Just One Mistake

This is a rough time of year in the household of one Epiphany-Halcyon household. It marks the anniversaries of a lot of unpleasant events in our shared past as well as my favorite, and thus most feared holiday and this year it was compounded by several factors outside of our mutual control what with his family imploding and mine dying. It’s nothing more or less than either of us expects out of the fall and I think, to this point, we’ve taken the hits fairly well. (Him more so than me, but what would be the right in the world if I wasn’t the one on the business end of the emotional breakdown.)

The last few days have been difficult and it’s for the stupidest, most self-imposed reason.

In 2006 I attempted NaNoWriMo with a concept and research I loved. I made it approximately 3000 words in before I fell behind, unable to do the thing that everyone kept saying – just keep writing. At the time, I knew it was more than I said it was. I said I wasn’t inspired or that I was busy. It wasn’t any of that – I was afraid. I wasn’t the only one that loved the concept and the research. Everyone who knew – and the scope ranged from family to friends to online buddies to total strangers – they all loved what I was working on. Hell, when people hear about it now they still love the concept and urge me to write it. They tell me that it’s so the epitome of me and what I should be doing.

I cannot express to anyone what kind of pressure that feels like to me. In the end, I caved under it. I stopped writing and, two weeks in, the computer I’d stored it all on crashed and I took that as the universes way of telling me it was OK to give in to that.

I won’t say I spent the years between then and now regretting losing the research. I have an excellent memory – the research is still there…and as far as having lost the characters, I didn’t lose them…they’re easy for me. What I will say is that, since then, I haven’t considered participating in NaNoWriMo until this year and this year it was an impulsive decision and one that part of me regrets.

I’ve never written and completed a piece of original work. I write bits and pieces of things I never finish and I won’t admit why to myself.

I’m scared.

People that love me read the little bits and swear up and down that the characters are real, they fly of the page and demand to be heard….that I have a voice entirely my own and that I should do something with it. The thing is – as wonderful as it is to hear that kind of praise, it’s the second most terrifying thing in the world. (the most terrifying thing in the world, as near as I can tell right now, being the panic attack I had last night that had me convinced for about five minutes that there was a good possibility I was having a heart attack and was literally going to die right then and there.)

It’s terrifying for two reasons. 1) because it could all be a lie. The thing is, it’s a lie that it feels so good to hear that it’s hard to be willing to ask for objective feedback – and even if I could ask for objective feedback, how do you evaluate the validity and truth of that?

That’s the second scariest question I’ve ever asked myself. My mother has read some – bits and pieces of what I’ve written. Linda has read literally almost everything. Courtney has read some… These are three people whose intelligence I respect but whose opinions I can’t trust for obvious reasons. My mother is my mother – if that one needs explaining you probably need therapy. Linda is the most encouraging person I think I’ve ever known, other than my grandmother. (Don’t take that the wrong way, Linda – my grandmother is the most encouraging person ALIVE – EVER… SINCE JESUS) Linda finds a way to compliment the worst things that I’ve ever read, and she’s found a way to praise some of the worst things I’ve ever written – so how do I know if what she’s saying is an honest assessment or a gentle hand for a friend? It’s similar with Courtney.

Where’s everyone else in the conversation? As for real people who are really in my life day to day, King is the only person who I ever allowed to read a word I wrote. The sad thing is, the only reason I let him do it isn’t because he asked in such a pathetic offended way, it was because brilliant though that man was, I knew if he said something that hurt me I could turn it back around on him so fast it would have given him whiplash, because that man and I could hurt each other so effectively. Why not Chris, who I adore so much – whose uncomplicated friendship has been a reminder to me through so many difficult years that uncomplicated friendships can exist? That’s easy. Because I adore him. Because he’s one of the sweetest people I know. Because as gently as he has scolded me from time to time over the nine years I’ve known him, he would never ever say something he thought would be hurtful. And if he was honest and he did tell me he thought it was awful I would be devastated – partly because the truth can hurt and partly because I would be so embarrassed as to have admitted to being so deluded. Because I’m so afraid of losing the respect he’s offered me that I hesitate to do anything that could earn it. It’s more of the same for why I’ve never given any of it to Mr. Halcyon. If he said something nice I’d never believe him and if he said something mean, I’d never forgive myself.

