How Happy Are YOU, On a Scale of 1 - 10?

Recently, I joined my mom and dad for dinner at their house.

I looked across the table at my dad.

"How are you feeling?" I asked him. "On a scale of one to ten, with ten being the best?" It was a question his doctors asked him a lot when he was hospitalized last year.

My dad thought for a minute before he replied. "Eight," he said, with a satisfied nod.

"That's pretty good," I said, at the same time my mom cried, "Eight?!" 

"What's wrong with eight?" he asked.

"Why not ten?" my mom countered back. "What could be better than this?"

My dad motioned to the room and the plate of Chinese take-out that was getting cold in front of him. "Well, there's got to be room on the scale for feeling better than ... this," he said.

"Not me," my mom said, happily digging in to her noodles. "I've got my family with me and I'm eating my dinner. I'm a ten!"

She smiled at us, her eyes sparkling. And I knew ... my mom was being sincere.

We chatted some more as we ate our meals, and then we rinsed our plates and push them in the dishwasher.

"I think I'll go home now," I said, putting on my shoes.

"Oh," my mom said, her smile fading. "Now I'm an eight."

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I thought about that a lot over the next couple days, feeling happy that my mom was so content.

And I thought about it weeks later, when my mom and dad's sweet dog Winnie got sick and had to be put to sleep. I watched my mom say goodbye. She got down on the floor with her dog, wrapped her arms around Winnie's shoulders, and wept into her fur. On a scale of one to ten, I was watching my mom sink down to a one. It broke my heart.

I knew it would take her a long time to climb back up to ten. I know she's still working on it.

That's what makes my mom's heart so beautiful and so brave. I love my mom, and her great, big feelings. And I love the way my mom loves. She loves with all she's got.

If you're lucky enough to be loved by my mom, you get all of her. On a scale of 1 - 10, my mom gives a 10 every time.

"They're just jealous" and other mom-isms

My Mom: [listing reasons why I'm a great catch] ...you're successful, you're funny...
Me: Some people think I'm not funny, Mom.
My Mom: Yeah? Some people are assholes.

My mom is the kind of mom I can never solicit advice from, unless I'm actually fishing for the answer "They're just jealous." As in, "Someone was mean to you? They're just jealous." My mom has a hearty bias--one in which I am adorable, clever and always perfectly lovable. It's sweet of her.

My mom is the best kind of mom. For one, she's super competent. When I was little, I felt bad for the kids whose moms seemed scatterbrained. My mom was always on top of everything--sewing the best Halloween costume in my class, delivering me to classmates' birthday parties with a meticulously wrapped present in hand, or even showing up at my school with the lunch I didn't even realize I had forgotten on the kitchen counter. My mom could cut my hair, fix my toys and find the things I lost.

I still count on her competence, like when we went to Montreal together and my mom figured out how to ride the indecipherable metro system even though it was all in French. My mom doesn't speak French. She's just good to have around.

My mom is a personal chef, which is the perfect job for someone who's skilled as well as warm and loving. She loves to feed people, which is wonderful when you're 32 and survive on Trader Joe's. Whenever I go to her house, she puts a plate of food in my hand, brings me a sweater and asks me all about my day.

She's also so much fun to be around.

My mom in Calgary, ready to pounce on 7th row seats for Pearl Jam.
We followed Pearl Jam's 2011 Canadian tour together because she is my favorite.

My mom lost her mom to cancer when she was very young. I think that awful fact granted me a very early understanding that moms are impermanent.

I can't imagine what my life would be like without my mom--so generous with her food and affection, so eager to accompany me on adventures, so tirelessly willing to hear about my every irritation, and so subtly funny.

I appreciate her every damn day.

A Girl Can Do What She Wants to Do and That's What I'm Gonna Do

I got my hair cut today. I like to cut my hair in tribute to Joan Jett.

My Joan Jett tributes last exactly one day, because I don't have the three hands patience required to operate a blow dryer + roundbrush. 

I saw Joan Jett play in Pensacola this summer and immediately recognized what I later read in books about her. Joan Jett is considered rebellious not because she's some deviant with an attitude problem. She's just her self... her larger-than-life, unabashed and unapologetic self. She manages to be a sweet, sexy, underdog who radiates joy and even kindness. I love this quote:

"I'm kind of a loner in a lot of ways, but in other ways, I'm very much a rule follower. Rules of civility. Rules that help us all get along. There's a thing called right-of-way, please and thank you. My rebellion is not about authority--well maybe it is a little bit about authority, but it's more about society." 
-- Joan Jett 

It is an act of defiance, sometimes, to just be happy being yourself. I've tried to love some people who couldn't handle all of me. It broke my heart, but there's nothing I can do about it. 

I think that if I ever get to have a daughter, when she hits that inevitable time in high school when she realizes she's too creative and free-thinking and self-aware to blend in with the popular kids, I will sit her down and play "Bad Reputation" and hope she doesn't think I'm just old and out-of-touch. And I'll say, from the bottom of my corny, sweet heart, "I don't give a damn if you think you're strange / you don't have to change."

You go, Joan.