Moomser

Virtual Coffee {37} the last one.

2012-04-24T15:06:00.000+02:00

Hello, dear friends, welcome to coffee!

You may want to grab a chair and get comfortable for coffee today cause this is going to be a loooooong post. It’ll also be my last post on Moomser, if you want to know why it’s my last post read this, otherwise suffice it to say that I’m taking a break to get my writing joojoo (sp??) back on and then probably separating my “real life” from my blog life with an anonymous blog. I do feel cowardly doing this, I’m absolutely all for living my life out in the open, but some things I choose to write about involve other people and at the end of the day I’d rather hide behind the anonymity of a fake name than censure my thoughts, cause this blog is mostly a public space for my thoughts and feelings.

So I wanted to tie up a few loose ends punctuated with a few totally random pictures…

It's Spring, you can tell because it won't stop raining

And then the next day it's sunny and gorgeous and you can roll around in the damp grass

The husband and I are trying to work things out. We gave each other some conditions that were necessary to each of us to keep moving forward and we’re both working on them on our respective ends, so we’ll see how that goes. But we’re trying. We are, neither of us, leavers, so right now we’re in standby mode. I wanted to share one of the things that I’m doing because it could be helpful for others out there… Several months back I read a post on Cheeseslave about a book called The Mood Cure, which seemed to have an interesting premise, so I bought it and promptly forgot about it, of course. Thankfully, after writing this post here a reader wrote me an email telling me about the very same book and her experience and suggesting I read it (thanks Susan!). I’m not going to get into what the book is about cause Anne Marie does it better on her blog (Cheeseslave), but it’s mostly about helping to improve your mood through diet and supplements (mostly aminos). I’ve been taking the supplements suggested for my mood imbalances (there’s a quiz both in the book and on this website) and I feel a LOT better. I have way more energy, I sleep much better, I have fewer mood swings, and life is simply not as bleak as it was in my eyes.

The past few years have been pretty stressful, I moved out to the country leaving friends, a job, and everything behind (2005), my Dad died (2006), I started a new job, with a lot of responsibility and no experience, had a baby (2008), went right back to work, had another baby (2009), the husband got leukemia, treatment (2010) and then got leukemia again (2011) and my body got depleted cause that’s what stress does. All this to say, it’s an interesting book and I recommend it strongly, it may well have saved my marriage.

Love. and big shoes.

On to more fatuous things, we’ve been grilling the heck out of everything we could get our hands on. Like pizza (awesome, I strongly suggest you try it!) and pineapple (great with meat!) and bananas. Yes, bananas. You slice them in half lengthwise with the skins still on (I washed them first) then you put them open side down on the grill, turn them over when the edges of the skin start to blacken, sprinkle with sugar, and leave a few more minutes with the lid closed. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! The sugar caramelizes, the bananas get kind of soft and slightly gooey… am I making you want to turn the grill on??

I’ve started my yearly detox again which mainly means no refined carbs and no sugar (also a Mood Cure suggestion), which means I’m now ravenous for bread and croissants and pasta. I literal would turn everything I see into a sandwich. I tell you, my mind is my worse enemy!! Although I’ve rediscovered juicing and am juicing anything and everything… some of my concoctions are great (apple, orange, carrot and beet for example) some are absolutely disgusting (I’ve blocked these out). Experimenting is half the fun! Although, I’m not so sure my kids would agree, they take up their juice glasses with a fair amount of trepidation lately!

mama, this pod looks like a moth!

shucking peaa

The beach house (which I obsessed over a few months ago) is ready and we’ve been spending the last few weekends doing all the little odds and ends jobs to make it really homey, I wish I had pictures to show you but alas I was planning a before/after post for a few weeks from now and haven’t taken the after pics yet.

Aperitif by the beach

I’m kind of dragging this post on and on… I’m sad to say goodbye. I really enjoyed these Virtual Coffee dates and would like to thank Amy for the great idea and for bringing us together every week like this, and for her hillbilly latte recipe!!

Also, if you want me to get in touch if I start a new blog up again drop me an email (moomser at gmail dot com) and I’ll contact you.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for coffee!

Toodles, Moomser

Sooner or later all good things must end. The Goodbye post.

2012-04-23T00:01:00.000+02:00

Let me start this post with a premise, my Mother is the queen of not giving a shit about what people think of her. Her own opinion of herself is the only opinion that matters to her. I respect this about her immensely.

The other day I got a call from my Mother, which, after a good half-hour of the parent-child equivalent of talking about the weather, finally got to the point. Apparently, a few weeks back she was at a party and a friend approached her and asked her whether I was getting a divorce.

I hadn’t talked to my Mother about any of the upheaval going on in my marriage because, as has become the refrain whenever I write about the situation, we don’t know what the hell we’re doing yet. I had received some inquiring calls from friends and family members but I had done the human equivalent of burying my head in the sand the “I don’t want to talk about it”. I realize now how ridiculous that stance was as I was, in fact, writing about it for all the world to read. But we’re not always rational and as long as I didn’t talk about it, I hadn’t actually shared it, or so my thinking went.

So anyway, you can imagine what the hell kind of position my mother was in at the party. Surprisingly, she didn’t care about that. She was, however, worried that by putting things out there on this blog I was fostering gossip and speculation and not all of it is necessarily kind-hearted.

I don’t care in the least if people gossip, she doesn’t care in the least if people gossip. And yet she worries that people gossip about me, my marriage, and my personal life. I wish I could say it’s ridiculous, but it’s not. I’m her daughter. I don’t give a crap if people talk about me, if they’re mean-spirited towards me, or whatever other negative reaction my talking about my private life can bring about, but, I would seriously care if people were talking and gossiping and speculating about my child. And there’s the rub.

She suggested maybe I shouldn’t be writing about my marriage on the blog, at least until a decision was actually made. She’s never had a problem with my blog although she doesn’t really ever read it because in a weird way she feels like she’s infringing on my privacy. Even though this blog is public, even though I told her about it, even though other people read it. And it’s true that I write about private things on here. I choose to. But, alas, I’m not the only one they impact.

My mother was at a party, on the other side of the world, living her life, and something I chose to write about myself on this blog impacted her. I don’t know how she felt, that wasn’t the purpose of her phone call, but I can imagine. One of your friends comes and tells you that your daughter and her husband are going through some stuff and are thinking of separating and you know not a single thing about it. Probably doesn’t feel too good. I can imagine she was flustered and embarrassed, she probably didn’t know how to react, she had no clue what that person was talking about. Why on earth did I put her in that position?

I wasn’t ready to talk to my mother about it, because never are things so real to me as when I tell her, but I needed a place to share it, I needed feedback and support but not from people in my “real life”. Unfortunately, sometimes there’s a divide that comes between the blogging world and the physical world. This was mine. I could and wanted to share with my blogging friends, friends that only know me, that only interact with me, but I wasn’t and I’m not ready to share some things with people in my life that know and interact with my family and with each other.

