Back in my olden days, when I was a teenager, I was an avid outdoorsperson.  Hiking and camping mostly.  I don't have much time or desire for hunting or fishing.  And it had to be nice outside.  If it dips below 65 at night you'll find me at home under a pile of blankets.

I'm sensitive like that.

I belonged to an Explorer Scout group all through high school.  I think they are called something else now.  Venture Groups?  Venture Posts?  Anyway.  It's a co-ed, "high-adventure" branch of the Boy Scouts (they also have programs for Police, Fire, and Rescue), and it was based out of the Nature Center at which I volunteered every Saturday morning from the time I was 12 until I was 18 or so.  I even went a few Saturdays during breaks in college, but I stopped when I aged out of it.  No one wants to be the creepy college kid, hanging out with highschoolers.

The Nature Center was small.  An old farm house converted into a gift shop, a little classroom, an animal room full of local critters.  Turtles and snakes and rodents, mostly.  A mean raccoon who lived in his own little house outside.  A skunk and some geese and a turkey, all not well enough to live in the wild.  From time to time we'd get injured animals that were found somewhere and we'd keep them until the Game Commission stepped in and found a placement for them.  We did a lot of nature hikes for scout groups and school groups and church groups that would come through on a Saturday morning.  Letting them touch the friendlier animals before taking them for walks and pointing out trees and plants and bugs and habitat kind of stuff.  There were big events, like the Maple Syrup Festival when we would boil down the sap from the tapped trees and eat pancakes and do crafty stuff with the little ones.  Smaller events like Owl Calling Nights in the summertime, snowshoeing in the winter.  Nothing major, but it was fun.  A few of my friends from school worked there too, and it was a great way to hang out without getting in trouble.  The Center was owned and run by the school district, so there was always something to do, and never a threat of having it taken away.  My dad worked there when he was a kid.  I went to Summer Camp there for a week each year when I was in grade school.  If I stayed in Erie, Jake would be involved in what is offered there.  That's the way it was there.  Generations of people just hanging out and enjoying a beautiful space they were familiar with.

This post is going in three different places right now.  I'm going to stick with the Nature Center.  Then I'll go back to the Explorer Post, then I'll get on to the third little piece of squishiness.  I'm having a hard time focusing today.  It's 800 degrees in my office because it's practically tropical outside right now and they must've shut the heat off for the long holiday and then cranked it up big time to warm the building before we got here.  I'm soupy.  I have one of those Hurry Up and Wait days in the office, where everyone needs info NOW but no one is around to give it to one another.  Social workers don't work in August and they don't work between Thanksgiving and New Year's.  We are always given huge amounts of time off but we never have time to take off.  So, the agencies that lose the time they don't use 90 days after the end of the fiscal year take it all in August.  The ones who lose it at the end of the calendar year take it off now.  Problem is, Social Work Administrators (hi! that's me!) need everything those times of year.  So, it's frustrating.  And now this post is in four different places.

Anyway, we went to the Nature Center and it was completely re-done and absolutely amazing and better than some of the zoos and learning places I've been to.  Because I still pack a tiny bit of pull there, Jake got the behind the scene tour and got to hold a bunny and touch a snake and stuff.  It was great having him there, even if it is nothing like I remember it.  We didn't get to go back on the trails because of the typical Erie weather, but maybe next time.  If you are in Erie and you haven't been to Asbury Woods lately or ever, please go.  It's really something to see.

And the Explorer Post.  That was amazing.  If they have something like that in your town, definitely look into it for the kids.  Hiking and backpacking and spelunking and white water rafting and rappeling and all sorts of outdoorsy stuff.  One time we camped with horses down in Kelletville right off Rt666.  It was amazing.  Pack up the horses and hit the trails, set up camp, sleep, and do it again the next day.  I remember watching the sun setting behind the ridge the horses were bedding on and it was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

We all got along and we all helped one another out.  Something happens on Day Three out on the Appalachian Trail that you just don't get hanging out in town.  Makes me want to reconsider my career, apply in Outward Bound.  That's what I would do, you know, if I wasn't a mom.  Did I ever tell you that?  I looked into it a few years ago.  The hours are long and the pay is low but man alive, is that ever what I want to be doing.  Maybe if I still have it in me when Jake leaves for college.

The Post was run by the Boy Scouts, yes, but it was totally devoid of anything Boy Scouty other than annual dues.  No badges or oaths or secret handshakes or gay bashing or anything like that.  And there were Athiests there too.  I remember wondering if the BSA caught wind that there were kids there who didn't believe in God they would shut us down.  I forgot to ask if the Post was still active.  It doesn't seem that it is, I can't find anything about it online.  Maybe that's why?

Do any of you allow your kids to be in the Boy Scouts?  I come from a Scout family, but I just can't see myself putting Jake in the Scouts.  I love most of what they do but hate their standards of admittance.  Is it wrong to hate haters?  Doesn't that make me one of them?  I guess to avoid being a hypocrit I'll say that I love most of what they do but I'm not tolerant of spiritual persecution and discrimination based on sexual preference.
I'm really big on freedom, and can't open my wallet or my son's heart to an organization that isn't.
Thirty years ago I don't think that people thought about things like that, but it's different now.  At least different under my roof.  Some people don't mind a little bit of something they don't agree with here and there peppered into their child's life.  I certainly don't, on a small scale.  But Scouts is such a huge part of who a boy becomes.  I just can't do it.
So what do you do with boys these days?  If the scouts are out, I guess we just send them to sports all year round?  Buy them an Atari or something and hope they don't get fat?

I really miss doing adventurous stuff, and I can't wait to teach Jake how to trailblaze and take care of himself out in the woods.  I got a taste of it out West this summer, but hardly.  We stayed in a hotel.  Jake is still a little delicate for anything that I want to do in nature.  And I hate half assing it in nature.  If there's a toilet?  I want no parts of it.  Maybe wait until he's five.

So, when I go (went, it's been one hundred years) camping, I leave (left) little altars, little place markers, little cairns to commemorate where I've been.  I gather pretty things from along the way and set them up nice at the end of the trip as a way to say thank you to the Earth for letting me be here, to show it what I love best about the place I stand.  I'm weird like that.

I think we as a species don't appreciate the ground we walk on nor the things we pluck out of it and off of it to shove down our throats.  I think we don't recognize the water we drink nor the air we breathe nor the beauty that surrounds us, even in the ugliest of times in the awfulest of places.  So I do my part to make sure that the Earth knows someone does appreciate and recognize and care.  I'm not hugging trees, or making sacrifices, or wearing hemp or anything.  But I take a moment with my planet every now and then and build a little something nothing out of nothing something as a way to say "I love you and I thank you for all that you have given to me and the people I love".

I took Jake to the park yesterday.  A typical City Park with a ground made of rehashed tires and play equipment that was probably donated with some sort of urban beautification grant.  There are some largish saplings and some overgrown and flowering bushes, par for the course.  Nothing special.

But to someone, it was:

I love things like this.
I love imagining little fists gathering the flowers and the rocks and the leaves and the pinecones and arranging them just so.  A head cocked in concentration, a pink tongue sticking out the side of a slightly parted mouth.

It's magic.

Friday afternoon, before I went to dinner, I picked up my brother and we drove over to the Old Folks' Home where my grandma lives.

I meant to go Wednesday, but I couldn't.  I wasn't ready.  Then Thursday, but I knew I wouldn't be staying for dinner and I couldn't look at my grandmother on Thanksgiving and either 1) pretend like it was a normal day and not mention the holiday and hope maybe she is too far gone to realize the truth; or 2) tell her Happy Thanksgiving and then leave her alone to eat whatever crap they were serving up while I went home and ate around the table with my family.  So Friday. 

Friday afternoon I went with my brother to see my grandmother.  I just realized that father, mother, and brother all end in "ther" and daughter has the 'h' and the 't' reversed at the end.  I smell a sexist conspiracy, one that doesn't even allow us girls a proper suffix until we spit out a baby.

My dad warned us that we wouldn't be recognized.  That she wouldn't be able to get more than two, maybe three words out.  That she might be violent.  Rude.  Mean.  He said that she wasn't herself.  That there was barely a glimpse of my Mimi in there anymore.  That she isn't sleeping and she is hopped up on morphine and has to be strapped down sometimes because she is so unpredictable.

