My sister-in-law is a dazzler. Every time I see Angela, she’s as chic as a Parisian hot off the Champs-Elysées and just as graceful to boot. Whenever I visit her house, I make no effort to hide the fact that I’m snooping around and trying to collect more tips on how to level up as a human.
"Where did you get your slippers?" I asked once, because hers not only looked like cloud hugs for feet but also far, far cuter than the once-fuzzy socks I was wearing. The ones that were desperately clinging to my ankles with their dying threads. Then I asked her about her soap. The luxuriously sudsy one that left my hands smelling so Calypso Take Me Away that for once I was happy to wash for the entire CDC-recommended happy birthday song. And I asked about her cute throw pillows. And her handsome mixer. And...well, you get it.
That's not all. In her kitchen, there’s always a batch of freshly baked goodies. Macarons and perfectly crumbly madelines in the shape of perfect seashells - all of which she baked in her spare time in between working and making their home spotless.
And then, there’s me. When I bake, I have to have a recipe on my laptop open since I don't really do cookbooks and I need a live person to instruct me with their voice on what to do with all these measuring spoons and powders. Then I'll need to click on the keyboard to skip the YouTube ad, only to get a certain amount of flour on the keyboard. I don't know if that's as bad as getting water on my laptop, but just in case, I'll quickly turn to retrieve some wet wipes to keep it from performing some powdered short-circuiting madness to my computer.
But while getting said wipes, I'll have to flail my arms about and knock the entire bowl of chocolate chips onto the floor, to the reverie of ant armies waiting in the wings.
Or the time pictured here, when I had what I thought was a fantastic idea for some crispy and deeply purple taro waffles...and then proceeded to make a batch of these weirdly floppy, dirtyunicorn-colored waffles instead.
And this is the point where I I inevitably stop and wonder about people like my dazzling sister in law. Or like my sister Hannah, who must've met my sister-in-law in that secret camp where only certain adults get to go and learn how to master this tiresome cooking-cleaning-feeding-other- human-beings-and-myself thing so well.
Since this is the general gracefulness with which I conduct most of my life, you should know it doesn’t take much for a person to impress me. Last week, I was walking over to my husband to hand him our TV remote. Instead, he held up a hand in the air to catch it. So I stopped to lobbed it carefully...right at his head. If he were seven feet tall. Because I can’t throw. I was getting ready to apologize for the bad throw, when he hopped on one foot, arched his back in the air, and caught it squarely in his palm…all while playing a game on his phone with the other hand.
Technically, all James did was catch a remote. But from where I stood, that Adonis just leapt into the air to perform a Michael Jordan-like catch right in our living room.
Do you know what would happen if I tried a catch like that? I’d mistime my jump, have the remote smack me in the forehead. Then I’d sprain my ankle while coming down and smash the remote under my other heel. So if you're the kind of person that can catch something that’s generally tossed in your direction, you can safely bet I’m sitting there in the corner, boggled out of my mind at your athleticism. I won't say anything to you out loud (like normal people should), but you should know there's a wild crowd cheering in my head for you.
Unless it’s James, I don’t tend to share my amazement with others, even friends. It's because the few times I do, people think I’m being sarcastic when I say things like "Omigosh. You just calculated the tip in your head? Just like that? You’re amazing!"
"Well gee, even a third grader could calculate a basic tip," my colleague shrugged when I once dared to air my secret bedazzlement over others' mental math.
So that's why I don't tend to go public with how impressed I am by people.
But lately, I've been thinking I need to do a better job of acknowledging these unknowing all-stars in my life. I have magical human beings all around me who - to my utter incredulity - share about how insecure they feel. How ugly or inadequate they think they are. How unimpressive they feel their work is. How they struggle to be as good as the next person in the room WHILE I’M SITTING IN THE CORNER WITH STARS IN MY EYES AS I WATCH THEM BREATHE.
Friends, you should know how wonderful you are.
So here’s a list of superheroes in my life - people I’ve quietly admired from afar but never acknowledged aloud because I always assumed unicorns can recognize themselves in the mirror. Hopefully you’ll find yourself in at least one of these and realize you’ve actually got Superman underroos beneath whatever you’re wearing.
1. Parents who work.
As a teacher, I had students in my room from morning 'til afternoon. Afterwards, I'd crawl back to my quiet home to recharge. Not you. Some of you work a full job, then come home to feed, bathe, and play raucous back-to-back games of Battlebots with your kids. Stay-at-home parents, you're not exempted here. You spend even more time with your children - you've got no escape! - and somehow manage to keep your head and your house looking better than mine. How do you do it?
2. People who are fluent in two or more languages.
I've taken twelve years of Spanish and can barely manage to ask where the restrooms are. I've taken half a year of French, and it takes me forever to compose a sentence. My parents regularly rib me on all the silly mistakes I make when I speak Korean. I once called my grandfather a tyrannasaurus rex because in Korean, his name and the word for 'dinosaur' sound similar. (Actually, I lied. It doesn't. My Korean is just that clumsy and muddled.)
