The bully

In first and second grade, the “cool kids” often teased me and my best friend H. We stuck together and tried to stay strong, but we were never really as “cool” as the “cool kids.”

E. was the leader, the center of attention. S.K. would follow every step she took, and sometimes S.R. and P.K. were allowed in the group.

One day they were extra mean to H. It was in second grade; we were 8 years old. I cannot remember exactly what happened, but I believe someone said something mean about something H. was wearing in the locker rooms after gym class. It might have made H. cry.

I always told my grandmother everything E. did, and she encouraged and finally almost forced me to confront E. and “put an end to the misery.”

After school one day I waited at the end of our street, knowing E. would have to pass me to get to her house. I was furious.

When E. came, alone for once, I told her she should stop being mean and stop bossing people around. Then I kicked her, right in the shin.

E. started to cry. I said “If you don’t stop bullying people I will tell your mom what you are up to.” She was bawling, screaming that she would tell her mom what I had done and that I better watch out.

Later that day, E.’s mom called my grandmother, who simply said, “Well, E. deserved it.”

Nobody was ever mean to us again.

Nudity is dirty in America

I recently read a “Dear Abby” column about nudity.

A woman had written a letter to “Abby” (advice columnist Abigail VanBuren) about how offensive her neighbor’s 16-year-old son was, walking around naked in his room. The woman, who could describe exactly what time of day the young man would appear in his kitchen every morning to eat breakfast (naked), complained that he was being rude and inconsiderate to his neighbors.

Abby advised the woman to put curtains on her window and call before dropping over for a visit.

A few weeks later, several responses were published from readers. Most said the woman was nosy and should keep her eyes to herself. One reader, however, pointed out the underlying problem:

“Americans tend to view nudity as an invitation to sex. It need not be.”

While nudity is considered natural on other continents, Americans see nakedness as something ugly, something to be ashamed of. It is associated with pornography, something young children need to be protected from. God forbid anyone under the age of 18 would ever see a naked breast of a woman on national television. God forbid a 9-year-old boy should see his parents naked. That just doesn’t happen here.

The whole society is affected by this. Boys grow up thinking there is something magic about naked bodies. They grow up worshiping porno magazines and adult movies. They also grow up thinking that any non-fictional woman who takes her clothes off is a slut.

Girls grow up thinking there is something wrong with their bodies. While some like to show off skin in tank tops and short skirts, they are constantly reminded by school administrators and strict public policies that bare skin is ugly, forbidden territory.

Combine that with the conservative laws that demand “abstinence only” classes as a substitute for education about sex (and god forbid they should talk about those gay people!), and you get a sex-crazy people with lots of guilt and no touch of reality in their system.

How did it get to this point? Why are Americans and Europeans so different?

Comments welcome.

Ticket-loser

Every time I travel somewhere, something goes wrong. I am usually an organized control freak, yet I cannot seem to control myself during my travels.

Once I forgot my overnight bag filled with everything I would need for a weekend in New York. Luckily, the trip was only for two days. It wasn’t nearly as bad as when I left for a small village in Maine one summer without any extra underwear. The coastal town of Castine did not have a single store that sold panties, not even ugly ones.

Of course, having to do laundry every single day is not as bad dropping your cell phone in the toilet, which I managed to do on my first trip to Quinnipiac University.

Losing plane tickets, however, is my specialty. I have actually managed to do it twice.

The first time was at Arlanda airport in Sweden, and I had a good excuse: It was very early in the morning.

I had just been to McDonald’s with my friends, and I was walking back through a shopping area, passing crowds at the international check-in counters. At the passport control, a guard stopped me and very nicely asked to see my ticket. I had slipped the boarding pass into my brand new passport, which I had been carrying around in my hand for the last half hour. Turns out, it was so new the hard plastic pages couldn’t hold the ticket tight between its folds like passports should do.

There was no ticket in my hand. In fact, there was no ticket anywhere, at least not with my name on it.

