Feeling Outside the Box

I often feel left out but tonight was the first time I ever felt like I didn't belong or wasn't welcome in my new relationship. As if I was just holding them back from doing what they really wanted. As if I was... as if I was a responsibility to attend to. I felt like an inconvenience.

Momento Mori

Today I watch Tawny trace lazy spirals through the house. She starts big: my bedroom, living room, kitchen, Keira's room, bathroom, living room, my room, living room, my room, living room, living room, living room. She winds in ever-tightening drunken spirals until she is spinning like a top and then she falls, gasping. Then she sleeps.

Then, like Charlotte Perkins Gilman, she's off on her spiral again. Charlotte's smooch replaced by an angry wound and her scootch replaced by the drunken gait of late stage feline saddle thrombus.

Sometimes I find her napping in irrational positions, her head tilted back at 90% or folded over a water bottle as if it's a body pillow, but as I sit death watch with her something occurs to me. Each of us greets Death differently.

Whatever impetus drives her, be it a search for relief or merely dementia, she has a freedom that she never had in health. Quiet, shy, and partially blind, she preferred the dark peaceful corners under beds and in closets. Nervous, she overgroomed until her hind end was bald. She never left my room and when she did it was to spat with the other cat. 

Lost in the fog of dementia she leaves the confines of the bedroom and explores every inch of the house (even getting stuck several times). Her hair is growing back and she greets Two-Face with friendly curiosity. Tawny still staggers into the litterbox and blindly finds the waterbowl (sometimes with her feet). She still tolerates a bit of tuna or a tiny treat. 

Daisy, our 17 yo Lab/Boxer mix that passed of a stroke in January, waited patiently. Laying still, blind eyes attentive to the sounds of the room when she was able. She didn't walk, she didn't drink, she didn't eat. 

My mom slipped into a Snow White slumber and greeted Death like her Prince Charming.

I think I will greet Death as an old friend. We have spent many quiet hours together watching my loved ones fight against pain and illness. I think she has a warm embrace and carries a lantern to light her way through the thick grief of loved ones. 

I imagine myself a writer and a photographer but I don't think I could ever illustrate the strange rabbit-ness of Tawny's back legs. Even when she drinks she doesn't sit but perches like a jack rabbit ready to bolt. Her nose and jowls are the perfect miniature of an american cougar and her left ear is cropped because she is a street rescue. Despite her wildness, she is not a hunter but prefers to sit on your chest, purring and drooling her content, all the while kneading like a kitten. She is "mon petite puma concolor".

I tried for a really long time to find a new home for Tawny and maybe it's selfish of me but I'm glad I never found them. ❤ 

Big Circles

I found the last post in an old journal from last year. The first and last journal entry I made that year.

What a difference a year makes! I can honestly say that so much of that last post was true! I am honestly comfortable being by myself.  I like to go out, to the movies or events but I love to stay home. Garden, clean, or just have fun with Keira, laughing and joking.

And when the time comes for her to move on, I know I'll be ok because of the work I've done on myself.

I had to stop talking to Ari. She moved out the day of graduation and our relationship has been pretty toxic. Whatever story you hear from either one of us is probably slanted, as Roshamon has taught us, but no, it's not because she wanted to convert to Christianity.

Honestly, I love my children and the only thing I can wish for them now is to live a life of conviction and if Ari is convinced that I am a terrible mother then I'm pretty damn proud of her for saying it. Being on the receiving end of the vitriol was and constantly is hard but if you are honest with the world, honest with yourself and live your life with conviction, I can ask for nothing more. Other than that they are happy.

Which Donovan is. That voice is silent no more. He has a wife, a beautiful daughter named Zenny, the grand daughter of my dreams, and we see them often. It is truly a charmed life when you walk through a door and a baby recognizes you and a smiles lights their face. She is my joy.

As is Keira. Keira has become my best friend. I can't explain it. Maybe because we're both Virgos. Maybe because I breast feed her. Maybe because she's just brutally honest which is refreshing in a world of back-handed whispers.

That brings me to me. I'm still working on my issues. My tendency to gossip is the one thing I'm working hardest on. Also, my negativity is getting worked on. But overall, I like myself which is not something I could have said two years ago. Hell, I couldn't even post a journal post... But I'm me. And I'm getting to know her which is most important.

The end of this post may feel like it's incomplete but that's life. Every day new things are brought to light, new people are met. So, until next time...

Little Circles 1.4.2018

I keep repeating "look how far I've come in a year" and, indeed, I've traveled further than I ever thought possible. The hard choices I faced this time last year seemed insurmountable. Still, here I am: a home, an income, free from Jason's abuse and my health (both physical and mental) are leaps and bounds better than where it was in January of '17.

And yet, in some ways, I still feel exactly the same. I am still so alone. Arianna is doing her best to remind me that I am a failure. Donovan is an echo of a silent voice. No friends. No family. No lover.

Only Keira remains as my friend and stable support system.

How far have I really come? Is my progress linear or circular? I hate to think I am merely chasing my tail in an eternally lovely circle.

What can I do to change? I realized yesterday that who I am is who I have always been: the little, lonely girl; reading her books in an empty house in now merely a lonely women, quietly watching television, in an empty house.

Once an only child, always an only child.

And while I think I truly find joy in shopping or hanging out with Keira, I only feel normal alone.

This realization hurts and brings peace all at once. It may only mean that I will always be alone, but it also means that somewhere, deep down, I'm ok with that.

Your Memory is the Ghost I Fear

This house used to be light and airy. The light pine cabinets and honey colored floors were warm. The sun slanted into the windows like dusty ridges of daydreams. The curtains fluttered lightly in the breezes from the open windows. Cherry wood shelves held dark leather volumes Homer and Austen. At night, laughter and warm golden lamplight spilled out like a bursting star. This home always smelled like flowers and food and laundry detergent. Dogs curled in comfortable piles across cushions and children while movies or music played. While you held me.

While you loved me.

Now the house smells stale and acrid, like a stain that just never seems to leave. The lights flicker and go out when I walk into a room, leaving me in the dark and scared. Just like you left me. Alone and afraid. Sometimes I hear the doors slam when I'm all alone in the house as if the spirit of your betrayal still haunts me.

I want to continue to love this old place with its wild gardens and twisting trees. With it's owls and hawks and squirrels. With it's hummingbirds and sparrows and quail.
But...

Since you left the dog has started to sound just like you when she snores and I feel you watching me in an empty house. The air still smells of your body.

Your memory haunts until I fear my home.

Big Eyes

We just watched the movie Big Eyes and I'm feeling so fucking triggered. Margaret Keane suffered from trauma that is so similar to the abuse that we have suffered. The girls had to leave the room briefly to get "air and sunshine" after it was over.

Yesterday I was reading an article about ways narcissistic parents abuse their children and all I could do was turn to Ari and apologize. I'm trying so hard not to bad mouth him so all I could do was repeat "I'm so, so sorry" over and over again.

We were abused and I'm helpless to guide my girls through it because that would be seen as bad-mouthing the other parent.

Lord only knows what he and Jason say about me to people.

Watch Big Eyes. It could save someone. Maybe you.

I have no container delicate enough to hold this heartache.

I was walking on the side of the road and right in front of me was a perfectly clean, perfectly white quail's egg. I was instantly struck by this little miracle. I mean, what are the chances that this fragile, little beauty would have survived, on the side of the road, at this symbolic time of year? What are the chances that it would be placed right in my path, in such treacherous terrain but where it's symbolism of growth, life and renewal would be instantly recognized and appreciated in a troubling time of my life?

I reached down, thinking to put it into my pocket for a nest I have on a shelf at home. As it tilted over I saw that it is only half a shell, the inside bloody and scraped out by the razor beak of some precise, opportunistic raptor. The shell was so thin, barely a breath of white calcium, yet here it sat in my palm, a testament to the brutality the life it held suffered. Again, I felt kin to it.

I feverishly try to figure out how to keep it safe, knowing full well that this shard is so much weaker than the full orb had been. I had no container in my life delicate enough to hold such remanants of heartache.