Sure, on paper, it sounds like I speak four languages. But it's a righteous mess when those four languages start elbowing each other across the lanes of my head highway and race for the finish line that is my mouth mouth. That's when I blurt out brilliance like, 'Ou est my car? 어디야...?'
But some of you can flawlessly conjugate verbs and even throw in a few progressives in all the languages you speak, as easily as you might toss a ball from one hand to the other (which, I believe we've established, I also can't do). Your brain is made of some superior stuff.
3. People who take the time to neatly fold their underwear.
You have the patience of gods. 'Nuff said.
4. Funny people.
I'm pretty sure my funny bone stopped growing at the age of 5, right when mentioning poop and pee is the surefire way to get a room to bust a giggle. James always gets slightly uncomfortable when someone uses bathroom humor in public because he knows - he KNOWS - that I'll be the clown in the corner still loudly cackling too many seconds after every other normal adult has retreated into polite silence.
So when there are people who manage to keep everyone 'round the table chuckling with wit of the more mature variety - clever impressions, witticisms, and sly self-deprecations - I bask in their sophisticated sense of humor.
5. Good describers.
This goes for anything. A book summary. How to get to the nearest Publix. Your pet cat. I'm so impressed by people who can rattle off the perfect string of nouns and adjectives to clearly make someone else know what you know.
I once tried to explain what was for dinner to James, and this is how it came out - "We're having that pancake thingy - that we had at the restaurant once? You know, in Buford? While we were on that road trip? - and rice and then some stuff on the side."
Sometimes I have no idea how I ever became a teacher.
6. People who remember when things happened.
You know you fall into this group if you say things like, "I graduated in 2012, and moved to Anchorage in 2015, after which I met and married my wife in 2020." HOW DO THOSE NUMBERS STAY IN YOUR HEAD? How do you keep track of all those timelines?
I once tried to purchase a bottle of wine when the cashier asked for my ID. That's usually the sign of a Very Good Day, if someone thinks I'm young enough to be an underage drinker. This time, I had my hands full of stuff and my wallet was buried deep in my backpack. Seeing this, the woman kindly responded, "That's all right, honey. I'm sure you're of age. Just tell me your birthday and I'll type it in."
That sucked. Not only did she retract the compliment of asking me for my ID, she now said she was sure I was 'of age'. She might as well have circled my eye wrinkles and frown lines with a bright red Expo marker. But then, I stammered as I struggled to remember my birthday. My own date of birth, along with some other important dates.
"Wait...it's in December. Two days after Christmas...when's that again? Oh geez, I should really know my own birthday..."
Thankfully, she laughed and played it off (and most importantly, let me take the vino home), but I try not to shop there anymore, especially on Wednesdays at 11 when Crystal is on the register.
7. People who remember things, period.
I do a Google search for 'How do you know you have dementia?' at least once a year. Because at least once a year, someone will share an idea and I'll say, "That's fantastic! How'd you come up with that?" After an awkward silence, they'll reply, "You. You said it yesterday."
Something similar happens when I ask friends for book recommendations. They'll mention a title and ask, "Have you heard of A Fish Jumping in the Night Sea?" and I'll shake my head no and eagerly ask for the full synopsis. They'll summarize the book with such sweeping hype that I'll get all good and excited about adding it to my reading list and rush home to order it, only to the very same title staring at me reproachfully from my shelves.
My theory is that somewhere in my twenties, my brain decided to punish me for all the cramming for college finals and said, 'That's it! No more! I'm not remembering another dang thing for you!'
8. Accurate estimators.
Anything that comes out of my mouth that's preceded by the word 'about' is bound to be wrong. It's about ten feet further, I'll say about something that's actually an entire city block away. Or Dinner will be ready in five minutes! and James will be wasting away with hunger at the table while I'm still bustling in the kitchen half an hour later.
Friends, if you can accurately gauge time, distance, height, size, weight, age, price, or really any numerically quantifiable property of any event, person, or thing - historical or present, living or dead - then my hat tips itself to you.
9. Artists and musicians.
Why does a phrase like 'starving artists' even exist? Some of you friends make things. Out of nothing. Where there once was a canvas, there's now a landscape or a comic. Or where there was silence, now there's a soundtrack. Some people just open their mouths and music comes out! I'm so amazed by you, creative friends.
10. Sports fans.
My father-in-law deigned to watch a little bit of basketball with James one day, and after a few moments of silence, he weighed in. "So these large men just run up and down, back and forth, all over the court to get a ball into a hole? As a job?" he asked gravely. "Isn't that just a little dumb?"
I had to cough to cover up my laugh because I've long felt the same way about most sports. But once in a while, when I watch an entire stadium of people roar in unison for their team, I wish I had enough patience to learn the rules and invest my heart in a game. It looks like such fun to jump and yell and scream after a goal (touchdown? basket?), and for once, I'd like to do it on time instead of two beats after I've realized everyone else is doing it.
