| thanks for the birthday wishes!! |
Nov 16, 2007 5:26 am
Mood: happy, 747 Views | Thank you to those who stopped by my blog yesterday to wish me a happy birthday. Thanks too for the thoughtful blogger - oldhoglover - who knew it was my birthday and shared that with the rest of you.
I did have a happy day. My lunch group at work celebrated with me. Then the Dreamer made me dinner that was ready when I got home from work. Drummer Boy, who's a stage manager for the fall play at school, chose to get to the play a little late and stay and have dinner with us. Then I got serenaded with a Happy Birthday chorus sung by an 8 year old who was accompanied on trumpet by his 15 year old brother. I also got to spend some quality time on the phone after dinner, which was really nice. 
So in all, a good day. Thanks for sharing it with me! | |
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18 Comments | |
| the lizard and I |
Nov 14, 2007 6:17 pm
Mood: frustrated, 734 Views | I bought a small stone plaque a few weeks ago that says: "To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world."
I saw that and had to buy it because it reminded me of the Lizard - he's my one person I am the world to. He leans on me, relentlessly at times. It can overwhelm me and make me want to hide. It's kept me up nights unable to rest. Caused my heart to beat too fast when I hear a certain tone to his voice.
I don't push him away when he's like this. Sometimes I become exasperated, have to ask him to please stop worrying or obsessing, or whatever it is that's caused his little self to seek reassurance from his mom. But I don't push him away. Aside from the fact that he's this adorable little boy (and of course I'm not the LEAST biased when I say that)  I understand his need to have reassurance.
A lot of his worried states come from the fact he's very intelligent. He can process information 4-6 years above his chronological age, but he can't assimilate it. He doesn't have the maturity to deal with the things he can comprehend, and then he just gets scared.
I know some of this is also adjustment to living without his dad. He's old enough now to realize his dad doesn't live here, not that he's just working a lot, and he doesn't really understand why the divorce is happening. His dad and I aren't at odds with one another, we don't play the kids against the other, it's pretty amicable all around. Even the Lizard's teacher commented on that during the parent teacher conference last month. How the Lizard equally talks about mom and dad, and she finds this unique in a divorce situation. Still, in the last 8 months or so, he's seemed more affected by not having his dad in the house.
But today, as he's been leaning hard on me, and I'm starting to feel suffocated by it, I have to keep remembering - I am really no one to the world, just this one person, but to him I am absolutely everything.
Plus someday this cute little boy with the bone straight blonde hair, big blue eyes, and glasses, who wants to give me jump hugs, and go with me everywhere...well he's going to become a teenager and not want to be around mom so much. So I know I need to enjoy this while I can - and remember how, right now, I am his world. | |
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22 Comments | |
| dealbreakers |
Nov 11, 2007 5:21 pm
Mood: thoughtful, 690 Views | ruggedntenderaty - in response to one of my responses on his blog, mentioned that while I may not have a written lists of wants in a man, I do have something.
I've thought a lot about this and you know? I do have something. Not a bunch of wants, but a bunch of "not" wants - or dealbreakers:
- any form of abuse
- lack of acceptance or the need to change me
- pushing me to the backburner while everyone and everything else in his life becomes more important.
- children issues, either still wants them, or doesn't accept mine
- doesn't hold a Christian faith. He doesn't have to go to church every week or have the Bible constantly open, but a belief in God is important to me.
- no sense of humor
- doesn't let me have space, or is threatened by something I may enjoy doing alone.
The rest is negotiable to me and, when with the right person, can be worked around without either having to feel they're being taken advantage of. To me, compromise in a relationship means that sometimes I "get" my way and sometimes he "gets" his way, but when two people connect, when they have the best interests of each other at heart, compromise should not be a chore. I think if it is, then he or I need to ask ourselves if we're with the right person.
Away from these dealbreakers I can say I have preferences and maybe this makes up a list of sorts? I don't think so because there would be a way to work around any of them like:
- I prefer a man who's taller than me, I've never met a man I really like who's shorter so I don't know how I'd feel, but I know I wouldn't walk away from him if he was.
- I prefer he's gainfully employed, but if not I suppose the reason why he isn't needs to be looked at, and unless he's unemployed because he's lazy and likes living off the system, I can work with this.
