Tag Archives: friendship

August 17, 2011

patti needs a tim crawford day every week!

By arlynnpresser

f2fb friend #195 patti schmidt is probably the single most consistent family friend to my boys joseph and eastman.  she works at the winnetka community house devising programs to keep children entertained and educated.   when my boys were growing up, they might run into patti four times a week and every year we do the haunted house together!  i am VERY good at spooking little kids.

i wanted so much to go to one of the fantasy dance classes or the little miss tea parties she devises, but she told me that, at 51 years, i was just forty six years too damn old.

instead, we had our toes painted.  she got blue, i did sparkly silver.  i told her about f2fb friend #73 tim crawford who makes once a week a “tim crawford day” with some attention to grooming, car care, relaxation.  with tim, i had a pedicure too–and he suggested that more people should take one day out of seven to totally devote themselves to themselves.

patti lives at her parental home and her mother has alzheimer’s.  her mother’s disease has progressed so much that she doesn’t really recognize her family members and she can’t care for her personal needs.  patti’s devotion–the devotion of the entire family–is predicated and motivated by the memory of all that mom did before.  the care she gave.  the dinners she made.  the sicknesses she nursed her children through.  the time she took to teach patti and her siblings how to tie a shoe, to ride a bike, to weather a first romantic upset.

patti cares for her mother weekday nights after work and also gives up at least one weekend day for fulltime care.  would i do that for my mom?  my mom put me up for adoption when i was three–if she appeared at my doorstep?  maybe.  and that’s a very soft maybe.

patti needs a once a week “tim crawford day”.

frenchie was the daughter of f2fb friend #99 cristina persico who lost both frenchie and frenchie’s father in the course of one year.  the entrance of the community house has a reminder of the persico family, but also of the entire town’s ability to rally for its citizenry.

i had a great time giggling and gossiping with patti, but i realized that i need to do it more often.  patti gets one hour a day for lunch and sure it’s great to head out for some pampering in her circumstances.  but it’s me who needs it.  i need that friendship.  so i’m making a commitment to seeing patti more often.  if only because OPI sparkle me silver nail polish won’t last forever!

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August 16, 2011

a link, an itinerary, and a lagniappe

By arlynnpresser

so today i have three nice surprises to share:

1.  an article explaining the f2fb project.  the writer wendy donahue does a better job of explaining me and the photographers chris walker and benjamin gonzalez make me look a lot better than i am in real life.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/tribu/ct-sun-fam-0814-facebook-friends-20110816,0,4059760.story

 

2.  an itinerary of sorts:

a.  atlanta, huntsville, tallahassee on the 20 through the 24th

b.  montreal the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth of september

c.  alaska on the thirteenth through sixteenth of october

d.  (gulp) from the eighteenth of october through the fifth of november–korea, taiwan, india, united arab emirates, turkey, italy, germany, and england

somehow i have to squeeze in the northwest and southern california before the october fly out.  i am starting to get just a little dizzy.

3.  a lagniappe–one thing i’ve learned this year is that if you have a clipboard and any sort of laminated pass that says “media” you can get in anywhere, whether a san diego comicon or a chicago half marathon.  so here’s a media pass–

print this, laminate it, and put it on a lanyard. carry a clipboard or a camera. now you can get into anyplace on earth!

 

i was at the chicago rock n’roll half marathon with f2fb friend #194 rett britt this weekend and he had an extra pass so i was able to look all official.  i really admired the athletes because everything that they have done to prepare for the race was done with the encouragement of friends and family–the race itself was just the let go and enjoy the ride time.  these athletes do amazing things!

tomorrow i hope to see f2fb friend #195 patti schmidt!

