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By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

A friend who is the same age as I am recently and suddenly died, leaving behind a wife and two daughters in college who are the same age I was when my father died.

I feel like I’m at the center of a prism, with light bouncing out in so many directions that it’s difficult to track each path.

I am devastated for my friend. I know he will miss many of the same things my father never got to experience. He won’t see his daughters graduate from college, develop their careers, and enjoy learning about themselves through relationships.

He also won’t get to wake up another morning and see his wife’s smile, make plans for the day, and make the kinds of decisions we take for granted, like where to go on vacation, whom to see over the weekend, what friend to call and visit, or how to brighten someone else’s day.

I knew him as a dedicated father, who beamed when he spoke of his twin daughters. Unlike so many other parents whose children play sports, he didn’t need his daughters to be superstars. His joy mirrored theirs. 

I’m sorry for his wife, too, who shared two decades of experience with him and their two children. She went from being in an empty nest to being in an empty house in 18 months. Everywhere she looks, she will see reminders of her husband and the life they shared.

I relate to his daughters. I know how strange it is to be in college, surrounded by friends who suddenly don’t know what to say to them. If friends ask the girls how they are doing, will they tell them, leaving many of their friends without the tools, experience or words to respond?

Death leaves a hole in our lives. The friends they have in college, like mine decades ago, may not know about that hole and may not have even met the man missing from the center of their lives.

A week after I buried my father, I was back at school, finding it difficult to concentrate or even to care about upcoming exams or responsibilities. 

When I told a math professor about my loss, he went out of his way to tutor me, to ask me how I was, and to be patient, waiting for me to tell him when I was ready to take a midterm. He arranged for me to take an exam on my own. He made a point of looking for me after each lecture. I appreciated the support and, yet, I felt so weak and angry that I needed it.

I remember the first horrifying moment I didn’t feel the weight of the loss of my father. I was wracked with guilt. What kind of son was I that I had, even for a moment, neglected to mourn?

I also recall the first person I met in those turbulent few weeks who didn’t know my story, who treated me like everyone else and who didn’t say she was sorry for my loss. We had the closest thing to a normal evening, which, at that time, was extraordinary.

In the weeks, months and years ahead, my friend’s daughters will remember the great moments with their father. They will look back at their idyllic childhoods and remember the mom and dad who made that possible.

In the days ahead, however, they will feel a flood of emotions and have a range of thoughts. I hope that they find the kind of peace that comes from appreciating what they had and knowing that, no matter how much they might feel this way, they are not alone and that others share their experiences and care for them.

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By Leah S. Dunaief

Leah Dunaief

If it was President Vladimir Putin’s intention to be the center of global attention, he has certainly succeeded. Not much can push the latest COVID news off the top spot. Maybe inflation and how it is affecting the average resident can, but that’s nothing compared to the dominance of the situation in Ukraine and the speculation about what Putin’s next move will be. There seem to be numerous Putin specialists who profess to have studied the Russian dictator’s every move for many years and know what his plan is. Or, does he have a plan? Is this a story that he is writing as he goes along? This makes for lots of rhetoric among the pundits. 

One thing is sure. The serious possibility of Russian aggression has caused North Atlantic Treaty Organization members to stand together and reaffirm their alliance. Perhaps this was Putin’s test. There was little reaction when the Russians invaded and took over Crimea in 2014. Would anyone really care if they took over all of the Ukraine?

Well, the answer to that question is decidedly YES. And the United States has stepped forward to reaffirm it alliance with and leadership of NATO by organizing the threat of severe economic sanctions against Russia, sending military equipment to Ukraine and finally sending a symbolic number of troops to NATO countries that border on Ukraine, namely Poland and Romania. A small number of soldiers also went to Germany, perhaps to bolster the resolve of the newly elected German leader, Chancellor Olaf Scholz, to honor its alliance. 

