That's the Way I Roll

Okay, listen up! I'm gonna wake up at 7:22 every morning regardless of what time I went to bed the night before. Upon arising, I'll demand my first cup of "cogety milk" for the day. We'll forego any breakfast until I decide I'm hungry at which time I'll take an order of "faffles" or else you better be prepared to deal with a cranky toddler. You better make sure my cars are available to play with at all times and, oh yeah, Nemo should be playing on continuous loop throughout the day. Naps will be solely at my discretion. On the rare occassion that I do want to lay down, I better have some fuzz to pull or there will be no sleep for me and subsequently, you either. Bedtime will be when I collapse in sheer exhaustion and not before. I hope you're clear on all this, because that's the way I ROLL!

Midnight Rendevouz

About once every two weeks or so, Drew wakes up in the middle of the night. Either because his allergies have him stuffed up, or because I accidentally wake him up with the click of the light switch turning off his closet night light. Once he's awakened, he thinks he needs to get up.

People have told me to just let him cry it out and he'll learn to stay in bed, but I want him to know that he can come to me anytime, even during the night. After the heartache it took to conceive him and the odds we beat having him with us still, I have no problem bringing him into bed with me on occassion. In fact, I love it.

Laying next to me, his soft hand resting in mine, he has to have his right foot laying on my body somewhere. Around 4:00 am, after being kicked repeatedly in the boobs and elbowed in the nose a few times, I'm ready to take him back to his bed, but in the first hours when he is still and I can feel the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest and smell his clean hair, there's no place I'd rather be.

Number on the Wall

A submission for The Scheherazade Project

Life happens like that. You close your eyes to blink and in that instant, your world changes forever. I wonder if destiny really exists for all of us or are the events of our life orchestrated by the choices of others? I wonder what would have become of me if I hadn’t made that call. So many questions that can’t be answered in this lifetime, but it doesn’t stop a mind from wonderin’.

I remember the day vividly. My clothes clung to my skinny body in an uncomfortable wet hug. We didn’t have a car, so we walked the four blocks to Chums Diner. I should have been at school, but mom wouldn’t wake up that morning - still doped up on whatever she was able to get her hands on the night before. I waited in the cold apartment listening to my stomach growl, praying that she would open her eyes.

Finally, Mom began to stir. I held out the medicine bottle, the one she always asked for when her head hurt, and hoped she wouldn’t throw it at me. I knew she didn’t want to be mad at me, it was just her headaches that made her angry she would say. But now she smiled and told me to get my coat.

Other mornings I had to run to keep up with her, but this morning, Mom held my hand as we jumped over the puddles on the way to Chums. She slumped into a booth when we got there and I sneaked off to the bathroom. I knew Charlie would have a plate of French toast waiting for me when I came out. Charlie always looked at me with sad eyes -- like he knew something I didn’t.

In the bathroom, I saw a poster that I hadn’t seen before. I couldn’t read very well, not even for an eight year old, but I could tell by the pictures that the people wanted to help out mom’s like mine. I memorized the phone number. I didn’t read so good, but I could remember things.

I was tired of missing school and having no clean underwear. I was sick of always having an empty belly and dirty hair. I hated sitting alone on the playground on the days I did make it to school. I imagined a life like Brittney Brenner, always in pretty dresses with matching tights, her mother, thin and beautiful, volunteering at school. I wanted that life for me too and I wanted my mom to give it to me. I planned to call that number from Charlie’s phone when Mom fell asleep in the booth like she always did.

After I ate and Mom smoked a few cigarettes, her eyes started to blink slowly. I went up to the counter and asked Charlie if I could use the phone. He looked at me the way adults look at kids when they’re up to no good, but he handed me his phone anyway. I talked to a nice lady who said she’d help us out and told me to stay at Chums until someone came for me. I was so excited. Finally, my mom could be the mom I always wanted her to be. I knew she loved me, she just didn’t really know how to take care of me like other moms. Probably cause she didn’t have a mom herself.

It seemed like a long time, but finally an older lady came into the restaurant with a couple of cops and looked at Charlie. Charlie nodded toward the table where we were and they walked over to us. One police man put his hand around Mom’s arm and she jerked so hard that her knees hit the table underneath. She looked around nervously and then got real mad. She started yelling and swearing and when the police man tried to put both arms around her, she started hitting him and yelling even louder. Pretty soon, they were putting her in the cop car and the nice lady was holding my hand telling me everything was going to be okay.

But everything wasn’t okay. I went to live in someone else’s home that night. It wasn’t a home like Brittney’s and it wasn’t a home like I’d dreamed about. I didn’t get to see Mom again, she killed herself with a bed sheet they told me and I grew up a stranger in someone else’s house. I hate my mother. I miss her.

Was this my destiny?

This Old Life

I've been meaning to post the final pictures of the Blogarita weekend, but I have like zero time to do anything these days. When I do have time, Blogger doesn't want to cooperate and let me upload photos, so that post will probably sit in my dashboard as a draft forever. Along with numerous other unfinished posts.

