What we collect says something about us -- but it's not always what we think.

I don't know anyone who doesn't collect something.

It may be old books or tacky pottery or even fine art. We all collect something.

Why? Well, because it appeals to us. On one level or another. We like it.

And what we collect does say something about who we are. But it may not be what we think.

For instance, I know a professor at a university who has a collection of giraffes. All kinds and sizes of them, filling every shelf in her office. But she didn't intend to collect them. She bought one somewhere, on a trip, and a student saw it in her office on a shelf and gave her another one. Word got around, and soon she had giraffes coming to her from every direction. She told me that she's not that fond of giraffes, has no connection to them (emotionally), but she's getting them left and right.

So anyone visiting her in her office would assume that she's crazy about giraffes. Not so. It's a collection that has assumed a life of its own.

Most of us collect things because they do have a connection to our lives -- certain art or objects we've gathered on our travels -- but that's not always the case. Sometimes we collect things for reasons that we don't quite understand.

For instance, I have a collection of coffee mugs. Not the ones from places I've visited -- Austin, Texas, or Yellowstone National Park or wherever -- but cups that have been crafted, one of a kind, by artisans, with their names etched or inked on the bottom.

From that bit of information, you might assume that I'm a coffee fanatic, insisting my brew be, if not from Starbucks, at least french-pressed. No way. I do buy coffee beans and grind them, but my coffee-maker is a Mr. Coffee from Target ($29.99). I like a cup in the morning but don't meditate over it.

So why do I need these "original" mugs?

I think it's because my thumb doesn't fit in most of those cups that come with your standard set of dishes and cups. The thumb part isn't big enough, and the cup itself isn't either. I started buying the artisan mugs because they fit my hand. And once I did, I looked for others and bought them every time I found one that "felt right". Unfortunately, I now have at least a dozen in my kitchen cabinet. I've since gone cold-turkey on buying more.

But my point is that someone looking at my collection might assume that I'm a coffee junkie, which is not the case: a cup in the morning, and that's about it.

I also have lots of clocks. Artistic clocks -- one is an old LP record with hands attached -- and one that chirps bird sounds on the hour. In my basement office, I have six or seven clocks. Does that mean that I'm obsessed with time?

Probably not. I don't even wear a watch most of the time. So what's the deal with the clocks?

I honestly don't know. But maybe I'm more intrigued with time than I thought. (And when I think about it, I have to admit that I'm one of those people who knows what time it is without having to look at a watch or a clock: I'm very aware of time, even if I don't have a schedule to keep.)

Which may be what it is with us and our collections. We don't really know why we like those quilts or those Art Nouveau prints. We just like them. But they're still saying something about us, even if we don't know what it is.

We all know men and women who collect sex partners, one after another, never committing to any but keeping each one on a string. What's that all about? Well, it could be that we're keeping our options open, or it could be that we're trying to prove our selves attractive, over and over, to different people, or it could just be that we're afraid of commitment. In any case, it's probably not what we're telling ourselves.

Suppose you collect old copies of a magazine you've subcribed to but haven't gotten around to reading. The New Yorker is a classic case. National Geographic is another. (In another era, it was Life.) We like those magazines but just don't have time to read them every week, or however often they come out. So we pile them up, intending to read them later. And they keep piling up. We know we'll never get around to reading them, but we keep accumulating them. Why? We like to think it's because we really will read them someday but it's probably because we want to think of ourselves as the kind of people who do read them every week or month. In other words, we say to ourselves that we're collecting them to read someday but really we're collecting them to prove to ourselves that we're the kind of people who should be reading them.

Let's elevate it a notch and assume that you're wealthy and collect "great art". I mean, really expensive stuff. Did you pick that painting because it appealed to you or because some art consultant told you it was something that would appreciate in value over the years? In the first case, you trusted your instincts. In the second, you trusted someone else's (and for a price). So now that painting is on your wall, part of your collection done over the years at the suggestion of some "expert" or other. Do you like it? Do you like the others? Or are they just like those books in your bookcase that you've never read but that someone said you should have there?

