I get stomachaches. I get them with regularity and always have.

“It’s just gas!” my mother says, and, of course, she’s right.

My mother tells me I get stomachaches because I have the “Benson stomach,” by which she means that I have the same stomach she has, which is the same stomach her mother had, which my grandmother inherited from her mother -- who was a Benson.

It seems a little sad that the only time the Benson family comes to mind is when I have a stomachache. Seriously, I know almost nothing about the Bensons except that they were Swedish farmers prone to indigestion. It’s not much of a legacy.

Yesterday I had a doozy. It started during my hike. I had eaten nothing recently and eaten nothing different so there was no logical reason to suddenly get a bad stomachache shortly after I started my hike, which typically takes an hour and forty-five minutes.

“It will get better soon,” I said as I walked. It did not.

I got to the halfway point in my hike and somehow felt the stomachache should realize that I had hiked for nearly an hour and respond appropriately. It did not.

Whenever I get a stomachache, I remember stomachaches of the past. I distinctly remember my 16th birthday being ruined by a stomachache. I went to a restaurant famous for its spareribs. I haven’t eaten spareribs in years, but I can still remember how I was looking forward to those.

My family and I were served our spareribs and I had to leave the restaurant after what seemed like a single bite. I’m pretty sure my family packed up the meal and joined me almost immediately, but I still remember being in the backseat of the car with an awful stomachache on my 16th birthday, overwhelmed by the unfairness of life.

By now, I should know something about stomachaches. I know, once one starts, I must not eat anything. If I eat anything, I will make it much worse and it will last much longer.

In spite of knowing this all my life, I cannot tell you how many times I have sat down to eat, felt a stomachache coming on, and decided “just this once” I can eat a little more (usually really fast) and everything will be fine. Everything is never fine when I do this.

So, now I tell my husband, Peter, “I’m getting a stomachache. If I eat, I will suffer.” Somehow, saying it aloud to another person makes me more accountable. If I then go back into the kitchen and fill my plate, I am proving to Peter (and myself) what an idiot I am.

I can go for months without a stomachache. I can persuade myself that stomachaches were something that happened a long time ago and have nothing to do with me anymore. I start to think they will never happen again. It’s nice thinking this. It’s also not true.

But maybe dwelling on pain isn’t the best idea.

Surely, in my life, I can expect a lot worse than a stomachache to come my way. Intellectually, I know this, and yet I spend almost no time contemplating future pain. Maybe living in denial isn’t the worst thing I can do. It isn’t fun to anticipate pain and I’m not sure it’s useful.

Instead, I try to notice all the days I feel good and I try to be grateful. Yes, there will be more stomachaches because I come from a long line of gassy farmers. But today, I feel fine.

Till next time,

Carrie

Carrie Classon’s memoir is called, “Blue Yarn.” Learn more at CarrieClasson.com.

DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION

Yesterday, I had a nice long Zoom chat with an old friend.

I know this is nothing remarkable these days, but it was the first time my friend Andrew had used Zoom and I was frankly a little surprised.

Andrew isn’t on Facebook. “It’s none of anyone’s business what I’m up to!” he tells me.

I don’t think Andrew is “up to” all that much, but he takes a particularly fierce view on privacy. He won’t buy groceries with his credit card if they are going to track what he buys.

“Why would you care if someone knows how much broccoli you’re buying?” I ask. “Maybe they’ll give you a coupon.”

“It’s none of their darned business how much broccoli I’m buying!” Andrew tells me.

He still has the same email account he’s had since the ‘90s. He still has the same telephone answering machine. He recently got a cellphone, but he doesn’t text. Andrew answers emails, but they take about as long as standard first-class mail to arrive and get a response. Still, it’s all worth it because he is a good friend and he always has a lot of interesting things to say -- once I get ahold of him.

Like nearly everyone else, Andrew has been a little lonely. He lives alone and his work doesn’t involve much human interaction. I usually see Andrew a couple of times a year when we go to visit my family. But that hasn’t happened this year and it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen for a while.

I was contacted by a mutual friend of ours on Facebook about having a Zoom chat with a bunch of high school buddies. I told him that would be fun and he should invite Andrew -- by email, of course. Andrew thought that sounded great and we decided to try out this Zoom thing in advance. That turned out to be a good idea.

Andrew didn’t use his real name (of course) so, for a time, I was looking at a blank screen that said, “GREAT.” But then he got the video working and he appeared in front of his bright kitchen window.

