Plotting at the PTA

by Laura Alden

  “The grocery list is right here.” I tapped a half sheet of paper. A couple of years ago, I’d read a tip about preprinting your own grocery list. People usually buy the same items over and over, the article had said. Why not save yourself time and customize your own list? That made a lot of sense to me, so I did. I still thought it made a lot of sense, but I’d received nothing but grief from anyone who ever saw it. Overly organized was the nicest thing I’d heard.

  “Not that list.” Marina made a show of pawing through the papers on the kitchen table. “Wait, wait . . .” She peered at a small square of paper. “But, no. This is a list of NHL hockey teams that Jenna would be willing to play for. Where, oh where, is the real list?”

  I opened the oven door. “They’re all real lists. Please be more specific.” I slid the pan of chicken inside.

  “Your weight loss list.”

  “What makes you think I have a list for that?”

  Marina gave me a “don’t make me get out my flying monkeys” look. “Unless I’m gravely mistaken, the world has not yet ended. Therefore, you have a list. You make lists for everything from Saturday morning chores to stopping at the grocery store for three measly little items.”

  She pulled out a stool, sat at the kitchen island, and started using a bowl of fruit as a visual aid.

  “You make a list for going on a weekend trip.” A banana plopped on the counter in front of her. “You made a list for your Thanksgiving menu.” An apple settled next to the banana. “You write up lists for PTA projects and school craft projects and projects you have going on at the store.” Three oranges were added to the pile. “I bet you have a list of things for the kids to do this summer. A list of books for them to read. You’ve shown me that list of places you want to go someday. And I’d lay money you’ve already started a Christmas list.”

  She laid a large cluster of grapes across the top of the fruit pile and the whole pile shifted. “Know what this is? It’s the listing pile of lists.” She chortled. “Get it? Hah! Funny again today, aren’t I?”

  I leaned against the kitchen counter, arms folded, ankles crossed. “Are you going to eat all that? Because if not, I’d like to put the grapes back in the refrigerator.”

  Marina popped one into her mouth. “All in good time, my dear. All in good time.” She picked up her imaginary foot-long cigarette holder and blew an invisible smoke ring. “Since you are not flapping this weight loss list about, I can come to only one conclusion.”

  “That you’ve made a tragic error and the world has, in fact, ended?”

  “Which would explain the high grades of my youngest son for last marking period. But, no. My conclusion is that you haven’t yet made a list.”

  I pushed myself off the counter. That chicken didn’t seem to be cooking very fast. Maybe the oven wasn’t working right. Maybe—

  “Once again,” Marina said, “I am correct. Conclusion number two is that in spite of your promise roughly a month ago, you haven’t done a single thing to lose weight. How, pray tell, are you going to lose those twenty pounds you so cavalierly said you’d lose?”

  “I never said I’d lose that much weight.” I wanted to, of course I did, but reality was different from simply wanting. Too bad, really.

  Marina waved off my protest. “Did I ever tell you about the prize?”

  “Prize?”

  She sighed. “Once again, your overloaded brain has failed you. Remember I called you during spring break? Remember that I said we were having a weight loss contest? Remember that I said I’d come up with a worthwhile prize?”

  “No.”

  “So much potential, and she’s wasted it all.”

  “Have you been talking to my mother?”

  “It’s time to announce the prize.” She thumped the oranges back into the bowl. “And it’s such a good one that I’m going to win it.”

  “How nice for you.”

  “Yes, indeedy.” She beamed. “Hawaii is coming, you know. Say, did I tell you this is an open weight loss contest for anyone in Rynwood?”

  I stared. No, she hadn’t told me it was any more than the typical Beth vs. Marina contest, which was no contest at all because neither one of us ever lost weight for more than two months in a row.

  “Oh, dear.” She put her finger to her lips. “I see I haven’t. Which means I also haven’t mentioned who else is in the contest.”

  Lots of people lived in Rynwood. There was no reason to suspect that any one person in particular would be joining the weight loss game.

