Day 1

There's a saying about writers staring down at a blank page.  In fact, I've been told that some famous writers stopped for the day in the middle of a thought, a scene or a paragraph.  The next day wouldn't be so daunting; they could pick up where they left off.
Not so for me. I have 30 days of blank pages staring at me.  It's been a while.

M and I were on a cruise for 10 days in the Baltic Sea.  Alone on vacation for the first time since 2007.  We were liberated from the Camp HAL routine of picking up kids at arbitrary times of day.  We were freed from generic Caribbean ports of call.  We were freed from early seating and painfully early bedtimes.  We were freed from all the restrictions and inconveniences of traveling with kids.
So, here's what we did:  We woke up when breakfast was delivered to our door.  We ate our breakfast, trekked out to immaculate, old Scandinavian cities.  We came home. We showered and dressed.  We ate dinner.  We went to bed. 
As it turns out, we failed to consider a few things:
1.  The sun comes up at 4:30 when you are at the Arctic Circle.
2.  We get tired walking miles and miles around old, immaculate Scandinavian cities
3.  There's really not that much to do on a ship unless you like to shop.
4.  Our ship pulled into ports at unholy early hours, so we had to wake up before 7 anyway.

In essence, our routine was the same as it was with the kids.  The primary difference was we had about half as much crap in our postage sized cabin.  Is this what we were expecting?  Weren't we supposed to be living it up?  Where was the liberation?  The kicking up of heels?  The romantic deck strolls?  The dancing in the wee hours?  Wasn't all this in the brochure?

Thank goodness for Happy Hour.  (You knew this was going somewhere, didn't you?)
Happy Hour is great-- BOGO (buy one, get one) drinks.  If I order something M doesn't really like, I get them both.  Heh heh.
So, there we are at Happy Hour.  In the Crow's Nest Bar, where just months earlier with the kids we had been ordering 2 for 1 Shirley Temples. 
This couple, young,  (especially by cruise standards) {about our age.  I still can categorize ourselves as young on a cruise} maniacally signals us to sit with them.  Apparently, Happy Hour coincides with Trivia.  They need a third and, marginally, a fourth. (It's Happy Hour, and that doesn't lend itself to my finest thinking.  I'm primarily for moral support)

M and I were reluctant to join.  We've had some trivia debacles in the past.  We also have a couple of trophies from the fine Shit Ship Carnival Triumph.  (Unsurprisingly, the trivia competition on Carnival ships is not that steep because it's always Happy Hour on Carnival.  There was even booze served to those poor people wading hip deep in their own waste.)  Trivia gets ugly on cruise ships.  There's always a Cheater.  A Know it All.  A Wanna Be.  An Arguer.  A person who NEVER EVER hears the questions.  A Grader Who Wants to Split Hairs Between Answers like "Mandarin" and "Chinese."  It's all so predictable.  And the stakes are so low.  (Although I now have accumulated a set of matching luggage tags.)

But, here we are.  Child-free.  An hour to go before late seating for dinner.  Double fisting gin and tonics.  (M isn't a fan)  Are these one of the Cruise Trivia Types?  Are they normal?  Will the fight us for the luggage tag?  What if they're INSANE and throw us overboard if we lose?

We sit down to introductions.  For my purposes here, everything is very confusing because we all had the same initials.  So, we'll go with TM and TD (Traveling mom and dad).
TM and TD are instantly, noticeably interesting.  And good at trivia.  And competitive.  The last thing worries me a bit, since I know I'm not bringing much to the trivia table and this could mean we're with the Arguer or the Grader Who Splits Hairs.  We small talk between questions.  (This infuriates Person Who Never Hears The Questions.)  Which is funny.  TM has a great laugh.  It's a little hoarse, but considering how petite she is, it's big and infectious.)  TD has his trivia-game face on.  A harder nut for me to crack.
Then, it happens.  TM reveals something so powerful that I am stunned into silence.  Something so momentous that I realize my world is so small and controlled and narrow.  Something that shames my parenting, and shakes the very foundation of the love I think (?!?) I have for my boys.
THIS IS WHAT SHE SAYS:

She and TD packed up their house in LA, sold their cars, put ALL their stuff in storage or in the trash, they un-enrolled their kids for school last year, and began an around the world trip.

