I may have used this picture before, sue me

Cats, red wine and wireless technology. America, fuck yeah.

Went through orientation at Smiley-Mart today. Seven hours of Smiley-Mart history and various training films including my favorite, what to do in case of a spill.

"There are three types of spills, non-toxic, toxic and unknown."

Um, yeah.

Went to mom's house when I was done and she sent me home with a bunch of super-fresh, organic green stuff from this place. I'm thinking sauteed mushrooms and Swiss chard for supper. If Miles doesn't stop running back and forth from one end of the porch to the other, whining the whole Goddamn time, I may have a report on how apartment-raised feline tastes with Swiss chard and sauteed mushrooms. I have been bemoaning the lack of protein in my diet, after all.

It's only 70 degrees outside right now and I'm freezing in a t-shirt and shorts. Honestly, how do all you mammal-type people do this?? Bleh. I've got the house open because it's lovely out here, and it's finally not raining and I need the fresh air, and I know that in like, 15 minutes we'll all be complaining because it's 150 frillion degrees and our brains are melting, so I'm sort of savoring this little pocket of cool. However, I'm not anemic, I'm not exceptionally thin (Hahhahhahhahhahhaaa...SNORT) I'm not some kind of bizarre hairless Chinese Crested half-breed woman, I do exercise, my blood circulates on its own, so why am I cold all the time? The entire world is comfortable at 70 and I'm reaching for a peacoat. Everybody else is gasping and getting indecent at 78 and I'm finally thawing out. I just feel like some sort of Equatorial freak.

Bleh. Am half lizard. Mom lied to me all those years. She just found a guy who conveniently looked and acted JUST LIKE ME and really got freaky with an iguana 36-ish years ago. That's the truth isn't it, mom???

I'm off to put on a couple of layers and figure out what the hell to do with a kohlrabi.

Doesn't that sound like something you'd see at a bar mitzvah??

"Levi! That dance is amazing! What do you call it??"
"The Electric KohlRabi."

page break

Y'all know how it is - I read a lot of blogs, and a large percentage of those are the "mommyblogs", a term that makes my spleen jump out through my nose in revulsion. While I'm tucking my spleen back in, I wonder at all the illnesses these mommies seem to get from the basics of raising a kid, like changing diapers.

I was just barely 20 when kiddo was born and had changed perhaps 8 diapers in my life before that, all of them attached to the rear-ends of Sport and McBrother, and I managed to make it through 2 years of diapers and potty training without catching any kind of stomach virus or ickiness from my child's diapers. Hell, my child had two eye infections before she was three and I didn't catch those.

Y'all, I am not a germophobe and I am NOT a clean-freak. I didn't carry anti-bacterial wipes or goop with me, man I'm not even sure I washed my hands every time I changed her diaper. So what the fuck? Are they LICKING their children clean or something?? What gives?

Seriously, I've caught more colds off my child since she's hit puberty than while she was a toddler.

[insert clever segue here]

I've mentioned my financial issues before. My little tiny city park train derailment of a financial problem that I'd like to keep from turning into a giant Amtrak disaster. I kind of suck at budgeting - ok, not really, but it's a matter of baby steps and I'm impatient and bleh. The plasma thing got sort of derailed (again with the trains??) by the holidays and I've had a little trouble talking myself into going back. Something about not having a set schedule and sitting there all Matrix-style for an hour, getting my fluids drained for an hour, has been really difficult for me to get back into. When you're too lazy to sell plasma, you know you have issues.

Would you like to know the sad truth? My left arm doesn't bleed. Well, Ok - I'm not half mannequin, so technically it bleeds - just not as well. So they have to stick me in the right arm, which renders it useless the whole time, which means I can't knit, write or type while I'm sitting there getting drained. I can bring a book, but it's surprisingly hard to concentrate on a book with all the beeping and phlebotomist scurrying going on. Yes, I know. They're paying me for my bodily fluids and I'm bitching because I can't figure out a way to distract myself.

Moving on.

I applied to a few places online, because I can't stand doing the whole "hi, are you hiring?" thing and the only one to call me back so far has been a certain big chain store represented by a smiley face. We shall not discuss the ethics of shopping for or working at this store. I have financial goals here, people. Sacrifices must be made. Therefore, sometime in the next couple of weeks, 16-20 hours a week, I shall be spending nights and weekends as a cashier at a Smiley-Mart in south Austin.

If you happen to be in the neighborhood, c'mon by and say hello. Just don't give me no shit, man.

[insert clever segue here]

Kittens!! Don't worry, they were just visiting. I haven't gone off the deep end again.

Mantra

My dad died a year ago today. Before I start talking about it, I'd like to say that I don't really want to talk about it. HEH.

Seriously, I've spent the last couple of weeks in a funk because I knew today was coming. I remember how we spent these weeks a year ago and frankly, it sucked. A year ago today, we spent the day telling him to let go and he finally did. Was it a good day? No, not particularly. But it was better than watching him suffer.

But here's the deal. Let's say you walk into work with a broken arm and in addition to every-goddamn-body asking "Hey, what happened to you??" they all grab your arm and give it a good solid yank. By the end of the day, you'd not only be pretty fucking tired of telling the story, you'd probably be finding a way to avoid people, wouldn't you?? Even the folks that you knew were asking out of concern.

That's kind of how it feels when I anticipate conversations about my dad. I just kind of don't want to be around anybody right now. I stayed home yesterday, justifying it with a comp day (I worked all day Saturday) and a 4-day headache (fucking mold). Fortunately, despite my very best efforts I am not the center of my co-worker's lives (I know! I was shocked when I found that out!!) so the chances of one of them walking up to me, all sympathetic and "It's been a year, hasn't it, how aaare yoooouuu???" Pretty damn slim. Thank Jeebus.

Anyway, the thing is, the only people who'll really remember and think to say anything are my mom, who's probably reading right now (hi mom!) and who knows that it's best to let me bring stuff up in my own time, my grandmother, who has already mentioned she's thinking about me (us) in email and my dad's side of the family and well, I'll call them tonight, because I need to anyway.