If you didn't select that art yourself -- without knowing its value or who painted it -- because you liked it, aren't you being sort of hypocritical? If your collections reflect someone else's taste, it's not your own, right? Your collection isn't yours. It's what someone told you to put on your walls.

In other words, your collection of art is bogus. It has nothing to do with you. And what does that say about you?

On the far end of the spectrum of collectors are the "horders", those unfortunates who keep too many cats or clutter their living spaces with mountains of newspapers and such, so that a person can't walk from one side of a room to the other. They're collectors, too, but they do so out of mental illness or a need not to let go of anything.

True collectors pick and choose carefully what to collect, but they don't always know why they're collecting what they collect.

Let's imagine you fill your house with pictures of your children. That seems like a natural thing for a mother (or father) to do, right? But let's imagine further that those pictures dominate nearly every space of wall. What's going on? Are you trying to convince yourself, by all the photos of your kids, that they love you? Do they? Why do you need that re-assurance?

I knew a man who collected memorabilia of John F. Kennedy's life. He was poor but had so many photos and clippings and ticket stubs and everything you can imagine, all neatly arranged in boxes and frames and in scrapbooks. I asked him why he was so obsessed (my word) with JFK, and he said, looking at me with dis-belief, "He was our greatest President." Here was a man with nothing to his name but, as a teenager in the early 196os, he'd seen something he couldn't believe that I hadn't seen. In his eyes, everyone should be keeping JFK's memory alive.

We all have our reasons for collecting what we do, and it's probably not important why we do it. It's part of who we are, and aren't we all, in the end, kind of hard to explain? Good for us!

One reason women live longer than men is that men don't like to go to the doctor.

Women, even as young girls, get used to being subjected to "invasive procedures": having to spread their legs and having someone's fingers (usually a man's) inserted into their most private parts. It's part of being a girl, and later, a woman.

Men, even as boys, aren't subjected to that kind of humiliation. Our private parts are on the outside, so nobody probes us so intimately.

This changes when men get older, when their prostate gland becomes more susceptible to cancer, when the doctor needs to put his gloved finger into our anus to feel the prostate to be sure everything is okay in there. But even then, many men never have this test done. It's not all that painful -- uncomfortable, to be sure, but not painful -- but men, having been boys, are reluctant to be "invaded" that way.

The result? Lots more men die of that kind of cancer than is necessary.

Women, being smarter (I think) than men, monitor their internal health much more carefully, subjecting themselves to very unpleasant examinations much earlier than men. As a result, they probably detect problems that need to be dealt with and get the proper treatment that allows them to live a while longer than they might have.

Men also don't deal with pain as well as women. I don't have any medical studies to back me up on this, but my experience is that men are much more reluctant to be cut on than women, who, again, eventually grow used to the idea that they may have to have surgeries to (1) prevent an un-intended pregnancy, (2) take some growth from an ovary or a breast, (3) make delivery of a healthy child possible, (4) remove all their female plumbing (the dreaded hysterectomy).

Men, most I know, would just put a gun to their head before they would endure any of this.

I knew a man who wouldn't go through the relatively minor surgery of a vascectomy but instead subjected his wife to the possibility of more and more pregnancies, even though they had no money to support the kids they had. He was afraid of the knife. What a wimp, huh?

I knew another man who had a heart attack and had no primary physician because he hadn't been to see a doctor for years. He was treated in the emergency room of a hospital, where no one knew him or his history or family history.

Again, I think one reason men don't live as long as women is that we, the men, are in denial about our bodies and our health and the problems that lie in wait for us. We're used to being okay, able to get around, feeling pretty good -- and so in fear of being told that something is wrong and that we're going to have to change our eating and exercise habits. Or that we're going to have to have some invasive procedure that may (1) cause us pain and (2) give us bad news.

