luckily there is laughter

  To me, laughter is worth so much more than gold. Little snorts, quiet giggles, loud guffaws and nose snorting laughs are so, so, SO valuable.

After I wrote this post I was a solemn, quiet lobster-girl. I tried to hide the tears from the rest of the family as I was at the homestead hanging out with the gang after a failed attempt at a rainy day wander. Mr. a-go-go however saw, knew and would simply walk by and squeeze. He knew that if he asked anything or acted any kinder I would be hiccuping snotty tears like a toddler who scraped her knees on the cold cement. After I had packed up all the gear and we were on the car, he gave my hand a squeeze and we talked. He's so good, that guy. I know it kills him just as much as it kills me but he doesn't give in to the wallow. That actually worries me a bit, he bottles up so much and he rarely explodes though he does get moody and golly, those days are quit unpleasant but we move through them gracing each other space with the occasional arm pat, gentle hug or lovely look.

We do talk about adoption. But because we are the kind of thinkers we are, we think it is a little too late for us. Not in an "oh poor us" kind of way more like we have settled into out small shared life doing our small shared things. Children are an enormous responsibility and we would be up to the task with all of its enormity in the ways you need to be there and with the love you have to share but the practical matter is that we are on the lower end of the moolah spectrum, fancy college degrees and all. There is a trade of to the life you wish to live and we are lucky, quite lucky to live our "almost" life. We have chosen to live in a town with less opportunity than the great big Los Angeles. Chosen to be closer to family and in the middle of this great big beautiful space. We have chosen our work based on locality and hours. I make very little but get to work with children and a handful of wonderful teachers in a lovely school biking/walking distance (which I still need to walk) from the casa. The mister gets to cram his forty hours into four days giving him an extra day off and he gets to bike to work as well, which he does, every day unless it is raining. Neither job offers health insurance and it took us more than a year to find something for me that was semi-affordable (I was rejected from four different insurance companies due to infertility, menopause and asthma, two of those things can be attributed to the DES) so now any chance of socking away a wee bit o cash is now sucked up by insurance but now the mister can breathe easier since I can breathe easier and it's all a matter of personal priorities.

We live small. We eat out maybe one a week and even then it is to share a plate. We don't go out to movies or shows mostly because movies are too expensive and we are awkward and anti-social and well...old fuddies. I haven't purchased any new fabric or crafting supplies other than glue and such and any new clothing other than jeans (and one trip to Penneys and maybe a Target or Old Navy run...or two...) comes from the thrifts. I desperately need new shoes, the kind that are cute, fit and will last. I know these will cost a pretty penny but that is okay since it is important. We spend our days puttering about, working on projects, talking, laughing, arguing, playing the ukes and watching bad B-movies on Netflix. We aren't quite settled into this space as what we had in L.A. is not here as far as home goes but what we have here is family, the ocean, the mountains, the quiet and each other. We'll figure out a garden space and a home someday, I hope sooner than later. I really miss our garden. I really miss our friends and yet I still feel a bit more heart settled here than down there.

I want to thank you for your comments on the post that had me spiraling. I will be responding individually now that blogger has a reply button. I do like a reply button. Soon, I will make my sad sack and angry fits of pepper lemonade public. Soon. I think I need to share the hurt, share the anger. I am in need of an upswing, I can't spend my time being sadder than sad. I can only allow the wallow to hit, to wrap myself up in it until it becomes too warm so that I can shrug it off and head to happier places. Thank goodness for happier places, for laughter and for friends both in person and online. We need to share more often...it keeps us connected. At least it keeps me connected so that I don't feel so alone.

sometimes

Sometimes I tell myself everything is okay even though the tears tell me otherwise.
Sometimes I succumb to the envy I feel when I happen upon others who live the life I wish I had.  Sometimes I wallow, wallow, wallow and then feel foolish, foolish, foolish for not feeling grateful and joyful for all the good that I do have and sometimes I say fuck it and give in to that wide wallow and throw myself a pity party, balloons and all.

If you don't happen upon this space frequently you might conclude that I (pity) party a lot. I don't, not really, I'm just honest about the wallow and feel right now that I'm a smidge entitled to it. And if you are wondering, the wallow is almost always kicked off when I see a bump in the road...the baby kind. See, the mister and I did not choose to be baby-free a-go-gos. Nope, though we were more inclined to adoption than birthing our own because the whole population growth dealio scares the ducks out of us but the weird thing is adoption costs more than good old fashioned procreation. No, the choice was taken from us even before I knew where babies came from.

