My Blah-Blah-Blog

Last night I watched The Backup Plan. It was cuter than I thought it would be and it had several laugh out loud moments as Jennifer Lopez “suffered” through her pregnancy. In one scene she was unwittingly roped in to coach another woman through a natural home birth: there was much panting, wailing, gnashing of teeth, blood, sweat and tears (not necessarily in that order). I admit I rolled my eyes a little over the absurdity of the scene but not before I recounted my own (fairly) absurd childbirth experience 12 years ago at 3:20 tomorrow morning (May 17).

I pretty much slept through the entire birth of my first child, not by choice and certainly not because I have super hero powers residing in my loins that cause child birth to be a painless-then-pop-it-right-out experience. No, no, not at all. Let me tell you how it all went down.

May 16, 1999. I was about 38 weeks preggers with my daughter. I was working full time and barely had a nursery ready when at around 3 that afternoon – my day off – I got a phone call from my OBGYN’s office. My doctor was out of town on vacation (of course) so the on call doctor gave me a call as a follow up to some sort of test they’d performed earlier in the day. She wanted me to know that I’d have to come to the hospital as soon as possible (RIGHT NOW!) to be induced as my protein levels were out-of-control and too high for the health of the baby.

I freaked out (OMG what do I do first!?) but then became annoyed because 1) I had to work the next day and 2) I wasn’t ready for the baby yet (I still had two weeks!) and 3) I had not eaten all day except for a bowl of cereal in the morning and here it was almost 4 already. I have no idea why I’d put off lunch for so long. After all, ravenous and pregnant are synonymous, right?

I was SO not ready for this kid. But, like any other mom-to-be who suddenly goes into labor, I found myself realizing that the end was indeed in sight and I needed to get my butt in gear and get to the hospital. No time to do anything other than grab an overnight bag for me and the baby and a carseat and off I went to the hospital.

I debated on grabbing some food to go on my way in but I remembered that it’s recommended you don’t eat just before going into labor. Besides, I was scared to death I’d poo on the doctor during labor so I didn’t bother. Surely the kid would be out in a few hours anyway and I could grab a burger.

After getting checked in, I was wheeled in to a nice little room, and was told to wait for the doctor. By now I was really, really hungry. It was almost 6:30 and I begged for some dinner. The nurse said no which made me secretly hope if I got sick and puked, she’d have to clean it up.

Besides, I had friends who told tales of eating the biggest meal ever only to go into labor shortly after. My own mother recounted the burger and strawberry shortcake she had just hours before delivering me after a bumpy ride to the hospital. All those moms/babies seemed to make it just fine after a big feast right before labor. Why couldn’t I at least have some fricken crackers?.

At some point a headache set in, followed closely by the worst case of heartburn ever. It was so bad I swear I could spit fire. I pleaded for some relief and the nurse reluctantly brought me a small dixie cup of what tasted like lemon-lime syrup with battery acid mixed in. That $h*t burned going down! Hungry, heartburn-ridden and head-achey, I realized in my misery that I was definitely not looking forward to having a giant baby head squeezed out of my nether-regions.

Eventually we were told that the doctor didn’t want me to deliver the baby until the next morning anyway, (see how urgent my case was?). I was nervous and starving to death and felt like I really was not about to get to sleep any time soon. The doctor decided to authorize a horse-sized coma inducing hospital-strength sleeping pill. I took it with some water (which unfortunately did not help the fire that roared in my esophagus). It must have been around 12:30 or so. I was looking forward to a nice rest.

She also authorized another medication: a cervical insert thingie that would soften my cervix and would induce labor. I asked her if it was alright to take a sleeping pill and a cervical insert at the same time and she said not to worry. She explained it would take all night to kick in so that I’d have a slow, easy start to labor in the morning after a nice night’s sleep from the sleeping pill. I’d be rested and ready to go!!!

Tucked in, lights turned down, I turned on the TV. A League of Their Own was on. The last thing I remember was Tom Hanks saying “There’s no crying in baseball!” before I drifted off to sleep around 1:00 am…

Only to awake about 45 minutes later to find that holy ^%($ I am not feeling so good in my girl areas and what the hell I peed myself? Is that blood? Zzzzz.

Wait, what is happening? Holy hell I’m in FREAKING zzzzzzzzzzzzz

I’m in FREAKING labor y’all! ZZzzzzz

Have you ever tried to complete a task while dozing off? You know, nodding off at work while typing?

Yeah well it was pretty much like that: I was in full on narcoleptic labor.

I don’t remember much from that night except everyone being incredibly amazed that I went into labor and popped out my firstborn in a record 45 minutes start-to-finish. My then-husband kept drinking cup after cup of coffee to stay awake but was struggling as well (we found out the next day that the hospital was 7th day Adventist and didn’t serve caffeinated drinks).

I vaguely remember seeing that little round baby face with teeny tiny red lips and thinking “she looks like my grandfather” and hoping that maybe she was really a he if she was going to look like a boy.

And I remember the new nurse on duty turning up my oxygen and asking me to repeat my name and birth date while firmly patting my hand. Apparently she didn’t realize my narcoleptic behavior was caused by a sleeping pill but thought I was drifting in and out of consciousness from the strain of labor.

Not.

I may have mumbled out my daughters name before completely passing out. I don’t remember pushing or anything. I did get an epidural at some point – I think – but who knows. For all I know they hatched my daughter in the next room.

