PUDDING PASSED LEVEL 1 SWIMMING!

What a freaking relief. And so much for that “pep talk” from the Tech Guru. “You’re gonna fail son. Just fuck it.”

Okay, so that’s not EXACTLY how it went down and I know he was only trying to prepare the boy for the worst but it only made Pudding take the attitude that he was probably going to fail anyhow, who fucking cares, he just wants the lollipop. TOTAL change from the first time around. And although it practically KILLED me to see him sobbing his little heart out when he had to repeat the level, I wasn’t so keen on this new attitude he’d adopted, the one where he kept walking around the house blithely announcing, “I probably won’t pass.”

Methinks it was a bit of a defense mechanism, but still.

He was so damned CONVINCED that he wasn’t going to pass that when I told him he HAD passed, a look of shock plastered his face. Then the big grin broke out and he wanted to grab the sheet and see what it said, which was hilarious because he can’t READ yet, but I showed him the big PASS that was circled on the front and he sounded it out and then just grinned at me.

That made my day.

That and the fact that I felt like shit warmed over on a stove, but still forced myself to sweat through my workout. Take THAT, bitches. (I don’t exactly know who the bitches are, but it sounds gangsta and I like saying stuff like that when I get my workout on.)

Oh, and remember my good friend Mark, the one I told you about whose website you needed to check out immediately? He’s kind of making my life complicated by saying that this thing I do here could be very valuable memories for me as the kids grow older. And he’s kind of right. I mean, half the time I can’t even remember where I’ve put my goddamn PHONE, so you can believe that these juicy tidbits will escape my mind as time goes by. Like today’s gem:

Once, when I had taken Pudding to swim class, I forgot to pack underwear for him to put on afterwards. So, as I explained this to him and helped him to put on his pants, I said, “I guess you’re going commando today.”

New in Mens Hosiery: The Penis Stocking

‘What’s commando?” he asked.

“It’s when you don’t wear underwear,” I replied. Which frankly, if you’re hanging like this dude to the right here, I would think commando would be a better option. I mean, what the fuck is going on here? Is his penis about to rob a bank?

“Oh.”

So today, we’re rushing out the door and of course, I do the same shit again. We’re in the locker room, I’m rifling through the bag – no underwear.

“I forgot your underwear, kiddo,” I told him.

“Oh. I guess I’m going pronto, then,” he replied calmly.

PRONTO.

So thank you, Mark, because in a few years I will have forgotten the day when my son said he was going PRONTO and now…I can always look back on it and laugh and laugh and laugh.

Last night’s convo coming out of the shower was also a doozy. I mean, this kid covers about 20 topics in 4 minutes.

“Mom, when I’m older can I have a man jewelry box?” he asked me.

“Uh, sure, I guess. If you need one.”

“Do they have man’s jewelry boxes?”

“Yes, they do. But you only need one if you wear a lot of jewelry, really.”

“Daddy doesn’t wear a lot of jewelry.”

“Nope, he doesn’t.”

“He only wears that one ring all the time. Why?”

“That’s his wedding ring.”

“You have a ring too.”

“Yes, I do. That’s MY wedding ring.”

“Why do they match?”

“Because we’re married to each other so we got rings that match. It’s like we’re partners.”

“Is it gold?”

“Actually it is.” I knew what was coming next.

“It doesn’t LOOK gold.”

“Well, we actually chose a white gold. So although it looks silvery, it’s really gold.”

“Oh. Mom?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want to get married.”

“That’s perfectly fine sweetie, you absolutely do NOT have to get married.”

“But I DO want to have a girlfriend when I’m a teenager.”

“That’s fine, too.” (Actually, it’s really not, so now I will have to figure out where to bury the bodies. We do have a huge yard…)

“I got lots of people to choose from.”

“Oh really?” I replied drily.

“Yes! I mean, there’s like hundreds of people in the world! Right?”

“Yes, that’s true. Even thousands.”

“See what I mean?” he said with a grin.

“Yes.”

Girlfriends, gold, and mans jewelry boxes. Oh! And marriage. Really, more conversations should be like this. Say what the fuck is on your mind, even if it has ZERO relevance to what anyone else just said or even what YOU just said, and just SAY shit. I love this. This is how I talk and it’s why some people find it so hard to have a conversation with me, because my mouth is keeping up with my head and my head is ALL OVER THE PLACE. And this is why I can keep up with my son, because I totally get that his mind is just ON THE MOVE and he’s throwing shit out there. ZERO filter. LOVE this kid.

So am I back? No. Not for REALS reals, but I just had to share that Pudding PASSED. That was AWESOME. And now…I am going to go and get a nice big fat piece of cheesecake and TOTALLY NEGATE MY ENTIRE WORKOUT.

The kids had a blast and it was so much fun seeing them collecting shells on the beach, examining live fish and shrimp, holding the broken remains of a horseshoe crab. The whole area is a national park and it’s HUGE, with long meandering walkways and bike paths.

Needless to say, we have to go back. The kids were upset that the Tech Guru wasn’t there and I missed him too – trips like that are right up our alley, out in nature being in awe of just about everything.

Anyhow, I hope that oh so FASCINATING tidbit about our extraordinary day was a wonderful read for you…because it will be the last one you read for a while.

Possibly ever.

The staycation this post’s title refers to is not the day we had, but the fact that I am taking a break from here, for a number of reasons, all of which I’ve discussed with my very dear friend from childhood, Mark Evans, who is an absolutely AMAZING fucking illustrator whose work you should immediately go and acquaint yourself with. Not that his illustrations have ANYTHING to do with ANYTHING I am saying here, but I have to tell you how awesome his work is. I mean, AWESOME. And I have been trying to get him to draw me for AGES but he is so busy with incredible projects such as the ones you will see on his site if you would just go and fucking LOOK already. I am hoping that one day it will happen before I get so old that he has to draw me as some kind of old crone hag or something. Cuz really, that would suck.

But back to the point: as I was telling Mark (amazing illustrator man), there are a few reasons why I decided, after giving it some thought, to take a break.

One, I really want to focus on my fiction. Mark is actually a big part of the reason for that: he, and other good friends, and of course The Tech Guru, have been encouraging me to get back to work on my Real Stuff. And although this space right here is some of my stuff, it’s not what I want the sum total of my output to be. If anything, it is a minor part of what I want to be doing. But right now, it is taking up too much time. I know, ironic given that I don’t even write here that much anymore, but I just don’t even want it as an excuse. I need to focus on ONE THING in my writing. And this can’t be it.

The other part, and this is equally as important, is…I’m just not so sure that I want to keep putting myself out there to this extent. In a world that is increasingly transparent thanks to Facebook and blogs and Twitter and reality shows, there is little that is sacred or private. I want to reclaim some of that for myself. I have a few really really good friends with whom I can talk about my kids, or my depression (which is decreasing daily, yay!), or my work, or my interests. And those are the people I want to talk to or be with and share myself with. I’d rather focus on seeing THEM or talking to THEM than merely disseminating the factoids of my life here to them AND a whole bunch of other people who don’t even know me.

So, I’m not sure what the future holds. I may not come back. Or maybe I’ll come back and only grant access to a few of those select people I mentioned, the people I actually know and care about or those that have shown some interest in what is going on in my life. Or maybe I’ll come back and keep it very superficial. I don’t know yet which way I’ll go, and I’m not giving it much thought for now. Now is the time to turn my attention elsewhere, and this…this will keep.

Thanks to Mark for being one of my muses, SERIOUSLY, who ALWAYS inspires me with his work and his words of wisdom and encouragement. Thanks to Michal for being a wonderful friend on this spiritual journey we call life, for checking in on me and making sure that my head and spirit are in a good place. Thanks to the Tech Guru who is always there, helping me to get where I want to go, no matter how the road twists and turns. And thanks to my blessed little Punksin and Pudding, who on my darkest days are my candles from God, and on my brightest days are my wonderful little learning companions with whom I can laugh myself silly. And thanks to everybody who came along for the ride and peeked in to see what was happening in my particular world of crazy. It’s still crazy and it’s loads of fun, and I appreciate that you cared enough to read my words from time to time. I hope to have more for you soon…just, not about me.

The Tech Guru has been taking him in for family swim time on weekends in the hopes of helping him to improve.

Yesterday they came in, and as Pudding happily went to divest himself of his Speedo backpack, the Tech Guru whispered to me, “I don’t think he’s going to pass.”

“What?” I answered, crestfallen. “Why not?”

“He’s just not picking up his head. He can swim, sort of – he gets around in the water – but he’s not picking his head up to get air. It’s like his head is too heavy or he’s just not getting it or something.”

I sighed. “Did you try getting him to turn his head to the side for air instead of lifting it UP out of the water?”

“Yes. He’s just…he’s just not doing it. He tries, he gets frustrated and then he just goes back to what’s working for him.”

What’s working for him is just keeping his head underwater for a REALLY long time. He seems to be able to hold his breath forever, which is great, but…is NOT what the teacher is looking for right now.

I was quiet for a moment. He’s been doing well in this round of Level 1, but the one thing the teacher has been concerned about has been his inability/refusal to lift his head up for air. The thing is, when he does manage to raise his head it’s not like he’s gasping for air or has taken in any water, but it just seems as though he is unable to lift his head. It could be that he’s still small enough for his head to be disproportionately large in relation to his body, as with babies and toddlers, but…I don’t know.

“Did you tell him he might not pass?”

“Yes.”

“How did he handle it?” I asked, afraid of the answer.

“He started to cry. I told him he has to try harder, but…he gets frustrated the minute it doesn’t work.”

His last session is this coming Thursday. The idea that I might be faced with yet another deluge of tears from my son made me tense and upset and protective. I am his mother. I do not want my son to cry.

“Well, he is signed up for Level 2 already, sooo… maybe, if he doesn’t pass this time either, we should just ask for private lessons?” I said.

The Tech Guru thought about it.

“Maybe,” he said, “maybe we should just ditch the lessons for a little bit and just…let him have fun in the water. Build his confidence and have a good time, and also get bigger and stronger.”

That actually sounds like an excellent idea. I know he looks up to his sister and seeing her sailing through her levels and now on the swim team while he flounders in Level 1, isn’t exactly a confidence booster. Of course, she was about a good year or so older than he is now when she started serious lessons – but telling him that, or that she did have to repeat a level in the very beginning, doesn’t help in the least. He’s 4. He doesn’t give a shit about that. All he knows is what he sees now.

Pudding came into the kitchen.

“How was swimming with Daddy?” I asked.

“Good,” he said.

“Um, I hear you’re still having a little trouble lifting your head up, huh?”

He looked down and shuffled his feet.

“Maybe I shouldn’t go to Level 1,” he said slowly.

“What do you mean? You are in Level 1 already.”

“I know. I mean, maybe I should go back to Guppies because I’m not good enough for Level 1.”

My heart wrenched a little…no, a lot…when he said that.

“No, baby, you’re in Level 1 because the teachers thought you had the skill to be there. There’s no need to go back. The only trouble is that if you don’t or can’t lift your head up, they think you’re having trouble getting air. That’s a really important part of swimming and they’re not going to let you pass to Level 2 if they think you can’t lift your head.”

He didn’t say anything.

“Just…try your best, sweetie. Do what the teacher tells you to and try your best. Don’t give up. Like everything else, reading, whatever, you have to practice and stick with it. One day it will just happen, but you have to keep trying. That’s all I want you to do: keep trying.” I ruffled his hair, pulling his head close to my hip for a second, really wanting to scoop him up and hug him but also not wanting to make it into a bigger deal for him.

“Okay,” he said, and then he meandered out of the kitchen and off to play.

The Tech Guru says he gives up easily and it’s true, he does, especially with us. That aspect makes me wonder if private lessons might actually BE a good thing, where he would have one-on-one time with someone who is NOT us, someone who might inspire him to try harder. But the idea of just being a kid in the water having fun, and maybe going back in the fall when an inch or two of height and a little more strength in his neck might make all the difference, is also very appealing.

I’m not sure which way we’ll go. I guess the first step is seeing if he does indeed need to repeat the class or not, which we’ll find out on Thursday. But even if he DOES move up to Level 2, I’m thinking that the summer off will be a good thing, some time to regroup, grow and just take a break from this whole thing, which is stressing BOTH of us out.

My Munchkin

I’m sort of glad the Tech Guru prepared me, but of course a part of me hopes he’s wrong. Not for me, but for Pudding. I guess it’s good that he prepared Pudding too, but somehow I think that having talked about it ahead of time is not going to prevent him from crying when the time comes.

And if he cries…

Sigh. I’ll cry too.

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Those of you who have been along for the ride for a bit know that this day is fraught with anxiety for me. Not because I AM a mom, but because I am WITHOUT a mom. And you know that she’s not dead, or somewhere in a nursing home eating oatmeal and calling me Gladys whenever I go to see her, or anything sad but unavoidable like that. My mom is alive, well and…not speaking to me.

You'll Like My Mother (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It’s fucking awesome.

Still and all, despite all the pills that I have to take NOW because of her and my dad, I have to say that she tried the best she could as I grew up and I owe a lot of who I am today to her. Sure, she made mistakes, but Jesus, I look at my own kids and I lose count of the shit I wish I could go back and do over again. So, I’m not holding any grudges about my childhood. Adulthood, yes, but childhood, okay.  She was young, and a suddenly single parent, and somehow, by the grace of God, I made it through, not totally unscathed, but not completely psychotic.

A LITTLE psychotic. And it started to turn into a LOT of psychotic when I missed my pills 3 nights in a row this week, let me tell you. But I’m okay now, the kids and the Tech Guru are still alive and the twitching and murderous impulses have decreased dramatically. YAY FOR DRUGS!

Anyhow, last year, I was all in a tizzy about Mother’s Day. Of course I wanted to share it with Pudding and Punksin, but I was also bummed about my orphan state. The Tech Guru went to see his mother, and in what ultimately turned out to be a completely JACKASS move, I told him to take the kids so I could have some down time.

Well, let’s just say that DOWN time doesn’t even BEGIN to describe it. I was here, alone – a rare occurrence for me – and I should have enjoyed it with wine and my fave TV shows and a book and,  to quote Simon and Garfunkel, the sounds of silence. But all that silence just led me to thinking about my mom and feeling shitty. And then I felt more shitty and mad that my kids had left me. How dare they leave me on Mother’s Day? Why would they be so fucking stupid as to LISTEN to me? I mean, look at all the OTHER times they don’t listen to me: Stop running down the stairs! Stop doing cartwheels off the bed! Stop launching yourself off the couch! Stop riding your scooter down the hall! Get out of the fridge! Stop peeing in the shower! Get back in the house, you have no pants on! No, I do not want to pet the fucking guinea pig, put him back in the cage! Stop hitting your sister with the light saber! Stop telling your brother the guinea pig is dead and making him cry! Why do you wait til the LAST MINUTE to go to the bathroom? Stop lifting my weights before you drop them on your toes!

All that stuff, I say a million times and they don’t listen. Leave Mommy on Mother’s Day? Everybody’s in the fucking car before you can say BOO.

So that was last year. This year I laid down the law.

There is to be NO LEAVING OF THEIR MOTHER BY MY CHILDREN ON MOTHER’S DAY.

I told the Tech Guru that he was more than welcome to go see his mom, because she IS his mom and he needs to set a good example for Pudding so that when HE gets older he will come see ME. (Yeah, that is totally selfish, I know.) But he is not allowed to take the kids. Any other time, sure, go see Abuela.

NOT ON MOTHER’S DAY.

Of course you might say, hey, why don’t you go too?

Well, I love her dearly but…she’s not my mother. I want to see MY mother on Mother’s Day. And if I can’t see MY mother on Mother’s Day, then I don’t want to see ANYONE’S goddamn mother. Again, yeah, I know. Selfish. But not really. It’s just that I know it will just make me sad and morose and tearful and honestly, I do enough of that bullshit already. Lately, not so much, thank God, but I’m not trying to go backwards down THAT dark road.