Again, I say: I have no container delicate enough to hold this heartache.

I find a tuft of cotton along the shoulder of the road, snagged with thorns and tumbleweeds. After cleaning it as best as I can, I try to delicately pad the hollow of this broken shell with the remnants of this discarded cushioning...

So delicate was this shell that even my attempts to protect it split it, the fissure appearing like a river on a map.

I cannot protect the evidence of this hurt. I cannot keep my pain to display upon the shelf like a broken egg in a discarded nest.

I have to leave it on the side of the road or risk doing more damage, no matter how careful I am.

Staying Still While the World Rushes By

I'm so frustrated right now.
So filled with angst, guilt, anger, wistfulness, worry, etc.

I hurt. The steroid shot in my back hurts so bad I can barely move, barely breathe, barely hold still.
The pain consumes me.

And yet there are people in Paris right this second who are feeling more pain, more fear than I will ever, goddess willing, feel in a life time.
Survivors of the bombings and terrorist shootings, hostages of these terrorists (regardless of their color, creed, religion, or race I will still consider them terrorists) are living in a Hell I cannot imagine.

People of Color all over the planet live with more strife day to day than I can process in my tiny world view.

Women and men of all ethnicities have not only been through, but have survived, more abuse at the hands of strangers and loved ones than is conceivable for me.

And here I sit, filled with futile self-anger, guilt, frustration because my pain keeps me from functioning.
I know people personally who push through more pain than I feel.
Why can't I push through?

I disgust myself.

And because I disgust myself, I become more angry at myself.

Comparing my situation to what others are going through does not legitimize my pain any more.
It actually takes away from what they have and are and will experience.
Their trials and tribulations are not about me. I can never compare to them.

And so I am helpless and angry.
I want so much to just jump out of bed and persevere but when I do, the pain rips through me and I'm on my knees; gasping, crying, and hating myself all over again...

...wondering where all my strength and courage went.

She's Not Heavy

I'm down and out again.
I apologize for only posting when something seriously wrong is going down but that seems to be the only time I remember.

I realized recently that it has been months since I've taken my thyroid med. The last time I got it filled was in June. That's three months for my thyroid to cook up trouble. Not to mention the fact that my doctor finds it impossible to refill even the simplest of meds so now I will also run out of my epilepsy and Parkinson's meds. My health is rapidly deteriorating along with my mood, my ability to concentrate, and my ability to sleep.

After a full day of activities and very little sleep, I got home and couldn't move or straighten my legs. I tried very hard to get from the car to the house, even waiting until the others had gone inside so I could limp, hunched over, groaning and not be embarrassed or shamed. Even my children tell me not to "make those noises" or "act that way" because it "scares them".

So I waited until I was alone so I could suffer without being chastised. Only I never was alone. Jason never left my side. He helped me patiently while I struggled to walk from car to front door and when I asked; with humiliated, downcast eyes, if he could possibly carry me inside, he lifted me without hesitation and brought me to bed. He never made me feel like I was over-reacting or faking, he simply helped without comment or judgement.

Yesterday, he bought me a candy bar as a surprise and when I flung myself into his arms in excited thanks, he caught me.

All those stereotypical trust exercises you see on the movies could never live up to the moment when he caught me and didn't let me fall. I have a feeling he'll never let me fall or fail. And having Donovan to watch Jason constantly there to support the people he loves, is a reinforcement for the great behavior Donovan already shows toward Moryssa, Jason, and I.

Arianna had her choir concert tonight and Michael stayed for one song before leaving. Jason has been to every single event, without fail, since he's arrived.

Jason told me that Laurie and the boys would go out while he stayed home with Ryan. That, indeed, the entire family would go to family centered events all the time such as cheer camps and football games, but he was expected to stay home and watch the baby alone. He loves being able to go out and spend time with the family and even though the events aren't always up his alley and sometimes even boring, he's still included. We do everything as a family.

My responsibility is to tell him what my expectations are and I've discovered I have a really hard time with expectations, both my expectations of others and theirs off me. I realized Jason wants me to tell him my expectations for me, however and that flickered like a firefly in the hot southern night. That might just be the ticket. When I have expectations of others they often fail to live up to them, either because they can't or don't want to. This disappoints me and leaves them feeling judged and condescended. When others have expectations of me, I often fulfill those expectations regardless of my physical or emotional comfort level, again leaving me disappointed, used, and exhausted.

I've never once tried to fulfill a preset list of expectations for myself that someone else could help me remain accountable for, where someone could catch me when I jumped blindly toward my potential. It's exciting. I'm breathless.

Finally, I can hear Jason whisper, "She ain't heavy. She's my baby."

Down Time

The last two days have been full. Full of love, sharing, adventure, excitement. Yesterday we went with the Wendy bird and her family to White Sands. There, it was quite windy and brutally sandy, but we played. We ran and climbed up hills at top speed, rolled bumping down them into dizzy, giggling piles, and buried each other in the sand. Last night we came home sore but happy.

Today we went into the Gila. I had a really hard time with my fear of heights on the road there and was crying before we arrived. Once there, we waded in the river, hunted for pretty rocks and toasted marshmallows. It was a very technology free day and, as a mother's day, one of the best I can ever remember.

But now we're home and sunburned and achy, exhausted, and dehydrated. Keira was just ill and, as I lay here, I feel the familiar pull of a seizure. Times like these are when they like to happen best, when I haven't gotten enough sleep or water, too much sun and excitement...

The exhaustion pulls at me like a lullabye, rocking me toward darkness but my brain is still programmed for high excitement and intense thrills. The currents cross and... After a hiccup of consciousness I'm minutes/hours later, feet/miles from where I was only a minute before.

During these times I can sometimes feel an aura. At one time it was a smell or a tingle at the back of my neck. At others, there was just a split second of sudden surety that I was about to descend into madness. Now, there is a feeling associated with it, a feeling of biting against a soft resistance that doesn't really exist. A feeling that is formed when one strains the TMJ from clenching ones teeth too tightly.

Fear quivers but only dully because the exhaustion has already begun to pull me toward oblivion. I wonder briefly if I'm about to have a seizure, then slip thickly toward sleep.

Not tonight.
But, with that faint aura, my body reminds me that I'm pushing my luck. Enjoy life but all things must be done in moderation.

There Is a Golden Moment

My tea is always cold by the time I finish it. I get distracted with one thing or another and soon its cold. The last sip is always so sweet though, because all the honey has thickened and sunk to the bottom.

That's my life right now. I'm so busy being busy right now, with Jason and the kids, with my friend "The Wendy Bird" and her two lost boys, tending to myself for the first time in my whole life; that I don't have time for the dirty business of the bitter tea that is my illness.

It is real. Of that I have no doubts. It is no neurological sleight of hand or psychological curse. The pain does exist, and it is constant.

But on days like today and yesterday, I can almost forget that its there. It's like an unwanted odor that lurks in the air. You become accustomed to it until you've left the room and returned.

I don't believe my pain and fatigue has mysteriously disappeared simply because I'm happy. Though I do seem better able to "rise and shine" and I'm able to do it a lot earlier than I've previously been able too. I simply believe that the noise of my illness has trouble rising through the dine of my happy home. I awake earlier and more refreshed because Jason ensures I get to bed on time. I am in less pain because I'm busy and have less time to dwell on it.

I'm drinking up the honey right now. That golden moment suspended, sweet and thick on my tongue. And I'm loving it.There is no way cold tea can compete with the sweetness of love, life and laughter.

Cat Ranchers

The Trouble with Tribbles is that they multiply. And quickly. And not even logically.
The same goes with cats.
We started with one cat. She had two female kittens. Now her kittens have each had either one or two litters and we are swimming in kittens.
Last count: Four Adult Females, Three teen males, one teen female, and seven kittens.

The thing is, they're supposed to be indoor cats. They're supposed to be all female but suddenly their breeding at an alarming rate, faster than I can possible get them neutered and...

Like I said, now were swimming in cats.

