Lydia Archives - Page 13 of 51 - Ramblin' with Roger

Lydster: Missed the laundromat

The Roches

My daughter had the opportunity to use the laundromat, but alas! She missed it.

In late April, our clothes dryer died. This was not a particularly surprising occurrence, given the clunking racket it had been making for several months. Still, it was annoying, particularly for my daughter. She was straightening her room. So she had… a few loads to do. It was also a bother for me, as a jagged piece of metal on the machine – where did THAT come from? – punctured my thumb. Grawlix.

This took place on a Saturday, and my wife was visiting her mother out of town. We couldn’t even order a machine until she returned home on Monday. And the new machine would not be delivered until eight days after that.

My wife washed clothes that week and took them to the laundromat. Did my daughter want to do the same? NO! The idea of schlepping wet clothes to someplace else was weird to her.

Too bad. There is an art to cleaning one’s clothes in the public arena. Getting the quarters. Finding the empty machines. It’s a ritual of being on one’s own.

My sisters reminded me that the washer, and probably the dryer were in our kitchen. I have only vague recollections of this.

“Her cycle is through”

But I have vivid memories of gathering the dirty clothes and taking them to the various laundry establishments. Each has its own idiosyncrasies in terms of cost, size, lighting, cleanliness, and availability of machines.

Especially the latter. When you need a washer, the machines are all full, but the wash is done, how long do you wait until you pull out someone else’s stuff, place it in one of those baskets or on a counter, and put your own clothes in?

These are the negotiations of life that can be very useful in other venues. I would have introduced my daughter to the song The Death of Suzzy Roche by the sister singing group the Roches, who I saw perform back in the 1980s.

A rule to live by: “Everybody in the laundromat is equal.” It’ll be something my daughter will probably learn eventually.

Lydster: COVID vaccine procurement

Albany Public Library and Mohawk Ambulance

Recently in this blog, I noted the vagaries of COVID vaccine procurement. I had my first shot scheduled for March 31 at the UAlbany campus, when unexpectedly, I got an appointment at CVS on March 3.

Likewise, I had nailed down for my daughter her first shot for April 17 at the Washington Avenue Armory in Albany. Then on March 26, my wife received a text that there would be a pop-up vaccination site the very next day. She’d gotten a text from the Albany Housing Authority a month earlier that she should sign up, though she doesn’t recall how that occurred.

As she was heading for a meeting, she gave me the URL, but it didn’t work. Slightly panicky that the window of opportunity would close, I called the site, the Arbor Hill/West Hill library branch, and spoke to a librarian who I know. He knew the event was taking place but none of the details; I’m sure, as a librarian, that had to bug him. It would have frustrated me.

When my wife was free, she got a second website that DID work, and I got my daughter an appointment. And just in time, because the six-hour window (9-3) was down to about an hour.

The process

Since my wife was going to Oneonta to pick up her mother and take her to Cooperstown for her second injection, my daughter and I needed to take public transportation. We took the #106 CDTA bus, which was the #138 the last time I took it who knows how long ago. It dropped us off at Livingston and Henry Johnson, a couple of short blocks from the library.

One of the things my daughter does that I admire is giving extremely wide berth to those folks we walked past who were not wearing masks. My sense is that these people are on the uptick in Albany, commensurate with COVID cases inching up statewide.

The line was short, and we went through fairly quickly. The event was run by Mohawk Ambulance. Though the information from the website did not specify, I knew I had to go to the table with my daughter because she’s under 18. There were about 10 tables in all, each with someone to register, and another to give the injection.

My registrar was kind but technologically impaired. Fortunately, her teenage daughter was also there to assist her. I offered my daughter’s non-driver’s ID; as I expected, she was confounded. This was because the picture was of my daughter at about the age of six. While the ID is still valid, she hardly looks the same except to me. I was glad I asked my daughter to bring her high school ID. While not an official item, it was sufficient for the registrant.

Easy

Next, I handed the registrant the letter from my daughter’s doctor. It noted that she “has medical conditions that meet current criteria for vaccination under the Phased Distribution of the Vaccine set forth by the NYS Department as seen at” this website. I pre-emptively said, “Sufficiently vague, eh?” I could have noted the need for the doctor to respect the HIPAA requirements of his patient, but I thought of this later.

After the injection, we were supposed to wait for 10-15 minutes. Mayor Kathy Sheehan was there. She said her husband had gotten his injection at the site an hour earlier. We walked to the #12 bus, rode it, then walked home. Eighty minutes from leaving the house to walking back in the door, including public transportation. My sister’s friend in the San Diego area spent FIVE HOURS that same day.

My friend Catbird has a friend over 65 in Albany who, as of a couple of weeks ago, still couldn’t find a vaccine. I suggested that the friend sign up for everything. The county site, the state site, CVS, Walgreens, whatever, because the supply is definitely loosening up.

Lydster: advantage of having a child “later”

At least, I know who Robert was.

I have this friend Fred, whose parents were about 40 when he was born. In an apparent act of hubris, I didn’t have my child until I was a decade older than that.

I suppose the advantage of having a child “later” in life is that I suppose I am more patient. Hey, I’m not saying totally cool, but better than if I’d been younger.

One cool thing is that I get to hear music I might not have heard. Some of it I even like.