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August 11, 2011

living responsibly includes thinking about the small things

By arlynnpresser

when i was a child, nobody lived responsibly.  i’m not just talking about the three martinis and a cigarette routinely consumed by pregnant women.  or throwing the mcdonald’s bag out to the curb.  or disposable diapers.  or raking the leaves and burning them on the front lawn.  plenty of people were opposed to equal rights for women and even african americans, and the notion of gay marriage?  uh, no.

we watched movies in social studies classes about the dangers of littering and smoking.  then there were boycotts organized against california grapes (out of concern for migrant workers), hershey’s (they sent formula to third world countries which, when mixed with bad water, would hurt children), and different states that wouldn’t pass the equal rights amendment.  celebrities came out of the closet and we learned a new vocabulary of tolerance.

i met f2fb #192 jason glaser as a complete fluke.  he divides his time between new york, chicago, sometimes europe and a lot of time in nicaragua.  he is working on behalf of workers at sugar cane farms who are developing kidney disease at an alarming rate, possibly because of poor workplace practices.  jason had a lot to say about why i shouldn’t eat bananas.

jason also has some concerns about anything that is based on sugar cane.

i try my best, but i think that it’s hard to keep track of what i can do and what i should do.  jason is an admirable friend because he does what should be done.  you can talk to him yourself about how to help the workers in nicaragua — laislafoundation@gmail.com–he’s been involved in lawsuits targeting the big united states corporations that bring us bananas and that has put himself in danger.  he has sometimes wondered about having some protection and i volunteered to be his body guard, but in the end, he knows that if a company really wants to bring him down, it will.

one of my friends zeeb peterson and his wife beth rosemarie live in a manner that takes very little from the earth and returns much–most of their artwork and furniture is made from found objects and they couldn’t help looking around my yard for things that would be workable.  i think that’s the best kind of recycling and responsibility.  i saw them this week.  i hadn’t seen zeeb for many years–it was a high school reunion!

my friend zeeb and his wife beth live in environmentally and socially aware surroundings--perhaps because of their pagan belief system

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August 3, 2011

santa cruz loses its guardian angel and i take a step backwards

By arlynnpresser

sometimes i like to think that this new years eve resolution has changed me.  made me less afraid of the world outside my door.  i’m getting on planes.  i’m driving heaven knows how many miles.  i have learned about people’s spiritual and personal lives.  i have hiked in the mountains and sailed on boats.  i’ve chopped wood blocks with my bare hands and opened champagne bottles with saber swords. i am what was once politely referred to as a bit “reclusive” but i was thinking as i pass my fifty first birthday and 184th facebook friend meet-up that i was all over that.

where i was at last week when i was a whole lot braver!

but sometimes i think i haven’t become anybody any braver than i was december 31.  this week, my house–which has always served as a “safe” place–came apart.   there was a heavy rainstorm and some of what i think of as the essentials of a home–hot water, power, air conditioning, a working washer and dryer–aren’t happening for me.  instead of making me feel like leaving, i have hunkered down.  isolating myself at exactly a time i shouldn’t.  i’ve been thinking about what’s essential for me and, frankly, air conditioning and a hot shower are very high on that list.  clean clothes would be cool too!

yesterday, i left home to visit f2fb friend #185 michael barth.  he used to work at the community house in winnetka and then he moved to santa cruz, california with his parents.  they had retired and he was working on a degree in forestry.  recently, they made the decision to move back to the chicago area.  michael came with them.  he is a caretaker to them but he has three essentials:  a job, a girlfriend, and an apartment of his own.

i told him i thought a job would have to come first so he could get an apartment and then the girlfriend would magically appear.  unfortunately, jobs in forestry are often meted out on the basis of politics–michael said that he’s gone on a number of interviews where the offer has already been made to someone.  as for an apartment, that’s tough because he serves as a caregiver to his parents although they are graciously offering to pay his rent.  and a girlfriend?  sometimes women don’t understand how necessary the task of caregiving is.

this morning i have scored an appointment with a heating and air conditioning professional.  the plumber is supposed to show up sometime tomorrow or the next day to fix my water heater.   i’ll get my essentials back.  i hope my friend michael gets his.

in the meantime, santa cruz better watch out–its guardian angel has flown away–

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July 26, 2011

f2fb friend #180 and, really, the only rule about the resolution

By arlynnpresser

a lot of people have told me this project is stupid because i’m going to get myself killed–most likely by some psycho facebook friend who will get me alone, strangle me, tear up my body parts, and dispose of them in such a way that a three part CSI miniseries will be devoted to it.  well, those folks might not be so wrong.  but f2fb friend #180 isn’t that psycho friend.  he just has walking pneumonia.