So this year, I don’t know what is going to happen except that I am going to be with my kids ALL DAY LONG. Which is really not any different from any OTHER day, but…it’s Mother’s Day. And I’m their mom. And that’s all I want…to be with my children, who are sweet and loving and still so open, and feel the love emanating out from them like warm sunlight over my soul.

It makes up for a lot.

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PARIS - OCTOBER 06: A detail of a model as she walks the runway during the Louis Vuitton Ready to Wear Spring/Summer 2011 show during Paris Fashion Week at Cour Carree du Louvre on October 6, 2010 in Paris, France. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

Every now and then, I get…obsessed with something.

Once it was boots. I went absolutely insane buying…boots. My rationale was that since I hate winter SO MUCH, that at least if I had awesome kick-ass boots to knock around in, I would be more inclined to go out and rock them to the world.

Um, not so much. I still hate winter. And now I have a huge gazillion gallon tote thing-a-ma-jiggy with enough boots to outfit a ranch.

Right now, I am obsessed with finding an aqua-ish turquoise-ish handbag.

They are out there. Trust me. I have seen aqua bags aplenty both online and in the shopping malls. But I CANNOT FIND THE PERFECT ONE.

This is where I wish I was Beyonce or Kim Kartrashian or some other celebrity chick, because all they would have to do is breathe a little sigh about wanting an aqua handbag and all of a sudden they would be inundated with handbags, for FREE, from Kooba, Balenciaga, Coach, Louis Vuitton and anyone else in the fashion world. They would design handbags just for them.

Somehow, I am thinking that…this is NOT GOING TO HAPPEN TO ME.

Of course, you realize that this is all your fault, you bastards. If you loved me, you would be sending me handbags RIGHT NOW. At least a fucking PICTURE of a handbag that I could say “OMG, that is EXACTLY THE ONE I WANT,” and then I could run off and buy it, since you would probably not be nice enough to buy it FOR me.

Fuckers.

All the handbags I see have something wrong with them. They’re the wrong shade. Or the shape sucks. Or it has too many buckles and hardware. Or it doesn’t have enough hardware. Or the lining is awful. Or it’s too big. Or it’s too small. And the more of this I encounter, the more OBSESSED I BECOME with finding exactly the right handbag.

Why is this so hard? Why does this have to become a THING I WRITE ABOUT?

I know, if there are any straight men out there that have even gotten this far through the post, you’re thinking, “it’s just a goddamn blue bag, what’s the big deal?” I am not going to even attempt to explain this to you, because this is just another rendition of “why do you need to have 10 pairs of black shoes” conversation. It’s NOT just any blue bag, and…you know what? You don’t get it, and you never will get it, so just…fuck you and go away.

Unless, of course, you want to get me a handbag.

Notice I said STRAIGHT men, because if you’re gay, you probably know EXACTLY where I can get the handbag and you definitely have much better fashion sense than I do. I know…it’s a terrible stereotype. Actually, now that I think about it, it REALLY is a terrible stereotype because I can immediately think of two gay men I know whose fashion sense is absolutely horrifyingly atrocious. Not avant-garde, not eccentric, just fucking ATROCIOUS.

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My life is actually pretty damn good.

It’s OTHER people that I’m worried about. And me worrying about them is getting to…well, to me.

I don’t know if it’s me, or it’s just freaky timing, or the Mayan calendar with the world ending in December or what, but so many people I know are just so terribly unhappy. And it’s bringing me down. Not in a “gee-this-is-bringing-me-down-and-i’m-pissed-because-it’s-all-about-me” kind of way, but in an “all-these-people-are-so-unhappy-and-I-wish-there-was-something-I-could-do-about-it” kind of way.

One person, my dearest sister/friend (although I have to tell you I normally HATE that term because most Black people say it with that kind of ethnic sass that I just can’t fucking stomach when it comes to being friends with people – I mean, attitude when you’re about to beat someone’s ass I can get, but the sass of the GIRLFREN routine is just so not me)…jeez, as usual, where the fuck was I? Ok. Seriously.

One of my dearest friends who is like a SISTER to me, if that makes it any clearer, has just discovered that she is pretty much…infertile. She is not married. She is not in a relationship. She has been trying for a while to make something happen via friends who wouldn’t mind being daddy donors, but nothing has come out of it. Finally, after discussing this with a fertility doctor and getting some tests done, she was told that…there are no eggs…or whatever eggs there are are too old to be viable, hence…the no pregnancies, weird hot flashes, and other shit she’s been going through.

This has rocked her world. She REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to be a mom. REALLY. So much so that when she found out, the first thing she said to me was “I don’t know what to do with my life.” Mind you, this was via text – she had just gotten off with the doctor and was literally unable to speak, she was so upset, but I could practically hear the pain in her voice.

Chalk it up to my (hopefully growing) maturity that rather than being thoroughly disgusted with her saying that – I mean, it’s not like life is OVER – I felt compassion for her. In my old days, I would have been annoyed that she was taking such a world-ending view over something that is not actually life-ending. It’s not cancer, right?

That would have been me.

But now…I understand.

Of course, I have children. And the irony of it is that as much as I love my children to FUCKING DEATH AND BEYOND, I think…I think…I would have been okay not having children.

I don’t know. There was a point very early in my adulthood where I wanted to have them. Then there were some points in adulthood, where I didn’t want to, primarily because I was afraid and didn’t want to bring any more life into this miserable world. Then I sort of made peace with whatever would come to be. And then, when I got married and we discussed having children, I got preggers on the first try. So…I’ve never HAD the experience of trying desperately to have children and finding it out of my reach. Perhaps if I had tried and NOT had it happen so quickly, I would have found the goal that much more life-consuming. That certainly sounds like me, because I hate being told I CAN’T do something. Not wanting to have kids is not the same as being told you CAN’T. There’s no choice there, and I hate being deprived of choice.

But also, I realized that since this had been such a front-of-mind goal for her over the past year – one on which she’d spent money, time and heartfelt emotion – having this dream wrenched away from her must be awful. Life may not be over, but the life SHE wanted for herself is not going to happen. Of course, being a mother is not a complete impossibility. There are donor eggs, there’s adoption…but right now, in the throes of dealing with her body’s inability to provide her with a biological child of her own, she’s not ready to hear that. And for some people, that’s…just not what they want. So I don’t know if it will EVER be an option and if it’s not…I respect that.

I just feel terrible. I feel terrible for her pain. I feel terrible for my complete inability to do anything, to fix anything, to come up with either an answer or a salve of words that will somehow make everything better.  I feel terrible that even in my attempts to be there with her as much as possible, to help as much as I could, even to the extent of setting her up with a friend of mine whom I thought would be a terrific donor, that there’s always that…thing between us, that line drawn, the one where she’s on one side with no kids looking wistfully at me and I’m on the other side waving back at her with 2. I can sympathize with her pain until the cows come home – and I do – but I can’t empathize with her because I’ve never been there. Her pain is one for which I can offer my shoulders, my ears, my love, my support, but I can’t offer any real words of comfort as I sit here with the sounds of two children playing and screaming in the background. Their very existence, and the ease with which they got here, robs me of any empathy I could possibly have. And so I feel inadequate to deal with this, bumbling along in the dark trying to be the best friend I can but knowing that even as she loves me back, I may be a painful reminder of what she can’t have.

And so I feel terrible about not being able to help her the way I want to. I love her across the chasm but now…she’s retreated into a cave of silent despair and I…I just don’t know what to do. I ache for her. I want to leave her the time she needs to grieve, and I know that will take a long time. At the same time, I don’t want to disappear into the shadows as so many people do when they don’t know what to say or how to handle your pain.

So…I send her a text occasionally to let her know I am thinking of her. To let her know I love her. I try to repress my instinct to say it will be okay because…it is just too early for that. I just want her to know that I am here, that I love her, that…I don’t have ANY fucking answers but…I’m still here, for whatever the hell that’s worth.

I don’t hear back.

And that’s okay. This is not about her reaching out to me to let me know I’ve been heard. This is about me reaching out to her to let her know that…I am here. Whenever she’s ready, IF ever she’s ready…I am here, and I am hurting for her, maybe not the same way she’s hurting, but hurting nonetheless because I love her and when you love someone, you want them to be happy and to reach their dreams.

That…that is just ONE story of a friend going through troubles. I have another friend who was in a relationship. Broke up with boyfriend. Soon after the breakup, she realized she was actually in LOVE with boyfriend, but…he is seeing someone else now. She feels that he is her soul mate. He…has moved on. And although it’s an entirely different situation, I hear her echoing the same sentiment: what am I going to do with my life? I feel so…useless. And hopeless.

To her, I said the same thing that I desperately want my first friend to realize: your worth does not depend on anyone else being in your life, boyfriend,  parent, baby… There is NOTHING wrong with WANTING those people, but NOT having them does not make you USELESS, HOPELESS, or WORTHLESS. In this, of course, I DO speak from experience, as I well understand how the rejection of another can make you feel completely lost at sea. But hopefully, after the pain subsides somewhat, you start to realize several things: that maybe it wasn’t meant to be. That maybe something better is in store for you. And that whether you find someone else to fill that hole or not, your worth is what YOU make it out to be, period.

My sister – she is a wonderful person. Sweet, kind, funny…and she will be those things even if she never becomes a mother. Of course she wants someone to share that maternal love with, someone to nurture and grow, but she is no less of a beauty for lack of being a mother.

My friend – she is a creative, feisty, spirited person. Maybe her soulmate wasn’t really her soulmate. Maybe she just wanted him to be. Maybe he didn’t recognize the unique individual gifts she has. Maybe he’s just moved on after being pushed aside and doesn’t want to come back and yes, that happens; some mistakes are irreversible. Whatever the case may be, all of the things that make up her unique spirit do not depend on his being by her side. Perhaps, as I’ve experienced myself, she will actually grow from the pain and become even stronger than she would have been had things gone according to her plan. This can happen…if she pushes herself to make the best of what she perceives to be a bad situation, and turns it to her advantage. Even pain is based on perception, especially emotional pain.

Both of these dear women live on the West Coast, which makes it even harder for me to be of any real consolation to them. I can’t shoot over to spend the night snuggling on the couch watching silly movies and getting drunk as we laugh and cry. I can call. I can text. And if they really really need me to, yes, I can fly. But distance prevents me from being the instant and spontaneous comfort I would like to be, and in an odd way it makes ME feel their pain all the more for being able to do so very little about it.

And of course, there’s my old boss, whom I wrote about in my last post. I feel so utterly sad for her and that sadness has stayed with me long after hearing about it. Of course I keep thinking…should I have called? And I know that is utter rot and complete hubris, because her unhappiness was deep and long and I’m sure she forgot about me a long time ago. But, knowing that I was yet one more person who found her brilliant and yet completely unapproachable, I wonder…if I had stepped over that line, would it have helped at all…it’s silly, of course, because I don’t think that she and I could ever have been real friends. And my reaching out to her would have been more for my own closure and to erase any last vestiges of negativity, but would it have done anything for her?

Of course, now I’ll never know. So I do what I do for all those in whom I sense despair, loss, grief, anger, sadness…I pray. For their lives here, and beyond.

I sit here in my house. I have 2 happy healthy offspring. I have a husband who is overworked and in need of a vacation but who is strong, supportive, and simply fabulous. We are not rich but we are quite comfortable and in this house alone there is a love that surrounds us and keeps us warm, content, laughing and happy. And I AM happy, but…the unhappiness of those whom I love – and even some whom I don’t – moves me deeply, and disturbs me. So much of the unhappiness that people spread to others is because they themselves are unhappy with their OWN lives. And it ripples out, infecting others with bad days at work, arguments at home, unnecessary impatience…

I hope…I hope they can all find acceptance and peace. Or the will to make a new thing happen, to go purposefully down a new path when a previously desired one has closed.

I hope for happiness, and for peace.

And for some light in the darkness.

Last week was a fucking doozy.

I don’t know if I ever got into the whole story here of my first pregnancy. I was in corporate America (advertising) at the time, and from literally the MINUTE I told my single-White-female boss that I was expecting a baby, I became her target.

It seemed like every year, she would zoom in on ONE person, and go about making that person’s life a living hell until they either quit or she found some reason to fire them. Prior to 2003, I wasn’t her favorite person in the world – I tried to stay off her radar altogether – but she pretty much ignored me and let me do my job, which I was doing damn well, I might add.  That didn’t change when I got pregnant, but her treatment of me did.

I am not going to go into the gory details now of all the things that happened, the incidents, the comments, all of the various reasons why on some days, I came home in tears. It was an awful experience, one that pretty much cemented my decision to stay home after Punksin was born. I contemplated going back to work in the 3 months after she was born, but I just couldn’t stomach the thought of leaving my incredibly beautiful baby to go back to utter misery and disrespect. Thank God, I didn’t have to.

I didn’t leave on good terms with aforementioned boss. I called my immediate supervisor, explained in a 45-minute conversation exactly WHY I would not be returning, and wished him well. Her, I never called. Corporate etiquette dictates that I should have, but I was done with fucking corporate etiquette. After she’d belittled me, given away some of my accounts and their resulting commissions despite all the work I’d put into them, and a whole host of other inappropriate and probably lawsuit-worthy actions, I really didn’t feel the need to say goodbye. Word went around the office that she was furious at me and was planning to call me at home. I waited with eagerness for THAT to happen.

I think she knew better.

It took a loooong time for me to get over my final days at that place. I would dream about her, my subconscious continually coming up with new scenarios in which I was back at my old job. These were usually not good dreams, and their very frequency told me that I had a lot of work to do to get her and the things she had done out of my system. For a long time afterwards, I was THISCLOSE to hating her. Eventually, though, I was able to let go, perhaps in part because I realized that I was just a convenient target for someone who was actually incredibly unhappy. I reminded myself that she’d targeted several people before me, and that the grapevine I stayed connected to for a time let me know that after my departure there were others who suffered similarly at her hands. Remembering her behavior in the office towards the staff on a whole – icy demeanor, rarely smiling, cutting remarks, ignoring people in hallways – I realized that she was really just a supremely unhappy person.  That was borne out by the facts that she had few close friends, that in all the time I’d known her she had no significant others or even good DATES, and that she clearly just had serious problems relating to people. There were some who could stomach her brand of friendship, but they were few and far between. She was not an easy person to get to know, or to get close to.

And it was a shame, because she was brilliant. I realized that, had I been less fearful of incurring her wrath, I could have learned a lot from her. But I wanted as little to do with her as possible and tried to keep her out of my business dealings, only calling her in on those accounts for which it became absolutely clear that I needed my Big Guns. Strategically speaking, she was very smart. She had a way with words, and it was no surprise to me to learn that she’d gone to Yale. What she needed, though, was charm school.

About 2 years after I left, she left as well, supposedly her own decision but from what I’d heard, not so much. I heard she did some traveling in Colombia, followed by attempts back up here to get back into advertising. Unfortunately, her reputation may have preceded her – there were few who worked under her who had positive things to say, especially if they were off the record – and she was not finding work.

That latter part I only discovered recently when I got the shocking news last week that she had committed suicide.

I was stunned – and yet, not. The level of unhappiness she had to reach to get to that point didn’t seem even remotely impossible; even in her busy working days I think she was miserable with life. And yet…and yet. I thought she was unhappy, and yet I thought she was…untouchable? That she was somehow expert in fooling herself into happiness with a huge paycheck and nice apartment on the Upper East Side?

Maybe in those earlier days she was. Maybe it was harder to hide behind frequent business trips and client dinners and hard work and micromanaging.

But maybe it wasn’t, because if it had been so well hidden, well, then we, her staff, would not all have been so completely aware of how miserable she was. She didn’t seem to revel in making our lives insufferable. She didn’t derive happiness from it. She was merely sharing her own pain, doling out misery because that was all she herself knew.