I forbade the girls from naming them knowing  full well that once they are named it is a thousand times harder to let them go but suddenly they all had names. Two-face and Ginger are the Eldest females. Moonlight and Sticky are Two-Face's daughters. Sticky has two litters, the teen: Mr. E, Albus, Socks, and Harriet Potter, plus five unnamed kittens...

ok fine. I named one. I call it Pinkie.

Moonlight has one litter: Snowflake and Smokey who found homes this weekend and "The Twins" who are so small and helpless I'm afraid of sending them out into the big bad world.

And we were doing ok. We were maintaining even though the price of cat food is higher than the price of gas. Until last night when Socks decided he wanted to start acting like an asshole.

Be forewarned people. I curse. I'm going to curse and talk about kinky sex and witch craft and you all will be utterly blown away.

My little Socks. Socks and Mittens, Mittens and Kittens, Kittens who lost their mittens, Gloves. Socks decided he was going to get laid and he didn't care who did it.

That's when my little Socks and Mittens cat turned into S&M cat.s
He meowed all night, clawing at doors and calling to his one and only true love.
He moaned. He cried. He coooed.

The only problem is that every female in the house is either his mother, his aunt, his sister, his cousin, or an elderly neuter who hates everyone.

And now we both hate life.

Doorways

There are lots of different kinds of doorways and windows in life. Literal ones that go from inside to outside or from one room to another, figurative ones that represent transitions of time like the doorway from night into day or morning into afternoon. Doorways of consciousness that go from darkness to enlightenment...

There are also doorways where one can change their state of being from material to ethereal, bodily to ghostly, living to dead.

In spirituality, these doors and windows of consciousness or dimension are called "tween times"and represent a form of transition or metamorphosis. In paganism, these times shudder places are often represented by crossroads.

In popular television, Crossroads are haunted by apparitions called, "cross roads demons" who's sole purpose is to catch someone at the exact moment of decision and change the desicion in the favor of themselves, usually by promising a boon in exchange for the traveler's soul. It is purported that famed blues guitarist Robert Johnson sold his soul in such a deal to gain fame and fortune. Would he have gained said fame without the crossroads devil and kept his soul? Highly probable.

In the craft, depending on their pantheon, there are several deities that deal with such things. Janus is in charge of helping make tough choices when multiple options are available. Hecate, who watches over crossroads, and conceivably their crossroads contracts, especially ones that may end up in the underworld, is also in charge of the doorways that manifest as the forks in life's roads.

There are gatekeepers assigned to the more spiritual  portals in life, as well. Morpheus guards the gate between awake and sleeping and, his melancholy brother Orpheus, guards the gate between sleep and death. Ere how else would we ever find our way in dreamland.

The new house is filled with doors. A perfect, matte, cream, snail spiral of halls with doors that curl inexorably onward forward to the center, or the heart of the house, the kitchen.

When we moved in I smudged the whole house to remove negative energy. Then, I sealed all doors and windows to the outside world (portals to some outer world). Then I sealed off all mirrors (windows to some other probable inside world). The I burned sweet grass braids to reinvite the positive energy. I slammed an invisible glass globe over top of our home, built invisible brick walks, and strapped a gigantic, indigo hued robe over it all.

Last night we slept peacefully and soundly. Even the TMJ I suffered from chronically  loosened up.

Tonight, I lie awake waiting for Morpheus to fold me in his soft caress and, in my mind's eye, I walked through a doorway the color of blue skies and white cotton candy clouds and I hear a voice. My voice.

"I Think My Father Just Passed Away."

Death doesn't affect me the way it used to, before my chronic illness, before Orpheus' sweet strains lured my mother to her own reward, but they do affect me.

I will stop by his house tomorrow and check to ensure he's ok. I'll inquire about his health. Tonight I am convinced he's following Orpheus down that dry stretch of terrain to the underworld and yet I do not grieve for he lived his life to a beat that would put even the muses to shame.

His life is complete and he's ready to transform to the next stage or hang about in this one a little longer.

His choice.

So Much Noise in a Silent Woods

Some nights my meds kick in right away and I drift softly to dream land before my head even hits the pillow.

Some nights, like tonight, they're is so much noise in my head, so much going on, I have a hard time settling in.

Tomorrow I will go to sign Arianna's opt out paper for the PARCC standardized testing. There are rumors that it could affect her grades, her ability to move on in school, her ability to graduate, and her ability to get into colleges and get jobs down the road of life.

I've spent so much of my life relying on education, depending on it to get me through adulthood. I was the posterchild for school, both secondary and post secondary. I breathed education into my children. Education was my religion. Learning, my Faith.

I've lost Faith, folks. I've lost Faith in the system that is not only failing me but is now failing my children.

They told me if I worked hard enough, did enough homework, busywork, school work, curricular and extra curricular activities that I could choose my future. The told me if I just got good enough grades that I would never want for anything that I would have security and prosperity. They fucking lied.

All my work had gotten me no where. All of my awards and good grades have gotten me is a broken body, getting welfare that doesn't even begin to cover the bills.

I lied to my children because I still thought education was important but they took my son, who had so much potential and taught him the same things over and over until her got so frustrated he quit school. He's happier car hopping at Sonic than he ever was learning the Pythagoras theorem or how to correctly dissect a sentence. They failed him and in turn, I felt I'd failed him.

Now another child is pleading with me. Telling me that public schools are a waste of her time. Telling me that she could get twice as much done getting home schooled as she's getting done now simply because she'll be able to work at her own pace. She told me the other day that the after school tutoring program decided she needed a full time tutor. A girl who had struggled against dyslexia and ADHD is begging me not to let her slip through the standardized cracks and I found myself telling the same old lies.

"School is important. You need school. You'll get things out of school you could never get at home." And yet I realized with a sick, sinking feeling that I was lying right to her face. That she was smart enough and driven enough to succeed if only she wasn't hindered by the constant tug and pull off bureaucratic vulgarity she was the victim of day after day at school.

That the teachers were tired, overworked, underpaid, undereducated, burned out, and now we're expected to add two months of standardized test prep to their year.

That students were being asked to go to school year round to catch up for the failure of these tests that tried to pour all our little pegs, whatever their shape, into square holes.

I knew I could give Arianna better, often did just discussing her day over dinner. After all, weren't we talking about the little girl who had to teach her third grade teacher how to spell "entomology" and what it meant? We're talking about the little fourteen year old girl who has college honors level knowledge of Greek and Roman mythology and at least a college freshman level knowledge of biology and physiology.

We're also talking about the girl who spells completely phonetically and whose penmanship is about that of a third grader but who can paint, sing, cook, do mathematical calculations in her head, and can't watch black and white movies because the images jumble. My sweet, darling girl, who at the tender age of fourteen is doing the work of a master level shaman death worker as she blindly flounders her way to become one of the most powerful psychopomps. I've ever met.

How many other kids her age even know what as psychopomp is? How many girls her age skip datenight so she can help the little burned boy cross over?

I've told people for years I'm fourth wave feminist and to me that means realizing that women's rights are important and that we desperately need those rights but not at the cost of family and children. I'm choosing to become a housewife in order to make sure my children don't get lost in the cracks. To make sure they have a home and recognition. To give them teaching when the government makes the teachers unable to do their jobs.

I'm there, as a woman, as a mother, to support my child's journey and to understand, that while it might not always be the journey I would have picked for myself, it's still a long and scary journey but they've got my back.

Always.

And thank the goddess that Jason has my back because I couldn't do this alone.

Together. As a family. That's when it'll get done.

I'm Lost

I miss myself.
The me I used to be, before the pain and fear and exhaustion. I feel like some vital part of me it's missing now.

Oh sure, I put on a show, smile for the camera. I can be bubbly, I even glow now that Jason is in my life.

But there is some part of me that is lost. There it's a vibrant, creative, alive woman out there wearing my face, pretending to be me. The part of me that enjoyed watching the sun rise, taking hikes, reading books, the smell of snow and summer rain, a clean home... had escaped me some how. And I'll I'm left with is the debilitating, numb exhaustion or the screaming, ripping pain...