So, let me summarize for you what TM said:  Their family of 4 has been traveling the world in only 4 small suitcases TOTAL.  They have been on 52 commercial airline flights.  They have been on 6 continents.  They have all been Together (yes.  With a capital T) in various apartments and rentals non stop for nearly 12 months. 

Let me tell you what I heard:  TD had only 3 pairs of pants total for an entire year.  TSon had lost 4 teeth on this trip.  TDaughter had applied to high school via a Skype interview in Switzerland.  There are no chicken nuggets in India.  The potties in South America are BYOTP.  Anti-malarials give you nightmares.  They each had only one suitcase.  They had been together in various apartments and rentals non stop for nearly 12 months.

Now, my reaction:  I would kill myself.

Not entirely true, but maybe.  I'd love to see the world on a grand family adventure.  I'm not so sure I'd be up for swimming in the Ganges, but the world is out there, to be explored.  I don't think I could share cars and 15"airplane seats and tents and dinner tables and bedrooms with my family every day for an entire year without a break.  How is this possible?  How can a family be that close?  How bad of a parent AM I?

Fortunately, TM was forthcoming about her trip.  She didn't tell me that every day was rainbows and unicorns. Her children fought and sometimes cried.  She was sometimes overwhelmed.  But, overall, her stories were positive.  She told me some of the nitty gritty (see BYOTP info on South America).  She told me that they were restless in LA.  They needed to DO something.  So, they did it ALL.

At some point during trivia, Travelingson arrived. He told us about their trip, too.  From the point of view of a kid who used to only eat spaghetti and hot dogs. 

I was hooked.  Their stories were compelling.  Their experience singular. For the next 10 days, whenever we could (except Berlin. Damn the late train from Berlin!) we met with the TravelingFamily for trivia.  We adopted Travelingson, in a way.  We got to know them, their adventure, their stories.  And our Alone Vacation became a sort of Family Vacation.  Which was both unexpected and lovely. 

Which brings me back to my blank page.  TM and TD are writers.  They get paid to write.  They looked down at a blank page and decided to leave everything behind and find the world.  The blank page dared them to fill it and they rose to the challenge. 

My blank page dared me to fill it and I retold their story.  It's not daring.  But it's a start.  And it doesn't require me to bring my own TP.  

One Day at a Time

I can only do one thing at a time.  Lately, that one thing has not been blogging.  I guess marginally, it's been exercising and focusing on my weight (is the scale broken, can it only go upwards?  That needs to be investigated further.) 
I know writers, I've been married to one for quite some time, and I find myself thinking "just sit down and write,"  and yet.  I find Blitz games on Facebook for hours at a time rather than write for just a few moments.
Mostly, I've lost my sense of humor about my kids.  About parenting.  It's been less fun lately.  It's been more worry lately.  It's less fun and sassy Emma Stone, and more desperate and inexplicable like Lindsay Lohan.  It's all expecting catastrophe and not being surprised when it arrives.  It was fighting about homework and just trying to make it to the weekend.  It was all boys punching and arguing and being mean and me and M caught in the middle trying to make peace.  It was fighting and name calling and don't let those 2 be in the same room together lest something gets broken.
So summer brings new challenges. 
From the last day of school until the middle of June, my sister and her husband were here.  That's a story unto itself.  Literally, the day we said goodbye to them, my parents arrived.  Then, M and I took our vacation.  Our long awaited vacation.  Our first vacation since 2007 without the kids.  We were gone.  On another continent.  My parents were in charge.  And there (apparently) was no fighting, no punching, no don't leave them in the same room lest something get broken.  It was apparently easy peasy lemon squeezy.  Who were those kids?  How did my parents find Emma Stone where we left Lindsay Lohan, all disheveled and hungover looking?
Now, we're back to just the four of us.  Two parents restored by vacation, two kids spoiled by grandparents.  It's supposed to be all fresh and new and sassy and post-rehab Lindsay.  But I don't feel changed.  I don't feel invigorated.  Blech.
Each morning, I wake up and think "today I will do better.  I will be a better parent."  After that first cup of coffee, after watching the kids fight argue first thing in the morning about what to eat for breakfast, I want to give up.  I'm giving up.  Today is the day I quit parenting. 
Maybe that will help me write.  If I can only do one thing at a time, maybe I should do that.

