ever-fixed mark

Do they make SUVs or mini-vans with a retractable partition between the front and back seats, like in a limousine? Or, hell, how about a non-retractable partition, like in a New York taxi?

If not, why not, asks the woman who spent several hours this weekend listening to a meandering back-seat disquisition on Thomas and his Friends?

Listen up, Detroit. This could represent the return of your fortunes. I would pay serious cash money for such a feature. I might even buy a GM car if it had a soundproof partition.

Umberto Eco once wrote that one could identify a pornographic movie because all of the action occurs in real time. I have always found that remark hilarious. In one instant he sweeps aside all the usual debates. Forget about whether it’s gratuitous, whether it’s graphic, whether it has artistic value, etc. Does it happen in real time? Definitely porn.

I have my own little genre-identifying axiom about how you can tell trashy fiction: the characters repeatedly address each other by name. “Well, John, I think we have ourselves a situation here.” “Yes, Mary, we certainly do.” I’m not sure why this particular kind of purple prose should be a hallmark of airport-bookstall fiction, except maybe that it allows the lazy writer to tell the story with pages of dialogue unencumbered by tedious narration or exposition.

This irritates me particularly because people in one-on-one situations rarely call each other by name in real life. My husband, for instance, never does; I sometimes administer little pop quizzes to make sure he still knows it. “I love you…” he whispers; I prompt, “What’s my name?” So far, he’s passed.

But things have changed around here on the name front. At this odd juncture in Aitch’s journey to fluency in English, he’s taken to appending the name of this conversational partner to every utterance. “Plane, Daddy!” “This way, Mommy!” “No cookies, Dog.” “Be careful, Gordon,” etc. Husband and I always feel compelled to respond in kind: “I see the plane, Aitch!” “Thank you, honey!”Sometimes we even respond in unison. Now, at this point we’re just happy that Aitch is using Mommy and Daddy accurately, but it does give even the most casual conversations a strangely formal, almost ritualistic feel.

Julie of “A Little Pregnant” used the term “habitual aborter” in a post the other day (actually, she used the trendier– and rhyming! — truncation “hab-ab”). It’s been on my mind ever since. “Habitual Aborter.” Sounds tough, doesn’t it? Edgy.

So Julie’s post started swirling around in my head with Susan’s post, as they do, and I’m picturing the Habitual Aborters as a girls’ club from the fifties, with embroidered jackets, headed up by Rizzo from Grease.

The Habitual Aborters are a tough bunch. Like Rizzo’s group, the Pink Ladies, they crack both gum and wise. They smoke cigarettes, drink malt liquor from quart bottles, and talk trash about the other cliques at Infertility High:

The “Double Lines.” Unlike most high schools, the Double Lines — the girls who get pregnant easily — are the good-girls’ clique. They all have blonde ponytails and matching jackets (pink or blue). The Habitual Aborters give them a hard time, but they graduate quickly so they don’t have to put up with it for long.

The “Malformed Uteri.” This loosely-formed group also includes fallopian blowouts and other reproductive anomalies. This clique isn’t well-organized. They just smile shyly at one another across the playground, and occasionally meet up for study sessions (most are planning to major in pre-med). They do have cool t-shirts, though, courtesy of Susan.

The “Multiple IVFs.” In contrast to the Malformed Uteri, the Multiple IVFs are highly evolved– really, they’re more of a gang than a social club. They have initiation rites, gang colors (green and purple), and scars that mark them as members. They have their own jargon (”frozen cyle,” “follicle suppression,” etc.) that the rest of the girls don’t understand. The “MIVFs” have a thriving drug-trafficking sideline. These are tough chicas.

The “Hyperstims.” An offshoot of the Multiple IVFs, these ladies are the baddest of the bad. They have been to hell and back; they’re afraid of nothing. It’s a small gang, but they are fierce. Thanks to their ailment, gang members are also kind of…bulky. They tend to intimidate.

The “Secondary Infertiles.” The alumni group. They came for a reunion and never left.

The Unexplaineds. Not really a clique; it’s where you belong when you don’t belong anywhere. They’re currently seeking their own table in the lunchroom, but in the meantime they have to make do cadging seats at the other tables.