Guys -- face it -- are masters of denial. (I'm one, so I know.) We just want everything to go on as it was before. No sudden changes. No dire warnings. No admonitions to do anything different, even if it might save our lives. We would rather just keep on keeping on, pretending that all is as it's always been. Hey, if we don't go to the doctor, we'll never hear the warnings we want more than anything to ignore, right?

I'm sure that any women reading this are simultaneously nodding and shaking their heads. Yes, it's all true; no, men are aren't doing enough when it comes to their health. I'm sure some men are conscientious about check-ups, etc., but I'm betting most aren't. But you have to remember: We're also the ones who want all marital spats to just resolve themselves, without our having to own up to anything, so the status quo can continue.

The best of men are simple creatures: good and strong and reliable and dependable -- and utterly in denial.

Hey, you gotta love 'em, no? Or not.

There are two words than can make your life better.

Okay, don't get ahead of me here. You may be be thinking "I do". But we all know -- at least some of us do -- that those two words, said when we take our wedding vows, can usher in a world of hurt and misunderstanding. A lifetime of compromises that we may or may not be willing or able to make. Most reliable estimates are that half the marriages in our country end in divorce. Ouch!

No, I'm thinking of two words that -- if we mean them -- hold no negative after-effects. Two words that, if they don't heal wounds, can be a start to healing them and maybe re-constructing that "I do" relationship.

Give up?

"I'm sorry."

Traditionally, it's been men who couldn't say these words, because men can't easily admit that they've been wrong. But I'm guessing that women have a hard time with them, too. After all, we're all human, and it's hard for any of us to say that we've made a mistake, a really big one, one we hope to be forgiven for. It's a big gulp for most of us.

Why? Because the built-in implication is that we promise to change our ways and make things better in the future. I'm sorry for not recognizing you as a person, but I'll try to do so from now on. I'm sorry for having an affair with a woman (or man) who looked no better than you but who made me feel young again or at least better about myself; I promise it won't happen again. I'm sorry for criticizing you too much, when I have my own faults to deal with; I'll try to correct mine and try not to notice yours.

I'm sorry.

Why is it so hard to say?

You'll notice that politicians almost never say it. If they did, it would mean that they'd made a mistake somewhere along the way. A sign of weakness or even flip-flopping. They have to defend their worst decisions and try to explain them to a public they want to vote for them next time around. Not good to appear weak or indecisive.

But those voters, like our spouses, are just human and would really like to hear those words: I'm sorry. And the follow-up: I'll do better next time.

Isn't that all we really expect of our friends, our family members, our husbands and wives, our elected officials? An acknowledgement that "I screwed up this time but I've learned my lesson and will do better in the future."

So, again, why is it so hard to say?

I think it's because we all like to think of ourselves as doing the best we can, whatever our circumstances, whatever the odds, and when we fall short, our natural tendency is to make excuses: I wasn't given the opportunity I needed; the press was against me; I needed more than I was getting; just let me explain; no one understands me; etc., etc.

Oh please. Yada yada yada. You f*cked up. Own it.

Apologize, okay?

After all, it's just two words. Okay, one is hyphenated ("I'm" for "I am"), but it's not that hard to say. It's not like you're saying you committed a crime, right? (Well, sometimes it is.) What we're talking about is the power of words to change a dire situation into a retrievable one.

Let's all practice it together. Say after me: "I'm sorry." Now say it again like you mean it. Try it again and, this time, try to feel like you really do mean it. Are you really sorry? If you're not, nobody's going to buy it. Not your spouse, not your friend, not your electorate.

So, the first rule of saying "I'm sorry" is that you have to feel it and mean it. The second rule is that you have to say it with conviction. In other words, you have to be willing to accept the consequences of your having said it: you have to change your ways.

Don't say it unless you truly mean it. But if you do, you may be amazed at the effect it has on others. They may just forgive you and grant you another chance.