The next morning (way too damn early) they brought me my little bundle of joy, I was ecstatic to discover she did not look at all like a man, and I called my parents who lived so far away so they could hear their first grandchild cry.

So here we are, 12-years later. I am still sleep-deprived and narcoleptic with occasional headaches and frequent heartburn. I’ve since learned my lesson about not eating lunch.

It may not have been a tale worthy of A Baby Story, more like Birthing Fails instead. But for that little package of joy that I received that day, I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.

Not even a nap.

And would you believe I’d love to have just one more? Sounds like someone needs to turn in their sleeping pills for some stronger meds.

So there’s my long rant and ramble about why gay is okay.

Here’s a great link sponsored by my church: http://www.sometimeschurchhurts.com/

No, that is not a subtle plug to get gay people to convert and come to church. It’s pretty much a statement saying that some Christians (and others) have been dumb in the past.

I’d like to stop being dumb.

So here’s this great guy who said this to me: “To tell me being gay is a sin is to tell me I am worth less than you. It is to tell me that I am not allowed to love the one I love as passionately as you love the one you are with. It is to deny me the right to love and be in love. It is to tell me that there is something inherently wrong with me because I’ve felt this way since I was little.”

Now, I don’t understand the being born or becoming gay thing, but that’s a moot point for me. My first point is, this guy is gay now. The second point point is, I love him. The third point is I’m only a human, and if I can love and feel compassion for him as an imperfect human, then how on earth can God NOT?

So here is my take on why so many Christians are still so anti-gay. Go with me here for just a minute:

Christians are taught a (unfortunate) fundamental principal: God loves you, IF.

So our whole lives we are taught to fear the loss of God’s love.

We are taught that if you lose God’s love, you can’t get into Heaven and will suffer for eternity. And damn, y’all, they make that SCARY.

I believe that many average Christians today are simply afraid that if they befriend or “accept” someone who is gay then they are guilty by association and are going to hell.

It’s sad to me that we think God’s salvation is so delicate that it is so easily offended and so easily broken. If we truly believe in and follow Christ, and if God’s spirit dwells in us and among us, should we not stop to consider this instead of discounting the humanity around us because of a sexual preference?

Can I really not love someone who is gay without worrying about their soul or mine?

Fortunately I can. I can see beyond a list of rules and reasons. I can see that everything God has made He has made perfectly. Lady Gaga beat most of us to the punch on that one – you are perfect. Period.

I’ll be honest, I’m still nervous around gay people. Mostly because I am afraid I’ll offend them by saying something stupid. Also because I’m a Christian (even that word represents so much of what I do NOT want it to represent). Saying “I’m a Christian” usually means “You’re a sinner and I’m here to brow beat you into my belief system.”

Dear gay, bi, trans friends: please love me while I try to reprogram my mind that has been – even if in a small manner – intolerant or fearful. Please don’t lump me into a group who would try to save your soul to the bitter end. Please know that I believe God IS love by definition, and you are made up of the same stuff and God that I am. And if you don’t believe in the same God I do, that’s okay too because still you are made of the same flesh and bone that I am, and I could never throw a stone at you.

Having said that, I’d like to address my Christian pals. I know some of you will think I’ve gone off the deep end, that I’ve become a liberal or I’ve lost my own salvation by my heresy. It’s cool – you can choose to continue in a world of fear and anxiety, you can choose to alienate others, you can choose to harm and hurt others.

Someone said to me on Twitter that Christians were one of the main reasons for the suicide of many gay people. How sad. Whether it is true or not I don’t know, but what is true is that we’ve given off that perception. If it is true, that’s even worse.

I challenge you to rethink your thinking. I challenge you to pray and meditate and seek out a different truth. Stop being afraid of losing your own salvation because you can accept something that has been ingrained in you as being so bad.

I’m afraid this writing sounds all too fresh, too juvenile. Well, that’s because this is a truth I’ve only recently (in the past 5 years or so) come to believe. And I don’t say I love gay people to be trendy or cool or progressive. I’d actually like to drop the gay part. After all, I also love chocolate-loving people and dog-loving people, and people who go to the gym. I don’t know if I love skinny beautiful model-esque people but that’s only because I’m jealous.

I love people.

I hope this is a lesson I will continue to pass along to my two children: to accept and love everyone and anyone. I don’t even want to teach a message of “tolerance” – for me, tolerating is doing your best to not be annoyed by someone or something.  Loving someone who has a different anything than you do should be the norm, not something you need to work at.

For sake of not wanting to write a ten thousand page blog, I’m going to skip a bit here to the not so distant past.

I’ve really come a long way in my own Christianity. I’ve done away with most of the things I learned at church – trying to please God all of the time – and to neglect my humanness – was too difficult. Impossible really. Everyone messes up. We all do something that is a “do not do” in the Bible. Who can be perfect?

I had to accept that we all “sin” – we all do stuff that according to traditional Christianity isn’t okay. So the whole “gay is a sin” thing stopped making sense to me when I realized something about the teachings I’d heard growing up: “gay is a sin and so is lying but lying doesn’t automatically make you ineligible for Heaven, only being gay.”

That made zero sense to me. So Jesus died for ALL our sins, but not being gay? I had sex before marriage, so am I excluded too? After all, aren’t both a “sexual” sin?

Do you see where I’m going here? It just didn’t make sense to me.