Back when I was a tiny growing thing nestled in my own private womb, my family went through an awful experience (that still carries a ripple effect) that left the doctors sincerely thinking my mother might miscarry the wee that was me. They professionally prescribed her a miracle drug (or so they thought) to keep me safely tucked inside. What they did not encounter and what was only discovered months after I was born was that miracle drug was really a dangerous dose of synthetic estrogen that gifted all of us "miracle" babies with all sorts of ilk. The kicker being infertility. A good many of us DES children managed to live average cancer-free lives with kiddos upon kiddos while others, like me, became text book cases. Even my old nurse-practitioner couldn't believe how text-book I was. She was ecstatic to see it all live and in person. Go me.

Along with the infertility, I spent my twenties getting cancer screenings and paps every other month. I hit menopause at the ripe old age of 38 and now I get to look forward to new cancer screenings.

I should have a sash or tiara or something.

I also hate to admit this but I almost wish I got pregnant when I was in my twenties, bad relationships be damned. And I hate, hate, hate that I get so darned jealous of the people who have unplanned pregnancies that turn into happy babies. I want to stamp and stomp and wail "It's not fair" but I don't, at least not out loud. Instead I purge my feelings into another blog, a very whiny and sad and angry blog and hope for the day, the minute, the hour where I don't feel like crying or that my self worth is zero because I do not and will not have children. I know that isn't true but it feels true to me. I feel like I lack something profound that will give me common ground with other adults that could be friends. But who wants to be friends with us childless a-go-gos? I snark but I feel it is true and that we are frequently misunderstood. I think parents assume that childless people do not want to be friends with child-full people and though having kids is not a requirement in the friends department, the mister and I seem to never fit in. We're not out-on-the-towners or bar goers. We don't watch the hip shows or listen to the now music. We dress down, not up, we live slow and make our own mostly off-key music. I worry that when we are old, we will truly be alone. Who will take care of us when we can no longer take care of each other?

I'm sure you're thinking I'm some sort of drama queen and believe me, I think I could agree with you. Thank goodness I bottle it up for the most part but it seeps out and pops out and explodes as if you dumped mentos down my throat whenever I read of another happy blogger expecting baby number two or three or four and I see their published lives, their owned homes and thin vintage cloaked couple-ness in their magazine worthy living room cooking up garden fresh goodness, crafting up viral prettiness as feathery, feathery chickens dance around in the background. I wonder, do they all really have such magical lives? Lives where 9-5 jobs are nowhere to be seen, where their blogs generate their mortgage payments, where bodies are so healthy there are no worries about hospital bills. Can it really be that magical? I sit on our battered and borrowed sofa in our overpriced rental with the mis-matched white paint speckling the walls and the boxes of craft crap tilting this way and that and wonder if it would be okay if I splurged and bought the organic eggs instead. And then I think it's probably better that I can't have kids, that I would suck at the mom thing anyway that there is no way we could do it, could afford it when we can barely find our happy medium as it is. And I wallow and wonder who I am...who am I?

And my heart hurts, it aches so and I wanna smack the crap out the adults I see yelling at their children for being children. I want to flee and run away and unplug myself from everything. I want to be different, someone else, someone worthy, someone likeable, someone who is settled and happy with who they are and what they have and I think this life of mine is wasted on the me that is me and just as I reach the highest heights of my heartache and sadness I spy something, it could be anything really, that makes me catch my breath. It could be the pink of the sun set or a lizard sunning itself on our porch. It could be the rolling hills that surround this new home of ours, the opening notes of a favorite song or a picture book that makes me laugh. Whatever it is, it pulls me down and stills my sadness, tucking it into bed underneath the faintest faded quilt of goodwill where it slumbers as ling as it can so that I find myself in my moment. A good moment, a moment filled with sweetness and song, with a whistling mister beside me on a battered and borrowed sofa that is piled sky high with quilts and happy colors. A moment filled with rainy day wanders and family filled Mondays. A moment that helps me realize that the magic is with us as well. It's just a little less showy.

wishy-washy aka I took over fifty pictures of this face and only one came out halfway decent...

I should have just bought a t-shirt instead.