Which, I suppose, brings me nicely to the second element of my problem, 2) because what if it all is a lie? What I if I ask for honest assessment and they look back at me and laugh? For a person who has spent their entire life able to float their failures and missteps on a raft of potential, what would it feel like to have that potential stripped away, and how do you move forward from that? A while back (a long while, I might add) a friend of Mr. Halcyon’s got into a nasty car accident and lost some of her mental faculties. Since that happened I’ve always told him that should something ever happen to me and there is a question of coming back from death with brain damage, let me die because I don’t want to live knowing I can’t do what I’ve done before.

I told my little brother when he was eleven that if he learned one thing from me over the years about social interactions – one lesson I wish someone had taught me when I was a kid – it would be to go big or go home…to fake it until you make it….to rock who you are, whoever that is. I’m funny, I’m not sweet. I’m smart, not pretty. If you need someone to help you finish an assignment, call me. If you need someone to go out for drinks with and have a blast, call someone else. People don’t ask my advice until they’re at rock bottom, willing to do whatever I tell them to to get out because while my advice may be right, I don’t know how to deliver it sounding gentle or kind.

At the end of the day, I seem confident and, while not together, I seem like I’ve learned to make my life work for me. To an extent I am and I can. I’ve learned how to take my limitations and live with them and I’ve learned to wear my scars like a badge of honor. I’ve learned to be good at the things I’m good at and avoid the things I’m not wherever possible – and when I can’t, to make a game out of the failing. I’m doing okay. But honest here – the confidence is a lie. I don’t feel like a smart girl. I don’t feel like a funny girl. I can joke that I’m an acquired taste, but I believe that every friend I have tolerates me because they feel sorry for the crazy girl.

NaNo has been rough. Rough at first because I was afraid I couldn’t do it and rough now because I’m starting to think that I can…that 1667 words every day isn’t all that much and that I can hit the 50K mark at the end of a month. That should be something to be proud of and even stripping away the element wherein pressure and writing long after you know you should have stepped away to take a break or not editing comes in… I feel as though I can be proud of what I will have done because what I’m doing isn’t good…. And of course the people who I’m willing to ask tell me that is and I think they’re lying but I won’t ask the people who wouldn’t be.

NaNo has been rough because in an effort to not let the plot or the characters be the thing that held me back, I wrote the thing that I know…. a damaged girl who has been fortunate to happen upon people who are willing to not only believe in her despite her self-destructive behavior but who are also willing to take care of her despite the way she abuses them. Sound familiar?

This character is every color of damaged I’ve ever been… and the thing is, writing from what I know means that the other presence is a dangerous one. The other presence, the person willing to take all of the shit, pick up all of the pieces and put that person back together…the person who makes that girl feel safe and comfortable when she needs it and pushes when they can get away with it…. That person is someone I’ve known and, for my particular situation, they’ve never been healthy.

Fixers have their own unique set of neurosis – they’re their own brand of damaged. They’re the guy that falls in love with you because you’ve set no boundaries or limitations on your relationship who ends up hurting you in the end when he realizes you didn’t have it in you to love them the way they wanted you to…. who comes around a bit too late or a bit too early. The relationship that you will always know would have been dangerous and self-destructive for both of you because neither of you were right for the other but that had the right spark…. The person you shouldn’t be with but you kind of want to anyway…

That guy – he’s been a common character in my life and over the years I’ve learned to spot him from a mile away and it takes everything I have to push him away because I long for that safety and that comfort. I’m always just one mistake away from tearing my life apart around a man like that.