  “I’ve started a Yahoo group,” Marina said. “Didn’t you get the e-mail?”

  I had, but since I didn’t realize what it was, I’d deleted the message without reading it. Bad Beth, for not paying complete attention to what she was doing.

  “And it’s the second of the month already.” Marina held up one, then two fingers. “What have you done so far to change your lifestyle?”

  “Yesterday morning I got up at five and did an hour of aerobics. Ate a single egg for breakfast, walked to the store instead of driving, ate a salad with no dressing for lunch, walked home, and ate a small and very plain chicken breast for dinner.”

  Marina’s eyes went wide. “Really?”

  “Please. Can you honestly picture me getting up at five in the morning to exercise?”

  “Not to work out. But to finish reading a book? Sure.”

  “Well, I haven’t found time to exercise. And I don’t know when I will. When would I?” I started to do a rundown of my daily schedule, but if the way she put her hands over her ears was any indication, she didn’t want to hear about my busy life.

  “Not listening,” she said. “La, la, la, I can’t hear you, but I can talk to you, so listen up.” She dropped her arms and folded them across her chest. “Like I said when you were up in the wilderness during spring break, it’s time to quit talking and start doing. If you don’t start making a serious effort to lose that poundage, I don’t want to hear you complain about being fat ever again.”

  I piled up the papers from the kitchen table. “Oliver?” I called. “It’s your turn to set the table.”

  “And it’s time to start taking care of yourself,” Marina said softly. “Lose the weight, sweets, it’s not good for you.”

  I stopped. “But I thought this was all about you. About you not wanting to hear me whine. About you getting ready for Hawaii.”

  “Of course it is. But since you care more about my opinion than anything else in the world, I thought I’d try concern as a motivator.”

  “Marina the Manipulator.” I opened the refrigerator door and peered inside. Leftover mashed potatoes would work for a starch. But what to do for a vegetable? I shut the door. “There’s that old saying about people in glass houses and stones. I’m not the only one in this room who could stand to lose a few pounds.”

  She picked up her purse. “But I, dear heart, am content, satisfied, and in a general way am happy as a clam with my fitness and appearance. I’ll send you another invitation to join the Yahoo group.” And before I could ask her why, if she was so at peace with her weight, had she joined a weight loss contest, she was gone.

  “Mom?” Jenna and Oliver pounded down the hall and into the kitchen. “When’s dinner?”

  “Check the timer,” I said absently, and opened the refrigerator door again. There was nothing wrong with a plate of raw carrots, broccoli, and green peppers for a vegetable. Nothing at all. And if I put a bowl of sour cream and onion dip on the table, well, there was nothing wrong with that, either.

  * * *

  “Why are we going for a bike ride?” Oliver asked over his shoulder.

  Because your mother is fat. “Because it’s fun,” I said.

  The three of us pedaled along in silence. We were riding single file, Oliver in front, Jenna next, Mom bringing up the rear with her backpack of emergency essentials. I wasn’t sure if it had been Marina’s dig at my health, her convincing tone that she didn’t want to hear any more complaints, or th
e fifth piece of broccoli that I’d pushed deep into the dip, but something had tweaked my brain.

  One minute I’d been resigned to carrying an extra twenty pounds the rest of my life. The next minute I realized I was being a horrible role model for my children, especially Jenna. I should be showing her that adult women could be active and strong. I should be leading by example, demonstrating daily that exercise was a lifetime activity, that it didn’t end when you left school.

  “Hey!” I called. “You’re getting too far ahead.” Or at least that’s what I wanted to say. It came out as a series of single-word sentences with two huffs of breath between each one. My bike ride to Amy’s house had left me thinking that I wasn’t in such bad shape, but I’d been deluding myself once again. My pace on that trip had been snail-like compared to the speed my children were pedaling.

  Maybe this was why some mothers didn’t go out on activities like this with their fast-growing kids. It was downright embarrassing to have my eight-year-old outperform me. Me, a former athlete. Sure, I’d been a swimmer, and it had been back in high school, but still.