So yeah. I don't want to talk about.

I miss him every single day.

squish

I went for a nice, long (for me) (only slightly painful) run yesterday and an interesting comparison popped into my head. You ready?? Here we go - pain, the emotional kind, is like tofu.

Seriously, think about it for a second. In reasonable amounts, both of them are actually kind of good for you, but too much of either are ultimately harmful and can cause mood swings and extra mucus (EW.)

The flavor and texture of both is sort of gross and difficult to describe and in order to make your way through a heaping' helpin' of either you have to use some kind of individualized coping mechanism. Hot pepper, inappropriate jokes, soy sauce, running, tamari, excess wine, whatever. A strategy, you gotta have a strategy.

This, an idea for a Hipster Marathon skit and a recipe for a couscous salad type thing that I realized I can't make because I don't have any couscous all happened in the course of 3 miles.

I can't decide if I should change my running music or add more Baz Luhrman.

treads

I've been restless lately. I'm itchy and my skin doesn't feel like it fits right. My head feels loose and wobbly, disjointed, like if you touched it I'd just sit there and nod like a dashboard dog. Words come up to the top of my brain like fish in a pond and then disappear just as quickly. It's maddening.

Nothing feels right. Running, eating, sleeping, drinking, talking, crying - none of it makes the itchy twitchy feeling go away.

I think I need a road trip.

Gas up the car, check the tires, throw a bag in the back and just go.

I think that's exactly what I need, because I can feel my shoulders relax just thinking about it. Open road - CDs in the passenger seat and sun on my left arm and a styrofoam cup of diet coke getting watery in the console and a map half folded on my dashboard, obscure highways and ranch roads highlighted in lime green.

I need some color. I need wildflowers and barns and mockingbirds. I need to pass by pecan stands and folks selling fudge and church sales. Deer Jerky 2 Miles. Buc-Ee's Fabulous Restrooms. I need to drive and listen to the radio stations fade into one another and sing loud with nobody else listening and sometimes just drive in silence. I need to roll. I need to move.

Spring fever. Jimmy brain.

I'll come back, I promise. I have no desire to stay gone. I just want to get in my car and drive. Drive and sing and think and look around. Stop and take pictures when I want to, stop and buy a stupid keychain when I want.

Or, y'know - not.

Maybe Sunday.

Better than nothing

I'm grumpy, one of my cats keeps peeing on my shoes, another one barfed on my calendar yesterday morning, my right ankle is screwed up from my run the other day and I've had a headache for 3 days straight.

Other than that, the play was great. Smartass.

My vacation was lovely - Jef and I went down to Louisiana in a little zippy rental car, hung out with the grandparents and the brothers and the stepmom, then drove back in the kiddo's truck.

We took one day to go to the French Quarter. Jef had never been and he insisted on referring to me as "the local", which was very sweet if a tad misguided, considering I only know two areas of the town really well and those areas have been thoroughly rearranged, courtesy of Katrina (bitch.) Anyway, while I was able to find every daquiri place in a 2-mile radius, I failed miserably at finding food. Yes, food. In New Orleans. In the Quarter. Shut. Up.

Fortunately, my grandparents' house is only a paltry 45 minutes away (SHUT UP) and the woman cooks as if she's hosting the 82nd Airborne all the damned time. And there were McDonald's on the way. Listen, if I have to tell you to shut up one more time, I'll turn this blog around, young lady.

Anyway. A good time was had by all, despite the frightening alchohol to blood sugar ratio we had going on at one point. We drank, we shopped, we hugged people who moved back to the city, we talked to total strangers (I love this man, y'all. Seriously.), we drank some more. I took him to St. Louis Cathedral and the Moonwalk and Cafe du Monde and Jackson Square and we wandered around and we watched big ships pass each other on the Mississippi and it was lovely, really. Just a lovely, sweet day with my boy.

Sweet baby Jesus, I need a haircut, y'all. Yipes.

Jef impressed the shit out of my grandparents and my stepmom and my brothers. I mean, of course he did, since he is the niftiest thing since sliced bread. I'm not even that big a fan of sliced bread and I think he's pretty cool. Heh.

Before y'all throw up, we don't fart rainbows all the time. We'd been getting on each others nerves before the trip and the whole not feeding him thing led to some issues and being stuck in a pickup truck for 9 hours, knowing that you have to drive another 3 and it's the end of vacation and you're tired and won't get to see each other again for another couple of weeks and you have to go to work the next day? Let's just say tempers can flare.

But we worked through it and the gas is poly-chromatic again and everybody's happy. Yay. Now you can barf. Just not on my calendar, I just got it dried out.

Seriously, y'all - I am the mayor of Split End City.

Kiddo also returned from New York in one piece. She cheered me up by calling me pretty much every day to tell me what she was doing. My favorites were the voicemail I got from her in Little Italy and the "mystery phone call"

"Oh my God, mom, we're in Little Italy, and I got a loaf of some kind of bread (background 'ciabatta') Ciabatta?? OK Ciabatta bread, anyway, for like a dollar and a container of gorgonzola stuffed olives and these mozzarella balls and oh my God, it's all so good and I got it all for like, less than like, 5 bucks. Loveyoubye!"

Hee. My little foodie.

The "mystery phone call" went like this:

"Hey mom - guess where I am?"
"uh...New York?"
"Well, duh, but WHERE in New York??"
"......"
"Ok, it's sparkly and it's mentioned in a Marylin Monroe song."
"TIFFANY'S????"
"Yep!!"

At that point my stepmother got in the discussion and tried to convince kiddo to bring her something back. Alas, I am a mean mommy who only thought to send enough money for my kid to y'know, eat and buy reasonable souvenirs. I know, I know, I'm an ogre.

I'm off to trudge around Town Lake - y'all be good.

