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Chinese Salted Plums Are My New Licorice.

I love salted plums! I tried my first one at a zen workshop I attend this past summer. A number of the Chinese members were passing around a giant bag of the plums after lunch and they piqued my curiosity. I asked if I could try one and they handed me a grey, powdery ball. Visually, they are totally unappealing. They look like something that fell behind the radiator and dried out, mummy-like.

I asked how to eat them and was told that you can do this a number of ways. Most people just suck on them until the flesh falls off and then you can either discard or save the pit. But you can also do things like create drinks flavored somewhat like original gatorade or add them to beer to kill a bitter aftertaste.

There are hundreds of varities. I like the ones that have a good balance of salt, sweet, and sour. Even though they are preserved, they can become stale. Be careful not to eat those or in my case give them out to your sister-in-law's super polite boyfriend.

Hypochondria

I've had hypochondria since I was very little. It's no big surprise, I was a pretty sick kid. I had very invasive surgery when I was four and each year until I was 14, I would have multiple, recurring infections. I stopped believing that my body was capable of healing itself. I viewed my body as either a hassle or as a threat. I became completely obsessed with disease and health.

My parents didn't know how to handle it. My mom has told me a story when I was 6 or 7, I asked the doctor if the medicine he was about to give me would poison me. At some point they just gave up trying to convince me that I wasn't going to die of- cancer, toxic shock, lockjaw, rabies.... My mom was confounded when my self-diagnosed case of scarlet fever turned out to be the real thing!

This body/health paranoia has been very hard for me to overcome. Fact is we are all truly at risk for health problems, even life-threatening ones. Hypervigilance isn't going to keep you living forever, disease-free. How you approach life is as every bit as important as your immunity. If I were to spend my time obsessing over how NOT to get sick my chances of an unhealthy life are greater.

Changing my mentality on this issue is by taking very small steps. The last two times I started to obsess (breast cancer and premature menopause) I stopped myself and asked myself what was behind the anxiety.

I also recognized that with the breast cancer scare I was picking up on the increased media and advertisements. It was October- Breast Cancer Awareness month. Understanding where I am personally and looking around to see if there are any outside triggers is very effective. Also, I went to the doctors and had my levels checked for premature menopause. I didn't allow myself to think about it or research it ad naseum until the results came back.

By understanding that what life does is to provide you with a series of choices and not insurmountable obstacles, I am beginning to let go of my fears.

Neshaminy High 1987- or "How I was Almost Metal"

This past weekend, I was looking over my yearbook with my husband, trying to identify for him who was "metal" in my school. To the left is my yearbook photo from my first year at Neshaminy, 1986-1987. Coming from four, very long years at Neshaminy Jr. High with no social connections whatsoever, I was open to hang out with any crowd. Not desperate, but curious. I believed I had had serious social problems in Jr. High and I was looking to move past them once and for all.

For the first 3 or 4 months I hung out with a pseudo-metal girl named Vicky Ziering. Vicky was nice but loud and had HUGE hair. Very serious metal hair that required almost an entire can of Aqua Net. She was in love with a Chinese metal guy named Tommy Yu. We were all in the same remedial science class.

Vicky liked metal bands with cute lead singers like Bon Jovi or Sebastian Bach from Skid Row. I went with her the metal club on Roosevelt Blvd. a couple of times and hung out in the parking lot because we were underage.

Kids into metal were considered trash in my High School and my area was pretty trashy to begin with. Unlike a John Hughes film, no one from that crowd, in my school, ever moved beyond the trade school existence that was laid out for them. Seriously- does anyone really believe that Molly Ringwald's character Claire would have been seen in the light of day with Judd Nelson's John Bender?

I honestly didn't have anything in common with most of those kids. I really didn't like the music and I just didn't have the desire to be typecasted.

Ultimately, I never did fall into any group while at Neshaminy. I had a small group of friends that I stayed with up until my senior year. It was only then that I started hanging with people where we all listened to the same music and dressed the same. I'm not sure why at that point I needed that kind of social allegiance when I had been fine with just drifting.