It was not only because so much time had passed since my stint there that I was able to feel sorrow at her passing. It was because, regardless of whatever she had done, I would never have wished her THAT level of unhappiness. Hearing that she had taken her life pained me because it showed that she was hurting inside, anguished and despairing. Ironically, in taking her life she showed a level of humanity that she was loathe to share when she was alive. Her manner of death imbued her with emotion and life, and it was so terribly sad to think that it had taken that one irrevocable act to do that.

I’ve prayed for her. I don’t believe that suicide actually erases sorrow as much as it prolongs it, which is a good part of why I haven’t crossed that line myself in the past. But I pray for her anyway, in the hope that it will be some balm to her soul, some ease on her journey. It’s still shocking to think of her not being here, and of her being gone by her own hand. I never would have thought that such a strong person would have been hurting so much inside…and yet…

And yet.

My Crab and My Fish: True Water Babies

So I’m at the swim club with Punksin and Pudding yesterday.

What was once an hour-long event has turned into about THREE hours, thanks to Punksin making it onto the swim team.

She started her Level 5 class last week Tuesday.

The teacher, who had been her teacher in Level 3, told her once again that she should try out for the swim team.

MY plan had been that she would try out in the fall – I figured she’d have the best shot of making it with that much more practice under her belt, but then the teacher implied that by the time fall came around tryouts would be done. Which seemed like bullshit since the club brochure clearly LISTS dates for fall tryouts, but I didn’t want to get blindsided and find out, oh, she couldn’t make it. Previous experience has shown me that these people don’t pay attention to their own fucking rules. Just to get INTO swim lessons, you have to attend a HUGE lottery and pray you get a good number. The book clearly states that NOTHING will start before 6:30. I got there at 6:00 and the goddamn thing was already under way. Fuckers.

Anyhow, so as not to be bested by their mediocre business practices, I asked the Aquatics Director to confirm when Punksin could tryout for the fall.

She said “Tomorrow.”

Uh, say what now?

That was last Tuesday.

So last WEDNESDAY, we tramp BACK over there and meet the Head Coach, who, upon being informed that the Aquatics Director told us to tryout that day, looked somewhat stunned. She was good-natured about it, told Punksin to suit up and get in the pool.

And she made her swim lap after lap.

Backstroke. Elementary backstroke. Breaststroke. Butterfly. Freestyle.

Up and down, without a rest, except to hear what she was supposed to do next.

Afterwards, the Head Coach told Punksin to go swim with the swim team for “a while, half-hour or so, just to see how she does.”

It was an hour.

After all was said and done, Punksin looked exhausted, but…I noticed that when she was out there, she was holding her own. Could it be?

YES IT DAMN WELL COULD.

She made the swim team

WHOO HOO!

So far she has been to two practices…one the day right after her tryout, and one yesterday. It is longer, more concentrated, more focused, and faster-paced, than her lessons. But…she’s doing well.

She’s not the fastest kid in the group by far. But…and I say this with no bias because when she does poorly I let her know…she has the best technique. She tends to really focus on what her coaches are telling her and she executes very well. I wish she were faster already, of course, but I remind myself that she is only 8, and that she is doing what she is supposed to do: focusing on technique. Speed can come later, when these strokes are ingrained in her muscle memory and she no longer has to pay such close attention to her execution. But when I watch her in the water now, it is a joy. She is not the fastest one down the lane, but she is by far the cleanest. She is not sloppy, she is not rushing, she is not all over the place. She is focused.

I can’t believe how far she has come in just a year. I’m already considering moving her to another Aquatics Club in the area. Because I am THAT kind of mother, I went through the Junior Olympic records and the results from other state-wide meets to see what clubs were popping up with wins and records because THAT club is where I want my kids, and one club in particular kept showing up. I’d never heard of them before and lo and behold – they are RIGHT IN THE NEXT TOWN. And they seem to perform exceptionally well in Womens’ Swimming. As luck would have it, tryouts have just passed, but I may give them a call and check them out and if we have to wait a year, we’ll wait. And while we wait, she’ll be getting stronger and focusing on getting in. Cuz that’s how we ROLL up in here. I have taught my kids: no does not mean no. It means try again.

(This philosophy has come back to HAUNT MY ASS when they ask me for shit like ICE CREAM, CANDY and CAN WE PLEASE GO TO THE PLAYGROUND, but this is the price I pay for instilling persistence in my kids. It’s okay. I will smile smugly as they hoist up trophies in the years to come. And I will tell this story on the ESPN specials.)

Lest you think Pudding is left out…oh no. He’s doing very well now, having overcome the disappointment of not passing his Level 1 class at first. I know, I didn’t write about it, and I was going to, but to be honest, it broke MY heart so much that to go over it again would send me into a tailspin. Suffice it to say that he did not pass Level 1 and he cried rivers. What killed me was, he was not the only kid in the class who didn’t pass. MOST of them didn’t pass. But he was the only one in the class who GAVE a shit. The other kids took their lollipops and marched off happily and all he kept saying was “Did I pass? Did I pass?” in his little high voice, and when the teacher handed me the sheet saying “Please repeat” it was all I could do not to cry because I knew he was going to be upset – all the more so because Punksin had advanced to Level 5 just a few hours before. I just urged him to get his lollipop but he didn’t want it, just kept looking at me and finally I knelt down and smiled at him bravely and said “Squirt, you have to repeat the class just to get a few things better,” and… he didn’t say anything. His head slowly went down and then the eyes welled up and the bottom lip quivered and then he couldn’t hold it in anymore and oh God did he cry. And that fuck of a teacher, no sympathy whatsoever, the ONE kid in the class who GAVE a fuck about passing and she had to see and hear him crying but she just walked away. Later on, she told him he just needed to work on holding up his head, which was NOT even on the list of requirements for passing that particular level, but she only said that much to him because his FATHER made him go and say goodbye to HER – again, the ONLY kid in the class to do so.

Didn’t I tell you I would get worked up about this shit? I mean, I remember his face and my heart just breaks all over again. He’s so small, and he tried his best, and I just felt so bad because I knew it hurt a little extra in light of his big sister’s accomplishment. But he has put it behind him. He’s in Level 1 again, different teacher, thank God, and with typical childlike recovery he is attacking it with gusto. The Tech Guru has taken him into the pool a few times for family swim to practice, and we got to swim this past weekend, and he’s doing GREAT under water now so I will personally SHOOT the teacher if he is told to repeat it again.

So, because I expect BOTH of my children to EXCEL, I noticed that this Aquatics Club I found for Punksin didn’t seem so hot in Mens’ Swimming. Another name kept popping up over and over in that category. I wondered why that was and then… I had a hunch and did some research that bore out my hunch: the club that excels in Womens’ Swimming? Female Head Coach, mainly female coaches. The one that excels in Mens’ Swimming? Male Head Coach, male coaches. They both field Mens’ and Womens’ teams, mind you. Interesting, huh? Technically, it shouldn’t matter, but hell, I don’t care about how it SHOULD be, I care about how it IS. If the male swimmers are doing better because they have a male coach, fine with me, that’s where my son will go, and same for Punksin if that theory seems to be borne out. I am done fighting the system. I am going to work the system and wrench everything out of it for my kids that is humanly possible.

That potential male club is about an hour away from us. If Pudding gets team-ready and is good enough to pursue this as a sport, hell-yeah I’ll drive him there. I don’t give a shit. This wouldn’t be for a few years yet anyhow…or so we think. We’ll see what happens when he’s really swimming. If he’s good enough to compete, he will learn from the best. That is pretty much my motto for my life and definitely where my kids are concerned.

My kids are my business. Not a means to profit…that’s not what I mean at all. But I want them to be self-sufficient, and we live in a society that rewards physical excellence. I want them to be healthy and busy – and sports are a great way to achieve both. I want them to understand that excellence is MANDATORY. When you expect the best from children, they will generally give it to you, as long as they have the right tools to do so. I make it MY business to make sure that my children have whatever they need to succeed and to use their brains and bodies to the best of their abilities. This is why I homeschool. This is why regardless of what they pursue, I find the best facilities for teaching a craft – ballet, gymnastics, swimming, you name it – and THAT is where my children go. MY business is making sure they are excellent in character, mind, spirit, and body. I am molding them – not be mini-me’s, GOD, they can do so much BETTER than me. To be the best THEY can be…the best if they compete, but also the best PEOPLE. I want them to be good, healthy, well-rounded PEOPLE.  Mediocrity is unacceptable not only FROM my children, but especially FOR them.

This is not about being Tiger Mom, or abusive, or making them live my dreams. This is about looking at these two beautiful gifts from God and being in awe of what He gave me.  They are so malleable…how dare I not try to give them the best and in so doing, help their futures? I cannot just leave things to chance and hope they make it. There is no WINGING it here. The best SCHOOLS, the best TUTELAGE, the best FACILITIES, the best PEOPLE , the best EXAMPLES – that is what I want them to have. And there will be times when they run into situations where they have to deal with less-than-best. But I want them to understand how to deal with it gracefully and move on, how to try to get back to BEST. I don’t want them to have 9-to-5 drudgery, with jobs they hate but are held hostage to by a paycheck they need. I want them to enjoy life. I want them to love learning. I want them to enjoy excellent health. I want them to do good out in the world. I want them to be good PEOPLE. And I want them to know that whatever they want to do, they deserve it and they OWE it to themselves to pursue it with dedication and via the best means available. If you believe in God, as I do – not some white dude in the sky looking down either benevolently or with vengeance, but a far more complex goodness – well, to me, you owe it to that Divine Goodness and to YOURSELF to be the best you can be. It’s taken me a long time to see that even for myself. But I realize if I teach my children that, I have to LIVE it.

These are my babies, and as I have told them many many times, no matter how old they get or how tall they grow, they will always always always be my babies. And I hope that whenever the day comes that I leave them here, that I will have equipped  them with the tools they need to make it in this increasingly insane world: an awareness of my deep abiding love through all time, a self-confidence that is humble and recognizes excellence and good in others, a continual pursuit of learning about self and the world, and a quest for excellence in whatever they put their minds or hands to, until the day they die.

I love my Pudding and my Punksin. They drive me insane and crazy and up the wall but…I always remind myself of the day I first held them in my arms. Of their first smiles. Their habits as babies that made me hoot with laughter. And I tell them these stories not only to see their joy in hearing about themselves as babies, but so that I will REMEMBER that love and continue to feel it even as they grow older, into tweens, teens, and eventually, adults. I am so blessed and when I want the best for them it is because I am trying my best to honor that which I see within them. They deserve MY best. If not from me, then from whom? They may not always get the best the world has to offer – and God knows I have had my dark days of despair where I have been less than superb – but I try to give them my best because I am Mommy, and I’m the only one they have. And so so PROUD and HONORED to be that person to them. Not having my own mom has made me ever more mindful of the importance that role has, the emotional attachment, the spiritual link. I don’t ever want to dishonor that. I see excellence in them not just because they are my children, but because they are God’s children.  How far they see or understand that will in great part be determined in how I treat them.

Love them, just love them to death, truly. Mine, theirs and the universe’s. Amen.

It’s been busy…but very GOOD busy.

I’m keeping this one quick and dirty.

First of all, I started working out. Not sporadic bullshit. Not paying a gym membership fees when I never go. Not reading the magazines while never doing the workouts.

SERIOUSLY WORKING OUT.

I finally just said “fuck it” and bought the infamous P90.

Actually, it’s the P90X that everyone is so obsessed with, but I wanted to start off slowly so that I wouldn’t get in over my head, get discouraged, and quit. So I got P90, which is sort of like the version where you get in shape for P90x.

It is FUCKING AWESOME.

Thank God I am blessed with the body I have. I am not fat or overweight. I gain muscle fairly easily, although admittedly, at age 43, it is going to take me a little more work to get where I want to be. But I am not in the position where I need to lose weight. I wanted to lose about 5-7 pounds of fat and then regain it in muscle.

This is already happening.

I was starting to see that hip thing that women get…that little edge that just sits on the hips and turns a curvaceous figure into something slightly grotesque. That…that was freaking me out. It was completely not permissible in my world.

And now?

GONE.

4 weeks in and it is GONE. My legs feel tighter…I am starting to see my 6-pack…my biceps, which never really went anywhere thanks to constantly hoisting one kid or another, are getting bigger…and my lats are coming back.

That last one is something I need to figure out. I don’t want huge lats and whenever I pay serious attention to working out, my lats are one of the FIRST things to explode. I gotta keep an eye on them. I mean, I like that they’re THERE, but I don’t need to look like a man with boobs. Especially when my boobs aren’t even that big to begin with.

Speaking of which, this has been on my mind for some time and I need to say this:

Man boobs.

ARE. NOT. COOL.

If you are a man, and you have any fatty tissue extruding from your chest…PLEASE. WORK THAT OFF. That is NOT ACCEPTABLE. Just…NOT.

Okay, I have spoken. Back to me.

I am so happy with the physical results, especially only about a month in. I have 2 more months to go. And I feel great. The Tech Guru says he can feel the difference too, and I feel way more energetic for…well, yes, for that, as well as other stuff.

But the biggest payoff by far, in my mind, has been mental.

I am just so fucking happy I don’t know what to do with myself.

I just feel…on top of the world. And things that I’ve been sitting on and thinking about doing for several month to several years, I’ve been attacking finally. With GUSTO.

On that list:

1. I got my first tattoo. Not some small girlie butterfly crap on my ankle either. It goes all the way down my spine. And my tat artist is already working on the next one.
2. I am commencing studies for my Master’s Degree. WHOO FUCKING HOO!
3. I began the writing for an app the Tech Guru and I are working on, a spiritually focused app with positive affirmations and words of wisdom.

That’s just the beginning. I just feel…so energetic and positive, and I want to spread the love and good vibes around. Seriously.

So whatever you’re sitting on, been sitting on for years, tossing around in the back of your mind but not pursuing for whatever reason (usually has to do with thinking you don’t have enough time, or being fearful of failure)…that? THAT thing?

GO DO IT! Stop finding excuses NOT to do it, and MAKE IT HAPPEN.

Maybe you should start working out first. Not only will it give you more energy, but you’ll sleep better. And, you’ll be so psyched and encouraged by the accomplishments you’ll make physically, that you’ll feel better able to knock out some of those other challenges.

Okay, in case you are one of those people that just can’t stand all the positivity, there has been ONE thing that has been upsetting to me.

My grandmother.

It’s gotten to the point where I don’t want to take her calls anymore.

She doesn’t call me that often to begin with. What with the Alzheimer’s, she just doesn’t reach out as much as she used to.

And that means that when she does, it’s usually a bad thing. Meaning that she ALWAYS WANTS TO TALK ABOUT MY MOTHER.

THAT…is not a road I feel like going down over and over and over.

I do understand that it is her daughter, and she needs to talk about it.

But she doesn’t understand, especially now that she is fairly senile, that this is my MOTHER. And I DON’T want to talk about it over and over and over. It accomplishes nothing but getting me into a funk. Nothing else happens. We don’t reach any answers, we don’t find any peace through these conversations, nothing happens. And it’s not that I don’t want to think about my mother. I do think about her, all the time, and I pray for her whenever I do pray, which is often, and for me, that works. But these around-the-mulberry-bush discussions in which my grandmother says the same thing over and over, why did she leave, why won’t she call, I hope she is okay…I can’t take those conversations. It’s all been said a million times already and for me, talking it out achieves nothing. If it helps my grandmother to talk it out, she needs to find a therapist. I can’t be the one she has this conversation with every fucking week. I just can’t.

So there’s that. And it’s sad because I like talking to her in general, and I do genuinely care about how she is doing, but whenever she calls me now, I find myself tensing up. She called me yesterday THREE TIMES. Hung up the first two times and then finally left a message asking me to call her back. I guarantee you, she is calling about my mother. Not because anything new has transpired, mind you. She just wants to go over it all…ONE MORE TIME.