Cushion cut

I'm beyond thrilled that I'm going to be in Louisiana next week during all of the South by Southwest hoo-ha. Austin doesn't need anymore damn people dressed all in black.

Saturday at 5 in the (GODDAMN) morning, I drop the kiddo off at the airport, where she meets up with her choir and they all climb on an airplane and fly off to NEW! YORK! CITY! for a week. Whooo!!

They have two performances, but most of the trip is just that - a trip. To New York. OH MY GOD. I'm halfway tempted to conk her in the head and go in her place. I would, if I weren't three inches taller and *cough* pounds heavier than she is. And if I knew the words to the songs.

As a result, I've sort of hemorrhaged cash this month, what with paying for a couple of new outfits (two performances! Not in the choir formal! What the fuck!) and the various odds and ends that come with a trip and then the expenses of my trip to Louisiana, plus dealing with the extra vehicle we'll be bringing back (more on that later) and so yeah, March has been/will be the month of crazy spending.

So April shall be the Month of Financial Recovery. It's March 7th y'all, and I'm already looking at April and saying "daaaaaamn."

Luckily, I like beans and rice.

OK, so, I'm sure I've told y'all this before, but deal with it. - when my dad was (good lord, I hate trying to phrase this so I don't offend people) sick (can I just say "dying?" 'Cause that's what it was. OK?) he stressed about what to leave me and Kayleigh. He had a shed, a storage room, a couple of closets and the floor under a king-sized bed full of guns and tools and car parts, but nothing that he thought he could leave to two girls.

I got a handgun and a drill. Before you go "WHUH??!" you should know that I asked for these two things and I got an extremely NICE handgun in a caliber that I like to shoot (and I do like guns, remember I'm from Louisiana and I live in Texas and this is not an invitation for a debate) and I asked for a drill because I needed one. I think my dad was actually sort of relieved to have something of HIM go to me.

For Kayleigh, he was going to sell his truck and leave the money to her to buy her first car, but she spoke up and said she wanted the truck. So - next week Jef and I are heading down to Louisiana so he can meet my family (gulp) and pick up my kiddo's truck.

So let's explore all the facets of this trip, shall we??

First of all, we have the whole Boyfriend Meeting the Louisiana Family Thing. As I told my mom - it's not that I value their input or opinion more highly than that of my mom, it's just that there's an 8 hour road-trip involved in going to see this side of the family, so y'know, it's a fairly big deal to meet them and they, lord love 'em, tend to be a little more judgey and protective of me. My mom and dad (and stepmom, for that matter) have always been the ones to look at their kids and go "well, they gotta make mistakes," while my grandparents have been the ones to try to prevent us from doing so. So if I'm willing to expose you to my Grandma and Poppa?? It means I'm pretty serious about you and I think you're pretty fucking special and I think they'll like you. Honestly, if I don't think my grandma and poppa will like you, then we probably won't date for very long. I know that sounds strange, coming from someone who was married for 14 years and seems to have only had 2 relationships since then, but consider this - I've gone out on a few dates and have just KNOWN that a second date wasn't even a possibility and one of the reasons why was because I could hear my Poppa saying "You lost your mind???" The other reason usually has to do with bad teeth/staring at my tits/bad laugh/ugly hands/just generally being a jackass.

Second, we have the picking up dad's truck thing. Do I really need to expand on this? No? Good, 'cause I'm not really in the mood.

Third, we have the idea that I'm picking up a truck for my daughter. For my daughter to drive. My daughter. To drive. OW. My brain just cramped.

HM. I think that's it. Wow. Only three facets? I'm a little disappointed.

Anyway, note that in here you do not find anxiety about sending my daughter to New York for a week. I mean, OK, yes it's there - I'm not a chrome-plated harpy. But look, no matter what Law & Order and MSNBC try to hammer into us, if she sticks with her group and does what she's supposed to do, she'll be safe. Her father and I have put out a pretty good sum of money for this trip and in reading through the itinerary, it looks like it's going to be worth every penny. All the little butterflies I feel when I think about it are not fear, they're excitement and a wee bit of jealousy. I hope she has a blast and comes back and chatters my ear off for hours and bores me to tears with her blurry pictures. I'm not worried about airplane travel because statistics are on my side and I'm not worried about anything else because that's just not my nature. The only thing I worry about for her are pick-pockets and/or her losing her cash. Other than that?? Party on, Garth.

Funny, my daughter's going across the country for 5 days with her choir and I'm not worried in the least, but my boyfriend and I are going to Louisiana for the same amount of time and I'm freaking the fuck out about that.

Oh, I know why. Because on my kid's trip, there's NOT A DAMN THING I CAN DO ABOUT IT. The trip is planned, I'm not going and there are other adults in charge. So my worrying is a little like screaming at the quarterbacks on TV. THEY CAN'T HEAR YOU, DILLHOLE!! I love her, she is my universe, but fretting will only screw up my digestion and annoy everyone around me. And I'll let y'all in on a little secret. If I let on that I'm freaked out about her going, she'll worry about me worrying and she won't enjoy herself. Yeah - she's like that. So I'm just cool as a little beatnik cucumber over here.

Meanwhile, Roy's daiquiris in Prairieville, Louisiana should see some booming business next week. HA!!

Ruminating

I love you guys, really I do. To show my love, here are two wildly different links to entertain you.

This chic is hilarious. Seriously. And she makes pretty, PRETTY art that I want to buy and hang in every room of my house.

This is not even remotely safe for work. Seriously - it involves penises - LOTS of them. But oh my shit, is it funny. And a little scary. Scroll down, you'll see what I mean.

I couldn't find the exact quote - but there's a part in "Best In Show" where Sherri Ann Cabot is standing at the snack bar, saying that she's too nervous to go in the auditorium and her brain told her to just stay there, and until she gets another message, she's just gonna stay right there and wait.