I love this blog. I’ve put a lot of myself in this blog. This blog helped me work through and get through much of the husband’s illness, I made good friends through this blog and I reconnected with many old friends and acquaintances. I loved all the comments and emails I got from people both in my “real life” and people I only know through the internet. But I’m shutting it down. I can’t put my mother, or, though she never said anything to me, my mother in law, or my husband or anyone else, in the position to be embarrassed, or uncomfortable, or unhappy by the things I write on here.

I loved being Moomser, so it’s with a heavy heart that I say goodbye. I’m not sure what I’m going to do, whether I’ll start another, more discreet blog, cause I’m a little bit addicted to this blogging lark. I also don’t want to lose the relationships I’ve forged through it, I can pick up the phone and talk to or email my friends and family, not so much with my blogging friends. So if you want to keep in touch drop me a line, in the comments or email and I’ll contact you when I start something back up.

I’ll be posting a Virtual Coffee post tomorrow, with some news of our day to day goings on and last pictures, it’ll be my 37^th Virtual Coffee, I’m a little shocked that I kept it up this long! Also, I want to close this blog with a “normal” post, just a regular Moomser post, it’s more fitting I think.

So goodbye for now and thank you for going through this journey with me. Moomser.

Shooting and peeing, an analogy.

2012-04-14T14:48:00.000+02:00

The first time I went to the shooting range, my friend gave me some much needed directions as to what not to do with a gun in your hand, one of the things he said was “if you’re going to talk to someone behind you or you want to look around you put the gun down first”. At first I wondered at this seemingly strange piece of advice, but then the first time I did it I understood his warning, because though you may think you’re only turning your head you’re actually turning your torso shoulders and arms right along with it and that’s how you end up accidently pointing the gun at someone.

Today I realized how similar shooting and peeing are; or rather, guns and penises in this analogy. Because the Boy, he never, ever manages to just pee in the toilet. It gets on the seat (which he invariably forgets to lift up), it gets on the floor, it gets on his socks and only a marginal amount actually hits the toilet bowl. And today I had an epiphany, it’s because he isn’t physically able to just pee, he has to fiddle with the flusher, or talk to his sister, who is, inexplicably, always in there with him, he turns around to see who’s walking past the open (what else?) door, and his torso, shoulders, arms and hips go right along with him. Which all just begs the question: why don’t we just make men pee sitting down?

Blogging and the lessons therein

2012-04-12T00:12:00.001+02:00

I started this blog on a whim.

We had a private family blog, which the husband mostly (or rather, practically exclusively) maintains and I occasionally contributed to and then concurrently in 2010 two dear friends started their own blogs which, incidentally, I suggest you visit cause they’re awesome: Nuts about Food and The Nero Chronicles. Their blogs have a focus, a purpose, I had none, but I enjoy writing and I’m a “sharer” so through the power of imitation I started what pretty much amounts to a life blog.

I wanted this blog to be anonymous, but as I said, I’m a sharer, so almost as soon as I started it I shared it on facebook. Thus, though not popular by any stretch of the imagination, this blog became not anonymous and is read, in part, by people I know in “real life”. This has never really been a problem for me, until recently. Sure, at times I found I would inadvertently censor myself or I would think of a possible subject and then decide not to post it because it would infringe on someone’s privacy, but it happened rarely and once I decided not to write it I never gave it another thought.

I was always happy to hear of a friend or acquaintance that visited me here, I felt it was a way to connect (albeit one-sidedly) to people in my life I rarely get to see. And yet now, I sometimes feel restricted by this blog, I constantly wonder whether I’m offending (I’m sure I am, with my anti-Italy posts), whether I’m over-sharing, whether by talking candidly about my life I’m overstepping on the right to privacy of the people in my life.

And so I question whether it wouldn’t have been better to suffer the silence of blogging just for myself while slowly building readership and, more importantly, friendship in the blogging world keeping it separate from my “real” life, thus concurrently protecting my family and maintaining a space for myself, where I could just be myself, and write my thoughts as they exist in my head rather than the version of our thoughts we present to the world. Because despite how candid we think we are, how true to ourselves we want to be, we inevitably censor, tone down, or up, or otherwise modify our reactions, our words, our gestures and actions and expressions depending on who we’re interacting with. It’s human nature.

On the other hand, I wonder if blogging anonymously isn’t just hiding, isn’t being ashamed, isn’t not wanting to own up to who we are. Isn't short-changing the very real, and very important friends one makes on the internet just because one hasn't met them in the physical world.

I’ve never really cared too much about what others think of me. Of course, I can’t say I don’t care at all, because that would be ridiculous, but I’m not overly concerned if someone doesn’t agree with something I write, in fact, it’s highly likely that someone won’t. But can I make that decision for the other people in my life?

Sometimes I wish that I had a specific theme to my blog, a food blog, a design blog, an arts and crafts blog (an impossibility, as I’m neither artsy nor craftsy) but this is a “me” blog and I don’t live in a bubble. Also, I’ve got that whole over-sharing thing going on.

I keep going in circles.

So the lesson I learned from blogging? There are limits in everything we do, limits imposed by society, limits imposed by our fears, limits imposed by our own good sense, and sometimes limits imposed in what we write, about ourselves and about our lives.

Can I live with these limits?

I’m not so sure anymore. So where does a blogger go from here?

Funny and frustrating things that make me question my sanity

2012-03-29T10:47:00.000+02:00

On the funny side: For whatever reason that is incomprehensible to me, the Boy has managed to bang his head on some surface in the kitchen every single day this week right before leaving for school. I have no idea how he does it, one minute we’re all: ok, shoes on, finish your juice, let’s go! And then: whack! And screaming and wailing.

Yesterday he banged his head on the counter, today he banged his head on the door. He was walking backwards. That could be why he didn’t see the door… but why was he walking backwards? Every day, I tell you. I just don’t get it, and I hope it’s just this week or his teachers are going to call social services on me.

On the frustrating side: One of the reasons I stopped working when I had kids was because I was exhausted at the idea of yelling and coaxing people to do stuff all day only to come home and have to do the same thing with my kids. Because, honest to God, I don’t understand how people in Italy work. We’re buying a house, in point of fact we’re buying a stable from the 1600’s and converting it to a house… this actually sounds way more historic and romantic than what it is in reality. We’ve been having some delays on the actual buying part but as the bureaucracy in Italy is biblically long we’ve decided to go ahead and get all the plans ready for the restructuring and hand them in to the proper authorities so they can take their sweet time to give us approval and let us start the works. What I don’t understand is this: I’ve been having to call the architect to task weekly, he makes excuses, he sheepishly tells me he’s sorry and there will be no more delays, he calls my husband – because apparently I’m too scary – when a delay that’s not his fault happens, today after I called him he told me that the plans I was supposed to see yesterday will be ready on Monday. I don’t get it, I’m not his mother and yet I feel like it, with the coaxing, the wheedling, the negotiating and the yelling. And this is what any type of construction work (or really any type of work where you need to get anything done) is like in Italy. Why can’t people just do what they say they’ll do? I’m already exhausted at the idea of what the next few months of my life will be like.

