My passion for perfume started long before it became the inspiration for my new novel FULL BLOOM, out August 5th and available for preorder now! Consider this Classic Column “Sniff Test” a certificate of authenticity for my fragrance obsession. Maybe some of you can relate…or I hope it makes you laugh!
Every woman has one department at the shopping mall that calls to them, nay, sings to them, like a choir of angels, radiating a warm, golden light from the top of the escalator.
For me, it’s fragrance.
I’m hypnotized by those glittering little bottles on glass countertops, each one with a secret inside, winking at me from across the room.
I’ve always loved perfume, ever since I was a little girl, when the crystal bottles on my mother’s dresser seemed like magical potions.
And whenever I smelled them on her, I knew she was going somewhere glamorous, mysterious, and as-yet-off-limits to me.
I have sad news to report, in the passing of our beloved barn cat, Barney.
He was a beautiful chunky tabbycat with bright green eyes, who wandered onto my backyard one day and decided to stay for ten years, until he passed away.
He died suddenly of kidney failure, and all of us are in heart failure.
I say us because I live on a horse farm, and I don’t run it myself. I have a wonderful assistant, Nan, and a wonderful barn manager, Katie, and all of us loved Barney. Daughter Francesca loved him, too, giving him extra hugs whenever she came home, and my friend Laura adored him and so did my friend Franca, who brought over her grandkids and even they loved him.
I love cats, and amazingly, I still have Vivi, my house cat who is now eighteen years old and going strong, thank God.
The loss of any cat, or any pet, is heartbreaking.
But Barney’s passing made me realize that there’s something unique about a barn cat.
I don’t know how much time you spend in barns or around horses, but the way it sometimes goes is that there’s a random cat that sticks around to catch mice, or maybe he doesn’t stick around but drops in from time to time. And sometimes he’s given a name and sometimes he isn’t. He’s a cat with a job, which is to catch mice, and more often than not, he’s nobody’s cat.
But Barney was everybody’s cat.
That sentiment was expressed by Katie’s husband Sean, and he was exactly right.
Barney got his name because he lived in the barn, but he had a personality as big as any barn. He was unbelievably affectionate, purring on contact, greeting everybody who came over, then following all of us around, including any plumber, electrician, or carpenter.
We had to tell contractors to close the windows and doors on their trucks because Barney would inevitably find his way in, pilfer their lunch or make himself comfy.
He wasn’t a cat, he was a mayor.
We lived and worked in his city.
The only rules he followed were his own.
He hung with the horses and drank from their buckets.
He curled up on their backs and they didn’t even mind.
He caught mice and arranged them like a serial killer.
He left pawprints on all our cars.
He had 243 nicknames and came to all of them.
He was a total character and of course he was a rescue who rescued us.
It was Nan who spotted him first in the yard, and she went to him immediately, noticing that he had infected abscesses around his neck. He wore no tag or identification, but she took him to the vet that day, and we got him antibiotics and plenty of canned food.
He healed in two weeks and never left.
He was always free to roam but never did.
We heated the tack room so he’d be warm year ‘round, and made him a cat door, so in no time it was his palace. He had all the wet food he wanted, plenty of treats, and lots and lots of love.
He faced down any neighboring cats who trespassed on his property.
All of the dogs here were afraid of him, even though they’re bigger.
He protected the farm, us, and democracy in general.
Because he was so much a part of all of our lives, we all feel a hole in our hearts at his loss.
We can still see him walk across the pasture.
We can still hear him purr in our ear.
We can feel him making biscuits on our laps.
We know his meow, strong and insistent, or chirpy and cheery.
Since it’s just me, I don’t generate a lot of laundry.
I barely sweat.
Did I mention I’m celibate?
And also, in winter, who sweats?
Usually, I’m bundled up in fleece tops and sweatpants and from time to time, I even sleep in them.
TMI?
Get ready.
I’m about to air my dirty laundry.
Literally.
In any event, I don’t have a lot of laundry.
And when I do, I just throw it in the washing machine, which I use as a hamper.
When it’s full, then I run it off.
I don’t do it more often because I have a job.
Also, I’m trying to be ecologically sound.
Okay, I’m lazy.