Writing what comes naturally to me, while hopefully cathartic in the end…while hopefully reading honestly…. It’s difficult for me to write because it’s hard not to miss every incarnation of that guy…particularly since that guy, he believes in everything you do. If your mother is supposed to love you unconditionally and believe in anything you can do, that guy is somehow more dedicated to the pursuit.

Why not let Mr. Halcyon be that guy… why not give him the opportunity?

Part of that guy he can’t be. He can believe in me and he can build me up when I feel torn down by my own hands. He’s the guy who rushes home because you ask him to but if we walked out of the house today and got mugged, I’d be the one to defend him, not the other way around. Not because he’s weak or incapable of defending himself but because when faced with a fight or flight situation, he immediately goes to the third option – negotiation. And the thing is – that’s why we work. The very reason we aren’t self-destructive or unhealthy for one another is because he understands the principle of negotiation and can handle my crazy thusly.

To distill the difference between him and that guy – the thing I have had such a hard time saying goodbye to is that moment when you’re presented with a danger small or large, that guy steps between you and the hazard, and then handles it.

A friend of mine names all of her men-friends and her conquests. Over the years we’ve described men as “the desk” and “the water cooler” and “the big heart” and the only term I’ve ever found effective for describing “that guy” has always been ‘the wall’ because that’s always been the way they’ve looked to me in a moment of fear…like a wall suddenly materializing between me and the monster. Thing is, walls also have the capacity to trap you – to collapse and to prevent you from getting where you have to go… and in my life, they often do.

A Bit Of A Downer

Practicality paid off again this week.

My grandfather, well into his eighties, was diagnosed with liver cancer about a month ago. The doctor told him he could hope for a year. More practically, my father and I estimated no more than a few months.

For reasons far too complicated to enumerate here, this is a difficult death. I’ve dealt with a lot of death and most of it has been difficult in it’s own ways but this, in particular will be hard. Not because my father is losing his father or because I am losing my first grandparent, having grown up with not only two complete sets but also two great grandmother’s as well – it’s complicated because, for my father’s relatively small side of the family, there are a lot of rifts and divisions. For the most part, the only reason we’ve stayed in touch has been my grandfather. Knowing that his lifestyle would catch up with him eventually, we’ve hung closer than we would have liked to my grandmother, my aunt…. People that, for the most part, we would all rather be rid of than anything else.

Yesterday, my dad called to bring me up to speed with the most recent medical developments. The doctor that gave him a year took him off of the chemo and installed a shunt to allow for more rapid and less painful drainage of the abdominal fluids that accumulate when your liver has failed. Now the prognosis is down to three months, if he’s lucky.

I wasn’t surprised. For his part, I think my father knew it was coming as well. I’m not saying it doesn’t suck – no matter how much you know something is coming, you can still hope for the best and certainly our hopes were dashed but at least we were already prepared. From the sounds of it, my aunt wasn’t. She seemed to think that he would be fine. She got him an appointment with The Cancer Treatment Centers of America and thought that they would work miracles. Now they won’t even see him. She’s devastated.

As for my grandfather? We’re not sure if it’s the anesthetic or the pain killers or the mad-cow, but he’s floating in and out of lucidity and, at this point, we’re not sure if he knows he’s dying or not. We’re not even certain he knows they’ve taken him off of the chemo. We are sure that, given my particular families particular dose of crazy, he can’t go home so we’re forced to find a hospice facility will take him. In my experience, taking people out of their homes is the fastest way to kill their spirits and that makes me sad, particularly in light of the fact that he doesn’t have any real grip on what’s happening.

At the end of the day this experience is reminding me how being honest with yourself about the outcome can keep you from being hurt, but it’s also reminded me that I’m not who I am because I have a negative outlook on life, I am who I’ve become because reality has necessitated it.

It may bum people out, but at least I’m honest.

A Shout Out To You, Internet

I have less than 50 friends on Facebook.

My friends (!?!???) and family have always joked that, while I may not have a lot of interpersonal relationships, I'm still kind of a big deal on the internet.

This, I won't lie, is a little hard to explain without feeling self-deluded.