I stumbled out on the floor in the middle of the departure hall. My ticket was gone. I wouldn’t be able to go back to the United States. I wouldn’t be able to start college classes that I had already paid for. I wouldn’t be able to see my friends again.

Tears started rolling down my face. Then I saw two men in dark green uniforms with serious looks on their faces standing in the middle of the entrance hall, engaged in a discussion. I walked up to them in despair, crying “I lost my tickets.” They pointed me in the direction of Icelandair’s information booth, then one of them put his hand on my shoulder and said “I am sure everything will be okay.”

Just as I was asking for help and a brusque, middle-aged travel agent told me I wasn’t going anywhere unless I had a ticket, a man came up to the help desk waving a white piece of paper in his hand. He was speaking in a language I only vaguely understood, but I screamed of joy when I saw my name on the ticket he held in his hand.

The second time I lost my ticket I wasn’t as lucky. It was two weeks after 9/11 and I was flying home to Bradley Airport from a newspaper conference in New Orleans. I searched my bags in the hotel room, I searched them in the lobby, on the shuttle bus and again at the airport, but my ticket home was nowhere to be found.

After spending an hour in the check-in line, I was told there was now way I would be allowed onto the plane without buying another ticket – a ticket for the seat I was already in. But the airline would give me a discount, the smiling man behind the counter said.

Since I bought my ticket late, security requested an extra search of my bag. It was opened and emptied in front of a long line of people waiting to check in. In an attempt to lighten the mood, I asked the guard to let me know if she found my ticket during her search. She did not find it amusing.

We had to change planes in Nashville, and I decided to use the ladies’ room. I hung my laptop on the door of the bathroom stall. It swung around and showed me narrow pocket on the back I didn’t even know it had.

That’s where my ticket was.

I slipped the ticket back into the pocket, walked out of the bathroom and got back on the plane. My fellow travelers were better off not knowing about the discovery in the women’s bathroom.

Nightmares and werewolves

A werewolf lived under my bed until I was about 12 years old. He was always there; it didn’t matter if the light was on or not.

If I was reading in bed and then had to go to the bathroom, I had to stand up and jump out into the middle of the room, so the werewolf’s arms (yes, arms) wouldn’t grab my legs. When I came back from the bathroom, always running, I had to leap back onto my bed as quickly as I could.

While afraid, I was also fascinated with scary creatures. We lived on a hill, and in the winter all the kids from the neighborhood used to come sledding in our driveway.

I used to tell stories about the roebuck (a male roe deer). I described the buck as a monstrous creature with large horns. It ate children, at times, and it would chase after you when hungry. One of my friends told me many years later that she had been terrified of going up the hill alone for fear of running into the roebuck.

Despite never having seen one, I very much enjoyed scaring others. I never told anyone that the monster visited my nightmares.

People and animals also turned to stone in my dreams, forever getting stuck in a place between life and death. I realized in my early teens that this stemmed from an episode of “The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe” from BBC that I had been subjected to at a friend’s house when I was 5.

When I turned 15, I got a new bed with a frame that went all the way down to the floor. I knew there would never be another werewolf (or other monster) hiding in my room. I finally felt safe.

Growing up in Sweden

Some of you keep asking me to write more about Sweden and what it was like, so here goes...

I was never sick when I was a kid. However, I often convinced my grandmother that I didn’t feel well so I could stay home from school and sit in her kitchen with my old typewriter and work on my short stories.

I “published” two books before I turned 15. Of course, they were both photocopied at my friend’s father’s office and distributed in person or by mail to friends and relatives. I also made a collection of my best poems and novels, distributed the booklet to my five best friends in school, and more or less forced them to read it.

I grew up with my grandparents in a small village in Sweden, population 6,000. We watched government-owned Channel 1 and Channel 2 on TV, with our favorite "Cosby Show" shown Sunday nights at 8 o'clock. Since I am an only child, I loved watching and laughing at the Huxtable mad house and I often dreamt about what it would be like to have brothers and sisters filling up the house.

