In the reality of the world

I am about to have something new in my life.

No, not anything daring or drastic, like regular sex or a pet.  I am about to have Sundays, twice a month, to myself.  My children are about to start having overnights with their dad, with him dropping them off at school on Monday mornings.

In the reality of the world, this does not change much.  When I picked them up at 7pm on Sunday nights, we drove home, I fed them something (they were always hungry, but that is a different issue), we would read and go over some homework, and before I knew it, we were brushing teeth and it was bedtime.  Nice, quiet little Sunday ritual that lasted about an hour, including drive time.

I have to admit, I really liked this bit of time with my kids. But again, in the reality of the world, it was only an hour, and the Sunday overnights will only happen 13 times in the next year, once you factor in all the vacations and holidays.  13. Only 13.  Less than two weeks.  Doesn’t seem like much.

It had me devastated last week, for a few hours that I did not hide from my children.  Not because I can’t do math.  I had already figured out the 13 day thing, so that was not the issue.  What had me freaked was that my kids had asked it not to happen, had appropriately told that to two different counselors and directly to their father, and none of them, not one, listened one little bit.  I could do nothing about it, because no matter how much I want to be able to write the story of the relationship my kids get to endure enjoy, I don’t get to.

So no matter how this turns out, I get no say, and the loss of control has me freaked out.  It is the codependent in me, I know, but freaking out just the same.

In the midst of all this, my ten year old had a total meltdown of his own. One that almost got him kicked out of a planned event at his care center.  While playing some kind of basketball related game, something happened that seemed unfair, and my son’s reaction was to block the kid and then try to trip him.  If that wasn’t enough, when the adult leader caught him, the other kid shut up, and my son got verbally mean to the leader, and more than a little mouthy.

Sigh.

It took two days for he and I to be able to talk before he could tell me the whole story without one of us being defensive and more than a little pissed.  When we worked it all out, he knew that reacting the way he did was not a smart idea, but wanted to know why some people can do things and get away with them, and when he does them, he is punished.  And more, why no one bothered to listen to him in the process to find the truth out before the punishment was handed down.

This is big, and without even having to have a light bulb moment, he knew that he was angry because adults around him weren’t listening to him, and that even when he told the truth, nothing really mattered because he was being forced to comply.  He flat-out said he was sure that talking to adults was a waste of time because his dad and counselors didn’t listen, and that the one adult who was listening (me) was unable to make anything happen.

Ouch.

He was right.

So instead, I had to admit to him that I am scared and angry about all of it, too, and that I feel just as helpless.  And together (with the help of his 12-year old sister), we came up with what we can do to make US better even if we have to suck it up for now that other people get to make out choices and we have to comply.

I said I was going to write on Sundays.

I said I was going to miss them like crazy and write something I could share with them on Monday nights. 

I said I was going to come up with a plan to spend the extra money I was not going to be using on gas to come pick them up and hour each way.  Did they want to help? I was still listening, even if no one else was.  What were they going to do?

This will be new.

I will miss the drive, to tell the truth.  I will miss my kids terribly.  I will miss the Sunday night ritual and the bonding.  I am putting my faith in the Universe that we all will survive it, and that, in the reality of the world, it is only 13 days.

I can only hope that while I am in my reality, theirs will be okay, too.  Maybe I will write about that on my first Sunday out.

Taking it to the streets.

Do you all know I write a blog?

I guess if you are reading it here, you might have been here before.  I write about my life, as I see it (my blog, duh) and I don’t make any apologies for it.  Okay, to be fair, I apologized once for calling this one guy a pussy whipped pathetic loser.  I didn’t actually apologize for what I said about him, but for not having warned him that I was calling him a said pussy whipped pathetic loser in a public blog that as high as a dozen people (not any of his friends) might read.  That, and that although I did not actually use his name, I would not feel bad in divulging his name if someone asked (mostly so they could avoid him, I am sure).  He called me a whore right after that (awesome!) when he read a few of my other uncensored blog posts and thought we couldn’t be friends then because of the sexual nature of them (again, awesome!).  My regret was that I hadn’t come up with anything more colorful to call him than a pussy whipped pathetic loser, but I can learn from my mistakes.