I get her perspective on the issues of the day. She’s been watching the news since she was nine. Of course, she now consumes in a manner that I generally don’t, on the phone. She is savvy enough to ask what of it is real and what is bogus.

Issues such as Black Lives Matter, and race generally, are of great interest to her. She’s passionate about helping others, participating in a monthly food drive. Saving the earth is very important, and she can cite statistics about how much more environmentally damaging meat is. She’s almost entirely a vegetarian.

We often have similar sensibilities. She and I enjoy bananas far less ripe than my wife does. Our sense of time is about the same. I’m the one she’ll usually tell certain stories about school experiences.

Torture

On the other hand, she knows there’s a lot of current mundane pop culture stuff that my brain simply refuses to absorb. So she’ll learn it and then test me on it.

Her current torture involves the Kardashians. Who are they, what are their kids’ names, etc.? For instance, she has told me, that the father of Khloe Kardashian’s baby True is Tristan Thompson. Then 15 minutes later, I won’t remember which Kardashian is a parent to which child. I don’t care, she knows I don’t care, and she has great fun with it.

It’s a joy to be her dad. But don’t tell her I said so.

Lydster: Zoom school sucks!

The ever-educational They Might Be Giants

As I must have mentioned, my daughter was all primed to go to school in person as late as August 24, 2020. Instead, she got Zoom school this fall, after suffering through it from mid-March 2020 and on. It’s not actually on Zoom, but whatever. And that’s not what they label it.

They call it “remote learning.” Remote: “having very little connection with or relationship to”; that’s about right. On the last Sunday of January, I had five Zoom meetings. Well, almost. The church was on Facebook and one of the meetings was on a Zoom-like platform called Wonder.

Except for church, though, it was people looking at other people located in little rectangles on my computer. Worse, some people STILL haven’t mastered the mute button.

So I feel my daughter’s pain. She has four or five of those every weekday. Some folks, in trying to encourage her… well, didn’t. I’ve occasionally sat in on some of those courses. Despite the best effort of some of her teachers – some of them are preternaturally cheerful! – it was still stultifying after a couple of classes.

Since my wife has also taught remotely off and on, including two weeks in January 2021, I know it is harder emotionally, technologically, and organizationally, especially when she switched back and forth. The one thing she liked about remote learning was the extra 30 minutes of sleep.

The homework helper

It was less true at the beginning of the school year but more true now. I am the homework helper. My assistance with statistics, which I took twice, in college and grad school, is spotty at best. Whereas I’m better with American history because I actually remember the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the 1857 Dred Scott case. (No, I’m NOT that old.)

Still, I occasionally learn things I either forgot or never knew. For instance, everything you need to know about the 11th President appears in James K. Polk by They Might Be Giants. Possibly the most successful one-term chief executive.

Sometimes, I just sit with her to help her keep on task, such as when she works on her Environmental Science. She almost never even asks for my help in her art classes since she knows that it’s not in my wheelhouse.

Too political

For one course, she was supposed to find and describe a poster that addresses social justice. The caveat is that the work is not to be political. If by political, they mean “vote for Bernie” or “X sucks”, then OK.

But it seems that social justice, by its very nature, is at least small-p political. Labor rights, hunger, fighting racism/sexism/homophobia, et al. These all often require political action, allocation of resources. Sure you can buy a meal for someone, but addressing systemic food deserts require a broader action. Or José Andrés,, at least.

Lydster: Be Kind to Your Parents

Fanny

Florence Henderson 1954 — Florence Henderson, 1954

There were several tunes I sang to my daughter when she was younger. One was Be Kind to Your Parents. It was a recording my sister Leslie and I owned on this red vinyl 45 when we were young. We even sang it, including fairly recently. I have no idea who the artist was.

As it turns out, the song is from a 1954 musical called FANNY. It ran on Broadway from Nov 04, 1954, to Dec 16, 1956, with 888 performances. The music and lyrics were by Harold Rome.

In the program, Be Kind to Your Parents sung primarily by Florence Henderson and Lloyd Resse. It was subsequently covered by Pete Seeger, Michael Cooney, and Michael Feinstein.

The lyrics as I remember them:

Here’s a piece of good advice. Think it over once or twice.

Be kind to your parents though they don’t deserve it
Remember the grown-up’s a difficult stage of life
They’re apt to be nervous and overexcited
Confused by the daily storm and strife.

Just keep in mind though it’s so hard I know
Most parents were once children long ago. Incredible!

So treat them with patience. And sweet understanding
In spite of the foolish things they do
Someday you may wake up and find out you’re a parent too.

This version from a kid’s show changes the line “though they don’t deserve it” to “you know, they deserve it.” Meh.

Now it’s time

When she was still a baby and toddler, I’d sing her Good Night, the song from the Beatles white album.

There was also a song I made up.

I love Lydia (X2)
‘Cause she is my daughter, oh yeah
She is my daughter

I knew I had copped the tune from somewhere. But it wasn’t until years later, I realized it was from I Eat Cannibals by Total Coelo. Of course, it was.

In the very first month of this blog, I noted how my daughter was named. I had a LOT of rules. And in spite of all of them, the first reference I hear to her name came from a Marx Brothers flick. One just cannot plan for every contingency.