- I prefer a smart guy, someone who I don't have to define my vocabulary to, but as long as he's not bothered by the fact I'm smarter and get a complex over it (like the husband did) then I wouldn't walk away for that reason.
- I prefer a man who's happy with himself and knows who he is. This one probably leans closer to dealbreaker than any other because I don't like the thought of a man who needs me to figure him out. I'm more than willing to aid a journey of self discovery, but don't expect me to lead it.
Then there are certain plusses but nothing that makes or breaks things for me like blue eyes, the ability to dream, similar tastes in music and movies, or being creative.
So maybe I do have a list and I don't like to think of it that way because it makes this whole romantic pursuit too clinical. Love can't be listed out, lined up on a spreadsheet, checked off a list. To me, true love, that kind that stays with you forever, has no constraints so that means it can come from anywhere, and anyone.
And something off subject of this but also an absolute truth for me is that true love takes time, builds slowly, grows into something you can't live without, doesn't start out that way. This doesn't mean that from the moment you lay eyes on the "one" you don't know it, but that you don't rush it. I do believe when love is real, or even at the onset, that the prospect of love is real, that the more patience you have with the process of knowing one another, discovering who that person is, appreciating him/her for the individual they are, the longer lasting that union.
Thanks rugged for making me think this through in more detail. It's cemented a few things for me.  | |
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12 Comments | |
| another me day |
Nov 11, 2007 9:32 am
Mood: happy, 564 Views | Wow! Don't know what I'm going to do with so much me time. 
This weeked is very different from last. My house is relatively clean so all I really needed to do was touch it up yesterday, tackle the dishes, and about 5 loads of laundry. Today, the Dreamer - which would be #3 son - is already with his dad who picked him up about an hour ago. The Lizard has a birthday party for a classmate to go to at 2 then after I get him at 4 will be driving him to his dad's for the night. My friend Chris is going with me to drop him off and we're going to hit this great Mexican restaurant out there - the dad lives around 45 minutes south from me - on our way home. Not sure what the Drummer Boy is doing, well after he guts his room to see if his missing wallet - with his driver's permit - is in there before I take time off of work to drive him to the DMV to get a new permit. But Sunday is usually his day to spend with his girlfriend.
Looking forward to a day of doing what I want to without the nagging thoughts of what still needs to be done bugging me.
Later!
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4 Comments | |
| The Way I Am |
Nov 9, 2007 3:16 pm
Mood: happy, 812 Views | If you were falling, then I would catch you.
You need a light, I'd find a match.
Cuz I love the way you say it's all good.
And you take me the way I am.
If you are chilly, here take my sweater.
Your head is aching, I'll make it better.
Cuz I love the way you call my cell phone.
And you take me the way I am.
The Way I Am by Ingrid Michaelson
with a few minor changes by me
Billy Joel talked about loving "you just the way you are" and countless others have said things similar, but something about this song hits a stronger chord with me.
Take me - not love me - just take me the way I am.
I've not gotten to experience that, until recently. Not head over heels, breathless, dreamy, ethereal. That's not real to me. That's fairy dust, which is nice to have around, but because it's dust, it can easily be scattered. One strong wind and POOF - not just no more dust, but that danged stuff gets in your eyes and makes them burn.
I experienced ethereal. It was......ethereal. But it had a shelf life, an expiration date, and it had to. It had no roots, just emotions.
Over and over I see people, not just on this site, but in my real life encounters, who have this happen. Whirlwind, sweeping, intense....but eventually it burns out. The shooting star syndrome. Burn bright, burn hot, burn fast, burn out.
I don't want that either.
Can it be that sometimes, we best find what we want by knowing what it is that we don't?
And you take me the way I am | |
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14 Comments | |
| a real me day |
Nov 6, 2007 5:04 pm
Mood: content, 649 Views | My youngest - the Freakishly Large Lizard (I'll have to explain that one some day) had a day off for parent/teacher's conferences. He's on a different schedule now from the other two who are in high school, and at 8, not old enough to stay home alone. So I made the supreme sacrifice and took a day off of work to stay with him.