  Jenna and Oliver coasted until they were just ahead of me. “Mom, you’re such a slowpoke,” Jenna said. “Can’t you go any faster?”

  “Sorry. When we get to the park, we’ll—”

  I cocked my head. Either my cell phone was ringing or I was having an audio hallucination that involved Vivaldi’s Gloria. “Hang on a second, you two.” I stopped, straddled the bike, and slipped one arm out of the backpack’s straps. The phone was still ringing when I found it in the bottom and turned it on. “Hello?”

  “It’s seven o’clock,” Claudia said.

  Rats. I’d forgotten all about the work session. “Um, I’m out riding bikes with my kids, can we do this later? In an hour?” Or never, whatever.

  “Seven o’clock is the time you agreed to,” she said in a precise voice.

  She was right. Bad PTA secretary, for neglecting her duties.

  There were a few clicks, and Erica and Randy were both on the line. “This is going to be short and sweet,” Erica said. “Claudia, you called for this session. What do we need to discuss?”

  “It’s Beth’s story project. I’m concerned about its progress. It’s already the second of May, and what have we seen? Nothing! How is all the writing and the editing and the printing going to get done by the end of school? I don’t see it happening, I just don’t. I’m sorry to say this, but this was a bad project from the beginning. We should never have agreed to do it.”

  “The vote to do the project was unanimous,” I pointed out.

  “Whatever,” Claudia said. “What I want to know is, how do we know it’s going to get done?”

  “Beth?” Erica asked. “Do you feel that the project will be completed on time?”

  “Um . . .” Why hadn’t I brought my schedule? Or, better, why didn’t I have it memorized from stem to stern so I’d be able to summon details at the faintest of Claudia’s sniffs? “I think so.”

  “You think so?” Erica’s repetition of my reply made it sound very lame. “That’s not a reassuring answer.”

  I watched my children play some sort of complex game. They’d propped their bikes up against a large maple tree. Oliver had found a small stone, and he and Jenna were kicking it back and forth to each other. Their point totals seemed to jump faster depending on how much body English the kicker used. Jenna had an edge because of her alternate life as a goalie, but Oliver had the creativity of someone who’d never found much attraction in rigid rules, so it was a fairly even game.

  “It’ll be done on time,” I said. “If I had the schedule in front of me I’d be able to give an accurate summary.”

  “She’s not prepared,” Claudia said. “If she’s not ready for this meeting, how can she possibly do this project?”

  Randy grunted. “Maybe it’s too big.”

  I waited for Erica to reassure the others that I had excellent command of the situation, that Claudia was overreacting, that there was no need to worry, no need at all.

  “Well, Beth?” Erica asked.

  “I . . .” The pavement under my feet suddenly felt unstable and, with my free hand, I gripped my bike’s handlebars tight enough to make my hand hurt.

  “Give us some assurance, Beth. Update us on the progress. Tell us about the targets you’ve achieved. Are you meeting your stated goals?”

  “Um . . .” Each of Erica’s short, focused sentences sent my thoughts in a different directions. I felt like a puppy trying to catch the first snowflakes of winter. “I’ve done a lot of work on this.”

  “No one is questioning your commitment,” she said. “Our concern is if your expectations have been realistic. If the book cannot be completed on time, the Tarver PTA will be publicly embarrassed. We’ve sent out press releases to news media all over the state. I’ve even been talking to PTA National about this project. If it isn’t done on time, our reputation will be damaged.”

  My heart thumped hard against my ribs. I was disappointing Erica. Thanks to my own grandiose ideas, I was going to ruin Tarver’s PTA.

  “I think she bit off more than she can chew,” Claudia said.

  Erica made a noncommittal noise. “Do you have a suggestion on how to proceed, Claudia?”

  “Oh, well, I guess . . .” Her words trailed off into silence.

  “Randy, how about you?” Erica asked.

  He grunted a response that sounded negative.

  “I see,” Erica said. “Well, we have a situation, don’t we?”

  A situation. I’d always hated that phrase. Why not just say “we have a problem”? “No, we don’t,” I blurted out. “The project is going just fine.”