I was ready for the worst. The worst has been haunting me for months.  Years, really.  I joke that my grandmother has been dying for the last dozen years.  It's only funny because it's true.  She just keeps pulling through. 

My dad told me not to expect much.
I didn't.

My dad was dead wrong.

When Brian and I got there, Mimi was sleeping.  Tiny and curled up.  Bed six inches from the floor because sometimes she forgets that she can't just jump out of bed and start her day each morning.  She can't weigh more than 80 pounds.  The end of the lumps under the covers not four feet away from the top of her head.  I know this is my fate.  I'm horrified of the days that arthritis has me crippled and curled.  It's starting already.  I'm shrinking.  I'm almost an inch and a half shorter than I was when I was married 10.5 years ago.  Mimi told me to remember my height and weight on my wedding day, that it will be important someday.  I pretend it's not inevitable.  I pump calcium in my body.  I stand up straight.  Stretch.  Strengthen.  Someday I'll be four feet small too.

Mimi was sleeping when we got there and I was relieved.  I was relieved I could leave a note and walk out.  Pretending she will believe me when I say that I'll see her soon and I was sorry I missed her.
I grabbed a notepad from the dresser.  The same notepad that I found a half written letter addressed to me last time I was there.  Mimi used to write to me three or four times a week when I was in college.  Two or three times during grad school.  Once or twice a month after that, after she moved into The Home.  She would clip coupons and crossword puzzles for me, comic strips that she thought were funny.  I wish I would have searched her room for her scissors on Friday.  I didn't even think about it.  I'll ask my brother to see about them next week.  They were tiny, smaller than haircut scissors.  Ever since I remember she's had them on the mantle, at the ready for anything that needed to be cut, and there was always something needed to be cut.  Sometimes Mimi would cut the flowers she liked out of the Burpee catalog and paste them on top of plain writing paper, making her own stationary.  You would never know twisted hands cut those flowers.  They were perfect.
One of the social work agencies I monitor is out in the suburbs, and the train station I use to get there and back is right across from the Burpee plant.  I was heartbroken when I saw it.  Just a huge industrial standard maize colored big old brick box of a thing sitting out in Warminster, Pa.  I'll stick to the catalog, thank you.

I grabbed a notepad from the dresser but couldn't find a pen.  I begged one off a nurse at the station, and wrote something like:
Hi Mimi!
Brian and I stopped by to see you but you were taking a nap.  We love you very much and we'll see you soon.
Much love,
Lora.
In perfect cursive, hardly my own but easily read.  Just in case she can still read.

Mimi woke up when we came back to put it by the bed.  She was thrilled to see us.  I don't think she said our names, but she knew right off who we were.  Asked questions about what we've been doing.  What we are studying.  She was confused a bit about the year, but we didn't correct her.  If she's happy thinking her grandkids are home from college, so be it.  I hate when people correct her.  Who gives a fuck?  Stop asking her how old she is and what year it is and what kid goes with what son.  My dad does that and it makes me furious.  Maybe that's why she's so volatile when he's there.  Let her enjoy the moment.  Let her feel loved.  Let her pretend times are good again.

Eventually it got out that we were done with school and she was so happy.  She laughed and clapped when we told her we were both graduated and working.  That we both had families.  That I own a home.

"We did it!",she said while clasping her hands and shaking them on either side of her face.  "We did it!", she said to the skies.  To her husband.  My grandfather who died nearly three years ago.
"You sure did!", we answered.

She couldn't stop giggling at the way we looked.  She couldn't believe that we were related to her.  She told us we were so good looking and she said she was so happy that her family isn't ugly.  Mimi always thought she was terrible looking.  She always said she was afraid that her children and grandchildren would be too. 

Mimi has lasted so long because she is afraid of death.  She said so to me.  She said so time and time again to Brian.  Her God is an angry one.  A vengeful one.  A Midwestern Methodist bastard terror of a Lord who has been waiting over ninety years to send her to hell because she wasn't good enough or smart enough.  Because she wasn't enough.  Because she fell in love with the wrong man and married him anyway.
It seems she has overcome that.  She told us that God has come to her.  That he comes to her often.  She touches the side of her head when she speaks of it, she puts her fingers to the spot behind her temple, above her ear. 
The "God Spot", the temporal lobe (Google it later, it's really interesting).  It's the part of the brain that lights up when people believe they are communicating with God.  When people are communicating with God.  Same difference, really.  Whether through prayer or meditation or whatever.  Go ahead and say a prayer/send out positive energy/meditate/whatever and pay attention to the inside of your head.  See?  Neat, right?  My ears actually perk.  My left one twitches.  I remember getting in trouble once in Sunday School for that.  The teacher thought I was trying to be funny by wiggling my ears.  But ears are just close to the part of the brain that fires during prayer.  I told her Jesus is doing it.  She didn't like that answer.  I didn't like her.

Mimi has no way of knowing that.  Mimi has made peace with God. 
And that gives me peace.

Mimi could only get four or five words out at a time before she started to slur, but it was enough.  I've known her since I was born.  She doesn't have to say much for me to know what she means, what she needs, what she thinks.  She told us that her brain is still working.  The thoughts and the memories and the words and all our lives are still up there.  They just can't come out the same way anymore.  That's okay because there isn't anyone around to listen anymore.  We've all grown up and moved away and created lives for ourselves.  And we are all happy.  My dad and one of his brothers see her now and then, she didn't ask about them.  My other uncle lives across the country.  I told her I was out there this summer.  I told her that he is happy and healthy and well.  That we are in touch.  I couldn't explain to her how.  That we both have blogs and we send emails to one another over the telephone.  That my phone is called a Curve and his is called a Droid.  That phones are called something other than phones and we hardly talk on them anymore but we are in touch now more than ever.  But she was so happy that we were in touch.  We always were her favorites.  Her first born son and her first born grandchild.  Add to that, I'm the only girl in the entire family.  She never spoiled me, but she made sure I always had everything a girl needs.  Including firm words about education and child bearing and independence and love.  Go, wait, ensure, deeply.  That is how I was instructed to do it.  I tried my best.  I think I did okay.  She's proud, anyway.

The last thing Mimi said to me was that she loves me.  And she needed a nap, she is tired and needs to rest often.  I told her to sleep tight, and leaned in to give her a kiss.  Her mouth went funny so she said no kisses so I gave her one right square on her God Spot.  She smiled and snuggled down under the covers.

That's probably the last I'll see her alive.  I have no plans to get up to Erie anytime soon.  I'm glad I got to tuck her in.  I'm glad she went to sleep smiling.  It's a nice way to remember her.

I went home for Thanksgiving.  Got there Tuesday way late at night and left Saturday morning.  So three days, really.  Plus two travel days.  It takes about six and a half hours to get there.

It might take a week to tell you all about it.  Not that it was eventful, really.  Ain't nothing much going in Erie, Pa this time of year.  The sun is long gone but the snow hasn't come yet.  Shame, I told Jake there would probably be snow.  Any other year there most likely would've been.  Then again, I don't think there was snow last time I was there for Thanksgiving either.  That was five years ago.  Jake was up there last year with my dad and his family, and there was tons of the stuff.  He even made his first big snowman.  I think it's neat when Jake does things for the first time with his grandparents.  Everything is better with grandparents, if I remember correctly.  Parents are always bringing you down by telling you to settle yourself and be quiet.

I'm going to work backwards, I think, in recapping the holiday. 
That's the way my brain works.

Friday night all the aunts and uncles and cousins (save for Cory and his wife, who live in St. Louis.  Cory is my only big cousin.  I'm the next oldest on that side and the oldest on the other side) and husband and boyfriend and girlfriends and the two babies piled into my cousin David's house with all the leftovers from the day before. 

Here's the girls.  We all have nice teeth and three out of four of us wear scarves inside the house.  From left to right, Aryn, my only blood related girl cousin.  She's the littlest one I've got.  I think there is five years between us.  Next is my niece Payton's mom Adrianne.  Then Amanda, my cousin David's girlfriend.  She has a little boy too, but I haven't met him.  He was with his dad for the weekend.  Then me there on the end.

It's weird that we are all so grown up.  That we are the kids, but we aren't kids and there is a whole nother set of kids that belong to us.  And there aren't any grandparents left on this side-my mom's side- and now my aunts and uncles and my mom are the old people, and we are in the middle, and our kids are the brats/rugrats/anklebiters/crumbsnatchers.  When did this all happen?  Ten years or so ago I guess, but I didn't notice it so much when it started.  When I'm thrown into it head first, it seems huge.