It was GREAT!!! Not so much for the time I spent with him. In reality, I spent little time with him. He got up at 8, had breakfast, went downstairs to play on the computer the 15 y/o will never let him have - and an hour later the phone rang for him. A friend who wanted to come over. The friend came over and half an hour after that, the phone rang again - another friend.
When I knew the Lizard would be my last child - too many problems with the pregnancy to consider another - and that the age differences between him and his brothers (6, 9 & 12 years) would mean he didn't have the built in playmates the others had, I felt bad. But then I figured he'd make friends earlier and in a way the others didn't, and that has proved to be true. He's far from bored or alone.
So he was downstairs with two friends and one friend's sister - I'm the depository for all the orphans and homeless in the neighborhood and the Lizard takes them all in - and I got the upstairs all to myself!!
My clean, quiet, upstairs.
I crocheted - my favored past time - watched The Office on Netflix, got a few special e-mails sent and adored having this day to do nothing that was so different from my Saturday do nothing day. This was a far more relaxing nothing day.
The conference for the Lizard went well too. He has an adapted curriculum and is an interesting little soul. He has a low band reading disability that gives him an IEP, and a 136 IQ with a binary brain that puts him off the charts with everything else. Right now he's in lazy mode, but his teacher, God BLESS her, is so willing to work with him and follow the lead of the district psychologist who is actually the one in control of his learning processes. I'm grateful for how they're handling things with him.
Mothering this one has been so different from the others. And you'd think - with 4 boys - there would be some similarities? Hardly!! They're all such individuals and as crazy as they can make me, I'm thankful I got chosen to be mother for each of them.
Overall, a really nice day. Relaxing, productive (nearly finished the scarf I'm making for my sister), and peaceful. I really needed this!
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12 Comments | |
| patterns |
Nov 5, 2007 9:32 pm
Mood: tired, 610 Views | Humans are creatures of habit. Whether we want to admit it or not, we take comfort from the sameness of things. It's why we have tendency to order the same food from the same restaurant. Sit in the same spot at the conference table at work during a meeting, or the same pew in Church. Park in the same place every morning.
These patterns follow our romantic lives as well. Even when it's not positive, we have tendency to fall for the same kind of person over and over. How many have heard someone talk about the guy who's a jerk, or the woman who's a user, coming into their lives yet again - and why didn't they see it coming?
I don't think it's because we're blind. Or because we have such a need to be accepted, wanted, even loved, that we go after the first good looking prospect to give us what we need. I think it's our patterns.
I lived with abuse for 22 years. I put up with a lot and swore I'd never go there again. If ever a man laid a hand on me, or spoke to me with anything less than respect, I'd be out of there so fast my dust would be gone before he knew I'd left.
I can say in the last 3 years I've not been physically or verbally abused. But I have been taken advantage of, over and over, and in all different ways. While this isn't abuse, in that classical sense of the definition, it is a watered down version of it.
It took me over two years, and three different men to see this pattern. But to be fair, I didn't see it on my own. I saw it with the help of a very talented therapist who never, once, has told me what to do. She's never directed my thoughts or projected herself onto me, but she has made me think, tear apart, get into the tiniest details of why I let myself be taken advantage of to assure it will never happen to the degrees I've allowed it to happen again.
I know my patterns now. What I do right, and maybe more importantly, what I do wrong. What I allow to go too far, and how to draw the line, pull back, and, if necessary, walk away - no matter how good it seems to be from the outside.
Coming to this site was part of me breaking away from the same patterns. When I saw that the guy I met in May, had, by July, become like the others - putting me on the convenience shelf and expecting me to come running when it was a good time for him - well I knew I was living the definition of insanity - doing what I had always done, yet expecting different results.
I have gotten different results on this site, and I'm grateful for them. But it took a lot of work to get to this point, not just be able to recognize that I had self destructive patterns, but get deep inside myself to learn why and how to stop them. It's a painful journey because, surprisingly, it involved little of being able to feel satisfied that the guys taking advantage of my time, understanding, or emotions, were SOBs but rather, it was me letting them get away with something another woman would put a stop to. Not my fault for it happening, just my fault for allowing it to go on. To face that though, is tough.