I can’t do that. And I hate being rude and just getting off the phone but on the last call I just told her I had to go and hung up because I couldn’t take the incessant wondering and speculating about the same shit that we’ve been speculating for YEARS. I can’t do it. It is completely non-productive. It is actually COUNTER-productive. I refuse to indulge in counter-productive shit anymore, for any reason.

Otherwise…all is well. All is truly incredibly well.

Yes, two days before Christmas we had two immigrants in our basement. We had to hide them there so the kids wouldn’t know until Christmas and it was touch and go for a while there. I kept running into the basement under the guise of doing laundry so that I could give them food and water and make sure they weren’t too cold. And also, to make sure they hadn’t escaped.

We didn’t know what their names were. Hubby picked them up somewhere around his job in White Plains and brought them home. We just dubbed them Pablo and Jose.

Then, thank GOD, Christmas came and we could let Pablo and Jose up from the basement and the kids were SO HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY!

Did I mention that Pablo and Jose are guinea pigs?

Also, their names are no longer Pablo and Jose. Our children, in what can only be called a stunning lack of ethnic awareness, have called them Spike and Speedy.

BORING.

The whole Pablo and Jose thing came about because The Tech Guru and I were watching Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern once and he was somewhere in South America – where guinea pigs are part of the native population, hence the Pablo and Jose monikers – and the family that he was eating with had some guinea pigs roasting on the fire. I mean, this whole idea of keeping animals as cutesy putesy pets that serve no fucking purpose whatsoever beyond entertainment really shows how well off we as a society are. Because in other places, you need to provide some kind of food and earn your keep, or your ass is getting cooked. Milk. Eggs. Even the dogs have to catch some shit or guard some shit or herd some shit; none of this lazing around going to doggy day camp and playdates in the dog runs with your best friend the Rottie from down the street. So although I wasn’t exactly dying to fire up the grill and roast me a cavy (cavy being the proper name for guinea pigs), I was okay with the people eating the guinea pigs. They have to eat SOMETHING. Shit, we eat chickens and cows. And pigs. Just not…guinea pigs.

Then lo and behold Pudding and Punksin decided they wanted guinea pigs and as it just so happened, a woman close to The Tech Guru’s job was giving some up for adoption, and she had two boys. You may have read my previous post in which I mentioned that two boys is a no-no since they will supposedly try to beat each other to death, but she assured me that NOOOOO, they were father and son and they got along FAMOUSLY.

BULL…SHIT.

Pablo and Jose, they sort of tolerate each other, but the son is always snatching food from the dad, and rolling all up in his face when the dad’s trying to eat, like “what, what, i’m in yo face, what?” and the dad is always walking around making rumbling noises and doing this thing that guinea pigs do where they sway from side to side with their hind legs like little sumo wrestlers, which is guinea pig body and verbal language for “back the fuck up OFF me or I will fucking shank you, motherfucker, fo REALS.”

I'm GANGSTA, yo

Actually…maybe that should be in Spanish?  Unfortunately, my Spanish – ees no so good, ju know wha i mean? I know how to say boring stuff like I love you, stop it, come here, what is this, how much does this cost, you know, simple stuff.  I know how to tell my husband he’s handsome and sexy and please take his clothes off. I mean, he’s Latin – I figure I should know how to tell him to get naked in Spanish. And telling the kids to STOP doing whatever the hell it is they’re doing, I mean, the Tech Guru only tells them that about a THOUSAND TIMES A DAY, so that in Spanish, I know. But nothing along the lines of, I’m running shit up in this cage, SON, or, bitch you better give me that carrot, or, why you hoggin’ the hamster wheel, yo?

What a fucking waste of Spanish classes.

But back to Pablo and Jose. The more I think about it…something is fishy here. They’re always swaggering and fighting. They steal shit from each other all the time. They have set exercise times (guinea pigs like schedules, apparently). They get fed 2 square meals a day with treats for good behavior.  Twice a day we take them out of their houses so they can get exercise. They even have guinea pig EXERCISE EQUIPMENT. And at night, we turn off the lights so they can rest…but they don’t always sleep…

Oh my god.

I’m running Guinea Pig Alcatraz.

Jesus. I hope they’re not raping each other…

Well, so far they have yet to kill or seriously injure each other. (If they are raping each other, it’s after lights out and I DON’T WANT TO KNOW.) But most of the supposed fisticuffs really is a lot of posturing and swagger. (Serious digression here but really: why is it that the more men swagger, the less impressive they actually really are? It’s like, I’m not really that hard or confident in myself but I don’t want you to know that, so I’m gonna act EXTRA MANLY to fool you. The Tech Guru has ZERO swagger. NONE. He doesn’t look hard, act hard, talk hard – shit, he hardly talks at all if he doesn’t know you well. He will sit there and not say boo, but internally, he’s sizing you up and trying to decide if you’re worth the bother of him opening his goddamn mouth. But! When he DOES finally say something, he MEANS it. If he says he is going to do something, THAT SHIT GETS DONE. And when he does get pissed, if it is warranted, he will KICK YOUR ASS – and he has the muscles to do it: nice big hands…muscular thighs, I LOVE his thighs, football player thighs and they haven’t changed a BIT from when he played in college…great abs, too! And a hairy chest, it goes all down to his stomach and just covers those abs nicely, not too much that it’s gross, but its like a soft carpet and I just rub my face in it and it feels like velvet…sigh… I like men with hair on their chests, not a whole bush but something substantial you can see and be like, yup, that’s a MAN. Big biceps too, did I mention those? Yum. But ZERO swagger! Just manly in a very confident, I-don’t-need-to-overdo-it-but-I-can-back-my-shit-up-if-you-test-me kind of way. That right there? Silent but kick-ass? That is SEXY AS HELL.

Okay, I, um, need to go find The Tech Guru for…something. Where the hell is he anyhow… yeah, uh, stay right there. I’ll be back.

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Okay, um, I’m back. What the hell was I talking about? Shit, I’m out of breath. Oh…yeah…guinea pigs. Whew! Prison. Yeah. Okay, I’m back on track now. I was SAYING, that these guinea pigs talk some good game but really don’t do much for us to worry about; a matter of fact, we should probably be more concerned about Pudding killing his guinea pig, Spike (aka Jose) because he hoists that little fucker around like a rag doll. We keep telling him to be gentle but it’s not really sinking in…but Spike actually seems to be getting used to it.

I guess he knows whose bitch he is now!

Damn, this post made me tired.

In a little under 3 hours this day will be over, and BOY WILL I BE GLAD.

It hasn’t been a horrible day. Nothing completely awful and terrible happened. My life did not drastically change for the worse. So, I suppose I shouldn’t complain.

But, fuck it, I’m going to ANYHOW. It was just one of those please-can-this-shit-be-DONE-with days. Completely non-productive with a liberal sprinkling of fucked-up-tedness thrown in.

I just ended up…sad.

It all started last night, actually, when I forgot to take my medication.

What that generally means, for those of you lucky enough to have avoided dealing with me, is that the following day is going to be a leeeetle rough.

It’s just one day. Missing one day isn’t terrible. I don’t fall into the throes of depression and want to hurl myself off a roof from missing one day.

But…I get a little…edgy. Snappy. When I miss my meds on a given night, the next day needs to be SMOOTH FUCKING SAILING, PARDNER, or we are in TROUBLE.

Well, today was NOT smooth fucking sailing.

I spent ALL. FUCKING. DAY. Looking for TWO. PIECES. OF. GODDAMN PAPER.

Yup, you read that right. All day. Two pieces of paper. That I have yet to find.

These two pieces of paper are the receipts with the kids’ schedules for their swimming classes. I have signed them each up for 4 sessions of 4 weeks each. Each session, the schedule changes. One session just ended. The next one begins on Thursday. Thank God I had enough foresight to put that second session in my calendar on my iPhone. But I didn’t put in the following sessions, because…Jesus, this is so convoluted and it only gets worse…although I have SIGNED THE KIDS UP, there is no guarantee that they will actually BE in those classes.

Here’s the deal: Pudding is signed up for consecutive progress in his classes. He just passed Guppies and now he is moving on to Level 1. I also have him signed up for Level 2 and Level 3 for the next 2 sessions. But if he doesn’t PASS Level 1, I will have to go back to the aquatics director and try to find space in the class he needs to repeat.

So this is why I did not put all of the schedules in the calendar, but now, I have NO idea what fucking times or days the kids are signed up for.

I know. You’re thinking, easy peasy, call the folks at Ye Olde Boys and Girls Club and have them look it up on the computer.

Yes. It would make SUCH perfect sense.

Except that these idiots HAVE YET TO COMPUTERIZE THEIR FUCKING SCHEDULING SYSTEM. So when I go in there and say, hey, my kids are signed up for classes but I am a dumb fuck and lost the receipt with the days and times so can you please tell me when they are, they are going to pull out some big ass scheduling books that they write in BY HAND, and they will have to go THROUGH those books – BY HAND – and look on each page of each class to see when the hell my kids are supposed to be in class.

Do you see why I thought it would be easier if I found the damn receipts?

But clearly I was wrong. Because I have spent – let me repeat this – ALL FUCKING DAY – like a 9 to 5 JOB – looking for these two papers.

That…was number one.

Also with the swimming, Punksin was unfortunate enough to be waitlisted for her next class, because by the time I went through their absolutely INSANE lottery system – I can’t even BEGIN to explain THAT to you – that class was full. She passed her class and is now supposed to be in Level 4. She is first on the waitlist for the Level 4 class on Thursday. LAST Thursday they told me they would call me on Tuesday – TODAY – to let me know if they could fit her in, because someone ELSE in the class wanted to move OUT.

No call.

So I call them. The same woman I spoke to did that “oh, yeah! I need to call them” thing that let me know she had completely dropped the ball on the entire thing. She said she would call the other family to see if they still wanted to move out, and call me right back.

That was 5 hours ago.

Love her. Really.

So, foul mood fully established, I’m chatting with a friend of mine on FB and she dropped the bomb on me that she and her husband are getting DIVORCED. That kicked my ass in the nuts. (I know, that makes NO sense whatsoever, but I like how it sounds so I’m KEEPING IT AND FUCK YOU.) They have 3 kids. They moved to Virginia for his job. We’re not in close touch all the time but still, I was sort of floored and, again, because I FORGOT TO TAKE MY MEDS, it made me instantly sad enough to cry. Because SHE’S sad and upset and tense and I just HATE that.

Then The Tech Guru comes home and informs me that he has had a SHITLOAD of work dropped in his lap and I should be happy, but…tonight, I’m not. I just want to curl up under him and have a good cry and fall asleep watching a shitty movie on TV. Instead, he’s working his ass off and I’m here watching Punksin fall asleep, and she’s telling me it’s too bright in here, and I’m telling her to CLOSE HER FUCKING EYES, and she says all pissy that it’s the MOON. Like I can FUCKING CONTROL THE MOON. I think I’ll just take my shotgun out and SHOOT THAT SHIT OUT OF THE SKY.

I’m so sad, I don’t even want a drink.

Who AM I?

I know this will pass. I know the goddamn swimming thing will get resolved. I know – at least I pray – that my friend will reach a happier place in her life, but I know it’s so tough on her right now with 3 kids under age 8. But I just feel sad for her, and sad that life sometimes has to be shitty and unhappy. And I know this is all INCREDIBLY stupid shit to complain about when so much is going on in the world of far more importance. I know this. I’m not asking you to any pity parties because I know tomorrow is another day and most likely with a good night of sleep, I’ll feel a lot better.

But right now, I feel…sad. And I just had to let some of it out.

Sigh.

Good night.

“Can I have a raisin crisp?”

“I’m busy right now, sweetie – give me a minute.”

Five minutes go by.

“Mom. Can I have a raisin crisp?”

“Now that I think of it, didn’t you JUST have breakfast? Wait a little while, you’re being a little piggie.”

He giggles and walks away.

ONE MINUTE LATER…

“Can I have a raisin crisp?”

“PUDDING. I said NOT RIGHT NOW. When it’s snack time, you can have some.”

I swear, it’s about TWO MINUTES and this kid COMES BACK like fucking Michael Myers in Halloween.

“Mom, can I have a raisin crisp?”

I glare at him. “You JUST ASKED me this. I said WAIT. When it is snack time, I will GIVE YOU THE RAISIN CRISPS.”

Five minutes later. Little footsteps. AGAIN.

“Can I have the raisin crisp now?”

“Did I NOT JUST ANSWER you? How many times are you going to ask me this question? GO SIT DOWN.”

Now I’m counting and it’s 45 seconds, I SWEAR to you, it’s 45 SECONDS and he’s in front of me AGAIN.

“Is it time yet? Can I have the raisin crisp?”

I don’t answer him. I don’t look at him. I love him to fucking pieces but right now at this minute, I am trying to pretend he does not even exist. But, remembering that I have taught him that it is rude not to answer someone when they ask you a question – even if they’ve already asked the same question A MILLION FUCKING TIMES – I sigh.

“No, it is not time. Please. Go. Sit. Down.”

My temple is throbbing and even though I have just told him that we just had breakfast, I’m already contemplating a drink. Now it is two minutes and here come those little footsteps AGAIN. It’s like a fucking nightmare.

“Mom -”

“No, you cannot have the raisin crisps. Go sit down.”

I don’t even know what the hell I’m looking at on the computer anymore. I hear him chatting with his sister for 1 minute and 32 seconds, and then lo and behold, here he comes! AGAIN!

“Mom -”

“PUDDING. ENOUGH. IF YOU ASK ME ONE MORE TIME FOR THOSE [FUCKING] RAISIN CRISPS, YOU WILL NOT. GET. ANY. RAISIN. CRISPS. EVER.” (I did not say fucking, you understand, but you better believe that’s what I was thinking.)

“But Mom,” he protests, “I wasn’t going to ASK you for a raisin crisp.”

I close my eyes and sigh. “Okay, then. What is it?”

“What’s a raisin crisp?”

I look at him. He looks at me, the picture of innocence and seriousness. He REALLY WANTS TO KNOW WHAT A RAISIN CRISP IS. Seriously.

I start to laugh. He starts to giggle, and before you know it tears are running down my face and I am holding my stomach as he grins and cracks up. Finally, when I’ve reached the point where I can hardly breathe for laughing so hard, I get up, go into the kitchen and show him the box.

“These,” I say, pointing to the picture on the box, “are raisin crisps.”

“Oh.”

And then, ”Can I have some?”

I Was Tortured For These

I smirk at him. I know I am beaten. I hand him the box.

He smiles at me and walks away.

Goddamn 4-year old terrorist ninja. I love him.

I’ve been thinking about doing it. Mainly because I’d like to see if there’s really any point.

It LOOKS nice…but…then what?

If you are clueless as to what vajazzing is, it’s when a woman gets waxed down there and then puts some design down there in Swarovski crystals or some shit. Down there, of course, being the va-jay-jay, or vagina.

I mean, it can look nice. But it doesn’t last very long, about a week or so, and I’m thinking, okay, you get these Swarovski things stuck on you, and then you have sex, and can’t either the friction or the sweat make those suckers come right off even earlier than they normally would have? In which case, you’ve wasted a lot of money and are now walking around with a half-assed looking design on your vagina.

At least it's more private than having "Juicy" across the ass of your pants.

So…I don’t know.

The other thing, and I found this actually more fascinating, was dying the pubic hair. Not like your normal hair color, but shocking pink or electric blue.

That, I could get with a little more.

There is actually a product called Betty Beauty made specifically for coloring pubic hair. They have your typical hair shades if you’re just trying to match the hair on your head or cover some grays. But then they have some really way out there colors: green, red, pink, blue and lilac. THOSE are the ones I’d go for. It’s not like the whole world is seeing it – if you’re going to go down this road in the first place, why not have fun with it?