We kids-not-kids talk about real grown up stuff.  Taxes and death and mortgages and car notes and children and dogs and wellness and cancer and life and hairspray.  In the kitchen, in whispers.  In the living room, loud enough for everyone to hear.  We are included in the Big Conversations with our moms and dads.  We are the moms and dads included in the Big Conversations.  We aren't told to go play.  Or to "get outside and let the wind blow the stink off ourselves".  We sit at the table.  The dining room table.  A dining room table owned by someone younger than I.  We have 30 years of stuff to talk about and we rarely get around to what's happening lately.  Amanda and Adrianne are pretty new to the mix.  It's got to be boring/annoying/uncomfortable/wonderful to sit around and listen to stories about versions of people who they never knew, the same people who are sitting right in front of them.  Or maybe it's not.  I've never had to join into a new family like that.  I met Dave and his family when I was a teenager.  It's not quite the same thing.

I moved away from home when I was two weeks past 18.  Packed up all my stuff in pink and white Baskin Robbins Sugarcone boxes and moved across the state and never moved back.  I've never regretted it, but I'm awfully glad I can go home now and again to the people who knew me when I was 3 hours old and 3 days old and 3 months old and 3 years old and 13 and 23 and 33.

I'm always the last one to know about anything that happens on television. 
That's how I know I'm getting old.

Well, I heard about my boyfriend Adam Lambert making out with his bandmate on stage.  And the crotch grabbing and blowjay simulation and stuff.  But I didn't see it.

Until now. 

All hail the power of spare time and the internet. (click there if you haven't seen the performance).

Because I'm 75 days behind all current events, this post is probably worthless.  But anyway...

It's a little sexually charged, sure.  Okay, a lot.  But no more than any of the poptart teenaged sleezequeenprincess stuff that our baby girls have been listening to/emulating for the past decade.  Or more.

I think it's a sad state of affairs when it is practically okay for Britney and Christina and their contemporaries (Miley Cyrus is even pole dancing for the kiddos these days) to do these same things before they are even old enough for me to buy them a beer after the show but when a 27 year old man does these things flags are raised and whistles are blown and appearances are cancelled.

Remember The Kiss?
When Madonna, who was like 104 at the time, kissed Britney and Christina who were both in their early 20s?
Yeah, that was hardly shocking.
From Madonna, who invented it all when she sang Like a Virgin when she was 26 years old.
Or Britney, who was begging to be Hit One More Time before she got her driver's license.  She was a Slave 4 Us by the time she was 20.  And then things went downhill.
And Christina, who at least waited until she was in her early twenties to get Stripped and Dirrty.

If I had a little girl, which holy crap am I glad I don't have a little girl, I would be terrified that in 2009 it seems that sexuality is accepted and encouraged and portrayed in a horrifyingly positive light for young ladies but when a growedassed man does the same thing it is unacceptable and disgusting and appalling.

Poor Jake was born a boy and will never find an socially approved time in his life to be a flat out whore. 
Scales are tipped and things are so unfair in the world. 
If only he had a vagina, he could be grinding it in peoples' faces and getting paid for it in ten years' time.
Such is life.

LesboLolitas = yes
GayAntics = no

Got it.
I think.

Because the universe has a sense of humor, Alix mentioned me in her interview over on Clouds and Silvery Linings when she was roasted over there.  (Alix is awesome, by the way, and totally deserves to be roasted all the time)
So, when people clicked over from C&SLs, they landed on my post about how, despite being a good and loving person who cares about her fellow countrymen and her way of life, I don't say the Pledge of Allegiance.  What a way to make a first impression.  Oh, and one of my favorite things to do in life is call Barack a Brown Fellow and a Muslim because I think it's really funny that there are people who care that he is darkish and honestly believe he is Muslim, and if  you don't know me you probably don't know that I'm a huge Barack supporter, or that we know each other in real life.  Loosely.

Alix, I apologize if any of your readers came here and now think that you admire Crazy Leftists or Vehement Anarchists.  I'm neither.  Just ask me.  And thank you for saying that I'm "whip-smart, expressive, irreverent, kind, raw, brutally honest, naughty, and captivating".  A girl likes to hear/read that about herself every once in awhile.

I wondered if people would drop my feed because of that post.  Any time I share something about myself that pertains to some subject that most people wouldn't ever speak of aloud I lose a few.  Because, you know, I'm so incredibly controversial.  (ha!) 
I lost 6 this time around, at least.  I didn't monitor my Google Feed subscriptions all that closely, but by Saturday morning I was down 6.  I secretly like that.  It makes me feel important to know that one tiny piece of information will make people think about something angry.  But I was up by 11 today, so I feel like I'm in good company this afternoon.  Hello new people.  Welcome.  Please say hi so I can stop by your blog and get to know you a little bit better.  Thank you for being you.

Anyway, did you know you can check how many people are subscribed to your blog in Google Reader?  Click "browse for stuff".  Then "search".  Then type a keyword from your blog (usually your blog title, for me it's 'Jakezilla' because 'fever' is too general) and your subscription number will be displayed next to your blog title.  Neat, right?  Sometimes it's good to know that other people are listening.  Sometimes it's not.  If you subscribe to your own feed, you can just click on the "show details" tab up there in the right hand corner.  That will have your info too.  It shouldn't matter how many people are reading, really, but it's nice to know.

So, where was I?
Oh!

Magaly over at Pagan Culture clicked over from the Roast, read my post, and told me that she doesn't pledge either.  And she is a militarywoman.
I've heard of Magaly before.  I remember her name because I remember thinking that her name would be awesome if coupled with my last name.  I click over to her blog when I see her name (that-should-be-coupled-with-my-last-name-and-this-may-or-mayn't-be-a-marriage-proposal) in the comments because there is always something interesting over there.

I think that it is wonderful that someone so smart and pretty and kind and caring has a blog all about Pagan life.  I think that there aren't a lot of people who actually understand Paganism and how non-threatening and pacifistic and beautiful it truly is and if Magaly's blog can spread a little bit of tolerance and love in the world, then it's all good.
A few of you already know this, but I'm wildly obsessed with ancient Pagan traditions that are carried through in Christianity, so any time I can get my greedy little eyes on anything Pagan I can't say no.  I love researching the origins of the things we still do today.  I love thinking about the way life must have been 3000 years ago, and I love knowing that we are still doing and believing things that were done and believed then, albeit under different prophets' names and under different faiths.  Knowing we haven't come as far as we think we have really ties the ages together for me.  

I think it's really cool that the internet is like that.  That even though it is super huge I can stumble upon Magaly and she can stumble upon me.  I am pretty sure we all hover around each other in smallish groups.  It's a small world.  Even in the computer.  So small in fact, that one of my real life best friends is internet besties with Magaly!  I saw MJ's name in the comment section of Magaly's blog and got all warm inside.

It's a world of laughter
A world of tears
It's a world of hopes
And a world of fears
There's so much that we share
That it's time we're aware
It's a small world after all

There is just one moon
And one golden sun
And a smile means
Friendship to ev'ryone
Though the mountains divide
And the oceans are wide
It's a small world after all

All this to say, thank you Magaly.  Thank you for thinking that my blog is the best blog that you know about.  Sure you've only been dropping by for four days and four days from now you might feel differently, but right here right now you think I'm tops and that is pretty damned amazing and flattering and I'm going to end this post straight away and go outside and walk around with a huge smile on my face.

 ***

I hope that all of you have the Happiest and Heartiest and Healthiest of Thanksgivings.

I am so thankful that you guys are a part of my life and I'm a part of yours.  I'll be thinking of  you when I cram my face full of Whiteman's Bounty this weekend, wishing you were across the table and sharing the day with me.

I swear that the powers that be in blogging come through at exactly the right moments all the time.
I've been tossing a bunch of stuff around in my head lately about what to do with this blog and how to do it and how to stay happy amidst everything that was being tossed and how to/whether to even let people know that I would be changing things up around here and then all of a sudden Scrambled Jill from Jillie Side Up gave me the Honest Scrap award.  I love this award more than anything because I get a chance to lay ten very heartfelt things right out on the table and no one can say boo about it.