Germany has the most to lose as far as its energy supply goes. Some 38% of the European Union’s natural gas comes from Russia, according to Eurostat, the EU’s statistics office. Much of it is imported by Germany to heat homes in winter and enable factories to operate. The loss of that source of energy would certainly cause economic pain to Germans and other European residents, who would have to pay more for significantly less supply. And of course, that furthers the impact of inflation.

Russia’s overt demands include halting NATO’s expansion and reducing its military exercises and presence in Eastern Europe. Specifically, Putin wants guarantees that Ukraine will not be allowed to join NATO, which its current leadership has indicated it would want to do in the future. However, noted globalist and New York Times columnist, Thomas L. Friedman, suggested in the issue of February 16, that Putin’s fear is that “Ukraine becomes Westernized. He fears that one day Ukraine will be admitted to the European Union.” If  such an event were to happen, which Friedman believes young Ukrainians dream about, they feel it could “lock in their frail democracy and lock out corruption and Putinism.”

Friedman goes on to point out that “Putin seized Crimea and first invaded part of Eastern Ukraine in February-March 2014. What else was happening then? The European Union’s 28 member states were forging a new E.U.-Ukraine Association Agreement to foster closer political and economic ties, signed on March 21, 2014.” Putin’s greatest fear, according to Friedman, “is the expansion of the E.U.’s sphere of influence and the prospect that it would midwife a decent, democratic, free-market Ukraine that would every day say to the Russian people, ‘This is what you could be without Putin.’” 

Meanwhile, Putin is deciding, according to Friedman, “If  I go ahead with a full scale invasion and it goes bad — wrecking Russia’s economy and resulting in Russian soldiers returning home in body bags from a war with fellow Slavs —could it lead to my own downfall?”

Whatever Putin’s thoughts are, he has used the threat of military force to bring the Western leaders to the table for extensive talks. Perhaps the diplomats will remake the Eastern European map without resorting to war. 

Until there is some sort of resolution to this stand off, what can we, here in America, expect? We will have to deal with the possibility of growing shortages and accompanying inflation, which in fact we are already experiencing at the gas pumps. 

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When people look back to spring 2020, they remember how the COVID-19 pandemic shut things down. Zoom became a regular form of communication, visits to grandparents were done in a drive-thru fashion and many people anxiously awaited their stimulus checks.

While those checks from the U.S. government were sent, some people needed the money more than others. 

Many people lost their jobs, their businesses and their livelihoods. In fact, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in February 2020 — just before the pandemic hit the States — unemployment was at 3.5%. Just two months later, as the virus began to spread rapidly, unemployment rates skyrocketed to nearly 15%.

But what many people might not realize is how impacted the local arts were during this time. 

We as a society leaned on our first responders out in the trenches. We listened to our elected officials on the news every day hoping to hear something good. We shopped locally to help our business-owning neighbors. 

However, something that we all enjoy one way or another — the arts — was shattered and not much was being done to help our local artists, performers and creators. 

According to Johns Hopkins University research, as of December 2021, the percentage of job losses at nonprofit arts organizations remained more than three times worse than the average of all nonprofits. 

Artists/creatives were — and remain — among the most severely affected segment of the nation’s workforce. The arts are a formidable industry in the U.S. — $919.7 billion (pre-COVID) that supported 5.2 million jobs and represented 4.3% of the nation’s economy.

And now, nearing two years since the 2020 shutdowns, artists on Long Island are voicing how it felt. Many believe that significant relief funding was not given to the arts and related nonprofits despite the impact they have on Long Island’s economy.

Think about it. How many of us love to see a show at the local theater? How many of us hang artwork from nearby artists on our walls? How many of us enjoy live music as we dine at our favorite eateries? 

Those people had jobs, too. 

Sometimes we forget that the people working after a typical 9-to-5 shift are working, too. What some may call a hobby is a way of life for thousands of people.

We still have a way to go, and unfortunately COVID will haunt us for a very long time in more ways than one. But the next time you’re out to dinner with a friend, drop a tip in the guitar player’s case. Splurge on a drawing from a local artist and support your neighborhood theater. 

The arts helped us during the pandemic. We found solace in other people’s creations. Now it’s time to pay back the artists and show them how much they are needed, wanted and loved.