And whether you're a two-timing spouse or a back-stabbing friend or a lying politician, that may be a gift you had no reason to expect. The onus is now on you to become a better person and show that you deserve that kind of forgiveness.

Are you up to it?

Just like "I do" or "I love you", the words "I'm sorry" carry with them some freight, but the latter, if you really mean them, can get you out of a lot of trouble while the former two can get you into more trouble than you ever dreamed of.

Rehearse in front of the mirror. Look sincere. Get it right. Your future happiness may depend on it.

And you may become a better person in the bargain.

The time of the written word, on paper, is almost over. Good thing or not?

It's a given that the current generation -- and those to come -- will communicate with each other more and more via electronic devices. They do now, and there's no reason to think they won't in the future. It's easy, it's fast, and it's going to get even easier and faster. It's also going to get cheaper, so that anyone with any hand-held device can contact friends with the push of a button.
So what happens to those old ways of communicating? Paper and pen or pencil is already almost an after-thought -- if it's a thought at all . Hand-written, or even typed, letters are now called snail mail and are generally dismissed as hopelessly retro. Why sit down and write something "long-hand" that you can send by email? Why indeed?

This harks back to a couple of previous posts. One said that with every advance in technology, we lose a functionality. The other said that no one gets a handwritten letter anymore.

So what do we lose when everyone connects via digital device? Well, for one, we lose the written record, the one we can print out and save forever. Or the one written, in our own hand, on pads of paper. Generations to come may want to know what we wrote, and when, and what we were thinking when we wrote it -- and what it looked like when we applied pen to paper. (There are those who claim they can tell something about us through our handwriting, but I'm skeptical.)

If we just save it onto our hard drive, it's much less likely to be viewed, by anyone, ever, because they all have so much they've saved themselves just that way. A collection of CDs or DVDs, all those pictures of our kids or theirs: it's all probably just going to end up stored in the closet (or on our computers).

Our emails to and from loved ones and treasured friends? Poof! Gone forever, deleted by their recipients and/or certainly by their/our heirs.

Think about it: how many children and grandchildren are going to want to download pictures you have saved on your computer? Not many, I'll bet. But if you have them all arranged in a picture album, wouldn't they be more likely to look at them? Wouldn't they be more likely to thumb through a real picture album of you and your wife and those sweet babies? Isn't there something tactile that's lost when we go digital?

And how many will download emails to/from people they don't know? None. And you can't blame them. They have their own lives to live and don't have time for yours, which, by then, is long past.

Now think of yourself as a mathematician. You're trying out new equations -- jotting them down on a yellow pad -- because that's the quickest way to make your notations: pencil on paper.
You know that's the way the most important break-throughs in your field have been done in the past, so why change it now? And if you wrote it by hand on that yellow pad, you have proof that you did it. Whereas, if you put all those calculations into the computer, they could be stolen or even wiped out in a single electrical surge. Again: Poof! All that work lost.

We make notes to ourselves every day. Pick up the laundry, take the kids to soccer practice, buy some shrimp for the party, etc. How do we make these notes? We do it on sticky notes and in our own handwriting, right? And we do it with pencils or pens, on paper.

So why the big rush to communicate only via the computer? Everything we enter there is lost, or potentially lost, as soon as we write it. We do it because it's quick, and we're all in a hurry. But maybe we should slow down and see if some things that we write should be saved. For ourselves to peruse in old age, or for future generations who might want to know who we were and what we were thinking. Not everything, for sure, but some things.

An email or text message can be done in a flash. A handwritten -- or even typed -- letter takes some time. Not everything you want to convery to someone else needs to be saved -- what you're doing right now or where you are -- but what if you want to write something of substance to someone you love, without all those annoying emoticons (the smiley-faces, etc.)? Can you really text-message everyone in your life with everything you want to say?