If you aren't reading Jillie Side Up already, please start.  Jill is so brave and so smart and she seems to work really hard to find happiness in her life.  There needs to be more of that in the world.  Jill lives in Colorado, again.  She and her husband up and moved to ElDiego earlier this year.  First Jill, then her husband.  Then they didn't like it.  So they moved back. 
You can always turn around, you know. 
That's why it's called home.
That's what home means.

So here it is:

And here we go.  In ten steps, this is my inner blog torment of late:

1.  You may have noticed that my email connected to my blog and your comments has changed.  My Blackberry is tied into my Gmail account, and my Gmail account was tied into my blogger account.  Every time I got a comment or an email regarding a post or an email response to an email I sent or a post I commented on my Blackberry would beep.  Well, ChiGong chime.  It was just too much.  Especially while I was playing with Jake or doing work at work or trying to find a moment's peace. 
My real world life was being interrupted by my online life and that was a little too much "I live in my mother's basement and play things that were inspired by Dungeons and Dragons" me.  So I have all bloggy stuff falling into a yahoo account that is not tied to my Blackberry or my Gmail.  My new email bills me as Lora Neely.  That's my first and middle names, and I think I've gotten more "OMG! why didn't you tell us you finally got married!"'s and divorcey sort of "I know what that's like and I'm sorry" consolations in the past two weeks than regular emails.  Thank you for your well wishes, but things are the same as always at home, just not so much on the email. 
I'm also trying to separate my last name from the blog.  People love to Google people.  I know this because I love to Google people.  With Jake getting older and going to school in the next few years and me and Dave having jobs and all, I figure that it's best to save people we know from reading all this crap.  Our last name isn't very common so once you have us pegged, you know you've got us.

2.  I have to cut down the time that my Current State of Blogging eats.  I've tried a few different ways of doing this. 

3. Not posting every time the spirit moves me was my first attempt.
And it works.  And I usually get things sorted out in my head by the end of the day.  Because the things I talk about here aren't usually the things I talk about in life, things have to get sorted out in my head.  There isn't any feedback about these things, and I end up working around and through these things rather than with them (if that even makes sense, but without other people's input, I have to do it all on my own and only with the tools I keep in my brain) but it works.  Mostly.
But it doesn't make me happy.  So I'm almost back to posting as needed, but I just can't find the time to do this.  It's a horrible cycle.

4. Not responding to the comments people leave on my posts was another.
This happened accidentally, when I posted about something that I just wanted to get out and move away from.  Something that hurt too bad to revisit 40 times then 30 times then 20 then however long people kept up the email string that started with their comment and my reply.
But this doesn't make me happy either.  I love the relationship I have with my readers.  Some of them are more intense than others.  It's a giant two way street where there is a lot of headbutting.  A lot of love.  A lot of contradiction.  A lot of headnodding.  A lot of teaching.  A lot of learning.  A lot of support.  That's why I've kept this blog up for so long.  Because I really appreciate that.
But it takes a lot of time.  Less now that I've transferred to a new email address because I only check it when I want and when I can.  Oh, and if you don't have an email tied to your profile and I don't have your email?  Sometimes I go to your blog and comment on your last post, but sometimes I don't.  It's really hard for me to get to an actual URL from work sometimes due to filters and stuff and it's a rare thing for me to use my home computer.  But whether or not I reply, I do read and absorb and love every comment left- good bad or indifferent.

5.  I tried cutting down on the amount of blogs I read.
This helps immensely.  I cut out the news feeds and the funny pictures and the mindless junk that I subscribed to because I needed news feeds and funny pictures and mindless junk at a certain point in my life.  Now I don't. 
So I cut it down to people who I know in real life and people who read my blog.  This group isn't a perfect overlap, which is okay.  I know plenty of people in real life who have a blog but don't know that I do.  I know plenty of people in real life who have a blog and have absolutely zero interest in wanting to read what I have to say here but I like their blog.  And there are a few people who read my blog but I have absolutely zero interest in wanting to read what they have to say on theirs.  Not because I  hate it, but because I have no use for info on the newest and latest tech gadgets or product giveaways or movie reviews or whatever.  It's a way to save time.  It was hard for me to do at first, because I feel like if people take the time to read my blog, I should return the favor.  But you know what?  I don't.

6.  I stopped reading blogs when I should be doing something else.
Like working.  Or blogging.  Or relaxing.  Or cleaning.  Or hanging out with my number ones.
Most of my blog reading is done in the middle of the night when I can't sleep and I don't want to get up and do something constructive or watch television or turn on the light to read a book or lie there in silence and listen to my head.  So I rev up Reader on my Blackberry and read.  I'm awake two or three hours in the middle of the night four or five nights a week.  That's a solid 8-15 hours of quality time I can spend with your words.
Commenting from a Blackberry takes way long, so I usually don't. 

7.  I've cut down on the number of comments I leave.
This does two things (three if you count making other bloggers feel unloved).  One, it cuts down on the amount of emails that I get as replies to comments I leave.  Two, it saves both me and other people time because I'm not taking time to leave a comment.
If something huge happens to someone, I keep the post unread and go back when I can to comment from a real computer or I shoot a quick email from my phone.  That's easier.  I feel kinda shatty for doing that because everyone who's anyone knows that comments are better than email, but sometimes you need to get a message through and you gotta get it through ASAP.

8.  I'm talking to other bloggers to see what they do and how they do it without feeling overwhelmed.  Like, sitting down and talking.  Whether post every day or every month or you get two comments or 200 on every post, it takes time and effort and brains and heart to keep up a blog.  I want to know how other people do it.  So I ask.  Face to face.  Most recently over margaritas and beers and flourless chocolate cakes.  Sometimes over coffee.  Or spaghetti.  Or lunch.  Or more coffee.  And so on and so on.  And I learn.  And I borrow ideas.  Or I shake my head because there is no way that would ever work for me. 
Blogging is one of the most socially active lonely activities that I've ever done.  It's weird, and after years and years of it I'm still having trouble adjusting.

9.  I talk to people who have all but quit blogging how and when and why they are all but quit blogging and they say that it was just time.  That everything runs its course and when the course is run it's best to step back and move on, no matter how hard it is to do.  I think about that a lot.  And had almost decided that maybe today's post would be my all but last and then I say good bye and I love you to a friend I met through blogging and she says "goodbye and I love you too and you know, you've really changed my whole entire life" and it all clicks that maybe this hasn't run its course yet for me and I should stick around for a little while.
Because sometimes you can change someone's life by suggesting they maybe have a few friends over for spaghetti every now and then. 
And sometimes other people change your life by coming over to your house for spaghetti every now and then. 
And sometimes people you don't know and who don't know you change lives by having their friends over for spaghetti every now and then. 
And it happens all over the area, then all over the country, and then people from overseas send you an email and thank you for suggesting that they phone a few friends and put on a pot of water every now and then.
And it all seems worth it all of a sudden.

10.  I don't talk much about it here, but I started this little huge thing called Wednesday Spaghetti.  It started in my kitchen over a year ago, me and my girls and some babies and a pot of water, a pound of noodles, and a jar of sauce.  It went over so well that I told some other people about it.  And they had their own and it worked so well that they told some other people about it.  And they had their own...
My goal is to become a real live and functioning non-profit.  In Name and EIN and all that we actually are, I just need to find the time to get the ball rolling and the word out. 
Find The Time.  See, there's that little huge thing again.  Time.
If you are interested in holding  your own WedSpags, let me know and I'll get you hooked into the blog.  Everyone is always welcome.

So that's ten.  I feel better getting that stuff out.
Thank you for bearing with me.  That couldn't have been all that interesting.
Long story short?  Posting/writing is my priority.  That's why I started this blog, that's why I keep it up.
The friendships that have grown out of my posts and the blogs I read are priceless, but not as valuable as time spent in the real world.  I will do my best to keep them up, but not every day.  Hell, I don't talk to my own mother every day.
I had such high aspirations for what I wanted Wednesday Spaghetti to be by now, and I'm failing at meeting my own goals.  It's time to start digging in and making things happen.  I truly do feel that it is an amazing and special thing that has changed my life, and I know for a fact that it is changing the lives of others.  I want that to be bigger.

you don't know how lucky you are, boy

There is a little boy who has made it onto the nightly news because he refuses to say the pledge because it is chock full of bullshit.  Hooray boy!
I'm so proud of you.  You little gaywad (his words, not mine.  But I'm using them here). 
Go on with yer bad self.
You give me hope that my own kid might grow up to be a loud mouth little fucker, raising hell and taking the world by storm. 
One hokey tradition at a time.

