The Future Quinn by Barbara Quinn

I’ve mentioned before that I'm going to be a grandma. What a thrill it still is to write those words. My son and his wife recently found out that the baby they are expecting is a boy. If the technicians are right we’ll welcome the little guy at the end of October. I would have been equally happy with a boy or girl when I had my son, and I felt the same way about this grandchild. But knowing what the gender is makes the event that much more real and closer.

I’ve already started shopping for baby boy things. Oh, there are such cute little items that were not around when my son was born. Little booties made to look like sneakers. Adorable sunglasses and hats that make me smile when I see them. My husband is looking forward to buying a Wiffle Ball and bat for the babe. And I can’t wait to read stories to him the way I read them to my son. Salman Rushdie’s Haroun and the Sea of Stories was one of his favorites. We wore out our copy of Good Night Moon.

All around us the world may be topsy turvy. People continue fighting time worn wars. Politicians keep jockeying for attention. And the cost of food and gas are going up so much each week that I’ve reverted to my penny-pinching first married ways. Those lessons learned in the early days of marriage are coming in quite handy now. But all that pales in the face of the fact that soon there will be a new baby boy in the family.

How lovely to look forward to meeting my grandson in the future!

My Very Accurate Mirrors by Nannette Croce

Remember that Seinfeld episode where Elaine complains about “thin mirrors” in fitting rooms? It makes me appreciate the very dependable full-length mirror in my bedroom. It always shows the true me. It’s one of those antique reproductions that tilts on a stand. Sometimes from cleaning or bumping it tilts the wrong way, making me appear uncharacteristically short and dumpy, but with a slight adjustment I'm back to the tall, slim gal I am in reality.

Lucky I have that mirror, because it’s the only accurate one in the house. The others are so distorted they belong in a fun house. It's like I gain five pounds just by changing rooms.

Now my bedroom mirror isn’t perfect mind you. While great for checking out an outfit, it’s lousy for makeup. I suppose it’s the light or something about the tilt distorting close-ups because it shows lines and wrinkles I don’t have.

My perfect makeup mirror hangs above my dresser. That’s a true antique I inherited from my grandmother, so old in fact, that the surface looks a little grainy, but amazingly I see my face quite clearly with none of the lines my other mirror shows, though they can’t be more than a few feet apart.

I feel sorry for all those poor women stuck with bad mirrors, and I am so grateful for my two very accurate ones.

Fear of Gratitude by Nannette Croce

Southern Italians believe in the mal’occhio or as phonetically pronounced in melded immigrant dialect “mal-oi-kia.” When someone gives you a compliment or comments on your good fortune, they purposely or inadvertently give you the mal’occhio, the “evil eye,” with the power to reverse your fortunes, unless the person follows with “God bless you.”

The small horn some Italians wear around the neck wards off the evil eye. Absent that you surreptitiously give the offending person “the horns,” a Texas Longhorns solute pointed outward.

Like knocking on wood or throwing salt over your shoulder, even if you don’t consciously believe a superstition, it plants its seed in your subconscious. On the upside the mal’occhio discourages bad behaviors like bragging and ostentation. On the downside, it makes public expressions of gratitude somewhat risky.

Announcing my good fortune to the world exposes me to the cosmic "evil eye." Safer to bluff like my grandmother did, “Huh, you think I have it so good? Well, let me tell you.”

It's been about five weeks now of counting my blessings to the public. So far no cosmic zap. Maybe it's not people who call attention to their good fortune the evil eye afflicts, but those who don't appreciate what they have or forget about those who have less or, worse, think it's a matter of just desserts.

Maybe, but just in case I think I’ll take that horn out of my jewelry box and start wearing it.