I’m thinking blue, since it’s my favorite color. I’ll get back to you on that. Unfortunately, I will be unable to post pictures if I decide to go ahead – I draw the line at posting pix of my private parts, sorry, but…I’ll tell you how I feel about it, how’s that? And also how the Tech Guru feels about it.

Now if someone would just make a glow-in-the-dark version…

Tonight, I took Punksin to her Girl Scout meeting. Pudding wanted to go to and I had said he could go, mainly because the plan was to surprise Punksin during the meeting with some cupcakes to celebrate her birthday, which is coming up. This whole fabulous plan I had in my head did not happen, because last night I went out with my sister and only went to the supermarket on the way home, missing closing time by 9 fucking minutes, and then today when I was supposed to go out and buy the cupcakes, I changed my mind – which is another way of saying I fell asleep on the couch when I was supposed to go to the store and by the time I woke up we were 10 minutes late in leaving for Girl Scouts. Sayonara, cupcakes.

Although falling asleep on the couch instead of buying cupcakes for my beloved daughter is an excellent reason to feel like a douchebag – that’s not it. It’s not anything I did to Punksin OR Pudding, its what I did to myself.

So we got to Girl Scouts and of course the minute we arrived, Punksin ran off giggling with her friends and there I was with Pudding, who was only 10 seconds in the room and already sporting that “I’m-so-bored-I-would-shoot-myself-in-the-foot-just-for-some-fucking-excitement-around-here” look – as though I dragged his ass there. So I told him to pull out his iPod, because the last thing I saw him doing as we rushed around like chickens without heads to get the hell out of the house, was shoving his iPod into his coat pocket.

“I don’t have it,” he said.

“What do you mean, you don’t have it,” I replied, which now, as I think of it, is really one of the stupidest things people say, because we know exactly what we heard, but we’re just hoping that by repeating it, we’re reciting some magical incantation that opens up the space-time continuum so that we can go back and relive the moment except this time the person will say something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT and more in keeping with what you hoped they said in the first place, which in my case would be something along the lines of “my iPod is in my pocket.”

Of course, that is so not what happened, and instead Pudding said, “It couldn’t fit in my pocket.” That was a real fucking bummer, because it meant that I had to keep him entertained for the next hour and a half. Of course you know what that meant.

My iPhone.

Which meant I had to add games to my iPhone on the spot because I don’t keep lots of kiddy games on my phone wasting my valuable space. That’s why the kids EACH HAVE THEIR OWN IPOD. But noooooo, he had to leave his at home, which meant I had to lend him my phone, which meant no texting, no checking scores on ESPN, no checking my Ebay auctions, and no all the other bullshit totally awesome stuff I like to sit and do while waiting for Punksin to scout shit out or whatever the fuck they do in Girl Scouts.

So I resigned myself to my temporary but oh-so-painful loss and handed the iPhone to Pudding. Then I remembered that I had my Kindle in my bag. Good shit! I can read something, I thought. I pulled out the Kindle and read the latest blog post from my girl Jenny on the Block, who is NOT J-Ho but The Bloggess, and I’m reading some totally randsom shit she wrote about robot tigers which is totally up my alley because robots are cool and tigers are of one of my FAVORITE ANIMALS EVER and…

the fucking Kindle dies.

Awesome.

Then, a huge lightbulb went on over my head. Actually it was more like the lightbulb hit me in the head while yelling “you stupid, stupid IDIOT,” because it occurred to me that what I should be doing when I have free moments like this, is not Ebaying or texting or reading or wondering why pouring my tea over my cereal to kill 2 birds with one stone ever seemed like a good idea. What I should be doing…

is writing.

I mean, I’m a fucking writer, right? DUH.

So I rooted around in my bag and found a pen, which felt like a major accomplishment actually, because I have so often been caught out there without a pen in my bag when I should always have one handy, but now I have upped my game and HAVE A FUCKING PEN.

But – no paper.

NO FUCKING PAPER. No notebook, no pad, nothing.

This is the point at which I started to feel like a douchebag, both because my writing had not been the first thing to come to mind when I was trying to figure out what to do with myself, and because when it finally did occur to me, I was unprepared to actually ACT on it. What was I going to write on, the palm of my hand?

But I refused to be deterred by any apparent douchebagness. As you know, my moon is sitting in the house of I AM TOTALLY FUCKING AWESOME. So I decided to go on a Quest for Paper. I capitalized that because I want you to know that this was not just me on a minor errand rooting around for scraps of paper, but more of a LIFE QUEST TO SALVAGE MY WRITERHOOD. Or WRITERDOM. Whichever one sounds better to you, that’s the one I was going for.

With all that said, I still figured that this would be an easy and quickly completed Quest. I mean, I’m looking for PAPER, and the Girl Scout meetings are held in a SCHOOL.  How hard could this possibly be?

I left Pudding playing some game on MY iPHONE, something involving hurling ragdolls at different targets, and started my Quest.

The halls weren’t dark, but the classrooms were, and except for the cafeteria where the Girl Scouts were, the school was deserted. So, because this is HOW I ROLL, I immediately started wondering if there was a psychotic murderer lurking on the premises, waiting in some darkened classroom for me to enter so he could carve an X in my forehead or nail me to a blackboard or something. Yes, there could definitely be a pscyho…

or a VELOCIRAPTOR.

Possibly Lurking In A Classroom to Kill You

That made the whole Quest thing a lot more exciting, but exciting without fear, because I knew that no matter what, I was coming out alive, A, because this was my movie, and B, because I wasn’t going to be stupid enough to go into a dark classroom before TURNING ON THE LIGHTS FIRST. I have never been able to understand this in movies, where people go bumbling around in the dark, yelling stupid shit like “hellooooooo!” and “YOOhoo!!”, as if being friendly is going to make everything okay with the psycho. OR the velociraptor. I mean, velociraptors can’t even TALK.  And most psychos aren’t so interested in chatting. I mean, look at Michael Myers. Not exactly the world’s most sparkling conversationalist. And who can blame him? What’s the point of becoming friends with someone if you’re about to string them up on a meat hook?

I was determined not to be the dumb chick wandering around in the dark and falling down just so she could get stabbed to death. I was going to turn on the lights in every room I entered, and the first thing that moved was getting shanked.

God help the 1st grade guinea pig.

The first classroom I went into was, of all things, a music room. Lots of music texts and instruments and music stands.

No fucking paper.

Of ALL THE CLASSROOMS IN THE SCHOOL, I pick the ONE that has ZERO PAPER in it. My fucking luck. Then I realized that it also had no psychos or velociraptors, so maybe all in all, I was still ahead. Alive counts for something.

The next classroom was some sort of language/speech therapy room. Lots of toys. Filing cabinet with…more toys. A bookcase that really should have been called…a toycase. Toys, toys, everywhere, it was like I had walked into Santa’s workshop at the North Pole. But, as I turned to leave, I noticed a small copier by the door, with “Personal Property of XXX” emblazoned on it with a permanent Sharpie marker.

And in that copier…there was PAPER. So…

I stole borrowed some.

So, all in all, I managed to get some writing done, and in the process did a lot of good and creative thinking about how I would make shit go down if some psycho was running around in a school.

Or a velociraptor.

Or….

A PSYCHOTIC VELOCIRAPTOR.

Possibilities

Yesterday the kids were taking their swimming lessons at the Boys & Girls Club. I got them in lessons at the same time, and it’s awesome: Pudding is on the shallow end of the pool learning how to swim while Punksin is on the other deep end refining her breaststroke and learning to dive.

I was sitting there watching them with the Tech Guru and thinking how incredible and wonderful they are. I absolutely LOVE MY KIDS. They are just so great – such amazing, positive energy, such gifts. And they are GROWING…so fast. Punksin is right up under my armpits – and not even 8 years old yet! And Pudding’s head is just level with my waistline. They are just growing in height, in intelligence, just growing.

I turned to the Tech Guru.

“Do you want another one?” I asked.

He watched Punksin as she floated on her back, practicing a stroke.

“I don’t know,” he answered after a few seconds.

“What do you mean, you don’t KNOW? It’s either YES, or NO. Either you DO, or you DON’T. Which one is it?” I persisted. Yes. I am an annoying little fuck sometimes. I know this.

“I don’t know,” he repeated, still watching Punksin kicking on the far side of the pool.

“There’s no right or wrong answer, you know,” I said.

“I don’t know. It means…I’m good either way. I’m good if we have another one, and I’m good if we don’t.”

Okay. That made a little more sense to me.

I looked at Pudding, who was paddling around happily on a baby boogie board, learning how to use his arms and hands in kiddy freestyle. I watched him and although he is still small all of a sudden it hit me how big he is getting and it seemed absolutely impossible that he is almost 5, that it’s been that long since he was my little baby Pudding with the cutest round head EVER that was completely bald of the beautiful dark ash blonde curls he has now. How could he have gotten big so fast?

Over on the other side of the pool, Punksin was being asked to demonstrate a stroke because THAT’S HOW FUCKING AWESOME she is. The Tech Guru hadn’t taken his eyes off her.

“What if…” I said, trailing off. I took a deep breath. “What if…what if I wanted to have one? Would you do it?”

He turned to look at me. “Yes.”

And then he turned back to Punksin.

I stared at him. “You would?”

“Yes.”

“You really would? If I decided yes, I definitely 100% want to have a baby, you’d do it for me?”

He looked at me again, almost as though he couldn’t understand why I couldn’t understand how simple this was for him. “You’re an awesome mother. I’m an awesome dad. We have awesome kids. If you really want another one, yes. I would.”

I leaned on his shoulder and smiled, feeling my eyes get watery at the knowledge that even if he might not care one way or the other, if it’s what I want – let’s go.  He believes in me, he believes in himself, and he believes in us and our ability not only to HAVE a child, but to make sure that child is the best person it can be.

I do understand what he means about being on the fence. There’s so much I miss. I miss the babyhood, the fatness, the cuteness. I miss the nursing, watching a baby fall asleep as I nurture it, feeling the hormones coursing through my body and calming me down. I miss changing diapers, I know, it sounds crazy, but I NEVER hated changing diapers.

And I miss being pregnant. It was a joy to me to be pregnant, to know that there was a life growing inside. Feeling it move was like getting a glimpse of God, this miracle that another totally different spirit and human was living and growing inside of me, feeling it move and turn – it was so wonderful.  I was never unaware that within me moved a miracle.

I’m always amazed to hear women complain so much about pregnancy. I loved it. I loved how I felt, I loved how I looked, and most importantly, I loved the miracle. It was the miracle of it that awed me, that I was always mindful of – there was a PERSON in there. Of course like most moms, I wanted the pregnancy to end so I could meet the baby, but I also loved having both of my children in the womb, connecting with them inside, talking to them, reading to them, playing footsie with them, and just marveling at all of it.

Having said all of that, I know that no matter how many children you have, they do all eventually grow up. They don’t stay babies forever. At some point, I will have to let that phase of my life go and live with the memories as the children I reminisce about move towards adulthood and their destinies.

The other factor is, we are slowly getting to the point where we can do more active things together as a family – things like skiiing, or surfing, or rock climbing, or snorkeling or diving or kayaking. The Tech Guru and I cannot wait to be able to do those things with Pudding and Punksin. Adding another munchkin to the mix puts a severe dent in that plan…as it stands now, if I were able to get pregnant right now, Punksin would be 8 by the time a baby arrived, Pudding 5. We’d be doing a whole lot more waiting – and then as Munchkin # 3 got to that point, Punksin would be almost ready for college.

And of course, I’m getting older now. Who knows if I’m even able to get pregnant easily? Pudding and Punksin were both one-shot deals – hubby and I talked about having a baby, and then made one on the first try, BOTH TIMES. I can even remember exactly WHERE in our house each baby was conceived and in what POSITION, that’s how tightly our conception plans came together. It got to the point where we would joke about it: “Don’t breathe on me, I might get pregnant.” “Don’t drink from my glass, I might get pregnant.” 

We’ve been pretty blessed in that respect, and thus far I have no reason to think now would be any different. The Tech Guru is incredibly healthy and virile, and I’m still menstruating like crazy…but I AM 42. Do I want to try again, for what would be the last time? Or am I ready to let that go forever?

Now I think I understand the “I don’t know” part, because I’m not terribly sure of my answer either. But what moved me more than anything as we sat on that bench watching the two blessed children we have,  was the Tech Guru’s faith in me, and his willingness to make me happy and go down that road with me again if I decide to.  I just felt awed once again by the amount of love he has for me. It was both humbling and exhilarating. This was the love that brought our children into the world, this love right here, this love that is fearless and full of faith that no matter what we put our minds and efforts to, whether it is having a child or any number of other “projects,” we will get it done, get it done right, and excel at it.

I have some thinking to do, clearly. If I do, I’m trying for another summer baby, which means waiting until at least August to start trying. That also means I’ll be 43 when a baby would arrive.

It’s a lot to think about, but right now, I’m basking in that simple “Yes” from the Tech Guru.

Okay, you’re back or you read it already.

I had a little more to say. That usually happens, in case you didn’t notice. Upon further thought, I just wanted to clarificate some very important parts. (Yes. I just made up a new word. Unless George Bush said it first, which is highly possible.)

After having gone on and on about saving yourself and loving yourself, I want to be clear that that does not mean, in political campaign parlance, “going negative.” Are we clear on that? This is not about that AT ALL.

I don’t hate my mom. I don’t hate anyone who doesn’t appreciate me or love me. I feel sorry for them to some extent, but even that can be a form of ego, and I don’t want to get too invested in that. And I want to be sure you don’t get too invested in that either.

What I do want you to understand and act on when necessary, is that sometimes people are in your life for a reason. Maybe you have something to teach them. Maybe they have something to teach you. Unfortunately, the way life most often seems to work is that we learn the most lessons from our more negative experiences, and if we don’t learn the lesson, we keep getting it thrown at us over and over until we do learn it. So the important thing is to find the lesson in your experiences, and apply it to bettering yourself.

The other thing to be aware of is that once you have learned the lesson, you can often let go of the teacher. Life is a school of sorts. Some teachers are with us for the long haul, teaching us new things about ourselves and life. They grow with us. They are similar to the Sifu in martial arts, a lifelong master who imparts new knowledge once we have mastered the previous lesson.

But then there are teachers who are there to teach you one or two things, and then there’s not really much more to be gotten from them. These are more like your kindergarten teachers or your algebra teachers – they have something very specific to give you and once their job is done, you need to move on. As my sister said to me yesterday, some ropes just need cutting, and if you haven’t cut them yet they will keep dangling in your face. You need to know when to cut the rope.

The hard part can be telling which teacher a person is. Take a parent, for instance. In most cases, one would think of a parent as a Sifu. And most often they are. Even in my case, I do think of my parents as Sifus of sorts, but the methods by which the universe is teaching me through them is decidedly… unconventional. I am learning by their absence as opposed to their presence. I am learning through their indifference as opposed to their love. But…I am still learning.

But in other cases, and romantic relationships is what really comes to mind, you learn about yourself, you grow, and then you often need to let go and move on. The worst thing you can do is cling to something that is really not for you anymore. You’re holding yourself back – and in many cases, you may be holding the other person back too.

I think about that with my mother. Is it also better for her that I am not around? I have to think so, but in some ways it doesn’t matter, I suppose, because it’s nothing I can change, for one, and also, as selfish as it may sound, I can’t be too terribly concerned with her spiritual path and progress. I mean, of course I care; I pray for her constantly, for her enlightenment, her progress, her peace. But I have no control over whether or not other people learn their lessons, especially when I, as merely another traveler, have no idea what those lessons even are. I do wish the best for others, but I can’t help them get where they need to go at my own expense.