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Pixabay photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

At the same time that TV advertisements often frustrate me because I’d like to find out what happens next in the show I’m watching, I appreciate the messages people are trying to send.

Sometimes, the ad is such a loss for me that I figure I couldn’t possibly be the target audience.

There’s that ad for a chocolate bar that makes a woman float in a store. Right, because eating that specific type of chocolate creates such a trippy, LSD-type experience that she not only feels incredible and floats above everyone else in the store, but the other customers see her floating.

“Look, up in the sky. It’s a bird. It’s a plane. Nope, it’s just another person who ate the trippy chocolate bar that lets them float to the ceiling!”

Then there are all the ads for medical products that could cure something, but that have such severe side effects that the risks may not be worth the cure.

“We might cure your hiccups,” the ad suggests, “or we might cause you to have such trouble breathing that you should stop taking our medicine and see a doctor.”

That brings me to the ad for Truist.

Have you seen their ads, with the pile of soft stuff that looks like an old collection of the stuffed animals my children used to win at boardwalk games or receive for birthday presents?

This pile of soft things rolls along, helping people by recovering hats that blow off at the beach, bringing a spare tire to a man stuck on the side of the road, or delivering a flower to a girl waiting on a bench with her mother.

Being the OCD parent that I am, I would probably say to my daughter, “Don’t take anything from a blob that’s been rolling on the filthy street!”

I imagine the idea for the rolling blob that cares could have originated in a number
of ways.

“George” might have forgotten that he needed to come up with an ad while he was racing to wake his daughter for school. Seeing the pile of stuffed animals he was supposed to help clean up in her room, he thought, “Hmmm, if I throw this in my car, it’ll look like I cleaned up and maybe I can use it as a part of my work.”

Once he arrived at the office, he threw the stuffed animals on the table, hoping he wouldn’t get fired and, just as importantly, that he didn’t lose any of her treasured toys.

Or, perhaps, “Andrea” couldn’t sleep the night before she had to present an idea. At 3:21 a.m. she watched an old western. There, in between the John Wayne dialog and the crescendo to a gunfight, she found inspiration. Rolling across the screen was the ubiquitous tumbleweed.

“That’s it!” she thought, as she imagined Tumbleweed 2.0, the modern version of an iconic image of the Old West. Instead of a collection of dried out grass, the modern Truist Tumbleweed (at that hour, alliteration is awesome!) is composed of soft, plush stuffed animals. And, instead of being indifferent to the plight of the people it passes, the Truist Tumbleweed cares, lending a stuffed animal hand.

“George” and “Andrea” may have moved on to other jobs. Or, thinking outside the box, they may have gotten a promotion. They could use some of that extra money to buy risky remedies or trippy chocolate. And, hey, if they have any problems, the Truist Tumbleweed is ready to show it cares.

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Pixabay photo

By Leah S. Dunaief

Leah Dunaief

Maybe it is a Hallmark holiday, but with St. Valentine’s Day approaching, love is definitely in the air. Perhaps Chaucer started it with his poetry about Valentine’s Day in the 14th century. There have been many iterations since. At the least, it’s a time to reflect on the loves in our lives. And there are many. Let us count them together.

Saint Valentine’s Day has traditionally been associated with romantic love, as people—give each other material declarations of their affections. These start with cards, some of them originally composed and handwritten, others store bought and ceremoniously delivered. Red roses are the usual accompaniment and perhaps even generous amounts of chocolate. All of that helps to endure a cold winter’s day and night. It certainly helps the local economy.

So many other loves exist, some of them deeply in our hearts. The love we bear for our children makes for family bonding. It has been said that if children loved their parents as much as parents love their children, the human race would end because the children would never leave their homes. From the marvel at first sight of those tiny fingers and toes to the day we walk them down the aisle to start their own families, we love them, disregarding all the aggravations that happen in between. For most, this is an indissoluble love.