In my head (where so much interesting stuff happens), the Habitual Aborters are about to have a rumble with the Multiple IVFs. I think the Hab-Abs could kick butt in a fair fight, but the MIVFs sometimes break out those huge needles.

We’re number two! I just found out that the people who were two places ahead of us got their referral, meaning that we can’t be far behind. Perhaps Sammy the Adoption Seal really was foretelling good news.

After yesterday’s post, I started thinking: Why all this focus on omens, anyway? Have we learned nothing from literature?

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. It’s been a while since I flattered one of the Romantics. It’s no “Ode on a Sippy Cup,” but here goes:

It is an adoptive Applicant
Who stops a Dad at Gymboree
“By thy Mom Jeans and crazy eye
Now wherefore stopp’st thou me?

Gymboree’s doors are opened wide
And our class starteth soon,
The kids are dressed, the snacks are pack’d,
They scream, forsooth, like loons!”

She holds the Dad with gnarled hand.
“There was a bug,” quoth she.
“Hold off! Unhand me, grey-rooted shrew!”
Eftsoons her hand dropt she.

The Gymboree Dad is spell-bound by the eye of the old Adoptive Applicant, and is constrained to hear her tale.

“The forms were filled and notarized
Merrily did we drop
The application into the post
At the mailroom stop.

The Ancient Applicant tells how the homestudy proceeded fortuitously, till it reached the I600-A.

The Case Worker came into the house
From the agency came she,
And looked fain on, and did approve
Our Homestudy.

But then ‘twas INS’s turn,
They, tyrannous and strong;
Did lose our paperwork; to find it
Took far, far too long.

At last they took our fingerprints
For better, nay! For iller,
For my thumb did match exact
With a serial killer.

All was finally straightened out
With Favorable Dispensation
But then referrals did slow down
To a trickle from that Nation.

The land of Waiting, and of fearful sounds from the Yahoo adoption board, where no reliable information was to be seen.

And through the weeks the info leaks
Did cast a dismal sheen:
But little happened, nothing changed—
The wait was all between.

The wait was here, the wait was there
The wait was all around:
It bored and enervated us
Yet to it we were bound.

Till a great land-insect, called the Ladybug, came at the darkest hour, and was received with great joy and hospitality.

At length did come a Ladybug
Through the air it came
As if it had been our caseworker
We hailed it in God’s name

It ate the food it ne’er had eat
It flew around and sang,
The silence split with a thunder-fit
The telephone, it rang!

And lo! The Ladybug proveth an insect of good omen, and followeth the Applicant as she continued to wait from referral to travel call.

And the weather turn’d from cold to warm
The Ladybug did follow,
And every day, for food or play,
Came to the Applicant’s hollo!

The ancient Applicant inhospitably killeth the pious bug of good omen.

“God save thee, ancient Applicant!
Needst thou some calming drug?
Why dost thou howl?” – “With my dish-towel
I squashed the LADYBUG.”

Dog and I went for a walk on the beach late this afternoon and spotted a seal. Normally, I can’t see camouflaged wildlife easily, because of my poor eyesight, so I’m always inordinately excited when I do see something. The sun had already passed behind the dunes, but the sky was still bright, and the water reflecting it was a light turquoise color and very calm — perfect conditions to notice something stirring.

I was walking along, admiring the water, when I saw a largish head break the surface, look toward the shore, and then dive back under. I have seen beached seal pups on the island before, and herds of seals (or was it sea lions?) out in California, but this was the first swimming seal I’d seen at our beach. I scanned the water until I saw it surface again, about twenty yards down the beach in the direction we had been walking. The next time it submerged, I kept walking in the same direction, and when it surfaced again it was parallel to us, and much closer to the shoreline. Even Dog noticed it and went on point. If he were a Lab, he would have been in the water trying to play with it, but luckily Dog is too sensible to swim when he’s wearing his winter coat .

If we get our referral tomorrow, I’m going to start spreading a meme that seals are the hot new adoption harbinger. Unfortunately, that leaves those of you inland dwellers out in the precursory cold, so you’ll need to come up with an alternative. Cockroaches? They’re everywhere.