Still, when you show up for a midnight showing of a movie and strangers want to hug you and you get a call from CNN the next day, it's hard not to think there might be something to the rumors.  For the most part though, I tend to keep a pretty low profile.  I use the same login name everywhere, but I don't cross link my blog, my twitter account etc... to any of my websites and I don't do it because being "kind of a big deal" doesn't really interest me.  It's wonderful to be appreciated and there's nothing handier than having an 'international contingent' when you want to travel and you need to know what kind of outlet adapter to buy, but I'm not Tila Tequila, nor do I want to be - so I'm me, and if you want to web stalk me and follow me around, go for it.  I won't be making any Forbes lists anytime soon....

Where am I going with all of this?  Today I was looking for a new avatar to use, so I was browsing my gallery to see if anything struck my fancy or if I was going to have to make a new one when I got home.  Internet, I've had Gallery installed for years and I love it, but I've never really noticed the "views" feature. 

A few months ago, I removed all of my files from Gallery and re-uploaded them with all new meta data to give myself a uniform structure and remove a lot of crap I didn't want.  Doing so, obviously, reset the view counters... This was July.

 

What have you people been up to because I don't even like that icon...

I guess sometimes I forget that there are people out there reading my blog, browsing my gallery and looking at my tweets.  It only really occurs to me when I have to confront that, despite the fact that I block search engine spiders to save on bandwidth, in the last 63 days that single icon has not only been looked at but been clicked on 1049 times. 16 times a day?  Seriously??!?  I don't advertise...my stuff is not posted all over the internet and the first time I walked into a store and saw someone wearing a t-shirt i'd designed I almost passed the fuck out.

It's weird, but it's a good weird - so thanks, Internet.  I love you too.

Yo Momma So Fat....

I hate Craft People.

This strikes most everyone who meets me as slightly…shall we say counter intuitive on account of my status as the Queen of Why-Would-I-Pay-You-To-Do-That-When-I-Could-Do-It-Myself? I have a cursory knowledge of painting, wine making, light carpentry, re-upholstery, garment making, knitting, crochet, jewelry construction, stained glass design, baking, cake decorating…etc, etc, etc… In the last month I’ve made blankets, two costumes (one of which included the most obscenely ornate trench coat, both of which I completely drafted my own patterns for), a wedding cake and greeting cards. My big goal at this point is to locate an Eames or Plycraft knockoff lounge chair on Craigslist and refinish it in a light gray vinyl and Brazilian Cherry stain.

I may have repaired my sofa with mounting brackets, plastic coated wire and a borrowed hammer tacker but before you confuse me with Craft People, you should understand that there is a subtle distinction between me and them: everything I do is useful and usable.

My Kleenex boxes do not have quilted cozies for every season – though I’m not above picking up some bulsa wood and spray paint to bang out an adorable, mod Kleenex box cover should my lifestyle ever warrant hiding the hideous floral patterns their corporate office reveres so. And yes I could knit you an ugly sweater, but I would rather make your kid an adorable stuffed hippo. Of course I can tell you that vodka and vinegar are the most effective ways to remove a strong scent from fabric, but that doesn’t make me a Craft Person – that makes me crafty.

A few weeks ago, I got quite the shock when one of the girls invited me to her baby shower. It wouldn’t have surprised me because, at their core, most people will do anything for free stuff, except this shower is not the “everyone from work” shower – this is the “friends and family only” shower. At the office, only an elite group of five were invited, or so I was informed in whispers when the card was dropped off and she hissed “friends only – I don’t want a bunch of other people there.” Forgive this for sounding strange, but I didn’t know I was friends with this girl.

It’s not as bad as it seems, it’s just that I’m not a person who has “friends.” There are people that I hang out with/around at work who I don’t do the tuck and run for when I catch a glimpse of them at the grocery store, but I wouldn’t presume to be friends with these people. I wouldn’t call them and ask for help moving or invite them to my baby shower…. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I would resent them asking the same of me, I’d do it in a heart beat…. Maybe it’s the after effect of being the kid no one liked in school but I there are exactly no people that I know whom I would feel comfortable imposing upon in any way. I just assumed that meant I didn’t have any friends – all though, apparently I do. Go figure.