I don't say the pledge either.
I haven't in probably twenty years.
Not once since middle school fo sho fo reals.
Why?
Let's break it down.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America.
If I'm pledging the allegiance to anything it certainly isn't going to be a symbol.  My allegiances are more valuable to me than a piece of stupid cloth, no matter how red, how white, how blue, how stripey, how spangled.

And to the republic for which it stands:
Give me a green card and about two grand and I'm out, babies.  If Canada wasn't so cold I'd be there next week.  Drive up to my mom's for turkey and just keep on going.  If Mexico wasn't so, well, Mexican, and like- poor and stuff, I'd be wearing a poncho.  And Europe is expensive and it's hard to get a job.  Then there is the whole thing now that I'm a mom, and I don't want to take Jake so far away from his extended family (read: I like having babysitters all over the place).  But I have no allegiance to this country.  It's where I live.  I can move anytime.  It's a free country.  I can do what I want.
I'm not going to move anywhere icky or anything of course.  But there are lots of places out there where I wouldn't sacrifice much and would gain a few really nice things.

One nation, under God
Did you know this part was added in 1954?
And originally "the flag of the USofA" was "my flag" but it was changed in 1923 because Amerikans didn't want all those filthy stupid immigrants to think that they could still pledge allegiance to their homeland flags.  Because they are so dumb they'd have no idea that the pledge meant that they were pledging to America.

To me, saying "under God" excludes people who call their Big Guy something other than God.  Maybe they should have said One nation, under skies.  That makes sense to me.  Then the Buddhists and Muslims and Jehovah's Witnesses and Pagans and Wiccans and Taoists and Atheists and Agnostics and everyone else could say it without lying to themselves. 
Plus, hello!  Separation of Church and State? 
Did you know that isn't in the Constitution, btw? 
But it's still an important part of our nation.
And I'm all for it, now that there's that brownish Islamic fellow in office.  What if he doesn't abide by the separation and he starts putting his Muzlam crap all up in my state?
What about that?
Pretty soon we'll all be like:
"One nation, under Allah."

indivisible
Ha!  We are split like peas in seventeen different directions.
But I secretly like that about us.
It keeps us on our toes, fighting the good fight.

with liberty and justice for all
This might be the biggest line of chewing gum that I've ever read/said in my life.
There's liberty, sure.  I live in the cradle of it.
And justice.  From time to time.
But not for all.
Not even for most.
Not for women or people of color or homosexuals or people of ethnic or religious minorities or children or immigrants or animals or tourists or or or.

And don't you just want to say Amen at the end of all that?  I always do.  Once I did.  In seventh grade.  No one important thought it was funny. 
Like the teacher.
Everyone else chuckled.
Or gasped.
I spent the durations of announcements in the hall. 
Because that was punishment.  Not to be able to listen to Dr. Cuzzola tell us about the pep rally on Friday or that there was going to be masheds instead of tots today.

I pledge allegiance to a lot of things.  My family.  My friends.  My beliefs.  My practices.  My job.  The people who fight every day to keep us safe.  Their family.  Their friends.  Their beliefs.  Their practices.  Their job.
We aren't defined by three colors.  By a pattern that fits into a rectangle.

I'm not so much about the word "republic" but I'm game when it comes to "community".  I like microcosms.  We can't all live off the macro.
We just can't.
Sorry.

A few nations have my heart.
America isn't all that special. 
There are worse places, but there are places where I think I might be happier.
There are places I've been happier.

I like the under skies idea.  I came up with that one day when I was grounded.  I was probably 13 or 14.  Grey skies, clear skies, cloudy skies, heavy skies, bright skies.  All skies.  We are always under one.  Why not make it official?

We have to be divisible. 
Otherwise?  Communists.
Suck that, jerks.

With liberty and justice for more people than liberty and justice is doled out to on a regular basis.  I really want that.  I'm not sure what I'd do for a job if we had it, but I'd gladly take a career change if it meant that everyone was treated as valuable equals.

I stand up for the pledge, btw. 
And if there are soldiers or veterans in the room, I'll put my hand over my heart.
For them. 
Not for America.
I think the hand over the heart is a little bit kinda Hitlery.
But I don't say it.
The pledge, I mean.
I don't always tell people that they look like fascists or Nazis or whatever standing at attention with their hand on their boob and the other straight down at their side.

Mgmt,

I thought that I wanted this for Christmas, but I found out that it's over an inch long.  This is the same problem I had with the key necklace I wanted for my birthday.  Or was it Mother's Day?  I forget.  It's always I want, I want, I want with me.  Anyways, for Christmas I think that I want Tiffany to stop making everything that goes around ones neck so darned big.  Some of us have freakishly small necks and we don't really want to draw further attention to that fact.
I like these earrings, but I really wanted a tiny little snowflake to wear around my neck from November 1-sometime around Easter.

Ikea has these comforters with different warmth ratings.  I want one in every rating because I'm a very temperamental person and I need them all.  I'd like to start with a Rate 1 and keep piling up the blankets as the weather gets worse.  You know what the bad thing about having a nice warm bed is?  Getting out of it.  I hate mornings when I go from a cold bed to a cold world.  Maybe this blanket idea isn't such a hot one.

I need a new watch. I was telling Dave that maybe he could get me a new watch for Christmas (his gift, btw?  Totally kickass.  I have to leave it at work so I don't give it to him before Christmas day), but I only like men's watches and I've been trying really hard to stop buying men's clothing and accessories for myself, so maybe he could pick me out something nice.  From the women's department.
And you know what he did?
He laughed at me.
He laughed so hard that snots almost came out.  It was like a guffaw that shook his whole body.
Mostly because I was dressed like an 85 year old man.  A well dressed 85 year old man, I might add.
What?  I like khakis and vneck sweaters.  They are comfortable.
I took a look at watches today at Macy's and I only saw one I like.  I know, I know.  It's a man's watch.  But the women's are all so dainty and fragile looking.  I love Skagen watches.  If you've never had one, you should run out and buy one immediately.  They are very slim, and that's important to me.

I want a new telephone number.  I get calls all the time for someone else.  I've had this number for ten years.  Right now I'm trying to convince some guy who has texted me before with angry stuff toward his babymama that I'm not his babymama.
Him: I hve paid my debts in full with life I see nw hw dumm i hve bin  that's all I hve to say I just wanted u to knw this.
Me: who's this?
Him: Lxxghtxn Grxnt
Me: Sorry, wrong number
Him: Play as u want want this is your ex husband ps I will need to start seeing my kids again so jus to let u knw dat u will get a le
Him:tter in the mail to see dishon indi gabby ok goodnight
Me: I really don't knwo you.  You have the wrong number.  I've had this number for ten years.
Me: You've texted me vefore and I've told you that you had the wrong number.
Him: Ok pxtrxcxx jxhn
Me: Check the number dude.  Call it and listen to the voicemail.  I'm not your ex.
Hiim: Oh n this time the kids coming to c me at my place nt yours so pretend u dnt knw me u broke the court oder.
Him: Sorry u right my bad.  I am so sorry.  lol wrong number :-)
Me: No problem, I just didn't want you getting so mad when there was a mistake.  I get calls and texts for someone else all the time. Not sure why.
Him: Again I'm sorry.  I missed a number, sorry :-[
Me: Again, no problem.  Have a good night.  Good luck with all this.  Nothing worse than custody fights.

Trust me I know, my brother and I were tossed around like
like
like
all I can think of right now are those trout that the fishmongers toss to one another and wrap up in newspaper and sell to people.

I want a pair of black Chuck T hightops, size 5s.  My green ones are wearing out.  My brown ones don't go with my grey and black clothes. 

What I really really really want?  I've been saying this for a dozen years now and I've never done it because the weather is always so cold that I run home and put on my pajamas and pour myself a cup of Wawa Eggnog (goose pus) and say "maybe next year" every year but this is the year it's going to happen.  I can feel it. 
I really really really want a Christmas Eve carriage ride around Old City after dark.  Complete with thermos of cocoa and a plaid lap blanket.

Holy crap, Thanksgiving is a week away?
Holy crap, Thanksgiving is a week away!

I knew it was coming, but it really snuck up on me.  It was like this thing that was sometime in the future, but it's been so warm here (I have yet to wear a winter coat) and the birds are still singing and the flowers are still in bloom and lots of trees are still green and no one decorates with turkeys anymore, people just go from Jack o'Lanterns to wreaths out front, that I didn't realize it was next week.  And today is already Thursday.