11. People with good hearing.
How many times can you ask someone to repeat themselves before it starts to get weird? There are no rules for something like this, of course, but my gut tells me that number is somewhere between 5 and 10. If I'm talking to someone in a decently quiet space, then I'll have no problems abiding by that quota. But put me in a room with loud music, surround sound conversations, and interrupting waiters, and both my hearing and attention span take a sharp nosedive.
Last December, I was having dinner with a friend in a loud restaurant, and she was telling me all about her family's holiday traditions. At the same time, Mariah Carey was reaching the zazziest part of All I Want for Christmas Is You, I could really only make out bits and phrases out of my friends' mouth. I'd already thrown out a few versions of, 'I'm sorry - can you repeat that again?' and 'It's so loud in here - what did you just say?'
By the fourth or fifth time, my inner social barometer set off an alarm signal that I might be sounding a bit rude, so I did the next best thing - pretend. I nodded fervently to the cadence of her speech and physically leaned in closer (both to appear interested and to desperately catch more of what she was saying) when I suddenly realized it'd gotten a little too quiet. My friend was staring at me expectantly, and I realized with growing horror that she'd just asked me a question. AND I HAD NO IDEA WHAT SHE ASKED. I decided to play it safe and say, "You know, I'm not really sure. What do you think?"
It turned out, she'd asked me when my birthday was. And now there are two people - the Publix cashier and my friend - who know better than to ask me for my birthday anymore.
12. Healthy people.
I'm talking about those of you who exercise for fun. Who voluntarily choose the bulgur over the burger, the celery over the sandwich, the treadmill over binge watching three seasons of Great British Bakeoff in one day.
My husband is one of these ridiculous health nuts. Two weeks ago, I came up with a brilliant cure for our Date Night Curse, where neither of us could choose where we should go for dinner. So I suggested we make a point of trying out every pizzeria within a ten mile radius. It was my shiniest, most golden brainchild yet. Now, I'd have a regular pizza rotation in my belly - always a good thing - and I'd never have to sit through another murderous round of 'IdunnowhaddYOUwanttoeat?' It was the brightest moment of my 2023 so far when James happily agreed - he said YES! - to weekly pizza night.
And then the air pfwooshed out of that happy balloon a week later when he somehow convinced me to sign up for something called a Transformation Challenge at our gym, where we would all compete with each other to lose the most weight. And all the happy pizzas that were dancing in my head were poofed away and replaced with boring, undancing celery sticks.
So that's the extent to which I care about my health - that is, only to the extent that I can still have pizza everydayifJamesisn'tlooking. But some of you were raised with a normally-sized appetites and are even known to make appreciative mmm noises over bowls of salad. You're a different sort of human being and my slightly flabby, prediabetic body probably wishes you were its brain.
13. People who walk in grass without looking.
I spent the bulk of my life in New York City, where anyone who cares about the longevity and cleanliness of their footwear will always, always look where they're walking. It doesn't matter if you're in a public park or in Central Park - you'll keep one eye out for aggressive homeless fellows and another for the piles of dog dooky that await your only pair of decent fall boots.
So it boggles my mind when I see people walking around in parks, with their eyes so carefreely lifted above the waterline. How could they so blindly trust that every dog owner that's ever visited the area with their toilet-bound pup was responsible enough to dispose of every malodorous land mine? You have astonishing faith in other human beings.
14. People who can end phone conversations.
It's the real reason why I hate conducting business over the phone, be it a banker, a telemarketer, or the delivery guy. An Uber guy called yesterday to let me know my food was at the door and ended the call with, "Enjoy your meal!"
To which I stupidly replied, "You too!"
I also have this weird thing where I have to have the last word in a phone call. This played out in a very real way last week when I was on the phone with a courier service, trying to track down a package. Once we finished our business, we got to that dreaded part of a phone conversation, where we start to wrap things up.
"All right, Jane. Thanks for calling Happy Delivery and have a nice day!"
And in whatever mad part of my brain this happens, I feel like it'd be rude for my conversational partner to wish me a nice day and then hear me just hanging up. So I reply. "Thanks, you too!"
Other person:"All right, now. Bye!"
Me: "Okay, bye!"
Other person (now sounding a little less cheery) - "Bye."
Me: "K. Haveagoodone."
Other person - (Resigned sigh. Click.)
14. You. Just you.
Not everyone can be my sister-in-law. Few people can manage to be as amazing a human being as my husband is. But if we've ever interacted for even a few minutes in real life, I can safely guarantee there was something you said or did that made me admire you.
And even if we've never met, I'm certain there's something in your brain that I can all-too-proudly admit I have absolutely no knowledge about.
So here's to you, my remarkable, magnificent friend. You are worth your weight in gold for all you bring into my life and those around you.