And yes, most of us truly love our parents, the mother who taught us to read, the father who taught us to swim. We go from thinking they are all-knowing demigods to wondering if they are the stupidest humans on earth, and ultimately to respecting them for all they have given us despite their various shortcomings. We are awed by their indestructible love for us and at the same time acknowledge that they are but human. 

We have been impressed with the number of entries for our Love My Pet section that is running in the newspapers and on the website and social media this week. We certainly love our pets, maybe because they can’t talk. And they are unfailingly loyal and forgiving. Well, dogs, are. I’m not so sure about cats. In some cases, we regard them almost as our children. 

A carpenter of undetermined ethnicity, who was doing some work in our house, once pointed to our golden retriever and proclaimed, “In my next life, I want to come back as an American dog.” 

We love our true friends, those who are there to prop us up when we fall as well as those who share our good times. We can also genuinely love our teachers. A caring teacher can make a profound difference in the direction of a child’s life. For example, my sixth grade teacher, in an unexceptional neighborhood elementary school in New York City, stayed after hours, for a few weeks, to coach half-a-dozen of us so that we might pass a citywide test for an exceptional junior high school. Two of us did, and to this day I love that woman, though after that year, I never saw her again.

We can love members of our clergy, who are predictably there for us with advice at critical times and with solace at times of deep loss. Yes, that is their job, but some do their jobs beyond measure. We can love our doctors, who take an oath to watch over our health, but again, some are deeply caring. For these people, we are more than grateful. They love us, and we love them back.

We can love the natural world around us, a world that is filled with songbirds and butterflies, squirrels and foxes, wild turkeys and seagulls to delight the senses. We love the first sight of crocuses announcing the beginning of spring and the early flowering magnolia trees. 

If we are lucky, we can truly love our jobs. For us, they are more than a source of livelihood, more even than a career. They are a calling. They propel us out of bed in the morning and often are the subject of our last thoughts as we go to sleep at night. They coax out the best in us and provide us with unique satisfaction.

Finally, we need to love our lives. Sometimes to do so takes re-contexting and perhaps re-adjustment. That love seems like a worthy goal. 

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Pixabay photo

With nearly 2 feet of snow covering the North Shore of Long Island, it’s important to remember that shoveling it can be a strenuous task for both the young and old. 

While freshly fallen snow looks pretty, it gets ugly fast when it piles up preventing us from getting to work, school or the supermarket. 

In order to get back to our daily tasks, the bottom line is we have to shovel. But shoveling can lead to not only minor aches and pains, but unfortunate situations such as heart attacks or death. 

This week alone with the most recent nor’easter, there were three blizzard-related deaths on Long Island — two in Syosset and one in Cutchogue. 

According to data analyzed in a 2019 Washington Post story, shoveling during snowstorms is responsible for about 11,500 injuries — 100 of which on average are fatal. 

However, Catholic Health Physician Partners cardiologist, Dr. Chong Park, gave his insight on how to prevent heading to the hospital while cleaning up your property. 

Park suggested doing a 10-minute warm-up before going outside.

“Light exercise and stretching allow your muscles and joints to loosen,” he said. “Also, avoid eating a heavy meal and consuming alcohol prior to clearing snow.”

Park added, “Should symptoms such as chest pain, chest heaviness, palpitations or shortness of breath occur as you shovel snow, stop immediately and seek medical attention.”

Other tips from Park include:

Dress properly: To stay warm when you’re outside, wear several loose layers of clothing. Additionally, don a water-resistant coat and boots along with a knit hat, scarf and gloves. It’s important to keep your gloves as dry as possible while shoveling. Wet gloves won’t keep your hands warm.

Set your pace: You may want to clear the snow as fast as possible, but that’s when injuries occur. Go slow and do it step-by-step. As much as possible, push snow along the ground. Use a smaller snow shovel to avoid lifting a load that is too heavy. 

Be sure to take frequent breaks, return inside to warm up and consume plenty of water. It’s also important to clear snow as quickly as possible before it begins to melt and gets too heavy.