Anyways, the point of all of that is that in the near future, there is a baby shower looming for me. The best thing about this is that this particular person is by far the most reasonable pregnant girl I’ve known and I have every confidence that she will not attempt to make me wear a pacifier necklace or participate in a diapering relay race….(not that I don’t totally pwn in those relay races.) If there were another best thing, it would have to be that this is also a “cool” pregnant girl. I’m one of those people that see something they like once and files it away hoping that some day the information will be useful. Among those ‘somethings’ have always been baby items that I saw once and thought were totally awesome but never had someone to give them to because no one I knew would ‘get it’

This girl – she gets it. I could explode. Suddenly I have a place to bestow all of this stuff that’s clunking around in my head. (Finally I’ll have room for that cure for cancer Colin was always bitching about.)

Problem? The physical manifestations of this stuff are just not as good as they were in my head. Iron on transfers fade, rhinestones fall off, embroidery is too Holly Hobby, that design is so ugly it ruins the funny…

Of course, to the crafty, these are not problems, they’re challenges :P

So last night I raced to four different stores to pick up the necessary supplies but, damnit, the thing that existed only in my head has been brought to fruition…delicious, snarky fruition.

B is for BuSpar

I think I was seven when it first occurred to me that I probably didn’t want to have kids.

I know that sounds silly because, at seven, most little girls are playing with Barbie’s and Baby Alive (Or, at least that’s what we were doing in the early 90’s. I guess now they’re playing with rolling papers and dreaming about fucking a Jonas brother, but whatever.) For me, seven was the magical age in which I got my little brother. My parents say that I asked for him. They remind me, emphatically even, every time he does something stupid and I start raising money around the neighborhood to send him to a boarding school. I remind them in turn that, unless you want to know which Care Bear is which, you shouldn’t be looking to six year olds for guidance on major life decisions. Either way, the experience of getting my little brother was one of the more traumatic endeavors of my young life. My mother, in her pursuit of raising a well rounded daughter who was attune to the world around her, decided that I should understand the concept of birth and labor in a “first hand” kind of way.

Internet, there are things that you cannot unsee.

I remember four details surrounding my brother’s birth.

1. I was allowed to bring my Duplo’s and my Tiger games to the hospital for my mother’s labor.
2. My parents had no idea what to name him and chose his name only because the hospital wouldn’t let them go home without filling out the name on the birth certificate.
3. We dressed him in a 101 Dalmations outfit, complete with ears. This first experience with incognito dressing would come back to haunt us in years and years of “I don’t wear clothes! I wear Barney/Superman/Big Bird/Woody/Wonder Woman!” screams from the afor mentioned child.
4. ….

You know what, I can’t even tell you about four. This is the one time I am going to get up and call this experience a unique little snowflake. All I can really say is I didn’t have a cheap seat or, to use another euphemism, this was not an “above the curtain” viewing. I’m pretty sure I can still feel my grandmother’s fingernails digging into my shoulders.

It goes without saying, but my first real understanding of child birth was graphic, gory and utterly repulsive. Add that in with the particular variety of little brother I got – one that has gone far beyond the usual reaches of stealing your stuff and tattling when you sneak out of the house on Saturday night and into… well, suffice it to say that my little brother has endeavored to become everything I ever hated about other people. I’m sure he and I will iron it out later in life after he has a few life experiences and grows the fuck up but in the interim, we’re not doing to well.

Either way, I’ve spent every day since his birth very confident that I never wanted to have children. I don’t blame my mother for this in any way. In fact, she inadvertently stumbled upon the best form of contraceptive on earth. Never has there been a more careful or conscientious person when it comes to keeping the risk really really really low and I’ve been exceptionally dedicated to ensuring my own little corner of the world doesn’t contribute to the climb in teen pregnancy rates. I pass out condoms like they’re candy and we’ve taken every teenager in reasonable reach to Planned Parenthood.