So back to writing this blog.  You still reading?  Good, because I need readership.  Yes, perfectly self serving and possibly a little desperate, but today I would really like people to read this stuff. And what does that have to do with you, you ask?  Here goes:

1) Read this blog.  You are already here, so thank you!  I get a little obsessed about my numbers sometimes. Yes, there is a way to track this, and every blogger (okay, most bloggers) out there knows how many hits they got on a particular post at any given time.  I want this number to be higher.  So while you are reading it right now, I want you to also log on and read it from your hand-held device, your smart phone, your work computer, your boyfriend’s computer, your second cousin’s pet tarantula’s computer, and anywhere else you so desire.  See, each time you read it from a different device, I get a hit.  Hits are good in this case, and more (in this case) is what I am shooting for.

2) Follow this blog.  You already read it, so now click the little button in the right hand side that says “JOIN THIS SITE” and you get to be one of my fans.  I don’t know what actually happens after that, like if there is some “Follower Genie” that will send you emails telling you when I have once again posted something amazing for you to read, but you might as well have your little icon picture right there on my page.  Oh, and let me know if you have a blog.  I like to follow blogs.

3) Tell your friends.  You are enjoying reading and following the blog, so share the wealth.  You can have book club meetings about it even, all of you reading the blog, sharing with people what you gleaned from the amazing value it brought into you life, and how inspired you are to continue to read and grow.  I suggest you do this over a few (I suggest a half dozen) glasses of wine or pints of beers,  in a smoky dive bar, in a part of town you are not likely to be seen.  It is more fun that way.

4) Give me feedback.  No, I don’t really want you to point out spelling errors.  Or grammar errors.  Or suggest that I use too many non-sentences.  I know all that.  It is a style thing.  I am good with that part.  But, what do you want to read?  I have a gazillion stories about the woes of being a single mom with amazing kids and an idiot for an ex.  I could talk endlessly about surviving my mother. I could brag on my kids forever.  I can save you a little trouble here and say that I don’t post pictures because: a) selfies as a fad needs to go away, b) I want my kids to have a little tiny bit of privacy (I will use the pictures against them later at my discretion), c) If there are no pictures of me I have deniability in court, and d) you do not really need me up in your face with scary pics of myself in a too tight tank top, or some silly graphic that I pulled off bing.  But other than that, tell me what you DO want, and I will listen (as much as my creativity will allow).  And since you are now a fan (remember you are now FOLLOWING my blog, right?), you might as well have some semblance of ownership, no matter how false it actually is, and read what you like.

Feel free to go back and read older blogs.  I never actually read them myself, because honestly I was a huge mess back then.  If you do like to read expose-type blogs, reading from the first blog forward in time will give you the best picture of who I was, who I am, and where I am going.   It will also give me tons of hit-counts to my page views.  Win Win.

Are you still reading here?   Awesome, Thanks! Now go tell someone else, and feel free to share the link anywhere you want.  I won’t mind.

 

 

 

 

Willie Nelson meets Coco Channel

I am in the middle of planning my next road trip.

My auntie from Switzerland is here for a visit.  She is in her 60’s, and is my mother’s youngest sister.  She is everything I hope to be in my 60’s.  She wears outrageous jewelry. She paints her nails in amazing bright colors, usually with glitter. She dyes her hair blond with highlights. She wears blue mascara.  She carries these great big designer purses, and tends to buy new ones every few weeks out of boredom and true love.  She is single, doesn’t answer to anyone, and is sexy as hell.

So while hanging out with her and my mom (her sister, remember) we started talking about things we are doing with our lives.  My auntie is vacationing.  She is retried and vacationing all the time.  She is in the USA now, staying here is California, for the next few months.  Her return date to Switzerland is unclear at the moment because 1) She doesn’t have to be anywhere, so what’s the rush, 2) She might want to stop in Italy on the way home, because June would be a great time to lay out and work her tan and Italy has great beaches, and 3) The men in Switzerland are “so boring” in her opinion, that a fun American man might just make her rethink the length of her trip. 