Good form: When lifting snow, it’s important to use your legs. Bending at the waist can lead to an injury. Keep your back straight and squat with your knees wide. Avoid tossing snow. Instead, walk it to where you want to dump it.

Avoid falls: Wear boots with slip-resistant soles. Once you have cleared your driveway and walkway, throw down salt or sand to eliminate any remaining ice or snow and enhance traction.

So, please follow our motto, “Snow: Handle with care.”

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Pixabay photo

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

We are stuck in a headline and news cycle rut. Please find below some fantasy headlines, and the sources or unlikeliest of sources, for those news flashes.

— “Kardashian women decide not to show any more skin” – People Magazine. In the interests of encouraging people to dress appropriately for winter weather and to draw attention to their ideas rather than their bodies, the Kardashians decide that revealing less of their over-exposed bodies will aid society.

— “President Biden had a great day” – The New York Post. Granted, President Biden hasn’t exactly created a stellar track record in his first year in office – the withdrawal from Afghanistan clearly could have gone better – but the The New York Post seems intent on providing a steady stream of stories excoriating him for everything.

— “Former President Trump tells the whole truth and nothing but the truth” – The Washington Post. Fond of fact checking the former president, the Washington Post would certainly attract attention with a fact check that suggests the former leader of the free world was being honest.

— “Senator McConnell itching to approve Biden’s Supreme Court pick” – The New York Times. Using unnamed sources, of course, the Times could break one of the biggest stories of the decade if McConnell somehow signaled that he was eager to give a liberal Supreme Court nominee the benefit of the doubt and his full support.

— “Giants and Jets get A’s for effort” – New York Daily News. It seems obvious and easy to pick on losing sports teams, particularly those that haven’t delivered for rabid fans for years. Hometown papers could recognize the effort, even if the results aren’t there.

— “We don’t really know, but look out your window” – the Weather Channel. I give weather.com credit for calling last weekend’s nor’easter well. About five days before a single flake fell, they knew that a big storm had the potential to form and dump tons of snow in the area. They were right. Then again, all of that technology doesn’t always play out scenarios accurately. It’d be funny and fitting if they said on the air, “big storm could be coming our way. Or not.”

— “Inflation totally under control” – CNBC. Despite evidence to the contrary at the gas pump, in the supermarket and just about anywhere people have to pay for goods or services, wouldn’t it be great if inflation somehow, magically, came under control, giving the Fed the chance to stay on the sidelines for an economy still recovering from the pandemic?

— “Fauci appreciates the respect and support of Senator Rand Paul” — Reuters. Okay, so, this may be among the least likely of the headlines, but, wouldn’t it be nice/ shocking if the two doctors somehow were on the same page?

— “Spirit of bipartisanship sweeps through Washington” – Politico. Yeah, sure, we can dream. Dems and Repubs aren’t seeing eye to eye on anything. In fact, they seem to be energizing their bases by attacking the other side. Still, the day such a report came out would indeed be a chance to celebrate.

— “Children rediscover books” – Apple News Spotlight. Disenchanted with electronics, children around the world left social media for a day and enjoyed interacting with characters like Horton, Mr. Tumnus, Meg Murry, Alec Ramsey and Emma Woodhouse.

— “Hero scientists behind life saving vaccines” – Fox News. Despite some members of conservative media taking vaccines to protect themselves and their families, they and their guests sometimes praise those who resist vaccines and question the legitimacy of the vaccines for others.

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The Fall of the Berlin Wall, 1989. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

By Leah S. Dunaief

Leah Dunaief

Here comes Russia again. I am of the generation of children that took refuge from an imaginary atomic bomb attack from Russia by pulling our coats over our heads and crouching under our desks. We grew up with the Cold War always threatening Soviet aggression on both foreign and domestic soils. Were there Communist cells, funded by Russia, hidden among us that could erupt at any time? McCarthy whipped the nation to a fever pitch. The United States and the Soviet Union raced each other to influence governments and people, ideologically and financially, all over the globe. 

