4/10/10 - Reintegration

So here’s the part about being home that I always forget about in my excitement to just be home – the reintegration process. I always forget that the kids and I are in our own routines and daily patterns and so is my husband. And that my internal daily to do list is vastly different at my parents’ house than it is at my own house. So there’s always several days of relearning how to live with each other in this day-to-day life.

Plus, and this always emerges no matter how hard I try not to let it, there’s always the issue of the fact that my husband essentially just got a 3 week vacation. Yes, he was still working, but that’s all he had to do. He was wonderful and did a bunch of stuff around the house we’ve been meaning to get to, but I even envy him that. Because of the simplicity. As I’ve said many, many times, his life is no easier than mine, but it sure is a whole lot simpler. Because he has dedicated time to do everything in his day. He has dedicated time to work. Dedicated family time. Dedicated alone time in his commute to and from work. Whereas I have to carve out time for all of that stuff. I have to juggle between time with the kiddos playing, laundry, cleaning and everything else that crowds my plate. And when I go down to my parents’ house, that plate just gets even more crowded. So inevitably my husband will say something about having to get up a bit earlier to take The Boy to school and I end up yelling at him. I know it’s silly and doesn’t make sense. But there you go. I’m just badly in need of a very real vacation.

In the meantime however, I need to get our laundry done, start back with my meal planning and compiling a grocery list to re-equip the kitchen with non-bachelor mode food and assorted other things. As well as catching up with friends, getting the kids back into the swing of things with school and so on and so forth.

All in a day’s work.

3/23/10 - Gratitude for Acceptance

What a lovely day. My Mom took the kids for some good old fashioned Nana/grandchildren quality time and I spent the day with my Dad. I had to follow him into town so that he could drop his truck off to get the brakes fixed (finally!). But mostly we just spent the day alternately chatting and reading. We talked about all sorts of stuff from fluffy chitchat stuff to how the kids were doing with the new knowledge of his impending death to how he was doing with his impending death. It was such a lovely day. And it was a day that I could not have had with him even a month ago.

I think I had to go away for a couple of months to do my own work. To trudge through the deep anger I had. To make peace with the denial and fear of facing my life and the world without my Dad. Now I am able to sit with him, as his daughter, and talk or just be in silence. And I cannot tell you what that means to me. After 33 years, there is finally peace in our relationship. There is understanding, love and acceptance for who we both are and what we had to experience to get here. I mean, I’ve always been a Daddy’s girl. Even when I was so angry at him I could hardly see straight, I was a Daddy’s girl. But through the internal work we have both done over the past couple of months, our relationship has reached a new level.

There is a tremendous amount of freedom in this acceptance. Freedom to cry at the beauty of his life and all that he’s given. Freedom to celebrate this man who played such a gigantic role in shaping who I am and who my children are. Freedom to laugh as things arise regardless of how irreverent or inappropriate that laughter may be and because we’d both rather laugh than cry. And while I would do almost anything to be able to take this revelation far into the future with my Dad, I plan on making every single second I have with him count.

Food and Writing

Ah, civilization, how I have missed thee! Ok, that’s being dramatic. We’ve only been snowed in for a couple of days, but I’ve been completely computer and phone free during those days which almost NEVER happens, so it feels like longer. I half expected to get on the computer today to discover The Boy had started college and all of my friends were moving to Florida to retire. Instead it’s only been a couple of days and life has just kept on keeping on while I’ve been away.

My mom took The Girl and me out to lunch today at a new Greek restaurant in Farmington. And it’s the funniest thing to see how people react in this town not only to a new restaurant, but more so to a new “ethnic” restaurant. The place was packed with people oohing and ahhing over the food and the décor and, and, and! It just cracks me up. But it was yummy, and a lovely change of pace from the typical restaurant fare in town. The service was good, although I really wish cute boy servers would pay attention to the fact that all of their cutesy little one liners that they use on most patrons really only work if the customers next to your other table don’t hear you use them on someone else first. Again, it just cracks me up.

And today is my parent’s 39^th wedding anniversary. Although since they’ve been together for 41 years and this will be their last anniversary together, they’re splitting the difference and just calling it their 40^th anniversary. Seems fair to me. So I’m making them the dinner of their choice (linguine with clam sauce and Caesar salad) and another friend of theirs made them a cherry pie for dessert. So once again, we’ll at least have good food and good company if nothing else.

I’m fretting a wee bit about my story for this week. Last week’s story came so easily and has so much potential, but this week, I’m waiting for inspiration to hit. Hopefully it hits sometime soon. This challenge is proving to be a lot of fun, when I don’t have to force it.

Western Union

“In a few minutes your love can be tangible.” – Western Union slogan

This particular slogan makes me irrationally angry. Maybe because I was pretty much raised in a time when wiring money has gone completely out of fashion except in the movies where the only people who wire money are felons and white trash kids stuck in some hickville trailer park without a clean wife beater. It makes me think of men with huge pot bellies sending money to their old ladies who are standing in their curlers, hair nets and polyester muumuus. It makes me think of dirty out of the way offices that you have to search out in the seedier parts of town.

It pretty much makes me think of anything but love.

And maybe that is what the slogan is trying to change. Trying to shift the point of view back to a quick way to send your oldest son money across country because he blew a tire on his spring break road trip. Because I think most Western Union offices are probably in well lit grocery stores nowadays.