My advice is to maintain a balance. Keep your hand-writing -- or at least typing -- skills up to date while you're perfecting your text-messaging skills. There may come a time when you need to write, at length, to a friend or family member or lover (or soon-to-be ex-lover), and all the emoticons in existence won't be enough to express the way you feel. And if later, in your old age, you want to recall what you wrote or what somebody wrote to you, how likely is it that you will still have any of that on your computer, if you have that computer at all? If you have it all stored in a box -- not an inbox --you're covered.

Just like old photos -- instead of digital ones -- it's so much easier to peruse old letters -- even journal entries or notes to ourselves or others -- when they're on paper. And more gratifying, too, especially if they were hand-written.

Circumcision is a tough choice.

Okay, this only applies to parents who are about to have a male child. (All others can skip it.)

Circumcision involves cutting off the male foreskin, which covers the head of the penis, usually at a time when the child is a baby. It's a choice parents have to make when they have a male child; doctors ask if you want it done. Or at least the doctor did when my male child was born.

I was of two minds about it. It hadn't been done on me when I was a baby, so I grew up with an intact foreskin that surrounded the head of my penis. (Sorry to be graphic, but you need to know what it's all about.) I don't think it would have been a problem except that most of the boys I went to school with had apparently had the operation and had penises that didn't look quite like mine as we all gathered around the communal urinal in the elementary school bathroom. Uh oh. Problem right away.

I was different. Not through any fault of my own: the decision had been made long before I had anything to say about it. But my whatever did look different, and I didn't know why.

The irony is that mine looked exactly as it was supposed to look, the way nature intended it.
The others, those with foreskin shorn off, were aberrations, the results of surgical procedures. But, again, mine looked different. I was aware of it, painfully, all through my childhood.

So what's the big deal about circumcising males? Why mess with nature, which put that foreskin there for some reason? Would you have your eyelids removed so you could see better? Would you have your little toe removed because it's just in the way? Why snip away the foreskin from the penis when it's there naturally?

I know I've read reasons, but none stick with me. Something about it being easier to clean the penis to prevent venereal microbes from lodging under that foreskin. But I've always found it easy to clean myself in the shower. Hey, that foreskin retracts easily.

When, later, I had sex with women, I never noticed a problem. When the penis is engorged with blood -- the definition of an erection -- the foreskin slips back, and we're ready to go.

There must be a religious or other reason for wanting to mutilate male children this way, but I'm at a loss to explain it. Please clue me in.

I had it done on my son because of the ostracism I experienced as a boy child growing up in a society that apparently demanded it, and I doubt that it did him any harm, but I'm not sure I would do it again or recommend it to others.

Generally speaking, I think we should leave nature alone.

It's always time for a physical inventory.

I'm not talking about all those tests that can only be done internally by doctors -- scans for cancer of the prostate or breast, cholesteral screening, etc. -- but just a general look at yourself, at how your muscles and bones and senses are holding up, at whatever age you may be.

I'm just talking about a good look at yourself.

I'll give you an example. I was walking up the stairs not long ago, when I was alone in the house, and I kept hearing this low-level grinding noise, like sandpaper on a surface. I stopped and it went away. I started up the stairs again, and there it was. I'm sure you've already guessed that it was my knees.

They didn't hurt, but they did make a disconcerting noise. A sound I hadn't heard when I was twenty or thirty or even forty. Something was grinding against something in my knees. Well, that couldn't be good, right? A sign of a problem to come? Or just the normal wear and tear of body on joints? Should I have someone look at it? Not right now. I'm not worried about it, but I did notice it and will keep listening.

Let's take it sense by sense.

How's your eyesight? I used to need glasses to see far away but not to see up close. A few years ago, I noticed that I couldn't read the newspaper without squinting. My wife handed me her reading glasses -- basically just magnifiers -- and, voila! I could see perfectly. While I was lamenting my descent into vision hell, something miraculous happened: I found that my long-range vision, what I'd gotten the glasses for in the first place, suddenly had corrected itself.

