Early one weekend morning, I was in a downtown area, looking for a place to park so I could explore a city green space. The parking garages were closed, and the only choice was to parallel park on the street.

I know this to be true because I circled the block four times, hoping to weasel out of parallel parking. I do not possess that skill, nor do I have a smart car that’ll park for me.

With no other choice, I took a deep breath and attempted the maneuver, cutting the wheel and backing in.

Not good enough, so I tried again and again.

By this time, especially with all that turning and twisting, the car had to be practically touching the curb.

I got out, looked, and my car was about two feet away from the curb. I decided that was close enough. I turned the engine off and enjoyed the green space.

Sometimes, close enough is good enough.

Sewing is that way for me. I decided to make some pillow shams, a project I haven’t tackled since my boys were in diapers.

After the third YouTube video of demonstrating how to find the exact middle of the material, I threw the tape measure against the wall,

There was no way I was going to get those seams exactly 18 and an eighth inches apart.

Instead, I eyeballed it.

There wasn’t an equal hem on both sides of the sham, but the seams were hidden. They were good enough and close enough and, from the front, the shams looked nice and neat.

In this case, a guess was good enough.

For years, I’ve made pancakes so now I eyeball the dry mix and the milk, and most of the time, I get pretty close the first time.

But I don’t have to be exact. If the batter’s too runny, I add more dry mix. If it’s too thick, I add more milk.

Close enough, in this case, is definitely good enough.

I decided long ago that when it comes to recipes, close enough is good enough.

My sister gave me a recipe for a spicy chicken casserole.

The long list of ingredients included boiling a chicken, straining the broth, chopping up chiles and melting cheese.

No way, I told myself.

I bought a rotisserie chicken and a box of spicy Velveeta cheese. Did that casserole have deboned chicken and hand-grated cheese?

Nope.

Did anyone complain?

Nope.

Close enough, once again, was good enough.

I eyeball hanging pictures on the wall. I’ve tried hanging them side by side, but I’ve never gotten it right, even when I use a ruler and a level. So, I made a choice to change my decorating style to staggered and “eclectic.”

In other words – all over the place.

I’ve racked my brain, trying to think of areas in my everyday life where I have to be precise. Not cooking, definitely not cleaning or the laundry.

The dog doesn’t require me to do things precisely – she just wants to be fed and let out to chase squirrels in the back yard.

I will concede, however, that there’s a place, reason and time to be precise.

Removing an appendix or performing LASIK eye surgery both require precise measurements.

Architects, accountants and airplane pilots must be precise in their fields. We count on pharmacists getting the dosage in our medications correct down to the last gram.

But I’m not a doctor, dentist, ophthalmologist or airline pilot. I’m just a regular person trying to bumble my way through life.

So if I hang a picture a little crooked, have a half-inch hem on one side of a pillow sham and an inch hem on the other, that’s close enough.

And good enough for me.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

Houston traffic is notorious for being bumper-to-bumper frustrating.

My temper gets the best of me sometimes, especially when someone zooms across four lanes of traffic in front of me to make the exit.

I’ve seen people reading a book while driving, blaring music so loud my eardrums hurt and forgetting their vehicle was equipped with turn signals.

But I saw something this week I never expected to see.

Road rage on steroids.

I was making a U-turn underneath the interstate. Waiting to merge, I noticed two cars in the intersection to my right had been in a fender bender. One of them had run the light, and the car headed south had been T-boned.

Cars were zipping around the wreck, so there wasn’t an opening for me and the dozen or so cars behind me to merge.

But then, in less than a minute, the unbelievable happened.

The car that had T-boned the side of the other car backed up. I thought it was to start clearing the intersection. But then the driver put his or her car into drive and bashed the side of the other car again.

Things like that happen in the movies, not in real life, I thought. The person behind me honked, and I moved as there was an opening. I thought about going back but there was no way to get to that intersection with traffic from all directions.