When I told her about our recent DC trip, she wanted to go.  Like pack her bags, and go, as in “see you in a week or so, bye.” And she laughed about how I could do that, and that I was lucky to be doing it so young (I don’t think of 47 as young, but whatever) so I should.  My mom had stayed silent for most of this time, and my usual skepticism about my mom’s motives started to rear its ugly head.  In my head, she was angry that we would be so frivolous with our money.  In my head, she was worried that we were not focusing our lives in the proper fashion towards knowledge and stability.  In my head, she had judged my (and my auntie’s) choices as not as noble as the ones she made in her conservative, frill-free life.

She surprised both of us by telling me that I should go everywhere while I can.  She said don’t worry about money, because no one dies regretting that they are not debt free, but they do regret not doing more when they could.  She said she wished she had followed through with HER plans to travel and see things, and regretted that she no longer felt like she had the choice to go places.  She seemed sad that she had missed out.

This real bonding moment did not escape me.  I knew, immediately, that my mom was vulnerable, and that I had the choice to make it worse with blame and rhetoric, or I could embrace the time and empathize by acknowledging and understanding, and by asking her what she would wish for me to do differently. 

The answer was amazing.  She told me about the 6 times (yes, 6) she and my dad drove across the southwest desert, and how they never stopped at the Grand Canyon.  She always wanted to see the Grand Canyon, but she said there was never time, and they were always in a rush to get from one military duty station to the next.  My dad, it seems, is not a very good sightseer (I knew this), and was impatient to get to places (I knew this, too) and she loved him, and understood giving in to his comfort more than her desire to explore. 

We went on to talk about the details of the last few trips I had taken with my kids, and about how something clicked in my head that I missed this as a kid, and would have loved to have shared that with her.  How I wanted my kids to know that I was taking all my time to be with them, and that money, in the end, was not as important as standing in the edge of something bigger that you, and marveling in the awesomeness of seeing it and touching it.  I told her about the things I DID love growing up on the few adventures we took together.  The mini mugs of hot chocolate.  The red wagon.  The silver dollar pancakes and the milk through the swirly straws. The rocks we painted one summer that she still uses as a door stop. 

In that short conversation, I absolved her of the guilt she felt, and let her know that I had zero regrets about my childhood, or any expectation for her to have done it differently.  I had food and clean clothes, a nice bed and a roof over my head.  I don’t remember going places, but home was always there.  I wasn’t hoping for her to be different, I just wanted ME to be different.  I wanted to see things, and be places, and meet people, and accidentally have amazing adventures and stories because I was not afraid to go. I was not judging her as fearful, just fighting my own demons, trying always to have what I was doing be enough. 

Did it mean I was running away from traditional 1950’s stability? Did it mean I was rejecting my mother’s choices and ideals? No, I don’t think so.  I think it means somewhere along the way, maybe because of some things she taught me, I learned (actually, re-learned) that nothing lasts and you better find things you love NOW because you may never have the time to do them again.  Debt and time? Oh well.  Those things will take care of themselves whether or not I worry about them.

I told my mom and my auntie what our next road trip plan was. And then I asked my mom if she wanted to come to the Grand Canyon with us.  My auntie, in her perfect-little-hipster-sister way, tried to convince my mom that she should go, and love it.  Heck, forget that, they should go right now, and screw me and my kids, we were still young and could go anytime.  Oh my god we laughed.  My mom still said no, but was really happy to pull out a map and tell me where she HAD been on the cross county drives, and how she remembered the roads, and all about the places to avoid because of heat and scorpions. (Scorpions? Yeah, I wrote that shit down).  She said it took her a while when my kids and I first started doing these road trip to understand why they were important, and even longer to understand her own emotions about what she missed, and to forgive herself for not doing it, and not hold it against me for going now.  It was a good evening.

My auntie, being ever the sexy travel goddess, decided to make it her mission to bring me and my kids to Switzerland and started making plans.  Seems I am going the summer of 2016, and staying in her summer house.  My mom says it’s nice and we will enjoy it, but I needed to promise to take my kids to Vienna as well.  She said there is a train that I will love, and that the kids shouldn’t miss.  She said, given the right set of circumstances, she might come with us, assuming, she said, she was not at the Grand Canyon. All I could do was smile.