Mostly both.

The pain robs me of my ability to enjoy my kids, my home, my pets, my love, myself.

I convince myself that I'm only suffering from stagnation and that if I only get up and get going it will all be better. So, I rise, take a shower, do some yoga, clean some of the house and find myself so exhausted I have no energy left.

Jason and I are considering beginning protocols. Little tasks that I'm forced to do every day. My baby steps so to speak. My first protocol is that I get up every morning and make the coffee. Here is where milk jug woman would peruse Facebook, read, drink tea, or leen el diario.

I go pee, then sink back into the warmth of the bed.

Active missing girls does yoga, breakfast, writing a poem, and doing the dishes. I sleep.

Lunch, a walk, a shower, doing some laundry.....meditation and prayer time. Devotionals over the dishcloths, prayers over panties, sanctity during sock sorting.

This missing girl had definitely got something up on me and I want it back. I want a job, and income , a personal life.

Dammit!!!

Do you know how much it would mean to get a pain free (physical and emotional) hug from my kids. Remember the dates off concerts and trackmeets and boyscout duties?

And again, I look myself in the milk jug and I say, "mind over matter. I can do this without that other smarter, more creative, more articulate half of myself. Then I get up, get showered, dressed, teethbrushed, makeup put on, hair done, shoes slipped on, keys in hand....

And realize I have nowhere to go because I've hated on and alienated all my friends.

Here's another way of telling it. If each of your normal daily activities was a single brick on ONE of the great pyramids of Giza... I just choose my brick from the bottom most keystone spot and now the pyramids is coming back down onto my head.

Somewhere in here is a lesson about slowing down and only doing what is most important but for the time I just want to know why milk jugs gets to have all the fun and ends me with all the cool down exercises?

This is my chance to use protocols as bait to lure jugs back to me and once she gets here, adding no amount of harmony or trickery is going to separate us.

I remember being able to hike to the top of a mountain. Now I can't even get to the base of it.

I'm getting my mother fucking mountain back. And all the beauti-fuckin-wonder-ful wildflowers they're are to smell along the way.

Protocols, stubbornness, good timing, and a firm hand from Jason and the girls is going to get me back in synch with my missing half.

And you.

I'm going to need all of you too. So if you come over and the house is a mess, look me in the eyes. See what you find there. If there's tears perhaps you came by to help out with the cleaning a little. If their filled with pain maybe you came over to help cooking. If you come over and they're dull and lifeless then it's you're turn to spot a protocol that needs to be set up and put me at it.

I move when I don't have pain
I move when I do have energy.
Sometimes, I don't move just because I don't know where to go next.

Give me a gentle hug and some kind guidance.  And bear with me.

Loud Quiet

I should have known, when I felt the world tilt and saw the ground swirl up around behind me, that it was going to be a bad night. My wrists softened the blow my ass received and, as I went inside, they began to throb.

This is a new era. The era of #foxfirelove expired when I met his wife and found out how excited she was for me to move in and become her second wife.

This is the era of #soakingwetshoulders.
He cried on mine. I cried on his. Somewhere along the way, we found love. I'm happy now. I'm a partner instead of a parent or a participant. Still, it's only been three months and he hasn't experienced the mother of all flares yet.

It happened tonight. Yesterday was wonderful with romantic gifts and candlelit wine dinners, parties, and kid free hotel rooms after. So adult and romantic and lovely. Today was doughnuts and coffee with old friends and home again home again, jiggety jig, after the grocery store.

Made dinner that I was suddenly too tired to eat. Fell on my ass in a most graceful way, by trying to catch myself on Jason's pant's leg and almost pantsing him. Then, a last minute decision to watch an extra episode of Charmed, washed my faced, did a load of laundry...

Then, slid gracefully into a dark cool bed. It was too warm. That should have been my second hint. By then, I'd laid on my back, my stomach, my knees (child's pose) both left and right fetal positions and yes, I'd even tried both cat and camel poses before the tears came.

Anyone with fibro will tell you, clothes are too heavy and hugs hurt. I describe it as waves of electrical battery acid that roll over your body. I moaned, groaned, cried, screamed, begged, bargained... I even prayed.

Jason told me he wished he could kiss the pain away and my head, particularly my brain, wanted to wiggle free and flee the scene of human speech, it's tone, rhythm, and screechy clickity click nonsense like angelic glyphs on a chalkboard.

His warm hand soothed me and made me less likely to gouge his tongue or my eardrums out. The gently whispered words were like adamantian steel claws shreading at my skin, his touch like glass, my own cries made me want to giggle and flee at finally having reached the freedom of insanity. But his presence called me and I could hear a deep calm drumbeat in my ear, his heartbeat. I breathed until my heart matched the tone.

Fibro flares that keep you in bed with a low grade fever and make you sluggish and nonsocial are what everyone talks about. "I hurt a lot. I sleep a lot. Must be my fibro flare."

Well how about this? My skin is too heavy. Sounds hit me like sharp objects, smells like fists to the stomach. Clothes feel like chain mail made of barbed wire. Taste? Cereal is about what I can tolerate. The sympathy you give me is like a warm blanket that you wrap me in. The pain is still all inside but now I'm hot, claustrophobic, and muffled, and ashamed.

Tonight I cried out in pain. Not just, "holy fuck that hurt" but instead a "why why why why why why why" with drool and snot and tears and sweat dripping all over your nice cozy blanket of sympathetic pity.

And you don't have an answer for "why me" or "how come". So now you're stressed and in pain and triggering some memories of your own.

Fibro is like labor. But with labor, often at the end you've earned something, a new baby! With fibro, after the same amount of pain and sickness and hysteria, you're only incentive is that it starts all again.

At the end of fibro, the only thing you have is the dark, bitter night, the pain, confusion, exhaustion, loneliness, and the guaranteed it'll all happened again, very soon.

You're on the wash board, folks.
And the infidel is your own body.
It's you.

Then I get to get up and try to be thankful for oranges.

The Shift

Coming back here is like touching a sore tooth but somehow I know it's necessary. It's strange to think all the emotions that flood across this page have been mostly negative but here I am, feeling quite content. I tend to shy away from blogging when I'm happy. I'm afraid it will be boring but my life now is nothing but boring. There is a question about how much to share, because though I don't feel that many read this, the way I'm living my life is in a style that many don't agree with. Many might say I'm having a midlife crisis. Others may say a mental breakdown. I think the correct words are self serving. Those might strike you as sounding negative but if they do then you know nothing about me. For how long have I been living my life for others? Doing things as others see fit? Listening when they said what I wanted was wrong? For how long did I calculate every nuance of every one else's life before making a decision, often putting what I wanted aside for what seemed best for the group.

Now none of that is an issue any more. Now, my situation is such as I do what I'm told and that is the beautiful simplicity of it. Living life like a 1950'a household (for that's as close as I feel comfortable to coming to the truth on here) is not what everyone is cut out for. Hell, I still feel myself chafing against it sometimes. Those of you that really, truly know me however, know that it's something I've craved for a very long time.

Co-dependency is a bitch. From a really young age I was forced into the role of mom and caretaker of my parents. I never got taken care of. I was never anyone's responsibility. I was never a child. I was always mom. A you grow, it begins to feel normal, it's what you crave, what you seek out. When you marry, you find someone to mother, someone to fix. Never realizing it's you who needs fixing. But not by anyone else. Only you can fix yourself.

Then a wife and breadwinner you find you have just filled another mother role. Again. Dammit with the fixing of other people. They don't really want to be fixed. You don't really want to fix them. Everyone is unhappy. The rift grows. Relationships end. You move on, seeking another fixer upper. Always looking for potential.

Until you stop and fix yourself. Once you start to fix yourself all of this becomes clear. The cycle breaks. You want a break.

I wanted a break so bad. He stepped in and he was a fixer upper but something was different. I didn't want to fix him and he didn't expect me to. Instead, he started to take care of me. No...instead, he made ME take care of ME.