I’ve had to rethink a lot of this, especially after I sat down one night with a super cool guy who is gay. He’s a big burly man who is a great big old bear. If you are gay you should smile at that comment. So yeah, big guy. He’s not skinny and into fashion and doesn’t walk around with his hand flapping around and he didn’t have hair better than mine. I was actually a little surprised to hear he was gay.

I was honest with a mutual friend, and I’m going to be honest here: I wanted to be okay with gay. I wanted to be this guy’s friend. Unfortunately, the years of “gay is wrong” had me wired to believe that. It was all I could do to not cry and ask this guy to stop being gay so that he could go to heaven. I didn’t want to be THAT person.

He agreed to meet at my place, and I told him how I felt about “gay.” He listened and understood that I wasn’t attacking, but that I was trying to understand what being gay meant to him, why did he think he was gay, or know he was gay, and why was it such a big damn deal?

It felt so good to talk about it. I’d hate to ever offend someone but let me say this: if you are struggling with the concept of gay, talk to a gay person. They will have all of the answers you need. More importantly, they’ll put a human face on being gay and suddenly you realize one of a few things like I did.

The first thing that went through my head was this: okay let’s pretend gay is a sin. Mr. Gay is a sinner. I am also a sinner because I’ve lied before, I cheated a few times in high school, I’ve been mean to people, and I stole a $3.99 ring at Claire’s when I was 15.

Now Mr. Gay and I are on even ground. His gay “sin” was no worse than my unethical “sin.”  Already I felt better.

The  next thing that dawned on me was this simple fact: he chose to have sex in a different way than I did.

Say what?

Yeah, that was my big fat profound moment: his lifestyle of choice is simply to love a man. The same way I’d probably like a guy with brown hair and muscles or a blonde haired dude who likes dogs. It’s what he is attracted to. Can that be bad?

I had to kick my theology to the curb here – I was having  a hard time here – but didn’t the bible say that it’s really bad? Well, I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to sit outside of city limits when I have my period but you don’t see me doing that, and the Bible says that, too.

OH I just opened up a can of worms didn’t I!? I’ve used two words in a sentence that makes me cringe: gay and Christian. Why cringe?

Because many Christian people have said horrible things to and about gay people.

and

Because being gay is – to most mainstream Christians – a sin. A very bad sin. A sin so bad that you shouldn’t even be friends with a gay person unless you plan on un-gaying them.

Now let me set a few things straight here: I’m a Christian. I go to church. I believe in God and the Bible and all that. I’ve been doing this since I was born, so I’d say that I have enough experience to qualify me for what I’m about to say.

When I was younger, about 16 or so, I was attending a church who had planned on attending a gay rally downtown. We were supposed to be the anti-gay people. Now, you have to realize that some (BUT NOT ALL) churches consistently teach that gay is a sin. It’s in the Bible after all that it’s not okay, right? It does say it in the Old Testament that a man should not lay with a man, right? (Let’s not get into the age of the Bible or who wrote it, the point of this is to show what I was taught).

So I thought it was wrong. That was wrong, abortion was wrong, sex before marriage was wrong and having an affair were all wrong, wrong. These were sins that would separate you from God’s love and would totally negate the oh-so-important death of Christ on the cross for the forgiveness of said sins.

Huh? Yeah you are probably as confused as I was but that was pretty much the gist of it. Those were the big sins (well, that and killing other people) that really made God NOT like you and took away your being able to get into Heaven.

And because I went to church, it was my responsibility to quick turn as many gay people away from being gay because we love them and don’t want them to go to hell. Because you know being gay is worse than lying, stealing or cheating.

What? Yes, that’s what I thought. We didn’t have anti-lying rallies or anti-stealing parties. Church gossip networks weren’t full of chatter about the pastor’s wife who lied about her age. No no it was about the couple in church who were having an affair, or the one lady’s son who HAD to be gay because he sat funny.

So here I was, going to this rally. Now listen up, we weren’t there to cause trouble, just to save a few souls. I think we had a sign that said God Loves You (I liked that one) and another that said Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve. That one made me feel bad but I didn’t say anything – we had souls to save and as a good Christian I should hold whatever sign I had.

The rally was more like a small group meeting, there was maybe 30-odd people on each “side.”  I was scared because we’d seen footage of the over-the-top gay pride parades – everyone in leather and jeering and same gender couples open mouth kissing (I’ve never seen this sort of stuff on the news, only at church meetings). I wasn’t sure what to expect.

Nothing like that was there though, just some average looking people who were petitioning for some right for something (perhaps partner health insurance coverage?). I actually couldn’t tell who was gay – nobody was wearing leather and nobody was licking anyone else’s face.

We left after a bit and a big black man yelled to me (he was on the gay side) “I love you sister!”

Huh? Wait I thought gay guys only loved men? How could he love ME?  And wait, wasn’t *I* supposed to be the one saying God loved them but hated their sin?

“I love you too!” I said. I wanted to go give him a  hug but wasn’t able to since we were all in a big group leaving the area. But I couldn’t figure out how someone was such a bad sinner was able to love me.

