There are days when writing about a table is preferable to writing about life.

My entire last week or ten days, maybe longer, was one crazy misadventure or misunderstanding after another.

Deja vu again and again. Imagine the movie Groundhog Day with a different cast of characters.

Each night, thinking tomorrow has to be easier, I would actually plan to do something simple, like write letters to sad people or call the insurance company or clean up after Christmas, possibly vacuum or make a meatloaf for dinner ahead of time.

My Bay Ridge grandmother would always say not to air your dirty laundry in public. A euphemism from before the internet. She hand washed her clothes and linens, then hung them out her back window in Brooklyn, on a clothesline with a pulley, so I took it literally for many years.

Without going into specific details, doctor visits with my husband, myself, and my mother. Hours on the phone with health insurance company listening to a loop of piano versions of Chain of Fools and Daniel, My Brother, complete with static.

Surprise visit from step-daughter and boyfriend, which turned into a critique of me and how I do everything, as well as a few potshots at my son-in-law because he's in the military. This is not new behavior; I just wasn't expecting three hours of biting my tongue. The boyfriend is Jamaican and easy-going but he hung out in the basement with my husband, smoking.

Major falling out with the sister-in-law we've been trying to help which was upsetting to both of us by her hanging up the phone numerous times when we tried to reason with her.

Add two sons getting some variation of the flu.

While I don't throw a Martin Luther King party, I was hoping that day might be slightly peaceful. It wasn't. The next day, I received a phone call from my out-of-town brother to inform me that my mother's furnace had died the night before (when the temps outside were below freezing) and could I deal with it.

Long story short, I dealt with the situation and my ever-cheerful mother is staying at my house while her furnace and air-conditioning system from the 1980's is replaced and brought up to code. So, the sun is brilliant; it's barely 20 degrees, and for the moment, all is well.

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