See what just happened? My whole life shifted. Like an earthquake that fixes things instead of wrecks them. Just a simple, quiet statement. "You must take care of you."

Your Eyes

For two days I've been trying to decide what you mean to me. It's hardly an easy question considering it's only been two weeks since you swaggered into my life. I can admit I knew right away we would be friends. There was too much history between us for there not to be a complete and instant connection. What a paradox we are, complete strangers but I have been living a near echo of your life. We've been to many the same places, done the same things. And yet, we are so different.

Your intelligence, control and reserve undo me. I'd rather see you fidget and pace nervously than to be alone with you at your most self assured.

You make me feel inadequate. No, scratch that. I make me feel inadequate. You're just being you.

It took me a week, no, I'll admit, it took me the full two weeks to stop feeling lessened by you. I imagined your eyes were closed during sex, perhaps picturing her instead of me and your emotions were so controlled as to almost seem like detachment.

It wasn't until last night that I realized your eyes had never been closed, that you watched me, steadily, from under your heavy lidded gaze.

Your eyes are the color of hunger; lean and cold like a starving predator and you watch me with cold calculation. Then again, it's the strange sickening reversal of feeling you get when you thrust your hands under scalding hot water and it feels cold and gives you chills even as it burns the flesh from your bones.

Your eyes are a live wire; the silver, hot/cold steel of lightning, like the lightning that flickered across your pale lids that night as you pushed into me. I whimpered for you like a dog afraid of the storm and you left me, shaking, curled around your hips for comfort because I knew this, like the storm, would be fleeting.

And when you left last night, our last night, you put Orpheus to shame, leaving me with only the impression of your straight spine as it faded into the pre-dawn gloom. But I never felt the quickening of regret, loss, or suffering. That I would save for another day.

Last night you gave me what none of the others had had the strength or the courage to give me. You gave me the gift of closure. You trusted me not to fall apart at the reality you were most likely never coming back. You and I ate companionably, talked, laughed until my ribs ached, loved passionately, quietly, and slowly.

I took your face in my hands, my index finger pressed into the dimple in your cheek, the scratch of new beard growth on my palms and I kissed you firmly, feeling the push of teeth behind full lips.
And the kiss said "I love you".
And the kiss said "thank you".
And the kiss said "I don't regret a minute we've had together".
And the kiss said "goodbye".

It's important to me that you know I didn't cry as you left. Or later. It's important to me that you know you've given me such a gift of strength and self assurance.

And now, as I write this, I realize the kiss didn't mean "goodbye" after all, because you've given me a part of yourself to keep with me. I'll never be able to tap that inner strength without invoking your memory.

As you and I came that last time, together, I begged you to say my name. You hesitated and when you spoke it, your mouth stumbled and paused over the foreign syllables. I realized you'd never spoken it out loud before and I cherished that newborn awkward moment as the first and last time you'd ever hold my name on your tongue.

It was crystalline. It was clear and as light shone through it, it cast rainbows on the walls.

Running Away

After the mess the other morning, with you and her on the phone, I went out into the garden to meditate. I'd been neglecting my spiritual studies and my friend, the one who takes such good care of me, has been pressuring me to spend more time on them. I was so lost without you. I was broken, and angry and lost. I didn't even know what I would say to the Goddess. If I was going to ask her for refuge or favors, what they would be. I told her honestly I didn't know what I wanted, what I needed. I told her I was so lost, just wandering. I pictured a silent woods inside my head.

All at once I felt a great calm descend on me. When I had been on the phone I'd felt numb and that my world was going slowly as yours was moving much too fast, but I didn't feel calm. Out in the garden, with the Goddess, I felt calm. As if my brain were suddenly a much quieter place. and I heard her voice.

She asked "When are you going to stop running away?"
I asked, "Running away from what?"
She replied, "When are you going to stop running away from yourself?"

I am astounded by how often the answer can be right in front of us and yet we may never see it. By then I was exhausted and vowed to return another day to find out what she was talking about.

This afternoon I woke suddenly from a nap know exactly what she was talking about. Instinctively, I knew that I'd been running from fear. While married I had someone to take the fall for all the bad things that happened to us. Whether that was me playing the blame game or if he really was just that bad at making grown up decisions, I'll never know. What I do know is that I don't have a fall guy anymore. Any decision that is made that leads to something unfortunate happening to me or my family is MY FAULT. I don't get to blame or share responsibility anymore. Everything is me. That's pretty damn scary when you think about it. It's like opening your front door and realizing you don't have a yard anymore, that it just falls into empty space like in the sequel to Jumanji.

So I've been running away from having to face that realization. I've been running away from having to begin making those choices. I've been running away from myself.

That doesn't make what I feel for you any less real. I still love you, miss you, will always hope that there is a small chance you can be a part of my life. What it does is it excuses you from the responsibilities that I tried to heap upon you because I was too scared to bear them myself. Taking care of myself, dealing with my health, making sure I took my meds and drank enough water and ate were responsibilities I tried to hand to you. And you took them, willingly. And you helped me with those things, you reminded me when to eat, drink, or even sometimes when to urinate because I was so caught up in the fear I couldn't remember to guide myself. Those activities of daily living were my responsibility. I ran away from myself.

I'm not angry at you for running away from me. Or toward her.
I hope I can get you back at some point in time. Some day or some year or some lifetime.
But I'm done running.

Hollow Little Boxes

I have to admit, I thought you would text me last night. I lay awake late into the dark, silent night waiting for the promising trill of harp. I find it hard to believe that after all you said to me you could just dismiss my as simply as that, regardless of what she wants. I hope you know how much you're hurting me. I hope you know, not because I want you to feel guilty but because I don't want to admit I spent the last four months of my life with a man who can not empathize like that. Who won't.

And yet, as cynical as I try to be I realize that part of me is always straining forward for that second when you'll borrow your friend's phone to text me, tell me you're alright, beg for forgiveness for deserting me like everyone else, tell me you still love me even though it cannot be just now...

And yet all I have is a silence that echoes through my hollow little boxes.

Shattered Little Boxes

This morning my empty inbox rang like a shattered glass bell and I saw that I had finally heard from you. But the message was devastating and my heart sank into the sickness that suddenly filled the stomach which had been as empty as the inbox only a moment before.

"I've just lost my family!!"

And I didn't know if it had been on purpose or from some accident but my first thought was how you'd said if you ever lost your daughter there would be nothing left to live for. It had gouged bloody trails in my heart when you'd said it.

I wasn't enough to live for. I didn't mean enough to you to keep you alive. I shoved aside the selfish thought immediately, scolding myself for taking you too literally, for reading into things that weren't there but then this morning, when those horrifying words were blazoned across my inbox I panicked. The fear shot through me and I demanded back that you answer me. That you tell me what was going on. I called once. I called twice. No answer. I felt sogoddamnedpowerless.

 I threatened in text that if you didn't answer I would call your mother, call the police, anything to keep you from what I pictured you doing. The mistake I pictured you making.
The Forever Mistake.



You called back then and the cold dead voice I thought I would hear wasn't there. Instead, your voice was pitched for panic. You were begging me. Begging me to sacrifice myself. Your voice was the voice of a man so beyond panic that sense was no longer a concept. You knew what you wanted. You perched on the cold edge of losing everything and you knew instantly that you couldn't let that happen.

So you plead for me to throw myself over that edge instead. And my heart cried red tears. And my heart went numb. And the world began to slow.
And I heard her voice and she sounded so young overlaying your ragged cries in the background and the grief you two shared was so fast and so harsh that I gave you over. My life was so still in that moment. So silent and still and alone.

I felt so old and you two seemed so young that when she barked her harsh curse I almost laughed out loud. Almost. But in the end my still sorrow was all I could hear. And it echoed in all those empty boxes, it echoed in my empty heart like the ocean.



Then the line was dead. And my heart was dead. All those words of romantic love pulled from the insides of valentines candy boxes had seemed so real. Your love had seemed so real but now I knew it was just... what... I don't know. I still don't know. Probably won't ever know if what you felt was real or just a reflection of my own love shining back from your eyes.