I am really excited for this Thanksgiving.  More on that later.  But thinking about this Thanksgiving makes me think of my favorite Thanksgiving, which seems like a hundred years ago but only yesterday all at one time.

Read all about it here. 

I promise that this blog isn't going to be just a bunch of backlogging, but my heart is all smiley thinking about that day.

Did you  know that when I was little Thanksgiving was my favorite holiday?
Who was the fattest girl you ever knew?
I was.
That's right.

There was a blog post or article or something floating around a couple years ago, about the lies we tell our kids.  Some of them cute, some of them controversial, some of them spiritual in nature.  Some were to protect them, some were to scare them, some were things that we tell our kids to shut them the hell up.  The last "lie", and I'm not sure of the direct quote, was something like:
I'll always be here for you.

Of course we won't always be there.
Whether it's because we are in the other room tending to the stove/the baby/ourselves/the wash or whether we are at work or whether it's because parents can't live forever, we won't always be there.

I try not to tell this lie, but I want to.  I want to really really badly.  I want to take Jake in my arms and kiss him a thousand times and tell him that I'll always be there, right beside him, no matter what.

But that's not true.  I'm not even right beside him now.  I can get to where he is in twenty minutes.  Ten if I had to.  But I'm not right there beside him now.  Always means always.  Not usually or sometimes or often or whenever I can.
I am very careful using the words 'always' and 'never'.  They hold great power.

I tell Jake that no matter where I am or who I'm with I live every minute of my life for him and thinking of him, and I promise to do that as long as he needs me to and as long as I can.
That's the best I can do.

***

Following up on yesterday's post, it seems that the Santa is Satan thing might not be as prevalent in the whole wide America as it is here.  I thought maybe I was just sheltered from it as a kid.  Turns out that maybe it's a local thing, like cheesesteaks or something.

Philadelphia is funny.  We aren't Southern, but there are a lot of what might be considered Southern Conservatives around these parts.  Not so much in the city, but around the city.
We don't have a Religious Right here in town as much as a Religious Left.  Boy do I love the Religious Left.  People who believe in (insert faith of choice here) and want to use their beliefs to help people despite their race, color, creed, sexuality, religious beliefs, ethnicity, marital preferance/status, and economic status?  People who don't want to change any of those variables?  Oh bliss.  But religion isn't really what this is about.  It's tolerance, respect, and openness.
But those uber-conservatives, who tend to lack tolerance, respect, or openness? I swear they bring them in by the busloads just to annoy me.  I hate being told what to do, how to live.  Especially by some weird yokel who has a very limited world view that adheres to a certain set of silly rules and disdain for humanity and who homeschools their children and feels that a basis to a well rounded curriculum includes dragging the brats downtown to rallies and protests outside of public offices and medical centers and stores who have practices they don't agree with.  (Must add here that I'm quite sure the people who don't want me shopping at Macy's probably shop at Wal*mart.  Wal*mart is really popular with this set.  Wal*mart is one of the most corrupt and evil places in the world.  But everything is so cheap! Of course it is.  At the expense of underprivledged overseas workers.  But they are workers!  The aren't real people!  They are poor, and foreign,  with tiny little eyes, and they don't take baths.  They are like animals.  Right.).  So, Christmastime brings out the Antisantas, just like Obama's visit brought out the Antiabortioners.
My patience is zero for people like that.  As you probably know.
I can respect that people don't want their kids believing in Santa, and I even understand it.  I certainly respect and understand people who don't approve of abortion.  But I don't respect people who can't respect me and my choice.
Why can't we all just get along?  Keep our views and beliefs and practices on our blogs and in our homes?  Wouldn't that be nice?
Okay, I'm done talking about this.  For now.

Note to the people gathering en masse to ruin my day by trying to change me:  I am much more open to listening to an opposing opinion if it is written down nicely or discussed over a cup of coffee than I am for someone to get in my face all crazy like.  And if we can sit down and do this like grown ups, there is more of a chance for  you to get me to sway a bit in my thoughts and actions.  I'm not made of marble.  There is room for change and improvement and shifts of all sorts.

***

Wait now, what is this post about?  Lying.  Right.  To your children.
I do lie to Jake.  I keep truths from Jake.
We are a very science-minded family.  Dave and I tell Jake that there are few things in life that are absolutely true.  The earth moving so the sun looks like it comes up and the earth moving so it looks like the sun goes down each day is pretty reliable.  1+1=2 and A comes before B all the time.  We love him more than anything no matter what.  Those things he can be certain of.  Everything else gets a bit blurry and twisty and faded.
We preface most non-concrete things with:
"well in this house we... but other families do things differently"
"I'm not sure, but..."
"in most cases... but sometimes that changes"
"some people... and others... and I... and daddy/mommy... and when you get bigger you might do something different than all of us and that's okay."

We do not teach him that one set of beliefs (about life and love and death and dislike and faith and hope and beauty and horror and art and science and math and politics and and and) is right and another is wrong.  We teach him that everyone is different and no one is right and no one is better and no one is wrong and no one is worse.
A lot of my friends, a lot of my family, believe that this is a lie.  That there is a right set of beliefs and there is a wrong set and we are doing a very bad bad thing by telling Jacob these things.
But that is the truth in our hearts, that is the truth in our house.

We tell him to be careful because not everything nor everyone is good.  He needs to know that.
But if there are things that I have to sugar coat for now and if there are things that I have to breeze over and things that I have to wait a year or ten to explain then so be it.
And if there are things that I add into the mix to make the world a more magical, beautiful, wonderful place for my baby then so be it.

spinning

I've had a day full of icky babies and the kinds of kids with the kinds of faces that make your genitals shirk back in fear of creating something repugnant if you use them for anything other than peeing, but I've already written about that kind of stuff here several times.  So I won't bother you with it again.  I particularly love this ugly baby post that I did what seems like a thousand Novembers ago.

I really have a problem with gross things.  People included.  I really don't know how I've made it so far for so long in the helping profession.

Actually I do know.  It's easier to do your job when your output target isn't all fuzzy warm warm like a puppy or a cashmere scarf.

***

And there is Santa talk all over the place, and I'm sick and tired of defending the choice to let Jake believe in Santa Claus. 
Seriously, it's Santa. 
We aren't pulling the heads off of chickens or boiling down newborns to make yuletide candles or anything.
I love that my kid believes in magic.
I love that my kid makes me love Christmas again.
That, my friends, is magic.

Sometimes when those crazy people stand outside of Macy's shouting how terrible it is for me to shop there because Santa is inside and he is evil and Jesus will show me the light, I suggest for them to get off the streets and take their little creepy children of the corn minion kids that always seem to get dragged to the protests to school and that Jesus told me that he hates people who hate people who like to have a little fun now and then.
And guess what else?  If they don't leave me alone and continue to shove madness down my gob, I tell them politely that thank you, but I choose to sit around the tree and tell my child the story of The Santa but all I tell him about The Jesus is that he was a guy who wants everyone to love and respect and help each other No Matter What and yelling at me on my way through the doors of a department store isn't going to change that. 
Jacob's three. 
He doesn't need the full story, which includes blood and condemnation and crosses and hellfire and judgement.  He doesn't understand believing in something he can't touch or taste or feel or shake hands with. 
Maybe when he's four.
And Jesus is totally down with that.
He told me so when he was explaining to me that his birthday isn't really in December anyway, that was just a way for his followers to forcibly and sometimes violently coerce people of different faiths to join up with the Christians. 
He didn't like that so much, by the way.
Jesus is more of a "let's sit down and toss back a few while we watch the game" kinda guy.  Not a "join me or die a firey and eternal death" guy.  He thinks it's sad that it has all become warped and twisted over the years.

First of all, those people don't know me or what I believe in.  I could be a nun in street clothes for all they know.  A minister.  A leader in the anti-Santa revolution.  Who are they to tell me I can't get a pair of tights or an eyeliner or to run a licked finger over the expensive shoes?
Second of all, leave me the hell alone.  Trust me when I tell you that you aren't doing Jesus' work by standing on 13th and Chestnut.
Third of all, suck it.

I get all riled up about this stuff.  As evidenced here.  Years ago.

