ROMANTICISM AND LAUNDRY

I have long been a James M. Cain fan. Given that I love Kate Winslet, too, you can imagine I am looking forward to the HBO adaptation of Mildred Pierce this weekend. Hilton Als in The New Yorker wrote an insightful article about Cain and Mildred Pierce.

I few days I ago, I began to write of my "struggles" with Romanticism. I think Als nailed my affliction and behavior here:

"Mrs. Pierce is the quintessence of American New Deal ingenuity, hard work, and fighting spirit. She is also a romantic, doomed to keep reinventing herself, because, like most romantics, she is repeatedly disappointed in her hopes both for herself and for others..."

The end of the article is also damned great:

"Discussing Mildred Pierce," Cain explained, "This books simply says that perhaps a dream come true may be the worst possible thing that can happen."


I was just on the horn with my dear friend Pammie talking about expectations, particularly our expectations of people. We act in a particular way and EXPECT to be responded to, treated in the way that we treat people. Often those expectations are not met. We respond by getting hurt, angry, and disappointed. It ends up being as predictable as the laundry: wear them, wash them, wear them, wash them ... I think laundry is the true cycle of life.

And we also expect things to be unpleasant or negative, like taking the time to straighten up the kitchen before bed. My expectations were multi-layered there.

I expected to be impatient to get out of the kitchen;
I expected to be annoyed at the amount of time it took to clean up;
I expected to be okay with the messy kitchen in the morning;
I expected that I couldn't change my expectations (or habits).

Turns out I was wrong. I still do start to dash off, but I almost always slow down, stay in the moment (and the kitchen), do some clean up, and change my habit. Now, on the occasions when I don't have most of the room looking spiffy, I am disappointed that I didn't take the time the night before.

Perhaps this is rambling. I didn't expect to write so much tonight. I'll circle back to expectations and romanticism later.