Mom Bullying

I'm judgy.  Like really judgy.  Are you wearing Mom Jeans?  I'm judging.  Is your kid screaming like a Banshee in the middle of Pottery Barn?  I feel for you.  But, I'm judging.  We all are, right?  I mean not always harshly or spitefully, but in every situation, we watch, interpret, and judge. If you change the word "judge" to "assess,"  it obviously loses a lot of moral connotation, that self-righteous superiority.  If you use the word "assess," we understand the process as akin to how we drive cars, run a business, spend money, raise a family.

Sometimes, I assess people rather than judge them.  So it's not always a negative adjudication of a person, it's a way of prioritizing the great people who I want to keep in my life.  It's a way of observing and finding compassion for people.  It's a way to find people who will be compassionate towards me.

Sometimes, the process really is a judgement.  It's a horrible, horrible quality (albeit one I occasionally find useful), but always find mean.  Especially in myself. When I judge, it's to a fault.  Even if I'm judging myself or my family, it can be ruthless.  A glaring moral absolute that I just can't defend.  I'm not bragging or apologizing for it.   I'm just sayin'.  Oh, screw it.  I don't know why I'm defending this.  I do it, and so do you.  Right?  Right.

So, what do we do when some one judges us?  How do I feel when someone has pronounced me (publicly or privately) shallow or selfish or unreasonable or lazy or [fill in blank]?  I watched a recent episode of Whitney (let's not get into the judgement of me watching that.  Or Whitney's attempt to reflect Chelsea's solar glow) and Whitney freaked when people proclaimed her "crazy."  Her insecure boyfriend's sore spot was "stupid."  The ditzy redhead's word was "flaky."  I thought about my word.  What's the word that sets me off?

A mom has recently judged me.  Twice.  To my face.  Harshly.  She couched it with a half-hearted LOL.  That totally sucked.  She didn't use a particular word, but she stuck a burning poker into my worst fear:  permanently ruining my kids.  Being a bad parent.  Failing.  Rearing future militant goths.  You know, the usual stuff that keeps us up at night.

For one thing, it's still bothering me.  I've talked about it to a bunch of people in an effort to work through it.  I've examined my own ambivalence about what she said.  I've tried to figure out if I'm defensive because she's right, or if I'm genuinely hurt because she's just wrong and mean.

For another thing, it bothers me that I see my own behavior reflected in her meanness.  I think of people who I've labeled as insecure, or meddlesome, or selfish.  Were they?  Did I just hit their sore spot?  Did I cross the boundary?  Was my judgement on them as petty as the one put on me?

For a third thing, does this mom really think that's she's above reproach?

How do I cope with this?  What would I tell my kids to do?  I like to think I'd tell them to blow the meanie off and remember that kids are mean when they are jealous or insecure and bully a weaker kid to make themselves feel better.  I'd tell them not to tattle or slander the person, just give 'em a good retort and an eyeroll to send him packing.

So am I being Mom-bullied?  Why?  Aren't we supposed to be on the same team? She obviously wasn't being constructive.  She wasn't identifying a problem and helping me work on a solution.  She wasn't trying to make me feel better about choices I've made--she wasn't in a teaching moment.  She was letting me know she didn't approve.

I'm going to try to blow it off.  I'm going to assume that some psychic glitch in this person caused her to publicly disapprove of me.  I'm going to remind myself that I am making the choices I think are best for my family.  I'm going to not slander this person or seek a verbal revenge.

This still sucks.

The Rites of Spring

Spring is a glorious time wherever you live.  Some of my friends in the midwest and northeast are still trapped in the snowy jail of winter waiting (im)patiently for their spring to arrive, but here in the deep heart of Dixie,things are all abloom.

The azaleas are in full glory this time of year.  The beastly, sticky hedges of winter transform into brilliant bushes of salmon, white and pink.  The live oaks are that unusual hue of green that peeps out only once a year--that lime unique to fresh, new foliage.  All of the plants are tumbling, unfurling, and hurtling toward that hot, sticky, jungly overgrown season of summer.  I literally think that I can watch the plants grow as I watch them.  Wisteria, for example, in full bloom already, will grow as much as an inch per day, and kudzu will grow even faster.

But before we embark upon summer when we don mosquito netting, gloves, and shears and fight back mother nature, we sit in rocking chairs on our southern porches, enjoying alcoholic lemonade and relish the spring.  This is the best time to live in the south.