***

Oh yeah and ugh.  Jake doesn't stay in his room at night for anything these days.  I'm worried about him falling down the stairs.  Or tripping over something in the hallway.  Cracking his head open in the bathroom.  Then he's taken to creeping in my bed about 3 or 4 am, which I secretly love because there is nothing in the world better than a cuddly 3.5 year old, but I secretly hate because I don't want to have a family bed for the next ten years. 

I'm such a deep sleeper that sometimes he scares the crap out of me when he sneezes/cuddles/farts/kisses/moves/snores and when I get scared out of sleep sometimes I get a little punchy and I'm afraid I'm going to rail into his cute little face one of these days.

Sleep is so dicey right now thanks to the clock change/upcoming holidays/work load that I start thinking of it around noon, which is about an hour after I've totally woken up from the night before.

Seems that every November sleep is plaguing me, but not in the way I want it too.

***

I start to get very excited right before the holidays about what I can teach Jake about the holidays we celebrate (or don't) and what kind of traditions we might start together in the coming years.  I keep thinking that if I just sit down to a blank post, I can get it all down and straight in my head, but it turns out that I've already done that here already.

***

When you've been at this blogging thing for so many years, it's funny/sad/weird/neat to see that the same stuff bounces around and around in some strange cyclical manner and every year is just a little bit different than the last but not so different and that is really nice and comforting because no matter what happens in between the big things, the little things are always there.

Old reliable.  That's me.

Makes me wonder what the heck is left to write.

There's been a lot on my mind lately.  Little stuff.  Big stuff.  Weird stuff.  Sexy stuff.  Happy stuff.  Maddening stuff.

If I had the chance to do so, I probably could have pounded out 3000 word posts every day since that last one, but instead I stewed over everything while I went about my business and now all my headthings are organized nicely and could probably be summed up in two or three sentences.

So, while that might be better for all involved- me making a long story short- I think I'll just drop it all and pick it up later.

Sometime when I've had time to let it all get big and weird and sexy and happy and maddening again

***

You know how I've said before that people that see me around in real life after getting to know me here are always shocked about how normal well-mannered quiet normal I am?
I totally thought of all you guys last night at the bar.

I was about an hour early to my improv class last night, and I thought I'd go in and watch someone do something arty.  There's always something.  Be it improv or dancing or acting or singing or whatever, there's always something going on.  Last night I was out of luck.  The front doors were locked and the side door was gated closed by the people in there.  It was some sort of secret French ESL class or something.  Who knows.  In any case, I wasn't invited.

So, I went to the neighborhood bar

And asked the guy behind it for a High Life.
And he said no
Then he said he was just kidding, that he likes to kid, that he wasn't working that night but the bartender would be right over
But then she wasn't so he gave me my beer and asked me if I was new there, introducing himself as Frank the Owner.
"No, I've been here plenty, just at odd hours."
"Do you live around here?"
"No, I'm taking a class over at the art center but I'm locked out."
"Oh, so you want to be a painter?"
"No, it's an improv class"
"A what?  Oh, you are a stand up comic?  Let me hear a joke.  I like to tease people.  I'm only teasing you.  Are you a stand up comic?  Can I get a joke?  Do you have an act somewhere?  Can I come see you on stage?"
"No, I'm not"
"Yeah, I didn't think you were.  I've been around a long time, honey, and let me tell you what.  You ain't gonna make it in that business.  Sorry, but I know that business.  I know it well.  Girls that look like you and act like you don't get very far in comedy.  You're too nice.  You're too quiet.  You're so... good.  I have two daughters.  One is meek like you are, kinda looks like you too.  The other one is strong and loud.  She's big.  That girl can go places."

Now, I could have argued, but he's a middle aged greaseball who wears undershirts with pit stains as regular shirts over filthy jeans and chainsmokes while he works.  At a bar.  Doing nothing.  He thinks his giant obnoxious daughter is gonna hit the big time.  She probably works at the bar.  Chainsmoking and watching television from in front of the light up vodka display, wondering if she can get her GED sometime before she turns 40, which is probably soon.
And if there is one thing I know about dudes like that, is they are best ignored.
Sure I could have spoken up, defended myself, told a joke, but then I'm forever the crazy desperate chick who stopped in for a beer before class.
There is nothing more revolting than a girl who flips the eff out at something that's nothing worth fighting for.

Telling someone who deems me too pretty and nice to be funny that I'm not too pretty nor too nice to be funny is only going to run us all in circles.
It has nothing to do with me being meek or mild or quiet.  I just don't fight with retards.
It's unethical.
Also?  I'm not the kind of person who performs on demand.
I'm too pretty for that.
That's what monkeys do.

I should probably tell you, just for reference, that this guy? this guy is accidentally and indirectly famous.
On television and everything.  Yep.
I think he thinks that he hit the big time by being loud and obnoxious.
Maybe that's why he thinks he knows the inz of the biz.
And maybe he does.
As much as someone portrayed as a five foot tall sociopathic gun-toting gambling drunk and a terrible father might.

Well played, Frank.  Well played.

Four and twenty

I could get a million awards and I'd still get that total Miss America hands-to-face "ohmygod!  I can't believe it!  Is that really my blog linked here? I had no idea!" feeling I get whenever it happens.

There is nothing like opening up my Google Reader first thing in the morning and seeing fever on someone else's feed.  It's so weird.  Usually I get pissy like someone else has a blog named fever so I click on it thinking I'll land on something awesome that I'll just absolutely hate out of spite and find myself standing there at the other end.

It's un-nerving.  Every time.

Have you ever had your makeup done by a superstar makeup artist who doesn't let you look in the mirror until it's all done?  And then you can't stop staring and trying to find some semblance of yourself in there somewhere? 
Or gotten pictures developed (as if, who does that anymore?) and you see someone cute in one of them and it takes you a realize that you are that cute someone?
It's kinda like that.
I can't get used to it.

***

My first one comes from Brndoutw8ress at Confessions of ME.  I found her a month or so ago and when I read a few posts I was completely blown away by what was there and I couldn't figure out why she only had a few readers.  Then I looked at the archives and realized that it's because she just started blogging.  There's nothing that I love more than a good tell-all.  And this is a good tell-all for sure.

As always, there are rules for this award, and the one that I'll follow is that I have to disclose 7 secrets about myself that you might not know.

I love these.  And hate them. 

I love talking about me but hate thinking up things that you might care about but don't know about yet.  There's a lot of disclosure on the seven hundred some posts I've slapped up here.

1.  I had to talk to my mom today about being a Living Will Surrogate this morning.  It was kind of a bad connection and all I heard was "I need to talk to you about something really serious regarding... this is kind of last minute but are you willing to be a surrogate... I have to talk to... but I hope you will".

After my heart started again and she cleared up what the hell sort of surrogate she was talking about I agreed.  Basically my mom wants to be taken out back and shot at the first sign of mental or physical deterioration.  Which, checking my watch, was sometime back in the early nineties.

Let me know when that will is drafted, mom.  I'll be home for Thanksgiving. 

It's weird to think about that kind of stuff.  That there might be a day where I have to go in to pull the plug.

On my mom. 

I'd have to get a babysitter if Jake is still young.  And he would ask me where I was going.  And I'd say "up to Mimi's" and he'd ask to come and I'd say "no, baby, mommy has to go kill Mimi and it's something she wants to do all by herself" and he'd say that he can help and I'd say no and then there'd be an awkward silence right before he'd start to cry.  Not because his Mimi was dying but because he had to stay home instead of helping do something he knows nothing about.

It's weird to think that I'll ask Jake to do that for me one day.

"Tug the plug, boy", I'll say.  And he will say okay and wonder what it will be like when he has to tell his children to do the same.

2.  Everywhere I went yesterday I was met by a gaggle of crows.  It was funny at first.  Then creepy.  Then outright scary.  I sent a text to Dave about it just in case it was an omen.  It wasn't.  Unless crows strike a few days before you die. 

Each place I went, I looked around and really took things in just in case it was the last time I had a chance to do so.  It's amazing how beautiful everything is when you look at it to say goodbye.

I had to stop that game before I picked Jake up from daycare.

3.  I like mayonnaise on my soft pretzels, but I usually settle for cream cheese because it's more socially acceptable.  Mustard is the devil's pus.  Seriously, why would anyone eat that crap on anything?