I’m probably doing laundry every two weeks.
So the other day I decided to throw something in the laundry and run off a load, but inside the machine was a visitor.
A mouse.
He looked back up at me, and his expression said, “Took you a while.”
I replied, “EEEK!”
Worse, he was sitting among mouse droppings scattered over my laundry like chocolate jimmies.
Please tell me you know that’s the sprinkles they put on ice cream.
Now you’ll never eat them again.
Anyway, the mouse was alive, but barely.
I got over the initial shock, then I realized I had to get him out of there, so I got a saucepan and put it inside the machine, and trapped him. Then I put the lid on, ran him outside, and set him down in my backyard at the edge of the woods.
There’s a stream back there, too, in case he got thirsty.
And has GPS.
Anyway he scampered away.
I’m guessing he was looking for a lady who has sex.
So, happy ending.
I’m a good person, but a bad housekeeper.
I went upstairs and threw away the laundry that had been in the washing machine.
By the way, there’s a drainpipe that goes into the back of the washing machine and runs from outside the house, so I’m telling myself he got in from the outside.
That’s a better story than he was already in the house.
I can make up anything I want to.
I write fiction.
The whole thing grossed me out, but I consider myself and the mouse lucky.
I don’t want to think about what would’ve happened in the dryer.
They say you don’t really know a person until you travel together, but is that true if the person is your mother?
I asked myself this on our recent trip to Arizona, our first mother-daughter vacation in almost ten years. We had an amazing time and got along great, but I noticed some new quirks, beginning as soon as our first flight.
“Can you open the window?” she asked.
“Sure.” I slid the shade up and squinted into the light. “Wow, you can see—”
“Nm-mm,” my mother grunted, and I noticed she was shielding her eyes.
“Sorry, too bright?”
“No, I don’t want to see how high we are, it scares me.”
I wondered again by the pool in Scottsdale, when I lowered my sunglasses to see my mother approaching with what appeared to be a cloth napkin tied around her head.
“Perfect, huh?” She posed like a pirate beauty queen. “I went to the gift shop for something to cover my head, but then I realized, I could get this from the restaurant! It’s just like a bandana!”
“It’s even more like a napkin.” And I reminded her she had a ball cap in the bag.
“Nah, the brim blocks the sun.” She settled down on the chair next to me, readjusting her bandana-napkin.
I slid down behind my book.
Another of my mom’s quirks is that she loves to order drinks, or “dwinks” when she’s ready to party, but she hates the taste of alcohol. She always forgets this last part.
“Can I taste it?” She sipped my Sauvignon Blanc and grimaced. “So winey.”
The only wine sweet enough for her is Lambrusco, an unusual, sparkling red, and when she asks for it, she tricks waiters into thinking she’s a jaded oenophile. Most restaurants don’t have it, so the waiter will suggest other esoteric options, using words like “tannic” and “peaty.”
I wanted to tell him, she wants notes of “juice box,” do you have a juice box wine?
As the server left to bring a sample of a “jammy” Pinot Noir I knew she’d suffer through, I said, “You don’t have to order a drink.”
“Of course I do, we’re on vacation!”
She had a point.
I was getting the hang of Vacation Mom, when I anticipated a problem. If a peek out an airplane window was too much for her vertigo, how was she going to enjoy the Grand Canyon?
The irony was that she’d planned the trip. The Grand Canyon was entirely her idea; she had even booked a guide to take us hiking into it.
I sat her down. “I’m worried about you. You need to mentally prep that it’s going to be really, really huge and you might get freaked out by the height.”
She waved me off. “It’ll be great, I just won’t go on the high parts.”
“Mom, I think the whole thing is a high part.”
Cue the soundtrack to City Slickers.
But when the day came, my mom closed her eyes for much of the mountainous drive up (don’t worry, she was in the backseat) yet remained in good spirits!
We arrived at the Canyon, and the guide showed us to the top of the steep trail. Or at least he pointed to it from a safe distance, since my mom refused to get out of the car. I said I couldn’t leave her in there like a dog, but she insisted:
“You go, that’s why I hired him, I want you to have a good time.”