Truly, without exaggeration, it is glorious.  My lemon tree is so laden with blossoms, and so heavily perfumed, that it is abuzz with bees feasting on the bounty.  The ferns are reemerging from the ground, unspiraling into luscious green ground cover.  The soil is again black and fertile, and the roses are hinting at the deep red buds within.  EVERYTHING, everything is coming alive.

There is a downside to all of this lushness, however.  Two days ago, our pollen index was 10.6 on a scale of 12.  I am not sure what 12 constitutes.  Is it total pollen saturation?  A point where the pollen content in the air exceeds the air content in the air?  Is it the point at which we start respiring chunky air? Who created the pollen index?  It seems like pseudo science, something concocted to quantify our suffering.  There is a little bar graph accompanying the pollen information.  A little green bar indicates low pollen.  Mobile's bar chart is some sort of deep burgundy, indicating air conditions similar to that of nuclear apocalypse.  It might as well have a ticker underneath it reading, "ATTENTION MOBILIANS, GO BUY AIR IN TANKS, THIS AIR IS GOING TO CLOG YOUR LUNGS."

 The air is visible, a shimmering golden halo hovered over the city, indeed the region, as though physically attached to us. The car washes in town were making a booming business as hapless drivers try to clear their windshields, only to have the yellow dust stuck to their vehicles hours later.  I had to run my windshield wipers and washer multiple times per day to keep the view clean.  It was as though I was driving in a yellow fog.

Our commerce begins to evolve.  Instead of money, we conduct transactions in Allegra and Claritin.  My heart, unused to the stimulants in decongestants, raced and palpitated when I finally broke down and took medication.  Finally, the sinuses were clear, while I sweated and fretted about my exploding cardiac system.  I kept the decongestants in my purse and offered them to friends and clerks suffering from the unholy effects of the pollen.  Everywhere I go, I am greeted by watering, glassy eyes, and hacking coughs.

Friday night, I slept in S's room (God knows he wasn't using it).  I slept upright, or semi-upright, in an effort to keep the gravity drainage system working problem.  My body was literally wracked by coughing all night. I couldn't control or stop it.  Even the dog stared at me, glassy-eyed, his feet stained yellow from the pollen, and silently begged for some Benadryl.

Last night, it rained.  The air feels cleaned, refreshed.  The weather website I trust says the pollen count is down to 9.8 of 12.  Humans can probably function at 9.8.  We can boldly turn down our car windows and enjoy the breeze (like the dog).  We can open our windows and air out our homes.  We can sit on the porches and welcome spring like our southern forefathers have done for generations.  The only interruption to the singing birds, and chirping squirrels, being of course, my hacking cough.

Boys will be...gross?

Sometimes I am fully responsible for my kids' misbehavior.  I am often the corrupting factor in their lives.  For example, yesterday we were watching a CNN piece where volunteers smoked weed and then drove cars on a controlled course to determine their level of impairment.  We watched (on CNN, mind you) these volunteers smoke a bowl, and then drive at up to 10x the legal limit of intoxication.  Both the supervising police officer and the driving instructor said that they were driving alright, and that they didn't feel the need to pull them off the road.
My kids' takeaway:  "Look at how much FUN they're having.!!"

Yes, kids, weed is fun.

That is not where I expected that news piece to go.  I was expecting the people to die in fiery wrecks with the message written in bloody letters across the screen:  "DRUGS ARE BAD."

Oh, well.  Parenting fail # 3,000,456.

But this morning, M  took bad parenting to a more, um, intrusive level.

We were watching Beverly Hills Chihuahua.  Please don't ask why.  I think it's because we started watching Phineas and Ferb and there were chinchillas and chihuahua sounds like chinchilla and...oh, god I don't know.

During the course of the 3 1/2 minutes that Disney showed the movie without commercial interruption, S asked how "they" make the dogs talk.

I said they used digital manipulation.
M said he didn't know about nowadays, but to make Mr. Ed talk, they put a carrot in his butt.

1.  This is not true.  Everybody knows "they" used peanut butter.
2.  WHY would you tell kids that there were people who went around shoving root vegetables up horses' asses?

We googled it.  Of course, we came back with the peanut butter story.  But the kids got the carrot thing in their heads, as kids are inclined to do.