4.  World Traveling used to be huge on my priority list.  Now I'm just as happy staying at home.  Please don't tell anyone I said that.  It makes me feel very non-continental and sorta bumpkin-y

5.  If I sit very still in the dark, horrible things from my past that I worked really hard to forget about sneak back into my brain.  Ghosts are very real and they live under my bed and in my closet and they move with me wherever I go and keep up with me no matter how fast I run.

I'm proud that I can process these things and get past them instead of letting them process me.  In a sick way, I'm glad these things happened to me because I think they've made me a better person.

6.  I'm geekishly thrilled with my improv class. 

The first few classes, the teacher talked a lot about trust.  I didn't get it.  Trust?  I don't do that well.  Especially in a room full of people who are watching me do goofy things with my voice and face and body that I've never done before.

Then I got it.  And then the skies opened up and the theatrical gods smiled down upon me because I finally understood. 

I don't have to like everyone there, or think they are brilliantly talented or wildly funny, or give them my house key or this blog address, but I can trust them there in that space.  I can trust them to let me be me, and they can trust me to let them be them and we can all get up there and do our thing.  You don't find that in too many places in real life.

7.  Sometimes I question people's judgement (in my head) because they think their kids are gorgeous and perfect but I think they are nothing but little creepsters.  Or sometimes I look at the kids in the park and think about what they might do with their lives and what they might look like when they grow up and all the filthy stuff that they might get themselves in to if they aren't careful and all the wonderful stuff that they might if they are. 

And I think that if it's okay to think that big people are gross, it's okay to think that little people are gross too.  You don't get a special pass just because you are still in the single digits. 

I do it with my own kid too.  Stare and think, I mean.  Not give him a special pass.  Even he doesn't merit one of those most days.

Sometimes he's so odd looking that it's hard to look him dead in the face without crying about it.
Sometimes he's so beautiful that it's hard to look him dead in the face without crying about it.

***

The next comes from Alix at Casa Hice, who I'm sure you are all reading from the last time I linked to her.  If you aren't, you should be.  Her blog is one of those mixes of life and love and luck and loss that so many people try to get down into words but few people accomplish.  Alix just hit 100 followers on her blog the other day, so how's about you check her out and push her way over?

My grandfather used to tell this story about when he came home from the War on leave. 

He served in the second World War.  Mostly in Wisconsin. But whatever.  That's where he met my grandmother and if not for WWII and if not for Wisconsin and if not for the Madison YMCA, I wouldn't be the Me that I am today.

Anyway.  My grandfather used to tell this story about when he came home from the War on leave, how his dog- who spent my grandfather's entire military career on the front porch waiting and sighing and sniffing the air- up and shot down the street and ran all the way to the train station to meet my grandad.  No one knew he was coming home, he wanted to surprise his mum and dad.  So it wasn't like there was any mad preparations going on or anything.

The dog, whose name I forget, who never left the porch for anything but supper, somehow knew that my grandpa would be on that train so he ran the couple miles or so to meet him.

So the story goes.

And sometimes it was said that the dog had never been off the block before that day.  He just knew where to go and when to get there and was waiting at the train car my Poppa stepped down from.

I like to believe that story is mostly true.

And because my heart can't take anymore pictures and videos of soldiers coming and going to and from their families, I'm linking here.  Something different and amazing is always welcome around these parts.

Thank you to all the men and women fighting for us.  Thank you to all the families who stand behind our soldiers. 

I hope next Remembrance Day you are all home and happy and healthy and whole and angry because you're stuck doing the housework and shopping for Thanksgiving Dinner.

Thanks to David for the link.  I needed that.

I went to parking ticket court yesterday.  My hearing time was 3.15, so I got there about 3.05.  Anyone want to take a guess what time I was out of there?
Remember.  Big city.  Parking nachtmare.

3.27.

Efficiency thrills me.
I got off because I had a good reason for fighting this one plus all the parking tickets assigned to my car are paid on time.  And there are a lot of tickets assigned to my car.  A lot a lot.  I could probably afford my own car, theoretically, if it weren't for the tickets.
But where would I park it?
The cycle goes on and on and on, spiraling itself into the deepest pits of hell-o operator, please give me number 9, and if you disconnect me, I'll kick your big behind the frigerator, there was a piece of glass...  I taught that song to Jake.  Because I'm an awesome mom.

***

So I got on the Wii Fit for the first time in awhile last night.  A longer while than I thought.  That thing is such an a-hole.  Do you have one?  The way it treats one when one skips a few days is very detrimental to one's self esteem.
It was all like "hello there, Lora!  I haven't seen you for awhile" and I was all like "yeah, well, the basement flooded the other day (in May) so I really couldn't get down here".
And then the Wii goes "wow!  It's been 227 days since I last saw you!" and I used my fingers to count backwards and that puts it back in late March so I says "yeah, well once the weather got nice I was just doing stuff outside and all.  I mean, why pretend to hula hoop in the cellar when you have a whole town that beckons?"
And then it was time to step on the scale and the voice was singing "measuring, measuring, measuring" and I was holding in my belly because that's totally the way to trick a scale then the box came up and read "you haven't met your goal.  +11.2 pounds.  You are 137.5 pounds.  Want to set a new goal?" and I said yes and set a goal to lose ten of those pounds in two months.
The 1.2 can stay, provided it nests in the right place (butt).
Who knew it was so easy to put on 11.2 pounds?  My problem is that the more I weigh, the better I look naked, so I don't make enough effort to stop cramming my pie hole- with like, whole pies and stuff- because who doesn't want to look good naked?  But what about the other 23 or so hours of the day?
The better I look naked the worse I look dressed so I need to find a balance in there somewhere.  An acceptable balance.  So I don't want anyone telling me to get a job on a pole or anything.
I can't believe this is my biggest problem right now.  We should all be so lucky.

***

My boss is out of town for a week.
That is all on that subject.

***

I'm doing phenomenally with the cutting back of the coffee.  I'm down to one or two cups a day, and no one is dead.  You don't know how shocked I am that no one is dead.
And I'm not replacing it with hot cocoa the way I did last time.  Enter the 11.2 pounds.
The calendar tells me that it's totally acceptable to pour a little peppermint schnapps in your cocoa, if the winds blow you the right way and you are so inclined.
The first time I got really drunk it was off peppermint schnapps.  Then I had to go to work.  I was under the assumption that schnapps didn't really have that much alcohol in there.
Luckily I stopped drinking about an hour before my shift to take a shower.
Unluckily, it was right when my friend called me and said that the stealth bomber (the airshow was in town) was flying over our neighborhood so I went to the front window in my underpants to look out and up.
Luckily for him I was in my underpants.
Unluckily for me I was in my underpants and he was on a car phone.  It was 1994.  I wasn't expecting to be called from a car phone.
Luckily I got cleaned up and dressed and only had to go to work at the Baskin Robbins and it was afterhours.
Unluckily I had to defrost the freezers so there was a lot of heavy lifting and mass amounts of hose water involved.
Luckily my boss always sprang for pizza and I loved the girl I defrosted with.
I still think of her every time I eat pizza with peppers and onions.  And whenever I see belly button rings, which is more often than one would think, almost 20 years later.  She pierced her own with a safety pin while talking on the phone to a boy she liked.
That takes tits.
I wonder if she still has them.
Metaphorical tits, I mean.
I'm quite sure that her own actual set is doing just fine.

***

Yesterday at Parking Authority Headquarters there were lots of signs on the wall.  No food, no drinks, no dogs, no bikes, no loud music, no cell phones, of course, but then there was another one.  A big one.  One that said "Remember, nothing is the way it used to be".
True that.

***

Thinking about it- getting drunk for the first time, I mean- I drank more in the summer after sixth grade than I did in all of high school.  And I smoked more pot in the summer after seventh than I have since graduating college.  I wonder how often the sixth and seventh graders are getting drunk and high now.  Or maybe they're totally over it by then, having gotten a few years of it under their belts.
Kids are fast these days with the boozing and the drugging and the sexing.
We had one pregnant girl in my middle school.  Now I work in middle schools where about half of the girls are knocked up.  They always say that they didn't use condoms or get abortions because they are Christians and they don't want to go to hell.
I have a feeling Jesus likes condoms more than bastards.
Sing it with me!:

Jesus loves the bastard children.
All the children of the world.
Red and yellow and black and white
All are precious in his sight.

That's what my brain sings any time I talk to unwed Christian mothers.  One of these days it's going to slip out of my mouth.

Which is why I should just keep eating.