Last night my daughter posted on her little kid blog some ranting raves about her friend and how her friend helped her get a boyfriend. Because we talk often about internet safety, my daughter uses a nickname for her friend: lollipop. I believe my daughter is meatball or cookie or noodle. Anyway, my daughter’s dad read the blog post before I did and called U P S E T to see the words “lollipop” and “boyfriend” in the same paragraph.  Now, honest mistake. I’m far more obsessive about insinuations when it comes to my daughter and we talk often about things that are appropriate or inappropriate. However, in reading and rereading her post, I saw nothing that could be harmful to a young person, even the most crass of us would have to take a minute or two to TRY to turn her post into something inappropriate.  (We’ve since spoken about the post with a calm and intelligent manner and tweaked it a bit).

Unfortunately her dad went into a rant about how she obviously has nobody watching out for her in her life (me) and he’s very, very concerned. She wasn’t sure what she’d done wrong and after a moment he backtracked and made sure to say it wasn’t HER that he had issue with, but the blog post. Then it wasn’t really the blog post, it was ME, her mom, and how he “sends money all the time and this is what he gets.”  After a few more nasty comments about me – the mom – I stepped in and ended the conversation. After all, what mom wants ANYONE to chide her daughter, much less her father? I myself have been frequent subject to his rants which – when we were married – ALWAYS ended with a smoothing over, something akin to “If you hadn’t made me so mad I would not have done that.”  Typical abuse pattern: they blow up at you, they apologize merely by laying the blame on you. I will be damned if I allow him to repeat this verbal and emotional abuse on my daughter.

As soon as I stepped in, however, I was treated to a barrage of foul language and name calling which included threats for calling an attorney, venomous attacks that I was useless and I should “get a job.” Apparently if you do not have a job then you are useless scum of the earth.  He didn’t like that I reminded him that he doesn’t really send child support every month and at some point hung up on  me.

Brilliant move you big fat tool. To overreact in such a way was so juvenile. It was so juvenile – and yet so typical of you – that your words really didn’t bother me.  Of COURSE you called back a few minutes later after I tried to soothe your daughter who was very upset now that you were upset about her blog AND that you had been so mean to me. And of course to nobody’s surprise, you tried to smooth it over and remind her how much you really do love her and would do anything for her. And it was no surprise to her either when you repeatedly blamed “her mother” for the evenings events. Well, I have news for you: your kids are on to you. You are quite consistent with your behavior but see, so am I. I am consistent with NOT blaming you or ever saying anything bad about  you. I am also consistent with telling them that it is unacceptable for parents to put kids in the middle and to speak badly of the other parent.

Good job, you are doing what your kids know you should not be doing. And I don’t even need to tell them.

And because of other things you’ve said (see below), I’ve decided to write you an open letter. I’m not afraid to put this on the internet. I’ve done nothing wrong or illegal, I don’t name you and I’m speaking from my heart. So go ahead, make a copy and save this.

Dear Ex Husband:

Last night you mentioned to our daughter that you have a computer program that is always running to work to record everything I post online. I’m glad you’ve taken up so much interest in what is going on in my daily life, enough that you want to record it and keep it for posterity sake. I’m also glad you are aware of every time the kids get online or log online. That could be considered a little creepy and stalkerish, and I’m really not sure why you think it’s important to know those things OR how you manage to do that. In all honesty I think you are full of it and merely said that to send ME a message that you’re watching me.

But like I said, you’re welcome to read my blog, you’re welcome to follow my Tweets. Maybe you can get more information on what is going on in your kids’ lives since you hardly call them or talk to them. Really. Calling once a week or less isn’t how to build this great relationship with your children that you so often tell them you are trying your damnedest to do.

Since I know you are reading this (well, you say you are so I hope you are telling the truth) I’d like to take this opportunity to make a few things clear to you:

Making threats to call your lawyer because you are upset with me is silly. Differing parental styles isn’t a reason to cry to your lawyer. Differing opinions isn’t a good reason to make threats to take children away from their parent. It’s an empty threat, one of many you have made over the past 12+ years. I’m not afraid of you, or your threats, or your caustic, rude, foul, name-calling verbal abuse.

I am not afraid to butt into a telephone conversation when you are speaking to our daughter and saying negative things to her about me, or are using subversive, passive aggressive psychological warfare on her to try to make her upset with me. You shoot yourself in the foot every single time you do this. She knows I do NOT speak ill of you and that parents should not do so. She also knows that you signed a parenting agreement that says you will not do so. She sees – by your own doing – that you are not a man of your word.

She also knows that when you tell her in one breath that you have a million dollars in the bank, and in another you say you don’t have money because times are tight – and back that up by not sending child support on a consistent monthly basis – that you contradict what you say.

The children also know why you were arrested a few Christmases ago. You and your wife told them it was my fault and my doing. That is an unacceptable way to treat the children and so to defend myself and to help them understand that I would never do something to ruin their Christmas by harming them, I showed them the legal record leading to your arrest. Again, by trying to make me out to be the bad guy, you’ve only succeeded to have your plan backfire.

Just so you know, bringing up a horrible and hurtful incident to your daughter, one that holds for her much emotional pain, so that you can try to make her think it is my fault, it doesn’t work out. She knows that people who have hurt her own 100% responsibility for their evil and wicked actions. To remind her of this incident and to bring it up solely for your own selfish purposes is reprehensible to me especially as you are her FATHER.

You made a few comments about hoping that I am able to push you so far out of the kids’ lives that they succeed far beyond your hopes and dreams. This makes no sense and is yet another obvious attempt to plant a seed in the kids’ minds that I am somehow responsible for coming between you and them. Fortunately for them, they are smart and they hear what you are really saying, and the message you’ve sent them is that they will do better in life without you. I don’t think that’s something you want to promote.

