31/Secrets & Lies

I haven't done much lying in this month of posts, so here's one. But which one of these statements is the lie?

1.  A New Yorker cartoon was written by me.

2.  A poem of mine was read on "The Price is Right."

3.  Nelson Rockefeller once touched my ass in an elevator.

30/Secrets & Lies

At 19, I broke up with a bodybuilder. He threatened to hit me. He never had. I said he wouldn't dare. Stupid, stupid. He knocked me out. I hit my head on the curb. Concussion. Vomiting. Blood. I'm told a couple came by, offering help. I said I was fine. My first time uttering the women's lie.

29/Secrets & Lies

If I tell you two of my dogs came to me in dreams immediately upon their deaths, will you believe me? You probably will if you're a dog lover. In both cases I was unaware they'd died during the night. One of them said, "I have come through the fire. My days of suffering are over."

28/Secrets & Lies

I'm feeling guilty for not following Indigo's original premise for this month. So which one of the following statements is true?

1. I'm taking a class tonight to become a weather spotter.

2. I'm taking a class tonight to learn how to teach English as a second language.

3. I'm teaching a class tonight on apple-tree grafting.

27/Secrets & Lies

Our office had a close family atmosphere, but not G-rated "family." Following some drinking at my first office party with them, we all got into an elevator and the boss said, "Can you ladies tell me why women fake orgasms?" I was both relieved and amused when someone spoke up: "Because we're tired and want closure."

26/Secrets & Lies

As my husband's dementia worsened, it was such a hard transition to go from decades of being open and honest with him to humoring him. It was necessary, of course, and I suppose it was kind—at least kinder than the alternative. But it was a long time before I stopped feeling like a disloyal liar.

25/Secrets & Lies

Before my daughter Gillian died, I could take alcohol or leave it. Suddenly I wanted it. Fortunately, I remembered my beautiful and tragic Aunt Babe (Estaire), who died when I was a kid. They said she drank herself to death after her daughter died. Living alone, I made a rule: No drinking alone. Thank you, Aunt Babe.

24/Secrets & Lies

The Three Junior Stooges were subcontracted to put a roof on my barn. When they disappeared, so did my welder. I told the cops, and they found one of them—in jail. He admitted the theft, and revealed a secret: "We tried to steal the generator too, but we couldn't get it out the door."

23/Secrets & Lies

I'm severely allergic to potatoes. I can't even be in the room if someone's peeling them. Potatoes contain solanine, a toxin present in such tiny amounts (larger amounts if the potato is green) that it doesn't bother most people. It's also in other nightshades and more. I rarely reveal the potato allergy. It seems so un-American.

22/Secrets & Llies

When I was 11, my dad took me out to lunch to explain something I'd overheard in an argument between him and my new stepmother. He told me, somewhat apologetically, that he'd had two brief marriages before he met my mom. I could tell he thought I'd be shocked. But I thought it was very cool.

21/Secrets & Lies

My lovely and soft-spoken neighbor, a retired nurse, was an impressive gardener, knitter, swimmer, and seamstress. Watching her work in flower gardens that could have been painted by Monet, or dive like a graceful arrow off the side of my boat, I never suspected the alcoholism she hid so well.

20/Secrets & Lies

The doctor was young, handsome, bright and charming. I went to him for reassurance (and probably conversation), and his response to my symptoms was usually, "I'll run it through my computer." After many months I acquired a computer of my own, and asked what program he used. Turned out his computer was still in its box.

19/Secrets & Lies

When I worked for a domestic violence agency, confidentiality was critical. A couple of times I recognized a victim there for counseling. The thing to do was to act as though I hadn't. And that wasn't difficult, really, because a woman active in her community and a woman abused by her husband look quite different.

18/Secrets & Lies

When I moved from NYC to the country I learned the locals were a suspicious lot. If I called any of the retailers to ask their hours or whatever, first they asked their question: "Who is this?" Why did it matter who was calling? I was always ready with the names of my best childhood friends.

17/Secrets & Lies

Growing up in an Irish neighborhood, I will forever associate St. Patrick's Day with excessive drinking and all that goes with it. In New York City, especially anywhere in the vicinity of the St. Patrick's Day Parade, drunkenness was encouraged, sobriety disparaged. All the secret alcoholics came out of the closet and swarmed the Irish bars.

16/Secrets & Lies

I once went house hunting in New Hampshire. I told the realtor we wanted an antique house with acreage. I saw many; loved them all. But my husband changed his mind: We'd buy a small house and then build. Apologizing, I promised the realtor we'd definitely buy. Was it a lie? He changed his mind again.