When I'm dealing with big decisions, that's sort of what I do. It's not intentional, but whenever I try to sit down and reason out an answer or a solution, it goes a little like this:

"Ok, so I need to - OOOH SHINY!"

So, yeah, the idea of sitting down and reasoning things out and weighing the pros and cons of a situation is just ridiculous for me. The answer to a problem is more likely to come to me at the end of a 3-mile run than at the end of a hour long conversation with a friend. Honestly, by the time I've gotten around to talking with a friend, I've usually made up my mind about the situation - if I can verbalize it, I've decided. I'm weird that way.

Sometimes, the answer comes in a dream (yeah, I know how hippy-trippy that sounds, shut the hell up) and sometimes it comes to me while I'm writing an entry and sometimes it comes to me while I'm having an imaginary conversation with someone who's pissed me off (what? You don't do that?) and sometimes it just slowly dawns on me what I need to do. Sometimes it comes to me when I ask a pain-in-the-ass insightful friend for advice and I see my question or "problem" (note the use of quotes) and I realize how ridiculous I sound and I know exactly what PITAIF is going to say before they say it. Self-awareness can suck the root sometimes.

I think part of why I've been feeling so overwhelmed lately is because I've got some questions brewing in the back room of my brain. But see, the problem with this method is that I don't always know what the questions are either. HEH.

I know part of it is money-related, because it's always money-related. This is the joy of being responsible for my own shit. I still think I prefer this to the old way.

Part of it is my upcoming trip to Louisiana. Jef and I are heading down there around the 12th to visit and pick up the kiddo's truck* and I'm a little leery about this trip. I've already warned Jef that he'll be going on The Tour of Sadness 2007, since we have the whole year anniversary thing and I'd love to show him my childhood home(s) but HEY, they got eaten by a hurricane! And look, my poppa just got one of his knees replaced! And yeah. Just...bleh. I want Jef to meet both sides of my family, (which says quite a bit, actually) but I just wish he could have met them a year ago. I wish he could have met my dad and I wish he could have met my grandparents (on both sides) before Katrina. So, yeah. That's sort of weighing on me a little.

HM....there's more, 'cause I wrote about that and usually when I feel this way and I write, I get this "aha!" feeling and I suddenly feel lighter. Or sometimes I cry. Anyway, none of that has happened yet, so there's something else.

I'll figure it out, and I'll let y'all know. In the meantime, enjoy the links and have a glass of wine on me. Might I recommend the Norton Malbec? Cheap, easily drinkable, cleans out of beige carpet easily. Ahem.

*Not sure if I told y'all this story or not. My dad fretted about what to leave me and Kayleigh because that's just the sort of guy he was. He decided to sell his truck and leave the money to me so I could buy kiddo her first car. She spoke up and said "No, I want the truck." So - she gets her poppa's truck. Which is pretty darn cool, if you think about it.

Don't look at me like that

*
Well, as always, I feel the need to clarify my last entry. I have this almost pathological need to be understood in real life too, so it's not you baby, it's me. I started to write a big ol' clarification, but then the entry got all wallow-ey and weird and BLEH. So nevermind.

Let's just say that life takes more effort than I'd like sometimes and I have trouble with that concept. But y'know, sometimes life is like that and we can't all walk around with sunshine and rainbows shooting out of our asses, now can we? No, we can not, because that would be awfully distracting in meetings. So there.

Anyway, and so, plus also, hi. How are you? You look lovely in that color, really. It brings out your eyes.

I'm feeling kind of overwhelmed lately because I have a lot of things in my life that I want to do and a lot of things that I need to do and, like always, I'm having trouble sorting out the two and prioritizing them and getting them done. So instead, I sit on the couch and watch CSI reruns and drink wine instead.

When I get this way, I also start feeling listy. Like, I want to get a notebook and start making lists - lists of things I need to do, projects, groceries, stuff I need to get done around the house, people I should call, work stuff I should do, daydreams, favorite songs, movies I want to see, books I want to read, other lists I want to make (yes, it's that bad.)

It's just one more way to try to grab the tail of my life and wrestle it to the ground, that's all. I've managed to go a whole month of feeling this way without buying a notebook (one my resolutions! Whoo!) I have a box of blank books taunting me from the closet. It may be time to dig one out and start list-making.

Here's an example of my first list - Ways in Which I'm Completely Off My Rocker:

1 - Well, the list thing.
2 - Compulsive nail cleaning.
3 - I can NOT handle anything coming towards my eyes. Like, if you're talking to me, don't gesture with your pen in my direction. I'll seriously squeal and duck.
4 - Oh, and don't even think about talking about eye surgery around me.
5 - Do I even need to mention my reaction to eye-related gore in movies? No? Good.
6 - I am deathly afraid of crickets and grasshoppers. yes, really. Shut up.
7 - I love pasta in any shape or form except bowtie pasta. Yech, I can't STAND that stuff. I think it's because of its association with mediocre pasta salad.

Anyway, I'm nuts and I need to sit down with a notebook and a pen and do some writing of the bulleted kind tonight, I think. You normal people are sitting there, all "why don't you just DO the stuff that's bothering you??" Look, if I could, I would OK? But I look at a messy house or a pile of laundry or whatever andI cI don't see a task or a set of tasks. I see a mountain. I see Everest. I see this insurmountable thing that I will never, ever be able to get a handle on. So I wander off somewhere safe (couch, wine, CSI - keep up.)

We all cope the best way we can, right? I cope with drugs, my penguin-esque waddles down the hike and bike trail, making lists and laughing at inappropriate times.

How do you cope?

*This is Jef's cat, Harold, looking very serious and judgey.

Crazy

I didn't get too far on my list the other day. I did go run and I did get the pile of clothes folded, but they got replaced by a whole new pile when kiddo cleaned out her bathroom. I made some progress on my horrifying living room, and I did go to Kohl's for new bathroom stuff (shower curtain and a couple of counter thingies. Why do we decorate bathrooms?)

I got my eyebrows waxed yesterday, for those of y'all keeping score at home.

