Jeneration X: One Reluctant Adult's Attempt to Unarrest Her Arrested Development

by Jen Lancaster

  So then it’s settled.

  Denial it is.

  I wish I had some snappy resolution to share about My Mailer, but I don’t. The situation is impossible with no chance of improvement and she did nothing to endear herself after her (solo) day in court where she later gloated how she “won my case against you.” It wasn’t worth the effort to respond that as the defendant, she didn’t have a fucking case. Also, I guarantee the judge didn’t say, “I was going to rule for you even if she did show up,” because admitting a preconceived bias towards one of the litigants is the kind of statement that gets you removed from the bench.

  Regardless, because my professional events are on private property, we’re able to prevent her from causing another scene and that’s resolution enough, so basically, the show’s over. [Apparently she’s been trying to contact Oprah to settle our dispute. As this is Oprah’s final month of filming, perhaps she’ll bump her interview with President Obama and Tom Cruise to accommodate us.]

  My big takeaway has been a newfound respect for other people’s privacy. The idea of strangers sorting through my dirty laundry (metaphorical or otherwise) makes me super-squirmy. With Karma being the bitch that she is, I’ve learned that if I have the expectation of privacy, I can’t keep invading that of others.

  No longer being Gladys Kravitz isn’t easy because temptation (and information) exists everywhere. Some days all I want to do is Google stalk the new family on the corner with the expensive house and the cheap, cheap, seriously-what-were-they-thinking plywood fence they just built, but their business is none of mine.

  I keep telling myself to snoop not, lest I be snooped and so far, I’ve kept those compulsions under control. And that makes me feel like I’ve taken another positive step towards full-blown adulthood.

  But if I ever do meet those people with the amateur fence, I might mention that Fletch does woodworking.

  Just because I’m a nice neighbor.

  Reluctant Adult Lesson Learned:

  Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight or a real estate attorney to family court.

  If you’re going to lawyer-up, do it right.

  C·H·A·P·T·E·R T·W·E·N·T·Y-S·I·X

  Death and Taxes? Can I Select Neither?

  When I told Fletch nothing could be more simultaneously boring and terrifying than meeting with the tax attorney, I was wrong.

  That’s because we hadn’t yet met with the estate-planning law firm.

  At least with the tax guy there was some raucous laughter, although it primarily emanated from him once he saw the mess our discount ex-accounting firm created.

  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it one final time:

  Never economize on handbags, parachutes, or CPAs.

  Fortunately, there’s little a healthy retainer fee can’t fix, so all’s well in that department.

  Anyway, today we’re in this white-shoe law firm discussing what’s going to happen when we die. I hate that we’re here, I hate what we’re talking about, I hate how much it’s going to cost, but it’s got to be done. At this juncture in our lives, we need an estate plan more elaborate than the cocktail napkin where I drunkenly scribbled “I leave everything to Maisy!!” before doodling a bunch of bananas and a sheep. After canceling and postponing this appointment more times than I care to mention, here we are.

  The tenor of the conversation has my palms sweating, but they’re not visible because I’m currently sitting on my hands. See, last week I discovered that OPI makes nail polish called Jade Is the New Black. I normally have an aversion to any color polish that couldn’t double as lipstick, but come on, with a name like that I couldn’t not buy it! I brought the bottle to my manicure yesterday and now my nails are an exceptionally festive shade of green.

  Considering I spend ninety-nine percent of my time either in the pool, at my desk, or going to the grocery store, I figured I could get away with a goofy color for once. That is, until I shake the estate planning attorney’s hand and feel exactly like the kind of asshole who thinks green nails are a fine idea.

  Perhaps when we’re done here, I’ll have my name tattooed on my neck and paint a rebel flag on the hood of my car before allowing my children of dubious, multiple parentage to wrestle free-range in the back of my pickup truck while we head to the minimart to procure the ingredients for tonight’s dinner—Wonder Bread sopped in meat grease.