Sometimes I can’t but stare at you in disbelief

2012-03-28T09:19:00.002+02:00

REVISION: from the comments and emails I’ve received it appears that the following is indeed not a reaction restricted to Italians, therefore, I apologize to Italians for my rash words and would ask my readers to mentally substitute “some people” where they read “Italians”. I don’t want to change the text itself because otherwise none of this would make any sense (if it even did to begin with). Thanks!

Fair warning: this is going to be one of those posts where I rag on Italians, so if you’re Italian please stop reading. I realize that I’m half Italian, married to an Italian and live in Italy, but sometimes the cultural difference is just too much for me and my head wants to explode so I vent on here, this is, in fact, why I started this blog.

So anyway, I’ve mentioned before that the husband and I are going through a rough patch and we’re at a place right now where we don’t know what will be of our future or whether we even have a future together or not. This has, of course, come up with people, granted not an awful lot, because thankfully very few people we know in “real life” actually read this blog, but the most significant question that any Italian has asked me as soon as they heard we were thinking of separating was “but what are you going to do about the house?”, this from my therapist, to friends, to family members.

Seriously? Seriously??

It’s a fucking house. Ask me how we’re doing, ask me what we’re doing about the kids, but don’t ask me about the house, because that is so far down my list of what’s important right now that it absolutely boggles my mind to think that anyone would be worried about it.

Yes, we’re buying a house, but guess what, the kids and I are going to be wanting to not live under a bridge if the husband and I separate. And if, in the future, it turns out the house is too big, or I want to move somewhere else or whatever we’ll sell the house, or we’ll rent it, we’ll do something about the house, but it’s so not a priority when you’re thinking of breaking up your family. How can they think it would be?

It’s just a house.

WTF?

Virtual Coffee {36}

2012-03-27T08:00:00.000+02:00

Hello dear friends and welcome to coffee! We’re having a really quick coffee today, more like a one sip espresso standing at the bar counter Italian style. Well, maybe we can sneak in a mini-croissant while we’re at it too…

We’ve been busy, busy, busy lately. We’ve finally spent the weekend at the beach apartment and this afternoon we’re taking yet another trip to Ikea to get some of the last odds and ends we kept forgetting. Our best friends from Milan came to visit us there for the day on Saturday and it was heart-warming as always to see our five kids (soon to be six kids) playing together since we all met in our coupled but unmarried living la vida loca partying days.

Our nanny-less month and some is proceeding more smoothly than we had any right to expect, thanks, in part, to a wonderful young lady that works at the girl’s daycare who occasionally babysits for us. Last week the Husband and I went out for sushi en tête à tête to talk about “our situation” and tomorrow we get to not get divorced directly at Ikea since we’re not bringing the kids with us. So, yeah, she’s a lifesaver. Also, we realized although we love our kids to pieces we would not survive without the occasional childfree moment or two.

Thirty seconds after this was taken she was butt starking nekkid in the water.

yeah, him too and all their friends

we even found and carried over a bench "for the pregnant lady"

In other news, the biannual (completely useless, and monumentally annoying) time change which here in Italy happened this past weekend is totally kicking my butt so I’ve been a walking zombie the past couple of days, both mentally and, alas, physically, but I’m confident we’ll all be over it soon (until October when, inexplicably, we have to do this all over again). Also, I’ve finally succumbed to peer and internet pressure and have started reading the Hunger Games. I gotta tell you, I probably did not pick the best emotional state in which to begin the book as I’ve been intermittently crying every other page. I really hope it gets better, or I may have to sue the author for the worsening of my depression… or something.

"you wanna go in the water?" - "yeah, I kind of do..."

The Husband impersonating Lawrence of Arabia

Ok, all done, hope you don’t get too jittery from the espresso! And don’t forget to say hi to our hostess Amy. Toodles.

Picnic on the beach

who's ready for ice cream?!

Marriage, it is like a drug that just won’t leave you be.

2012-03-21T08:00:00.000+01:00

A little over a week ago the husband and I sat down and talked about what we’d both been thinking but hadn’t had the guts to actually put on the table, the s word. Separating, separation, breaking up our family.

Rationally I know that it is very common, there’s no stigma, lots of people do it because marriages don’t always work out, and let’s face it, back in the “good ole days” we didn’t have the option and now we do. But still, it isn’t like going out to the store for a minute, a lot of thought and consideration are involved, are necessary in fact so that’s what we’ve been doing. Thinking and considering the actual, practical implications of a separation. Where would we live? When do we need to involve lawyers? How do we work out the logistics of the children? How is he going to survive not seeing them every day? Do we still raise them in this rural backwater if only one of us actually needs to be here day in and day out? We’re buying a house, a rather large house, do we keep it and go ahead with the renovations, do we divide it in two houses, do we sell it and start over?

Taking a minute (or ten) and actually working these things out in our heads resulted in not an awful lot of fighting and bickering over the furniture, as one would assume, but in a rearing of our stubborn streak. Really seriously thinking about breaking up our marriage took us back to why we got married in the first place. We started putting each other first. I can’t move back to America, not because he would stop me if that’s what I wanted, but because I wouldn’t want to be that far away from him. When the Husband got ill I had to imagine what my life would be like without him and now I don’t want to live my life without him in it whether we are married or not.

The reality of separating made us nicer to each other, it made us more caring, ironically it brought us closer together. I honestly don’t know what we’re doing but I don’t think we’re ready to give up on each other. The Boy came up to me the other day after I put him in time out for something or other and said: Mama don’t be mad at me, we’re a family. A family. I don’t know how or if we’re going to work it out, but I guess we’re not done fighting. I just hope it doesn’t kill us.

Linking up today with Shell at Things I can't say.

Virtual Coffee {35}

2012-03-20T12:55:00.000+01:00

Hello dear friends, and welcome to coffee! Today I’ll be having a green tea as I’m on one of my “it’s spring, time to detox” kicks, which, much like the weather is a fickle friend but I’m enjoying it while it lasts.

I have a love/hate relationship with spring. The weather drives me nuts, whenever I leave the house I look like I’m off on a trip as I’m usually carrying at least two jackets and a sweater per person, you just never know how it’s going to change from one minute to the next (just this morning it was hot and humid then chilly with some wind, then overcast, then sunny and now it looks like rain).