I drove away with my mouth open. I’d seen road rage on videos but never in real life, never to that level of anger and frustration.

This person’s car was banged up, but to intentionally bash it in again, and endanger the safety of the person in the other car as well as him or herself, was unimaginable.

There’s really no excuse for acting like an out-of-control lunatic when things go wrong. But there are quite a few reasons why people’s tolerance is at the empty mark.

Covid tops the list.

At the beginning of the pandemic, our loved ones were isolated from us while they were sick. We weren’t allowed to see them in their final days, weren’t allowed to say goodbye.

For two years, we lost the opportunity to take vacations, visit relatives, or go to the movies. Now a variant of the virus is making the rounds, and we’re cancelling activities again.

There’s the heat.

Southerners know July and August are two of the most miserable months of the year. In a state where it’s hot a good bit of the time, having a string of 100-plus degree days ignites tempers as well as brush fires. And we haven’t even gotten our first electric bill.

These days, it’s become acceptable to be a rude, obnoxious human being. Acting as a decent human being is no longer the first choice.

We need to start seeing people wearing an apron, a name tag or a uniform as a person.

A teenager saving money for a car or tuition.

A single mom working a thank-less job to provide for her children.

A father taking the job nobody else wanted because he wants to provide for his family.

A teacher struggling with demanding parents and a system that demands more than anyone should have to give.

A driver who made a mistake in judgment. Not someone who purposely left home, hoping he or she could wreck her car and yours.

The time is now to give people a break.

Revenge therapy doesn’t work. You don’t have the right to lose your temper and cause someone else to fear for their safety.

If another driver is traveling slower than the traffic around them, that’s their choice, not a personal slam to you.

If the clerk in the store isn’t perky and friendly, perhaps it’s because they’re the only one who showed up for work that day and customers have been rude and obnoxious for the past four hours.

Put yourself in someone else’s shoes and rein in that temper.

Show compassion and civility.

Let’s make the world a better place.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

Grandchild number six is coming our way in August, and it’s been a while since we’ve helped outfit an infant.

Things have changed.

Our mother’s right arm flung across our chests if the car came to a sudden stop was considered safe enough when we were kids. Required car seats came along and changed the world.

When my now 42-year-old son was born, the infant car seat weighed about five pounds. They cost less than $20 and did the job.

By the time the third child came along, the price had tripled and the car seat/baby carrier weighed about 20 pounds. By the time he could walk, I had biceps like Thor’s.

Today’s car seats are called a system. There’s a base that stays in the car. You press one button on the top and the seat detaches and hooks right into the stroller, also part of the system.

There’s a cost for that technology — $700.

I kid you not.

Diaper bags still serve the same purpose – lugging around three or four Pampers, teething rings, an extra onesie, wipes and a bowl of dry cereal.

My purse was the best diaper bag around. I fished stale Cheerios and Froot Loops out of the bottom of that purse for years.

Today’s diaper bags start out at $75 because they’re considered designer bags. Call them what you may, but they still only have room for diapers, a change of clothes and a bowl of organic cereal.

No baby home is complete without toys. Our sons had quite a bit of fun banging Tupperware measuring cups and wooden spoons on an old pot or the floor. The price tag for today’s sensory toys starts at $19.95 and they don’t even talk to you.

When it comes to outfitting the baby’s room, the costs are high. Years ago, crib sheets came in three colors – white, yellow and light green. I remember paying $5 for one and thinking that baby would be sleeping like a king.

Today’s shoppers must go through sticker shock because crib sheets come in sets – gotta have the matching pillow – and can sell for up to $179 for one sheet and one accompanying item.

Baby bottles were made out of plastic – clear or white. You could find them at any late-night Piggly-Wiggly. The price was right – 99 cents for three.

You can still find the cheap plastic ones, but you’d be labeled a slacker if you showed up at Chuck-E-Cheese with those.

Today’s baby bottles come in colorful sets, complete with a choice of glass or plastic. They claim to help with colic, burping and gas, problems all of my babies had.