I was touched. And I realized how much of my mom’s behavior was to make me happy: a good view from the window seat, fun drinks at dinner—okay, the napkin thing was just weird, I got nothing for that—but she wouldn’t let her quirks keep us from having an unforgettable vacation.
In the end, I made it less than thirty minutes down into the Canyon before my own vertigo forced me to turn back. When I reemerged on the top, flat ground, there was no sweeter sight than my little mom, bravely out of the car, trying to take a photo with a shaky hand while gripping onto a signpost for dear life—a good ten yards from the gorge’s edge.
When she saw me, she broke into a grin, still clinging to the signpost like a koala. “How was it?”
I know, there are those of you who don’t think this is big news, and there are others who have no idea what I’m talking about.
Allow me to explain.
You get to apply for Social Security when you get old.
And the good news is, I got old!
I crossed the finish line!
I bookended my own life!
I really don’t take this lightly. Not everybody gets to be old, and I have friends who did not get to the privilege of aging.
Life is precious.
But it’s not an entitlement.
Like Social Security.
I remember when I saw the taxes taken out of my first paycheck, and Mother Mary told me the money would be given back to me when I’m old.
It seemed unfair.
Until now.
Frankly, the government did the right thing.
Because I would’ve invested in shoes.
Also handbags.
But they kept my money, and all I had to do was keep breathing.
I did it!
I was excited to apply for Social Security, but I worried there would be a lot of forms and I wouldn’t know where to begin.
So I typed into the computer, How do I apply for Social Security?
A link popped onto the screen, and I answered the questions from there.
It took me TEN minutes to apply for Social Security online.
God’s honest truth!
I felt like I finished the test early and was looking around at everyone else still writing, a position I’ve never been in.
I admit I wasn’t sure about one of the questions, which was whether I wanted my first check now or later, but I decided the answer is now, especially because I’d waited long enough and I’m worried about what’s going to happen to Social Security.
Here’s where I tell you that I used to be a government employee.
I worked for the federal court system when I was a law clerk to a judge on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. It was the most wonderful job I ever had except for the one I have now, where I’m the judge.
I give myself great performance reviews.
And raises.
Also shoes and handbags.
To return to point, I knew a lot of government employees back then, and they were all hard-working, honest, and dedicated to their jobs.
They did not waste taxpayer money.
No one ever forgot for a minute that someone was paying for our pencils, computers, and desks.
Bottom line, we were paying.
But nowadays, a random billionaire is running around like the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland, shouting “off with their heads,” waving a chainsaw, and firing federal employees willy-nilly, claiming that most federal employees are frauds.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
But this column is supposed to be funny.
And the joke’s on us, friends.
Now we’ll pay taxes but get fewer services, all thanks to random billionaires who pay no taxes.
They’re not entitled, they just act that way.
Here’s the truth:
America is a big country, and its government provides a lot of services that need to be administered. The court system in which I worked administered justice. In other words, you cannot get justice without a lot of people to do the things that need to be done first.
Just like you cannot eat a dinner without somebody to buy and cook the food, then set the table and clean up after.
It’s really that simple.
You cannot get services like justice without administrators, and when you eliminate the administrators, you eliminate the services.
I can only pray that random billionaires don’t take our Social Security, put our checks in their own pockets, and call it justice.
Evidently it costs $0.04 to make a penny, so I guess it’s economic.
But it costs $0.14 to make a nickel, and nobody’s dissing the nickel.
I’d take a penny over a nickel any day.
You can’t quantify everything.
Even money.
I love pennies so much I named a dog Penny. Her fur was the warm copper color of a penny.
A penny’s only 2% copper and 98% zinc, but still.
Zinc is a bad dog name.
And I always pick up a penny if I see one on the sidewalk, then I say the lines: See a penny, pick it up, all the day you’ll have good luck.
Honestly, I’ve been lucky since my last divorce.
I have purses that have a penny in them that I found on the sidewalk.
What are we going to do for luck now?
When we seem to need it most?
I even have memories associated with pennies.
I always got pennies in my Christmas stocking, which I loved. Somehow a penny on a magical morning is worth more than a cent.