My vegetable garden makes sad eyes at me whenever I look out the kitchen window, probably wondering when I’m going to start fertilizing and planting and what not, but the likelihood of at least one more snowstorm is holding me off for now.

And the pollen, I swear the pollen is trying to kill me. The one thing I truly, sorely miss about living in a big, polluted city is not having any allergies as green areas are kept at a minimum in Milan.

Of course, I also love the colors, and the pretty pink flowers blooming on all the trees on my street, and alternating my dark and dreary wool sweaters with my bright and happy cotton ones, and the smell of renewal and possibility in the air that just says spring to me.

Pretty flowers, also, five minutes before taking this picture it was sunny. Crappy spring weather!!

I’m also in full spring-cleaning mode, part of the reason is that my live-in housekeeper/nanny is enjoying her hard earned holidays back home with her family. I thought this month and a half without her would be pure hell, but I actually enjoy having full rein of my house again. Sure, we’ve had many an organizational bleep as I’m used to having someone trustworthy to watch the kids whenever I need it, but apart from that it’s been easier than expected.

In fact, I’d been trying to talk her into using more “environmentally friendly” cleaning products, mostly because I’m extremely sensitive to chemical smells and most traditional cleaning products make me nauseous (I’m not exaggerating, also, it’s a great excuse to have a housekeeper!). Of course, she refuses saying that vinegar and water just don’t get the job done. I was on the fence because, well, as she does most of the cleaning I’m not going to get into an argument with her over it (I swear, it’s like I’m living with my mother!) also, I didn’t have enough experience cleaning over a long period of time with homemade products to judge. So I went out and bought some cute, colorful spray bottles and have set them up in the two main bathrooms we use and the kitchen. Well, you know what? Vinegar and water kicks ass. Seriously. Also, the kids can play with it with no adverse effects. In fact, yesterday they cleaned the windows and they thought they were playing. How awesome is that!!

These spray bottles just make me happy.

I’ve been experimenting with essential oils to cut down the vinegar smell, because the husband complained that the kids smelled like salad the other day, so I’ve been using varying combinations of rosemary, eucalyptus, tea tree, lavender, sweet orange and rosewood essential oils to find the perfect smell and as a bonus the first three essential oils are also anti-bacterial.

Ok, after this little green propaganda moment I’m off to clean the bathrooms, and I’m surprisingly excited about it!

Don’t forget to go visit our hostess Amy for coffee too, please!

Oh, to be a child again - Monday Listicles

2012-03-19T11:07:00.001+01:00

Once you’re all grown up you rarely think about being a kid, and actually when you’ve got kids of your own you tend to concentrate on the good and bad things of having kids. This week though, thanks to Stasha (aka Northwestmommy) at The Good Life, I’ve decided to concentrate on the good things about being a kid. Both from my own, alas far-gone, experience and from what I see in my own children.

Ten great things about being a kid

1. Running is fun, not exercise

2. Sleeping in the afternoon is not only encouraged but celebrated

3. Food can be smeared, squished, thumped and ingested, both separately and all at once

4. Staying home and watching tv all day when you’re sick

5. Watching tv all afternoon because Mama’s sick or tired or irritable

6. Thinking it’s acceptable to throw a fit upon sighting broccoli

7. Going to the grocery store dressed as Spiderman any day of the week and thinking you’re the coolest thing since sliced bread

8. Sitting on the swing for hours with your eyes closed while someone else pushes you

9. Free cuddles whenever you want them

10. Crying, a hug and a kiss make everything better. Everything.

“Adults are just obsolete children and to hell with them” Dr. Seuss. How often I agree!

Happy Virtual Coffee {34}

2012-03-13T22:12:00.000+01:00

Hello dear friends, and welcome to coffee. Or rather, if you’re in my time zone, welcome to a pre-bed herbal tea. I’m not a lot of fun to be around lately, which is why I’ve been participating in Amy’s virtual coffee so sporadically, but I miss catching up with everyone so here I am, late, but present.

Since I’ve been mired down in a bog of bad moods, unhappy thoughts and adult complications of our own creation today I decided to concentrate on the happy, because, thankfully there’s always some happy to be found somewhere, all we have to do is look for it. So tonight I’m counting my blessings and the reasons to be HAPPY!

I’m happy for this glorious spring-like weather we’re having. The snow is mostly melted, we can play outside again and the days are getting longer. Today we even managed to go to the park until almost 7pm. Bliss.

I’m happy that the Boy now seems to really enjoy going to preschool, he’s opening up and become very sociable and more confident.

I’m happy that the Girl is starting to slowly tone down her epic tantrums. I don’t know if it’s something I’ve been doing, or if she’s gaining more control as she gets older, but we’re ALL happy about this, neighbors and grocery store cashiers included.

I’m happy that the Husband and I are managing to be civil and gracious to each other and that whatever happens the fact that we’re friends and parents will hopefully continue to stay in our forethoughts.

I’m happy that I’m starting to get a handle on my insano-moods lately, without anti-depressants for now, thanks to a reader’s kind email that put me on the right track. Things like this remind me why blogging is so amazing.

And lastly I’m quite happy that this day is almost over, the kids are sleeping peacefully and I’m in bed fixin’ to watch one of my shows and go to sleep relatively early. Meeting for coffee in the evening isn’t half bad, is it, and tomorrow’s another day, full of possibilities!

Tonight I’m also linking up with Mamarazzi for Happy List on Dandelion Wishes.

Living with Leukemia part 9. The End.

2012-03-10T23:36:00.000+01:00

When I started this series of posts on how the Husband’s illness affected us I never thought I’d end up where I am right now. I actually thought I’d be at the opposite of where I am right now. Cause where I am right now is at the dashing of all my hopes and dreams. The other day I mentioned a quote by Dr Seuss from Oh, the places you will go, if only we knew when we embarked on this voyage the places we would go. We would at least have tried to veer off course, perhaps.

The Husband and I, we’ve been off for some time, possibly since a little while before his illness. When I think back to when he was first diagnosed, how we honestly thought it would bring us closer together, how such a serious hurdle to overcome together would help us put aside all our pettiness and it would bridge whatever divide had started to come between us, how silly of us. It did, of course, for a time, it brought us back together, we clung to each other like a drowning man to a life raft. And yet here we are discussing the dreaded S word, the one that precedes the much more final D word, the point of no return.

Tonight I lay in bed next to the Boy and all I could feel was guilty. The endless debate in my head: how can I seriously consider tearing apart his stability, pulling the rug out from under him, how do I break up his home? And yet, how do I not? What am I teaching him, we’re his example of love, of companionship, of partnership, we’re teaching him how to relate to others, is this really what I want for him?