As I got older and the people around me started having kids and settling down, it started to make me anxious. It took me a lot longer than it should have to come up with that word but it really is the most appropriate one for the emotion. When one of the girls at the office gets pregnant I get physically uncomfortable. When a family member pops out a kid I back away. God forbid someone in their late teens or early twenties gets their girlfriend pregnant accidentally – when that happens it’s a little like pulling the parking brake for the first time in a few years – the whole drive shaft seizes and smoke starts coming out of my ears. (Perhaps my understanding of pregnancy, child birth and child rearing was slightly skewed by my friend embedding a bullet in his skull because he knocked his girlfriend up and she wouldn’t have an abortion. That might have had something to do with it…maybe a little.)

I’ve developed a nervous twitch when people mention that they’re trying to have a baby…It’s just completely surreal.

I get that my reaction is irrational and that my behavior may read with a wink of “thou dost protest too much” but I can’t ever help it because it’s how I feel – completely and utterly repelled.

About two years ago, I got pregnant. I was on the pill but karma, in that way that it does sometimes, reached into a disastrous situation and decided to make it just a little bit worse. The sex that lead up to the almost baby was had on the cusp of Mike’s near suicide attempt. That’s right ladies and gentlemen, my boyfriend told me he’d bought a gun and intended to eat it because he was on the edge of financial ruin and what happened but I went and got myself knocked up. A lot of factors went into my decision to have an abortion but, to be honest, the emotional turmoil and our status as completely unprepared to raise a child really didn’t factor in that much. I didn’t want kids and, for his part, I don’t think Mike really wants kids either, though I think he’s far more inclined to tolerate them than I am. To boot, I was a miserable pregnant girl. I didn’t have morning sickness – I had all day long sickness, and it wasn’t just eat and wretch it was a simple inability to eat, period. Was part of that psychosomatic? I’m sure. Had I wanted to be pregnant the fact that I had to drink all of my meals for a few months probably would have seemed a lot less problematic. I might have even gotten over the fact that taking fifteen steps was enough to make me want to pass out I was so dizzy. I probably could have avoided the anemia if I’d been planning a pregnancy.

Two years later and I’ve never regretted the decision to have that abortion. It’s a decision I revisit often, like I’m sure I’m going to change my mind about it at some point – like I’m supposed to. Pop culture and the media pumps you full of the notion that if you elect to abort you will live to regret it – to miss the little life that could have been – and maybe that’s true for the spiritual but for me I’m still sure that this was absolutely the right decision for me. Sure, the protestors outside the clinic were scary – it seemed like the wrong moment to be pouring salt in people’s wounds. The fact that they had bomb doors and a video intercom system was more than a little foreboding, but when it was all said and done it was a comparatively painless experience.

I’m older now than I was then. While my eight year long relationship with Mike has always raised eyebrows and the question “when are you crazy kids gonna settle down and make babies?” over the last few years, the tone of the question has changed. People ask now with a lot more sincerity than they used to. Co-workers who I barely know stop me and tell me that I’d be a great mom and ask when I plan to have kids. The office pregnant girls, who are more than aware that “no, I don’t want to touch your stomach and feel the baby kick – tks” smile and point out that they wish they could be half the mom that they know I would be if I had kids.

They don’t do that to everyone and I’ve never really understood that because I’ve always had the hunch that I would be a horrible mother – a selfish one. I like watching bad tv and would do everything in my power to ensure that my child was enriched by PBS, not Dora the fucking Explorer. I wouldn’t give my kid Disney cd’s, I’d teach them to love metal and big band and blues and indie rap. There would be no cutting the crust off of the edges of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches because that’s some pink bullshit right there. If my kid fell down roller skating, I’d probably be laughing when I went to help them up because I don’t care what you say, it’s kind of funny. Just because I made you get your drivers license doesn’t mean you’re ever getting to use the car and I think it’s fabulous that you want a $200 pair of jeans…come to think of it, they’re cute – I want a pair too. Oh well, now we both need a weekend job cuz there’s no way in hell I’m buying those for you just because you want them. I’m happy to make edible play dough and stay up all night making a costume for the talent show but god help us all if my kid ever took an interest in t-ball or fishing (or became a Heather… shudder) because I would have no idea how to relate to them.