The only sure-fire cure came from my grandmother – a little baking soda in a teaspoon, add water, and give to the baby until he belched. Worked every time.

Let’s not forget the strides we’ve made in diapers.

When my eldest was born, I wanted to be a natural woman and save the planet. I bought a package of 12 cotton cloth diapers, baby diaper pins and plastic pants.

Those cloth diapers became dust cloths after the first time I cleaned a dirty one in the toilet. After that, I’d have given up my high heels before I’d give up disposable diapers.

Go ahead and buy those fancy nets and plastic fences to try and prevent a child from getting their head stuck in between the spindles on the staircase.

They’re going to try and stick their head through there anyway.

And they’ll try to flush candles down the toilet.

And they’ll write on the walls with a black marker you overlooked underneath the recliner.

No matter the price tag, some things never change.

Babies will cry when they’re hungry, overflow a diaper when you don’t have a spare and reject every pacifier you buy them.

We’re hoping grandchild number 6 settles for the three-for-a-dollar binkies.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

Cars are simply machines that get us from one place to another. Fill them up with gas and replace the tires when the old ones wear out. I usually get attached to vehicles because they’re more than a machine to me.

Such is the case with a car we just traded in. We bought a Highlander back in 2015, and she safely transported me over 170,000 miles. Some of those miles included trips to the beaches in Gulf Shores, Ala. and touring wineries in the Hill Country.

Most of the miles were from every-day life – going to and from work, trips to the grocery store or taking grandchildren from our house to theirs. I felt safe in that big car, just as I did as a teenage driver.

My first car was an old Pontiac Executive. The car was like a boat – four of us could sit in the front seat with no problem. My dad gave it to his teenagers when he wanted a new Cadillac, and we were thrilled.

That car took a young teenager everywhere she wanted to go and it was a sad day when dad sold the car for another Caddy.

The first car I bought was a white hatchback Honda Civic — $1,995. That little car took my toddler son and me everywhere – to work, day care, the grocery store and a summer trip to Florida.

We traded that car for a mini-van when our second son was coming along. I loved the mini-vans we had. The boys were free to litter the floor with toys and dropped chicken nuggets. There were permanent indentations in the vinyl from where car seats had been belted in for years.

When the boys were teens, they purchased their own cars, and a mini-van was no longer needed. I bought a sedan and that car became my crying space.

My dad passed away, and I grieved for him in the car. The Mazda was a safe place to cry for him, an almost daily occurrence that first six months.

Someone rear-ended me one rainy evening, and the body shop told us the car was totaled. I remembered saying a prayer of thanks to the car for giving me a safe space when I needed it.

We replaced the crying car with a bigger sedan, and that car fit me quite well – not too big, not too small.

But when grandchild number four was due and number five joined the clan, we needed a vehicle with enough room for all the grandkids. The Highlander had room for all the grandchildren and two adults, just the right number of seats we needed.

That Highlander was my trusty companion – taking me back and forth everywhere I went with plenty of room for luggage, groceries, bikes, cameras and gifts.

She transported our grandchildren to museums, parks and the beach. She didn’t mind dirt, sand, spilled drinks or having Legos underneath the seats.

Our Highlander was reliable and was sometimes a place where I could sing as loud and off-key as I wanted or cry after visiting the cemetery.

But she was showing her age. There were creaks and rattles, parts were wearing out and traveling long distances were becoming chancy. After all, the old girl was seven years old and had many miles on her.

Still, when we traded her in, I felt guilty. Sure, the Highlander was only a car, an inanimate object, but with her, I’d felt safe to take a quiet ride or a noisy one.

I could complain in that car, whine about the unfairness of life or roll the windows down and enjoy a calming ride in the country. On particularly rough days, I could howl at the sky and the car never complained.

The car was a comfortable friend.

I believe this next vehicle will live up to the legacy of the one before her, but the bar is high.

I simply hope the next owner of our old car finds a friend in her, just like I did.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.