And I had pink piggybank full of pennies. It was about three dollars but I felt rich as Midas. And I remember getting coin envelopes, stacking the pennies inside, then taking them to the bank and depositing them in my savings account.
I still have that plaid passbook.
Its balance won’t buy a pack of gum, but it has sentimental value, which is the most expensive kind.
I owned a pair of penny loafers, with actual pennies in the slot.
And how about when you went on a field trip, and they had big machines that you could put a penny in, and it would smash the penny into a souvenir?
I did that a bunch of times.
I remember how cool it was to press the penny and get this squashed penny that of course I would lose.
But still, pennies!
Remember penny candy?
When I was a kid, I used to go to a candy store and get penny candy out of a big glass jars. Come to think of it, we would all stick our hand in the same jar, so it couldn’t have been sanitary.
But what do you want for a penny?
You get what you pay for.
Cheap germs!
And I remember putting a penny in a gumball machine.
Magic!
Or, stale gum!
And there are so many expressions with pennies.
Like, a penny for your thoughts.
Now we won’t know what anybody is thinking.
Women are always asking men that in the movies.
I myself have asked men that question, in a feeble bid for intimacy.
Funny, when I heard the answer, it wasn’t worth the money.
And how about the expression, bright as a penny?
Now nothing will be bright.
Penny wise and pound foolish?
I think of that all the time.
It guides my financial planning.
And how about, not a penny more?
I think it when I’m shopping online.
A pretty penny?
Gives me a shiny image every time.
And how about penny ante?
Or in for a penny, in for a pound.
I love that expression.
Or penny dreadful?
I hate that expression.
Penny stocks will probably continue.
Because money makes the world go round, in whatever denomination.
As far as I’m concerned, there are three seasons: spring, summer, fall, and cracked feet.
Read on, unless you nauseate easily.
Because I’m trying to understand what happens to my feet in winter time.
I simply don’t recognize them anymore.
I’m not sure they’re even human.
My toes look like blocks, and on the bottom, the edges are sharp.
I could cut Gruyère with my toes.
Plus there’s a white rim around the edges of both feet.
Cracks form like tectonic plates on my heels.
Flakes of skin come off if I scratch my soles.
Did you just throw up?
I did, and it landed on my feet.
And improved them.
The fun begins when the cracks start bleeding. Sometimes it hurts to walk. I mean, it’s not torture, but I have a low pain threshold.
Then I have to put Neosporin on the cracks and cover them with Band-aids, so my feet look like busted tires in a cartoon.
And no shoes help.
If I wear clogs, I can’t tell the difference between the wooden base and my feet.
I could walk across fiery coals and not feel a thing.
By the way, that’s the perfect description of my second marriage.
To return to point, I know women aren’t supposed to loathe their bodies, and generally I don’t, but my feet deserve it.
In fact, they’re getting off easy.
I think you should loathe them, too.
And now, maybe you do.
Most of you might read this and say, Obviously Lisa, you need to moisturize your feet.
To which I would reply, Honey, there is no amount of moisture that would make my feet human again.
I’ve tried Vaseline, Gold Bond, Cetaphil, and every other product on the market. I slather them on my feet at night, and the next morning, my feet are exactly the same.
They suck up all the moisture.
They’re thirsty and they drink like crazy.
Basically, I think all those products work the same way, which is that they cover your feet and seal its moisture in.
But what if there’s no moisture to seal in?
Honestly, it’s like the Sahara down there.
I’m dry as dust.
And it’s not because I’m getting older. I’ve had this my whole entire life.
And don’t get me started on my legs.
There are alligators with better skin.
But even so, my legs aren’t as dry as my feet. You know it’s bad when people try to help. At Christmas, Daughter Francesca gave me a special kind of balm that you put on your feet at night with little red gel socks.
I slept in those for a week.
You know what got moisturized?
The socks.
I have the moistest socks in the tri-state area.
Also my sheets, because I get sick of wearing socks to bed.
My sheets are a Slip ‘N Slide.
And when you sleep with dogs, the dogs try to lick moisturizer off your feet.
Apparently Cetaphil is tasty.
It’s an appetizer to Gold Bond.
Sometimes I let the dogs lick my toes.
It’s the only action in my bedroom.