Every time I get my eyebrows waxed, I end up with a GIGANTIC zit right smack-dab in the middle of my forehead. I mean it's a third eye sumbitch, too. I can't decide which is worse, the Bert brows, or the giant cyclops zit.

A long time ago, I resigned myself to the fact that maybe some people are just supposed to be happy and some people aren't and I was one of the ones that wasn't. After about a year I realized that living that way was gradually driving me insane, so I started looking for a way to be happy. I looked in a lot of places, some of them more logical than others, until I finally found myself in a therapist's office.

I started talking to her and I got on anti-depressants and mood stabilizers and I started getting happy.

I got divorced and I got even happier.

The other day I realized that I'm truly, honestly happy for the first time in a long, long time. The last time I remember feeling this way was probably my freshman year in college (1989-90.)

But I still have to take the drugs, and I still have to run 2 or 3 times a week and I still have to stay away from the diet sodas and I still have to make sure I pay attention to certain silly things and I still need to remember to stick up for myself and say what I think (things that should just come naturally, shouldn't they?) and so much, there's so much work to being happy.

There's so much maintenance to being low maintenance. HEH.

As I told Jef - it's not that I'm low maintenance, it's that I'm self-maintenance. The idea of somebody else dealing with and taking care of my crap just mortifies me. I need drugs and regular exercise and fresh air and sunshine and 3 meals a day and lots of water (Jesus, am I woman or a poodle??) in order to function, so the idea of somebody else taking on all of this crap? UGH.

I don't need jewelry or flowers or *stuff* to be happy. I mean - it's nice, don't get me wrong. But, for one thing, I went for 14 years with a husband who didn't give me flowers because he gave them to everybody else so he felt like that de-valued them. Same with jewelry. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to get some fucking jewelry. I am stereotypically female in that I love the shiny stuff. But the Ex had some bizarre notion that he wouldn't get it right, so he didn't get anything.

What the fuck was I saying?? My daughter just came in here, dancing around....Oh...yeah. The idea of asking anybody else to take on my crap. Just, no. If we define "high-maintenance" as needing lots of material shit, then no. Y'know, presents are nice, but no. If we define "high maintenance" as needing lots of actual maintenance in order to function in reality? Well yeah. That's me. But I do it myself. I work really hard to keep it separate from everything else too.

Maybe too hard.

Hi Jef - baby, if you read this one?? I'm nuts, OK? Seriously. I mean - you already know about the meds, but see here's the thing. I run so I don't get fat, but I also run to keep myself sane. If I drink too much Diet Coke, I start to get nutty. I have problems with low blood sugar. I'm afraid I'll get cancer like my dad did, so I'm trying to be healthy, but then I'm convinced I'll get it anyway so sometimes I say "why bother??" I'm petrified of my ex and can't stand up to him at all. I think getting divorced is the smartest and best thing I ever did. I know why I'm with you, but sometimes I wonder why you're with me.

See? NUTS! NUTSNUTSNUTSNUTS.

I just think somewhere along the way I got the idea that I'd be able to sit back and relax, all "aaah, here I am in Happiness U.S.A." and well, so far that hasn't happened. There are times when I know that I'm in the right place at the right time, or I know I'm doing the right thing and I know what "happy" feels like. But most of the time? It eludes me. I wander around, wondering if I'll ever be satisified, if I'll ever go through a whole day without feeling like crying or feeling like there's an oily knot of fear in my chest. One day without feeling like I have to defend everything I do, without worrying that someone will expose all my secrets, will point me out in the crowd for being the moron, the fraud, the dupe the I am. One day of not feeling like I'm pulling the wool over all the normal people's eyes.

Phoning it in

Y'all, I was gonna do another projecting my issues type entry about Britney again, but FEH. I just don't have it in me anymore.

I do, however, have the day off tomorrow. Right now I'm headed out for martinis and gossip with a friend. Tomorrow, tonight and this weekend, I'm planning to do some of the following:

Put away the mountain of clean clothes in my room
Take a bunch of stuff to Goodwill
Weed through my books and take the rejects to Half-Price Books
Get my Oscar the Grouch eyebrows waxed
Clean my horrible living room
Wander through Target and consider some new bathroom stuff
Go for a run
Make something with the beads I bought in Dallas last weekend
Write a real entry

SMOOOCH!!!

Go home, mister

For years, I've gotten homesick on Mardi Gras. Last year, it just made me sad. This year I'm more than happy to pretend it's not even happening. In fact, until Sunday it didn't even really click with me that it was carnival season.

I just don't want to think about Louisiana right now. It makes me miss my hometown and it makes me miss my dad.

Lately everything reminds me of my dad, and I know it's because down in the part of my brain that I try to ignore, I'm reliving last year and I'm doing a countdown. This time last year, he only had a month left. We knew, but we didn't know.

So y'all forgive this New Orleans girl if she embraces her adopted Texan status today and ignores all that south Louisiana foolishness. I'm going for a run on an Austin trail, then I'm going home to work on my filthy little hill country apartment and perhaps knit some very silly projects, considering winter is just about over down here.

I will drink cheap Spanish wine and eat sauteed mushrooms over avocado (it's good, you should try it.) I'll have some of those damn mini Cadbury creme egs for dessert.

I will ignore any and all Mardi Gras coverage, even if it means going to my room and closing the door and the blinds and burying myself in books I've read 4 times already.

Tomorrow I'm not giving up a damn thing, because I'm not Catholic.

Thoughts on a shiny noggin

Y'all, Britney's bald head makes me all kinds of happy. I mean - home skillet done snapped, and I just know she's gonna start decorating her noggin with Swaroskis and shit now. (PLEEEEEEEEEEEEZ) I gave up celebrity gossip and have been so good about not following it, but dude. Bald Britney! I am not made of stone, people!!