Sometimes, I imagine that if you were to look up the word contradiction in the dictionary (they still have those, right?) you might see a picture of me. I always feel like I am at odds with myself. I do not do well in social situations and prefer to hide out at home where I am safe from awkward moments and yet when I am at home and safe from awkward moments I feel a smidge bored and a whole lotta forgettable. But when I am out and talking to people I have a constant dialogue in my head mostly made up of the words "stop talking, stop talking, STOP TALKING!" And I say that in relation to the blather my mouth is spewing forth. Yeesh!

I want to be liked but am too afraid of being stupid so I hide out and yet I speak up and out against things I think are unfair or unjust. I have little patience for what I imagine is stupidity but I am not exempt form doing and thinking stupid things.

I tend to lean towards the idea that my way is right or better or easier and yet I am always fearful of doing everything wrong. I already know that if we were to arrange four boxes of people doing the same thing whilst playing this song, I would be the thing that was not like the others.

I am not a fan of my face and don't say but I like your face, this is me, blathering on about um..me and I'm not a fan of my face...especially right now since I seem to have found that weight I recently lost. It has camped itself out on my face (among other areas). Though, on the oft chance of taking a stellar picture of said face (one where the chins are nicely cropped out) I will post it here to tomorrow. But if there is one thing that will bum me out more than the non-working sniffer it is looking at and searching for one single good picture of THE face.

The other day, I decided I need a new icon picture for FB and Pinterest and blogger, et al. I bathed and moisturized and brushed everything that needed brushing. The good mirror (the only mirror actually, thank MAUDE it is a good one) showed me on the way to looking decent. I applied mascara and lavender eye powder, a smidge o' pink to tint up the cheeks and my too-young-for-me red lipstick. I stood in the good light in the living room, picked up the Rebel, aimed it at where my face should be and took a few pictures before reviewing them.

And then I cringed a cringedy-cringe as I looked at that trio of dopplegangers that could not possibly be me as I had good hair just moments before. I ran into the bathroom (the very same one I left an egg in but I will share that story later) to view the disaster only to be greeted with a decent me. I sighed, took a breath and decided to try again, this time using the powershot as it has a flip screen which is really good for making faces at the camera.

More than fifty-shots later (and two changes in eye-wear) I plugged both cameras in for some editing and felt my mood plummet down, down, down. I am well aware that my face isn't awful and that looks are not the MOST important thing. And I am well aware that it is what is inside that counts and on a good day, I think my insides hold up nicely but man oh man what a way to feel down when not one single shot looks presentable. And I took them myself! With lipstick on and cute hair as evidenced by the good and only mirror in the tiny casa. Yeesh! I must be balding or losing my photo mojo or maybe I really do need a hair-cut, I don't know. So after too-many-to-count photos that got dumped in the virtual trash I am stuck with one. One single not-so-awful photo of this mug that is mine (though I see evidence of allergies, oh droopy, droopy eyes). Am I vain or what?

In retrospect, I probably should not have attempted this whilst watching America's Next Top Model. Yeeash. I need a new hobby...or another job...or a new lipstick (one that is a leetle less red?).

achoo!

 The allergies are still mucking up the brain big time. I can't really fathom what I did this week outside of work at the preschool but I do know my brain has been overflowing with ideas. Ideas that appear to simply float about the noggin in a safe bubble with no need to escape at all. Sigh. I did not craft a single thing up...I did however bake some gingerbread birthday goodness for a sister-a-go-go, so I suppose that is something, right?

I am reading a fabulous book that is so engaging to me it is difficult to put down. It's not your normal kind of read so when I tell people the title they tend to look at me as if to say "Riiiiiight, enjoy your...book?" Anyhow, if you are at all interested in progressive education and/or democratic classrooms, I highly recommend The Discipline of Hope by Herbert Kohl who is, by the way, an amazing writer of quite a few books. While it is awesome and amazing, it makes me very sad and wanting of a kindred spirit to talk to about these ideas and such. And cue another sigh.

Last week I saw The Hunger Games with a group of new gals and while I enjoyed the movie muchly, I really wanted to steal away with all the dresses from District 12. I am a sucker for calico. And since this paragraph seems to be about confessions I have to admit that this week has been all about jordan almonds and bad t.v. I really wish I could have my nose back. This whole not smelling things is a bummer and there is really not much I fancy right now other than salty or sweet and what good is that?