“Welcome to Goose Bay, Newfoundland, first refuge of trans-Atlantic flights afflicted by sick passengers, engine trouble, and terrorist threats. We hope you enjoy your stay and somehow manage to disassociate our fair land with the tragedy that brought you here. Goose Bay: Come back soon…on purpose!®”

Last night, I broke up my meeting early (they were as sick of hearing me talk as I was of talking) and started toward the city center for a little walk. I was surprised to find myself at the Museumplein by 4:30 – 90 minutes before closing time at the Rijksmuseum, plenty of time to take in some Old Masters.

The Rijksmuseum is a handsome brick building, reinforcing my idea of Amsterdam as a huge university campus. It was under construction, unfortunately, but they had moved all the best pieces to a single wing. Normally I would have been disappointed, but a pre-edited collection was perfect for a short trip.

As a result I got to see several amazing works in a concentrated period, the highlight of course being paintings by Rembrandt and his pupils. The way they captured skin tone and texture was just astounding. The place was fairly empty, so I got to indulge my preference for standing very close to the paintings, and to the placards that describe the paintings (not because I need to see them in detail, but because the letters are so tiny). As word-oriented as I am, I find I can’t enjoy the painting until I’ve read the description. Sometimes I try to force myself to experience the painting first, to make my own guesses and judgments about it…but my eye always goes to the text. (Similarly, when I’m in the car and a new song comes on the satellite radio, I always glance at the receiver to read the artist and title. The habit persists even when I’m in the car with the AM/FM radio, even as I’m silently telling myself there’s no text there, idiot. It’s like I think they’re going to magically start broadcasting that information.)

Anyway, they kept ringing the bell to warn of the imminent closing time, and as I was making my way to the entrance I stumbled upon Night Watch. I hadn’t realized it was there, because I wasn’t able to read the floor plan (it was in English, but the letters were so small I didn’t bother). I had studied Night Watch in school and had always assumed it depicted a military scene. Turns out (this is why you should read the placard!) it was a vanity production for the local “militia club,” wealthy men who paid for the privilege of modeling. The more you paid, the more prominent your spot. Facing Night Watch was a similar grouping, of men even more gorgeously attired. I’m picturing the 16th-century equivalent of Rotarians commissioning a famous photographer for a cool picture.

I thought that the long walk to the museum and the fresh air would tire me out, relax me, but when I got back to the hotel I found that for the fourth night in a row, I couldn’t sleep. The first night I had picked up a book, because that always works at home, but I ended up staying awake until I finished it at 3:00 a.m. After that I just watched TV.

What’s on Dutch TV at midnight?

Incidentally, the Korean adoption boards are abuzz with the news that a Korean adoptee, Toby Dawson, medaled in moguls. (Pardon my use of the noun-as-verb construction “medaled.” I absorbed it inadvertently from watching all that Eurosport.) He is hoping that the media attention will lead his birth parents to contact him. He even gave his referral picture to NBC to post on their web site. I teared up when I saw the little boy with his K-number. We have moved up to number six on the wait list–very slow progress, two places in six weeks!–and I am hoping to see our own referral picture any day now.

Toward that end, my other late-night time-killing activity has been surfing the adoption boards for referral news. I will be glad to be back on US time so I can do this during business hours. And I cannot wait to return to my regularly scheduled sleeping program. I have so many floaters in my eyes that I feel like I’m walking through clouds of gnats.

Sometimes when I’m on the road I like to read a novel set in that destination. Most of the time I choose the book consciously, but the last time I went to Amsterdam I happened to startThe Museum Guard on the airplane when I realized it was partially set in Amsterdam. It really enhanced both the book and the trip for me. This time, though, I left my small town in Massachusetts and traveled all the way to Amsterdam only to pick up a book that was set in a small town in Massachusetts: Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld.

I noticed this book a few months ago. My affection for the prep-school novel is well-entrenched but has diminished with age, and I wasn’t planning on reading it. I saw this book on so many “best-of-2005″ lists, though, that I became intrigued, and faced with a lot of down time and a limited selection, I caved. Plus, I liked the grosgrain belt on the cover design.

I was expecting a sarcastic, satirical Less than Zero-type book, with worldly teenagers partying heartily. Instead, it was a measured story of a midwestern girl, Lee, who gets into an elite school on a scholarship. The cultural aspects of school life are examined in detail — making friends, finding a roommate, parents’ weekend, Carnation Day. It was so innocent that I would have given it, without reservation, to the pre-teen me to read.