  “Then you need to show us,” Erica said. “E-mail a progress report as soon as possible. On a project with this much scope, we cannot simply take your word.”

  “I want to see some of the stories,” Claudia said. “Anybody can write numbers in a spreadsheet. I need to see what the kids are writing. And not Oliver,” she added. “Her son’s stuff doesn’t count.”

  My breaths turned hot and sharp. Claudia Wolff was saying I would turn in a falsified progress report. She was calling me a liar. “Are you calling me—”

  Erica cut in. “Not an unreasonable request,” she said. “Beth, we’ll give you a week to come up with what three children have written to date. Three stories, with the recognition that they need not be complete, and a solid progress report. You do realize how crucial the timing is for this project, don’t you?”

  Of course I did. I was the one who’d kept harping on that very point all winter and half the spring. I was the one who’d drawn up the calendar and the schedules and the drop-dead deadlines. All of which were far out of reach, at home on the computer. “Yes, I—”

  “Then you have a week to bring this together. Show us solid evidence of progress and we won’t shut this down.”

  “Sounds good,” Randy said. “See you in a week.”

  “But I can gather up all that by tomorrow. I’m not at home, that’s all, and—”

  “They’re gone,” Claudia said.

  “Oh.” Yet another reason to hate conference calls.

  “I hear you’re supposed to be part of Marina’s weight loss contest.”

  “Um, I guess so.” Whether I wanted to be or not. Marina didn’t always present me with a choice.

  “You guess?” Claudia laughed. “You don’t know? It’s already the second of May. I’ve lost over five pounds already. Better make up your mind or you’ll never catch up.”

  “You’re in the contest?”

  “Well, duh. Who wouldn’t want that prize, a day at that fancy spa in Madison? Talk about a motivator. Massage, facial, manicure, pedicure, the works. Want to make a side bet? Twenty bucks says I win.”

  My response was unthinking. “I don’t bet.”

  “Hah. I knew you wouldn’t. Not a chance you’re going to win, anyway. But hey, that extra thirty pounds doesn’t look too bad on you, cons
idering.”

  “Considering what?”

  “Well, how old you are. At your age you can’t expect to look that great. Fact of life, you know?”

  “I don’t bet,” I said. “But there are always exceptions. Twenty dollars says I win.”

  “You’re on,” she said triumphantly. “And you’re going to lose.”

  A thought popped into my tiny little head. “How many people are in this contest?”

  “Last time I checked the Yahoo group it was up to fifteen.”

  “If we both lose,” I said, “the overall winner gets our money.”

  “Doesn’t matter, because I’m winning. A certificate to the spa and twenty bucks of Beth’s money to spend. Sounds like the perfect day.” She laughed. “Did I tell you I’ve lost over five pounds already?” She laughed again and hung up.

  I ended the call. There was motivation and there was motivation. A day at the spa would be nice, but even nicer would be seeing Claudia’s face when I won the contest.

  “Let’s go,” I called to the kids.

  They abandoned their game and hopped back on their bikes. “Where are we going?” Jenna asked. “Are we still going to the park?”

  I glanced at my watch. Looked at the sun and gauged how much daylight was left to us. “To the moon, Alice!”

  Jenna looked puzzled. “Who’s Alice?”

  “That’s a really long ways,” Oliver said.

  “Maybe it is a little too far.” I grinned at my children. “How about to the lake and back?”

  It’d be a three-mile round trip, but whatever Claudia’s secret weapon might be, there was no way it would be exercise. My secret weapon would be sensible meals combined with a reasonable amount of exercise. No wacky diet could beat that, not in the long run.

  Yep, good sense and exercise. How could I lose?

  * * *

  The next morning it took a lot of groaning and a long, hot shower to get me moving. Three miles. How could three lousy miles of bike riding make me hurt so much? As a kid I’d ridden that far, one way, to buy a bottle of soda. As a teenager I’d ridden twice that far to get to the good beach. When and how had this ill fitness happened to me?