Years ago when our daughter was a baby, you’d had a lot of drinks and you came to me and pulled me up close to you and looked straight into my eyes and said “If you ever leave me, I’ll make you feel such pain like you’ve never felt before, and when I’m done with you, no man will want you.”  Well, guess what? You were half right: never have I experienced the pain and agony that YOU put me through. Never have I been with someone else who made threats and took from me every bit that they could. Never have I again been with someone who WITHHELD MEDICAL CARE from me in an emergency situation. Never have I been pushed around and bullied by another man. So you are correct, the bad things in my life were always at your hand. It’s called emotional terrorism, verbal abuse, psychological abuse and physical abuse. No, I had no bruises or broken bones and you never punched me – but it still remains that by definition you are an abuser.

However, I DID leave you and your curse to be unlovable and unworthy hasn’t held true. I’ve met real men, wonderful men, who treated me a million times better at their worst than you ever did at your best.  I’ve never been screamed at, called names, I’ve been treated well and cared for with loving and tender intents. Your children have seen role models that present a positive image, one that does no harm to children through bullying or psychological tactics.

For all you claim to want for your children, you spend a lot of time and energy on what you think I say about you, and what you think you should say about me. But no amount of your worthless words will tell my children any less: that I love them, respect them and truly have their best interest at heart. You remind them that I “took” them and you spew out the word “mother” with such hate and nastiness. They hear this and realize this but your words cannot and will NEVER undo the sacrifices I’ve made for them to make them better people, healthy people. I truly do have their best interest at heart and I will die before I do anything to harm them intentionally, and that includes attempting to paint a picture of you that is less-than-pretty. I’ve stood up for you and made excuses for you – for all the times you never wrote or called on birthdays or holidays, for the times you have said mean things about me.

Even the time your wife WOKE OUR DAUGHTER UP and instructed her to “act like she was crying” while you berated me on the phone for your arrest because YOU CHOSE NOT TO PAY CHILD SUPPORT AND YOU CHOSE NOT TO SHOW UP FOR A COURT HEARING. This is nauseating and wicked behavior.

And your children know it. And this makes you guilty of attempting to alienate your children from me. Read this for a moment: http://www.mrcustodycoach.com/blog/child-custody-tip-parental-alienation or do some research on it.

So a word of advice to you: whatever it is you think you need to do or say to your children, pause before you do. Are you speaking words of life and love and care to them? Are you equipping them for their future? Or are you sowing seeds of bitterness and resentment?  Are you truly a role model of a father to your daughter, and a man to your son? Do you want your children to be as you have been?

We cannot choose our children’s trials and tribulations, and helping our children heal does not mean placing blame on others. What happened to our daughter happens to millions of children around the world. You know that you have another child who had a similar situation and yet you do not blame her mother.

And another reminder: I’m not the only wife who left you. I’m not the only wife with CHILDREN who moved out of state to be closer to family and a better life for her children. Perhaps the common denominator here is not the women you choose to marry, but rather you.

Perhaps instead of blaming us you should stop and consider this: had you been a better man, a more truthful and honest man, a man willing to sacrifice and a man willing to accept the blame when he does not and will not provide for his family, then this would not have happened. If we had not HAD to leave you for our own sanity, for my own safety, then this would not have happened.

Stop placing your children in the middle of this situation. This is harmful to them. You took a parenting class, no? You read the court document you signed when we reached an agreement for custody, no? Do you not understand that YOU ARE THE ONLY ONE who is deliberately hurting your own children?

Stop it. Stop, stop, stop it. Be a better man and be a better father. I know it’s in there somewhere. For once sacrifice your own needs for the needs of your children. They need you. They don’t need to hear you cut down their mother while you try to make yourself look or feel better. It’s not working. You only succeed in making yourself look the fool.

I’m not perfect. I’m going to air some dirty laundry here and I’m going to start with telling you about … surprise! My laundry. I like to do laundry and I do it (what feels like) every day. With me and two kids we’re always having mountains of laundry pile up around the house. We have common places where  piles start: on the bathroom floor. It starts with discarded jammies before hopping in the shower and it grows from there. Then there’s the hallway: this is where clothes that are tripped over in the bedroom get tossed to so that they are “out of the way.” In reality they are still in the way: MY way, and between the kids and the dog traipsing through they get dragged into my room and start yet another pile in my doorway: the was-on-the-floor-but-got-moved-to-the-hall-and-are-now-in-my-room.

This pile eventually grows so large that it merges with the pile in my bathroom as it oozes out the door. This pile gets kicked about so we can close the bathroom door and then my bedroom floor is littered with clothes that don’t even belong to me. Speaking of which, it is very weird to find someone else’s kids’ clothes in your laundry and you have no idea how they got there.

I finally decide that if I don’t get the laundry done someone, most likely a small child, is going to disappear, so I make the kids help me carry down all these piles and piles of clothes downstairs to get sorted into color piles for washing. Now our downstairs hallway is impassable because of the piles and mountains now residing there. These neat piles don’t last for too long as the kids and the dog and even me walk through them or jump over them. This pile now oozes into the living room and random socks and undies can be found kicked under the coffee table. Gross.