The numbness stretched on all day. I slept. I ate. I read. I dutifully removed all evidence of you from my life with the leaden grace of a fishing weight in murky waters. But as the sun began to arch from the sky, as the dark came, those empty boxes began to sing and the lead began to melt.

Now my heart aches with all the tenderness of a thousand heartbreaks and I rage at the "it's just as wells" that are cast my way. And the tears flow and flow and flow and choke me. The ache I feel for you stretches across my chest and into my back, down into my hips and along my legs and feet. Across my shoulders and into my neck, my head, my face. My body is a live wire of pain, electric pulses that echo my heart beat.



No anger though. Only the lost empty ache of someone who grieves, who mourns for a loved one who has died. Because that's what you are. She has killed you to me. She has killed the happiness in me. And she had already killed that happiness in you. And she will kill the happiness in herself.

We're all doomed.

Empty Little Boxes

I have people who promised they would never stop loving me telling me now that they just "can't". That it isn't in them right now. Now, when I need the support and reassurance the most, when my self esteem is balanced upon a pin and crumbling. Now, when I'm left to feel most alone. And I'm supposed to feel guilty that I want them to put aside their own problems and give me the love and comfort when I need it. I'm the one who is supposed to feel guilty for having the bad grace to fall to pieces right when they're in the middle of redefining who they are, what they are and are not capable of.

And so I'm left alone. And you're the worst offender. I wait patiently for you to text or email me and I count the empty inboxes like I count the minutes on the clock. My world is hollow again. Empty because no one finds me sexually attractive and the platonic love and support feels like it is merely a matter of form. Another pat on the shoulder. Another discretely passed tissue to wipe the snot and tears that roll down my face as my heart breaks again and again and again.

Because I don't learn my lesson the first time. No, that would be too easy. I continuously go running back to my empty inbox because that is what you've trained me to do. I run back hoping for a note or acknowledgement of my existence just as I did all those years ago waiting for a birthday card or call from my father. All those empty mailboxes and all these empty inboxes and all the time my pussy sits like another empty little box. Waiting for some sign that someone finds me suitable for something other than pity.

You all don't love me enough to nurture me. You don't want me enough to fuck me. You don't even care enough to tell me that you don't care enough. So I sit waiting.

With my empty little boxes filling with tears and sighs and self hate.

And when you come back you wonder why the sex is mean. You wonder why my words are angry. You wonder why I wander away with a blank stare reflecting my tears. It's because I feel unwanted. I feel unworthy of every man who ever touched me and, in your case, even some who haven't yet. I feel as if there is something fundamentally wrong with me that only you men can see and recognize. So I ask you to punish me. I want you to beat whatever that flaw is out of me.

Instead, you disappear.
And again I'm left with my empty little boxes...

Every Scar is Our Song

Just like that it feels as if the storm has passed.
I know it's most likely just an illusion and all the pain will come rushing back without a moment's notice but, for now at least, the thought of you brings me only love and calm. There is a little ache that lives behind my heart but that will likely be there forever. I think it is a long healed scar that aches during emotional storms like an old war injury. It is a tender feeling but one that I can't help poking at occasionally, experimentally, as if to determine the nature or the cause of that long ago injury.

I'm not sure I'll ever know. I did realize today that my actions with you were very likely REactions instead. Pre-programmed into my subconscious by The Other One just as guilt is programmed by The First One. I'll call what happened "The Petulant Backlash".

I try so hard not to let my expectations dictate my actions with you or with the children. Never the less, I often find myself critiquing your behavior. Not in comparison to The Other One. Never in comparison to him, hut sometimes in comparison to an ideal I have built or what society has taught me of The Perfect Man. I hold you up to this ideal never once thinking that I don't even like these ideals and the one I truly love is you because you DON'T align with these ideals. Ideals like fake chivalry, misogyny, or narcissism. Your flaws are what draws me to you, are what make you attractive to me. And I don't just say that in a self placating way or in an attempt to blow smoke up your ass. I say it because it's true.

I love you because you haven't done the right thing, because you do have a weakness for me that supersedes what society deems is honorable. I love you because you are willing to break the rules to please me, you are willing to make yourself truly uncomfortable to make me happy. I love you because you honest feel that you are not worthy of me. These are the things that, in any other man, I would see and weak and annoying. In you, I see them as shining examples of how much you love me.

I love you because I am encouraged to be a better person, a more loveable person for you.

So, I am terrified that this thing we have created won't work out. That the fairy tale will be just as hokey and fake as all the other romantic horse crap we've been fed. But I'm calm now and, for whatever reason, I'm willing to wait to see what you decide.

But I know the storm will rise again. And I can't always promise that I will be strong enough to weather it.

"I Can't Quit You Babe I Think I'm Gonna Put You Down For a Awhile"

It gets harder when its quiet.
Like at night or on the weekends.
I strive so hard to live like those pithy little memes on Facebook. You know, the ones that say the only person you need to be happy is you. That you can't truly love another person until you love yourself. I post them by the dozen on my page, wanting my belief and the sheer number of them to be enough to make it true. But, in the end, I only wind up resenting them as being unreasonable and unrealistic. I love you so much that it physically hurts to know that we may never be together.

I thought I was having a heart attack last night. No joke, the pain radiated down my left arm and my jaw ached. My chest felt so tight but I could still feel that hollow echoing thud. I thought how great it would be to have a heart attack and die out there. No car, in the middle of the night with the girls sound asleep. I could die and not have to spend another minute living without you. You know suicide just isn't my style. Suffering slowly and loudly. That's my style. But now, a heart attack, that would end it all without having to worry about suicide or suffering. My chest felt like it was cracking open. I was sobbing so loudly I couldn't understand why the girls didn't hear me. It hurt worse than reading a Twilight fan fiction.

I was fucking living one.

Dying would have been too convenient. Heart attack would have been too tidy. I woke this morning with that same wet pain in my chest. Its been so easy to fake happy today. After the girls peeled me out of bed this morning, forced me to face the world, it was easy to pretend that everything was just fine.

I texted you. I messaged you. Of course I did. I can't help myself. I love you and I always will. Nothing will ever stop that. But I kept it casual. I asked if we could be friends. Asked if I could be there for you as just a monotonous little nobody.
I'm like the fat girl on the diet that gets a job at the bakery just so she can at least smell the fucking doughnuts. Except, she's never happy with just a little sniff, is she? No she'll eventually take a crumb or two and when that isn't enough she'll find herself in the corner of the dark stock room with powered sugar on her chest and drool on her chin, shoveling jelly filleds into her maw.

Edward tells Bella that she is his "own personal brand of heroin". That's how I feel about you. I'm filled with a vague sense of longing for you until the sun goes down or I have to go too long before talking to you again and then I start to show signs of withdrawal. Even now, sitting in the quiet, I can feel my body crave you in ways I shouldn't crave a man I've never held, kissed or fucked. And yet, here I huddle, shoving jelly filleds into my maw.

I fucking hate Stephanie Meyer for getting it so right. I hate her for understanding the simplest bond between two adults is a sheer need that defies logic or understanding. It defies explanation. But you're sick. You're so exhausted and so stressed out and I know that while I'm not a gigantic factor in those two things, I am one of the factors that you... WE actually have some control over while the other factors are more like acts of God with wills of their own.

I fucked up before by trying to quit you cold turkey. I was selfish and wrong by trying to leave your life. I know now that I can't ever leave your life any more than I could pull out my veins and arteries and use them for a jump rope. But I can try to be your friend and try to eliminate some of the stress that comes with being what we are. I can try to support you instead of being just one more thing that knocks your feet out from under your. I can be the one thing in your life that comes to you with no expectations on your time, energy or love. At least that's what I hope.

And later...
Later on if you feel better and you want something more. I'll be there then too. If that's what you want. Because I can't convince myself that loving you is bad for my heart.
That sooner or later heart attacks really do happen.
And that they're really just as messy as any other kind of hurt.