When I was 11, we got a new TV that could also receive Channel 4. It didn't come in very clearly, and occasionally it was only available in black and white. It was clear enough, however, that I could watch "Beverly Hills 90210" and "Dr. Quinn – Medical Woman."

Channel 4 also had commercials, something very exciting for an 11-year-old. Every week I was glued to the TV to see whether Dylan would end up with Kelly or Brenda, and to see if David was ever going to get a record deal.

With a limited selection of television shows, I was often went to the movies at our local community hall. It wasn’t very expensive, but they only showed movies twice a week (and it was the same movie both Wednesday and Sunday).

My friends and I went every Sunday evening, to keep up with the latest discussion in school. We spent many Sunday nights outside the theater arguing about whether "Swing Kids" or "A Perfect World" was the best movie. My friends were always waiting for their parents to pick them up, and I wouldn't walk home until they were all gone.

My family did not have a VCR until I turned 14, so I remember going to my best friend’s house to watch movies. It started out with "Scooby-doo" and "Ducktales," which her aunt had recorded from cable TV, and it evolved to "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade." There was something comforting about watching the same movie over and over again, and even today when I watch "Indiana Jones" I picture us fighting over the good seat on the sofa.

Occasionally, I visited my aunt who lived in the city and had cable TV. While my grandmother and aunt were busy in the kitchen, I sat in front of the TV for hours just watching music videos on MTV. The first video I ever saw was Michael Jackson’s "Black or White." The faces were flashing by, changing from black to white, and then back again. Then I saw Madonna, Roxette and Aerosmith. Alicia Silverstone was jumping off a bridge, saved by a thin wire attached to her belly button piercing.

I got my first stereo for my 13th birthday. I also got my first CD - Bryan Adams’ "Waking Up the Neighbors." I listened to it day in and day out until Christmas finally came two weeks later and I got two more CDs. By then, I knew every word of every song. I didn't know what it all meant, but I knew the sound, the beat and everything printed in the booklet about the man behind the hoarse and sexy voice.

I never really got over the fact that I totally missed out on New Kids On The Block, so my friend gave me her old tapes, which I listened to long after everyone else had given up on them.

My family was not into books. The only thing my grandmother read was a glossy tabloid magazine with crossword puzzles and health-related articles. My grandmother got the magazines monthly from a friend who subscribed, and I got them when my grandmother was done with them. I didn’t care that they were several months old, since I was mostly just looking at the celebrity pictures.

I was 11 when I got my first book. It was a Nancy Drew book, and within a year I was reading book No. 52 in the series. I followed Nancy through all her mysteries, trying my best to figure them out before she did. I went with her scuba diving, driving in her Mustang GT convertible, and swimming in an underground river, wishing that my life could be just as exciting.

Pretty soon, I also discovered the school library and the books by Enid Blyton and C.S. Lewis. These books got me through many cold and rainy summers. The idea that there was a land out there somewhere with talking animals and big giants intrigued me. I wanted to go to England so badly, to find the wardrobe that would take me to this magical place. I also wanted to take long vacations by the coast and find a mystery, after having a marvelous picknick by a bubbling brook.

Over the years, my life gradually changed, like most people’s lives normally do. I moved to the city. I expanded my CD-collection, and I got cable. I got hooked on "Friends" and "Seinfeld," and every day I tried to catch the 5 p.m. reruns of "McGyver." I related to Monica and Rachel, I felt sorry for George and Elaine, and I was amazed by McGyver, who wasn’t only cute, but had a solution to every problem (usually this involved salt or duct tape).

Then I started studying and working with media. I read tons of books. I moved to the United States. I discovered channels that I had never heard of, and spent more time in front of the TV than I had done in my entire life.

Politically correct words

Americans are obsessed with being politically correct so they won't offend anyone in any way when speaking on the radio or writing in a newspaper (They are also terrified of getting sued, which is a whole other chapter).