the second day in san diego was to be somewhat relaxed.  the boy scouts had scored press passes to comicon so i figured i wouldn’t see them much.  the three of us had had a wonderful time meeting f2fb friend #179 brian brethauer the evening before but he wasn’t going to be able to score me another pass to get in.  the san diego comicon was the biggest thing going but f2fb friend #180 mr. X wasn’t going so i wasn’t going.  we were planning on having dinner–i told him to pick the restaurant–and i was going to look for a toy store that would carry scrabble boards because i had never met Mr. X and our only connection was a shared love of playing scrabble on facebook.

in the interests of full and fair disclosure, he always won.

in the morning, as the boy scouts and i were thinking about breakfast, i received a call from Mr. X.  he had just been to the doctor.  he had walking pneumonia.  my first thought is we should cancel.  but, no, he was on his way home to bed and wanted just the opportunity to give me a hug, say hi, and we’d figure out whether he was feeling better in the evening.  he said he was just a few minutes from the town and country hotel lobby.

i ran down to the lobby and immediately recognized Mr. X.  we hugged, said hi, and i asked him about what the doctor had told him.  we saw each other for less than two minutes.  he phoned me back five minutes later to compliment me that i look a lot better in real life than in facebook photos and that if he rallied enough in the evening to get together he would be so happy.

in the late afternoon, he felt miserable but was determined to help me with my new years resolution so long as i ditched the boy scouts and came alone to his house.  the first request–ditching the boy scouts–is easy enough.  anybody  i meet can say no to them.  but the second request–somehow i felt the time had come to institute a rule maybe not so much for my self-protection as for my reputation:  no meeting a gentleman at his home if it is the first time we have met.

so Mr. X and i had an impasse.  he was too ill to leave his home to see me and i was too rule bound.  he asked that he might see me in september when it is possible that i shall return:  he asked for me to set aside two days, one for meeting each other and the second “in case we hit it off”.

i leave san diego with my chef tattoo making me look fierce

so the drive to los angeles, swinging into the rental car office just in time and dashing off for LAX.  time to return home and to think clearly about the remaining friends to see and meet.  i am very blessed by how nice everyone is to me!

the rental car also breathed fire. that's what happens at comicon!

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July 24, 2011

a small little convention in san diego plus a facebook warning

By arlynnpresser

sometimes the logistics of this new years resolution get to me.  i have friends all over the globe, sometimes they move, sometimes they even move without telling me (which might be a sign of some sort).  i have two friends who live in alaska, which sounds like it makes things easier to see them, but they live so far apart in the state that it will take a minimum of three flights to go from one to another.

so i considered f2fb friend #179 brian brethauer.  he lives in idaho, and not like ten minutes from the boise idaho airport.  i worried how i was going to see him.  yet, he seemed to intuit that there might be a problem and he suggested he would be in san diego on july 20 for a tiny little convention for those who love comic books (otherwise known as comicon).  thus, the trip to los angeles and san diego was planned with the greatest goal being to meet brian brethauer.  i drove three hours from los angeles to san diego.

meanwhile, brian drove eighteen hours from idaho with his two friends dave and ezra who are brothers.   brian and i are friends through our shared appreciation of my grandfather fritz leiber’s science fiction.  but it was our first time meeting.  awkward?  absolutely not.  a testament to what a great friend brian is.

we boarded the tram for the convention center where the preview party would be held.  we talked about facebook.

comicon turned out to be a huge deal, way bigger than i expected and way stranger.  everybody was dressed as their favorite character from their favorite alternate reality.  i thought it was great that everybody could be exactly who they wanted to be without anybody judging them.

brian has been coming to comicon for ten years now, five of them with dave and ezra.  he said that when the convention started, you could order tickets online over the space of a few days.  this year, he didn’t even get tickets, instead he agreed to help his best friend jason brubaker sell copies of his comic “remind” and jason was able to score three “exhibitor” tickets for dave, ezra and brian.  somehow, jason even got me a pass.