I passed the vision test to get my driver's license renewed -- with no vision restriction, meaning that I no longer had to wear prescription lenses to drive: I can make out all the signs on a highway without glasses. To make a long story short, I now need cheap magnifying glasses -- which I can buy at the Dollar store -- for reading, but I don't need prescription glasses anymore on my driver's license. I guess my eyeballs changed shape. Maybe yours have, too. Hey, I'll buy cheap reading glasses over expensive prescription lenses any day.

How's your hearing? What's that? (Cheap joke.) Mine is more or less okay-- despite having spent a year or more in the Army artillery, hearing big cannons go off close to my head -- meaning that people don't have to yell at me. If it's bad for you, though, if people do yell at you, there are lots more ways to deal with it than when my father lost his hearing in one ear (as a result of a bomb going off near him in a long-ago war) and had to wear something in his ear, wired to a cigarette-sized device in his shirt pocket. Nowadays, that something in your ear is almost invisible and isn't connected to anything in your pocket. It's painless and does the trick. So get your hearing checked, okay? You hear me?

Sense of smell? I don't know that anyone has figured out how to test this, so I would say that if you think you smell everything pretty much the way you used to, don't worry about it. But you might want to ask yourself this: Do I notice the roses and lilacs in the spring? Do I smell the spring flowers at all? If I pat on after-shave behind my ears, do I smell it? Does my wife? (Meaning that maybe I patted on too much.) Do I notice if my wife or significant other has on a certain perfume?

If you answered no to most of those questions, you might want to get back in touch with the olfactory you. Smell/aroma is an important part of who we are. The old expression "Stop and smell the roses" is as literal as it is metaphorical. If you've forgotten how important smells/aromas are in your life, maybe it's time to burn some incense or at least pick up some nice-smelling flower before you go home. And plant some roses.

What about a sense of taste? It's related to smell, and I don't know what to do about it except find a good doctor who specializes in nose and throat stuff. I know people who claim to be able to tell the difference between a bottle of wine that costs $10 and one that costs $50, but I simply don't believe them. I think the sense of taste is best experienced by going to restaurants that feature cuisines we're not familiar with. Have you tried Indian recently? Thai? Challenge your old assumptions about what you like. You might be pleasantly surprised. Revive those taste buds!

Touch? If you can't feel anything through your fingertips, you need to consult a nerve specialist.
But if it's just that you haven't touched anyone in a while, that can be remedied. We all want to be touched, at whatever age. Studies have shown that older people in nursing homes benefit from stroking dogs and cats. Don't you think they'd rather be stroking other humans? If you haven't stroked something --or someone --pleasant lately, maybe it's time to re-enter the dating scene -- or get a pet. Pay for a massage. It's not for everyone, but it might be just right for you.

Beyond the immediate senses, there is a simple test you can do to assess your own physical inventory. For starters, look at yourself in the mirror. How do you you look to you?

If you're too fat, you know what you have to do: eat less and exercise more.

If you're too skinny, there may be an underlying problem, as that's not the way most of look to
ourselves when we see ourselves in the mirror. Most of us see ourselves as too fat.

When the clothes you like fit, the ones you liked when you thought you looked your best, you're on the right track.

What I'm saying is that there are tests and evaluations that can only be done by doctors, and there are others we can perform on ourselves. So let's go back to the mirror. Stand in front of it, with all the lights on. Size yourself up. If you're really bold, do it naked. Is this how you want to look to a potential sex partner? A future husband or wife? Be honest.

If you don't like what you see, think about how you can change it. One of the most wonderful things about being human is that we CAN change the way we look, sometimes in dramatic fashion. I'm sure you've read accounts in the tabloids -- absolutely true -- of people who have lost hundreds of pounds! You can lose twenty or thirty or forty, if you're willing to cut back on what you eat for a few months. We, as humans, can't change our DNA: who we came from or who we're likely to be, on a genetic level. Some of that is a given. Sorry about that. But we can always change the way we look.