  Fortunately, I’m not sure the lawyer notices the polish color because of my outfit. I wanted to be dressier than my usual khaki shorts and alligator shirt, so I went to put on one of the sweater-set/sundress items I normally wear on book tour. That’s when I realized that every piece of appropriate clothing I owned had not only been sitting at the bottom of the dry-cleaning basket since I finished touring three months ago, but at some point had been used as a litter box, likely when I accidentally shut Chuck Norris inside the closet.

  I panicked and began to paw through the rest of my wardrobe, quoting Cher Horowitz as I made a vain attempt to find my “most responsible outfit.” I settled on a white pair of Capri pants, a flowered pastel tunic sweater, and a pair of silver sandals topped with a big silver cabbage rose, all of which I’ve previously worn separately without issue.

  I thought I looked adorable until I saw my reflection in the shiny law firm windows. Instead of taking in my freshly touched-up roots or deep tan, I thought, “I should hold the door for the lady who came straight from Nana’s mah-jongg game down in Boca.”

  Seriously, I’m one pair of Easy Spirits away from booking an Alaskan cruise in this stupid getup. I look exactly like Michael Westen’s mother on Burn Notice. I could go dressed like this to the movie theater and demand discounted seats. All I’m missing is a jeweled cigarette case and a crooked wig. I’d say that I’m ready to drive ten miles under the speed limit on the expressway, bitch about Congress, and yell at kids to get off my lawn, but I’ve already been doing that for years.

  Anyway, I’m glad my SeniorWear [Trademark pending.] distracts everyone from my junior high school manicure, but I’m sitting on my hands nevertheless.

  We’re being schooled on the four facets of estate planning and Ben, our lawyer, is asking us hard questions, like who we want to give health care power of attorney should we become incapacitated. Ben explains if something happens to one of us but not the other, certainly we’ll make that decision for the injured spouse, but what happens if we’re both incapacitated? Normally this task falls to family.

  That gives us pause and Fletch and I both gawp at each other. Finally, I tell Ben, “We’ll need some time to discuss this. All I know is I don’t want my brother in charge. He’d be all, ‘Broken leg? One hundred percent chance of recovery? Pull the plug anyway; I’ll do it for you!’”

  Since we’re not opting for family, who will we choose to make medical decisions for us? How do we put that burden on anyone who didn’t share a backseat with us on the kind of interminable family vacations where we tried to catch and eat flies because my dad believed stopping for lunch was for amateurs?

  I have great friends—the best, really—but have I been a good enough friend to request such a favor? What am I going to say: “Hey, remember when I didn’t come to your birthday party because it was rainy and my hair was frizzy? Yeah, sorry about that. Listen, do you mind being the one who decides if I live or die? Thanks!”

  We awkwardly stumble through more assignments under the other facets until we get to the actual will.

  Ben explains that what we want to do is draft a will where everything’s assigned to a trust. The trust (a private document) is where stuff gets specific, like who gets my porcelain Royal Doulton Union Jack bulldog. Because wills are public, anyone can go to the courthouse and request a copy. The trust portion will protect our privacy while we’re still alive. [After that, I don’t care.]

  “Someday if you’re bored, Google ‘celebrity wills,’” he tells us. “You’d be shocked at how much information some of them contain. Probably because instead of using estate planni
ng attorneys, they used attorneys who also planned estates. [He said this enough times for me to gather that the distinction is important. But what do I know? I have green nails.] For example, did you know that Michael Jackson assigned Diana Ross as his secondary decision maker on some of the facets?”

  “Huh,” I reply. “Hey, Fletch, we ought to ask Diana Ross if she wants to be our second, too. Clearly she’s not afraid of the job.”

  After we work through the draft of the will itself, we get to the trust and that’s where it gets interesting. By “interesting” what I mean is where I realize I’m an asshole yet again because in divvying everything up, my first thought is, “Dance, monkeys, dance!”

  I’m all cavalier, determining who I’d like to gift upon my demise and I’m particularly delighted when Ben explains how I can write in terms and conditions. Funny, I thought that kind of stuff only happened in the movies. Clarification: bad movies.