When I look back on the mother’s that I’ve known – my own included – I see women who have made incredible sacrifices for their children and, while they don’t seem to resent them for it, are certainly a little worse for the wear. My grandmother stayed in a marriage that is ultimately bad for her simply because she had children. My mother is, to a large extent, doing the same despite the even larger sticking point of her sexual orientation. She has effectively swallowed that in order to maintain her relationship with my father so long as my brother is still in the house. From the outside, I can see nobility in their actions, but I can also see the negative impact it’s had on their children. Exempting myself from the conversation, I know my brother was ready for my parents to just get a divorce and move on from the age of twelve – I think he’d rather. Conversely, I’ve had pictures of the bad moms too. My other grandmother is a cold, calculated, manipulative truly evil woman. I won’t say that the abuse her children suffered at her hands was the worst kind but I think Loralie Gilmore said it best when she said “Honk if Emily Gilmore thinks your mind is her personal playground.” My grandfather is dying of liver cancer and the entire family is afraid to go see him because We Dare Not Speak It will be there. I’m pretty sure that’s some bad juju.

At the end of the day, I’ve never been able to pinpoint what it is that these relative strangers are seeing that makes them think I should be entrusted with another human being.

I don’t read “Mommy Bloggers” – but I do read a lot of Bloggers that have gone Mommy over the last few years and, I have to be honest, they’ve done a lot to change some of my perceptions about parenthood. Their missives on raising their own children have gone a long way toward making me feel less alienated…a little closer to whatever it is that people see before they feel the need to grab me by the arm and encourage me to “marry that man and have a little baby!”

I have a post in my near future about finally finding a “cool” pregnant girl that is actually tangibly here – it feels a little like finding a unicorn. I’m not saying that I want to go home and get myself good and pregnant right now. M is still knee deep in classes, we’re planning a move in the not so distant future…It will be a few years before we’re really settled enough anywhere to even consider having that particular conversation, and I do still hold strong to my convictions about being able to afford college funds and private schools, but I think, as long as there are still people out there who teach their kids to laugh when they get hurt rather than to cry I might have some more options than I thought I did and that’s nice.

Do I Have To Spell It For You?

In the last few months, I've caught myself doing a lot of the things that used to drive me bonkers about my parents. Before I embarked on the wedding cake I cleaned the kitchen. Not just a cursory wipe down all of the visible surfaces clean, but the kind where you take every appliance off of the counters and wash the appliance, then was the counter, the wall, the backsplash, the stove, the cupboard doors... If you've ever cleaned like that you'll understand that while you're cleaning the backsplash you notice that there's gunk on the bar, and since you can't reach the bar to really clean it unless you're on the other side, so you go to the other side and the next thing you know you're vaccuming the baseboards and your significant other is standing over you, confused how your project in the kitchen made it all the way to the upstairs bathroom. My mother did this every Saturday morning and, as a kid, I neither understood it nor tolerated it. She would get up Saturday morning and tell us we were going to go get donuts just as soon as she finished cleaning the fridge....three hours later she would be washing the living room windows. It was annoying.

My father didn't share that particular neurosis, but he has this habit. He's had it for years - as long as I can remember, even - and it drives everyone who knows him up the wall. Whenever he says something that you don't understand and you counter with "What?" he repeats exactly what he said, only louder. This is fine when you simply didn't hear him, but if the problem is more that you heard him, it just didn't make sense, it's one of the more annoying things that happens on any given day.