In the end it all comes back to that physical inventory we take of ourselves. How much more do I weigh than I want to? Do I need new glasses? Should I be walking or running more? Am I the lover my mate thought he/she was signing onto for a lifetime? Am I making the most of what I have, physically? Am I being lazy and letting myself get fat and unattractive just because it's too much work not to be? Do I need knee surgery? Do I need to get my hearing tested? These aren't questions we should be asking of our doctors: they're questions we should be asking of ourselves. Hey, it's your body and your life, right? You're in control of most of it.

Have you taken an inventory of yours lately? Anything you think you need to improve? As I said before, one of the wonderful things about our bodies is that we can bring them up to speed any time we're willing to put forth the effort.

And that sense of smell and taste? Tried a good Indian restaurant lately? Or Thai? Or . . .

Here's to good eating and good living!

We all do invisible jobs that we get no credit for.

I was sweeping out the garage recently -- all those leaves that blow in when the door is up -- and thinking that no one appreciates, or even notices, that I'm doing it. My wife drives her car in and just expects that the cement floor will be free of leaves (or trash or whatever). I also walk the yard and pick up branches that have blown off our trees and put them into trash bins. And I mow the yard every week in the summer, even though no one has walked on it since the last time I mowed it. All this work I do, with no thanks.

But she does hers, too. Keeping things neat inside, taking care of grown kids' complaints, making holidays special with decorations, even doing the taxes.

We all do invisible jobs -- invisible to anyone but us -- and get no credit, much less thanks.

Why do we do them? Why do I, from time to time, re-organize the drawers in the kitchen, tossing out or donating old utensils? No one notices, much less appreciates. Why does she replace things on the wall or on the mantel? Does anyone notice or appreciate? No way.

I guess we do these "invisible" jobs because they're important to us, to keep a sense of order. For many years now, I've been taking out the trash, which involves going from room to room to be sure I've gotten everything that needs to be thrown out. Could my wife do it? Of course. But it's become my job. Why? Maybe because I grew up in a home that was kind of trashy, where things accumulated way past time to get rid of them. So it becomes my job to keep our home clear of that kind of waste. And because I assume that job, it's taken for granted that I'll do it.

That's what I mean by invisible jobs. I think there are tasks we assume because they mean something to us and so we do them, but, in doing so, we absolve everyone else from the responsibility. And, in the end, everyone just assumes we'll keep doing them. They forget that we do them. They become invisible. They just get done, but no one knows how.

I remember a woman whose husband died and who was dismayed to realize, as the months went on and the seasons changed, how much he had done to keep the yard and the driveway clear, the cars lubed and tuned, how he had pruned branches from the backyard trees, how he had coiled the hoses in winter and stored them in the garage. How he had made coffee for her every morning so that she had it when she woke, sleepy and in need of a caffeine dose.

On the other hand, I recall a man whose wife died and who realized that he didn't know how to cook anything -- or even shop for groceries. He also didn't know how to do the family's taxes.
Or clip flowers from the front yard and put them in vases on the table. All those years with that woman he loved, and he'd been in the dark about how much she did to keep the family going.

It's probably a mistake to try to claim credit for everything we do that no one notices -- those invisible jobs -- because, in a relationship, the other party has just as many as we do. But it might make sense, from time to time, to sit down together and remind each other of what makes a good marriage or partnership, what each of us does to keep that remarkable union on track. No finger-pointing, no posturing: just a sensible look at who does what -- and a mutual appreciation of what each of us does, however invisible.

Claim credit for what you do, for sure, but don't make a big deal out of it. If you're cool about it, and keep doing it, someone will notice.

And, besides, you weren't really doing it for them anyway, right? You would be doing the same for yourself.

