Going Through The Change

Call me fickle, but I like to change my mind as often as I change my appearance. It's just my prerogative. Someone once asked me over the phone if I was the one with the straight blonde hair or the curly red hair? I answered, “Yes.” I have been both and more. It would have been just as logical to ask if I was the gal with the straight red hair and the Spanish accent (iQue raro!) Lately I've started to notice how my appearance is aging. Whether I like it or not, I seem to be going through “the change” right in step with the seasons. When the weather goes through its temperature spikes, my body chemistry also surges with hot flashes. It gives the term “hottie” a whole new meaning.

I also have warm memory flashes of the springtime of my youth. Back then the blossoming of love and being discovered by boys were the only things on my mind, that and the constant concern about my appearance. Besides continually changing my hair color, I had to have the perfect Coppertone tan. We didn’t have tanning beds back then, but we did have the next best (artificial) thing: sun lamps. Simply put, a sun lamp was just a huge infrared light bulb that we clamped onto furniture and presto, it burned one section of skin at a time. I was hot all right: red, hot and peeling. The only reason I was accepted socially was because most of my friends were also burned to a crisp or worse, they had a “natural” orange glow from the fake tanning products of the day. As I transition into the autumn of my life, I'm beginning to accept the fact that my freckles are never going to come together to form a beautiful tan. "I am what I am and it ain’t tan” is my new motto.

Fads change, seasons come and go, while the cycles of life continue on. I love that God created seasons so that Mother Nature—the Mother of all mothers—is perpetually in motion. Spring bursts forth and the earth is reborn, then all things living eventually die off by Winter. Year after year it is the same and yet different. The master plan repeats but the details vary, as though God Himself did not want to get stuck in a boring routine. Maybe Mama Nature is described as feminine because she reserves the right to consistently change her mind and her appearance at the same time, not unlike the way I operate.

How comforting to know that God remains constant in His faithfulness and His ultimate plans for our earthly days. The wise words of Ecclesiastes 3:1 'spring' to mind: “There is a time for every season and a time for every purpose under heaven.” Whatever I am going through, I can remember that it is only for a season and there is an intentional purpose. Hair colors change (naturally or not), tans fade (or peel), but thankfully, God's love is for forever.

Irish Spring

This week is when I celebrate what I call an Irish Spring (and I don’t mean the soap.) It is the week of St. Patrick’s Day and the first day of Spring. Even though I am only part Irish I feel a connection to all things Irish this time of year. I honor my ancestors with comments like “Saints be praised” in an Irish brogue I didn’t even know I had (and neither did anyone else.)

My mother’s mother was an O’Reagan. That's where I get my Irish heritage and my red hair (well, that and Miss Clairol.) People often comment on my Irish looks, but sometimes I wonder if they are politely inferring that I seem leprechaun short. Coming from a family where the rest of the members are blonde and German-looking, I don’t think much about being part Irish except on St. Patrick’s Day. I think more about the culture of hard work and integrity they passed on to me. They didn’t run around drinking green beer or telling me to kiss a blarney stone, but Lord knows I could have used it! They were a proud people of humble beginnings who first came to America as migrant farm workers. They dropped the 'O' in O’Reagan to fit in more easily with their newly adopted homeland. They didn't want to call attention to themselves or stand out like newcomers in a crowd of strangers.

I'm not sure how they would have felt about me with all my stories of calamities and my not-so-lucky charms, except I do know they did like to share a good laugh. I hope they would have laughed that I accidentally dyed my hair green and it wasn't even St. Paddy’s Day. They probably would have cried when they heard that as a waitress I once slipped and spilled a perfectly good glass of Irish whiskey down a lady’s back. The Irish I know are lovers of great stories. . . so many stories, so little time.

The real St. Patrick has his own story that has nothing to do with leprechauns or libations. While I'm no Irish historian, here are my favorite parts of St. Patrick's legend: After years of captivity in Ireland, pre-saint Patrick was visited by an angel telling him he would return to Britain. He became a priest and had another vision that he was to “become the voice of the Irish” by returning to Ireland to Christianize the pagan natives. He used the three-leaf shamrock to illustrate the Holy Trinity as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The “wearing of the green” shamrock became a symbol of faith. He became the patron saint of the Irish and now his day is a time to celebrate Irish heritage all over the world.

The craziness associated with St. Patrick’s Day is all in good fun. Traditions sprang up of drinking beer, the pinching of anyone not wearing the signature color green and—my personal favorite—the slogan, “Kiss Me, I’m Irish.” Silly traditions aside, I can never look at a shamrock the same way again. It's more than just a lucky charm, it's a symbol of faith. St. Patrick dedicated his life to serving God. As a fitting tribute, I raise a symbolic glass of green beer to toast St. Patrick for being a man of faith and and a deserving saint of a noble people.

P.S. Since I am also part German, I'm campaigning for a day to celebrate the slogan, “Kiss Me, I’m German."
—Bernice Lori O’Reagan Broyles (BLOB), LOL

DEADLine Disasters

I finally figured out why they call it a DEADLINE, because at the end of the line I’m DEAD tired. Although I love my royalty accounting business and my songwriter clients are the absolute best, every 90 days of every year I have to work around the clock to get their quarterly statements out on time. Coincidentally, somehow every 90 days, every possible catastrophe just waits in the wings to rear its ugly head until the moment I am completely stressed out and totally snowed under a pile of ledger paper.