Dad: "Can you hand me the idler bar?"
Me: "What?"
Dad: "The idler bar."
Me: "Huh??"
Dad: "The idler bar."
Me: "This thing?"
Dad: "No, THE IDLER BAR"

I spent the first fifteen years of my life trying to figure out how to better handle this exchange before it escalated into him getting up, puppetting his words with hand mouths to get whatever tool or part he was looking for - all of which looked like hunks of rusty metal to me. I did the obvious and just tried asking "What's an idler bar?" immediately, but that seemed to just inflame him further.

Years later, I work in customer service and I find myself having to explain a lot of things to people over and over again only to be met with obstinate confusion on the other end of the phone line. Today, while attempting to explain to a customer that he would need to contact the delivery courier to find out when he would receive his shipment, I noticed more than a little bit of my Dad sneaking into the conversation.

Me: "Yeah, you would need to contact FedEx to find out when this will be delivered."
Customer: "So it went UPS..."
Me: "No, FedEx."
Customer: "What?"
Me: "The order shipped via FedEx."
Customer: "Right, but I can just call my local UPS office."
Me: "No. It went FEDEX."

You can put that one in the "Things I Inherited From My Father" column apparently - right below my status as Hall Monitor for the Close-The-Damn-Door-The-Air-Conditioning-Is-On Club.

Ted Strong

Ted Kennedy died last night. Today I wore blue.

I was asleep when it hit the news, but Mike woke me up to tell me. Getting woken up in the middle of the night is bad enough, but to be asked “I have bad news, do you feel up to it?” isn’t the best follow up.

I get that, for most people, this death is still far secondary to the recent demise of Michael Jackson but, for me, the Kennedy family has always been something far more fascinating. I must have been pretty young when I developed my attachment to the Kennedy’s, because I don’t remember when it happened or what triggered it. Teddy delivered his concession speech five years before I was born. I was nine when Jackie died, and I remember being sorry that she was gone. When John-John died in ’99 I felt for Ted and Eunice but I wasn’t interested in the eons of searching and the conspiracy theories that came forward. When Patrick got clocked with a hammer during a business meeting, I blogged about it. There are Kennedy’s in my dreams, there are Kennedy’s in my closet. There are even Kennedy’s in my office. While my heart may have gone out to Bobby, and Mike may have a tremendous love for the man who gave him the space program, Teddy, by virtue some would say of his mediocrity, has managed to outlast them both, and his legacy is larger than life.

When Sam Johnson died, I wrote the following:

Respect your elders. They’ve seen more than you can imagine. Their stories and advice are the only things that they have to offer you that are of any real value and they’re the only thing you’ll have left after they’ve gone. Realize that you get only one chance, but live it in a way that you won’t have to apologize for later. Never ask permission or apologize for doing something you believe in. Understand that the good things in life – the things you should be most proud of – aren’t tangible; they’re the things that can only be seen by looking into a person’s eyes. Be patient with your friends, but hold firm to what you believe in. Don’t get so caught up in yesterday’s news that you forget what today is all about. Don’t expect anyone else to support you. There’s no point in being jealous. Know only that each person works for what they have, and those people who haven’t worked for the things they’ve received will never really live to appreciate it and that’s a form of half-life. Do the things that you enjoy. Never mind what everyone else thinks of them.

In short, this goes out to all of the people who are spending their weekend relaxing and enjoying people that they love because they know on Monday morning they’ll be back to work at whatever they do, or school for whatever they’re studying, to give it everything they have.

Chappaquiddick, the Bay of Pigs and Marilyn Monroe and Joe McCarthy - all stains on their respective pasts but I think Dennis Leary said it best when he said “Good senator, but a bad date.”

The sentiment applies here, not in the same context, but with the sense that the feeling – righteousness, hard work, ethics and respect are what, regardless of their missteps, these Kennedy brothers tried to be. They may not have always succeeded, but at the end of the day those were the ideals they struggled towards as people and as politicians.

Today is a sad day and the world mourns their many losses.

"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die." - Ted Kennedy 1980 [listen]