I still remember the relief I felt, going to the old Metropolitan Opera House in 1959, to view a performance by members of the Bolshoi Ballet, who came to America bringing not only the most breathtaking dancers but also tangible evidence of detente. And then the Berlin Wall came down. I was there. At least I was there in 1989, six weeks before they broke through to West Berlin. I walked No Man’s Land, the barren stretch between East and West Berlin, with cameras trained on anyone who would start the crossing between those two universes, seeking permission from the guards to go behind the Iron Curtain. 

I was in the Russian Embassy in Washington D.C. in 1991 with a small group of journalists, being feted with caviar and blinis, when word came that the Soviet Union had crumbled, and then the embassy personnel cried. “The end of a dream,” they sobbed. The end of a nightmare, I thought, as they led us to the exits and fell upon the sumptuous food we left behind. Mikhail Gorbachev won the Nobel Prize, the Russian people were real, not just the Evil Empire, and co-existence was finally possible. In a couple of years our attention turned to jihadists.

Now Russia is dramatically back in our lives. The Russia that for centuries had sought warm water ports and had ruled Crimea for 134 years until 1917. The Russia that again annexed Crimea, a part of Ukraine since 1954 and of an independent Ukraine since 1991, with armed intervention in 2014. The Russia that has now lined up reputedly over 100,000 troops on three sides of the Ukraine border, and with aggressive leadership is making demands.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is insisting that Ukraine not be allowed to join NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization initially formed after WWII as a protection against potential Soviet aggression, that has grown as more Eastern European countries have joined. Putin insists it is a security issue to have bordering Ukraine a NATO member. He also wants military exercises in nearby NATO states to cease and for offensive weapons to be removed from those NATO countries.

So where do we come into the picture?

“It seems to me that the United States does not care that much about Ukrainian security—maybe they think about it somewhere in the background,” Putin said in his news conference. “But their main task is to restrict the development of Russia.”

By “development,” the concern is that Putin wishes to restore the former Soviet empire and that, after Crimea, Ukraine would be the next step. Students of history will remember the lessons of the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia and the “spheres of influence” imposed by the Yalta Conference (in ironically Crimea). Meanwhile, Putin, with his soldiers and weapons at the ready, is accusing the U.S. of threatening Russia. White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, likened Putin’s comments to “when the fox is screaming from the top of the henhouse that he’s scared of the chickens.”

Now, as of yesterday, the decision has been made to send several thousand troops to Poland, Germany and Romania. Presumably they are meant to show support for NATO and for the principle that countries may decide which alliances they will enter.

Meanwhile everyone concerned, including Putin, has embraced the idea of diplomacy as a path to a Ukrainian solution. For the moment, at least, the spotlight has moved away from constant COVID.

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Pixabay photo

When reading a police blotter — such as the one on page A6 — some people may be surprised at some of the incidents that occur in our towns and villages.

Take, for example, cars being broken into and the purses and laptops that were on one of the seats being stolen. Or people going around checking to see if a car door is open and, if it is, going inside the vehicle to see if there is anything valuable. Sometimes these incidents even involve teenagers seeing if they can find some loose change in the cupholder.

Police officers can’t be everywhere so the odds of one being nearby while someone is breaking a car window are next to impossible. And if someone is checking to see if a door is open, how are officers supposed to know if the vehicle belongs to the person or not?

When they are called to the scene, think of all the more serious incidents they are being taken away from to fill out a report for one that could have been prevented.

People who have grown up in a city know the golden rule, which is to lock doors, whether to a house or a car. It doesn’t matter if people are outside or inside their homes or vehicles. It can be as simple as that to reduce minor incidents in our communities. Also, valuables should never be left in plain sight in the car. If there is no choice, they should be put in the trunk, out of view.

Of course, we live in an imperfect world and crimes are going to happen even when people are careful.