A series TV show is not a novel -- alas.

When you pick up a novel and start to read it, you're assured that the author has thought it all the way through. In the end, the plot and the characters will somehow be reconciled --to your satisfaction or not -- but it's all part of a vision the author had when he/she started the story.

Scripted shows on TV -- from sitcoms to legal nail-biters to paranormal thrillers -- are a different animal. They start with a certain premise and introduce you to characters, who you become familiar with over a series of weeks, and then, suddenly: BLAM!

The series is cancelled.

It happens all the time. Most recently two of my favorites -- Pushing Daisies and Dirty Sexy Money -- were dropped. No more episodes except those already in the can, and probably those before anyone connected with the shows had any warning. What that means is that the remaining hours were probably building toward others that will now never be aired. All those characters I had become so interested in, even involved with, will soon be history.

Poof!

Someone, somewhere, decided to ax these very inventive and addicting series. Just when I was getting to like or at least be interested in the characters.

Hey, I understand that it's the prerogative of those who put up the money to terminate any series they don't think is producing enough revenue (i.e., advertising money), but it's always a shock to those of us who really liked the show in question.

You may not personally care for those I mentioned, but the principle still applies: If you give us this show and set us up for expectations that we'll be seeing these characters go on for a while, do you have the right to shut it down, on short notice or no notice, with no input from us, the audience? Is Hollywood and TV really just about profits? What about creativity and audience loyalty? What about us, the people who watch these shows and look forward to the next episode? Don't we count?

Apparently not. TV is a business, and those pulling plugs retain the right to pull plugs. To them, it really is all a business, and the shows we love are just products -- like light fixtures or washing machines or copiers. Move the product or pull it. If this one doesn't sell, find another one.

So, my advice to any of my fellow watchers of scripted TV shows is to not get too attached, too devoted, because the plug can be pulled at any time by the least creative people in Hollywood. In the end, it's all up to the money men, and they are looking only to make more money.

Which brings me back to my original premise: A series TV show is not a novel.

When a writer sits down to write a novel, he or she is almost certainly not looking to make a sale to Hollywood (except for writers whose names you know and that appear bigger on their covers than the title of the book). Anyone writing a serious novel is trying to tell a good story that hasn't been told before, at least not from this particular point of view. That novelist will develop the story and resolve it and, in the meantime, give you some characters you haven't seen before.

When the writer of a sitcom -- or any scripted TV show -- sits down to write, it's to please his or her bosses. What he/she writes may be very original/interesting/funny/etc., but it has to fit within the parameters set out for him or her by someone above him/her, an executive at the producing studio. And what he/she writes will likely be re-written many times over, often by hired writers from outside, before it sees the light of day or night on your TV screen. In other words, when it comes to your favorite TV show, what you're seeing is not the vision of a single author -- like with a novel -- but a pastiche of re-writes by writers who have decided it's easier to make money re-writing other writers' material than coming up with something of their own. The money is good, the work isn't that hard, and the hours are easy. Wouldn't you do it?

But it's still sad when our favorite TV shows come to an end, abruptly, with no explanation. For every MASH or Mary Tyler Moore grand finale, there are so many series that just . . . stop. Here we were, following the plot and getting to know the characters, and -- just like that -- it's over. For those of us who love to read novels, that's not okay. We need resolution of the plot and to know what happened to all those characters.

I'm sorry that the masters of TV don't always understand or appreciate when they're producing something of quality instead of just turning out something that makes more money (e.g., the endless round of reality shows). I'm sorry they don't know that they have a hand on the controls of media in our country right now and could opt to give us better stuff but keep pandering to the least smart among us, just to make money. I can't solve that problem.

What I can do is ask that, when they have a well-received series, comic or dramatic, and they're thinking of cancelling it, they come up with the dollars to have writers script a satisfying end, just like they would with a novel. It's the least they can do for their audience, don't you think?

Don't they owe us that much?