“Unmute,” I messaged him. He did. I still heard nothing. I called him on the phone. “I can’t hear you,” I told him. Then added, “Your hair is really short.”

“I cut it myself.”

“Well, your mic isn’t working.”

“I know I’ve used this microphone before!”

“Let’s see it.” Andrew waved the headset and microphone in front of the camera.

“Andrew, that is a really old headset.”

“It is not old!”

“Yup,” I told him, “that’s a collectible. I think maybe you should call up the folks at ‘Antiques Roadshow.’ I bet they’d be interested.”

“Ha, ha!” Andrew said. After several more tries he reluctantly admitted that the ancient microphone might not connect to his current computer.

“I guess I’ll need a new microphone,” he grumbled. “But we can still talk on the phone.”

And we did. We put our phones on speaker and we looked at one another in our monitors and we talked for a long time. I realized, once again and with force, how essential this connection is. It was so good to see my old friend’s face -- even if his camera was a little fuzzy, even if the light was shining rather brightly behind his closely shorn head.

“Oh my gosh! I’ve got to go,” I said, when I realized how long we’d been talking.

“We should do this again,” Andrew said.

“Yes!” I agreed.

We definitely need to do this again.

Till next time,

Carrie

Carrie Classon’s memoir is called, “Blue Yarn.” Learn more at CarrieClasson.com.

DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION

My husband Peter is now at war with the mice.

The mice (possibly with the assistance of a rat or two) have eaten the electrical wiring in our car causing extensive damage. The coating on the wires is apparently tasty. I don’t know any automobile engineers personally but, if I did, I would suggest that constructing a car out of tasty materials is probably not a great idea because now we have a lot of small creatures trying to eat our car, one piece at a time.

We are not alone. We’ve heard the neighbors complaining about the same problem and when we brought the car in to the mechanic -- every dashboard light flashing and any number of peculiar electrical malfunctions happening at once -- the mechanic was not surprised. They had just towed in a city vehicle that was in worse shape yet. When they lifted the hood, half a dozen rodents jumped out and ran around the shop.

“Those rats are making me rich!” the mechanic said, with a little more pleasure than seemed appropriate.

Peter is determined not to singlehandedly keep the mechanic in business and so he has been trying -- with limited success -- to keep the mice out of our car.

The good news is, Peter is very resourceful. The bad news is that Peter has a soft heart and a weak stomach. He does not want to use mousetraps. He says they are gruesome and that there are too many mice nibbling on the wires to make a difference. He wants to discourage the mice with a little less blood and gore.

That’s why he went with electrocution.

The “Rat Zapper” lures a mouse in with a tasty treat and then a battery zaps it to death. It seems to work pretty well. Peter has been hauling out a lot of victims. But Peter is not crazy about execution in any form, so he’s been studying up on the alternatives. Just yesterday, he invested in the “Under Hood Animal Repeller.”

According to the literature, the “Under Hood Animal Repeller” emits very loud noises that mice supposedly do not like and people cannot hear. I used to have something like this in my attic years ago, but they have obviously improved. This one hooks up to the car battery and automatically turns off if the battery gets low or the car is started. In addition to the loud “variable ultrasonic pulses” this device emits, it also has flashing LED strobe lights, “to create a hostile environment for rodents to live and nest, forcing them to flee from the protected area,” according to the pamphlet.

I’m going to tell you honestly, I have my doubts.

To me, it sounds as if this device is going to just frighten off all the middle-aged mice, looking for a quiet retirement community. “Too loud! Too bright! Let’s get out of here, Mother!”

But it sounds like it is designed to appeal to young, hungry mice, looking for a fun night out. “Loud music! Flashing lights! Party!” Peter says he’s going to install at least two, and I can easily imagine the mice club-hopping from one device to the other under the hood of our car.

We shall see. Peter and I do our best to peacefully co-exist, but these rodents are posing a challenge. Meanwhile, Peter keeps a watchful eye and the electrocution device keeps zapping away.

“I got another customer!” Peter announces cheerfully, at least once a day. I want to be supportive, but I’m not quite sure how to respond.

So, I just say, “Congratulations, Honey!”

Till next time,

Carrie

Carrie Classon’s memoir is called, “Blue Yarn.” Learn more at CarrieClasson.com.

DISTRIBUTED BY ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION