I shouldn't

I shouldn't be sitting here drinking this wine.
I shouldn't be able to fit into this pair of pajama pants.
I shouldn't be able to walk normally.
I shouldn't be able to move without worrying about my hip dislocating.
I shouldn't be able to move my arms without whacking my engorged breasts.
I shouldn't be able to see any part of my body from the midsection down to the floor.

But I can, and I am, and I do.

I should've been a shuffling, waddling, fat husk fielding a million questions.
I should've been using a plastic bag on my driver seat to get in and out of my van.
I should've been worrying about choosing a name.
I should've been reconfiguring car seats.
I should've been having heartburn.
I should've been having insomnia.
I should've been excited and nervous.
I should've been worrying about juggling a toddler and a newborn.
I shouldve been perhaps even actually holding a squishy new baby.

Instead, I am forging a new normal that doesn't include any of that.
Instead, I regularly find myself counting how many spoons I have left to get through the rest of the day.
Instead, I found myself having the sensations of a phantom pregnant belly as I laid in bed this afternoon.
Instead, I cry in the hot shower as I look down and see my frame and body all the way down to my feet.
Instead, I am staring at my fertility awareness app on my phone, and seeing that the only thing due this week is my menstrual cycle - and *not* my baby.  Oh, mind and body, you are cruel playmates this week.
Instead, I'm praying to get through the next week without as much heavy grief as I had nearly 7 months ago.
Instead, I am sitting here, mournful and sad, completely depleted of energy.
Instead, I am drafting plans for an annual collection for a charity in honor of Francis' due date that never came.
Instead, I carry the weight of a heavy heart of miscarriage and feeling alone in my grief event though I know I am not.
Instead, I am finding myself comforting other mothers of angels in their journey, just as others walked with me in mine. It is a supremely sucktacular sisterhood have to join.
Instead, I argue with platitudes intended to comfort when all they do is cut deeper and sharper.
Instead, I fight with myself to find silver linings, hidden graces, and the what-ifs that I couldn't do if I had continued that journey.

Instead, I get to say things like "If a girl has to endure the suckage of mourning the loss of a child, she deserves the kind of love and support I got."

And instead, I know not everyone does. And they shouldn't get anything less than I received.

My kids don't do your idea of normal

For years, there have been stereotypes as to what little boys and girls do in terms of playing, socializing etc. And for the last 21 years, MY kids have been doing their own version of these things. My eldest asked for a Barbie for his 7th birthday. My 3rd child wanted a toy dumptruck for her birthday. I have provided my boys with toy kitchens alongside their cars, and my daughters with Rip-Stiks alongside their dolls. Honestly, my girls have a tiny doll collection by comparison to some of my friends' daughters. I did too. And I dug in the dirt as a kid. If my dad, who abhors yardwork, had a tree I could've climbed in the yard, I would have. He bought the smallest lot on the block so he wouldn't have to do much mowing or gardening. So my tree climbing skills never blossomed.

I also was prone to hanging out with boys more often than girls, because boys didn't have the same B.S. going on than my female peers. The fact that I now have a TON of female friends is sometimes boggling to me. But, I've also gotten girlier as I've gotten older, and then this crazybaglady gig I do *is* rather girly. And my daughters are a healthy blend of girly and tomboy, and I am not doing anything to squelch it. It does pose some challenges at school because our genetic quirks make us and our children outside the herd. The herd doesn't know how to handle us right away, and the kids struggle with fitting in at school.

My 5 year old tells me with regularity that the girls in her class move away from her, and that it makes her sad because she likes them. It hurts my heart because I know what that means for her. It means that she isn't someone they relate to easily, and she's probably a bit rowdy at school (because she is at home too), so the girls don't want to get involved with a rowdy girl who would probably play better with the boys. My suggestion was to just leave the girls alone and hang with the boys. My daughter said that the girls are better than the boys and she didn't want to play with boys. I told her that sister and I were faced with the same problems as little girls, and we decided that girls were annoying and we hung out with the boys instead because they were just more fun.

It is a bittersweet realization that my daughters are SO much like I am, because I know the difficulty they have been living. My 12 year old was one of 2 girls in 5th grade who opted to go play football with the boys instead of walking around the playground gossiping. Middle school has been tough on all of us, and I truly wish more parents embraced variety and encouraged their daughters to go climb a tree, play football, go fishing, or skateboard. I wish more parents embraced their sons' softer sides a little more and let their sons play with kitchens and dolls. All of these things for each gender serves purpose, and makes them more well-rounded individuals. My oldest sons are awesome caregivers to their siblings, and can care for a home. My daughters will eventually learn the nuances of mowing the yard so my husband won't have to do it as often, and basic hardware use so they can install their own curtain rods, unclog the sink drain, or check the fluid levels in their cars.

Why do I do things this way? I do it because I don't want my sons to be a source of frustration for their partners by never helping around the house. I do it because I don't want my daughters to feel like they must settle for a partner who does this stuff, but neglects her soul or worse yet, abuses her. I want them all to appreciate what their partners do for them, because they understand what it entails. We're too weird to be your idea of normal, but we're too normal to be weird. And speaking only for myself, I am absolutely ok with that because... well, frankly I don't care if you think we're weird. I do, however, care that you teach your kids to not be jerks to mine for being slightly off center from your definition of normal.

Birthday gifts

It's been a while since I posted anything, which is not uncommon for me to do around here. Like a lot of people, I thrive on the instantaneous potential for feedback over on crackbook. As those folks over there know, I've recently been tasked with my father's care. He had a stroke, or multiple strokes, over the Christmas holidays. It is coming to light exactly the small missteps others made that led us to where we are today. It has only been a week, and like God tells us, "we know not the hour" of the culmination of this leg of the journey. I have high hopes to tolerate it for the long haul, with the rocky crags, the beautiful sunrises, the smooth terrain, and the potholes along the way.

As my readers know, I couch virtually everything in humor, whether it's truly an amusing situation, a heart rending one, or something that has drawn my ire. My father has a certain wit about him, and he instilled it in me. He is also the genetic source of my debaucherous side. He also taught us many other lessons. He is a living message of "preach the Gospel at all times, use words if necessary." He has always given his time and talent where he could. He has served as church sexton, usher at Mass, and bread slinger at a food mission. The bosses at the bread mission expressed concern over a man of a certain age who was heaving stacks of full bread trays, 5 at a time. My father quite handily put their concerns aside with his feisty wit and determination, outslinging "the young bucks"  as he calls them, and finishing the prep work for his station in less time than it took for the younger volunteers to even get their product to their stations.  Telling him no means he is even more determined to prove the naysayer wrong.

And this stroke has slapped him with a big fat NO. No, sir, you can't drive anymore, because you are blind in the right half of both eyes (hemianopsia). No sir, you can't be alone anymore because not only can you not see half your world, but you will now start seeing things nobody else can, your depth perception is skewed, and your idea of slow is still too fast for your safety. No, sir, your dementia has been made worse by the stroke, and life as we know it has changed. No, sir, you must use that walker because the vision loss is going to affect your balance. No, sir, it is no longer your time to give and do for others, but it is your time to receive. And he quite simply does not know how to sit back and accept others serving him.

For a man who has always given, always done for himself and others, this is a huge blow. It is a slow painful death to a man to not be needed. And as I just typed that, I realized that in my insistence on serving him, I have inadvertently caused him to not be needed. My oldest sister suggested I have him help with small tasks that he can do, like folding the baby's diapers for me. This is a lesson to me as well, because like my father, I have a need to do things for myself. I need to loosen the reins on the small tasks so I can focus on where my purpose currently lies. That purpose is to manage my father's care and keeping, that of my household, and to work on growing my business. And my other purpose is to serve as my dad's protector - from himself, the pitfalls of his environment, and people who would take advantage of him.

Dad has always taught us to never expect anything from anyone, but should someone give you something, you are to be damn grateful for it. It has a link to his upbringing during the 1930s, with parents who, to be polite, were difficult. For whatever reason, Dad feels unworthy. He's always felt that way, but it is truly showing itself as an impediment at the moment. He feels unworthy of being served in his old age. I know how that feels. It's exactly how I felt when I attended a retreat at church, and these women refused to let me lift a finger to do anything except tuck myself into bed, dress myself, and use the bathroom. To a mom who did so much for her family on a daily basis, it was truly FOREIGN to have someone else take care of her. Right now, I've been speaking a horrible foreign language to Dad, and he can't translate.

So, here's this aged man, who has been forced out of his world, and into ours. His presence in our home was my birthday present. He was discharged from the rehab hospital the day after my birthday. I was joking the week prior, and still do, "Happy Birthday! Here's the care and keeping of your father!" It's a very important task, and it's not rainbows and sparkly fairy unicorn farts by any stretch of the imagination. But humor is how I handle things. Despite the snark of the outward appearance of that statement, I am finally getting the opportunity to see a part of my father he hid from the world. His vulnerability calls for my strengths to be put into action. The life experiences I've collected along the way with Devildog have been training grounds for this stretch of the journey.

Having a dad who was 49 when I was born, I always had an appreciation and respect for the elderly. They've been there, done that, got a thousand t-shirts to show for it. Just this week alone, I have seen beautiful things about him, about my oldest sister, and about my husband and children. And that is a gift that can't be taken lightly.

Of fire trucks and dreams

Clone needed black pants for her band concert this week. She hit a growth spurt RIGHT after we got her a pair for the December concert. Such is our luck, right? So, off to a second-hand store that sells kids' clothes. The store has this giant toy firetruck near the registers, with a sign on it that it's not for sale, just for fun.

Clone was in the dressing room, repeating every try-on session I've ever had. We've got ample bootie, and it poses challenges with proper fit, and my need to veto a lot of what she has tried on for putting too much cash and prize on display. She's got a long femur too, so it's a trifecta making virtually every skirt or pair of shorts too far north on her legs. I was poking around looking for cute onesies for chunk boy's summer wardrobe. He is his daddy's clone - long torso, short legs, not skinny. The kid's elbows have dimples.

Meanwhile, this little girl who may have been around age 3 or 4, was there with her mother. The little girl pointed out the fire truck to her mom, and mom promptly said "That's for boys." That little girl shrank. Not only did her mother shut her down, but then she squashed her daughter's interest in dreaming. I said something about knowing some women who are first responders that would disagree. Mama didn't seem interested in, or pleased with, what I said. Honestly, I did not care. Lord, please let this child go on a school field trip to a fire house and find at least one or more women in the line of duty. My heart breaks for that family, broken down before dreams even begin to take shape.

I heard "you can't" as a child. My mother heard it in her childhood. Some of the problem was that my parents didn't have the extra money for things. But pride got in the way. "Can't" should have been followed by "afford". The word "can't" in my childhood was translated to ability, not finances. It prompted me to be honest with my kids when things were unaffordable. "It's not in the budget" or "we don't have the extra money" is honest, and pride-piercing. But it's not dream crushing.

My dad let me tinker with his tools when I was a kid. I entered adulthood with small skills that paid dividends. I could make small repairs and saved money on replacing items or hiring someone to fix stuff. We lived in base housing when tropical storms blew through Camp Lejeune. Base housing has a list of self help items they can give residents to do things like change air filters, replace the hook and eye latches on screen doors, replace broken porch light globes etc. My screen door was ripped, and I couldn't open the door for fresh air without bugs moving in with us. I went to the self help shop at the housing office to ask for screen material. The guys looked at me like I was nuts, and said "it's not on the list of stuff we can give you."  He may have said something about my husband, but it's been so long, I forget.
I looked at him and said "Well, I have tools and a staple gun, and I can fix a screen door. Or, I can add one more piddly ticket to your list of work orders, and it'll be months before I get a screen door fixed because other people have trees in their houses." He paused a minute, sighed, and gave me enough screen for my door. I was an antithesis of the typical Marine wife, and I don't know that he'd ever experienced anyone like me before. The guys in the maintenance department appreciated that when I called for repairs, it was really worth their time, and not BS calls like someone's closet doors being off track and they didn't know how to get them back on there.

I realize it's an anomaly to see non-traditional roles in play. My sons can cook and clean, and my daughters love motorcycles. They've all played with kitchens, cars, dolls, and tool sets. Clone will say she'd rather hang with the boys because they have something interesting to say, versus girl gossip. Blur was at a party recently. There was a bounce house and the boys were being brutes. The other girls ran away, but my feisty redheaded little girl stayed put, refusing to cave to the boys' attempts to get the bounce house girl-free. A time or two, she may have done that running back block.

I want my kids to accept dreaming as a possibility. I want them to take leaps of faith and do things that interest them. I want them to not have to battle the inner bully of self-sabotage and self-defeat that I have. Logically, I know I can do things. Internally, I constantly nudge that timid child out of the corner, making her try new things, and do things she resists. It started with getting my motorcycle endorsement two years ago. It's incredibly empowering to learn to ride. It's incredibly soul-strengthening to get in the saddle over and over and build the skill and confidence to venture among the "cagers". I got sidelined a bit, but I will be getting back in the saddle in a couple years. My body still needs to rebuild, I have a new baby, and I'll need to take the endorsement course again because I have already forgotten a lot of it. In the meantime, I've found myself surrounded by a lot of awesome cheerleaders who help me stifle the inner bully, and spurn the timid child forward. I want my kids to see me go after goals, achieve things, and not defer dreams. I want them to strike out in search of their own dreams, and the best way to do that is by example.

Size matters, depending on how you see it

I, unlike soooo many people I know, hit a kind of genetic lottery at conception. I got my father's father's lean lines and high metabolism, and my father's mother's hips that made childbirth a greased pig in a greased chute kind of delivery. The extent of my exercise consists of walking 30 feet to my mombus to get in it and go somewhere, and what ever movement haphazardly tending home generates. Aside from the things I'm allergic to, I eat pretty much what I want, including those baked goods and sweets. And jealous people comment about how lucky I am because my size is single digits and I shrank after having baby #5. The assumption is that I am back to pre-baby size/weight etc.

uhh, NO I am not.

I still have 20ish pounds lingering on my small frame, I am still a couple sizes larger than pre-baby, and I have a limited wardrobe because history tells me to wait longer and my old clothes will fit again. So I'm still frustrated getting dressed each day between size and fit issues, and nursing accessibility and comfort. I won't wear it if it isn't comfortable and moves with me and for me.

There's the other issue that is the bane of dressing my frame - my curves. I don't hate my curves. I love that I'm curvy. It's not a problem for me until I try to find pants that lack the ever-pervasive ghetto bootie gap in the back, while respecting the budget. Victoria becomes no secret, because I also strive to avoid butt cleavage like I try to avoid displaying mammary cleavage. So, if ya see the mom-drawers, be glad it's not full exposure. I'm sexier for leaving something to the imagination and carry myself with confidence, not because I put cash and prizes on display.

Now, I believe big can be beautiful if you wear it well. And I have seen some gorgeous women whose size labels would wrap around me twice or more. I don't see size the same way some people do. I'm blissfully oblivious to that niggling detail about other people. My own sister has had weight shifts up and down, and asked me my opinion about it, and I annoyed her because she thought I was placating her comments. No, seriously, I did not notice the change.

But apparently, the rest of the world sees those changes, and their tricky minds craft fallacies. I've been told "oh my gosh, you're already back to pre-baby weight!?!?" Which bugs me to hear that. NO, no I am not, and I don't appreciate you assuming that I did. If I wanted to shrink the hips and thighs a little, I know exactly what to do to achieve it, and that it will take some time and a lot of power walking on my part to get there. The fact is, that I don't want to bother getting off my blessed assurance right now, and I'm not pissing and moaning a lot about it because it's my issue to own.  I'm just embracing the physical package I have at the moment and we'll see what comes later. I have other things I want to do and when I am ready, I'll do the walking. Some of this size won't go away till the boob monkey weans, and that won't be anytime soon.

Between babies, after I'd shrank back to my small, normal-for-me size, many a friend listened to me lamenting about trying to find pants that fit. "Oh, it must be sooooo haaaarrrrd for you to be a size 2! waaaah!" Unfortunately for a couple of them, they got the receiving end of my OH SNAP moment. It's proportion and perspective folks. If not for the hips and thighs, I would've been a size 0. Comparatively, it's akin to someone being a 20 on top, and a 24 on the bottom. Then there's the challenge that clothing makers assume if the wearer is a size 2, they are young, with no curves, and not having borne offspring. So, yes, dressing a slender but very curvy form is a challenge and has its own caveats. Having an insanely high metabolism can be a challenge and have its own caveat. And it doesn't help that there is no standardized sizing in the fashion industry like there is for men's clothing.

Instead of making assumptions about a person's physical state, strike up a conversation and ASK them. Persnickety Ticker gets the assumption from others that she has a heart problem because she's big. Nope, it's the other way around. She was born with a bad heart, and had heart attacks at girl scout camp during P.E. sessions. The guy who had a major accident and has permanent facial disfigurement gets the assumption that he can't speak properly, or has a cleft palate. How much are you missing out on a friendship, wisdom, knowledge, or experience, because you make an assumption based on the outer package? This goes for prejudice of all kinds. Age, size, pigment, hair type, native language, height, physical ability...you name it, there's a prejudice for it.

Stop hating on people who can not help the genetic lottery they got at conception. Stop making the comments that paint failure on someone else. You telling me that I went back to pre-baby size/weight, whether true or false, just slaps the woman near us in earshot. She has struggled for years to even come close to losing any of the baby weight, and the baby is in middle school. Then she sees me and associates me with a painful experience. Nevermind the fact that I did nothing intentional to cause harm, but that tricky brain installs that message to her spirit and we potentially miss out on something cool.

I can't take responsibility for your insecurities. I have plenty of my own, and I need a bag with wheels to hold them. Own what you are, what you have, how you're made, and stop hiding behind comments whether well-intended or back-handed. I am overall an awesome woman with a curvy silhouette, kickass sense of humor, and I love what I love. I am not without imperfection, fault, or shortcoming. And I can't help the package God put me in, I can only do what I can with it.

Bittersweetness

It's been an interesting several weeks since my last post, fraught with cognitive failure and the pendulum sweeping the other way to sheer brilliance for a fleeting second. I should be sleeping right now, because the clock is ticking on the incessantly hungry infant's tummy. But I am sitting in the silence and relative stillness of the house, with only my brain running at warp speed. Such is the joy of an ADD brain. It's 1 am and I'm unable to get my brain to shut up at all tonight.

I have been seeing this one blog post about "The Last One" in my crackbook feed numerous times this week. Finally, I read it. And in doing so, my eyes welled up and my brain started running even faster. I never imagined I'd have FIVE kids in my life. I figured  after #3, and we were good. Then I had a 4th, and thought we had 2 of each, we were golden. HAH! Have I mentioned that I was supposed to have a home office and a motorcycle?

The Tie Breaker is 3 months old and careening through his milestones with warp speed just like his siblings did. And I was looking at him asleep in my arms tonight, wondering what purpose God has for him to send him to us after we feel like we've screwed up at least one of our other kids some how or another. I am still shocked and awed that we were entrusted with the care, feeding, and training of another miniature human. I am boggled that my friend thinks so highly of me to ask that I would be Godmother to another of her children, when I am a slacker in so many ways, including my faith. But at the same time it's all humbling. How haughty of me to think I should strike out on some kind of adventure in my life that didn't necessarily include starting parenthood alllllllll over again.

And I am chronically struck by the sheer fact that we have TWO adult children, yet there are 3 more home, and that the youngest is a brand new sprog. I do derive bemusement from telling people our kids are 3 months old on up to 20 years old. Part of that is just me still trying to digest it. Part of it is that I am amused by the shock others have when they learn we're a larger-than-average family, and NOT a blended household. Yeah, we're rebels like that. I sometimes think that I should have been a sociologist.

But with all of that comes an occasional pang. I miss my boys sometimes. Reality is though, that they are at the point where they must transition into adulthood, despite my desire to keep the little boys they used to be. They're grown and turning into fascinating adults. And every time the baby smiles, I see both his brothers too. And then I see a quirk from one of his sisters. I thought I was done having kids after the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. And I'm certainly feeling done after the 5th. With each of those done feelings comes a hint of sadness behind the celebration. First steps for them, but the last first steps for me. First teeth (oh lordy, who are we kidding, teething is abysmally miserable), first words, etc. And I find myself doing something I was incapable of 20 years ago. I find myself dwelling on the smile, the diaper change, the nursing (not always, because oof - someone is constantly touching me!), the giggles, the cooing, the completely different means this kid needs to get a burp out of him, the comforting a baby with reflux and knowing you can only do so much. Then I dig in my memory bank, wondering if the oldest 2 had any of these quirks and issues, and I just didn't have the knowledge then that I do now. Parenting would have been a whole different experience for both me and the spawn, had I been connected with the kind of people who share their story. When you know better, you do better. I hope I'm doing better.

And those well-intended words those veteran moms and old ldies shared when my oldest 3 were born: "Enjoy those babies". It is difficult when in the throes of sleep deprivation, missed showers, gross diapers, the whole kit-and-caboodle. I find myself feeling more present in this segment of the mom-gig. I constantly work to have balance and avoid losing my sanity. And I want to enjoy my kids. I just don't always find the wherewithal to do it. Despite my efforts to find balance, I sometimes don't have it. I rely heavily on my middle child now, and I have mixed feelings about it. She needs to make her own transitions toward growing up, but she's still a child too. And again, we strive for balance. She's incredibly helpful and has the capacity to follow her brothers into adulthood with a different brand of thinking and experience that will hopefully catapult her beyond her peers.

Each of the older kids loves the younger siblings. As much as I hate to admit that I miss my sons, one of them hates to admit he misses his newest brother. When they're here, they're awesome with the younger kids (usually). When they're here, I also selfishly breathe in their presence because I know they're not staying long. And I enjoy those fleeting moments, because I painfully recognize them for what they are. And then I look at this newest person to join our world, and think how much more I really do have the privilege of getting to know him before we launch him. It's a perspective that was impossible for me to properly possess two decades ago.

Art of Life

It's too personal a story to relate.
But after a long time friend left my house today, I found a note I'd jotted down during one of Father Lam's homilies. And it so appropriately sums up what I was feeling, and how that friend has lived life.

"The pain passes, but the beauty remains." - Pierre-Auguste Renoir


Thank you for making the trek - all the way to my house today, and all the way through our lives.

And don't stick your head in a tiger's mouth.

catalysts

Sometimes, it's more painful to waffle on a decision than it is to just decide already and deal with what comes of it.

I'm dealing with a lot of junk and trying to mentally and emotionally sort it. And today was ok, but it went downhill this evening. I could go into a rant, but it will only serve to continue stirring the negative sentiments swirling in my head. It didn't help that there were some reactions around me that weren't what I was hoping for them to be, and I accidentally shot my own foot and that of a dear friend with my griping. And I'm hanging my head in shame with tears of frustration and hurt. I hate feeling like I can't win.

I am on the teacup ride at Disney, and I've never liked that ride ever whether in real life, or proverbially speaking. Things have been out of balance for a while here, and trying to right the ship again is proving a massive challenge. I look forward to finding balance soon. A lot has suffered for things being out of whack.

Normally I try to avoid the news because it raises my blood pressure, and demonstrates the moral lows of society. But this is abhorrently low. I don't care what your position on the pro-life/pro-choice conversation is, because the root of this story isn't based in that debate. I have seen this all over the web because none of the mainstream outlets are talking about it (but they'll talk ad nauseum about Vick's antics). They'd rather rail on a dog cruelty case till people get tired of hearing it and stop giving a crap about it, but we won't hear about this human-against-human cruelty at all. But this story of greed, indignity, predatory behavior, municipal failures, and murder deserves more attention than a football player who shot his own foot, or the one who committed his own egregious harm to animals. This case deserves the same kind of outrage that stemmed from the death of Treyvon Martin, minus the division of the populace. Where is Corrine Brown's wig-wearing,, horrible grammar self, lambasting the officials in Pennsylvania for not doing anything to stop this death mill? Where is Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Gloria Allred, Nancy Pelosi, Sarah Palin, or any freaking body else who claims to be a proponent of equality, fairness, and what's morally appropriate? They're all afraid to go near this story, because it's so horrific and inhumane, they're ashamed to admit nothing was done about it sooner.

I see jerks making judgmental comments about the women that went to this medically trained individual (he's not a doctor or a man - those 2 types will generally be of help and care). Instead of judging women for making the choices they do, start training your sons and daughters to choose mates and partners wisely, and to treat each other with respect, so they don't find themselves feeling so desperate that they have no other option but the path to this guy's office. Because there's always going to be vultures circling the vicinity of anything smelling desperate. And instead of looking down on women who land in tricky situations, reach out to them with compassion and kindness. You don't have to buy them a car, stroller, or diapers, but just give them the emotional support to get through the challenges, and stop kicking people when they're already down as it is.

I was there myself 20 years ago - feeling sticky and trapped and lost. However, I was incredibly lucky. Oh my God, how incredibly lucky I was. I'd had sex with a guy who was raised with morals, and who was not going to leave me stranded. And we got pregnant. SO many people pair up with someone who doesn't hold the same sense of obligation, and they get into trouble for the decision. Emotional, physical, and financial abuse is a small part of it. But the children suffer for it every time.

Thankfully - oh so incredibly thankfully, I did not suffer the same fate my counterparts did. I was not abandoned. I was not left to fend for myself. I was not overtly harmed. I did lose friends. I did miss out on fun. I was looked down upon by many - and yes, I could see it, hear it, feel it. All they saw was someone who looked 12 (I was 17) with a bulging middle, and they never stopped to ask me my story, or offer encouragement. They could only bother to assume unkind things about me, about my parents, about my situation. They contributed to kicking me, and breaking me down - even if only in their minds.

Why are we doing that to each other?

I had a friend whose boyfriend was pushing hard for her to have another abortion after falling pregnant when birth control failed again. I tried to convince her to keep her baby, and promised that I completely understood and grasped her fears, as I'd lived them. I volunteered to help her any way I could so that she could avoid the path she was walking toward. I didn't share with my husband that she didn't want the abortion but she felt like she had no option. He and I both wish I'd told him. He would have intervened with certainty. Later that fateful day, this girl was mourning the loss, and inconsolable. I still feel guilty that I didn't do more.

Had she been given more encouragement, instead of being berated and told she wouldn't make it, I'm certain that she would have done well despite the challenges. I knew she had it in her to get there. A few years later, she reached out to me via IM, thanking me for mentoring her and encouraging her. She finally got away from that particular guy and was living elsewhere and doing well. I do not know what ever happened to her after that, but I think of her often. I know she still carries the burdens of the choices made in her earlier days, and it will forever haunt her.

Instead of casting knowing and judgemental glares at young women who become mothers sooner than they should, smile at them. Stop and say "You look young, and you probably feel daunted and overwhelmed, but just know you're doing the right things to raise your child. I admire you for what you're doing." If you're in a position to do something tangible, ask if they need diapers, bus fare, pants for the child, shoes for herself, a text book for college classes, a car seat that is appropriate for her child's age/stage, lunch money, or even a freaking nap and you'll watch the little for her.

Get back to being a neighbor in the old-fashioned sense of the word, and stop being the person that just lives in the same neighborhood. Be a neighbor and friend, and evil will have less chance to reach the pervasive levels that this individual reached, because people won't feel so freaking hopeless and desperate. Stop giving such a damn about what's in it for yourself, and start just being interested in what's the right thing to do for someone ELSE, without reparation to your own self.

Intention

As per my usual, I have neglected my blog in favor of the instant gratification of crackbook. But I've been insanely busy the last couple months, and trying to shift gears on a few things. I added more to my plate in November when I decided to become a Thirty-One independent consultant. I had an incredibly phenomenal January and I'm just utterly blown away by that. I'm grateful to those who have done what they have done to help me achieve the goals I set out to accomplish. There's a chance I may fall short of one goal this month, and as much as that disappoints me, I am still thrilled with what I did. Devildog was impressed too. Anyone who knows him, knows that is not an easy feat. I am certainly interested in seeing where this journey takes me.

But I started this blog with one word in mind: intentional.

As I've said before, I have been listening to Dave Ramsey podcasts for several months now. One of the things I keep hearing every day is the word intentional. "You have to be intentional about it" is one of the phrases mentioned several times a show.  I am just wired for A.D.D. and that whole "ooh squirrel!" thing nails me every time. As I progressed through the end of 2012, and into 2013, I realized that if I was going to get anywhere better than I am right now, I better be attentive, and be intentional.

Intention means you plan. Doing something intentionally means you lay out the framework, and you DO it. I'm not all the way in place to launch, but I make progress daily. I am constantly restructuring my thoughts, so that ultimately it will lead to restructuring of my actions. Being a work-in-progress is uncomfortable at times. I'm forcing myself to look at what I'm doing, and assign a value to it in my life. And I don't always like what I am evaluating. And then I have to add more to my developmental to-do list so that I don't make the same kinds of errors.

Inadvertently, my personal theme this year has so far become being intentional. And when I am intentional, I generally see decent results. I'm constantly trying to balance the various plates in my life, and trying to return favors that are long-overdue for repayment.
And in the middle of typing this blog, my brain kept poking me off the chair to go load the dishwasher and run it. So I had to, before I decided I didn't feel like it enough to skip that task. This goes hand-in-hand with the stuff I have learned from FLYLady over the last 11 years. It goes hand-in-hand with the stuff I'm learning from Dave Ramsey. It goes hand-in-hand with the ability to accomplish the goals I set for myself. It goes with the idea that I have to pay back into the circle of giving, because I drew from that circle so many times in the past, and I'm finally in a position to help others in a way that I know is directly benefiting them. I'm doing my part to preach the Gospel, and occasionally putting words to it. (See St Augustine for that reference). I've been drawing from that well for about 20 some-odd years. I think I'll be busy for a good long while.

Unspeakable Acts

Yesterday, 2 people in 2 different countries killed large groups of children.

Of course, amid speculation about the perpetrators of these evil acts, there's a bunch of screaming for gun control, better access to mental health care, you name it. People are yelling for it.

Here's a nugget for you folks out there who think there should be more or less of anything.

JUST FREAKING BE POLITE TO PEOPLE!! Stop being jerks. You being an asswipe to someone that afternoon could potentially be the last straw in their crappy day and you send them over the edge. Remember me talking about my husband's friend that killed himself? THAT is an example. If one person had chosen their words more cautiously, that sailor might not be dead, and friends mourning that horrific loss.

Let me demonstrate the opposite. I half-jokingly say all the time that I mistreat all the kids that come to my house just the same. If you're here when we're cleaning, working, doing yardwork, whatever - we are going to put you to work with us. I treat the kids' friends like I treat my own kids. Borrowed Billy practically lives here more time than at his own house. He loves being here, because he learns something new every day in our house. I never thought twice about sharing knowledge with my kids because that's what my dad always did with his 6 kids. It never occurred to me to not do that. How are they supposed to learn how to function in the world if we don't do that? Not sharing your knowledge with your kids leads to them being financially taken advantage of because they don't know something like how to tell if you need new tires, or your oil is too low, or your water heater only needs a new heating element or sacrificial annode rod versus full replacement. It leads to kids getting credit cards as soon as they turn 18 and student loans when they head off to college, then suffering the burden of being saddled with debt for the entirety of their adult lives. They get to retire into poverty because they couldn't save any cash for their old age. Borrowed Billy is an example of what happens when you're not an asswipe to someone. He's going to head into adulthood with knowledge he wouldn't have gotten at home, and be able to live his life differently than he would have if he hadn't taken up residence on my futon.

A few years ago a friend asked if his girlfriend could stay with us. She lived in what he described as a total trash-life situation. I told him I had to meet her first. If I'd had any hinky feelings, she wouldn't have lived with us. I saw a girl who felt lost and like she was always doomed to living like her family did. I didn't even know she was still 17, and legally her mother could have caused us all kinds of trouble. Thankfully she did not. Like with Borrowed Billy, I treated her pretty much the same way I treated my own. We held her to a standard appropriate for her age, and she did fabulously living with us. It was my husband's friend that mucked up things, but that's water under the bridge. Ours was the first example of a normal relationship she'd ever seen. She had always seen various abuses around her, and that's all she knew. She had new hope that she didn't have to be destined to live like the others in her family tree. We eventually parted ways, but a few years later she popped up in an IM to say hi. She thanked me for letting her live with us, and showing her that she could have a better life. She said that we gave her love and care and that nobody ever did that before. She made me cry. All I did was just help her meet her basic needs, and give her a hand when she was stuck. It as all I knew how to do, because that's how I was taught to treat people.

Common sense and human decency are two lost arts, to the point that they are now superpowers because so few people have and use those tools in their interactions. So when people are acting out evil atrocities such as happened in 2 places yesterday, everyone gets mad and starts muppet-flailing about how things need to change and rules need to be more stringent. How about holding your kids accountable for their actions from a young age instead of telling the teacher "not my child", or "My baby wouldn't do that!" or "why didn't you give my child a passing grade?". What you should have said was "I'm sorry my child did that, and I will discipline him/her at home" (and then DO IT, holding yourself to the discipline too), or asking "what was my child doing, who else was my child with, what else were the other kids doing, and who was supervising them?" and sort out the facts of the situation before calling "not it". It just might have been your kid doing the misdeeds after all. And your child didn't get a passing grade because your child didn't study for that test or do that project themselves. Teachers are NOT stupid. They know when you do the project for your child. If I were a teacher and got the idea a parent did the work, I'd be inclined to giving a failing grade, just because it's not the STUDENT'S OWN WORK. Aren't you lucky I'm not your child's teacher. Only once in Evil Genius' entire school career, did I side with him. ONCE. He knew I was going to side with the teacher because I was always teaching him that the teacher gets my vote initially. I met with her and gave her the benefit of the doubt, till I learned that she ascribes to the teaching method of "no straggler left behind", disallowing the accelerated students in aiding the stragglers to catch up with the other end of the spectrum. She did the entire class a major disservice. It was in the middle of that conference my vote moved and I sided with my son, because that teacher really didn't deserve my support after that.

And then I'm seeing in my crackbook feed the things like "why would someone have three guns in their house if they knew their adult son was mentally ill?"

To that, I say this:
The second amendment does not, and should not, specify that you have to be deemed mentally fit to safely own and operate a weapon. Nor should it stipulate restrictions if you have any form of disability or mental health challenges in anyone in your household. Just because you have a family member that has any of that, it does not mean that they are unable to grasp the gravity of handling a weapon, or the consequences of its use. Mentally and emotionally handicapped people CAN LEARN. When people stop making asinine generalizations and having overreaching kneejerk reactions, and wait a minute till we get all the facts in situations like this, then and only then can appropriate steps be taken to mitigate the atrocities.
I suppose if we use all that same line of logic, then knives sharper than a rounded butter knife should be made illegal too since the loon in another country stabbed a bunch of kids too.

Stop being a ninny and hold yourself, your friends, your children, your coworkers and your leaders accountable for their poor choices. The government can't babysit everybody, nor have they demonstrated that they can successfully handle what they already have. Why the hell would we want them nosing into how many boogers are in your collective noses?

Just be civil to each other, help without expecting anything in return, hold yourself and your kids accountable for actions and choices, and share your knowledge without fear of other people knowing what's in your head. You can't change the collective world till you change your own self, and inspire others to change their own selves. When you have enough people that do things differently on their own, you will start seeing a shift in how society behaves in general.

Purpose has a point

In the recent days the word "purpose" has come up in conversation at my house on a few occasions.

Devildog and I were talking about being intentional, or doing things with a purpose, or doing things purposefully. That one stemmed from a conversation to iron out some wrinkles in a situation. We get lost in our electronics and fail to truly be attentive to things in a manner that we should be. I catch myself numerous times a day moving without purpose, or as the case may be NOT moving at all.
That's not to say we should be in constant motion, but when moving about things, it shouldn't be aimless or haphazard. (I'm guilty of any version of it all) I'm the type that needs balance or I am completely out of sorts.

So here I sit with a list of things on my to-do list, typing on my computer instead of getting off my duff and doing them. I'm enjoying the quiet of half my house sleeping as the dishwasher runs (I'd love a quieter model at some point), drinking my coffee, and sitting on the couch with Clone's Camp Crestridge blanket over me. 

That list will keep me focused later when I get up and start doing something around here. For now, I'm letting my exhausted husband sleep. Rest heals the body, and he's got a few tweaks that need healing. He ran the trail at the park the other day in 22 minutes. He hasn't run since 2005, and had to walk at times too. He's got a PFT (physical fitness test) to take soon as part of a hiring process, and he really wants this job. It's in the line of work he has dreamed of doing. I can tell you first hand that when my husband feels like he has purpose his whole demeanor and energy changes. He could be a walking zombie, but press onward because he knows he's not undervalued, a worthless drone in someone's machine. He has been sliding backwards toward the lethargic side the last many months, because his current job has sucked the life out of him from day one. His first day, he came home and said that it was the wrong place for him to be and that he didn't foresee a long career there. It's a Sisyphus situation where he is. And he loathes being Sisyphus. It doesn't meld at all with his value system, the way he was trained to operate, or his personality. It would if the leadership actually led. Devildog is a natural born leader, and fortunately, was trained to lead in such a way that subordinates want to work for him. At Home Despot, he would get moved to a different department, and no less than 15 people would ask the store manager if they can transfer to where ever he was going. He could've been in charge of shoveling poop, and people would have still wanted to work for him. Knowing he was valued and served a purpose, he busted his chops to do the job well. I look forward to Devildog finding a job that gives him purpose, because it will prompt other changes at home in general.

In turn, the purpose of our household as a whole will shift.

More affirmation

In all the whining I've been doing lately, I got a couple clue-by-four swacks to the skull. And then I got knocked down about a thousand pegs last week when a few people in my life lost a friend to suicide. Sadly, I didn't know him, but I had met him and he seemed like a good guy. Hearing about those involved, and the lot they were handed in life, certainly makes mine and the challenges I've had from childhood to now, look like a freaking cake walk. Then 2 friends ended up in the hospital (same building actually).

I mean, if the worst of my day is wondering how the hell I'm going to cover my bills, then I have really no true reason to whine.

Then, the other day, I forgot my electronic leash at home, and didn't have a yarny project in the mom-bus either. I had a magazine in my midst  though, and enjoyed the quiet while waiting for my son to come out of JROTC drill practice, as the Blur slept, and the cool breeze wafted through my opened windows. If I'd had a folding camp chair in the back like I have done before, I would have sat outside in front of my van to read.

I picked up where I'd previously left off in the magazine, and as I turned the pages, found this blurb about connecting with people. And it just made sense. I do this stuff too, and I have often thought rather defiantly "dagblastit, I shouldn't be chasing people down to stay connected with them like I am." I have tried to keep in touch with friends, and tried to reconnect with those I feel are important in my life, but it isn't always reciprocal. If I am to continue the friendship though, I do need to step back and leave the ball on their half of the court for a bit to see how they play it.

This topic came up while I was talking to another mom friend at church yesterday and she shared some of the same challenges I'd been having. I read the blurb to her, and she nodded, saying it made sense. She and I both share some of the same opinions about certain groups of people around us, and how their behavior reflects poorly on them and their associated places. I often wonder if I should even bother swimming upstream to try to get anyone to pay attention to their own behavior, or if they'll even care that I'm trying to get their attention at all.

Or maybe I should just do as the story in the article suggests, and leave others to discover how awesome I am, and how being associated with me could be mutually beneficial (or even just beneficial for one party only). I'm going to give this other approach a try, and see what comes of it. After all, if I'm not spinning my wheels over people who can't hear the noise of my tires, then there's no noise to hear over other noise and it's just quieter that way. And Lord knows, I have enough mental clutter as it is. So, if I can dislodge some of it, then maybe I'll have fewer A.D.D. brain moments because I'm not caught up in trivialities of other people.

Life carries onward

My Crackbook post this morning:

Today, I honor those who died in buildings, planes, fields ,and on streets, and those who have suffered the effects of any and all of it - by holding my head high and living my life every day. Why honor them this way? Because the attempt to paralyze us can't be successful. The hatred can't be perpetuated. The lives lost can't be in vain. The joy mustn't be successfully stolen.


And further proof that life must continue and move forward: My toddler.

We've been working on the potty training thing since Clone went to camp at the end of July. So far there has been measurable success with the #1. It's the #2 that's going to be what drives me to drink. She'll keep her panties dry all day, overnight, while away from home. She won't, however, even admit that her backside is about to lose its contents. So, Mommy gets to be the primary mess cleaner in that regard. If you could hear me speak about it, you would just know the party this is for me. It's a real kegger, that one.

So, the Blur got quiet after dinner, as I was trying to plug the INSANE schedule of: 3 workers, 2 students, and Princess-poops-her-pants into the Cozi online calendar, as P-p-h-p pooped her pants. My husband was amused. Of course he was, he wasn't the one who caught her hiding behind the door that I opened to allow the lovely balmy breeze into the house. So she was carted off to the bathroom to hose her and her Boots-adorned panties off, without benefit of the kind of hosed shower head I need to make it easier on me.

Me:   "Seriously, child, this is not nice. You should poop in the potty. Or at least tell me you have to          
           poop so I can give you a diaper."
Blur: "Boots is not happy"
Me:   "I'm not either."
Blur: "Yea, I pooped on Boots."
Me:   "uh huh. What are you going to tell me next time you poop."
Blur: "sorry."

I've got nothing. Because I know she's right.

Making steps forward

I did call one friend, and apologize for leaving her hanging.

I knew she would be 1,000,000% real with me, and sure enough, she verbally Gibbs-smacked me with an iron skillet.

She said that our friendship was deeper than dishing out the day-to-day bullcrap at each other and that I shouldn't apologize for living our everyday lives. She went on to say that she knew that if either of us truly needed help, that we both knew the other would help in what ever way is possible.

Well, now I feel a bit stupid.

And then, I thought more about it. DUH, Trish, that's pretty much what constitutes almost all of your friendships that are worth a damn. We may only catch up with each other online, or in passing, or not at all for weeks at a time. In one case, years pass with no contact. And we can pick up where ever we are, and jump in for how ever long we have mutually available.

Then, I called L back and thanked her for her wisdom shared during our previous call, and relayed a sense of relief from at least one of my perceived burdens with one person. Some of the wisdom she'd also shared in the earlier call was that she and I are the type of women that dig in when we must, and we don't require incessant hand-holding from our friends, nor do we do well having to handle needy friends who must have their hands held all the time. We can pick up the phone if we truly need some kind of help - literal or mental/emotional, and there is a friend who can do just that.

So really, THOSE are the kind of friends that fit me best. And those are the most enduring kinds of friendships. And I'd rather have that, than a variety of people flitting in and out of my life because we're just incompatible. That will still happen, but I'm discerning the kind of role I want people to have in my life each time I encounter them. Likewise, I would expect nothing less of others when dealing with me.

Here I was carrying around this weight of guilt over being a bad friend, in a manner that would rival the fruits of a Jewish mother's laying it on thick. Does it assuage my guilt at all? A bit, yes. But then it piles it elsewhere, under the column titled "Foolish Errors & Worries". I am a much more confident, independent individual than I was even 20 or 25 years ago. But I have things ingrained into me that will never leave, and my inner child will forever be present. I hear her voice all the time, and I'm constantly learning how to parent her - much like I parent my own children, and much unlike how I was parented. I see the same kinds of insecurities appearing in my children, and with it come those exact same pangs I had as a child. And I hear myself telling my real children and my inner child the things I needed to hear at those times, but no one said to me.

Because really, why do I care if no one wants to play with me now that I'm an adult? Why do I take such trivialities as personally as I do? So, when my Clone brings to the table these complaints that girls at school are doing X, Y, or saying Z, I have to fight back my own insecurities that I felt at her age and beyond. And then I have to tell her the things my socially-challenged mother didn't know to tell me. Some girls are afraid of what everyone thinks, and it prompts them to behave poorly towards someone they once regarded as a friend. There are some girls that want to be seen as cool, no matter the personal cost to them or others. And that unfortunately, there are going to be people in the world that purport themselves as a friend, when in fact they may only be looking for personal gain. We must learn to listen to our instincts when something is even remotely off kilter about a person. We must also not be afraid of being real with people, and not be afraid to let go of the weight of burdensome friends. In turn, we must respect the decisions of others when they decide that we are not the kind of person they want or need in their lives. And to expect that when you're 1,000,000% real with people, you're going to find yourself on their chopping block.

And it will be okay to be there on occasion, because you're going to move onward to more fruitful things like friendships that don't drag the day-to-day BS, or incessant drama, into the friendship. Or if it does, you and that friend recognize it for what it is, and once it's behind us, it stays there. And even when your friend thinks you're out of your gourd for doing things a certain way, you respect her opinion, and she respects yours. And the differences don't harm the friendship, because the value of the friendship trumps the differences of opinion. Unfortunately, I'd let myself lose sight of this important revelation in evaluating my friendships over the years.

The wheels on the baggage go round and round

I noticed a friend who has lived in my computer for many years deactivated her crackbook page again. She does that periodically because she recognizes what the vortex does to her life and that she needs to step away from it. I applaud her for that, because she has ovarian fortitude that I lack in that regard. Slowly though, I am actually nearing that point myself. I'm still stewing over my losses, and haven't given a whole lot of effort to the attempt at amends. I'm still deciding if I even want to, or actually should do it. I know I should, at least to apologize for leaving certain people high and dry from my end of the fence. They may not see it that way, and just see it as their own evolution that left me in their dust. I won't know till I take that step though. I'm still working up my nerve to do it, just like I'm still working up the nerve to get back on the motorcycle. It will happen, I just don't know when my cajones will appear and make it happen.

In any case, I was talking to L on the phone since she isn't online at this point, and we shared our burdens with each other, looking at the blessings and silver linings of each situation. Interestingly enough, there were parallel threads with us both. I'd experienced my own version of her disappointment, and likewise, she'd had her own version of the one I am experiencing. She said even though her mind has reasoned that she needed to cut ties with people, she still feels IMMENSE guilt for doing so. We talked of forgiving others, and ourselves. We've always heard that we should forgive those who have done wrong by us. And for many folks, forgiving equals letting those offenders back into your picture. Forgiving, in fact, does NOT mean we have to allow them back. It just means we don't let the hurt they caused to remain as a weight on our own shoulders. Reconciling is a completely different bird, that has feathers of forgiveness in its plumage. Forgiving just means you don't have to lug around that heavy baggage of resentment, guilt and revenge.

L is also Catholic, with an excellent Southern Protestant upbringing full of Biblical Scriptures. She's got excellent timing with the verses she shares with me. This recent conversation bore "My yoke is easy and  my burden is light" to which I remarked "yea, cuz I put wheels on my baggage." That imagery sent her into a bit of a giggle. Leave it to me to not let things stay heavy too long. Levity is one of my many coping mechanisms. Lately though, I'm not as light-hearted, snarky, sarcastic, amusing, interesting, humorous,  - the usual Feisty stuff. I'm feeling weighed down with mental and emotional clutter. And it's causing difficulty pretty much everywhere. Rather than chucking the burdens, I put wheels on them and schlepped them EVERYwhere with me. All I'm doing is wearing out my shoes, my shoulders, my heart and mind. The whole problem is getting to be pervasive, and that is really annoying. I liken it to dragging a suitcase along on a plane, along with a bunch of other loose odds and ends that won't stay in another bag, and keep falling out of it. If I'd checked that suitcase, I could have less difficulty handling whatever was spilling out of that other bag. Nope, instead I put wheels on it, compounding my own challenge, and the trip becomes a chore, instead of an enjoyable journey.

What baggage have you put wheels on, and schlepped along behind you? How much of it should you have just jettisoned, restructured, or framed differently?

The suck sucks.

"Embrace the suck, for the suck is part of the process" - AJ Jacobs, Real Simple, May 2012
I literally JUST read this line in an article about being creative and how that prolongs mental acuity, and had to stop to brain-dump. I've been stewing on things for several days. And I don't like what I've recognized. 

I have royally screwed up on something very important to me. And I managed to blindside myself with it to boot. It's been a long time coming, and I was oblivious to it till it was too late to save as much of it as I could have. Of course, anyone who knew me from childhood knows I take comfort and refuge in my oblivion, as I'm painfully aware of so many other things that spurn any number of thoughts and emotions.

What have I killed? My relationships with people who aren't in my face daily, or live in my computer. Therein lies my problem. My most valuable connections have become those that live online. It started when I found out my friend was given a proverbial death-sentence a few months ago. For the record, she's still defying those doctors, albeit not quite as feistily as she has in the past. I learned via her blog, a few days after her post. It wasn't via phone, in person, or heck, even a private message on crackbook. Ouch. I'd made myself unavailable and less present in her life, and learned this detail like pretty much everyone else did.

Then, I decided that with the first day of school, I should celebrate the quiet my days can have between the schlepping tasks that I mourn having to do. I posted a "hey let's do a woohoo/boohoo coffee at my house", and 99% of the responses came from people who live in my computer and so many miles away that it requires days in a car, or boarding a plane and me schlepping them from the airport for the visit to happen. One person made it, one person was on the way out the door when something came up, one person simply had too many things for her own family to do she couldn't come. Everyone else was either working, or doesn't see me as important in their life to come join me. I haven't made efforts, why should they, right?

OUCH.

I reasoned that I'd deferred my social life to my husband's school schedule, need for study and homework time that didn't involve also minding his spawn so I could be the social butterfly. That's only partially accurate. A part of it is also fiscal. That mom-bus is not the beacon of fuel efficiency, and with all the driving that I *must* do for my family of 6, there comes a point that I fail to muster the wherewithal to do any driving if I even wanted to do it. Plus, given the unemployment/underemployment of our lives the last couple years, I simply couldn't afford the 60 mile round trip to the yarn shop, 16, 20 or 60 to a friend's house when I have to spare the wear & tear, and fuel just get where I must be.

Honestly though, the larger blame falls squarely on MY shoulders. I could have picked up the phone. I could have dragged the toddler with me, and shortened the visits according to the toleration she or my friends demonstrated with the situation. I relied too heavily on a virtual connection to people, and my personal connections fell by the wayside.

So now, I have almost zero turnout to an invitation, I get a cool reception when I try to join a conversation at church with people who were happy to see me 2 years ago, I find friends from church have ended the virtual friendship online after other friends were strongly disagreeing with what was said on the internet. I apologized to the now-unfriended friend, but I think that relationship is soured terribly over it. And I'm the loser in it all. She's an awesome person. And then I had NO idea she had some major and scary health issues involving surgery. No one tells me anything anymore, and that hurts too. I do care, but my actions state otherwise apparently. Again, that was my mistake, and I failed them and myself.

I have friends who have moved into another circle that I doubt I'll ever join, simply because my kids probably won't be attending the parish school. These families post pictures of communal activities, and I think "wow, that looked like fun", and then the sour "would have been nice to be invited". And I look, and everyone present has a child at the school. I understand that they're connected that way, and I hold no ill regard for it. But in at least the 2 parishes where I've been for more than a few months or years, I see it every time. I am (or at least was) friends with some of these people prior to their joining that club of school parents. It stings. I called a couple of them out on it about 5 years ago and was told it was imagined. Really? Then how about asking the people you know from church whose kids do NOT attend the parish school if they want to carpool to and from youth group meetings, or go sit at Starbucks or Panera while the kids are there, so we don't have to drive all the way back home or find something nearby to do so we can save the gas going home and coming back again 2 hours later. So far, none of them have. I'm not in their faces often enough to remind them that I want to have a friendship with them. And I don't want to be that annoying fly who keeps showing up and buzzing around unwanted. So I leave them alone more, furthering the chasm in our friendship.

The other night I told my husband that I basically left a friend whose husband deployed last year high and dry. When we learned of the impending orders, I told myself that I would make myself available to help her when ever I could, because she was amazingly available when Blur was a baby. I understood the stresses of deployment, having dealt with it myself when the boys were raucous preschoolers who drove me to want to drink (and I did). And what did I do? I figured that she was busy with work, baseball for her son, gymnastics for her daughter, had help from her mom, helped her mom with grandma, had come to rely on another friend whose kids went to the same school - and I left her alone. I was either afraid of imposing on her, or I was impeccable with the timing of a call (shower, bathroom, walking in to work, at the game...take your pick, I'm stellar with timing), or I was afraid to call and catch one of those moments. BIG OUCH. She's moved on to other friendships that don't include me. She's still happy to see me, but I don't know that our friendship is the same either.

I suck as a friend. I have long known this about myself, because of a genetic tendency to circle my wagons when certain kinds of chaos appear in my life. It's not entirely an acceptable excuse.
I'm sitting here with my eyes welling because I am mad at myself and, yes, even those I call friends, acquaintances, etc. Mostly I'm mad at myself. I've hurt myself, and my friends. And knowing that about myself sucks. I really DO value my friends, and the friendships I have with them. I just fail to show it. And I'm sorry. I need to call these people directly and apologize, but at the moment, this measly apology for the world to see online is all I can muster at this moment. I'm still raw and angry and hurt. And I know myself enough that I need to make peace with myself and this situation a little before I make those calls. I don't want to start out apologizing for being distant and unavailable, and end up unleashing on them, negating the apology by blaming them for their share of the chasm in our friendship.

So, if you're one of those friends I've let fall off my radar, or I've fallen of yours, I apologize. This is me attempting to embrace the suck that I've created, so I can try to figure out what to do next about any of it.

Life, and how you live it

Today, I was scheduled to read at Mass. No big deal, it's old hat by now for me. But somehow, in rushing around to get out the door (forgetting to bring my electronic leash), I ended up with some kind of unprovoked anxiety, complete with elevated heart rate and shallow breathing. I was having the worst time centering myself and clearing my mental clutter. I was pleasantly surprised to see our pastor Monsignor H celebrating Mass today, versus our usual, the associate pastor, Father L. Whoever schedules the priests really needs to consider a rotating schedule, and not hogging Msgr H to whatever Mass that person attends. We love Father L, but Msgr H has some awesome homilies that we don't get to hear as often. Seeing Msgr H in the vestibule, I stopped to greet him and share my delight in seeing him in vestments instead of just his collar. He always has a thought provoking question when we encounter each other. I love how his mind works to make me think about things I wouldn't normally.
Today, he asked "Do you think it's a fair question to ask what people's mindsets are walking into the doors of the church, and what they are as they leave?"
I said "Absolutely, it's a fair question. I know for myself I'm usually rushing to get here on time, and be early when I'm reading, and then sometimes fighting with traffic, and inconsiderate drivers en route. Today was not horrible trying to get out the door on time, but I was a bit rushed because I had to be early. I made great time driving here with no issues. But somehow, I ended up with a bad adrenaline rush that I've had the hardest time clearing away so I can be calm. So I imagine that others are fighting with distractions and diversions and struggling to clear their minds before Mass starts." He shared his thoughts, but wasn't able to finish them, as someone else needed to speak to him. Such is the life of a shepherd.
How awesome was that kind of Divine Intervention in hearing what I needed to hear, and articulating what was going on with me at that exact point in time. I somehow managed to get myself squared away so I could do my job. All the readings talked about living. Today's Gospel reading mentioned the word "life" 9 times. Then Msgr H's homily talked about the readings talking about life, and living it appropriately. He moved on to talk about the NASA Rover Curiosity, and how it will explore unknown places. He asked us to imagine a rover exploring our parish, and how it could be determined that the parish was alive. He asked us to imagine a rover exploring our hearts, and determining if we were living our lives appropriately.
I'm certainly guilty of letting the diversions get more of my attention than they deserve. Right now, I'm supposed to be matching up my coupons to the sales this week so I can restock the house with groceries. We're nearing "Mother Hubbard's Cupboards". But I had to get this out of my brain before I got too diverted and lost it, because I really felt like I needed to share it. I am prone to being easily distracted and my focus gets placed somewhere other than where it's most needed. I prefer to blame my ADD brain, which is only partially accurate. I still am responsible for what I do, and what I fail to do, regardless of how my brain is wired. Today's conversation with Msgr H gave me food for thought, and the homily drove home the point. With school starting, I really do need to make wiser use of my time, and allow fewer diversions to detour my day as much as I have allowed them to do up to this point. I could be so much more productive and have fewer "aw, crap" moments in my life.

How about you? What kind of diversions detour you from what you should be doing? What else can you accomplish if you set aside any number of diversions in your day?

I knew there was a reason I liked Margaret Cho

http://jezebel.com/5875219/cho-mad-twitter
This is what prompted my previous blog post. It was late, and I had to empty my brain. Reading that page strummed an emotional chord with me, and I wouldn't have slept if I hadn't gotten all that out of my head.

I sometimes struggle with balancing the sweet and the sour sides of me. On occasion I think I should be more docile and kinder in general. And while I should, the long-standing anger and resentment that I keep shoving back to its dark hole still reaches an arm up and grabs my ankle, trying to pull me down there with it. But in all honesty, I like who I am now, and I don't want to change things. I do want to corral the mean side of me, but that's always going to be a work in progress. I don't want to become so docile that I fail to LIVE. (Insert Auntie Mame-to-Miss Gooch quote about living here)

I used to be shy. Yes, me, shy - it's sometimes hard for me to believe too. Teachers would call on me because they knew I was smart enough to answer the question, but I was barely audible to even the kid sitting next to me. An hour later, the teacher could hear me talking over the rest of the class. There were lots of things that shoved me into that dark hole. Constantly being stymied and squashed by my parents for whatever reasons they held, being teased by my peers, having a raging case of ADD and no skills to work around it, having a big lack of social skills, being molested several times over the course of a few years by someone related to me, and a general case of "nobody gets me" for years will do a number on a person. I knew I could do so much more than I was actually accomplishing, and that failing of myself cuts too. A sheer lack of electives that interested me at the junior high is what sent me to band. I needed 2 performing arts credits to graduate, so naturally I opted for band again when I moved to the high school for 10th grade. That single set of decisions is what I credit for changing my life entirely. Band geeks get it, and each other, and they don't judge (much) for the quirks. Score one for my dig out of the hole. A girl in band with me moved to my school because her dad was in the Lutheran seminary and that was his year to serve at the church down the street from school. She was in Upward Bound. I got into the program here because I knew her, even though my school wasn't a feeder for that program. That program has a summer component where you live on the college campus, in the dorms, go to classes to get you a leg up for the school year, and you continue through the year on Saturdays. That program is where I met Devildog.

I credit him with cracking my shell. I'm pretty sure that sometimes, he wishes he hadn't. He single-handedly reversed the inner voices in my head. Because of him, I believe that I really AM a beautiful, intelligent, capable and awesome woman. He refused to let me say that I was ugly, stupid, incapable, or less than stellar. He encouraged me to do things that I had been scared of doing for the lamest of reasons to be scared. While he didn't build my confidence, he did do his part to give me the means to feel confident. BIG score 2 for my dig out of the hole.
Because Devildog & I had 1.75 kids by the time we graduated high school, he opted to join the Marine Corps. As a Marine's wife, you put up with a lot of crap that civilian wives don't. You also grow a backbone bigger than a civilian wife's. You gain skills that even some males don't have. My husband brought home a book called "Roses & Thorns", which turned out to be a handy written heads-up for me. I think every military spouse should read it as soon as they're engaged or married to a service member. Then he signed me up for a Brides's Class at the Family Service Center at Camp Lejune. I freaked when he said he wasn't going. "I'm not doing that without you!" He calmly looked at me and said "Honey, I still have to go to work. And they'll pay for child care for you to go to the class". That one, he SHOVED me at, kicking and screaming and I am ever grateful he did. I learned a hell of a lot those 3 days. That prompted me to start volunteering at Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society, where I learned much-needed career skills, and more about navigating military life. From there I landed a job at a hotel, where I made myself valuable. Then I moved on to the merchandising job I have now.

All along the way, I've ticked little things off my bucket list. I have grown bigger balls than I ever imagined I would have. If I'd had the skills, attitude, confidence and general persona that I have now, when I was in my 20's, I think our lives would be even better now than they are. I have taken on a personality that people aren't sure about when they first meet me. I am rough around the edges despite my outward beauty. I feel even more beautiful now than I did 10 years ago, despite my need to work out and tone up the muscles from baby#4. But inside I still feel edgy, and the inner Betty Badass keeps popping up to say hi. She's the reason I can take my van someplace and be taken seriously. I learned to use a weapon out of necessity, because one was in the house. If you have something in your life, you need to know how to operate it. The gun range is FUN, and I love going. I haven't been since before I got pregnant with the Blur. I'm overdue for some range time.
Likewise, I've wanted to learn how to ride a motorcycle since I was a kid my daughter's age. It was always something on my list, but I didn't have much drive or need to accomplish it just yet. Then, Devildog's Bronco was having some issues, and fixing it was becoming a regular thing. The neighbor jacked up his truck to excessive redneck proportions, to the point it was no longer street legal. He needed to get a truck to tow his TRUCK, so he put his motorcycle up for sale. We used a chunk of our tax refund to buy it. Even I knew it was an awesome deal, and I don't lament or regret that purchase. So, now, that means I have to learn how to ride for real. I've long staved off Devildog buying a bike, saying "I am not gonna be the broad on the back. You get a bike when I get one too." Well, necessity and a great deal on a bike has merited a change of sorts. I'm ok waiting till the kids are older for us to buy a 2nd motorcycle. However, before I even think about riding the back of someone's bike, I have to learn how to operate one. I need to know what to expect from my driver if I'm riding passenger. So that's one of the bigger things on my bucket list that I'm ticking off of it soon. I love gifts, but given the state of my house, clutter free ones are awesome. I asked for the class for my birthday, and some friends have helped make that happen.

And when I finish that course, and get the motorcycle endorsement that Florida requires to legally ride a motorcycle, you can bet, that Betty's ego will be just a little bit bigger. And that shy, beaten-down little girl who still lurks in the recesses of my life will have won another small victory over the people like my grandmother who threw her hands up cursing and saying I'd never learn how to crochet (HAH~ check me out ya witch, I can crochet AND knit!), those who called me ugly, weird, stupid, mistreated me, harmed me and the ones who asked me at 7 months pregnant with my now 18 year old son "Who would f**k you?". Yes, Dennis and Ronnie, I am still waiting to see you this many years later, because I'll gladly introduce you to the Devildog. And I look better now, than I did when we were in school. Tsk, too bad you were a prick to me, because I had a major crush on one of you in 9th grade too.

I get the best revenge because I refuse to let the shadows of my past keep me stuck there, and hiding behind dreams and what-ifs. And in a couple weeks, I can look a little more like Betty - riding a motorcycle.

Memories & Margaret Cho

As a kid, my favorite memory of watching Margaret Cho on tv, doing her standup comedy, was the story of her mom standing outside at the crack of dawn on Saturday morning, yelling for the "keeeeeeeds" to get up and get dressed so they could go to "Mongomonery War".
I have absolutely no idea why or how that is my primary and only association of Margaret Cho, but that's just how my brain works sometimes. It's funny stuff, and my cognitive function grabbed THAT snippet and kept it. My brain is weird, and talking to my younger sister, it's a genetic mishap, and I got the lucky end of the weird stick.
Then again, she has had her own challenges, issues, and interactions that have colored her perspective on things. We both will have a different idea of the same event, and we lived in the same house, relegated to the same renovated sleeping porch turned into two 8x10 cells, a bathroom and laundry room. I'll have to tell you about Dad's construction later. This is about something completely different. We spent time at a Catholic school. After my initial culture shock of about the first 3/4 of my first year there for 6th grade, I had a couple AHA! moments and things got better for me. They never got better for my sister from 4th grade till she finally left after 7th grade. I never knew. Or I was just that obtuse and never paid attention. It never occurred to me to ask anything. If I'd known even an inkling of the crap people did to my sister, I would've tried to do something about it. I'm an Aquarius, my sense of justice is resolute. But I was unaware of the things my sister was subjected to till we were adults.
My childhood was not stellar. Dad worked hard, Mom stayed home to raise us. But mom had her own issues that never got resolved. Despite the 20 year age gap, the two of them had enough crap swept under rugs, that there was a LOT of carpet in their lives. So they lacked the tools and means to deal with the crap their kids got from other people. I didn't know my mom was molested until my aunt told me during the week she was here for mom's funeral. That explained a few things. I am thankful my aunt shared her view of my mother, because it truly helped me get in my mom's head enough to understand why she did things the way she had. As a child, I had been molested, and when I told my mother, she literally ran away from me. I had unwittingly shoved a sword into her own festering wound, and she couldn't handle it. Top it with the belief she was born with fetal alcohol syndrome, physically and emotionally abused by her parents (till the day her mother died in 1994 at that) and add in a car accident that toppled her around inside a 15 passenger van in the later 1980s, and you have a mother who honestly was not fully right in the head. So, in the end, we found ourselves learning about life from neighbors, parents of friends, enemies, strangers, and everywhere else those lessons presented themselves to us. The fact that the younger 3 kids (I jokingly call the 2nd litter) are able to cook creatively with flavor, and that we don't just take my very Irish grandmother's approach and just boil everything - is AMAZING. I still have issues with overcooking and scorching though.
All through elementary school, I was called names. I really was weird by their perspective. I honestly was poor. Mom smoked (ugh), and we often came home to find a garbage bag of clothes on the doorstep. But my oblivion prevented me from seeing what I lacked fiscally. It didn't prevent my classmates from trying to make sure I knew what I was missing though. I thankfully was not bullied physically, and I think my oblivion is what spared me a lot of what others tried to inflict on me. I was still hurt by people, and the advice I'd been given never helped me. Looking back, I'm glad to have gotten away from that same circle of kids and that I got to go somewhere new for 6th grade. I was just sucktacularly prepared for any of the culture shock. It did teach me how to adapt to changes. I was around adults almost exclusively as a kid, so I didn't know how to act around other kids. They didn't know how to relate to me either. Even now, most of my friends are older than I am. I finally caught on to the way it worked after several months of struggle. And like most everything I do, once I get the hang of it, I have it, and I flourish (ie: knitting, crocheting, cooking). Then I went back to public school, and my past met me at the door. I'd changed, but no one else wanted to see that. My advantage was that I was stronger because I'd learned how to adapt, and was confident because the academics had become much easier for me after 3 years of Catholic school. I got through the challenges of that year, even begging my mother NOT to intervene and just let me handle it, because she would've just made things worse. I'd learned to read people, and I'd learned how to utilize the grapevine to my advantage. I preferred to hang out with the guys because they were not entirely up to catty BS like 99% of the girls were. Then as high school progressed I still had jerks in my day, but I wasn't as affected by them. Or so I thought. I had no idea of the true extent of my wounds. And I probably still don't, nor do I want to any more.
Over the years I'd been torn down by people trying to make themselves look, feel or sound better. Deep down, I knew I could do more, be more, and take Auntie Mame's advice and LIVE more. I just didn't know how to take a leap of faith.