The Husband and I, we’re civil, most of the time, we’re friends, we talk and get along but we also hate each other, we’re mean, and unpleasant, we’re not really good examples. We could go on like this for years, most likely, but why? Why should we, when we still remember what it was like to love each other, to like each other?

I don’t know where this is going, but I do know it can’t stay like this, because if no one is happy then everybody loses.

This is the last living with leukemia post I’ll write, because it’s heartbreaking to me that we managed to avoid the one and only really terrifying ending that could have come from this illness, that of a life without the Husband, ironic then, that now I may still be living my life without the Husband.

If you're interested in the other Living with Leukemia posts you can find them here:
Part 1 - The Girl
Part 2 - Me
Part 3 - Me again
Part 4 - Broken
Part 5 - Anniversary of T.W.C.O.A.T.
Part 6 - Anger
Part 7 - Loneliness
Part 8 - The Ugly Truth

Stand. Just stand.

2012-03-01T22:35:00.003+01:00

Today I remembered a little bit of who I was, I remembered my thing. You know that thing, that thing that makes you feel better, that get’s your juices flowing, that amps your energy, for some people it’s running, for some people it’s yoga… everyone has their thing. My thing was dancing. Not professionally or anything, probably not even very well in fact, but that was my thing.

As a child and tween I took the obligatory dance classes, anything from ballet, to modern dance, to flamenco. As an angsty teen I’d sit in my room with the stereo as loud as my parents could stand it and dance around, and around, and around… for hours. As I got older and more disciplined I went back to the dance studio and pliéed my way to something akin to a nervous breakdown. I flitted from class to class, spending time and money I really didn’t have as a college student, trying everything you can imagine, classical ballet, contemporary dance, modern dance, even something similar to African tribal dancing simply called Afro. All this of course seasoned with a healthy side of clubbing on the weekends, where I was probably the only one actually there to boogie rather than the drinking and hooking up that normally goes on at that age.

And then I got older, work got in the way, and relationships… because what guy in a relationship is going to take you dancing? And life in general, it gets in the way of what we really like to do. And then you start feeling self conscious and silly, at 36 I’ve managed to lose the simple pleasure of being silly. I get embarrassed, I feel like an idiot at the idea of jumping around the room with volume up, I’m too old, I’m a mother… I don’t think twice about prancing around my living room, neighing, with both kids on my back as I pretend to be a horse, but dancing, that’s too embarrassing. How ridiculous. How sad. When did I start thinking I was too old to dance? When does anyone get too old to dance?

This biblically long preamble to say that today I got in the car and Stand by Lenny Kravitz was playing and I got that giddy feeling one gets when the endorphins start pumping, I laughed out loud, and I imagined myself dancing (I was driving, I couldn’t actually dance), I even bounced around in my seat a little bit. And it was fun. And it made me happy, well happier than I’ve been lately anyway. When did I get too old for fun?

So I got home and I downloaded the song and I got the kids and we played it really loud and danced around the living room. I could see my reflection in the windows, I looked idiotic, I was embarrassed, I wasn’t sure what to do with all those limbs flailing about haphazardly. But it was sort of fun.

And my two kids, they had no compunction whatsoever about dancing around and being silly, more proof, if any was needed, that children are so much smarter than adults.

Now turn up the volume! (I linked up the Glee version of this song because I like this video better than the official Lenny Kravitz video, which is a bit ridiculous and won't let you concentrate on the music. Also here there are cute boys in suits dancing about.)

Oh, the places

2012-02-28T22:16:00.001+01:00

I’m still in my funk, I can’t write to save my life, so I won’t be tedious. I just wanted to share a quote, with which I’m sure you are already familiar. It's been rolling around in my mind almost obsessively the last few days. I have no idea why. Possibly because I’m in a Dr. Seuss phase in my life and his writing is so catchy, the cadence so rhythmic, the words so relatable...

Words are important to me and I can’t make sense of the words in my own head so I’m borrowing from others in the hope that sooner or later I’ll make sense of my life and the words trapped in my head will find their way somewhere coherent.

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who'll decide where to go...”

Now, where to go…?

Sometimes the problem is you

2012-02-24T10:31:00.000+01:00

I’ve been off lately. I’m not sure how to describe it, I’m not even sure how long lately is. Last summer I was in a pretty bad place, my emotions were all over the place and I couldn’t get it under control, I figured I may need meds or something to help me through it but I went the therapy route first cause I’m wary of drugs in general. I figure the stress of the past two years had finally gotten to me and I was overloading, therapy helped, I’m no longer a victim of my emotions, so yay for therapy, I guess.

And yet, I’m still off for some reason. I’m walking through my life in a kind of haze right now, I’m doing all the things I need to do, or rather most of the things I need to do. We’re taking steps forward as a family, we may be buying a house soon, the husband is well, everything is peachy. But I’m so unhappy. I don’t understand it. I look at my life and think I have everything I wanted, it’s not perfect, but it’s good. I look at my husband and I remember how much I loved him and still I’m so unhappy. I love my children so much, so much, that I’m not sure I want them to grow up with me, not like this. I don’t know where I am anymore, I don’t know how to fix it.

I try to fix it, I try and I try and I try, but I’m like a fly banging on the window over and over again, unable to get out. It makes no sense. I alternate between being determined, almost pig-headed, about making it better, and hopeless that it will ever get better.

I keep thinking it’ll be better once this or that happens, like it’ll be better once we buy the house, or it would be better if I could move back to Houston, or I would be better off divorced or whatever other fix it scheme I come up with at any given time, but rationally I know that the problem isn’t the place or the people, the problem is me.

I just don’t know how to fix me. I can change the world around me, I’m strong enough, determined enough and calculating enough to do that, but I don’t know how to change myself. I don’t even know what the problem is. Maybe if I could figure that out I could fix it, but I don’t know how. And yet I have to figure it out, the idea that unhappiness is just part and parcel of the human condition terrifies me. Baseless, uncontrollable unhappiness. How does one live like that? And what on earth am I teaching my children? Because I can act cheerful all I want, I can play with them and laugh with them but the undercurrent of sadness is always there and I don’t want them to grow up thinking that it’s normal. I hate writing these posts, it’s like I’m admitting to defeat but invariably I feel better after, like it’s not such a terrible secret if I can share it here.

And yet, even as I write these words I’m thinking, what have I to be so unhappy about? I have my family, I have my health, I have love, I have stability, so what on earth is the matter with me? And that, my friends, is the million dollar question.

Some things just boggle my mind

2012-02-22T23:36:00.000+01:00

I just had to write this really quick post today, because OH MY GOD, people!