15/Secrets & Lies

The surgeon was youngish and extremely attractive. At the hospital shortly before my surgery I chatted with two friendly nurses, one of whom noted the name of my doctor. I said, "She's so pretty. And also very nice." I expected them to readily agree. But they didn't. They were uncharacteristically silent. It was a loud silence.

14/Secrets & Lies

The hand-eye coordination I inherited from my tennis-playing parents made me an 18-year-old ace at bar shuffleboard. You'd never have known it to look at me, which is how my friends convinced the occasional unsuspecting guy to bet money on himself. ("See that blonde over there? She likes to play shuffleboard. Think you can beat her?")

13/Secrets & Lies

A pay phone rang early one morning in the subway station, and I picked it up. The guy had the wrong number, but he was friendly and fun so we chatted for a a few minutes. Then my train approached, and I said goodbye. "No!" he cried, panting hard. "I haven't finished yet!" I dropped the phone.

12/Secrets & Lies

Years ago (maybe 20) we had a large and wonderful online writing group. I was Susan on that message board, but for fun I used the name Editoria for a short time, posting snide critiques. People guessed like crazy who Editoria was, but I don't think I ever told them. Or I did and wasn't believed.

11/Secrets & Lies

After months of crank breastfeeding calls from my stepdaughter's classmates, I was prepared. When a woman called to tell me in a heavily-accented voice that she'd lost her dog, I said, 'You mean you lost your breast!" I'd forgotten the notice I'd posted years earlier on a vet's bulletin board, offering to help locate lost pets.

10/Secrets & Lies

My pretty Aunt C. was a prize-winning cook. A new widow, she was smoking and drinking when she dozed in her chair, setting herself on fire. After the funeral, her son-in-law came to clean up. What he saw remained his secret all his wife's life. Aunt C., in her melting nightgown, had literally climbed the walls.

9/Secrets & Lies

Dan's teacher requested a meeting with his mother. He was 16 and I was 14. He asked me to call the school as Mrs. O'Sullivan and say I couldn't come. Thinking anyone over 40 was old, I tried to sound like an old Irish woman. In the phone booth, a sweating Dan pacing outside, I failed.

8/Secrets & Lies

I thought they were sick—feverish—those young people slumped and dozing in the doctor's waiting room. Later I heard on the news he was trading opiates for sex. But before I knew that, I knew I had to find another doctor. I realized it the moment he sweetly asked if he could touch my t-shirt.

7/Secrets & Lies

We were seated at a pizzeria when a woman at another table pointed to my husband and said to her small son, "See that man over there? He's a policeman, and if you don't eat your pizza he's gonna arrest you." I stood up. "He's not a policeman," I told the boy. "He's a chemical engineer."

6/Secrets & Lies

Bill's cold, anti-Semitic father never talked about his family, except to say they were French. Eventually the father died, and then, later, Bill died too. I remained curious. The internet makes it so easy—all those old Censuses. There they were: the mother, the father, the five siblings, their immigration from Austria, Yiddish their native tongue.

5/Secrets & Lies

Gerde's Folk City, 1962. By myself. Midnight. Teeming rain. Guy near the bar had an umbrella. I said, "My name is Susan Hialeah. My dad owns the racetrack in Florida. I drive a Rolls Royce Silver Cloud. Would you like to see it?" He would. We walked blocks to my 1951 grey Pontiac. He wasn't pleased.

4/Secrets & Lies

My mother's sudden death was suspicious, but the autopsy revealed a secret no one suspected: She died from cleaning a rug. Windows closed in November, the toxic fumes from carbon tetrachloride (no longer sold today) were too much for her liver. Early the next morning she awoke sick, collapsed, and died. She had just turned 38.

3/Secrets & Lies

When I was a breastfeeding adviser, my oldest stepdaughter was at Harvard Law. She recruited her friends to call me with fake breastfeeding problems. One I recall fondly was a timid young mother who mumbled, "My left breast" repeatedly. After a great deal of gentle coaxing she revealed the nature of the problem: "It fell off."

2/Secrets & Lies

Sharing senses of humor and mischief, Craig and I were the Will & Grace version of Lucy & Ethel. Laughing about a nasty woman's heavy Romanian accent, he dared me. "This is Nicoleta," I said when she answered the phone. "Yes, this is Nicoleta," she replied. I corrected in her exact voice: "No. This is Nicoleta."

1/Secrets & Lies

"I remember you," the famous poet said, greeting me when I walked into the bar. "I fell in love with you two years ago." I knew it must be his line, but the feeling was mutual. I leaned in, expecting a slightly upgraded peck, but he opened his mouth. "Oh!" I whispered, and opened mine too.