Last Random Thoughts of the Year

I’m perplexed by this whole false eyelash thing. I see so many women wearing false eyelashes that I am used to that by now. What gets me is the size and length of some of them. The nurse in my doctor’s office had a set of huge, thick eyelashes, so large that I wondered how she could either blink or see. She looked like she had caterpillars on each eye. I was so distracted that if she had taken a quart of blood out of my arm instead of just a few vials, I probably would not have noticed. This trend is extremely prevalent in women’s basketball, where I cannot figure out how a player can see the basket with those hairy awnings over her eyes!

You always hear people say that they “don’t know so-and-so from Adam,” so who is Adam and how do people know him? 

I'm so far behind on watching "The Crown" that Claire Foy is still the (young) Queen Elizabeth.

Just when you think you have seen it all, there is a news report that a bull is running down the railroad tracks at Newark Penn Station. Imagine coming home late from work and trying to get your family to buy that excuse. Attention Newark Passengers: Is there a matador in the house?

I was shopping in Home Goods recently and observed a young couple there with their toddler daughter, who was walking around the store performing “Let Her Go” with considerable flair while her embarrassed parents tried to pretend they didn’t know her. I say, let her go! She was having the time of her life!

Whenever I type the word “crockpot,” it is autocorrected to “crackpot.” I’m not sure how to take that.

Bagels have gotten out of hand. Today’s bagels are extra large, doughy concoctions that can barely fit into the toaster – even those with an extra-wide slot for bagels. When I was a kid, we would go to visit my great-aunt and great-uncle down the shore once a year, and we would always stop at a bagel shop on the way home. This was the only bagel shop around. The hot, freshly-baked bagels were the highlight of the trip (sorry, Aunt Bea and Uncle Billy), probably because you couldn’t find anything like them anywhere else. And they were not oversized versions of the Pillsbury Dough Boy!

I am so tired of being this short, having to climb store shelves to get something on top or searching the aisle to recruit someone tall enough to help me. I’m tired of asking my tall friends, Debbie and Joan, to reach the second shelf in the kitchen cabinets (that’s right, I can’t even reach the second shelf; that’s how short I am) to retrieve the gravy boat or some Tupperware – or to change a bulb. I am the owner of three, count them, three of those small, foldable step stools. And the bad news is that I am likely to get shorter as I get older. 

What’s worse than biting your inner cheek or lip accidentally? Doing it repeatedly since it now draws your teeth like a magnet.

I’m at the age where I think ALL toilets, including those in public restrooms, should be “comfort height.” 

In my opinion, we need hooks on all doors. OK, maybe not the front door (unless you like to hang wreaths), but the back of the bathroom door (in private homes and hotel bathrooms) at least so I have a place to hang my pajamas and robe. 

Normally the TV in the waiting room at the doctor’s office is set to dreadful Channel 12, NJ News. But last time, the sound emanating from the TV was the dulcet tones of Bob Ross, the late host of “The Joy of Painting.” “You can put a happy little tree right here, or anywhere, because this is your painting,” he tells you. I tend to fall asleep watching his program; in fact, I have two episodes recorded on my DVR to induce night sleeping on those bad nights. I’m glad I wasn’t in the waiting room for long or they might have had to wake me for my appointment!

I thought my eyesight had improved after my cataract surgery. But recently I was walking toward the pool for my aqua class and waved to my friend who is usually in the water before I am. It turns out that it not only was NOT my female friend, but the person I waved at was an old man with a big white beard. I hope he thought I was just being friendly. 

If you can lose weight by exercising, does jumping to conclusions count? Because I know a few people who would definitely knock off some pounds.

I have a friend who takes his pre-teen daughter to ballet lessons several times a week, during which he retreats to the local library for respite. And while he faithfully attends her dance recitals, he admits that it they consist of several hours of sitting and about 45 seconds when your kid is actually on stage dancing, although that might happen several times. I recall attending a recital with my BFF many years ago and asking her, “Which one is Krissy?” because with their hair slicked back in a bun, how could I tell? The tiny dancers all looked alike!

Visiting Las Vegas recently, my friends and I had our first encounter with a driverless Uber car. We ordered an Uber and a car pulled up with two people in the front seat. One was a “driver” and the other a trainee. We tried to get into the backseat, but there are no accessible door handles: You can only open the door using the Uber app. I guess both “non-drivers” were trying to get their customers accustomed to not getting any form of assistance, because neither of them budged to help us. We piled into the car, the three of us completely filling the backseat. As one noted, we might need the jaws of life to extricate us. But the car will not move unless all passengers fasten their seatbelts. We couldn’t even find the seatbelts, no less get them around us and buckle them. We somehow managed to get out of the car and were informed that there would be no charge “for the ride.” Ride? What ride? We barely shut the doors! If this experiment is the way of the future, a lot of us will be staying home.

I have to admit that writing tributes for people I have lost is getting tougher. These are all people who are/were important in my life and the loss of each of them is heartbreaking. But I couldn’t let the month pass without a tribute to my dear friend, Janie Paluzzi, who passed away in November. I cannot do her justice, but…here goes: 

I thought she was going to live forever.

When Janie Paluzzi was diagnosed with leukemia 20-something years ago, the doctor explained her life expectancy. Her reply? “We’ll see about that.” After her initial dire diagnosis she went on a vacation to Italy with her entire family, deciding to stick with her plans and deal with the disease when she returned. She defied the prognosis just as she defied the odds.

She fought with fierce determination and, despite having to deal with more cancer diagnoses, when she finally succumbed to the cruel hand she was dealt, she had far surpassed any expectations by reaching 69 years old. 

Janie did extensive genealogy research to try to locate any family member who might be a bone marrow match. She researched the disease, its treatments and the best place to go, eventually moving to Baltimore with her sister to be close to her chosen site, Johns Hopkins. And she beat it, with the help of every possible drug and her persistence and strength.

Despite the debilitating treatments and more heart-wrenching diagnoses, Janie continued to work, take care of her immediate family, and demonstrate her customary random acts of kindness.

She married her wonderful Joey very young and stayed loyal to her large family as she built her own.  When their daughter Lauren came along, she showed her love and care as a wonderful mother and ultimately as a grandmother, even though she drew the line at massaging baby Lauren with Gammy’s “wotion.”

I remember when Janie started at J&J, joining our Public Relations Department and working down the hall from me. She was always smartly decked out in a suit, her hair in a bun, looking like the ultimate professional woman. As she rose in the ranks working for our top execs, she kept her first friends and made many more. 

 Janie Paluzzi was beloved throughout J&J. Despite the hand she was dealt, she never complained. She always had a smile on her face and she managed to make each person feel special, like you were the most important person in her life when you were with her. I never knew when she would show up in my office with a bag of eggplants from Joey’s garden or – better yet – with a tray of delicious eggplant parm she had made for me to enjoy. 

Janie knew that I had been a Yankee fan since 1959, but that I had never been to an Old Timer’s Day, so one year Janie, Joey and Lauren took me to Yankee Stadium for that special day that only the Yankees can pull off. It was an experience I think of each year as I watch the ceremony on TV and cry. I’m sure I will be crying a little harder this year.

We all have our Janie Paluzzi stories. How lucky we all are to have had Janie in our lives. I grieve for her family and for her legions of friends, including me. No one will ever take the place of our dear Janie; no one could. She was irrepressible and she is irreplaceable. I wish she were here to read this and I hope she knew how I -- and everyone else who knew her and loved her  -- felt about her. She will live in our hearts forever.