So What's With The Profile Picture, Anyway?

Yanno...it's dawned on me that someone may be wondering who the lovely lady, featured in one corner of my profile, is.  

Well, now, there are a couple of answers to that:

1. If you're a tall, dark, handsome Irishman who plays percussion during his waking hours, and you wonder if it's actually me, in costume...of course, the answer is HECK, YEAH!  Come on down!

2. Okay. The truth, however, is...not really. For one thing, I'm a little more contemporary in my dress than she is. (!) And there are, shall we say, a few other differences as well. Alas.

But the reason that picture is on my page is something that happened a long time ago, at my RWA Chapter meeting, when someone had an old book in which they were doing research and came across portraits of famous poets and writers--and their spouses.

And at that time, that lovely person pointed to the image you see and said, "Wow, you look just like Lord Byron's wife."

To which we all laughed--until we looked at the image. And realized that at that time in my life, yes, indeed, I DID kind of look like this woman. 

Of course, we've all changed in the ensuing years.

Lord Byron's wife is, clearly, no longer with us.

I still am among the living, but...trust me...I don't look like that fresh-faced young thing anymore. 

Although, it must be said, her expression is remarkably similar to the expression I had on my face in one of my bride-alone wedding pictures.

I was looking somewhat pensive, thoughtful, solemn, whatever you want to call it...and to this day it's a shot I think is one of the more beautiful pictures anyone ever took of me.

Of course, I was also 29 years old. So who doesn't look wonderful at 29?

BUT...

In any event...

That's the answer to the question. The lovely lady is Lord Byron's wife, Annabelle. Her story is a sad and disturbing one, with enough soap-opera elements in it to seemingly justify the old saw about artists "suffering to be brilliant." But in this picture, she's clearly enjoying a more serene moment, and I'd like to think that a little of that serenity was in my expression* when my fellow writer declared the likeness.

There you have it.

Any famous, or moderately famous, person out there that they say YOU look like?

Feel free to share in the comments!

Janny

*lest there be any misunderstandings, however, "serenity" has rarely been used to describe my temperament!

The Little Stuff--or, "Would You Like Fries With That?"

Had the TV on yesterday, watching part of a feel-good Hallmark movie as I ate my late lunch, and saw a commercial come on for the finale of This Is Us. It started with a woman singing a snippet of "Time After Time," and clearly was focusing on one of the characters whose memory was going, probably permanently, through one of the horrific mind-stealers such as Alzheimer's.  

Now, I don't watch that show. I never have, although it's been recommended to me. I got a couple of glimpses of some scenes in promos, heard some comments online about it, and decided it wouldn't be a good place for me to hang around, for more than one reason. So, in one sense, I had no context for how deeply the commercial hit me.

But it did me in.  Because the woman's voiceover was saying, "I'm not afraid of losing the big stuff. That's not what I'm worried about. It's the little things I'm afraid of losing."

And I sat in front of the TV and bawled.

Because that's what it's always, and ever, all about. 

That's what life is about.

A thousand little things. Strung together, for a few thousand days, multiplied over a few decades' worth of walking the planet...are what life ends up being about.

And it's what loss is also about, in its most painful and persistent form.

We all talk about it, after we lose someone we love.

We talk about the little things. Like missing their voice on the phone. Like longing for their smile across the kitchen table. Like expecting them to come walking around the corner any minute, carrying the newspaper, or a coffee cup, or the cat...

But they're never going to do that again.

And every time we have to face that, over and over, it's a new shattering inside.

This has nothing to do with whether we believe we'll ever see them again. For Catholics, as it says so touchingly in the funeral liturgy, life is changed, not ended, and frankly? That's the only thing that keeps most of us a) sane, and b) from offing ourselves out of sheer agony or despair. We know we'll see them again. 

But that's also what makes it so hard. 

Because when someone is woven in the warp and woof of your life, their absence leaves holes in you. And those holes often don't mend all the way. Sometimes, they snag. Tear open. 

And sometimes, the craziest things can be snags.

Like the ad for a TV show you don't even watch.

Or an ad for French fries.

Yep. You heard that right. 

There's an ad out there right now from Wendy's, touting their "Hot and Crispy Fries."

But Wendy's fries were bragging material way before this...at least in my world.

As in, early 1980.

When I first began hanging out with Patrick, one of our conversations touched on the various jobs we'd had over the years. One of those jobs, for him, was working in high school, part-time...at (you guessed it) Wendy's.

Making French fries.

Yeah, of course, tons of kids work in fast food when they're in high school. And the Wendy's connection is "just a coincidence."

Except...that the conversation we had about French fries would probably have made Dave Thomas himself proud. Because Patrick didn't just learn how to make fries; he learned how to make  them from a guy who was so good at it that people used to stop at Wendy's in Palatine just for the fries. They'd get the other parts of their meal elsewhere, but Wendy's had the best fries in town, even then. Even before they decided to call their brand "Hot and Crispy," this guy's fries were hot, crispy, and addictive.

And he taught Patrick how to make them that way, too. Something that this young pup took very seriously, indeed, because the restaurant's reputation hung on it. 

Thus, during one of my first conversations with my future husband, I learned the proper way to prepare fries so they were hot, crispy but not dry, and tender  but not soggy. Patrick enjoyed learning how to do it, and he was proud that he learned to do it to his mentor's standards.

The funny parts about this?

First, that I couldn't tell you exactly how it was done now.

But second?

That Patrick could take a look at the technique of the "fry guy" in any food place we went to, pretty much for the rest of our lives, and tell me if the fries were going to be any good or not.

And he'd be right.

Recently, I heard some sports commentators talking about working the "fry" area of a restaurant--and claiming that "everybody knew" that making fries was the worst job in the place. It was always given to the rank beginners, the guys on the bottom of the totem pole. 

Yet, at least one guy--and his apprentice--made the product of that lowly job something the restaurant became  known for, and did it with a great deal of pride.

I applauded it then, as I applaud it now.

Little things.

You never know how they may come back, years later, and touch your life.

So pay attention...now.

And appreciate that good fry guy, if you've got one. 

Because someone, somewhere, loves him.

And he won't always be around...for either of you.

Thoughts?

Janny