And you know what, I’m not complaining.
And as far as my feet go, I’m waiting ‘til spring.
It’s Super Bowl weekend, the Eagles against the Chiefs!
And I’m an Eagles fan, but it got me thinking.
Yes, I know. Some of you believe a thinking Eagles fan is an oxymoron.
Or that we’re morons.
But don’t hate us.
No more hating.
Because we live in divided times, but we can’t let the times divide us.
It shouldn’t be Eagles fans against Chiefs fans.
Because the Super Bowl isn’t litigation or war, it’s a game.
I believe the sentient among us understand that, even us Eagles fans.
Obviously, it’s fun to be in a tribe, and sing the songs, and wear the team colors, and get a little crazy. Case in point, I was wearing my Eagle’s jacket this week when I went into Nudy’s restaurant in my town, and they were giving out free breakfast to everybody in Eagles gear.
Wow!
In other words you didn’t have to be nude at Nudy’s.
And it was fun to see everybody dressed up in team gear and know that we felt the same way about at least one thing – free food.
Tribalism is fun, but you have to know where to draw the line.
And we do, all the time.
For example, only two teams are in the Super Bowl every year, but everybody watches it, enjoys it, and even throws a party. The Eagles have rarely been in the Super Bowl, but I watch it every single year and love every minute. I have opinions about the commercials, the half-time show, the refereeing, and even the play-calling.
Meanwhile I never played football in my life.
The Monday after the Super Bowl, everybody’s a Monday morning quarterback.
And everybody’s got opinions.
And I love that everybody loves to talk about their opinions and share them and discuss it and maybe even disagree. We rank the commercials. We decide whether the halftime show compares to Prince’s. We have a lot to yak about.
But nobody gets up in arms.
Or fights about it.
Or hates over it.
Or thinks of someone else as the Other, but rather just Another.
An unusual thing happened to me yesterday, which reminded me of that lesson.
I dented my car and I brought it into a body shop, and lo and behold, I found out that the owner was my cousin.
My actual cousin.
I had no idea he even existed. We have family reunions now and then, and he had not been at them. But as soon as I looked at him, I saw a faint reflection of my late father’s eyes.
And I teared up, like a big baby.
It turns out that our grandfathers were brothers, back in Italy, and they came to this country at about the same time, speaking only Italian and having nothing but a dream of this remarkable country and the willingness to work hard. That’s exactly what they did, and remarkably enough, only one generation later, their grandchildren, two total strangers who speak very little Italian, met by chance.
And besides the personal story, it made me realize something else, especially this Super Bowl week, in these crazy times when everybody is a Republican, a Democrat, a Libertarians, or a vegetarian.
We really do have more in common than we have different, and that is our shared humanity.
Any one of us could be the other’s family.
Because in truth, we are.
Everyone is someone’s family.
We’re all one big team.
And if we start thinking this way, we all can win.
I was there last weekend visiting Daughter Francesca, and we did a million things, including go to the Javitz Center to Meet the Breeds, a dog show where you can see dogs of all varieties, and pet them and kiss them.
Of course, we have dogs at home that we can pet and kiss.
So God knows why we paid thirty bucks to pet and kiss other peoples’ dogs, but there you have it.
We love dogs.
It was a great time, then afterwards Francesca had somewhere else to go and I went back to the apartment to watch the Eagles in the NFC playoffs, which I did with Flat Bradley, a cardboard cutout of Bradley Cooper.
It’s way more fun than it sounds.
And we won!
I mean the Eagles.
I also won, because Flat Bradley is the perfect man for me.
He doesn’t expect dinner and he doesn’t want my money.
And the sex is great.
You can follow along on my social media, where I post all the pix.
Except for the ones that are NSFW.
Back to the story.
The whole weekend, I was taking cabs and whipping out my credit card left and right. The day I packed to leave, I was missing my American Express card.
I had no idea where I lost it.
Before I go further, let me tell you that the last time I lost a credit card, I was also visiting Francesca in New York City. It was my Visa card and it dropped out of my pocket as I walked along the Hudson River. I cancelled the card, but later that day, a woman emailed me through my website to say she’d found it!
I love New York!