I think I have mono. It hasn't been confirmed by a doctor or anything, but I had it once ten years ago and I feel pretty much the same way. There's no mistaking the pain in my throat. It's not like a sore throat that accompanies a cold, but more like my tonsils are being ripped away from the tender lining of my throat each time I sneeze or even swallow.

Fortunately for me, I'm finally almost finished with my massive tile job. I only have to grout the backsplash now and I'm out of there. I still have to go back up north to put windows in and install siding, but I'm not sure how I'm going to work that into the schedule just yet.

Cheerleading is winding down with only one game left and not having to deal with outside maintenance now that it's fall has been a big time relief for me. As life goes though, stress never settles down in one area without it ramping up in another. I'm technically, unemployed now. The mortgage company that I work for is closing up shop so I have 30 days to close whatever I have in my pipeline, which is admittedly very little in comparison with last year.

I don't think I would have sought out a career change otherwise, but now I'm contemplating a new job altogether. I submitted a resume to a local newspaper company with a very good reference from someone on the "inside". It's a full time salary on a part time workload which is right up my ally. Not that I'm lazy or anything, I just need time for my other avenues of income. I've been waiting for a week to hear if I'll have an interview and the call finally came today. Sometime in the next two weeks, I'll be called in for the process.

Who wouldn't want to hire a "Highly motivated sales professional with extensive experience in marketing and operations management. Superior organizational, communication and administrative skills to ensure efficient customer satisfaction."???? You'd hire that person, wouldn't you?

Time will tell.

Blogaritaville - Day 2 (Part of it anyway)

We were up earlier than any soul should be for going to bed at 2:30, but nonetheless, once Drew was awake, we were too. With the exception of Nelly, we all looked like shit. Sorry guys, but it's true. Puffy eyes, pillow case lines etched in our faces and hair askew. It was about this time that I realized the convenience of my earlier labors. I had cooked and frozen our breakfast days before, so all I had to do was pop it in the oven and then hurry myself into the shower.

Clew brought stuff for Mimosas, so we started the day off right. The breakfast of champions!

After breakfast we were on our way to yet another scrapbook store, but this time to work on a Halloween project. Here is a picture of Nelly and Chesney intent on their pages.

I know it doesn't seem like we should be eating again already, but we were hungry when we got back from the store and it really did take longer than it seemed to in this post. Lunch was chicken alfredo with garlic bread sticks. Me bending over the open dishwasher in the background is a nice touch, dontcha think?

You'll remember this post by Clew last week. This is the package she was talking about. She had the company deliver it to my house on Saturday. It was my birthday present -- two Willow Tree figurines. One titled "Sisters By Heart" the other, "Heart and Soul". The idea is that we'll each keep one and whenever we see eachother we swap figurines. Cool huh? Thanks sis. I love em!

Then Martie came over so we took some more pictures.

Then we scrapped again until it was time for dinner. Wet burritos and Mexican rice and a tasty black bean and corn salsa dip from Clew and a kind of chili conqueso dip from Ches. Both very delish.

And beer! CHEERS!!!

And finally, this was the lovely (aka butt crack) cake Nelly made for my birthday. Instead of cutting it we ate it like any group of well mannered ladies would.

Then the drinking and shenanigans began, which are best saved for another post......

The Weekend - Blogarita Style

Day 1 ~

I had lots of surprises planned for the girls but Clew surprised me by arriving early on Thursday night. We spent the evening chatting and catching up and dozed off in the living room around 1 am. Chesneygirl and Nelly arrived the next morning around 10 where squealing and hugging ensued. After some chatting we went to see Martie and drop off Drew and our weekend commenced.

Nelly took this picture from the backseat. Apparently, I must have been excited to get where we were going because she caught me going 60 in a 35 mph zone. This must be where her fear of riding with me began. The rest of the weekend, I heard the following statements from the back seat: "Dude, don't hit those people." "Stop sign coming UP!" "Do you know where you're going?" "We're gonna crash!" Etc. You get the picture.

Finally, we were at our first stop. Atlanta Bread Company where we got soup, salad and sandwiches. I had given gifts to the girls with clues as to where we were going for lunch and when we finished at ABC, I gave them their second package with a new clue. Then we headed to Pages In Time, a mega scrapbooking store in my area so we could get supplies for the weekend and then we stopped at the mall.

The trunk doesn't look too bad for a shopping spree but consider that we only spent an hour at the mall. We decided together to forego the movie and just have dinner so we made the short trip to On The Border for mexican grub and margaritas.

Notice my big ol drink and further notice that Nelly is sipping on two! After we were full and a little tipsy, we started back to my house.....

....where we scrapped....

....and ate some more.

Clew brought some cool M&M's to surprise all of us. Look closely at the wording on the candy.

We crashed in the living room around 2:30 that night and woke somewhat refreshed for the next day. To be continued.....

Blogarita

You may or may not know that Clew, Chesneygirl and Nelly were at my house for three days this past weekend and I intend to write in depth about it. Later. I know Blogger and Monday morning picture uploads are not a good combination. So check back later for a riveting tale of adventure and silliness.