Dress up for Ed McMahon

“If you really want something in this life you have to work for it. Now quiet, they’re about to announce the lottery numbers.” –Dan Castellaneta, The Simpsons

Today’s the day! The big day! The day when it all happens! Today, this very one!

I’m dressed and ready. I’ve been fully attired since 7am. [Don’t get too excited—the weekend translation of “fully attired” is “Not in Big Fluffy Robe.”]

The porch has been swept in anticipation, that messy bush that I’ve never liked has been transplanted to some dark corner out of sight to do what things that I plant do (that is, die), the cats have their collars on, Tess’ face is washed and her pants match her shirt in some significant way, Emma has opted for a sweet, darling goth punk princess look, I’m wearing a shirt the color of seafoam that I think will look good on TV unless it’s too washed out by the lights, along with my new hemp clogs and mascara, John will be home soon and I’m sure he’ll wear one of those heavily starched white shirts, black jeans, and black Doc Martens that I like so much. If nothing else, the mascara should tip you off that this is a big day.

I’ve spent the day tidying the house, putting away approximately 10,000 Legos and vacuuming crushed Cheerios and dog hair out of the rugs. I’ve begun packing. By show time at 8pm U.S. Eastern Time this evening, I should have everything in order for the inevitable move. Should I bake some cookies for the camera crew? Fresh-squeezed lemonade? Will they expect a tour of the whole house, or should I just concentrate on the entry way, living, and dining rooms and close the doors to the Bad Rooms? Do people really look 10 pounds heavier on TV? Does my makeup look natural? Will our dog Blue sniff people in inappropriate places when they arrive? Is our house number legible from the road so they can find us?

There are special occasions that merit dressing up, aren’t there? The prom, Easter Sunday for some, weddings, family reunions, your first piercing at the Mall, those awkward high school dates where Who Knows What You Should Wear so you’ll look Fantastic but not like you’re Trying Too Hard.

For Mama, one of those days was always Super Bowl Sunday. Without a doubt, we could tell it was Super Bowl Sunday by the elaborate preparations that the day entailed: she was always fully dressed, makeup’ed, coifed, a fresh perm done that week just in case. While Daddy and I were big football fans (think “Baltimore Colts’ #19 Johnny Unitas”), she wasn’t—so why all the fuss?

I recently emailed Mama to ask about all those fancy preparations on Super Bowl Sunday; I asked if she minded if I wrote about it. Here’s what she had to say:

“No, I don’t mind – actually, it’s more than once per year – the next drawing is February 28th. I think I have lots of company, waiting to win! I’ll be anxious to see how you make that inspirational…!”

Mama was dressing up (still does) not for Joe Namath, but for Ed McMahon and the Publisher’s Clearing House Prize Patrol. When I asked for more information, here’s what she wrote:

“I’ve been entering Publishers Clearing House contests for 35 years and have never won, but, for some reason, I always think this will be the time – hope, faith or ignorance, I don’t know. I also enter online on occasion. I really want to win, not just for myself, but for my Church (at least 10% would go to the Church) and so I can help my family and set up trusts for the grandchildrens’ education. It really doesn’t take much for me to live but it would be nice to leave my family an inheritance and I would also like the assurance that if I have to live my last days in a nursing home, it would be paid for without difficulty. Now, I know a lot of people win huge in the lotteries, but I would not buy a lottery ticket because in my mind that is gambling. You don’t have to pay to enter PCH contests, although you can buy from them, but it is not necessary to make a purchase. I think their motto is ‘where dreams come true’ and I’m using 37-cent stamps to try to ‘make my dreams come true.’ Now, would you like me to write your blogs??  Ha-Ha!! Love, Mama   P.S. Remember, be kind and don’t make me sound like some kind of nut (even if you think I am)! I read the one you told about roast beef doors at the hospital and even I had to laugh at the memory.”

Never fear, Mama. How could I portray you as a nut for dressing up those 35 years in anticipation of Ed McMahon since I’m following in your footsteps, coifed and perched near the front door, all dressed up for the HGTV Prize Patrol tonight to come tell me that I’ve won their 2006 dream home.  I’ll be watching live, waiting to recognize the Viva Europa coffee shop near our house, a sure sign that the Prize Patrol is headed my way. Then they’ll turn onto Cumberland and I’ll redo my lipstick. When the cameras show the stone pillars out front of our walkway, I’ll no doubt pass out. I’ll be watching my life play out on TV, like that airplane full of people who recently watched their own emergency crash landing on the inflight TV sets at 37,000 feet, then 20,000, then 10,000, then impact.

For a whole month earlier this year, I entered the Home and Garden TV (HGTV) Dream Home contest online every day, each day perusing the floor plans and photos of the bunkroom, exercise studio, craft room, game room, and laundry room big enough to host dinner parties. My very favorite room was not a room at all, but an “outdoor living space,” a breezeway between two wings of my new 5,000 square foot home. I had a feeling I was going to win—was it hope, faith or ignorance? Like Mama, I don’t know.

I’ve once or twice imagined myself winning $20 million, determining what I would do with the money, who I would surprise with a gift, how I would finally buy that cute little VW convertible bug in seafoam blue (okay, it’s a toss-up, perhaps I would get that red Ford Thunderbird remake). The expenditure list included college tuition and hot stone massages and cartooning classes for Emma and that long-chained necklace by Dan Tishbi that I saw last week in the DC airport and trips to see my friends Kichom in Tokyo, Eliav in Tel-Aviv, Tony in Stellenbosch, Hilde in Dusseldorf, and Richard in Wellington (note to self: I need a friend in Paris). I would make sure that Emma and Tess experienced life outside the U.S. in significant ways.

Of course, Mama and my brother would be on the list for a cash infusion, then artists and writers who are creating beauty in the world, with gifts not based on need, but on merit (and more than a modicum of whim): jewelry artists named Lisa Fidler and Johan van Aswegen, a poet named Sebastian Matthews because I just love the idea that people are making jewelry and writing poetry in this world of ours, a painter and theatre director named David, a woman named Lori who is fighting for transgendered rights, my friend Amanda who is living inside the lack of rights that Lori is fighting for, my friend Jack the intercultural guru who is remarkable in too many unusual ways to mention, friends who are working with underprivileged children, and more.

We all just need to be freed up to do the work we were put here to do, don’t we?

But then I’d wonder if money changes too much, trivializes too much, encumbers too much. Of course, the answer is yes, but I promise not to buy more shoes than I can wear at one time or plastic lawn ornaments or a big house with tiny columns. I’ll still recycle and shop at consignment stores and drive a 1990 Ford Bronco II. 

So don’t forget to turn on HGTV at 8pm U.S. Eastern time tonight. I’ll be the gray-haired woman in the seafoam blouse who is acting surprised in a lovely shade of Kiehl Moisturizing Black Raspberry lip gloss.

What? There were only three finalists and I wasn’t one of them?

All that mascara for nothing.

~*~ 37 Days: Do it Now Challenge ~*~

Dream big, but aren’t unhappy people who win the lottery just unhappy in a bigger and more public way afterwards?

So, enter the contest, but don’t gamble the life you’re living now; keep on living that life just the same: your own house is actually your dream home because of the people in it, even with that peeling wallpaper in the upstairs bedroom. Let’s live a life that doesn’t need TV validation, shall we?

Make that list of people who deserve your gifts when you win—then go ahead and support them in the ways you can now. The gift you give will actually be more real, more meaningful, more sincere.  Perhaps it will even be a gift of yourself, not money.