Fuck You Very Much

I've been waiting very patiently for the past six months. Standing very calmly while you all jostle for your positions on top of me. You fight for the choicest spot to inject your viscous wrath and bicker and fight over who has the right to harvest the most tender bits of me. My husband was the most patient. Nineteen years of laying in wait upon my back like a monkey I just can't quit. He slowly ransomed his favorite parts; my naivete, my optimism, my trust. He plastered up the holes with a crumbling concoction of cynicism, bitterness, and vulnerability. Then came my mother, slashing with nails of guilt and self doubt. Gnashing with teeth of fire and jealousy. She replaced her stolen bits with, "My you've gained a bit of weight, haven't you?"

My son took my power, my ability to rule the home and mete out punishment and replaced it with jeers and rolls of eyes. He knew my grasping fingers had become, at that point, merely an illusion I showed the world. My sharp tongue was wet ash. Next, my brother took whatever familial ties I had left and, licked his lips and tasting tender tears gave me back only half truths. I choked on his fear of me.

Now you fall in line, harvesting heart like so many wasted minutes waiting for you to call, like counting so many empty inboxes. I know you can't help but hate me just as you love what I represent, the freedom to love as you would without all of your own beloveds stealing juicy bits from your own trembling form. You don't have the strength left to love me and hold yourself together, a sad fatherly form of duct tape and medical gauze.

And all the rest of you offer only empty platitudes, so afraid that my fear, my anger, my sorrow is contagious, stretching from me to you like so much warm, discarded bubblegum.

There's nothing left for you to claim from me. I am become an empty shell of cardboard and outdated dreams. You have created a golum of your greed and fear and tears and now I stumble from one of you to another, clumsily grasping for acceptance. Nails raking for support. Teeth gnawing for unconditional love.

Harvesting the juiciest little bits of you to feed my empty soul.

Leaps and Bounds

I'd forgotten how good it feels to be here.

I just reread my last post and it was chilling to realize that Mom passed only two weeks after that on Father's Day. It was painless and she passed in her sleep, or more specifically, a kind of coma. Mike was sick again and thus unable to go but dad and I sat by her bed for a long while. We talked about letting go and I suggested she hung on because he hadn't yet given her the assurance she needed. He resisted at first. We both cried a great deal. Finally, he went to her bedside. He's become so stiff in his old age that it was painful to watch him stoop toward her ear. But then he did it. He told her that if she needed to go he would be alright. He gave her permission to die. Then he went home and I went to the hotel. She died at 5am that morning. Both a blessing and a curse.

So much of my life had been absorbed in her struggle that I'm not sure I knew what to do with myself. We prepared her funeral. It was a good turnout. That's what they always say, don't they? As if the population of your funeral had anything to do with how you lived your life. She was a loving, caring, devoted person in health. She was alone in sickness. I understand that acutely now. People didn't avoid her because she was a burden or because her frequent bouts with dementia made her unlikeable. It was because her illness forced them to face their own mortality and there is nothing people like more than blinding themselves to negative or unpleasant aspects of life. My friend TJ calls it unnecessary problems. My own illness has brought a similar reaction from some but not all of my acquaintances.

I remember thinking that the Paster knew nothing about her as he read the scripture he'd chosen for her and that I, a veteran pagan, could have chosen more apt scripture for her.

That's been just about two years now. We spread her ashes under her beloved Mulberry tree. I think of her often, dream of her frequently. When I first became ill I was struck by seizures. After an extremely forceful one I couldn't remember that she had passed. It must have been terrible for Mike to have to tell me again. I know it was awful enough living it twice. People often comment about how they still feel the presence of their loved ones either as a spirit or a running dialogue in their minds. I'm happy to say I feel none of that. I feel that she is truly at rest. The girls spray her perfume every once in awhile and on those occasions the pain becomes sharper but there was never a feeling of leaving things undone or unsaid and for that I am grateful.

I miss you, Mom. Everyday you are in my heart just as you always were. Your memory guides me even though your spirit us at rest.

Dreams About Birth Inevitably Turn To Thoughts of Death

I had a dream about my mother this morning. We were on a native reservation somewhere in the woods. My friend Jeanette Garcia was there. We were working all together, gathering sticks and binding them together in bundles. On the path ahead of me sat a small round piece of drift wood. As I reached for it, it turned into an owl, spoke to me (words I don't remember) and then flew away. I turned to my mother and she had streaks of blood along her thighs. The streaks of blood became earthworms and I knew from that her time had come. We put her in a birthing chair in a small smokey room and the baby began to push its way out. I heard one of the elder men say from outside the tent that my mother needed to birth a "workhorse". I knew by that he meant a boy baby. The baby slid out into my arms and as I was trying to clear its mouth I poked one of its fragile eyes. It began to cry and sputtered out amniotic fluid. I noticed it was a girl. Donovan tried to hug it and I told him the baby was covered in blood and he should wait for me to clean it. He then tried to cut the umbilicus and I told him he must clamp it first. I remember thinking that this work was enjoyable and fulfilling and that I should get an apprenticeship under my friend Kamy Shaw. She would help me learn. My mother began cramping again and I assured her it was only the placenta passing. I left her to get a bowl big enough to hold it and that part of the dream phased into another one about a double decker carousel with fairies.

The thing is, on the surface of it I understand consciously why my mother may have been pregnant in the dream. Because her liver and kidneys aren't functioning her abdomen is filled with fluid and terrifically swollen, even as her limbs and face are wasting away. This "fluid filled abdomen" is exactly what it is to be pregnant. The fact that she had a baby girl instead of the "workhorse she needed" indicates that I feel like a failure to her. That as a weak woman suffering from RA I am much more ineffectual in helping her than if I had been born a strong boy. The thing that concerned me the most was the presence of the earthworms and the owl. I have been taught that these are symbols of imminent death and as I have always believed, death is also a form of rebirth, thus leading back to the birthing sequence. In essence, I delivered my mother from the womb of my own mother. I am then called to look at the word "Delivered" and understand that it has multiple connotations, one of which is to rescue one from a bad situation. So, here I am knowing what it all means but wondering if it was all made up by my subconscious or if the universe planted the seed in my mind to help me prepare for my mother's death being sooner than I thought.

I did call her this morning and my father said she was fine. The dream still has me in a very thoughtful mood this morning, however.

Howling For All The Wrong Reasons

The doctor says I have shingles. They itch really badly and I've been promised by multiple people that pain will probably follow. The doctor also said that stress can cause them. I told her about my mother and about my new puppy and about Loki the cat's insane pink eye. Then I looked her straight in the eye and told her it probably was stress after all.

Mother called a couple times today. She is still fully convinced that she will die tonight. I told dad she needs to put her advanced directive on file at the hospital just on the off chance she gets put back into the hospital which is really very likely considering they would have put her back in today if a bed had been available. Both the numbers in her blood pressure are in the double digits and the home health nurse says that her kidneys are shutting down. Dad says everything will get better if they can just get her hydrated and back on the milk thistle. She has tricked us so many times that I really don't want to believe her when she says she is going to die tonight but part of me says if anyone is going to know wouldn't it be her? Then again, a very dear friend said that its possible its just the dementia talking and that she could have years left.

BUT it rained tonight and I'm watching a biopic about Allen Ginsberg and his poem "Howl". The puppy is curled up beside me asleep and Mike made a wonderful green chili crusted grilled salmon and latkes for dinner so my tummy is full. The night is cool and I'm contented. If mom passes on tonight its what she wants and if she doesn't then that is just as well because it means that I get to spend more time with her.

Gods and goddesses bless us with whatever is best for us now.

"Real Women Have Curves... Not the body of a fifteen year old boy."

I just joined a facebook group with the name above because I thought the title was funny. I don't necessarily enjoy my curves one hundred percent of the time and I thought it would be mentally uplifting to become part of a group that did enjoy their curves. Perhaps it would make me more appreciative of what I have. The whole group was nothing but trash talking between fat people and thin people. Pure hatred going back and forth. All the thin posters said that "curvy" was just code for fat. They used words like "fattie" and "rhino". It was ugly and hateful. They made assumptions like all curvy women have diabetes or all curvy women cheap horny women just looking for some. The curvy women were just as bad. In the end I left the group after only being a member for a couple of minutes.