TBR News Media has always encouraged neighborhood watches. In the early days of our media organization, The Village Times started the Neighborhood Watch in Suffolk County. Our editor at the time, Ann Fossan, was familiar with the Neighborhood Watch program from her home state of California. The program is easy enough to institute. Neighbors looking out their windows or walking down their driveways might spy an unfamiliar car or unknown person engaged in some inexplicable activity. They would then be encouraged by the police to call the nonemergency number of the local precinct and report it. The police do not feel they would be unnecessarily bothered; they welcome the cooperation of the public in order to do their jobs.

To work together as a neighborhood, the residents need to know how to alert each other. That means inviting neighbors over to a block leader’s home for coffee and exchanging phone numbers. In this way, people get to know their neighbors and, if there is a problem, everyone is alerted. Each block needs a block captain.

The result of our project was the alliance of 70 neighborhood groups which included 700 local families. At the time, teenage boys were going around checking to see if sliding patio doors on homes were open and, when they were, they would enter and commit theft. After establishing the Neighborhood Watch, the incidents decreased significantly.

Retirees can be especially effective with their oversight of local houses and streets from their homes.

Just the simple act of people being aware and mindful can make a difference. Frequently, discussions surround the fact that we need to show more support for law enforcement. This is one way to do that. Don’t aid and abet would-be criminals with careless behavior. Lock your doors and watch over your neighbors.

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Photo from Facebook

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

Even when I’m squinting through a deluge that floods my front windshield, I can see sprinklers on timers, throwing water on lawns drenched with rain.

That image captures the sometimes feckless nature of the routine and periodic token efforts we engage in and that reflect our modern reality.

To that end, I thought I’d share similar similes and phrases to capture the moment.

Like a pencil on an airplane. Sure, pencils are helpful when doing crossword puzzles. On a plane on the way to another country, though, pencils serve no purpose in filling out the necessary paperwork to enter customs. When my family travels, I pack black and blue pens in my carry-on bag.

Like a mask worn around the chin. Exhausted from wearing masks, people have dropped these potentially protective pieces of equipment to their chins, even after they are done eating or drinking. These masks, while visible, are only effective at hiding double chins.

Like a concerned automated voice on a customer service line. I have been on far too many calls where it’s clear the company has no interest in allowing me to speak to an actual person. After pushing 18 buttons and waiting through music that makes Kenny G sound like a symphony, a sickly sweet voice tells me how important my call is to “us,” which sounds suspiciously like a corporate version of a dystopian leadership. If my call were truly important, I wouldn’t have to wait over an hour for someone to pick up the phone, tell me she can’t hear me, and suggest I call back later.

Like an expired coupon. Sometimes, I think the coupons I get in the mail have either expired before they arrive or, like a message to Ethan Hunt in the Mission: Impossible movie franchise, will self destruct in five seconds. That way, I’ll get the offer for something that piques my interest, like half off a turkey sandwich, and then I’ll have to pay full price as sympathetic store clerks tell me they’d be happy to throw the expired discount in the garbage, which is really the most they can do.

Like another set of incomprehensible instructions. Do you ever struggle with the directions to assemble something, staring at pictures of objects that often look nothing like the assortment of pieces assembled in front of you? These instructions use vocabulary that doesn’t make sense for objects that aren’t in the packaging.

Like someone else’s garbage when I’m carrying dog poop. My big dog makes huge poops that rival the stink of a train or airport bathroom amid extensive weather delays. While holding my nose, I pass my neighbors’ garbage cans on the street. Tempted as I might be to drop the double-knotted bag into their can, I carry the prized stink bomb back to my own garbage can.

Like a phone going off in a forest. Unlike the question of whether a proverbial tree makes a sound if no one in a forest hears it fall, I’m convinced I would hear a phone going off in a forest, especially if I were in the middle of a nap or about to write the best phrase of my life that the electroshock sound would delete from my rattled brain.

Like another chat with “Jeopardy!” host Ken Jennings. Is it me or does Jennings seem anxious Amy Schneider may threaten to eclipse his record win streak on the show? His conversations with the contestants seem especially stilted and awkward. In an answer that borrows from the game’s format: the adjective Jennings most often uses when he doesn’t know what else to say and he’s run out of forced laughter. The answer: What is “fantastic?”

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