Reading the above makes me feel a smidge hopeless over the integrity of this post. My blog has been lackluster as of late and I'm still trying to figure out if I am through with this business of blogging. Probably not as I really need the validation of any little thing I can get and yet I am quite moody and blue that I have been doing this for a decade and I see my projects and pics reposted all over the web and back and yet I've nothing to show for it. Cue a wee fit as I clench my fists and stomp about in a very whiny way and proceed to sigh. I'm a mess. A sad mess. And I feel so small and childish and churlish and all assortments of other ish and I'm wondering what pics will look pretty and cohesive to this post. Not a clue....not a clue.**

Thank goodness I can still laugh at myself. Thank goodness for that...and bread. Fresh baked crusty bread with melty butter and black pepper on top. No, wait...with butter and homemade jam on top. No...wait...with tomatoes marinated in balsamic, garlic and olive oil on top. Man, I wish I had some crusty bread...

**I went with random pretty. I hope it works...

fuzzy wuzzy

 I've been experiencing a case of bad brain as of late. Not the kind of bad brain where the world is dark and gloomy and not the kind where I'm feeling all failure-like but the kind where my brains has ceased to function. It's all cloudy and fuzzy and I have become forgetful. We can blame it on the weather or maybe my thyroid or perhaps it is the menopause or the extra pounds on my body but I lay blame on all the pollen that has been careening about the pretty air here on both clear days and wet. I have been a bleary-eyed, runny nosed, lethargic, sneezy mess. Ugh, allergies.

I have also been quite forgetful and fuzzy and foggy and a wee bit clueless even. I woke up (almost) bright and early and (almost) ready to go. I (kinda) knew the plan for the day but did any of it get done? Sigh. Not only did I not really accomplish much other than the promised scones to the mister and some dinner prep, I managed to forget the staff meeting that was scheduled for today. I knew it was today, at least, I knew it was to be on March 27. I just...um...forgot today was the 27th. Yeesh!

And here I type something other than what I had wanted to because these darn allergies made me forget what I was going to type. See? It's a trap and I am completely useless...for now. I hope tomorrow will prove to be less fuzzy, less snoofly and more something.

 And it is only Tuesday...uh-oh.

hello morning

it wasn't my parched throat or stuffier than stuffed up nose that woke me up this morning. it wasn't the too loud duet of jogging girls that ran past my window or the growing grumble of cars zipping by on the highway or the stompy stompiness that is our upstairs neighbor as he jumps up to shower for the third time that night. no, what stirred me from dreams of skinny three-story-tall shops, painted pieces of wood and plastic gloves covered in hair dye, was the tiny sound of singing birds that sounded just like fairy-sized horses. i couldn't even begin to replicate the sound that woke me but it was tiny and happy and pretty magical until the staccato tick-tick-tick of whatever it was that haunted me throughout the night jumped in. i still don't know what the ticking sound is (was?). it was so pervasive that i even dreamed of it driving me crazy. that dream became black and white and all angles a la a german expressionist film. all night long that tick-tick-tick invaded the noggin causing me to stir and bolt upright. in my dream it turned out to be a bent blind on the window fixture but in real a-go-go time it remains a mystery. it is heard most clearly through one ear as i slept on either side. tick-tick-tick. i would sit upright and the sound would disappear. it was and is positively kooky.

i also dreamt of a necklace found in that skinny three-story tall shop. a necklace so spiffy i had to draw a picture and write down a description of it to see if i could make it. i do hope it actually came from my dream and not from some blog or pinterest pin, i hate when i think i thought of something only to find it came from someone else's crafty brilliance that was so cool it collected in the noggin making me think i thought of it.

i spent most of yesterday huddled on our borrowed and beat up sofa (someday we'll get to recovering it) under thrifted blankets and quilts battling the chilliest of chills and feverish of fevers. i made the mistake of going into work and then got sent home. i felt lame and misunderstood and not at all like the 41 year old i am supposed to behave like. i watched bad crime television and read two books and nibbled on saltines as i sippy sipped up the sweet and sticky nectar that is called coca-cola.

so now i am up and the fever has broken. the chills are the chilly kind as i really should put on a sweater and my cabin fever has me anxious and cranky and clueless as to what to do. there is some school prep i need to take care of at least and hopefully a photo walk or something. maybe some food other than crackers will be in order as well. i have no idea. all i know is that the plans i had made for march are already kerfungled as the month is moving too quickly and i have been knocked down again...each month i say it and i hope it to be true but i really do hope april is different.