My brother in law and his girlfriend are expecting a baby (YAY!!). So today she and I were talking about baby and pregnancy things and she mentioned she wasn’t sure what to do about a crib or cradle for the baby. I try not to talk to much, because, well, we all know how annoying too much advice is when we’re pregnant and also I epitomize the American consumerism ideal and had both a cradle and a crib for my kids, as well as a wicker basket for when we were downstairs, and I do, in fact, realize how completely ridiculous that is.

So anyway, I told her about the co-sleeper, because they don’t exist in Italy and when I saw it in the US I wished I didn’t already have more sleeping implements for babies than actual babies in the house. And, I told her, if you plan on breastfeeding, or if you’re a basket case like I was, checking to see if the baby was breathing every half an hour (on a side note, why do they have to terrorize new mothers with statistics on sids?) a co-sleeper is a really good idea, you can check on the baby and latch it on whilst practically still asleep. Optimizing sleep, when you have a newborn is really all you want to do anyway.

So I told her I’d send her some sites to check out and I went a-internet-searching, as one does nowadays, and I landed on this site: arms reach please go visit the site and come back, because you have to see this for yourself.

Now, I like animals, I’ve always had pets but for the love of all that is holy I cannot, for the life of me, fathom how you can put co-sleeper beds for babies on the same site as co-sleeper beds for pets. Seriously. What happened to your pooch sleeping on the rug near your bed? And also, I cannot, I simply CANNOT imagine buying a bed for a newborn with the image of practically the same identical bed for a dog. It blows my mind. And I thought the pet stroller was ridiculous enough all on its own.

What, I ask you, is the world coming to?

Big Boy Blues

2012-02-19T00:14:00.000+01:00

You’re four years old today. Halfway through your party you had a mini meltdown, the excitement was too much for you, your batteries were probably running a little low, so we headed to your room to hang out on the bed for a minute, just the two of us. You just wanted me to hold you, and you looked up at me, tears in your eyes, and said Mama, I’m still little. I guess hearing how you’re such a big boy now all day long must have scared you a little bit. You have no idea how much it scares me. If I could fold you up and turn you back into that black-haired baby, screaming at me in the OR four years ago, I would. In a New York minute.

When grown ups have babies they spend a fair amount of their time wishing for their babies to just grow up already, to sleep, to crawl, to walk, to eat independently… I never did, and I still don’t. There must be something wrong with me, but when you walked I was so proud of you, and yet I felt like you were taking your first steps away from me, even though you walked toward me. I don’t want you to grow up. But you will, you are, and all I can do for you is cheer you along and teach you some things and then stand on the sidelines, bated breath, and hope and pray that you grow up well, and that you’re happy and healthy.

It’s so frustrating and sad and joyous and exciting, this growing up think that you’re doing. So I said to you today, you’re still little, and you’ll always be my baby, even when you’re all grown up, but you’re also a big boy. You’re exactly right, right now, and I will love you all the way.

Happy Birthday darling boy, your smile lights up my life, you make my heart sing.

Tales from the bedside

2012-02-17T00:03:00.000+01:00

As I seem to have mentioned at least a few times we were all sick last week. And when children are sick, as you well know, it means getting up 1,253 times a night despite how the parents are feeling.

So a few nights ago, at 2.30am the Boy calls to me for water and I head off on one of my many treks to the kids’ room. He guzzles his water, and I realize he has a temperature of 39.8°C (103.6°F) which explains his delirium. As I’m giving him a fever reducer he turns to me, eyes still closed, asleep, one would presume, and says to me: “Mama, I’m a bird, you know? A big, strong bird. Like that famous eagle.”

A few weeks ago, in Houston, we went to the Zoo. And we saw a rather large bald eagle.

As I showed the bird to the boy, I explained that that bird was pretty special because it was on the seal of the President of the United States of America. (I'm trying to teach give him some sense of american-ness without boring him into hating it.)

So there you have it, he really does listen to me when I talk. My Boy, the Eagle.

Virtual Coffee {33}

2012-02-14T14:15:00.000+01:00

Hello dear friends, welcome to coffee.

I’m finally, slowly, starting to get back in the swing of things… kind of. Although I still can’t get my mind to wrap around the idea of all that snow out there. And yes, I know it started snowing late this year, and I avoided most of winter due to my month and a half long vacation in Houston, and I also shouldn’t complain since I just wrote the words “month and a half” and “vacation” in the same sentence, but seriously, enough with the snow. I’m pretty sure my friend Bridget, who lives in Alaska and can be found writing an extremely funny blog under several feet of snow for at least five months out of the year, definitely thinks I’m a wimp. But I have had enough. Enough.

This whole weather antagonism I’m feeling right now is likely due to the fact that our entire household was felled by the flu this weekend. The kids started it (don’t they always?!) with vomit-fest 2012 last Tuesday, then inexplicably high temperatures, an ear infection, then the nanny and the husband started feeling ill and by Friday I threw in the hatchet and declared our house officially a plague zone.

Of course the kids are feeling better now, and have recovered all of their energy, which means they will no longer sit quietly in front of the tv all day whilst I nurse my sinus infection and fever so my wonderful mother in law came down from Milan yesterday and has officially taken over child entertainment and general care duties. This warrants a big round of applause for mother in laws. Thank you.

So, if we were really having coffee today… well luckily we’re having it over the internet so I’m not spreading any germs.

Oh, and Happy Valentine’s day! I’m not feeling very Valentine-y myself today, though I did get some nice red roses from the Husband. He got some Ugg slipper/shoe type moccasins. And that’s as far as we’re going in the “celebration of our love” today since we’d just be sneezing all over each other and generally spreading cooties otherwise. Though we do have tentative plans to go out to dinner this weekend sans kids, cause that’s what Valentine’s day is really all about for parents, just a good excuse to have a quiet meal with no children in the vicinity.

Valentine’s day also means that the Boy’s birthday is right around the corner… and this means that I have to figure out what to do about it. We have tentative plans for a small party on Saturday, which will probably be a costume party as carnival time is here and it’s a pretty big deal in Italy. In fact tomorrow there’s the carnival party at their preschool and daycare but they’re both going to miss them due to the plague that has befallen us. Although the Boy’s been wearing his Spiderman costume non-stop for the past week, so he’s fully in the carnival spirit already.

That’s all the news from here, I’m going to go play dead in bed for a bit now cause I just poured all the meager energy reserves I had left in this sorry excuse for a coffee post. Thanks for stopping by, and for ignoring the tissues strewn all over the place!

And don’t forget to stop by and visit our hostess Amy!

This post makes no sense because I wrote it with a gaggle of whining kids in the background.

2012-02-09T22:17:00.000+01:00

Does two kids count as a gaggle?