I'm joking, because the truth is, I kind of feel for Britney. There was a time during my divorce when I really, truly thought I was going to lose my mind. One more phone call or email from the ex, one more shitty comment and I'd be writing this from the loony bin. (Instead of someplace that's totally NOT work. Ahem.)

There's a point in any stressful situation where you realize that there's not a Goddamned bit of what's going on that's in your control. Nothing. The only thing you can handle is getting up and putting one foot in front of the other. Arm in shirt, leg in pants, key in door, you can handle that. When you get to that point, you either relax or rebel.

The relaxers do exactly that. They sit back and just ride the roller coaster. They do a lot of deep breathing and perhaps some eye rolling, but they mostly just mutter "not my marble, dude" and wait for the storm to pass.

The rebels reach out for anything upon which to exert some control. In the extreme forms of rebellion, they lash out at other people to try to make them feel bad. In the mild form, they do things like re-decorate, buy new wardrobes, get tattoos, take up new exercise regimens and get extreme new haircuts.

When I got divorced, I chopped off 5 inches of hair and got two spur-of-the-moment tattoos - one of them on my neck.

As long as I can remember, I had dreams where I was trying to walk but I couldn't because I was floating above the ground. I wasn't flying, but actually floating about 2 feet above the ground and every time I'd try to walk, I couldn't get anywhere because I couldn't get any traction. You don't have to be a shrink to figure that shit out.

About 2 years ago, those dreams stopped. I haven't had one since. I've been more scared and alone and freaked right the fuck out in the past two years, but I've been able to control what happens to me during it. I know that at the end of the day, I made the decisions on what happened to me, and I was responsible for my own shit. It might suck, and it might be the worst damn decision I ever made, but dammit, I made the decision.

It felt really Goddamn good to get rid of those dreams.

Getting divorced sucked. Hell, being divorced sucks. Even if your marriage isn't happy, when things get rough you always think to yourself, "Man, if I'd stay married, somebody else could be picking up the chicken noodle soup/dry cleaning/cat barf right now." I guess I'm old-fashioned, but as a Woman Who Left, it feels like I failed. We won't even get into the ways the Ex failed, because every story has two sides and water under a bridge and caveat emptor and all that happy horseshit. But, you (I) do sometimes wonder if you (I) really gave it your (my) best effort.

So that my mom, Jef and Jane can all breathe again - does that mean I want to go back and give it another shot? Good fucking God, NO. I'm depressive, not delusional.

As much as it sucked, and as much as I'd like to go back to a HAPPY partnership someday, I'm glad I did it. I know I wouldn't be happy if I were still married to the Ex, and I'm happy now.

I'm happy with my life. There are things about it that could use a little fine-tuning, but I'm happy.

My point, and I swear I had one when I started, is that for some of us who never felt like we had control of our lives in the first place, when things get really crazy-insane? We reach out at something, anything and just CHANGE it, make a mark on it to show we were here, to show that we have power and agency and control in the world in some way.

Or, y'know - bitch could just be crazy.

A rebel and a relaxer arguing is a lot of fun to watch. The rebel is getting redder and redder, just trying to MAKE the other guy made, and the relaxer's like "dude - have you considered decaf?"

Do not pass go, do not collect $200

Because I have a corner booth in hell* already reserved, I have a picture of the future.

There is Hugh Hefner's head, floating in a jar. It is resting on a podium next to a tall, statuesque woman. She has curly blonde hair and big blue eyes and vaguely familiar features. A large, toothy grin spreads across her face. She is wearing a 20th century style dress known as a "halter" over her curvy frame.

"I'd like to congratulate Danielynn Stern on being named Playmate of the Year. I'd also like to thank her for gracing the cover of our very first 'Legacy Playboy'."

Oh, stop staring at me like that. Y'all know Hef thought of it too and he's just pissed off he won't be alive to make it happen.

*I actually don't believe in hell. I believe hell is here on Earth, in the form of Karma and the consequences of all our shitty decisions. And Celine Dion.

*BWOK!!*

OK, so I'm a giant chicken. Those of you got to read the big angry rant, lucky you. The rest of you, sorry. I took it down because I'm a weinie and because it was just entirely too much negativity, even for me.

I'll be back later.

smooches.

See what happens when you pay me a compliment?

So now that I've written something sort of damning of the ex, I feel this need to defend him or attach some sort of disclaimer. Bleh.

Before you rise up, all "Girl, don't you say nothin' nice about him!!" let me explain a couple of things. First, the ex is not a bad person. I wouldn't have spent 14 years of my life with a bad person. He just has some problems claiming responsibility for his own emotions and I am all too willing to own other people's emotions, which made us the perfect little dysfunctional match.

Second, while I do talk about the ex and some of the problems we have to Jef, I try not to trash talk about him where my boyfriend can read/hear it. Why? Well, for one thing it's just plain tacky. For another, it sort of sets a bad precedent. If I say those kind of things about the man I was with for 14 years, what do I say about the guy I'm with for 8 months?* Despite the fact that I write out here on the intarwebs, I actually don't believe in airing my dirty laundry. That's why most of my and the ex's mutual friends were so surprised when we announced we were getting divorced. I'll tell you about shaving my crotch or my horrible housekeeping, but some other things just aren't done. And this site is still semi-anonymous. The only people from my real life who know about it are my mom and Jef. I don't know, I'm starting to sound hypocritical to myself w/ the "I don't air my issues" and "I'm here on the worlda-wida-webba" at the same time. But somehow it seems different to me to sit with a girlfriend and vent and then turn around and tell the same stuff to your current partner. I'm not making sense anymore. End of paragraph.

Third, and I always feel the need to do this whenever I say anything even remotely uncomplimentary about anybody, I'm not a perfect person. So here's a list of all the ways in which I'm just a little hard to live with.

*I am a moody depressive.

*When I walk in the door, I drop my shit right in the middle of the walkway. I've tried to stop this, but can't seem to. I think the only answer for me is a house with cubbyholes right by the door. In other words, I have the housekeeping skills of a 5 year-old.