Those little nitwits spent the next half hour running around trying to violate me.

Eventually, I was sitting on the stool in the kitchen when E came by and jammed his finger in my crack.

"What the hell?  What are you doing?  Why are you doing that?  Leave me alone!"

DAAAAAAAAAAAAAD, it totally works!  We made mom talk!

I totally should have been wishing for girls.

Existential PMS

After a particularly vitriolic Facebook post this morning, I felt a rejuvenated sense of hostility toward my fellow man.  Don't get me wrong,I made the obnoxious post--I just feel as though my relationship with mankind has hit a wall.  Hard.

A great friend pointed out to me that I seem to do this every new year.  I carry over my bah humbug into a post-new year dysphoria that I can only express through sarcasm and open disgust.  Apparently, it's like an annual period.  I get unholy mean and intolerant every January.

Maybe it's because I've made my resolutions to improve my health while every other jerk on the planet has decided to throw himself headlong into a fried Twinkie.  I've committed to being more community minded while every other ass is testifying before Congress that it's every (wo)man for herself in our neat-o domestic, post-apocalyptic arms race.  Maybe I've decided to reduce my carbon footprint while there are a bazillion people choking on chunks of air in China.  Maybe I claim the 6 weeks before I give up on all of my resolutions as my time to be superior and condescending to the whole rest of humanity.  Suck on this, people.

OK, so maybe I didn't make all those resolutions.  I mean, I sorta want to do those things, but let's be honest, I'm old and lazy so it's unlikely that unless recycling services come to take the non-compostable chips bag and Coke Zero can from my napping hands, my carbon footprint isn't shrinking.  I am trying to be healthier, but that's only because I'm vain and want to be skinny.  Maybe the reason I'm so hard on everybody else is that I'm filled with a depressing and miserable self loathing.

Maybe it's my own jaded soul.  Last night, I was speaking with a mom who (awesomely) has found a great opportunity to go back to work.  She really found something she's interested in, made it meet her criteria for being home a lot with her kids, and she is rediscovering the working world of grown ups.  I thought, wow, I should totally get on that.  She's so energized and enthusiastic.  I'm so filled with inertia and malaise.  I thought, hey, maybe she's doing something interesting to me, too...financial planning??

I CAN NOT think of a worse field for me (well, except physicist, chemist, astronaut, firefighter, police officer, CEO, CFO, anything with "C" in front of it, priest, pilot, masseuse, anything involving tact or drug tests, and/or  interacting with the public in any setting.)

Here's is my financial planning survey:  

Are you a deity, god, goddess, demigod, mythical deity or superhero?

If no, answer next question:

Have you currently or ever engaged in a pact with a devil, demon, gnome, troll, elf, US Senator, or other creature that has promised you immortality in exchange for something valuable, say, a soul or your vote?

If no to both questions:  Screw it.  You are going to die.  When you will die, exactly,  is merely a matter of happenstance, genetics,  environmental factors and possibly karma. You plan, God laughs.

If yes to either question, awesome.

So, in short, my fellow humans, I need to come to terms with the bad ones among you trying to wreck my short, meaningless existence. If you don't care about me, fine.  I can take it. Please stop screwing up my kids' planet.  They're going to need it one day.

Natural Selection

*This entry is dedicated to a friend whose name I can't share because I don't want her to get in trouble with her family :)*

Pink, red and white is everywhere right now.  Much like half eaten candy canes that I am finding around the house (I'm looking at you, S) Valentine's decorations are the sorry, slightly furry leftovers of Christmas.  Valentine's stuff is all over.  Except for a few locally owned chains that are pushing Mardi Gras, Valentine's Day is the next retail holiday push.  Store away your Christmas stuff in our red and green totes, and buy these pink and white Valentine's Day Totes to store this Valentine crap we're selling!  Ugh.
This is what Wikipedia has to say about Valentine's Day:  St. Valentine's Day is a liturgical holiday for Valintinus who was performing prohibited marriages, ministering to the persecuted Christians, and doing other stuff generally uncool with the Romans.  He supposedly healed his imprisoner's daughter, and left her a note before being executed signed "From your Valentine."  This sounds a little pat to me, but I'm no expert.  A timeline, if you will:

• The age of chivalry heightened this into an idealized romantic love.  Amorous courters would offer flowers, gifts, confections to their lovers in knights and maidens tymes.
• In the 1800s, books were published as guides for young men to write verse for their lasses.  Emo was born.
• In the 1800s, Brits got the postal system going which meant that valentines could be sent anonymously.  Hence, things got really saucy.  This was the first drunk emailing.
• Loving all this unsolicited, free word-porn, the popularity of valentines, and thus, the holiday itself surged in the mid 1800s.  *See entry on  Fifty Shades of Gray.
• Although the Brits had been sending valentines for a while, the first US mass-produced paper lace cards were made by one Esther Howland.  Since 2001, the US Greeting Card Assn (could there be such a thing?) has been giving out the annual Esther Howland Award for greeting card visionary.  Or, as the trophy's known:  Thanks for paying our bills, Ms. Esther.

Eventually fabric and lace yielded to paper, glitter, vellum, and soft-focus roses for men to by for women and snarky cards about horny husbands for women to buy for their men.Currently, we are in a consumer paradise of pink and white (rather than yellow and pink for Easter) Peeps, pink and white M&Ms, pink and white Kisses, pink and white roses that cost a ridiculous amount.  Pink and white decor, theme clothing, candy, and home furnishings explode around us.
Superstores dedicate aisles to it.  Pier 1 sells artsy pink and white.  Target's got your chic pink and white.  WalMart has your budget pink and white.  Dollar Tree has last year's pink and white.  Dirt Cheap has the pink and white that nobody else wanted.

While the historical significance of the holiday may be a blend of martyology and lore, the celebration has distilled into something more palatable to the average American:  consumerism.
But I feel that both the snowballed legend and the current conspicuous celebration are overlooking a crucial element of the holiday's evolution:  its proximity to Christmas.

St. Valentine's Day occurs exactly 51 days after Christmas.  Coincidentally, and there are no actual studies to corroborate this, it takes 51 days for the human  body to completely eradicate residual familial/in-law induced toxicity.  That includes internal toxicity and any external crazy absorbed through environmental sources.
It takes 51 days for you not to wake up with that horrible dream where you're living at home again after a series of massive life failures.
51 days days to stop thinking of yourself as a treed cat.
51 days to stop the Pavlovian desire for vodka when you hear the word houseguest.
51 days to stop your left eyelid from twitching when you hear a child whining.
51 days to rid the godawful stench of artificial cinnamon/evergreen from your nose.
51 days for you to eliminate the PTSD when you see red and green in the discount bin.
51 days for you to not to gag when you smell turkey and/or ham.
51 days for you and your husband to start speaking to each other after that big fight over where Aunt Betty was going to sleep.
51 days for you to start speaking to your kids who fought nonstop with their cousins for 2 whole weeks.
51 days for you to start speaking to Uncle Al who not so subtly suggested you get your son "tested."

In short, it takes from Christmas Day to Valentine's Day to remember how and whom to love again.  Valentine's Day represents a way in which the Darwinian impulse to survive seeped into civilization.  We need a day to remind us to love those people around us.  We need to be reminded that without our parents who made us crazy, we would be left unprotected and die.  We need pink and white to remind us that our husbands weren't being passive aggressive when they "forgot" cranberry sauce at the grocery store 6 times as soon as he heard your mom was on her way.  Without sparkly cards and sappy poetry, we'd never forgive them, have make-up sex and perpetuate the species.  And we would die.  If not for the endearing popsicle stick and paper doily nursery school crafts, we would never want to take care of our ungrateful, ill behaved, 'when are you going back to school, go out and and play in the blizzard' children.  And, we as a species, would die.
Pink and white is a primal code in our brain to repair ourselves from the emotional and physical chaos of Christmas.  It is a holiday that resonates with our collective desire to love, despite the massive family dysfunction we all have.  Pink and white is an emotional band-aid.  A salve for the deep scars, both benign and neurotic that we all bear from spending the first 18 years of our lives with crazy people who we didn't choose as housemates.  Tacky chocolates and pastries are the panacea to our marriages with people we love, we chose and we still choose to love because they were unlike all others.  (Which, in hindsight might have been more of a symptom than an asset.)  Thus, the holiday serves as a sociological excuse to fulfill our genetic impulse to survive, our psychic need for love.