giving up on getting in this course and there's no way I'm coming back another day to register.

Transaction complete she rubber stamps my copy of the form. I'm about to leave when she snarls, "Go to the One-Card office down the hall to get your student ID card."

Arriving at the One-Card office, I'm greeted by yet another Registration Lady who takes more of my money then asks me to stand in front of a camera.

Instinctively I fluff my hair - it's been snowing all morning and my hair is still a little damp from my walk from the subway but how bad can it be?

And hey, the worst of the registration is over. Just one picture and I'm out of here. I smile happily as I imagine myself back at school, drinking coffee in lectures and challenging the professor as a wise and mature returning student.

The card printer machine chugs and whirrs and minutes later out pops my card. Who is that woman on my card? Please tell me it's not me. She reminds me of one of those dried-apple dolls that were so popular in the 1970s.

There must be a mistake. This must be the card for the person just before me or just after me. But as I see a beautiful 20-something girl just leaving and a 60-something black man with a beard waiting for his card, I'm forced to accept a sad truth - the only hope I have of surviving at school, and perhaps in life, is to suck up the Registration Ladies.

The Best Kept Secret Blog - Get Out Of My Face(book)

It started with an e-mail from my friend R. Would I be her friend?

This was a strange request coming from a woman I had know for 30 years, whose wedding I had attended and whose head I had held over the toilet while she threw up copious amounts of the celebratory punch served at her 40th birthday party.

When I replied with a witty, "????", she immediately shot back her own response.

"I'm talking about a Facebook friend. [Duhhh...] You've heard of it, right?"

Well of course I had heard of it. It's THE social networking site for high school and college kids but why on earth would middle-aged women like R. and I bother with it?

"It's addictive. You'll love it," she promised and so it was that I found myself posting a bare bones profile of myself on my new Facebook account.

For a shy woman who is occupied with kids, husband and contemplating why her thighs are turning to cottage cheese, the profile step proved intimidating.

Do I list tunes by Van Morrison, Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello as my favourite music or do I try to appear hip, grab my daughter's iPod and copy down the names of the songs she listens to? I eventually decided that honesty is the best policy and listed my favourite artists from the 80s. (Besides, I couldn't figure out how to work my daughter's iPod.)

I steered clear of Political and Religious Views, was a little frustrated by the choices under Relationship Status (why can't you select both "Married" and "It's Complicated"?) and soon found myself in Favourite Quotations.

Once again, the shy woman was stumped.

While I wanted to copy my sexy friend Y's quote - "I once had a rose named after me, I was flattered until I read that it was no good in bed but fine against a wall" Eleanor Roosevelt - the best I could come up with was "When your friends begin to flatter you on how young you look, it's a sure sign you're getting old.", Mark Twain.

I finished my profile, viewed 17 photos of R. and her book club debating the merits of the latest Oprah pick and called it a day.

Then the requests started coming in.

It seems R. and I aren't the only middle-aged women on Facebook. Before I could say "Google" I had requests to become Facebook friends with three other acquaintances who found me via R.

I couldn't go to a PTA meeting or grab a coffee with a colleague without being asked, "Are you on Facebook?"

It be came stressful responding to friend requests. I suppose I could've just click "Confirm" and left it at that but I always felt compelled to write a little something to go with my confirmation - something witty and sharp.

But what with the laundry and helping with homework and my midlife inability to recall common nouns, I found the task daunting. Many a night found me sitting at the computer, staring at a friend request for hours, before finally tapping out a banal, "Yes, I'll be your friend."

Before I knew it, I had become connected to more virtual friends than I actually had in real life.

I was confused.

Maybe I wasn’t using it correctly but why would I care that my hairdresser’s cousin was a Lord of The Rings fan? Not only did I wonder how my ex-boyfriend had found me on Facebook but how did he end up with Bob Dylan as one of his friends? Isn’t Bob Dylan dead?

And to think I once found Cutting and Pasting confusing!

I'm thinking of taking a little break from Facebook and scaling back on my cyber adventures.

Although, I have recently gotten into a cool web site called Second Life. You get to create an avatar, a virtual you created exactly as you want her to be. You should check it out - it's way more fun than Facebook. Look for my avatar - she's got the body of a 25 year old, an IQ of 140 and never worries about cottage cheese thighs.

The Best Kept Secret Blog - Anti-Resolutions

Despite being the reigning Queen of New Year's resolution making, I just can't seem to muster the gumption to do any goal setting for 2009. Even things as simple as "Eat more vegetables" or "Floss daily" don't get me going.

While some of you won't see this as a big deal, for someone like me, whose middle name could be "Reinvention", it's perplexing.

As I sit here pondering what's caused this apathetic state, I realize I've been disappointed one time too many. Despite years of listening to the experts, gurus and pundits and believing in The Secret, S.M.A.R.T. goal setting techniques and daily affirmations, I'm still a middle-aged woman who shops too much, carries five extra pounds and can't seem to give up her red wine habit.

I think it's high time to throw in the towel and acknowledge that maybe none of this works.

In fact, I'll go one step further and save the rest of you some time by offering up some anti-resolution guidance.