Here’s a not-so-secret secret: the way the universe works, whatever is good and right for you, will be right for others too, which means that if someone is not supposed to be in your life…you are not supposed to be in theirs. And if someone is supposed to be in your life, well, the universe will put them there. They will find a way to be around you. If someone is not around you because they’re too busy/don’t like you/won’t make the effort/don’t respect you/don’t love you/can’t stand you/have too many other concerns…well, as I always say, people put effort into the things that are important to them. If you’re not important to someone, then you need to (say it with me now): SAVE YOURSELF. Relationships take two people committed to being respectful of each other’s feelings and MAKING THE EFFORT TO SHOW LOVE AND RESPECT. This does not only go for romances; it goes for friendships, siblings, parent/child, best friends, ANY RELATIONSHIP WITH TWO PEOPLE.  If you are the only one doing the work… then that person and the universe is telling you something. Listen.

When Punksin was born, I spent money on a private detective to find my father to tell him he had a granddaughter. In hindsight, that was the silliest and most naive thing I could have done, but it was a gesture born of desperation and unrealistic hopes. The man had never cared about having a DAUGHTER – why would I think his granddaughter would all of a sudden elevate our relationship to what I always wanted it to be? I found him, I told him, we spoke for a couple of weeks – and then he disappeared again. I had done all the work, and he was doing, as he had done for my entire life, nothing. That is not a relationship. That’s masochism of the first order. I was angry for a long time after that, a very long time. Which did me absolutely no good and just caused more pain.

I just wanted to be clear because so often when we are hurting, we do tend to get angry, and lash out. That’s natural and that’s human.  But it’s so much better for us if we can overcome that. We heal faster when we embrace positive energy instead of negative. We grow faster. We move onward and upward. Saving yourself and leaving someone behind you can be done with thanks to the universe for the lessons you learned, and with a hopeful face towards your own future. Even if you feel you have been wronged, save yourself, and then be at peace. It’s always hard to remove hurtful things from life – we can make ourselves accustomed to the pain people give us when we’re scared of total rejection – but wasting time and energy with anger after those things are already gone is…pointless at best, more hurtful at worst.

Save yourself from everything negative – even yourself. Be at peace.

Be at peace.

My Life

At least…my life is.

Somewhat.

I have highs…

And then I have lows. Unfortunately for me, my lows are pretty effing low. I mean, dig down 6 feet into the ground low.

My aunt recently had a birthday party, and I was all gung-ho to help her celebrate but then when the party actually happened…

I hit one of my lows. A very, very bad low.

I think the worst part, the absolute worst part when it all hit me, was after we blew out the candles, and I hugged her, and we hugged and hugged and hugged and she just…knew. I started to cry a little right there on her shoulder and she wouldn’t let me go and I knew that…she just knew.

This was two weeks ago; I didn’t want to write about it yet because I was still dealing with it internally. Again, I am amazed at how you think you have dealt with something and put it behind you, only to have it come and SMACK you upside the head all over again. And it doesn’t hurt any less the second time. Or the third, or the fourth. It’s just the same ass-whupping.

But I have started to realize ONE very very important thing and this has been so major for me: the pain hurts, oh yes indeedy, it does. But…

The recovery…is getting faster.

Now, I don’t know that the Tech Guru would agree. He has to deal with me during the aftermath of my regressions, when I’m moping and miserable and snapping and chugging away at bottles of medicine like they’re candy. And God bless him, because… he doesn’t snap back. He doesn’t get angry. He doesn’t pull away from me and make it two of us stewing in our own pots of confusion. Really, we can’t have two people being crazy and insecure and mental up in here. That shit will NOT WORK. So I feel incredibly blessed that I have someone who gets me, who understands my freakouts and knows when to let shit ride, and when to draw me in and hug me and tell me how fucking awesome I am.

And maybe it’s in great part due to that, that the recovery is getting faster. I spiral…but I stop. I need less anxiety meds. Oh, I needed some at my aunt’s party and drove home rather high, but…overall, I feel my mental and emotional state improving.

I hesitate to even write this here, because whenever I do, whenever I make note of my progress, SOMETHING fucks up my equilibrium. A photo, a memory, a song – and I feel myself losing it again.

But although I realize that I cannot suppress my feelings, I have decided that it is just not worth it to go down that road of self-doubt and anger and pain. Anyone who makes me go down that road is not worth my emotional tribute. Anyone. And you get to the point where you realize that there are people you love dearly…but you just don’t get along, or you just don’t understand each other. I realized that about my mother in high school. Loved her to death but me and her, without anyone else in our family to act as buffers between us, was a lethal freaking combo. Then I realized in my 20s that although I love her to death…I didn’t really LIKE her very much. I know…it sounds terrible. I know. But the further and further into my adulthood I have gone, the more and more she has treated me like shit. There are people like that. You love them, but you need to let them GO before they make you insane. Because as much as you love them…your life is actually better, without them.

It can be really really hard to admit that, especially about people you love and care about very deeply. When my mother first stopped speaking to me in 2004, I was a wreck. She wrote me a terribly nasty letter that I still have, and I will never forget going to pick up Punksin from nursery school, right after receiving this toxic letter and reading it, and sitting out front in the car crying for about half an hour before I could gather my shit together to go inside. How could the woman who had given birth to me speak to me this way? What had I done to warrant such cruelty, to be told she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me?

So…I tried to pick up the pieces and move on. But it hurt like hell to feel that utter rejection, that betrayal of that bond, that loss of someone you thought would love you FOREVER. It hurt, oh yes, it hurt.

But then…sometime, several months later, it dawned on me…that now that I was no longer having the tense conversations and the misunderstandings and the walking around on eggshells, my quality of life had actually…IMPROVED.

I remember feeling guilty about admitting that to myself, that life was actually BETTER. I mean, she was my mother, for God’s sake. She was supposed to be in my life.

Right?

Now…I don’t know. Maybe she did me a favor cutting me off. It still hurts, but you know what? If she were AROUND, I wouldn’t be hurting any less. Probably more, as a matter of fact. So either way, this relationship is going to be painful for me, that’s clear. But, because I am NOT dealing with her, it hurts me only at those times when the loss seeps in once again – which is often enough, but still a lot less than if I were speaking to her weekly or daily. Eventually, with time, pain fades. We’ve all seen that.

So there’s my lesson for you, people. There may be some people you love dearly, be it family, boyfriend, best friend, whatever, about whom you realize that as much as you LOVE them, you just are… better off without them as a presence in your life. Maybe they bring too much drama. Maybe they cause YOU to bring drama and act completely unlike yourself because of how fucked up they make you feel. Or maybe you don’t bring the drama, but you keep the tension inside and it’s just festering there because you are stifling your feelings in order to keep this person happy. People that make you feel like this can be so hard to let go of because you care about them, because you love them, because you feel obligated, because they’re family, or because you feel like you don’t just walk out on someone that is so important to you.

And that’s all true. Relationships are important, and worth fostering and working on, especially familial ones. But you can’t be the only one doing the work. If you are constantly being made to feel unimportant, constantly having to swallow your thoughts and feelings, constantly putting yourself out there to make someone else feel good while they do little to reciprocate, constantly reaching out only to be rebuffed or ignored, constantly riding a roller coaster of emotions wondering IF you are loved and appreciated and respected, then at some point, you have to SAVE YOURSELF. This doesn’t mean you have to stop loving the person, or that you should start holding anger or negativity towards them, because even that will eat away at you. What it IS about, is loving yourself enough to SAVE yourself from whatever is not benefiting you or bringing you peace and happiness. No matter WHAT, or WHO, that is.

It is okay to LOVE yourself, and SAVE yourself. Sometimes you have to do the saving, and walk away. Sometimes the universe will help out and make something happen to sever the relationship and you fight it until you wake up and realize that this is actually what’s better for you. SAVE YOURSELF. SAVE YOUR HEART, SAVE YOUR SPIRIT, and SAVE YOUR LOVE for those who LOVE YOU BACK, not just in words, but in how they TREAT YOU.

Love is like show and tell: it’s not just words, but actions, that prove love. Take a long hard look at whatever relationship you are thinking about: take away whatever they’ve said about loving you, and pretend it’s a mime show. Have their ACTIONS said love? Do they DO things to show you they love you? When you try to communicate your feelings, do they respond? And how? And after all of that has been answered, how do you feel about those answers? Overall, when all is said and done, do you FEEL loved? Or ignored? Or disrespected? Or afraid? Or unsure? Or used? Or dominated? Fuck what they say to you – how does this person make you FEEL?

I have such a beautiful life. I have a husband that adores me even now, 15 years into our relationship. Sometimes it’s hard to believe it’s been that long because he looks at me with the same love, affection and lust that I saw in his eyes 15 years ago. His eyes and his actions tell me that I am loved, that I am sexy, that I am intelligent, that I am appreciated, that I am adored. He tells me…he tells me I’m special – and he makes me believe it, that I’m special to HIM and I’m special as a person and that if other people can’t see it and appreciate it, they are crazy. He truly fucking believes this shit. (I know, he’s crazy, isn’t he?) My two sisters from another mother, God knows how much closer I have become to them these days as I have poured out my heart and frustrations, and THEY make me feel loved, listening, understanding, consoling, advising, BEING THERE. They SHOW me love. I know they love me. Today one of them said to me, “I wish you could see what other people see – that you are so strong and beautiful.” And it made me want to cry. Because I’d like to think so, not in a conceited way but I’d like to think that I am a beautiful, very loving person, but some people just take and take and give so little back that it just fucks with your head and makes you feel anything BUT strong. They sap your strength and make you wonder what is wrong with you that they can’t or won’t love you.

But only for a time, as my grandmother says – only for a time. Because that’s not fair to the people that DO love me. My husband loves me. My sisters love me. My aunt loves me. My nana loves me. My kids love me. And I am not going to let ANYONE FUCK UP THE KIND OF LOVE I CAN GIVE to these people. I demand a lot, because I GIVE a lot. But I’m only giving it to those who GIVE IT BACK, and I’m only giving my emotional energy to those who GIVE IT BACK. POSITIVELY.

This rollercoaster is a hell of a ride, let me tell you. But with each go around, I’m cowering less and less and coming back into who I  used to be and who I really really AM – the crazy chick in the front seat, laughing loudly, hair flying, hands waving in the air, enjoying her life and the people in it. The one that LOVES THE PEOPLE WHO DESERVE IT, AND LOVES LIFE, LIKE THERE’S NO TOMORROW. The one – that feels loved. Because by some people…

she truly truly is.

It is a 5K, but it is not your average 5K. Not by a long shot.

There are mud swamps, and tunnels to run through, and barbed wire – all in all, about 21 military-style obstacles to overcome, at the end of which you are tired as hell and completely covered in mud.

This

sounds

AWESOME.

One of many obstacles in Rebel Race - YEAH BABY!

Mud. Crazy sweaty people running obstacles like insane Marines (who actually sponsor the race). This is fucking AWESOME! I mean, who would NOT do this?

The kids are pissed because you’re not allowed to run the race unless you’re 11 or over, and I can certainly see why. It’s absolutely crazy out there. But what I like about it is that, unlike most 5Ks, its not about your time, and you’re not even really competing against other people. People actually help each other out on the course, it’s this we’re-all-in-it-together attitude which is really helpful when your ass is hanging from a rope 10 feet off the ground and you can’t find the strength to pull yourself up any further.

What this race IS about…is mental stamina, and toughness. And just STICKING TO IT and getting it DONE.

And I love that. I don’t care if I’m the last person to crawl across the damn finish line, to be able to say I tackled this insane course and finished it will be an accomplishment in itself.

The Tech Guru is totally on board (love it!) but, alas…we’ve run into a slight snag.

Every year for the past 7 years, he has run the Teterboro 5K. That’s another race that’s about mental toughness, because even though it’s a flat 5K with no hills and no obstacles, it’s run on the tarmac of Teterboro Airport.

In July.

You know when asphalt gets those waves of heat rising up that you can actually see? That’s what happens at this race. And of course, being that it’s on an airport runway, there’s no shade to speak of. ANYWHERE.

The first year he ran the race, it was about 90 degrees outside by 8:30 in the morning. It was so brutal that they had a fire truck following the runners and dousing them with water every mile or so, so that people wouldn’t pass the hell out. The Tech Guru’s time was not the greatest, but neither was anyone else’s who ran that race – except, of course, for the Kenyans and Ethiopians, who run that race like if they’re going out for a jog to pick up the morning paper and some coffee.

But it has become a rite of passage every year to run that race, and although no year has proven to be quite as hellish as that first year was, it’s the one race I make sure to sign him up for every year.

Well, lo and behold! Rebel Race is on the SAME DAY AS THE TETERBORO 5K.

So…we have some thinking to do. Do we stick with tradition, or break the streak and attack something new?

Well, I am not running Teterboro, no way in hell. I’d get bored out of whatever mind I have left running on an aesthetically dull runway, and he knows that. The other thing is, we are constantly constantly talking about how to achieve more mentally and physically – we can go on about that for hours, especially after we’ve watched some documentary on the untapped mind or the limits of the human body, or seen a movie like The Matrix or Ip Man. So I think that, as a new challenge, something else to conquer, this is right up his alley and mine.

Something to conquer. I just realized – that pretty much defines my modus operandi for 2012.

I am CONQUERING shit.

ARE YOU WITH ME?

Or are you going to keep doing the same crap? Whatever that crap is?

You know what they say…you can’t keep doing the same shit and expect different results. Life just doesn’t work that way.

There’s going to be a lot of new things happening this year, with me personally and with the blog. So stay tuned, and stay with me.

And get out there and CONQUER SOMETHING.

I fell asleep with the kids around 9:00. Passed right the hell out.

When I woke up, it was after 1:00 and the room was pitch black. So I picked up my iPhone and saw a message from the Tech Guru asking “R u asleep?”

I wrote back, “Yes, and so are you,” because he was right next to me in the bed. Har de har har!!

Now how was I supposed to know that when he gets text messages his phone does some weird quacking duck shit or whatever? So 5 seconds after I text him, the room turns into a fucking duck hunt and I’m sitting there frozen like…oops!

This was in my bedroom, I swear

That goes on for a few seconds and then…silence.

Nothing happens. Nobody moves. Whew.

Now how was I supposed to know that he gets TWO TEXT ALERTS, just in case he misses the FIRST one? After about another 10 seconds or so the goddamn ducks come back and start that racket again.

You see, me, I don’t get alerted about anything. Including phone calls. My phone is permanently silent. I have to be actually LOOKING AT THE PHONE to know if anyone is calling, texting, or whatever. The only thing I turn on sound for is for the Ebay alerts that tell me I have 5 minutes left on something I’m watching. (Which reminds me,  I missed bidding on a dress while I was passed out and I am so pissed, I hope they relist it, it was AWESOME. FUCK.) But, that’s IT. Oh, and of course I turn the phone on for those few rare moments when my children are in someone else’s care. Otherwise, I don’t even do vibrate. As Pudding would put it, I am a fucking stealth ninja, yo!

Anyhow, as this second round of duck season is going on, the huge mound of pillows next to me erupts and a hand reaches forth like something out of a horror movie. It gropes around for the phone, finds it, and pulls it back into the grave of pillows.

A few seconds later, a head pops up and looks at me.

“Are you kidding me?” the Tech Guru says groggily.

“Hee hee,” is my reply.

He looks at me for a second as if wondering, probably for about the millionth time since I’ve known him, if I have completely lost my fucking mind. Then he leans over, gives me a kiss, mutters “You’re crazy,” and goes back to sleep.

He really shouldn’t be wondering if I’ve lost my mind. He’s been with me long enough to know that that happened a loooonnnng time ago. I mean, come on. YOU know this and you don’t even live here. And I think he’s lost his mind too. I mean, really….DUCKS?

I would say that definitely has to apply with Beyonce and Jay-Z, given all I’ve heard about the prep that went into the arrival of their baby.

I mean, they have lots of cash, and they have the right to spend it however they want, but I think they really crossed a line when they got in the area of INCONVENIENCING OTHER NEW PARENTS.