But it also speaks to the part of me that is just flat royally pissed off that we’re in the financial state we’re in. Because to tell me that THE way to make my love tangible is to send money to family and friends just makes me want to scream since it’s just about the only thing I can’t presently send them. I can send virtual hugs and all of the positive vibes and thoughts I can muster. I can send cards and emails and Facebook love notes. I can think of all kinds of funny, silly, creative ways to “make my love tangible” should I ever feel the need, but sending money is really not one of them (not that I wouldn’t love to receive that kind of token of all of your love).
Also on some philosophical level it makes me irate that I should ever have to make my love tangible. I mean who really wants their loved ones to nail down how very much they are loved into a hot pink teddy bear or a bouquet of flowers?

Forgiving Tolerance

"You can forgive someone almost anything. But you cannot tolerate everything...We don't have to tolerate what people do just because we forgive them for doing it. Forgiving heals us personally. To tolerate everything only hurts us all in the long run." – Lewis B. Smedes

Forgiveness is a funny thing. I ran across this quote the other day and it’s been working its wily ways in my head ever since. Started me thinking about boundaries and how they relate to forgiveness and tolerance.

I’ve never been good at putting up boundaries, it’s part of that whole wear my heart on my sleeve thing. What that also means however, is that I have an extraordinarily high tolerance for a great many things. I mean, sure, I can get up on one of my many soapboxes and talk about respect and personal responsibility and how I won’t tolerate a lack of either one in my life, but the truth is that I’ve long tolerated a great many disrespects in my life. Although only when it comes to me. I will break apart those soapboxes and beat people senseless for any disrespect done to someone I love. But my own personal boundaries are pretty much nonexistent.

It’s something I’ve been really trying to work on the past few months. Although I must say that putting up boundaries in friendships and relationships that have existed for 10 years or more is not an easy task. It’s sort of like trying to build a dam in the middle of a raging river without getting wet.

One of the things that I’ve realized is that forgiveness plays a tremendous role in being able to put up those boundaries. Learning how to forgive myself for not feeling worthy enough to put up the boundaries to begin with is huge. And even though I’m sure it will sound strange and maybe even a wee bit conceited, learning how to forgive those in my life for not helping me put up boundaries is another.

It’s about not only taking care of the people I love, but also about encouraging them to take care of me. Allowing them to. And forgiving us both when we forget.

Website Pondering

Ok. I just saw a commercial for a website called onlinebootycall.com. There are so many things wrong with this I am not at all sure where to start.

Let’s start with the fact that the actual name of the website brings more questions to my mind than clarity. Is it a cyber sex site? Is it a dating site? Is it a place to find people with whom to only have booty calls? Are said booty calls online only or do you actually meet in person? Maybe I’m a little out of touch, but I just need a little more description than that.

Also, the commercial? Featured this cavemanesque looking man proclaiming to be the founder and CEO of said website. He goes on to say how this site was about looking outside the box. Forget the flowers! Forget the candle light dinners! Forget the wooing and chivalry! The last frame of the commercial is of some skank throwing a bouquet of flowers at a man in a button up shirt laying sadly on the ground and then parading out of the shot on the arm of the original cavemanesque gentleman.

There’s also a website out there whose sole purpose is to hook up married people who want to cheat. I’m actually a wee bit intrigued by that one. Not because I want to cheat but because I want to see how it works. Is it all dark and steamy or is it all guilt ridden and hesitant?

I also wonder if these websites are successful in any way. I mean the cutting edge commercials surely point to the magnitude of their success, but I would really love to see some numbers on these suckers. I mean seriously, what kind of advertising revenue do they see? What does their customer base look like? I love to just steal a look at their books.

And call me old fashioned and crazy if you want, but I’m never going to throw a bouquet of flowers at anyone. I love flowers. What I don’t love? Scary steroid men in polyester shirts and fake tans whose own personal heroes died in the 70’s of some horrible brain eating STD.

Just a Flirty Girl

I have always been a bit of a flirt. For better or for worse, it’s always just been a piece of my personality. Much like that 7 year old on the playground I suppose. If I’m flirting, it’s because I’m interested in you in one way or another, and jibing with word-play and body language is usually my way of conveying that.

Whether it’s me playing the tough girl and issuing challenges for who can out drink the other or win some sort of metaphorical arm wrestling match. Or me playing the smart girl engaging in a duel of words. Or me trying to invite you to take a look at the world through my eyes by asking for advice or shyly being curious about your everyday interests, “So what kind of music is in your car right now?”

I know, it all sounds a wee bit childish doesn’t it? I could plead only child syndrome. It explains just about everything. My lack of experience connecting with people in day to day situations. My awkwardness in social situations. My lack of finesse in navigating interpersonal relationships. Although I know other only children who don’t suffer from the same ineptitude. But ultimately I think it’s just how I figured out how to share myself with people.

It’s also a way for me to let go a bit. To free that playful side of me that I usually keep tethered. When I let myself off the leash though, I wake up the next morning and dissect everything that I said and did. Inevitably I find something that was just a bit too daring and end up burying my head in my pillow willing my remembrance to be wrong. I didn’t really make that big an ass of myself. Did I?

Whether I did or not isn’t up to me of course. It’s all about perception. And regardless of how much work I do or how much confidence I gain, my perspective will always be off when it comes to evaluating my own actions. My biggest hope is that there will come a day when I can just shrug it off and flirt my way through another day.