*I'm a clutterbug. Piles of crap everywhere. And yes, nine times out of ten, I really do know where everything is.

*I leave a 1/4" of milk in the jug and put it back in the fridge.

*I steal the last beer and sometimes the last cookie.

*I almost never make my bed, and usually only do it because company's coming over or because I've just washed the sheets.

*I let my cats sleep in the bed with me and if you have a problem with that, I'll probably choose them over you.

*Sometimes I take off my bra while I'm watching TV and leave it laying right there, in the middle of the living room floor. Trust me, there's no missing that bad boy.

*I can NOT cook in a dirty kitchen, not even a sandwich. If you want dinner NOW, the kitchen needs to be clean, or we need to go out to eat. The upside of this is that I usually can't go to bed unless my kitchen is clean.

*I don't soak my dishes because the thought of that nasty water bothers me way more than the thought of scrubbing a pan.

*I leave cups and glasses EVERYWHERE. I send the kid scouting through the house every day for glasses when I do dishes, because lord only knows where I've left my coffee cup from that morning.

*I'm picky about everything except food.

*I like stinky food like sardines and blue cheese. But not together - that's too gross, even for me.

*I can and will go an entire weekend without bathing or changing clothes. In fact, I rather enjoy it after a tough week. A little ferality never hurt anybody.

*Sometimes, I just don't really want to be touched.

*I think Fritos, cheese and a glass of wine is a perfectly acceptable dinner every once in a while.

*I can get a little self-involved. I still love you, but I'm over here, doing my thing - don't you have a thing to do?? No? Well, go find one.

*I'm forgetful. If I don't write it down, I'll forget it. And, frankly, if it's not important to me, I'll forget it too. Just because something is important to you doesn't make it important to me, sorry. I'm sure there's some transitive property of relationships here that I just don't get, but there it is. I'll try to share in stuff with you, I respect that things are important to you, but just because you have a big important meeting today doesn't mean I'll remember it. Sorry.

*I don't communicate my needs and wants clearly, or hell, sometimes at all. It takes me a long time to dredge up what I really want from the bottom of my brain, and if you start talking in the middle of my thought, you'll completely derail my train.

See folks? I'm hard to live with too. A moody, unpredictable, prickly, forgetful, selfish, cookie-stealing, messy, stinky cheese-eating, giant bra-leaving, crazy cat lady.

Call me!!

*Of course, I say nothing bad about him, because he's given me nothing bad TO say. Smoooooch!

The pic's from Halloween, the rant's from yesterday

I have these random skinned spots on my knuckles this morning. Why? Was I boxing in my sleep? Did I win? What the hell?

I try not to talk about my ex too much here. There's a few reasons. One - the last time I talked about him in great detail, he freaked the fuck out and I ended up taking down my last journal. Of course, he was reading that one and it was right after we split up and bleh. Whatever. Second, it tends to raise my blood pressure just thinking about the man. And no, not in a fun way. If he raised my blood pressure that way, I'd still be married to him, now wouldn't I??

Yesterday, he and I had a small run-in over the general care and feeding of our child* , which is really the only thing we have issues over anymore. Of course, it's really the only thing we SHOULD have an issue over, isn't it? Hm, funny how I still feel like he should have a say in any part of my life. Those ties, they take a while to sever. Remember this, it's important later.

Each time he and I have a problem, the argument takes less and less time to dissolve and I find myself less and less rattled by it. I find that I am more willing to tell him to take a flying leap,both more and less willing to just tell him what he wants to hear (huh?) and less apt to be upset about it later.

For example, when he challenges my parenting, I pretty much tell him to not even start with me. He may not like or agree with my parenting, but the fact is, I AM a parent. I do this full-time. I'm the one making the decisions and dealing with the emotional, irrational, insane 15 year-old girl in the house every day. I'm the one who has to play middle man between him and his child because he can't seem to figure out how to talk to her. Sometimes I feel like I'm parenting both of them, as a matter of fact. Don't tell me "be a parent" just because I don't parent like YOU.

I'm more willing to just say "Ok, I'm sorry this isn't going your way, I'll have her call you" and hang up than try to fix things, because finally, FINALLY, after years and years and years of banging my head against this particular brick wall, I've figured out that nothing I say will fix a goddamn thing. HOwever. I'm also not just going to sit there and apologize if I really don't feel like I did anything wrong. I used to do that. I used to apologize and cry and throw myself under the bus just so that he'd stop yelling. Fuck that noise. If I didn't do anything wrong, you can suck my ass, I'm not apologizing. And stop yelling, you're scaring the cats.

Do I get annoyed because he's disrupted my life AGAIN and tried to make me into his vision of what he thinks I should be AGAIN? Yes. Do I get annoyed because sometimes he has a point, but that doesn't mean he has to be such a jerk about how he makes it?? Yes. Do I let it make me cry and drag me down for the rest of the day anymore? Good lord no.

See? I will never be the person the Ex wants me to be. He claims that he loved (loves) me just the way I am, yet every time we fought, everything that came out of his mouth said differently. Everything I did was wrong, wrong, wrong. You can only be told you're wrong so many times, y'know? You can only hear apologies like "I'm sorry you misunderstood me" and "I'm sorry you got your feelings hurt" so many times. After a while, it takes a toll on a person. The toll it took on me was that I started to believe that I was the bad person in the marriage. The first thing I did was become the bad person in the marriage. Needless to say, that didn't help matters much.

Then I tried therapy and drugs. While that helped me become a happier person, it didn't help my marriage any. I realized that the problem wasn't really me. It was the marriage. So I left.

It's taken me two years of living without the ex to finally be able to figure out a lot of things about him and how to deal with him. The biggest one is that I will never, ever be able to change how he feels and I think he hates that. I believe that when he's angry he wants someone to be able to make him un-angry and life doesn't work that way. The only person who can make you un-angry is YOU. So finally, 16 years after meeting this man, I've figured out how to say, "I'm sorry you feel that way", and walk away and not worry about it.