Parents of preemies and other newborns were not allowed in to see their kids? Or made to run through some gauntlet of security guards that lasted over 20 minutes? WTF? Who made the Carter baby more important than anyone else’s?

Celebs have been having kids since the beginning of celebrity-dom, and most of them go the route of checking in through the back door, using an assumed name and, I don’t know…somehow they seem to do okay.

But that was apparently NOT ENOUGH for Jay-Z and Beyonce, who paid $1.3 MILLION TO RENT OUT AND REDECORATE a suite and BLOCK OFF A FLOOR. They took all the employee cell phones so that no one would snap a picture of Baby Carter, and they TAPED UP THE SECURITY CAMERAS so that there would be no footage of THEM. (And therefore, no footage of anyone else who might enter the hospital intent on doing something crazy to somebody else’s baby.)

I have never been a big Jay-Z fan or Beyonce. I think I have one or two of their songs on my iPod and the rest I couldn’t really give a shit about because frankly, especially when it comes to Beyonce, it all starts to sound the same. But this just turned me off. I mean, really, I’m happy that they have a baby, and I’m happy that it arrived healthy and sound, but the way this was handled just REEKS of self-importance. There was no need for them to take it to that level.

There are some dads out there who were prevented from getting in to see their wives and newborns, and if I were any of them I would SUE THE PANTS off the hospital, Jay-Z, Beyonce AND the goddamn baby. They are lucky as shit that I wasn’t in there giving birth because I would be PISSED AS HELL and LOUD ABOUT IT.  One man said all he wants is an apology. As far as I’m concerned, he’s aiming WAY too low. If these people have $1.3 million to spend on this foolishness, surely they could throw another half mil his way as a way of saying sorry.

And really, for $1.3 million, they could have hired doctors, nurses and all the damn equipment they wanted, and had that baby at HOME or in some PRIVATE PLACE where no one else would have been put out. Do like Brad and Angie – they rented out a hotel in Namibia.  I mean, that seemed a little over the top to me too and I’m sure there might have been other people with plans to stay there, but at least it was (only!) a vacation you were fucking with. Messing with people trying desperately to get in to see their KIDS? NEWBORN KIDS? Some of them in NICU?

Rude.

As I said, never been a big fan to begin with, so I’m sure they won’t miss me, but…I’m done with them.  There’s been quite an outcry over their behavior, but what do you want to bet that their publicists and agents won’t even let them see it or hear about it? Not that they should NEED to…this should never have occurred to them as possible behavior in the first place. But apparently the only way they’ll KNOW that their behavior is disgusting is if people stop buying their branded products, going to their concerts, and treating them as though gold comes out of their asses whenever they sit on the toilet.

And alas, that probably won’t happen.

“Shoes,” I answer.

“Oh.”

Pause.

“Didn’t you just get a pair of boots a few days ago?”

I didn’t answer, mainly because I didn’t trust myself to answer without using some sort of expletive.

Who the fuck is she, the Shoe Police? I think the Tech Guru must have paid her – this is SO something he would say, being the man that he is, you know, the kind that buys one pair of shoes every 10 years or so.

YES. I JUST got a pair of RED BOOTS. SO THE FUCK WHAT?

And WHY should I NOT have these shoes!

I just kept on looking at my shoes. It’s allll good.

Because you know what?

She’s only 7. NOW.

But one day, she’s going to be a teenager. A girl TEENAGER.

And she’s going to want shoes, I know she’s going to want shoes, because she is already into fashion and clothes and makeup and earrings and all that girly crap. She goes into my closet and dolls herself up and she asks me to SAVE CLOTHES for her so that 10 years from now she can sport my stuff. (If she thinks I plan on being decrepit in 10 years she’s got another think coming…I am going to be HOTTER THAN EVER AT 50, goddamnit.)

I don’t let her wear heels or makeup yet and she is just BARELY allowed to wear small clipons but she loves designing and coloring clothes, and playing with apps that allow her to make up a face… oh yeah, she has drunk the Fashionista Kool-Aid.

So when the day comes – because YES! It IS going to come – when I catch her looking at some shoes, or some jeans, or a shirt, for God’s sake it could even be a friggin pair of EARMUFFS, I am going to SCROLL ON BACK THROUGH THE TIMELINE to THIS DAY RIGHT HERE, Sunday, January 8, 2012 and she is going to hear those words ECHOING BACK AT HER THROUGH THE WORMHOLE.

Meditation has been a wonderful thing – it has taught me….

PATIENCE. (BWAH HA HA HA HA!!!!)

HE JUST CANNOT SHUT UP.

He’s about to get fired.

Let me make this very clear: I AM THE WRITER. I WRITE WHAT I WANT, WHEN I WANT. If I want to BEAT SOMETHING INTO THE GROUND, so be it.

HE…is the admin behind the scenes. He makes the site look pretty and adds functions and looks at stats and all that boring crap that is VERY IMPORTANT that I can’t do.

I CONTROL THE CONTENT. So STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO WRITE.

He is actually across from me as I write this and I’ve already yelled this, but I figured I would write it HERE so that we could ALL BE CLEAR ON OUR ROLES HERE.

DON’T

Yes..I can DO this.

EVER

TELL

ME

WHAT

TO

WRITE.

I WILL GET ANGRY. And you wouldn’t LIKE me when I’m angry.

THE

END.

OMG…he’s still talking!

I didn’t hear the rest because I just shut him out.

Why is he fucking with my world?

This is MY WEBSITE. And I will TALK ABOUT WHAT I WANT TO TALK ABOUT. I DON’T GO ALL UP IN YOUR HANGOUT AND SAY HEY FREAKS, STOP PUTTING EWOKS AND PORN IN THE SAME SENTENCE.

Cute Fuzzy Ewoks That Should NOT Be Associated With Anything Sexual

It really wasn’t that bad, though, for the record. It wasn’t like a whole bunch of guys in a room seriously discussing ewoks and porn. It just kind of came out once, as a joke, and I was like, WTF? And yes, I ran with it.

That’s what I do. I take things and run with them. I’m like a wide receiver in football, and everyone out there is a potential quarterback: you give me some material, and I’m gonna run that shit right into the end zone.

But I am not talking about Ewok porn anymore. I think that touchdown has been scored and really, there’s not that much more to say about it.

But just remember…

YOU said it first, NOT ME. (YOU being some undefined person out there that is NOT ME.)

Which I totally don’t think was a good idea, because now they’re going to be all like, why were you sitting there letting us talk about stupid shit like Ewok Porn when your wife was sitting right there, dumb ass, and if you couldn’t get the bitch to go away you should have given us some secret sign, something along the lines of I don’t like Ewok Porn so much but my wife does DON’T YOU HONEY and then we would have known she was sitting RIGHT THERE and we would have helped you out by talking about something more intelligent like quasars and quarks and existentialist bullshit until she got so bored she left the room and THEN we could have gone back to the Ewok Porn.

Oh well. I guess that’s his problem.

For the record, though, I have nothing against geeks. I am a geek. Geek is just someone who actually can talk intelligently about something besides Snooki and Kim Kartrashian and the latest football scores. Not that I have anything against the latest football scores either. We love football in this house. I just like well-rounded people, is all. People I can talk to about sci-fi, shit on TV, whether or not there’s intelligent life out there in the Universe, life goals…you know, meaningful shit, or interesting shit, or just…shit.

Not Optimal Fantasy Material

So to all the “geeks” out there, please, don’t get me wrong. I am not insulting you. I AM one of you. It was just…the Ewok porn thing. But then I saw the picture of the girl dressed like an Ewok and it made a whole lot more sense. Although personally I didn’t think she was that cute. I mean, she was OKAY. Not the kind of cute to inspire porn fantasies to me, but, hey, what do I know? I’m a woman and I have pretty high standards for other women. I mean, I’m always dumbfounded by what men will fantasize about, chicks that are just not that pretty and whose only redeeming qualities – for porn purposes, anyway – is the ownership of a vagina. Really? Is that all it takes? Because for that matter, there are horses with vaginas, and hamsters, and cats, and dolphins and rabbits…I mean, lots of things have vaginas. I think once you get into the land of porn fantasies, though, it shouldn’t just be HUMAN, but ATTRACTIVE. And some of the chicks I see in some lower-grade porn with bodies that are too thin or flabby, faces that would stop a clock…I mean, isn’t this supposed to be a FANTASY? So WHY, in a FANTASY, would you choose some D-grade shit? In real life, we have to be more practical, I get it. But not in PORN. Not in a fantasy. That’s like me fantasizing about having sex with Steve Buscemi when I could totally fantasize about having sex with Jason Momoa.

Optimal Fantasy Material

And that takes us into beauty being in the eye of the beholder and standards of beauty, and I’m not getting into that discussion here, because it’s way more serious than I feel like being now, plus I might have to accept that for some people EWOKS are attractive and I just really don’t want to go down that visual road because I might throw up. I’ll just acknowledge that we all have different tastes, and if that girl is cute to you, especially when she’s dressed like an Ewok, then, go for it, dude. But I’m just REMINDING you…fantasies should be awesome. Whatever awesome is to you. Life can be fucked up enough…don’t let it make you downgrade your fantasies. It’s all in your head and why can’t the stuff in your head be totally fucking awesome?

And to the geeks in the hangout, I promise that the next time hubby is in the room, I won’t be there sitting on the sidelines wondering what the hell is wrong with all of you. Maybe I’ll be in my own hangout and we’ll talk about how Jabba the Hutt was coming on to Princess Leia and how gross it all was but yet we wanted to see HOW THAT WOULD ACTUALLY WORK because really, did he even have a penis and if he did, would he even be able to find it, and how if he did and he managed to do the vile deed, Princess Leia would totally go over to the Dark Side and kill everybody because she’d be absolutely traumatized by the whole experience and that would be a WHOLE OTHER MOVIE like some kind of Star Wars alternate universe.

Ew.

Just in case you didn’t figure that out from the title.

No, I’m not trying to be negative or anything. At least, that’s not my intent right now. Not all of it is going to be things that piss me off. Things that piss me off is different from things that annoy me. Annoyance is…milder?

So, today’s thing is:

Lace-up boots.

TOO MUCH WORK, people! TOO MUCH WORK!

The thing is, I love the way a lot of them LOOK. They LOOK awesome, a lot of them, especially the ones that are all up your thighs.

But try actually putting those fuckers on!

Goddamn Lace-Up Boots

I speak from experience.

You’re sitting there, and you’re lacing, and you’re lacing, and you’re lacing, and you’re lacing, and it’s not tight enough so you have to figure out where to pull it so you can tighten it, and no matter where you pull it’s not totally doing it so you have to keep pulling until it all somehow magically comes together, and it takes WAY TOO LONG. TOO TOO LONG.

I mean, going through this shit with sneakers is bad enough. But BOOTS? THIGH-HIGH BOOTS?

No.

There must be zippers, people. If you are planning to buy me any boots, EVER, they MUST HAVE ZIPPERS.

**********

I know this is TOTALLY NOT RELATED…but I am sitting here next to the Tech Guru, who is in some hangout on Google+ and I’m hearing this conversation and they are ALL A BUNCH OF GEEKEDY GEEK NERDS. I am a nerd, but THIS SHIT RIGHT HERE is crazy.

Part of what made me start writing is this post was the desire to tune them out; unfortunately my phone and headphones are ALL THE WAY UPSTAIRS IN THE MANSION and the maid and the butler have the night off so, basically, what that means is, I have to listen to this insane geek talk or shove fucking pencils in my ears (which is becoming a more attractive option with each passing minute).

Don’t get me wrong, they were actually talking about some very interesting stuff at first; when he first joined the conversation there was a lot of back and forth about etymology, which was right up my alley, I wanted to jump in but I didn’t want to be trapped in this virtual room because I knew the convo was not going to stay on etymology forever.

And of course!

They had to go and fuck it all up and show their total geekdom by starting to talk about shit like -

Ewok porn.

Ewok porn is one of those weird things like, I don’t know, sushi and Kit Kat bars.  Individually, they are awesome, but put them together and you have a REALLY BAD COMBO. Ewoks are cool. Love the Ewoks. Porn is cool, for the most part. But EWOK PORN is something that only a COMPLETE FUCKING DORK would even contemplate, furthermore talk about.

I should add here, that the Tech Guru was not contributing to the conversation. He’s actually pretty shy and reserved when he meets new people (maybe that’s where Pudding gets it from?) so I’m sure that contributed to his reticence, but I’m also hoping that it had something to do with NOT HAVING THAT MUCH TO SAY ABOUT EWOK PORN.

Now they’re talking about…digital painting. The Tech Guru is an artist, did I tell you? So they’re all geeked up yapping about drawing apps, which is better than EWOK PORN, but still…

I need to go find some pencils.

Pronto.

As it turned out, the medication WAS on the kitchen counter, but if you knew how full of drugs medicine and helpful products my kitchen counter is, you’d understand why it wasn’t easy to find. The damn bottle was actually on its side under a box of sinus pain medication. For those of you who are new here, now you know two things: I take lots of meds and my kitchen counter is a fucking mess.

In any case, I KNOW how you all were on tenterhooks out there, wondering if I had found my stuff or just completely gone off the deep end. Unfortunately for those of you who were awaiting a spectacle, um, sorry…meds found, CRISIS AVERTED.

Of course, my period is on its way and it feels like a million stallions are thundering through my bloodstream, spreading angst and drama as they go but…that, at least, I can deal with.

I think.

Pudding started “camp” today. Yes…we STILL call it camp, which has resulted in lots of odd looks from outsiders, like the woman in the yarn store today who asked him if he’d just come from school to which he replied, of course, “No, CAMP.” I mean, who the fuck goes to camp in the WINTER? I’m sure that’s what most people are thinking.

WE do, OKAY? We do shit OUR way around here. Get USED TO IT.

Honestly, I think the return to camp was more drama for me than it was for Pudding. First of all, I found out when we walked in that the ONE KID that he had taken a shining to, a little brunette named Jenna, was not coming back. That got me upset because…well, Pudding is not like his sister was at that age. She would roll into a room and within 5 minutes she would have talked to everyone in it. Pudding, he’ll be there for 5 YEARS and still be thinking hard about which kid he actually likes.

And I respect, absolutely, that even at this age he shows some discernment. I hope he keeps that, actually…but with that said, why is it that the ONE GIRL he actually LIKED, is not coming back? I swear, I was almost ready to find out who her parents are and call them:

“Um, hi, I know you don’t know me from a hole in the wall, but my son, who makes friends about once a year, he really likes your little girl. So can you please bring her back to camp – I mean, school? I will pay for the class. I’m warning you, if you say no we’re pretty much going to have to kidnap your kid, you know this, right? Great – see you next week!”

The teacher actually told me about Jenna’s not returning when we entered the classroom because even SHE knew that they had a “bond.” “They’re on the same wavelength,” she whispered to me as Pudding sauntered off to read a book. Clearly her PARENTS need to be told about this whole wavelength thing and get with the damn program. How dare they deprive my son!

So I felt bad about that. Totally not in my control, but my heartstrings were being tugged for my son.

Then!

MAJOR

MOM

FUCKUP.

They have added swimming to the itinerary, which is awesome. So I made sure this morning that I packed his lunch, his extra set of clothes, his towel, and his swim suit.

Imagine my horror when I go to pick him up and there he is, sitting on a bench on the side of the pool.

Fully dressed.

By himself.

“What happened?” I cried as I rushed to him.

“You forgot my swimsuit,” he said to me calmly.

“No! No I didn’t! It was right in the bag, you didn’t see it?” I replied as I rushed to his bag and began pulling everything out.

His lunch bag.

His extra clothes.

His towel.

NO FUCKING SWIMSUIT.

The swim teacher came up to me and said, “We offered him another suit, we keep the best stuff from the lost and found basket but he didn’t want to wear anyone else’s clothes.”

I looked at him and…I couldn’t fucking help it.