I finally get all of this wonderful laundry washed, dried, folded and sorted by owner. Sometimes the kids help if they’re around but if it is late at night or they are at school, I’m usually doing the laundry by myself. I don’t mind too much because it is sort of a therapeutic and mindless way to be productive while unwinding.

The piles are set on the couch or table or – if I’m feeling extra energetic – on the respective owner’s bed. They sit in a nice pile until one of a few things happen: they get put away, they get shoved onto the floor, the dog lays on them and pushes them off or they get crammed into a closet.

Nope, not my real laundry. I use a dryer.

Yeah, I reeaallly hate that. The clothes that end up on the floor migrate (on their own mind you) back to the newly started dirty laundry pile. I think they call out to each other to join them or something. Other clothes still on the floor get kicked along to under the bed and are never heard from again. More become covered in dog fur and fuzz and dirt and become so wrinkled they have to be rewashed again before they can be worn. That or they can be saved for a Halloween costume, wolfman or wookie.

What I don’t like about laundry is when it is time to put away clothes. I obsess when clothes are mixed together in drawers: pants HAVE to be with pants, shorter ones on the left and longer on the right, darker colors on the bottom and lighter on top. Don’t mix socks in with underwear and don’t mix short sleeves with long sleeves. Of course we don’t have enough room in any of our three dressers for all of our clothes – and Mister Man doesn’t even have a dresser – poor kiddo uses bins for his clothes. So to put all the clothes away where they belong becomes a bigger chore than I’d like to do at the moment so I usually set them on top of my dresser with well-meaning intent to put them away “later.”  However, before “later” arrives, I need that one shirt in this pile so I dig it out and so on and so forth until my clean pile has been depleted into a dirty pile and the cycle starts all over again.

This, my friends, is just the monster that is laundry. It doesn’t include the monster of dishes or children’s toys or bathroom trash that ends up missing the trash can and hides in a corner behind the toilet.

So why does this go on?

I’ve learned not to care, that’s why. The time and energy and effort I put into making sure everything is just so is wasted because laundry is, and ever will be, a never-ending chore.  I’ve realized that my happiness isn’t based anymore on whether or not my favorite shirt is in a drawer (in the right drawer!) but mostly whether it’s clean and I can find it. Sure, my day would be less stressful if I didn’t have to look at any of these piles and think “I really need to get to that” or if both my kids had clean clothes put away instead of school-morning rummages through piles of “are these clean or dirty I can’t tell so I have to smell them” clothes to find their school uniforms.

With all of the mess and disorganization in my house one thing remains clear to me: I’m not a hoarder (yet) and there are no cat pancakes (catcakes) anywhere. We don’t have rats or rodents, only an occasional ant, spider or wood roach. There are no moldy pizza boxes under anyone’s bed or mystery smells with an elusive hidden source. I’ve found that I can sleep better at night without chiding myself about what I didn’t do today because I have decided that I don’t care about what I didn’t do anymore – it’s not worth it.

Although, this pile of nicely folded clothes is so yummy...

My logic may be flawed for some of you and in some situations it won’t work, say feeding your kids or going to the grocery store or something that DOES cause mystery smells or catcakes. It’s a relief to embrace who I am and what I CAN do and know that the world won’t end because we are all really too lazy to put away our laundry, and the neighbor lady won’t really think too badly of me if I have laundry piles on my couch (although we don’t answer the door when the laundry pile is in the hallway. It’s too much of a liability if small children or animals wander in the doorway).

Sure, the kids should help out more. Yes, I should take two seconds to put away my clothes. If I can get over OCD to have clean laundry piles not put away, you’d think I could get over OCD of having mismatched clothing items in drawers. If you don’t like your food to touch then you know what I’m feeling.

A friend of mine asks me “How do you want to live your life” all the time as he often thinks the same. We have differing views: for me, considering my background, I need little to be truly happy. I’m safe, my children are safe, and we’re not starving. We have our own little piece of the world and although everything around us is topsy-turvy and upside-down and still a great big unknown, we’re happy. Yes, I have days I don’t want to answer the door because there are dishes in the sink or I’m wearing pants with paint stains on them and my hair looks like I brushed it with an egg beater. Yeah, there are toothpaste spots on the mirror and last week’s leftovers in the fridge (they don’t smell (yet)) and my trash really needs to go out.

But ask me if I’d rather spend an hour cleaning a mess that can really (honestly truly no kidding) wait until tomorrow (for real tomorrow, not “tomorrow”  as in next week) or sit with my kids who are growing older every SECOND of the day and this is an hour I can’t get back. Go ahead, ask me.  I’ll pick my kids every time. They are 11 almost 12 and 8 almost 9. In a few very short years they won’t want to snuggle up on the couch, they’ll want to be with their friends off driving around eating cheeseburgers and spending their allowance on MORE clothes for me to wash. My son won’t always sit on my lap, he’s going to be too old for that very soon.

Us moms need a life outside of a mom’s life. If I really did NEED a perfect Martha Betty Stewart Crocker house then I suppose I could get up at the crack of dawn and work straight through til my sweet children are tucked into their military-made beds with sheets so crisp you could cut someone with them (since I would have ironed and starched them no doubt). And of course I’d collapse into my bed with my hair in pins and cold cream on my face and be content to know my children – whose  names I’ve forgotten because all I do is clean – are sleeping soundly.