I did a search for groups that represented curvy women in a positive light and couldn't find any. All I could find were groups of skinny women calling other women fat and so called curvy women calling skinny women all kinds of terrible things. The interesting thing is, most of the women who had posted pictures on this group I wouldn't even consider over-weight and I got to wondering if anyone stopped to even look at these women. I am 5'6" and 177lbs. I've been this weight for almost 6 years. The medical world considers me overweight but not obese. I think most of the women who had posted pictures on this group had a lower percentage of body fat than I did. And people were on there calling them "hippos". One person said it was "easier to hit like than to go out and exercise".

Suddenly these women who are trying desperately to like themselves and be proud of who they are were being attacked not because they were being physically unhealthy but because they had the gall to try and be emotionally happy. One thing I don't think any of these women understand is that becoming emotionally happy is the first step to becoming physically happy. If these women are supported in their lives to becoming emotionally happy  they will become strong enough to be physically healthy.

I wish these women, both skinny and curvy find the strength they need to be happy and healthy and like themselves regardless of the world around them.

The World Doesn't Stand Still

It is almost midnight. Summer break so the kids are all still up. They are watching something on the internet that has them all cracking up. I watched a silly horror movie with Kevin Costner in it. I ate Taco Bell for dinner with a large Mountain Dew. Tomorrow Keira starts her acting classes and Donovan has a dentist appointment. Maybe Barnes and Noble with call me about an interview. It seems as if nothing is different. Everything is good, right?

The fact is my mom called at 2 this afternoon and told me I should drive to Deming because she wasn't going to make it through the night. She knew she was going to die. Arianna came with me, so brave for a ten year old to face what very well may be the death of a loved one. She knew the implications and came anyway. I went. Not because I thought my mother was going to die but because I knew if she did and I wasn't there I would never forgive myself. I told Mike is was like prophylactic guilt protection. I didn't go to what I called the Death Watch because I wanted or needed to say goodbye to her or because I didn't want her to be alone but because I knew I would feel guilty if I wasn't there.

All the grief that a daughter can feel bottled up into one crystalline moment that shatters when my mother said "I made a mistake, I didn't really need you. Go home."

And so here I sit, the world still turning and everything feeling all normal as if it will go on like this forever. But it won't because one day she really will die and what if that guilt isn't enough to sucker me into her drama next time... or the time after that... or the time after that.

Blogging is good for the soul

"I think she only crawls out of the woodwork to blog when her life sucks."

Yes folks, I haven't posted in forever because frankly, things were going pretty good there for a bit and I thought everything I could possibly post was boring and redundant. It was almost as if I was waiting for that moment when my life turned to shit and got exciting again.

We had that huge snow storm two weekends back and the pipes all froze and we had rolling blackouts which was fun. The kids and I played "Grandfather's Store" by candlelight. I realized that when I used to play with my parents we used what their great grandfather would have had in their store and I was still kind of stuck on that era. I kept coming up with things like "washboard" and the kids kept coming up with things like "atom bomb". Technically we were both right - it just depends on whose grandfather you are talking about. Except Keira who insisted on using words like "giraffe" and "penguin". I think she was using Diane Fosse's grandfather - or Jane Goodall. Or maybe that guy from The Snows of Kilimanjaro, a movie I might point out, that has neither snow nor Kilimanjaro in it.

Anyway, I should have seen it coming - It's like the curse of Valentines Day, right? Saturday an Sunday we house sat for Sabine in Radium Springs and the weather was gorgeous and the river was low. We spent most of the weekend on the sand bar, playing in the sand and the kids watched movies and we had snacks, etc. Sunday Mike was home all day. It was warm and we grilled. I got to see Rebecca's new baby Coraline and it was amazing to hold her and play with her. At the same time it was good to see that Rebecca was wearing motherhood like a new dress. Monday morning was V-Day and I got up feeling chipper with little to no expectations about the day or romance or any silly thing like that. Mike slept late and then we went to have lunch. We talked a little bit about the future and decided that we may as well stay in Las Cruces for a year to save up money for a real move. We've done the poor move twice and it sucks, especially with kids. I'd like to do a prepared move for once.

Michael mentioned he wanted to take me out to the movies for Valentines Day but by the time 5pm rolled around it was like thunderheads gathering on the horizon. I could smell the ozone in the air and knew it was not going to be a pleasant night. A night at the movies with my honey quickly deteriorated into dinner with the kids at "wherever you want". The dryer broke. Michael started getting anxious and throwing up again.

By six am this morning I'd had little to no sleep, almost chopped my hand off in the dryer, fought with Keira about 80 times, and realized I was still so far behind on homework I'd never see the light.

Optimism is just the guy that sets it up so the fall really hurts this time...

Shedding the Pounds

I've been trying to lose weight the last couple of weeks - I've been exercising by riding my bike to school, eating better, drinking only water. The first week I gained 6 pounds. I was livid but Michael said it was only water weight and when I finally lost it I had also lost two pound so regular weight. So, in the spirit of bettering my life I began spring cleaning and in the spirit of water weight I gain a whole bunch more stuff before I was able to get rid of other stuff. So now my house is trashed but I got rid of 3 bags of garbage and several boxes yard sale goods...

Selfish

I decided, since everyone is out of the house and its my birthday weekend, I'm not going to clean the house alone.

Power Dynamics of the Patriarichal Home

I feel like I'm stuck in some power struggle I don't quite understand. Mike fought all night to sleep on my side of the bed. I've slept on the same side of the bed for 14 years and suddenly last night he started sleeping on my side of the bed and refused to budge. I slept on the couch for part of the night, tried to sleep on his side to no avail and finally wrestled what little space I could on the edge of my side. As soon as I got up to wake the kids this morning he resolutely moved back into my spot. What is going on here?

I know I'm a little OCD that this even matters but seriously - you run your life a certain way for 14 years and then someone up and changes it without explanation, without remorse.

Keira's another one. She looks me straight in the face this morning and tells me, "I have no clean clothes." Her drawers are filled with stacks of clothes we bought her at the beginning of school and here's the kicker: Some of them still had tags on them. So when I put the nice new jeans on her she throws and absolute shit fit. Yelling, screaming, kicking. You'd think I'd suggested we lobotomize her the way she was carrying on.

Ari and Donovan have chosen their sides, the quit doing homework two weeks ago and have been lying about it ever since.

I'm tired. My psychologist says the only one I can control is me but it feels like when I stop trying to control them they either give up or gang up on me. The house is trashed because no one will clean it but me and I haven't had time. Homework isn't getting done by anyone but me. And I don't even get a side of the bed anymore. And this is where I'm supposed to come up with some startling revelation that will help me deal with myself and the world around me but you know what? I got nothing.

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I Curse Her For Leaving the World the Coward's Way

"I didn’t want any flowers, I only wanted

To lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.

How free it is, you have no idea how free——

The peacefulness is so big it dazes you,

And it asks nothing, a name tag, a few trinkets.

It is what the dead close on, finally; I imagine them

Shutting their mouths on it, like a Communion tablet."

-Tulips Sylvia Plath

I know that need for peace that she speaks of. The image of pale white palms open on white sheets is almost religious, I have seen pictures of Jesus and Mary with their palms facing outward like consolation. But the hugeness of the peacefulness, and the permanency of it... That is what scared me away.

Now the need for the quiet, for peace, is not so alluring and I can gain peace and happiness from my day to day mad rush. I can take a minute before the family wakes to write this journal. I can sit on my meditation pillow and ask the goddess or gods for Grace. I can ask them to grant me peace and tranquility. Yesterday they gave me the gift of the flowers. Today I can only imagine what they will send my way. Tomorrow, perhaps I will get no peace at all.

But the important thing is that I know what Sylvia wanted and I know she finally got it. I commend her the strength she had in going through with it but at the same time I curse her for leaving the world the coward's way...

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