My therapist once gave me an excellent visualization tool for dealing with other people. She said to think of other people's problems as marbles. That when they try to hand you their problems you can look at it like a marble in your hand and say "Ok, I can put this in my pocket and deal with it later" or "Ok, this is my marble now, I'll keep it in my hand" or "Dude...that's not my marble" and toss it. Three guesses what I used to do.

I've gotten irreperably off track here, but my point is, the Ex can push my buttons like nobody else and I hate it. I'm one of those people who hates to cry in front of anybody. I was embarrassed to cry at my own father's funeral, so c'mon. Gradually, over the past two years, I've found and disabled each and every one of my buttons. Some of them were easy, because frankly my life is none of his business.

Unfortunately, the parenting button sort of has to stay enabled because of the kiddo. It just pisses me off that it's the one area where I feel like, no I'm not perfect, but I can kind of point to my kid, my intelligent, funny, gourmet cooking, snappy dressing, wise-cracking, animal-loving, atheist, Janis Joplin-singing, movie-memorizing, calls me mama and tells me she loves me in public kid and say "Dude...I AM a parent. A good one. Bite my ass."

*Kid stayed the weekend at a friend's house. We don't necessarily approve of all the goings-on at this friend's house, but she gets to go on a conditional kind of basis. Kid's cell phone died. Charger was forgotten at home. I had back up numbers, ex did not. Unfairness and safety issues of only one parent being able to get ahold of child brought up. While I agree, general dickitude was not appreciated, because kiddo had made an effort during the weekend to call me twice a day and let me know where she was, who she was with and what was up. There was only one misunderstanding about what was going to happen on Monday (no school) that led to the whole blow up.

Three random stories that might explain a lot about me

My grandparents used to take me on vacation every summer. We usually went to either Florida or Texas - something that was a two day drive from New Orleans. I've been to Disney World, Busch Gardens, Astro World, Six Flags, a whole bunch of caves in Georgia and one year, in a burst of creativity, we went to Tennessee.

Anyway, on one of the years we went to Florida, a fan belt broke in my grandparents' Cadillac and we ended up stuck on the side of the road. I can't picture my Poppa hiking for help, but this was about 25 years ago, so I guess he did. Regardless, a Florida state trooper ended up coming to our rescue by crossing over the median and picking us up.

Now, see I don't question authority unless authority gives me a reason to do so. So I said "Um, sir? How come you get to cross the grass and we don't??"

He looked down from under the brim of his Smokey the Bear hat at the cute (I was kind of cute) obnoxious little blonde girl in front of him and, to his credit, said:

"Well, that's because it's real swampy here in Florida and we know all the safe places to cross and y'all might not. We don't want y'all to get stuck."

Given a perfectly reasonable explanation for an injustice, I'll go about my merry way.

Of course, years later, I realized that the real answer was "because we're the police and you're not."

It's up to you to decide whether "years later" means when I was in high school or, like, last week.

********

My dad had this friend named Tommy. Tommy was an incredible artist. He had a red face and a stutter and was one of the funniest guys I've ever met. He died of stomach cancer when kiddo was a toddler.

Tommy is why I will never, ever, ever have Botox.

See, here's the thing. Anytime my dad and Tommy would be hanging out, drinking beer and bullshitting (something that they wouldn't shoo me away from, thank you Dad) the worst thing Tommy could come up with, the vilest poison, the most evil thing ever??? Was botulism.

"That can's dented! Botulism!!"

"Wait, how old are those chips?? No don't eat those! You could get botulism!!"

"Red sky at night, Sailor's delight, Red sky at morning, BOTULISM!!!"

So yeah, no botulism in the forehead for me, thanks though.

**********

My grandparents had this ranch style house that had that most useless of features - the formal living room. It, and the formal dining room to which it was attached, pretty much only got used for Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, for storing random things and for when my best friend Carrie and I were playing.

During one of the holidays, my grandmother made the mistake of bending over at the waist to fix the cushions on the couch. My dad snapped a picture of her butt.

"Whit-NEY!!!"
"What??"
"Did you just take a picture of my butt??"
"Why the hell would I take a picture of THAT??"

Come Christmas, there was a small box under the tree marked:

To: Ma
From: Whit

It rattled

My grandma opened it up. It was full of puzzle pieces.

"Whitney, what the hell is this??"
"Well, put it together, I'm not gonna tell you."

She put it together, and it was a picture of her, caught in the act of bending over fixing the cushions on the couch. Not a picture of her face, in other words.

Sometimes a little bubbles over

I am a terrible person.

When I come across a blog written by someone with cancer*, I get a little stab of jealousy and, yes, ANGER when I find out they're doing well or their treatment is working or they're recovered or in remission.

I get annoyed by all the pink crap for breast cancer when there's nothing out there for colon cancer and 100% of the population has a colon.

I'm pissed off that breast cancer has a walk and nobody else does. Is it because boobs are sexy and pancreases aren't??

I hate that one of my favorite writers is beating cancer right now and I can't just feel unadulterated joy for her like I should. I should be happy for her. I should poor a glass of wine and put on a silly hot pink hat and hug my kid and kiss my cats and paint a colorful self-portrait and then lift something big and heavy and lift a big ol' double-finger salute to cancer because she got away, so NYEH!!

But I can't. Because I'm still pissed off that it wasn't my dad.

This anger eats at me and it will consume me if I let it, and that makes me a terrible, terrible person.

*I hate the term "cancer blog", because goddammit, you are more than your disease.

snippet

The scene - kiddo has just put lowlights in my hair (because she doth rock in all things hair) and I've just gotten done washing and blow-drying my hair. ACTION!

"You rock!"
"Does it look good?? Is it what you wanted? Let me see!"
"Looks great!"
"Come here!! Let me see, lemme seeeee!!!!"
"Hang on, I have to put on pants!!"
".....I'll wait."