rolling with it

 mister is asleep on the sofa next to me as i tippy-type various angst-filled posts that may or may not sometime be published. his breathing is slow and deep as his crossed arms over his chest twitch every now and then. i feel ever-so-slighlty train wreckish and i think it's just a cycle i go through. call it depression or moodiness or simply the holidays, it is what it is and it hits like clockwork.

it's not surprising really. at least to me. my mother went into the hospital around this time just before she died. i had no idea she wouldn't be coming home. none. i think about her last Thanksgiving in a lonely room so far from her home and her comforting objects and my chest tightens. heartsick. i still feel so young. i feel like i shouldn't have to feel this way. that i am too young to not have her alive. we were close. crazy close. and i miss her. there are times when i miss her so much tears simply fall and other times i am so angry at her for things that cannot be changed. then there are times when i am so very mournful of what she went through, opportunities she lost, and the burden of her illness that my mind goes blank and i refuse, refuse to think anymore on it otherwise i might wail and wailing takes me to a place that i fear so very much.

so yes, it's the season. the season of sad. it can be bittersweet. it usually is. i gather up all my good memories of my mother and my family and the holidays and i fling them about in hopes that i can feel the warmth and charm of my mother. sometimes i succeed, mostly i do not because when i open myself up to it all, it lets all sorts of other into the mix. nothing like the holidays to remind you that you are the last of your traditions. i hold onto them so so so tightly. i wonder why when i know there is no point, no one, no child or children to pass them along to. ick, that sounds so desperate. but here's the thing, my best memories circle around those traditions my mother gave to me. those traditions that she shared even though her heart was broken. her person was broken. i need to share them but am unable to. at least in the manner i wish.

yet, through all this muck. this sad. this ick. i feel grateful and thankful for what i do have and how i came out of it all for the most part, intact (sad raccoon be damned). yes, there is melodrama and whininess and sad rants and such. i make no excuses for that. anyone who never feels these things is taking too many pills. i'm putting this out there because it is what it is. i feel sad. i feel blue. at some point tonight, i am sure i will laugh at something. i will feel inspired and i will write down an idea. i will smile to myself and i will remember my mother without tears. i will smooth back the hair that flops over the mister's forehead and feel my heart burst with all sorts of good feelings and i will slip into a pretty bed with velvety-soft vintage sheets, hippo under my arm, this song stuck in my head as i slip into slumber full of wonder and joy for all that i have.

what song is in your head?

I've been keeping as busy as I can as the job hunt continues and no one seems to want me. I've pursued just about everything from office clerking, preschool teaching, shop working, merchandiser and grocery store bagger and at this point I'm beginning to think I am damaged goods. It makes me think a lot about perception and how we perceive ourselves so completely differently than those who do not know us and those who do. I'm always baffled by the response I get from friends who read this blog and think this or that about my mood or mental state. I am often left wondering, "Goodness, is THAT how I sound? Eesh!"

I've been reading a lot lately from various blogs about the purpose of blogging and the edited versions of our best selves. In all my honesty I can say that I don't edit. I'm who I am, the good, the bad, the nutty. I have upswings and downward spirals and panic attacks and laugh attacks. I blog when I am sad, moody, grumpy, happy, bored...you name it. The only editing I do is probably the not-posting yet another cranky mood as it seems I'm quite particular and am quite tired of close friends telling me I am emotional and everyone knows this or that about me when truly, those weren't the songs in my head at the time.

Have I written about the songs in your head dealie-o? It was a group exercise from one of my infant development classes. Our professor had us stand in a circle facing in (and yes, there were eye rolls, mine included) and asked us to close our eyes and think of our most favorite dancing song. She asked us to imagine ourselves dancing and so I did**, along with the rest of the class and I could tell because I could hear some folks jig a little. After a moment or so, she had us open our eyes and turn to someone standing next to else and tell them the song THEY were dancing to. What? Huh? We all stood there completely befuddled. And that was the point! She said that no matter how well you know someone, no matter how much you common you may have, even if they are your children, parents, siblings or spouse, at any given moment, you most probably do not know the song in their head, even when yo uare both dancing. I was floored! I was astounded! She was completely correct. It became my mantra that week as I am certain my friends will tell you. I couldn't talk about it enough. So now, when mister and I are in a mood. Or when we're reaching the peak of persnicketiness or other somesuch chaos, one of us may ask "What song is in your head?" We use it as a tool to simply gauge how the other is feeling. Usually, when I ask this, I think of a song that matches the mood I think the mister is in and if he answers along the same lines then I know how he might be feeling.