While taking a communications class a few years ago, we watched a video with comedian George Carlin that I still remember because it was extremely funny and right on. Carlin was naming some euphemisms for well-known terms:

bathroom tissue – toilet paper
directory assistance – operator/phone book
involuntary personal protein spill – throwing up
previously owned vehicle – used car
differently abled – handicapped
cerebrally challenged – stupid (minimally exceptional)
negative patient care outcome – death
hair disadvantaged – bald
sobriety deprived – drunk
involuntarily leisured OR temporarily outplaced – unemployed
possessing an alternative body image – fat
severe appearance deficits OR cosmetically different – ugly
economically disadvantaged occupying substandard housing – poor/homeless

Many of these euphemisms are commonly used in advertisements on TV. I also frequently see "an unknown person entered the residence subsequent to exiting his vehicle" in stories written from police reports insted of "a man left his car and went inside his house."

It my jobs as a journalist to translate what people are saying into plain English.

So while things that are too wordy are funny, they mostly just waste valuable time and space. Just say it the way it is, people! No cerebrally challenged man possessing an alternative body image will receive a negative patient outcome if you do.

Dentist and a Garfield Band-Aid

After bragging about tile removal and marvelous cake baking in my last blog post, I feel I have to post an update about my condition.

I returned to the kitchen for some more work last night, putting on a new pair of rubber gloves so my fingers wouldn't stick together from all the glue on the back of the tiles. Some had mountains of glue, others had just a few drops. Whoever did our kitchen "upgrades" can't have been very handy, I thought.

The tiles behind the stove were calling out to me, and after one was pulled off with a bit of a struggle, I went straight for the second one. A flat-head screwdriver held tightly in my left hand, my right was flailing about somewhere near the tile trying to get a good grip of a corner. Before I knew it, my left hand slipped on the tile and stabbed my right hand with the screwdriver.

Pain was shooting from the top of my right index finger, right below the nail. I could see something red through a large hole I had just cut in the white glove. Quickly, I ripped the glove off, ran over to the sink and started rinsing my hand in cold water. I clenched my gloved left hand around my bleeding finger so I wouldn't have to look at it. It was just too scary. What if I had cut a deep, stitch-worthy gash?

I took a quick peek, and it was bleeding a lot. Still holding my finger, I grabbed the phone on the counter and tried dialing Albie's number with my left pinky. I pressed the speaker phone button and waited.

"Who's this?" my boyfriend answered in his usual tone.

"I stabbed myself with a screwdriver and I'm BLEEDING!" I said, a little too loudly. "Do we have any Band-Aids? A first-aid kit?"

"Eh, that's a good question," he said. "I don't think so."

Albie suggested using a paper towel, which I did. After rinsing my finger yet again, I rolled half a paper towel tightly around my aching finger and then put a piece of blue painter's tape on it to hold it in place. Then I had to lie down, because I started feeling sick to my stomach. With my right hand high above my head, I rested for a few minutes.

After I felt better, I raided our bathroom for bandages. I found an old but unopened package of antibiotic ointment that I spread on my wound, which had now stopped bleeding. It really didn't look too bad. There was one deep part and then a long stretch of a scratch, deep enough to penetrate the first few layers of skin. The homemade bandage would have to do.

The next morning I got up early to go to the dentist. Not wanting to get laughed at, I took my homemade bandage off before I left. It was freezing outside, however, so by the time I arrived in the waiting room, my finger was pounding again. I walked straight up to the front desk and said in a tiny voice, "Do you happen to have a Band-Aid?" A children's bandage was supplied to me.

Then I had the nicest dentist visit I've ever had, despite two fillings. After an hour and ten minutes of talking about "Seinfeld," "American Idol" and University of Connecticut basketball, I walked out of there with a left cheek numb from three shots of Novacaine and a right index finger covered with a Garfield Band-Aid.

And the best thing... I'm off tile-removing duty for a while.