Anyway. I’ve been feeling guilty about not writing for quite some time, but everything that comes into my head lately is either too depressing, too boring or would need fifty pages of explanatory preamble to make sense, so I haven’t been writing. But then today I decided to just stop feeling guilty and just write something already. Anything. Cause I like this blog and I don’t want to let it go off into inexistence quite yet, but each day that I ignore it, with a hundred and one supremely valid yet nonsensical excuses, makes it all the harder to go back to it.

I seem to always hit a certain degree of mal de vivre and of regret whenever I come back to Italy from a trip to Houston. I hate boohooing, I made a conscious choice to stay in Italy when I married the Husband and though we had always planned to move to the States I knew that there were no guarantees. And yet, all I’ve been doing since I’ve been back, nay, since before I even left Houston, is hating on Italy and letting all the little irritating things of everyday life become big, huge mountains that I have no will to face.

The truth though, if I really sit and look at it, is that there are just as many things that potentially would irritate me about living in the U.S., were I living there, because, no place is perfect and unfortunately the grass is always greener in the yard where I am not. (Did that sentence make any kind of sense outside my own head?)

Unfortunately, when I get myself into this funk, I tend to blame the Husband. He’s the one that’s making me stay here, it’s his fault, if only he hadn’t tricked me into marrying him… as if I had no free will…

So he’s been bravely, and somewhat resignedly, bearing the brunt of my bad behavior (I really intended to write mood here, but I simply cannot resist alliterating when I can), and I’m trying half-heartedly to return some semblance of sanity and reason back into my life. Because, despite what I would have me believe, Italy is not the antechamber of hell, it is a perfectly pleasant, though somewhat eccentric and often baffling country to live in. A country where logic and reason has no place (just look at the politics, or rather don’t, cause it’s depressing but that’s just an example) but that has many other qualities which I won’t enumerate here because I’m not there yet even though I’m now aware that there are good things, and I’ll soon start appreciating them again.

For now I’ll try to ignore the fact that both my kids managed to get sick after less than a day and a half back in school and the insanely cold temperatures and snow storms that hit just in time for our return home whilst diverting all of my attention to one of the regions main assets. The wine.

Sometimes pyjamas just aren't worth the trouble

2012-02-06T00:23:00.000+01:00

After bath today:

Husband: ok baby, let’s put your pjs on

Girl: no!

Husband: come on, Girl, pjs

Girl: no!

Husband: Girl, it’s time to put your pjs on

Girl: don’t wanna!

Husband: Ok, sweetie, but it’s cold, let’s just put your pjs on and go read a story.

Girl: story?

Husband: Yes, pjs, then story.

Girl: no, don’t wanna!!

Husband: do I have to get mad at you? Ok, Girl, I’m getting really mad at you! Put your pjs on!

Girl: DON’T WANNA PJS!

Husband: fine, be naked, I don’t care.

….

So, we’re home now.

Sometimes I don't make a bit of sense

2012-01-24T07:49:00.000+01:00

I haven’t disappeared, or given up blogging… but the husband’s gone back to Italy and this means two things: I am the children’s number one entertainer and my photo editor, organizer and transferer from memory card to computer is gone. Hence, no writing and certainly no photos. Alas (or thankfully, depending on the points of view) we are flying back to Italy next week and we’ll be back to our regularly scheduled programming.

I wrote this post last week (or the week before, have completely lost track of time) and though it is long and rambling and not completely coherent I felt bad just leaving it sitting there so am posting. So for now, I leave you with this, and I’ll be back to writing and commenting (and tweeting, pining and what have you) next week if the jet-lag and my two kids don’t kill me.

The question I hated the most at the beginning of the whole leukemia saga was “how are you?”, with the head tilt and the concerned expression. And my answer was always “fine”, because what the hell else was I supposed to say, right?

I certainly couldn’t answer: “I feel like something large and slobbery ate me, digested me and shit me out and I was just barely conscious enough to experience it all”, because, well, who wants to hear that, and what could they possibly say in return.

After two years nobody asks me that anymore, people go on with their lives and even though the husband actually was re-diagnosed this year and had a second transplant, the news was old and trite and simply didn’t elicit the same sensationalistic reactions. Which kind of surprised me, on the one hand, because obviously with cancer if someone relapses pretty quickly after treatment the odds of them surviving kind of start going down. On the other hand, I had fewer questions to answer and fewer people to reassure and that was definitely a good thing for me.

Now, though, I’m seeing lots of people that I hadn’t seen since before the illness so the how are yous have started all over again. And this time around, with a teeny bit more maturity and distance from the fact I’ve started giving it some actual thought. How am I? The first thing that popped into my mind when I thought this was, well, I’m way better than I would be if the husband had died aren’t I? Certainly on the more positive side of the spectrum as far as possible attitudes go, but not quite comforting either.

How am I?

I’m a little sadder, generally, than I used to be. Not about anything specific, I just used to be more happy-go-lucky. I’m a little more distant I’m trying to let go of my expectations. I’ve had some disappointments, throughout these two years of the husband’s illness, from people I thought would be closer to me, from people that really should have been closer to me, but I’ve learned something very important in the process. Most of our disappointments are the result of our expectations, if we can let go of those our lives will be much easier. I hope I learn to do this in this lifetime.

I also have a more developed sense of what’s important in life. Not that I don’t often find myself wasting time and energy on futile feelings and actions but I’m learning to recognize them as unimportant, and I hope to get to the point of just letting them go (soon).

So, how am I doing? Better than I would have thought, worst than some people think. It isn’t all water under the bridge yet, unfortunately. Every day that passes that the Husband doesn’t relapse is a good day, but we don’t know it’s a good day until it’s over. It’s like you wake up and hold part of your breath, and you hold it all day, and at the end of the day you breathe out and think phew, one day further from the transplant. Every day we’re a little more optimistic, but the illness is still very much a part of our lives. Even though the people around us forget, and thank goodness that they do, we don’t forget. Not ever.

So this makes me more emotional and I have a shorter temper especially when I see people close to me getting angry and upset over stupid little things. I want to tell them, you’re alive, you’re healthy, you’re loved, stop fucking worrying about what people think about you, or stop getting mad because that guy cut you off or who the hell cares that this or that wasn’t perfect, but this is what people do and who am I to say they shouldn’t.

I find I’ve distanced myself emotionally from many of the people I love, but that happens I think when you try and let go of your expectations. With no expectations there are no disappointments, but there’s a certain, necessary, emotional aridity that’s a direct result.

So, how am I? Well, I haven’t really figured it out yet, but at least I’ve started asking the question too, and maybe, hopefully, someday soon I’ll know and I’ll start feeling normal again.