When I am grumping about something I may remind myself that I do not know what song so and so is dancing to and they in turn do not know mine. But still this vast world of blogging allows for much to be misconstrued and I'm not a fan of being misconstrued but I suppose I have to take the good with the not-so-good. I'm trying and fumbling greatly and doing everything I can to make this little blog grow into something that will put food on the table. Any ideas? I'm grasping, grasping, grasping away. Writing for this site or that site and trying to merit out the paying gigs which appear to hire the same six or so people. What's a moody girl to do? I suppose there is nothing else really but to keep trying, keep pushing, keep writing and to keep dancing.

So, what song is in your head?

**I was dancing to this song.

on hands and rambling

i've been using my hands a lot this week. it's funny how much we take for granted these everyday working parts of ours. i say this because yesterday i trapped my hand in a drawer in such a way i thought i broke it. the middle finger of my left hand to be exact. i was tucking in an errant strand of yarn after stashing a bag of dryer lint into my craft drawer. what? YOU don't collect dryer lint? anyhow...the rollers on said drawer are very smooth. so smooth that the drawer shut practically on its own thus trapping the middle finger of my left hand in its clutches. there was an instant moment where i recognized the pain and stopped breathing. it was a toe-stubbing kind of pain. the kind that makes you suck in everything around and wonder in absolute silence how anything can hurt so freaking much! the kind where once the pain stops you cradle your toe or hand or finger and look at it and wonder how it can still be attached and then you try to move it and the pain hits all over again. it was almost too much. almost. but i applied ice and practiced moving it around and while it hurt worse than a toe-stubbing (why does it hurt so much to toe stub one's toe anyway?), it didn't really appear to be broken and so i went to bed and hoped it got better because it was my left hand and i am a leftie and i kinda like using that hand (never mind the difficulties i had attempting to scoop out some after dinner ice cream...what a fiasco!). all night long as song after song played in my head thanks to a loverly mix i created, i was aware of a great soreness in my hand and so i never really slept, i just dozed and snorted and listened to tunes and dozed and maybe snored a little snore every once in awhile until i woke up in the morning shortly after the mister left for work. i managed to forget all about my sad, sad finger (you know, the middle finger on my left hand) until i went to dry my hands after the morning wash up and managed to TWIST it again as if i'm some sort of super human. it was then i noticed the nice purpley-green-blue bruise that hovered over the knuckle. it still hurts the darned bruised thing and it is taking me a lot longer to do things (you should see me typing this out) but i am grateful that i have two hands that for the most part work.

so, like any good blogger, i took a picture of my hand, the middle finger of my left hand, to share with you the pretty pretty bruise i'm wearing but not until after i made sure to lavish on some lotion because that first shot i took was lotion free and well, that was kinda a scary hand in that shot. so i did my darndest to pretty up the hand and i didn't care that i'm only mostly dressed for the day (it is raining after all and the mister has the car) and no my socks are not unmatching, they are miss-matched and it was as i was taking my oh-so-glamourous hand shot (which reminds me of another story of how i used to tell people i was either a hand model or an earring model when they asked what i did for a living) that along with the sad state and pudginess of my hands i could see a trace amount of silver paint along the right thumb as if i held hands with the Tin-Man. it made me stop and look a little more close at these hands of mine and i thought to myself, pudge and all that these are my hands. they have done so much, and far too little all at the same time. they are soft at times and calloused at others. they hold scars which hold stories and pencil lead (which tell two more stories) and hangnails and teethmarks from the witch-baby. they are strong hands, crafting hands, sewing hands and baking hands. they are hands that attempt things and reattempt things like crochet and ukulele playing. they are hands that doodle and sketch and draw and drum impatiently when i am bored, bored, bored. they are hands that cannot type very well or tie knots very well but they are mine, each dent, bump, soft spot and pudge...mine all mine and sometimes they are the mister's as well as we hold on to each others' through thick and thin wearing our rings with Looney Tunes quotes...

these hands, pudge and all, bruise and all, are pretty good hands. if i do say so myself.

early thoughts

it's not even 6am and I am sitting here in the dark wrapped up in the warmth of the gas fireplace tip typing away as the witch-baby insists on nibbling on the plastic bag the mister uses to carry his monkey making supplies. what is it with cats and plastic bags, or in the matter of my old cat b.k., photographs?