Just this week as D-Day approached, my copier went out. I quickly ordered a new machine but it took an entire day to get the customer support person to "support" me in agreeing the blasted new copier did not work, duh! I could have told them that hours before if they hadn't been speaking a foreign language I do not know. So back went the machine to the store and once again I ordered a (new) new copier and spent another entire day setting it up. Right now I can only whisper that it appears to be working on the chance that it will hear me and decide to pull a prank on me and break. . . all over again.

This is not the worst deadline disaster I’ve been through (she says, starting to sound like Moses.) One time I worked until midnight calculating paychecks where each payee was paid a different rate. People in the music business don’t like to do the same thing twice, that would be much too easy, way too routine. By midnight I finished all the checks, loaded them into the postage machine and then watched in horror as the postage machine chewed up every single check before I could slam punch the STOP button. I had to spend a night of déjà vu and redo the whole day's work. I made good friends with the graveyard shift cleaning crew as I spent many a night in that office trying to outsmart my own technology (and usually failing.) Don't you dare say it was "operator error"!

The mother of all messed up deadlines came one quarter when my computer crashed, taking with it thousands of data entries that had to be entered all over again (after anger management classes). As if that wasn’t enough, the heat went out and the water heater burst in my office the next day. I was cold, wet and stressed, but God knows I managed to get all the reports out on time. I regret that the plumber saw me crawl under my desk to find my computer backup.

The good news is that all these disasters are just time, money and things. No one was hurt, but my dog Chopper looked like he jumped out of his skin when I screamed like a banshee. Deadlines (and the accompanying disasters) are inevitable for me, but I can't let them steal my peace with endless worry. Matthew 6:34 says: "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today." Well, that's the truth. One day's disaster is definitely plenty without adding to it by piling on what could happen tomorrow, like it's the phone's turn to go on the fritz. Talk about a dead LINE, hello-o-o-o-o? My friend tells me to pray because (he says) if I'm praying I'm not worrying and if I'm worrying I'm not praying. Maybe I should give it a try. At least I won't have to wait for the phone to recharge before I get Jesus on the line!

And The Oscar Goes To...

Every year I get so excited about the Academy Awards and this year is no exception. Lights, Camera, Action. . . and that's just me getting ready for the Oscar Party! I love the whole world of movie making. I'm fascinated at how a movie pulls me out of my everyday life and transports me into someone else’s world. Like most kids, I enjoyed playing “pretend” when I was little. I loved accessorizing my homemade costumes with sparkling jewels and silky scarves. My parents nicknamed my glamorous alter ego “Zsa Zsa”. Unlike most kids, I haven’t outgrown my alter ego nor the wearing of sparkling jewels and silky scarves: I am consistently the best-dressed person in the grocery store. You never know when I might be discovered by a hungry (and desperate) Hollywood director in—of all places—Nashville, Tennessee.

I have to say that Meryl Streep remains one of my all time favorite actresses. She can make me believe that she really is someone else. She is especially skilled in foreign accents which complete her transformation into a character. I also have an ear for accents and when I get absorbed into a drama I start to think like the characters. By the time I leave the theatre I am unconsciously speaking with a foreign accent, even when I don’t know what language was spoken. I hold my breath until the spell passes, hoping no one else notices my Pigeon English (Isn't that what they speak in Pigeon Forge near the Smokies?)

When I was in high school I did TRY to take Spanish lessons. The only thing I remember how to say is “iQue raro!” which means “How odd!” For my friends and me it became our secret catch phrase. To get the full effect we would roll our R's endlessly: iQue rrrrarrro! To which people coincidentally reacted ‘How odd!?!?’ It was the perfect answer to any question, and the meaning was determined by the facial expression. For example, "How do you like these shoes?" iQue rrrrarrro! (frown). "Jimmy thinks you’re cute!" iQue rrrrarrro! (smile). "What did you think of that test?" iQue rrrrarrro! (gasp). While going through this Meryl Streep method-acting phase, I got the rolling R’s stuck in my throat. To the annoyance of all adults and most friends, I could not rrrresist or rrrrestrain myself! "Who is your favorite president?" RRRonald RRReagan. "Who is your favorite actor?" RRRobert RRRedford. iQue rrrrarrro, SI!! The only way I could break this (almost perfect) Spanish language accent was to rrrrefrain from using any words starting with the letter R. I would have to come up with creative answers like, “Just turn to the. . . NOT LEFT, por favor.”

English is still my second language and I don’t have a first language. iQue rrrrarrro! Eventually I lost the accent. I did not become a method actress or a foreign language expert. Through my Drama Queen years I did learn something from the Bible about gaining self-control. Proverb 25:28 says, “A person without self-control is like a city with broken-down walls.” 'Broken-down walls' portrays a structural barrier lacking strength, protection and privacy. It is a place without boundaries. There is a time to control my speech by concentrating, not on the accent, but on what is being said. It takes a brave act of will on my part, but I am doing my Oscar-worthy best to save the lights, camera, action for the real actors. iQue rrrrarro!