  I kind of love the idea of being able to run shit from the grave! Like if I want my alma mater to get money, I can make it so they’re getting paid only if they endow a chair in my name. (Of course, whether it’s a university honor or something with four legs, a back, a couple of arms, and my name on a plaque will depend on my industriousness going forward.) This is like a legal form of extortion!

  As I cackle and rub my green-tipped hands together in delight under the table, it occurs to me that I shouldn’t be quite so gleeful.

  I mean, this isn’t a hypothetical arrangement and for all my bravado, I actually am planning for my eventual demise. No matter how I spin it, I am going to die. I might not die soon (at least I hope) but I am going to die. No matter how many books I sell, no matter who loves me, no matter what color my nails are painted, it’s all going to end for me exactly like it has for every other person who walked this earth.

  Suddenly everything feels very real.

  Although I’ve considered my own mortality many times before, I’ve never contemplated it on this level, except for that hour last year when we talked about life insurance.

  Rather, my fear of death has always favored the how-to-prevent-it-from-happenings, and never the what-happens-when-it-happens-because-make-no-mistake-it-will-happens.

  But in putting together these documents, I’m forced to come to terms with the fact that I’m no different from a carton of milk. I have an expiration date and there’s no getting around it.

  That’s when Fletch and I really begin to talk. Do we want our legacy to be making everyone we know arm wrestle for the spoils? Or do we want to take what we’ve earned to do the kind of good that we—to this point—have not quite accomplished on earth?

  We’re opting for the latter.

  Ever since I stopped volunteering, I’ve felt this sense of guilt that I wasn’t doing enough. In terms of doing charity work, I learned that I’m better at giving money than myself so I’ve been as generous as I can whenever I can. Yet the guilt remained.

  After earmarking the bulk of our net worth to deserving nonprofit organizations, I feel an enormous sense of relief as we leave the law office. There’s an almost indescribable satisfaction that comes from knowing my life will not have been lived in vain.

  No matter how silly or vapid or mean I’ve been at times, I’ll go out confident that my life will have made a difference and that fills me with a sense of peace and calm.

  Despite my reticence, I’m glad we made these decisions. Although we still need to talk with those we’ve chosen as our second [Not Diana Ross, FYI.] I feel like we’ve leapt an enormous hurdle today and we’re coming to the end of our Reluctant Adult Decathlon.

  We shake hands on our way out the door and we head to the car having made the decision to begin concentrating on what’s really important in our lives.

  But before that happens, I’m probably going to get a fresh manicure.

  Reluctant Adult Lesson Learned:

  Estate planning sucks. Do it anyway.

  C·H·A·P·T·E·R T·W·E·N·T·Y-S·E·V·E·N

  Distinguish Myself

  “What does this mean?”

  I read and reread the letter and I still can’t make sense of it, so I have to ask Fletch.

  “Is this… something?” I wonder, handing the heavy sheet of paper across the counter to him.

  According to what the letter says, I’m receiving a distinguished alumni award from the Liberal Arts department at my alma mater, but I’m not sure it’s legitimate because I… didn’t exactly have a distinguished college career. I mean, why would I receive this? What are they going to recognize me for, specifically?

  Flunking out after my sophomore year?

  Swimming in the fountain after every home football game?

  Climbing up the fire escape of the old Education building to throw rooftop parties with my fraternity friends where the Dutchie may or may not have been passed to the left-hand side? [If I ever have to testify before Congress about this, I’ll claim the Bill Clinton defense.]

  Spending more nights in a row warming a barstool at Harry’s than any other female student in university history?

  Accumulating a record number of campus parking tickets because I refused to walk to class since getting sweaty would mess up my hair?

  Taking eleven years to earn a bachelor’s degree and then graduating, finally, with a solid C average?

  Seriously, if my college career was distinguished, I’d hate to see whose wasn’t distinguished. [To be fair, I probably dated him.]