sleep was not my friend last night. i have been super wheezy girl and there doesn't seem to be anything that it wants to make nice with. couple that with an excellent short story i read just before bed and the night was quite interesting. after spending the last two hours taking refuge with a cough drop nestled in my cheek i finally admitted defeat and decided to get my arse up. the homestead may not be my space but i am comfortable enough to wander around at night in the dark dark darkness. i wandered to the small kitchen window above the sink and gasped with the show of stars dancing in the darkness. i shuffled over to the sliding door and stood and smiled at all that twinkly goodness. how marvelous to find a dark dark sky just before sunrise so clear and full of all those visible wonders. score another one for SLO.

now that i'm awake, the wheeze thinks it is party time and the nose has decided to attend as well. every little sniff and wheeze sounds so loud in the darkness. the witch-baby has decided to be extra lovey thinking i will feed her but first she needs her large blue liver pill. usually it is the mister that pills her in the morning as he is the early riser in the family. taking her by surprise i scoop her up in all her bunny softness and flick the pretty blue pill down her throat. success! and now she is licking the bag as i sit tip typing away in the dark wrapped up in the warmth of the gas fireplace listening to harry nilsson radio (thank you pandora).

how quietly do you think i can make some hot lemonade?

if only it were backwards day

cuz i feel lousy. i'm not sure where my brain has hied off to but i am quite sure it has run away and eloped with my self-esteem. i'm having a stupid, stupid week (seriously, stoopid). but it's okay cuz i think anyone would be having such a week if they were me. let me count my woes...

*i'm still sick with lung stuff. i blame it on the pollen from the trees we played under two weeks ago at the park. i tend to forget i have sad lungs. i'm kinda like a kid that way. "but moooommmm..."

*because of the ick, i have a COUGH...as in fully loaded. it ain't pretty. and i've been hacking so hard my muscles hurt and my bones ache and i feel on the verge of nausea nonstop.

*because of the cough i can't sleep. and if there is one thing i'm really good at, it's sleeping. haven't slept in well in two weeks. there are nice plumby bruises under my eyes from this lack of sleep.

*the mister too has not been sleeping. it's all because of me. i hack, i wheeze, i cough and then i um...SNORE, like my old valiant when the manifold baked itself open. worse than a chopper. it is bad. and because he isn't sleeping, i feel guilty. he is the one with the hateful job after all.

*not only is there a cough and guilt and a flurry of alien beings festering in my lungs, there are wee creatures that seems to nap in my throat causing me to gurgle and wheeze and sound like a pack of snurfle-faced pugs. this also keeps me awake.

and because i am feeling self-indulgent, let's toss a few more woes into the mix...(you may wish to run away and go read something else or watch this or this because i do give a little too much info coming up. i'm just warning ya.)

*so i'm sick and i'm wheezy and i'm very unhappy with this ick why not wallow a little in my infertility. you may or may not be aware of this but it is so and i'm sad. actually i'm pretty pissed off about it because there are real REASONS* and there is nothing i can do. we had been trying for five years and two summers ago i had a very painful test (for me) that spelled it all out. the parts aren't shaped right. deformity was also mentioned. and grandma had just died and so i coped by pretending i was okay. that i knew it was probably not going to happen anyway and i probably would suck at being a mom so this is for the better, right? and so i pretended and i cried and i ate and i got lazy and i ate more and got lazier and gained what i like to call "the no-baby weight". and i'm quite embarrassed about it all but it is there and i want to change it but i can't breathe to DO anything about it so what do i do instead? i drink a coke...from MCDonalds. a large one and then another and another (not in a row, mind you) over the course of a couple of months which ADDS to the "no-baby weight" and topples over a few more dominoes. okay, a LOT more dominoes.

*and then there's this whole road trip and move. don't get me wrong. i am VERY excited about it all but it is a bit overwhelming. the packing up of the tiny casa, the adventuring to the unknown and wondering if we're gonna be okay through it all, leaving good friends and lovely people behind...see...more dominoes.

*so all these dominoes are falling over but they're not connected to any cool Rube Goldberg machine just my shaky sense of self which makes me weepy. add the ick and this makes me extra weepy. so there has been a lot of tears this week but i think they're a bit cathartic. tiring yes, painful, most definitely but the more i work it out in my head, the more i think about it and talk it through, the more stable i feel.

oh, if only today were backwards day...

*p.s. did i forget to mention the menopause? oy!