After that I vowed to never carry a credit card in my pocket.
Now I carry my credit card in my wallet.
But I manage to lose it anyway.
I know.
I’m amazing, right?
I’m Queen of Unforced Errors.
The proof is that I got married a second time.
Anyway to return to the story, I was walking to get a coffee before I called the credit card company, and I walked in the door of the coffee shop, it struck me that I had been here two days ago.
So I took a chance and asked the barista, “By any chance, did I leave an American Express card here?”
And the barista asked, “What’s your name?”
I did not answer Mrs. Bradley Cooper, even though I have the mug that says so.
I answered, and he said, “Yes, you left your card!”
And he handed it to me!
What?
Amazingly, I’ve lost a credit card in New York on two occasions and both times, New York gave me the card back!
What a city!
And that morning I walked to the car, carrying my coffee and Flat Bradley.
You think New York has seen everything?
It’s hasn’t.
On the sidewalk, every head turned.
Drivers in cars pointed and laughed.
Yes, I had a walk of shame with a cardboard celebrity.
And we’ll be watching the Super Bowl together, me and my corrugated man.
Anyway the reason this matters is lately I’m wondering if I’m a jerk.
Because I was listening to the radio, and they were talking about how awful Eagles fans were.
And then I read an editorial about how awful Eagles fans were.
And then I asked my bestie Laura and she said a lot of people think Eagles fans are awful, but I still love you.
OK, I didn’t know any of this.
Maybe I should have, since the stadium has its own in-house judge to send fans to jail when they get out of line.
Buzzkill.
Another hint is Robert DeNiro as an Eagles fan in The Silver Linings Playbook, a movie I love because it has an adorable Jennifer Lawrence and also my imaginary boyfriend Bradley Cooper.
But I thought that movie was just fiction.
But now I realize I was in denial.
Nobody tells us Eagles fans that we’re jerks.
Maybe because they’re afraid of getting punched in the mouth.
Me, I’m not that kind of Eagles fan.
But it got me thinking, like that Reddit forum, Am I The Asshole?
Like when I say I’m the Eagles fan, do people think I’m an asshole?
Because I’m kind of not.
At least you have to know me better to know what kind of asshole I am.
And if I really plumb my fandom with the Eagles, it comes from being a shariah Philadelphian.
This is my hometown, I’ve never lived anywhere else, and I have the accent to prove it.
But if I go deeper, my love for the Eagles goes back to being Frank Scottoline’s daughter.
My father wasn’t the Eagles fan that you expect, certainly not an asshole, and not even a sports fan in general.
But I used to spend every Sunday lying on the living room floor with him, watching games.
My family is big lying-on-the-floor fans.
I still am.
There is no couch that beats a floor.
The dogs love it cause we cuddle up.
And any time I watch an Eagles game from the floor, I remember my dad lying beside me, explaining about the offensive and the defensive teams, and telling me the names of the players.
He was a mellow guy so he never shouted at the TV. In fact I don’t think I ever heard my father curse.
Meanwhile my mother’s hobby was profanity.
So maybe you see why the divorce.
My father and I never went to a single football game. We didn’t have the money, but I didn’t know that. What we had was a soft rug, plenty of potato chips, real coke with sugar, and a father and a daughter lying on the floor for two games back-to-back, talking for eight hours.
And during playoff season, that would include Saturdays.
So yes, I’m an Eagles fan, but I hope you like me anyway.
Sadly my father has passed on, so now I watch the game with a cardboard cutout of Bradley Cooper.
You might think I’m kidding but I’m not.
I started doing it because I know from the children’s books that kids love Flat Stanley, and I started thinking, why can’t adults have Flat Bradley?
Well it turns out I can.
So I bought a cardboard standee of Bradley Cooper a few years ago, and then he got a little worse for wear.
I won’t tell you how.
Then my bestie Franca got me a new Flat Bradley, and he looked so good in his cardboard tuxedo.
You can check my social media during the playoffs and watch me make dirty jokes with a cardboard cutout of a man.
Why do I do it?
For fun.
Because if you ask me, I think fandom is about fun. It’s about belonging to a community, or a city, or a group of people who love the same thing.