  I tell Fletch, “I remember getting one of these letters in high school, too—you know, those Who’s Who Among American High School Students awards they gave out for ‘outstanding students’?”

  “Not familiar,” he replies, eyes scanning my letter.

  I pause, remembering the volume I’d been so proud to receive until I realized that my information filled approximately one square inch in a five-hundred-page tome. I wave my hand dismissively. “Oh, everyone got them. The whole thing was kind of a scam. Some private company recognized students for their ‘outstanding achievements’ but if you ask me, the only thing really ‘outstanding’ about them is that their parents were willing to shell out forty-five dollars for a genuine leatherette-bound yearbook.”

  “Yeah, never saw one. But, Jen, this? This is real.” He hands the paper back to me.

  I flip the paper over to see if there’s any fine print on the back. “How are you so sure? Seems to be the kind of thing a college would send out to troll for a donation check. Ooh, or like when police departments send people notices saying, ‘Hey, you won a boat! C’mon down and claim it!’ but really, it’s just a way to bring in those with outstanding warrants? And even as those poor saps are slapped into cuffs and loaded into the police bus behind the decorated storefront, they’re all, ‘Do I still get my boat?’ Am I going to be hauled off to campus jail for not listening to Nancy Reagan and Just Saying No a couple of times in 1985? How do we know that this isn’t an elaborate sting operation wherein—”

  Fletch sighs deeply. “Joanna nominated you, dumbass. She met some ladies from the Liberal Arts department at your last book event and they suggested she do so. She spent months putting together an essay and going through the application process. I assure you, and I tell you again, this is legitimate.”

  Joanna and I have been friends ever since the vagaries of the University housing department saw fit to put us together freshman year. I cherish her for a variety of reasons but a big part of that is because we knew each other back before we had any idea of who we might be when we grew up. Author Laura Dave has the most spot-on quote in her book The First Husband, where she explains how her old friends “… knew each other in that honest, unmitigated way that people get to know you who meet you when you’re still young. Before all the rest of it. Before it becomes both easier and harder to know yourself.”

  So, yes, we’re Laura Dave–kind of friends.

  Joanna’s one of the most honest, straightforward people I’ve ever met, so the idea that she’d pull one o
ver on me is difficult to comprehend. “She never once mentioned this to me!” I exclaim. I mean, secret things almost never happen around me because I’m so suspicious. I take great pride in that it’s almost impossible to catch me unawares.

  Okay, a lot of times I see conspiracy theories in coincidences, and sometimes Fletch isn’t the only one around here requiring a tinfoil hat, but still. I even hate good surprises, and woe to anyone who tries. Like if Fletch actually had been able to pull off bringing my New York girlfriends Karyn and Caprice here for my birthday without my first cleaning and shopping and coloring my hair? You’d have seen me on the news.

  Fletch nods. “Yeah. She knew you’d be mad but did it anyway because she thought it was important you were recognized. She’s very proud of you, so we kept the nomination under wraps until everything was official.” He points to my letter. “Now it’s official. Congratulations.”

  Huh.

  “What I fail to understand is why me? I had the least distinguished college career out of anyone I know.” I reflect for a moment, scanning the internal databases for someone who screwed up as much as me. “Oh, wait—I was friends with a guy named Hoff who was in chemical engineering so he could make his own drugs. So my college career was more distinguished than Hoff’s but that’s it.”

  Fletch gives me the kind of indulgent smile one usually reserves for LOL Cats or toddlers with upturned bowls of oatmeal on their heads. “Jen, the award’s for what you’ve achieved as an alumna. Trust me, no one’s giving you anything for your undergrad career.” And then he snorts, which is kind of unfair. I mean, I didn’t even meet Fletch until well into my ninth year of college, so he never knew me when I was in my late-eighties Girls Gone Wild phase. Without the Kissing of the Other Girls or the Photographing of the Ladyparts, I mean. [That kind of stuff didn’t go down on campus until I was toiling away in corporate America wearing an ill-fitting business suit. Frankly, I’m relieved.]