1. www.TheSecretIsBS.com

It takes courage to even write this, let alone believe it.

Every time I glance at these words or repeat them in my head, I imagine thunder and lightening and fire and brimstone raining down on me.

Yes, it's good to be positive and grateful but come on! It doesn't always apply.

For example, let's see you try telling a Mexican immigrant who makes $14,000 a year picking strawberries in southern California to ask the Universe to give him back the $720,000 house he lost in the sub prime debacle and you'll have a thing or two raining down on your head - primarily expletives in Spanish.

2. Make up your mind about the red wine controversy.

This was a year of mixed messages on whether or not drinking a glass of red wine a day is a good thing or a bad thing. The jury is still out and individual women must weigh the pros and the cons.

Drink red wine and decrease your risk of stroke and heart disease.

Drink red wine and increase your risk of breast cancer.

To this I would also ask you to consider the following:

Drink red wine and increase the odds of a calm, harmonious family life.

Drink red wine and decrease the odds of ranting at your husband and kids that possessing breasts and a vagina does not uniquely qualify you to clear the dinner table and pick up dog poo from the back yard.

3. Diets Don't Work

I don't care that Marie Osmond lost 40 lbs. on NutriSystem. As anyone who is even vaguely aware of the Oprahsphere knows, her Oprahness has gained Marie's 40 lbs. and has crossed the 200 lb. threshold.

And this is despite having a personal trainer at her disposal, a staff chef who can whip up roasted flax seed any time of day or night and a host of flaky friends like Marianne Williamson and Eckhart Tolle who encourage Oprah to figure out what she's really hungry for. (I suspect it's a side of fries with gravy though Oprah claims it's work-life balance.)

While I'm all for healthy eating and regular exercise, I encourage you to never underestimate the benefits of chocolate and the number of calories burned by reaching for the a cork screw.


Last January I made myself neurotic trying to live up to all my New Year's resolutions. This year I'm taking a moratorium from New Year - New Me goal setting. Check back in a year and I'll let you know how it's gone.

My hope is that I'll be better off for it - a healthy, vital middle age woman no worse for the lack of big goals. My biggest fear? That Oprah's 40 lbs. (previously part of the Osmond clan) will find their way to me.

The Best Kept Secret Blog - Out Of The Mouths of Seniors

Okay, so maybe it didn't rank up there with finding a cure for cancer or being selected as a contestant on So You Think You Can Dance Canada but I was proud of what I had done. An article of mine had been published in the December issue of More magazine.

Like any proud writer I told all my friends, casual acquaintances and the woman who sat next to me on the subway about the piece. And I handed out copies of the magazine to the people in my life whom I wanted to impress, including my 80-something mother-in-law.

I love my in-laws and think we have a pretty good relationship as far as these things go but given my mother-in-law comes from a generation that values hard work and a strong moral backbone, I can`t help but wonder if she`s not just a little perplexed as to why I schlep around in Lulu Lemon`s all day, drinking coffee and tapping away on my computer keyboard, all the while calling it work. My article was vindication, proof that I had a "real" job.

My husband dropped off the magazine and I didn`t hear a peep until two weeks later when my mother-in-law called to discuss the particulars for an upcoming family gathering.

We had just dispensed with the business of whether I would bring a salad or dessert when she mentioned the article.

Mother-in-Law (MIL): "Oh, and by the way dear, I read your article."

Me (Casually, preparing to bask in the glow of her praise): "Oh - what did you think?"

MIL: "I found it really depressing and didn`t care for it much but it did seem to be grammatically correct."

Me: "But the article is about three women who tried to reinvent themselves at midlife, failed yet learned from their mistakes and became all the better for it. It`s meant to be uplifting."

MIL: "The women in your article were so obsessed with their looks and their hair turning gray. I don`t see how you can call that uplifting dear."

Me: "But the article chronicles a woman who went through a painful divorce, an entrepreneur whose first business flopped and an author who unwittingly made very publishing mistake in the book. It doesn`t even mention their looks."

MIL: "Well, maybe it was just the magazine itself but it seems like all you girls in your 40s and 50s are so worried about getting older and whether you`re accomplishing enough. Why I`d love to be in my 40s again. You should tell those women to buck up and do some volunteer work - they`d all be better off thinking about someone else than worrying about themselves so much.

"Now, how are those grandchildren of mine?"


At first, I was deflated by our conversation - didn`t she know how big of an accomplishment this was for me?

But the more I thought about our conversation, the more I detected some grains of wisdom in her words. Perhaps in our generation`s bid to celebrate midlife, we`re spending too much time at the party.

Where our mother's only provisions for navigating midlife were a box of Lady Clairol and the occasional discreet joke about "The Change:, we turn to books, magazines, coaches and websites to be our guide. We worship at the altar of reinvention and look at aging like we`re staring into the fiery maw of the devil himself.

Maybe we`re looking for too much reassurance that I`m Okay - You`re Okay and like my mother-in-law suggests, we need to get on with more important things.

I, in fact, have already made my first move in that direction by enrolling in a dance class. Auditions for the next season of So You Think You Can Dance Canada will be starting soon and I intend to be ready.