I’ll pass. I’ll take the laundry piles and the sticky light switches and the drink-box straw wrapper stuck to the bottom of my shoe for one more family movie night, one more round of video games together, one more round of reading books together.

I’ll get to the laundry tomorrow.

It is no secret that things have been tough around here the past few months. Okay, the past year. The end of March will mark my one-year anniversary of my being laid off at work. I’ve been looking for jobs almost every day – scouring the internet as best as I can to find opportunities. Friends pass along what information they have but even the best bets end up with no call-back, no interview and no follow-up. I was frustrated at first and taking it personally until I found out that at 4 different jobs I’d applied to, there were anywhere between 100-200  other applicants! Whew!

We’re making it though, we’ve no shortage of food and the electricity hasn’t been shut off (although it’s been a close call at times!). We still aren’t getting child support regularly (and by regularly I mean monthly – it seems to trickle in every other month at best which is frustrating but que sera).

My daughter was blessed by her school to be able to go on a class trip to DC which we didn’t think would be possible. She worked hard though, going to all of the fundraisers to help raise money knowing she couldn’t go. It was such a show of grace for her to walk through that. I was so proud of her and I knew karma/providence/life/ would be kind to/bless her and it would come back around. It did and she was able to go which was a huge lesson for her.

When my kiddo was 5, she wanted to learn how to play the piano. She never was able to have real lessons, but my brother gave her a nice little keyboard for Christmas one year. She played around with it but it never progressed to much other than little kid key tapping. It only has about 18 white keys so it didn’t have much of a range.

A few weeks ago, however, our neighbor told us that she has a friend who gives piano lessons. She shared our story with her and she offered to give Sadie free lessons! It was so sweet and such a blessing so we met her a few weeks ago. She’s a lovely older lady who makes me think she traveled the world and played in Hollywood nightclubs back in the day.

After two lessons, she mentioned my daughter needs to practice on a keyboard. And not an 18-key keyboard either. Uh oh! There’s no way we can afford a piano so we hit Craigslist and Freecycle to see what might be available on the net. Not much luck there either – we were looking at no less than $300 for a used, older keyboard with 88-keys and even then one without speakers or a stand or working plugs etc. I didn’t even bother to look for used pianos – Lord only knows how much THAT would cost!

So yesterday I decided to call around and find a place who rented pianos. I called one store and the gentleman explained that you can rent a piano for up to six months in a try-before-you-buy program, but at the end of six months you return the piano or purchase it with 100% of your rental fees going toward the final purchase price. Giving up a piano after 6 months didn’t work, and I definitely can’t purchase a couple-of-thousands of dollars worth piano any time soon!

The man on the phone asked if I was interested and I explained that I wasn’t working right now so it would be out of our budget but thank you for your time. He asked what our particular situation was and I told him I had been laid off and that my daughter had been given free lessons.

Well! My goodness! It’s as if it was meant to be – he told me that a friend of his had moved out of town and had left her piano with him to be given to a student who wanted to play but could not afford a piano. He hadn’t met anyone yet but said that if we wanted it, we could HAVE it.

Yes. HAVE IT. We could HAVE A PIANO. We’ll only need to come up with money to deliver it and then have it tuned, but then he said maybe he and his son could deliver it for us to save some money. Then a friend of mine said her hubby could help with a truck to get it to the house too. Now I just need to come up with some manpower to help get it loaded/unloaded and down two stairs/up two stairs and into a narrow hallway.

We’re so excited we can’t wait! My daughter has also been invited by her music teacher to go to a local recital event this weekend. She’s been playing on a borrowed keyboard for the past hour and although it’s a little bit off tempo or she hits the wrong note here and there, I love the sound of music in my house, music that MY girl is making and loving and enjoying!

It reminds me of when I played the violin and clarinet back in school. We all love music so much, so I really hope this is something she can stick to and find herself challenged by and successful in for years to come.

So if you are in a rut right now, or feel like nothing good is coming your way – or never comes your way – hang in there. Good things truly come to those who stick it out with patience AND with grace.

I’ve been debating on going back to school. I haven’t been able to pin down what I wanted to do though, no idea what classes to take or what degree to work toward. It was driving me crazy. In between applying for and looking for jobs, I have spent hours on the Dept Of Labor Statistics website reading their Occupational Outlook Handbook. It’s a nifty tool – it tells you – by occupation – what the job outlook is gonna be, how much median income is, what training is needed etc for tons of jobs. I knew I wanted to find a job that would pay enough for me to support the kids without worrying whether or not child support was coming. I want there to be money in the bank for school pictures, yearbooks, and if my kids want to go to a birthday party I want to be able to afford a gift for them to take!

Let me tell you – I didn’t know that it would be hard to pick what I love, what I CAN do, what I WANT to do. I have been researching and reading for probably a good month and a half if not more.

And finally now today, a little breakthrough (major maybe!?). I found a great job working for the Air Force (as a civilian). It was helping coordinate services for families who have suffered domestic violence or child abuse. It was more than that, but I don’t feel like writing the entire job description.

Long story short, I wondered what degree it would take to do this job well. I could probably pull it off now, but I want more training for my future. Multiple tests have me scoring high in Social Work, Criminal Justice and Law and Education – three things I love! (Writing was one but I doubt there’s money in that for me (although I have lots to say don’t I!?) as was hair stylist and truck driver). 

Oh,  I forgot I said long story short. I’ll skip to the good stuff.