The pre-teen me would have loved it; the adult me enjoyed parts of it but was impatient with the heroine, who was so insecure about her perceived lack of status that she wasted four years at school without ever drawing an easy breath or, apparently, learning anything. As Lee rebuffed all social overtures and alienated all her classmates because she didn’t think she was good enough to hang out with them, I muttered to myself, “Come on! Loosen up! Go to a freaking dance for once in your life, you moron!” She never redeemed herself, though. As her school days drew to a close she committed a final act of flamboyant social suicide, and then in a swift denouement, apparently turned out all right in college. The life that had played out as high tragedy during high school was, post-graduation, pretty ordinary after all.

Thus, the novel was startling, but only in that its rhythms were so true to life. There was no rape scene, no deep dark incest secret, no car crash. Girl goes to high school and gets over it. It was a nice change from the usual, but the narrative arc is “the usual” for a reason. I like a little Bildungs in my roman. If I wanted to experience the life of someone who is socially awkward for years on end — for example, someone who thinks that being forced to have dinner out with her colleagues three nights in a row is the business-trip equivalent of the Bataan Death March — well, I would just look in the mirror.

I arrived in Amsterdam without incident, despite the snowstorm in the Northeast, and I’m powering through my jet-lag. When traveling in Europe I’ve adopted a policy of adapting to my hosts’ time schedule as quickly as possible, whether through pharmaceutical means, light therapy, or sheer determination. This doesn’t really make me any less tired or any more effective, but it helps me avoid those horribly deep daytime naps and depressing nighttime insomnia. There is nothing worse than hours of TV infomercials in a foreign language.

The hotel is part of a Japanese chain, nice enough but with very seventies’ European decor, and not in a retro kind of way, either. I enjoy the occasional night in a hotel, but there is something so disconnected about attending a large meeting in one for several days. You eat, sleep, live, work, and exercise in this odd uninteresting cloistered environment, insulated from real life. When I saw the movie Lost in Translation a few years ago, it really brought home for me that feeling of dislocation brought on by jet-lag and hotel living.

To combat both traveler’s anomie and jet lag, I always try to Get the Hell Out of the Hotel as much as possible, but here the meeting agenda is conspiring against me. This is the kind of meeting that features multiple group meals. In my industry, no one would dream of sending you halfway around the world to a meeting and then asking you to work late, but they think nothing of scheduling your meals and social events from morning to night. I realize that most people think of a group meal as a benefit, “Thank God I don’t have to eat alone!” but I actually love to eat alone. So tonight I took the tram into town, ate dinner, and then sat at a nice little bar for an hour or so with my book. It was complete bliss after a long and people-filled day. (They are nice people, but I am a crank.)

Amsterdam seems like such a young town. Head shops and marijuana cafes aside, there’s something about the scale of the city that makes it feel like it would be the perfect place to spend your twenties. The city center is lined with buildings just three or four stories high, all with large windows, even on the ground floor. Each block looks like a university quad. It’s so manageable and accessible, yet with all the bars and coffeeshops, not dull at all.

Elvis spent time here in his youth. Why didn’t I think of moving here after college? My twenties were a little later than Elvis’s twenties, but still. I could totally see myself waiting tables in a bar, reading English literature in cafes, and developing an intense and inappropriate crush on some Angry Young Man.

I’m off to Amsterdam, weather permitting.

No, I’m not going with the cool kids. The Netherlands Board of Tourism did not see fit to invite my bloggy self. It’s just plain old boring work.

Should I convert my bitterness into a series of scathingly negative blog posts, thus bringing the Low Countries’ tourism industry to its knees?

Nah…too much work.

This trip is off to a bitter start in any case. Airport tales of woe are only interesting to the bearer, so I’ll give you the highlights: Snowstorm, flight canceled, new flight delayed, now rerouted through Paris, blah blah blah. I’m currently sitting on the floor in Logan, because there are no chairs near the outlets and the airline’s lounge is closed (oh! the indignity!). I’ve just figured out that the only way to get the Logan Wi-Fi to work is to check the “send me lots of spam” box.

See? It’s not exactly “the Superdome during Hurricane Katrina.”