Brookstone, vibrators and the economy - wtf wednesday

2012-01-11T19:00:00.000+01:00

We all know the economy’s gone to the crapper, but there’s nothing quite like being reminded of this in the unlikeliest of places. The husband and I went to Brookstone on Monday, because it’s the classic place where tourists go to look for idiotic presents to bring home after their trips (although, some things I’ve gotten from there have been pure genius). We made our selection and went to pay, and I was a little surprised to see the checkout kid put the person in front of me’s purchases in a Whole Foods grocery bag. I paid and since I had a few things I saw the kid look around in a panic, and then he phewed in relief and picks up a large, worn, battered, clearly used brookstone bag and puts my stuff in it. At the questioning look on my face he answers: oh, we ran out of our bags right before Christmas, but we didn’t get our new bag budget until January 1^st and we still don’t have any bags, we’ve been using old grocery bags but I’ve finished them today so we’re really happy when someone returns something and we can keep their bags! Really? Brookstone, you sell a whole lot of pretty useless crap, how bout investing in some bags for the people buying your merchandise?

Also, on the way out we notice this display:

Now, we all know that 99% of the time “personal massagers” are vibrators in disguise for politically correct stores, but seriously the “disguise” part’s totally blown on this one! So, Brookstone, maybe less vibrators and more shopping bags in the future.

I was going to link up with Poppy at Funny or snot for WTF wednesday, but she's not doing the linky anymore... sigh.

Virtual Coffee {32}

2012-01-10T23:52:00.002+01:00

Hello dear friends, and welcome to (this rather late) coffee. And since this is our first coffee together this year, also a belated Happy New Year!

I’m a bit sad today, because after three weeks together day and night the Husband is flying back to Italy. This is the longest vacation he has ever taken in his life, including our honeymoon, so it’s going to be hard readjusting to real life again (well, for him, since the kids and I are in Houston for another three weeks).

We’ve been busy, so we’ve made some really good memories and snapped about 2,500 pictures… no, I’m not exaggerating. He’s going to be very busy culling all the crappy pictures once he’s home!

Culling pictures like this one. Though we've been doing an awful lot of this since there's no Starbucks in Italy.

The kids have both managed to get sick in the last few days, but it seems they are on the mend now and we can resume our action packed holiday. Seriously. We’ve been to the aquarium, to the zoo, to the fire museum, to more playgrounds and indoor play areas than I can count, we’ve seen some friends and have many more to see still, we’ve eaten in all my favorite restaurants and discovered some new ones I didn’t know.

yes, the fire museum.

We celebrated the Epiphany (celebrated by Catholics on January 6^th, in commemoration of the Magi - three wise men, or three kings - visiting the Baby Jesus) with both the Italian and the Mexican traditions. Why the Mexican? Well, we have a lot of friends from Mexico and this falls under the category of any excuse for a party!

In Italy, the tradition is that a benevolent old lady/witch-type character called La Befana, who has no magical powers but flies on a broom, comes in the night and brings children candy or coal (depending on whether they’ve been good or bad) and maybe a small present. This is when people put up stockings in Italy, for La Befana, not for Christmas. And they’re not necessarily nice, fancy stockings, when we were little we used to use our own socks, or rather, we’d put out my Dad’s dress socks cause they were the biggest and longest socks in the house, in the hope that she would fill them up all the way (which, incidentally, she usually did).

I look like an angel, but I'm really not

So happy to have stockings!

Not so happy about the coal (candy coal, but still look at her wtf face!)

this coal is pretty cool, and I can eat it you say?!

In Mexico, they have a cake called Rosca de Reyes, which is a round, bready type cake with candied fruit on top, where usually one baby Jesus figurine is hidden (although most of the time you find as many baby Jesuses as there are children present), whoever finds the baby Jesus has to have a party on February 2^nd (Dia de la Candelaria or Candlemas day) – or alternatively take the figurine to mass for a blessing.

We found one of the baby Jesus but are exempt from hosting the party as we live too far away

Anyway, this is going to be a very brief coffee, as the Husband’s literally putting the luggage in the trunk as I type, but I’ll leave you with a few pictures of the past couple of weeks.

And when you’re done go visit our hostess Amy!

on the carousel at the aquarium. what? I like carousels and who can say no to riding a dolphin?

some sort of rescue operation going on in the fire museum playroom

sliding down the pole in full fire fighter gear (except the boots, he wouldn't wear the boots)

I had a mini internal freak out about germs when he put that mask on

we even ran into some real live firemen outside the museum and they let us get on their real live firetruck

Bang, bang

2012-01-08T08:17:00.000+01:00

Generally if you ask a European the first thing they think of when thinking of Texas they will say one of the following: death penalty, oil rigs, cowboys (and/or all the related attire), horses, beef and guns. Since I no longer ride horses, am married so the cowboys are out (and am frankly too Italian for cowboy attire), and the death penalty is certainly not something I want to experience, I decided to go shooting today.

It probably will surprise no one to know that I have a fair few friends who own guns and use them to shoot things, I mean, what else would one do on a sunny Saturday morning? So we were thrilled when they kindly offered to take us shooting, though the kids had to stay home (see, we’re not barbarians!).

The first gun safety talk given to us by our friend (the giant you see hovering over me in the pictures), managed to thoroughly freak me out and elicited visions of me accidentally loosing control of the gun and shooting everyone in the range dead (thus seguing straight to the death penalty portion of this post). I regained some of my composure whilst reading the half-assed gun safety rules we initialed at the shooting range and the disclaimer that clearly stated they were NOT responsible if I lost control of my gun. (Although, they probably are responsible for cleaning up the mess afterwards). Thankfully, the giant’s wife found a shooting instructor to go over the rules with me and I got all jittery again, which is precisely the condition you do not want to be in when handling deadly firearms.

We “suited up” i.e. put on glasses and ear muff thingies, I opted not to put on two layers of ear protection cause I wanted to actually hear the instructions coming my way. Let me tell you, hearing a gunshot in closed quarters even whilst wearing ear muff thingies will make you jump about a foot off the ground for at least the first ten or twenty times, then you get used to it.

These are some of the things I learned today. Most people who handle firearms are not idiots and though they are very concerned that guns be handled properly they have no fear of the object in and of itself, which is strangely comforting. Gunshots are very loud. One must have a strong hold to properly shoot a gun, hence the sideways “gangsta rapper” hold should be avoided if you want to hit your target. Loading a gun is way, way harder than one would imagine. The casings are very hot and they will probably get in your shirt. This is NOT an excuse to lose control of your gun. Shooting at a target is a lot of fun.

I scared the husband with this one

they have zombie themed targets, who would have thought...

shooting's fun!!

you can even shoot at numbers

Seriously, what better way to spend a Saturday with friends in Texas?

on the windowsill behind us was a stuffed rattlesnake. I forgot to take a picture of it dammit!

A heartfelt thanks to our friends for "risking their lives" with us today!