I’ve decided to go for a double major: Sociology and Criminal Justice. Many of the requirements are the same: one particular class is required for both degrees, so you don’t have to take two classes, just one. It’s totally doable. If I work to the masters level, I can teach. I can also find more jobs that I’d be qualified for. I’m still debating on a minor, it’s a tossup between anthropology or psychology. I’m leaning toward psychology because it will factor in well when dealing with people in many legal or social service need based programs or situations.

So that’s that. I’m really excited about it! I’m calling a few universities tomorrow, and then it’s off to enroll and start school sometime very soon!

I’m a little nervous about full time school (esp if I do the double major) and any potential jobs that come up. I’d love to just stick to school full time but I’m not sure scholarships/grants will cover it all. It could, especially if I start applying now. You’d think a single mom would qualify for a lot but not really – many programs I’ve found are for high school students.

However, I’ll be a first generation student and that helps. There are other life-situations which may help out too, but we’ll see.

So yay! I’m very, very excited. This all feels like exactly what I’d like to do, and doubling up really opens the doors for many more job opportunities.

Cross your fingers for me! And seriously, if you want to adopt us and let us live in your finished basement while I go to school, that’s perfectly fine with me!!!

♥ to you.

True story:

When I was just about 10-years old, Cabbage Patch Kids were ALL the rage. I wanted one SO bad, and I mean SO BAD! My mom and her best friend (who was MY best friend’s mom) both put their names on a waiting list with Sears. You couldn’t find a Cabbage Patch doll to save your life those days.

I prayed day and night for a doll, the kind of prayer only a 10-year old can make. The begging and pleading with God, the crying yourself to sleep because you are SO MISERABLE you can’t live without ______. I could not live without a CPK doll. I even had a few “sew your own clothes” patterns for the dolls, and a book about how they came to be. I loved to look at the pictures (which were real posed dolls photographed wearing the fashions you could make) (I never made them).

At the time we were also waiting to receive orders for my dad and we knew we’d be moving to Germany. I HAD to get a doll before we left for Germany! Surely they didn’t sell anything like this over there!

Time ticked on and then one day it happened! We got a call that there was a doll at Sears. Now, it happened to be a few days before my best friend’s birthday. My name was before hers on the list.

My mom asked me how I felt about letting my BFF have the doll since it was her bday. Then I’d get the next doll and that would be all there was to it. I decided to let my friend have the doll, but I was pretty disappointed. She was nice about it and let me hold her doll and play with her (and breathe in deep that powdered baby smell). She even received a two-pack blanket set and gave me one (I still have it!).

My friend’s mom said God would bless me for being so kind. I wasn’t too sure about it, but I thought I’d wait and see. All this God stuff and everyone else had a doll but ME. HMPH!

Soon it was time to leave for Germany. We had all of our belongings packed up and shipped out, and we’d be following soon behind.

A few days before we left, my mom got a call from her sister. She was at the mall (I think) and some woman walked up to her and asked if she knew anyone who wanted a Cabbage Patch Doll. Well she did (me of course) and she purchased it. Mind you these dolls were selling for $80, $90, $100 each if not MORE at the time. I don’t know how much she paid for it, but she got if for me, sent it in the mail, and soon I had my very own little red-headed Cabbage Patch Kid named Greta (odd that she had a German name). I took her on the plane ride with me and ‘taught’ her a few German words.

We lived in Germany for a month or two or three, and I took Greta with me EVERYWHERE we went. One day, we went to the French/American Exchange store. It was sort of like a Fresh Market WalMart but European and super cool. My brother and I took off for the toy aisle.

He went one way, I went another.

That’s when I saw it.

(Insert angel-sounding voices and strumming harps here). There were rows – an ENTIRE AISLE – FULL of Cabbage Patch Kids. I’m talking what seemed like HUNDREDS of them. Maybe there were. There were boys, girls. Red-heads, blondies, brown headed babies. Curly red haired babies, braided brown haired babies. Blue eyes, brown eyes, hazel eyes. Girls in dresses, shorts, jammies, boys in shorts and shirts and overalls. There was even a bald baby. I couldn’t believe it. I was stopped dead in my tracks as if I was a 5-year old who had just happened upon Santa’s workshop. I distinctly remember not being able to talk.

I ran off to find my brother and dragged him to the aisle. If I could show him then he could speak on my behalf. I stood – my mouth agape – pointing. He even got excited and managed to pull me over to find my parents. We dragged them, me stuttering and my brother shouting excitedly. I don’t know if they knew what we were saying but we made them run over to see what we saw.

Oh was it ever a commotion. It was a commotion because the dang dolls only cost about $20 each.

We loaded up so many baskets of Cabbage Patch Kids. We got several of each, and my dad had to get the bald-headed baby cause we felt bad for it. I don’t know how many dolls we had when we left the store, but we must have almost cleaned them out.

We mailed them back to the states to family and friends, but the best part was I got to keep SIX of those new dolls. I ended up with a total of 7 dolls altogether.

Now, some of you may be prepared to roll your eyes at what I have to say next. Call it coincidence, call it whatever. But for me, as a little 10-year old girl who had prayed so hard for just ONE doll, and was told she’d be blessed for giving the one doll she COULD have had away, well, I really felt like God watched out for me on this one, and I knew that my generosity was returned to me multiple times over. It was awesome.