I started to cry.

“I’m so so sorry, baby,” I moaned as I hugged him tight. He grinned at me and he was okay, didn’t seem the least bit put out, but I felt like shit. And I knew right then that the reason that I was continuing to feel like shit despite the fact that my son was clearly not perturbed about not being able to swim, was that I was having flashbacks of all the times in school that I was the kid who couldn’t do something because of not being allowed, or not having the money, or not fitting in, and just being THAT KID sitting on the sidelines watching as others had fun. I go through hell and high water to make sure THAT DOES NOT HAPPEN TO MY KIDS. Not that they always have to “fit in” – God knows I have learned to appreciate my individuality and I have taught my children already that they are their own people who should follow their own minds. But, with that said, if they don’t do something, I want it to be because they don’t want to do something, not because they CAN’T.

I know…it’s pretty stupid and nothing to get worked up about and I KNOW that all the getting worked up has WAY more to do with my issues than it has to do with good parenting. I know this. But…it didn’t stop me from crying, not for ME, but for Pudding, who looked so small sitting on the bench all alone because all the other kids had been picked up by their parents and were in the locker rooms changing.

“I feel terrible,” I whispered in his ear.

“Why?” he whispered back.

“Because I was so sure I had packed your swimsuit. I pulled it out and was so sure I had put it in there. I must have turned to do something else, as usual, and forgotten to go right back to it, I know exactly where it is, it was right on the dresser and I swore I put it in,” I replied, feeling helpless and still hugging him tightly. The teacher was looking at me a bit awkwardly, but I got the impression that she’s dealt with enough moms to know that the slightest thing can often cause a total breakdown. Not just with the KIDS, mind you, but with the MOMS.

He pulled back and looked at me. “I got 2 smiley faces,” he said, grinning as he showed me the stamps he’d gotten, one on each hand.

I smiled back through my tears. “That’s awesome, kiddo.”

“Mommy? Do you still feel terrible?” he asked, looking at me seriously.

“Yes, actually, I do. But we’re going to go home and as SOON as we get there, we’re going to put the swimsuit IN THE BAG so you’ll have it for next week, okay? I’m so so sorry, baby,” I said, hugging him again.

“It’s okay, Mommy,” he said to me.

Which only made me hug him more and love him more and feel more like shit all at the same time. How does that even fucking work?

“You could have worn another suit,” I said somewhat lamely as we walked out of the building a few minutes later, not because I wanted him to wear someone else’s suit, I was actually glad he hadn’t, but because I just wanted him to understand he COULD have.

“I didn’t want to,” he said lightly, and I realized he was so done with that and I needed to take his cue and be done with it too. Easier said than done.

“Okay, sweetie. But I’m still sorry,” I said, kissing him as I put him in his carseat.

“Look what I made in class,” he said, already moved on.

He showed me a paper bird nestled in a bed of yarn which was neatly enclosed in a nest fashioned out of the two halves of a small paper plate. “This is Tweety,” he said.

“The yarn store is right down the street, and the yoga studio. I want to stop in…wanna come?” I asked.

“Okay,” he answered as he played with Tweety.

It’s the feeling of inefficiency and the idea that I have somehow failed my children in varying ways, whether it’s something seemingly small like forgetting a bathing suit or something big like…things that I’m not even ready to talk about publicly yet, that often sends me to medication or a drink. Or, as you know, sometimes both. But it’s their responses, of love, acceptance, and innocent understanding, that helps me…NOT to need it.

I love them so incredibly much. They inspire me to be the best I can be, not just for them, but for myself. Obviously, I don’t always succeed…but I’m trying.

And that goddamn swimsuit is IN THE BAG.

I CANNOT FIND MY FUCKING ANXIETY MEDICATION.

CODE RED! REPEAT: CODE  - FUCKING – RED!!!!

I had a bottle of Ativan that I carried in my bag so that if anxiety hit me while I was out and about, I would have it readily available. Truth be told, I actually haven’t needed it that much of late, so there is a good chance I misplaced it, but the bottom line is…

I DON’T KNOW WHERE THE FUCK IT IS! AND I NEED IT! NOW!

I bought this purse organizer thingy that is supposed to help me transfer all my necessities from one purse to another without losing anything important. I was so psyched when I got this thing. First of all, it has lots of little pockets. I love little pockets. I’m like a fucking rabbit or something, I see pockets, I have to nose in them and find out what’s going on in there, and it’s just…fun. And oddly comforting. Having lots of little pockets means I have somehow managed to organize my life. That is the message it is supposed to send to the world.

I have a secret for you, though. No matter HOW MANY FUCKING POCKETS they put in these things…

I always need JUST ONE MORE. JUST…ONE…MORE.

So I have this thing with the pockets, and I put all kinds of doo-dads and gadgets in it. My glasses, in case one of my contact lenses should go flying out of my eye while I’m driving. (DO NOT LAUGH. This has actually happened to me, not so much that the lens went flying out of my eye but it decided to go down into that netherland of my eyeball, you know, the place where those errant eyelashes go and disappear, and not only was this terribly annoying and uncomfortable but it sucked that it happened while I was flying on the Belt Parkway at 70 FUCKING MILES PER HOUR IN THE FAST LANE. And me, with no glasses as back up, had to continue driving with one eye squinted shut to keep the goddamn contact lens at least within my body, not sure where it would come out later, maybe my mouth? Where do those eyelashes go? So I learned the hard way…CARRY GLASSES. I could carry a spare pair of contacts but it’s not so easy to chuck a contact in your eye while you’re driving, no matter how agile you are with those suckers.)

I also carry ibuprofen. Hate being outside and getting a headache, and then you need to go into some bodega and they want to charge you like $2.50 for a packet of 2 pills, which is total highway robbery, not to mention fucking USELESS, because I have yet to have the headache that does not require at least 4 pills, which means 5 BUCKS, for which I could buy a whole damn bottle. And when I have a headache I don’t want to go buying shit for it at that time. I want to have it ready to go. So ibuprofen, an absolute must.

Of course there’s the girlie cosmetic bag. Then there’s the reading glasses. Yes, I have become decrepit enough to need reading glasses. Or my eyes have anyhow. I stopped fighting it and just go with it. I didn’t even realize I needed the damn things til I started crocheting and then I was like, wow, if these suckers can help me see these stitches, they might help me see the WORDS ON A PAGE. And I was right! So at least now fewer of my headaches are due to reading.

What else goes in the purse organizer? The phone sometimes. Hand lotion, for those hand jobs. (Joke!) And of course…

MY GODDAMN ANXIETY MEDS, so that if I am OUT and get a panic attack, I don’t need to drive home in a state of manic madness before I can get some relief. Besides, driving home like an insane lunatic running from Martians is probably not a good idea…although to be honest, driving home AFTER I’ve taken the meds and am high as a kite, is probably not a good idea either.

So all this shit is what usually goes in the purse organizer. Except now…

I CANNOT FIND THE ANXIETY MEDS.

I looked through the bag to see if they fell out.

No.

Looked on the kitchen counter to see if I placed it there after taking it recently.

No.

Looked in my dressing room and found it – yay! Except it wasn’t really it, it was an old bottle, with only 4 pills left. I only need one right now, but the fact that I cannot FIND the other pills, the more recent bottle, the one with about 25 PILLS OR SO LEFT? THAT…is FREAKING ME OUT.

FREAKING ME OUT.

Because despite all my chatter earlier about being happy and peachy and oh so thrilled…I need meds. I need them now.

I think it’s a fucking plot. The minute I post about being happy, something flares up and sends me back to straitjacket mode. Even shit just in my head.

If anyone has seen my meds, please return them. NO QUESTIONS ASKED AND THERE WILL BE A REWARD. I might even SHARE ONE WITH YOU.

In the meantime, I’m tearing up the house.

CODE RED! CODE RED! CODE RED!!!! HEEELLLLLLLLPPPPPPPPP!!! S-O-FUCKING-ESS!!!!

Me, I’m fine. A tad woozy from meds but as you will soon learn, that’s not so abnormal. These meds are not behavioral meds, though, no, these are cough and congestion meds to clear up the mucus that LOVES to collect in my chest and sit there like a frigging squatter. I took some last night and it didn’t make me woozy but today’s dose has me feeling a little…out there.

Oh well. Enough about me and meds.

I feel oddly good today, and it’s weird to feel so good because it’s like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. That’s pretty damn sad. I am learning, though, to trust in the Universe’s goodness, to get out of that mindset that good is only there to make the bad even more horrible. I don’t believe that anymore. I feel good because good is here, and more good is coming and…life is good!

No, this is not the wooziness talking. Seriously. I feel very…positive. And that’s saying a lot. I know there will be days when I go back down in the dumps but that fucker Claude – you remember him, right? – he seems to be getting smaller and smaller and smaller. And he visits less often.

This…is good.

Punksin’s birthday is right around the corner and she has asked for only 2 things: a bike, and a vacation. So…that’s what we’re getting her. Can’t figure out where to go yet but all of us are overdue and a vacation would be LOVELY so I’m working on making that happen. Which reminds me, the Tech Guru needs to get his passport renewed…maybe we’ll expedite it so that we’re not here waiting on tenterhooks for his passport to arrive THE DAY BEFORE WE LEAVE, as we were when we went to Jamaica and my passport was floating around out in Never Never Land. Talk about stressful.

After that, I need some me time and I was thinking about visiting my sister in California in March. She is not biologically my sister but God knows I love her more than some people I am and have been related to, and we both have the light-skinned long hair thing happening so we could PASS for sisters. And we’re both Sagittarians! AWESOME. She is a sister of the spirit. I love her to freaking pieces.

So that’s going to be the first half of the year. I need to sit down with the Tech Guru and see if there are any conferences he wants to attend, and what conferences I want to attend, and then work out our travel plans from there. And we’re also getting tired of the vacations that are just…go, stay somewhere else, come back home. I want vacations where I try something new or learn something new or work on a skill… Painting vacations. Writing vacations. Hiking vacations. Yoga vacations. Vacations where we really come home with memories that are not just about what we saw, but what we did.

So I have my work cut out for me this year but I’m making it happen…this is the year of MAKING SHIT HAPPEN.

Are you with me?

I love to cook, but every now and then I go through phases where I just get BORED with cooking food. I’ve been in a rather LONG one of those phases…ha ha.

But tonight’s dinner was lovely (despite Pudding’s declaration that “I’m NOT eating your food!“) and it was light enough and it’s early enough, that there will still be room enough for dessert.

Tonight, we’re staying home. Long ago, we grew annoyed with the whole idea of going out and paying oodles of dollars for the privilege of kissing each other at midnight in the midst of a whole bunch of other people. It’s MUCH more fun to kiss each other at home naked in front of the fireplace, with a few extra hundred in our bank accounts. We watch the ball on TV, we toast with champagne, and then we talk about our goals for the year to come and what we’ve accomplished in the year we’ve just left behind.

I remember the year we were waiting for Punksin to arrive…my stomach was out to there and we were so excited at the prospect of being parents!

I remember the year that we HAD Punksin…reaching the end of that year, we were awed at our biggest accomplishment yet – becoming parents to this incredibly awesome little girl who had changed our lives forever.

I remember the year we were waiting for Pudding. I wasn’t that big yet, and we were planning our last trip as a threesome, heading to Jamaica in February…

And then of course that New Year’s Eve, in 2007, I looked down at this 5-month old little boy who absolutely took my breath away with his perfect features, his round head and deliciously chubby arms and legs.

I remember years before we got married…the best year was the year we got The Matrix on DVD! We were curled up under blankets on the couch, stark naked, watching that movie OVER AND OVER AND OVER. That is one of my FAVORITEST MOVIES EVER.

Tonight, Punksin wants to stay up. Haven’t decided yet if we’re going to allow her. Part of me wants her to, but part of me wants to preserve the ritual we have of greeting the New Year together, just the two of us, talking about all the things we’ve learned and accomplished, and what steps we need to take to get to the next destination on our journey together, as well as the things we each want to accomplish separately. Like getting to the entrance of an amusement park, this night, the last night of the year, always feels full of hope and promise as we wonder what adventures lie ahead, what ups and downs we’ll encounter, and what mountains we’ll finally conquer.

2011 wasn’t a bad year by far, but I look forward to 2012. May it be full of wonderful things…for all of us.

I can’t say I’m sad to see it go…but honestly, looking back at it, I don’t feel this overwhelming sense of relief that it’s over either. I mean, it had its ups and downs, for sure, but…that’s life. There have been some years that I couldn’t wait to kick in the ass on their way out the door, but this year…really, not so bad.

I learned a LOT about life this year, and I think when I look back on it and reflect on what the take-away lesson for me is from 2011, it’s this:

Things – and people – are only as important in your life as you allow them to be. And if you are not important to other people, without anger you should release their importance to you.

I learned that I am not as important to some people as I had hoped to be. That was a mindfuck, not just knowing it but then sitting down and absorbing it and all that that meant. But in the end, I came away…okay! And that’s when it hit me like a freight train: being important to certain people was only a big deal because I made those people important…to ME.

And one of the things I needed to do to heal from that was to erase that importance, to stop dealing in what I hoped for and wished for and wanted, and start dealing in REALITY. I mean, to continue in fruitless attempts to get love and affection and praise … why? What made these people’s praise and love and affection any better than anyone else’s? If anything…it was worse, because it was conditional upon me being someone I’m not, or hiding my own feelings, or bowing down to other’s egos so that they could feel great while my own ego got bruised and battered.

Fuck that.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve done – well, to be honest, not so much thinking as just sitting with my feelings, allowing them to go where they would and see what happened. And I was pleasantly surprised to see that when it came to some things, and some people…I no longer cared. The price I had to pay was too high and too RIDICULOUS, when I LIVE IN A HOUSE with people who love me and show it to me unconditionally and constantly, whose egos are strong enough to show me love even when I am battered and bruised.

The Tech Guru? He is awesome. I sat there with my feelings and realized that so much of my growth over the past decade has been aided by him…because he has loved me for who I am, all the aspects of me that so few other people know, and his love has allowed me to really blossom. His love is like fertilizer for my soul…I sit in it and I can feel the warmth of the sun on my face and just feel my spirit growing and blossoming into…whatever it is going to be. My writing, my metaphysical studies, my yoga, my literature, whatever I bring out of my soul to show him, he respects and caresses. He is strong enough to love me openly and without reservation, to communicate any and all of his feelings: when he’s angry, I know. When he loves me, I know. When he wants me, I know. His love does not ask me to give of myself while he keeps himself hidden. It does not ask me to be someone I am not, or to hide all the people that I am. His love gives me strength. It is solid, and strong, and steady and wonderful.

It is food for my soul.

He is important to me, as he should be, because I have made him important. But unlike so many other people in my life, he deserves the importance I give to him.  As I reflected upon WHY I needed other people’s love or approval, I couldn’t really come up with a good answer other than…I wanted it. I thought I deserved it. I thought I needed it. But I’ve come this far without it…and in some ways, the absence of certain people has actually helped me to flourish. So…why would I seek to change that, to let them back in so they could just bring me anxiety and stress?

And so here I am, at the end of 2011…and I’ve let a lot of people…

go.

To all of you – my mother, my father, my cousin, former friends – I release you. I wish you peace, I wish you enlightenment and I wish you…joy. But I release you from any responsibility toward me, from any ideas of how I wish you had acted, wish you had been…you were what you were, and I am what I am. And what I am right now, is a woman who is profoundly at peace, because I look over to the living room, at my husband sitting on the floor, playing with the two blessings he has bestowed upon me, and I feel truly happy. No anger, no pain…just unadulterated joy at what I have been so blessed with. I no longer place importance on what I don’t have…because what I have is an incredibly wonderful person as a husband and true best friend, two amazingly intelligent and sensitive children, and a future that with them that looks so bright that I am smiling as I write this.

This life, these people, are important to me.

And they are wonderful.