 

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July 21, 2011

the unexpected facebook friend

By arlynnpresser

my new years resolution made on december 31, 2009 was to among other things lose five pounds.  i weighed 138.  i weighed 138 on december 31, 2010 when i made this year’s resolution to turn off the computer, get off the damn couch, and find all these 335 people who are my facebook friends.  my technology was simple:  i would make the virtual world real.

along the way this year, i’ve met some new facebook friends.  people i’ve met in person on my travels who have sent me friend requests later.  there was a comment about me at gizmodo.com and another on brazilian national television.  suddenly new friendships form and i wonder–should i visit the new friends as well?

i settled on the notion that i should meet the friends who were my friends as of december 31 last year and that if i meet other, more recent friends along the way, that would be an added bonus.  damn, i really really want to go to brazil, japan, and iceland–even as the prospect scares me silly!

tom bremer is my friend in los angeles who befriended me after he read an article about me in gizmodo.com.  he was following my adventures and noticed i was in los angeles.  he asked if he could meet me. . . . and even though everything in los angeles is three hours away from everything else, it turned out his office was just across the street from my hotel.

you can check out his work at tombremer.com — he’s an amazing animator and he was just the right person to meet before heading for a small, little known convention in san diego.  it’s called comicon and i have to meet f2fb friend #179 brian brethauer.  if i don’t make it to san diego in time to see him at the convention, i have to go to idaho where he lives.

thanks tom!  i’m really glad you contact me!  if i’m in a town where any facebook friend lives, i want to see them!

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July 20, 2011

f2fb friend # 178 teaches me to check in on friendship

By arlynnpresser

i met f2fb friend #178 josh garfinkel in chicago while he was thinking about going to law school.  he and i met through a mutual friend jon levkoviz who directed my younger son eastman in a movie.  josh was like an ingenue fielding offers to the prom–university of michigan, harvard, university of chicago, northwestern.

and we went to movies.  and played world of warcraft.  and hung out.

then his father died of a heart attack in his sleep.  it was a devastating blow.  and yet, somehow he managed to go to university of michigan law school.  law school takes a hundred and ten percent out of you, and sometimes it must have seemed overwhelming.  but he’s overcome everything, making his family–including his father–very proud.

sometimes in our friendship, josh has seemed distant.  and then not distant.  i always thought that the “distant” times were because i had something wrong or had offended in some way.   and because he’s twenty years younger than me i have thought i wasn’t cool enough to be his friend.  but no, distant times were when josh was feeling overwhelmed in the wake of his father’s death and with the pressures of law school.   i should have checked in more often with him.

josh and i spent the evening at the courtyard of the hacienda hotel with f2fb friend #140 benjamin gonzalez and brandon brown, who are filming about this year’s journey.  i was surprised at how easily the conversation moved–movies, music, popular culture, politics, religion.  before i knew it, it was almost midnight and tomorrow i was to have breakfast with a very mysterious facebook friend who is NOT part of the original facebook friends of january 1, 2011.  i said good night to everybody but not before whipping out my flip camera.

i really look forward to seeing josh garfinkel again when he comes to chicago!

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July 20, 2011

a f2fb friend shows me how to die. and i tell her how to avoid it!

By arlynnpresser

there are places that we keep in our  heads:  the statue of liberty, the white house, the eiffel tower.  we don’t even need to have ever seen them, but when the image appears in a book, a movie, a video game we just know.  and we share with everyone else–whether they’ve been there done that or not–a common understanding of what’s at hand.

i always thought that i would forever have the world as a picture in my mind.  augmented by trivia facts that are words strung together that don’t do anything to make the picture any clearer:  the  eiffel tower is located on the champs de mars,  buckingham palace has three rings surrounding a central courtyard.

this year, some of my facebook friends have shown me things i have only imagined:  the inside of the new york public library (thank you john r. douglas), the topanga mountains (thank you jose rios), and the tower in providence, rhode island where superman leapt the tall building in a single bound.  f2fb friend #177 balbinka kamila showed me the iconic hollywood sign on mount lee in the santa monica mountains.  it’s forty five feet tall and three hundred and fifty feet long–way bigger than i expected.  and i would have gotten closer but a) we were trespassing and b) i was wearing ballet slippers.  better than heels at least.

balbinka is an actress and director.  she worked with my son eastman on a movie ten years ago and we’ve kept in touch.  she is well aware of the ironies of her business!  after we hiked back to the car, we settled into her living room to watch “a modern day matchmaking affair” which she directed.  brava brava!

and i’m grateful to all my facebook friends for what they share with me, whether it’s a place, an experience, a story, a skill.  i’m a lucky lucky gal!

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