When I wrote the post entitled The Lives of Others, I was thinking about the film of the same name, but had not yet seen it. But now I have.
Beverly, the president of the film club to which I belong, recommended it to me shortly after it came out. I put it on my Netflix list, but recently moved it up to the top of my queue. I wish I had done so sooner, because it was a wonderful film.
If you have not seen it, it takes place in East Germany a few years before the fall of the Berlin Wall and focuses on a couple under surveillance and the man watching them. Although the foreshadowing was obvious and I figured out the end before it happened, it was still a wonderful and suspenseful film about a time in the world’s recent past about which I knew very little.
There was nothing about the film I didn’t like, although I wonder how accurate the subtitles were. There were a couple of scenes that I thought were more meaningful, but the words didn’t convey that.
I thought I was going to get off easy today. Dean took Clare to school at 7 this morning. All I’d have to do was take Andrew at 10 and pick Clare up at 12. Andrew said he’d get the bus home. Easy day.
I drove Andrew to school as planned, then did some work in my attic office. Then it began to snow. It was light at first – I sat here looking out the window thinking how pretty it was and how much I was going to enjoy the drive to school to get Clare if big fat flakes were falling. I continued to work and occasionally looked out the window to marvel at what a little snow does to the landscape.
At 11:30 I decided to head out and brush the two inches of white powdery snow off my car. The road was covered in snow, and slippery under my daughter’s cast-off faux Uggs. I wondered, briefly, if I should take the SUV instead, but thought that my car would be fine, and when I headed up the street (a very slight incline) I was confident all would be well.
All was well until I turned off Bradley and onto a side street. This street is somewhat steep, narrow and curvy. Not like that street in San Francisco, but not like the Ohio Turnpike either. If I’d had the road to myself I may have swerved and gone straight to a less hilly street up the road, but I was in the turn when I saw the 4 stuck cars on Rayburn. This included a pick-up truck that was facing the wrong way in the right hand lane (and partially on someone’s yard). So, I called forth all of my driving in northern Illinois winters memories, held fast to the steering wheel and drove up the hill, avoiding the pick-up by a few inches.
There were cars behind me and cars facing me in the other lane, but no one in front of me so I didn’t have to worry about rear-ending anyone. I drove very slowly, but kept my foot on the gas and I made progress. Slowly. I was lucky that I never had to stop, because I might not have started again. I made it to the top of the hill and then waited for the slow progression of cars to pass me on Wilson. Turning right on Wilson was fine, I figured I’d been through the worst part, but as I inched up to the top of a slight hill approaching Whittier, I saw I’d been mistaken. Cars were off the road and those that were moving were slipping and sliding sideways and backwards. I slipped sideways twice and once had to hold the steering wheel very tightly as I skidded forward a number of feet.
Once I turned onto Whittier it was better, more crowded, but flatter. As expected, the road in front of Whitman was a madhouse. Pretty much a parking lot while parents sat in their cars calling their students on their cell phones or waited in the right turn lane to turn into the parking lot. I’d already decided to park the car outside Whittier Woods and call Clare to come to me.
So I called and got her idiotic answer message of some puppets saying Snape, Snape, Severus Snape over and over again. I tried again. No answer. So I texted her that I was outside Wittier Woods. Then I sat and watched as the big fat flakes I’d been looking forward to driving in covered the car windows. A few minutes later Clare called and said that she was hanging out with friends and didn’t need a ride home.
Here I’d like to say I was understanding and wonderfully motherly, but I’d be lying. I told her how angry I was that I risked my life driving in the snow and couldn’t she have told me that earlier? She said she did and I said, you said you were going to hang out with your friends on Thursday. She said, Mom, it is Thursday. I said, oops. Sorry.
So I made my slow way back home, this time wisely avoiding Lombard East Rayburn.
I got home, called Clare to apologize and took some photos of the pretty snow, happy to be off the snowy, slippery streets.
I headed up to the attic and began working and admiring the pretty snow that now had covered the trees so that the whole world looked like a black and white photograph with some sort of blur effect.
Then the phone rang. It was Andrew. Wrestling practice was canceled and he needed me to pick him up.
The other evening at dinner, my daughter told me that she didn’t want to hurt my feelings but she thought that Marge Simpson was more interesting than me. Then she went on to explain that she thought I was smarter than Marge, but that Marge did more interesting things than I did. She then proceeded to list all of the more interesting things that Marge Simpson did, but I didn’t. Then Andrew and Dean started listing more things, following Clare’s lead.
My feelings weren’t hurt. I don’t care that a cartoon character has a bigger personality than I do, nor do I care that she has bigger hair than I. Nor that it is blue.
Clutch Cargo Lips 