I hope those here who find themselves in self destructive patterns, or always with that same person who lets them down over and over, realize there is a way past that - and it's not a new site, new profile, picture, haircut, or anything that can be seen, but a new way of looking at ourselves, our patterns, and then being courageous enough to step away from the security of the known, even when the known hurts us, and get out of the box to see what else is out there. | |
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11 Comments | |
| motivated and active |
Nov 4, 2007 11:44 am
Mood: happy, 545 Views | I wouldn't say anything remarkable happened between yesterday and today except that I gave myself permission to be lazy and unmotivated and do NOTHING - which is exactly what I did. My two youngest bowl on a league on Saturdays and I took them bowling, and did feed the kids, but aside from that, did absolutely nothing of value all day.
When I got up this morning I didn't tell myself anything different, but I felt different.
In the three years I've been working my way out of my marriage, I don't think I've given myself permission to be less than what the husband always expected me to be. He had no leeway in his standards unless I was sick or pregnant, and then it was minimal leeway at best.
I've gotten to the point in the last year that I can go to bed with dirty dishes in the sink and not wake up at 2 a.m. in a panic that drives me out of bed and to the kitchen to get the dishes done. I can also leave the house with the bed unmade and not have it in the back of my mind that I need to get home before he does and make the bed so he won't blow his stack over it.
Can you tell one of the points of contention in the marriage was his insane need for cleanliness?
Well I've gotten past that stuff, but didn't realize until some time today, as I was cleaning things up around here, that maybe I just need to forgive myself those times when I don't feel like doing something. Usually I force myself, set an agenda and work toward it absolutely HATING every step along the way.
I've not been hating it today. Could be that the two youngest are with their dad so I have some real peace. My drummer boy - the 18 y/o - doesn't usually go with his dad but he does stay out of my way when he's home and they're not. He knows how much I cherish my quiet time when they're gone and respects that.
He's gone right now too at a classmate's house working on a project which makes it really REALLY quiet. Then when he gets back he and I will be doing dinner - maybe just ordering in, but not cooking tonight, that's for sure. Then I have a DVD movie date to look forward to later this evening.
But I think the biggest reason it's been easier to move myself along today is because I gave myself permission not to move a THING yesterday....then didn't. First time for that in three years.
A lesson learned. | |
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10 Comments | |
| unmotivated and lazy |
Nov 3, 2007 10:12 am
Mood: sad, 578 Views | I don't want to do anything.
Not just today.
Any day.
I DON'T WANT TO DO ANYTHING!
Okay - not entirely true. I want to sit and do what I want to do, not what I have to do.
This isn't a new emotion to me. I've been in this place awhile. Pharmaceuticals, aren't they a wonderful thing? They make what's wrong right and take what's right and make it wrong.
I also know this lack of motivation is part of the stages I have to go through to get past what happened in my marriage.
..........
I paused after I wrote that, thought to fill in a few blanks, but then moved on to the next thoughts that appear below.
Why did I have to pause?
..........
I realized over this last week that I speak in a lot of generalities when I write in this blog. There are a lot of things I don't reveal. At the start I could say it was for lack of trust. I was new, didn't know how this place operated, have been on other blog sites that turned out to be pure crap and it is online, a very public open forum, and I wasn't prepared to pour out my soul. So I held things back. But by doing that, did I lose what I've always used blogs for? For me that's been introspection. The kind of thinking about one's self that would drive someone else batty if spoken out loud. So I'd speak it to the screen.
Blogs have helped me come to grips with things in the past, and I've done it all silently. But this is the first site I've been to where people comment so regularly on what others say.
Maybe part of my holding back has to do with that. Some of where I'm at inside is still an open sore, not even scabbed over yet, still covered with a band-aid. I don't need someone to rip that band-aid off. Someone who doesn't know me, how I think or feel, can only judge these outward words. Words sometimes spoken for the benefit of nothing more than "hearing" myself think because sometimes when I do that something that didn't make sense suddenly does.
But back now to that original thought. My lack of motivation being part of the healing process that had to happen after 22 years of abuse.
In my marriage I could never be unmotivated, it wasn't allowed. My mom died and I didn't get dressed for a week after the funeral. Then on day 8 the husband came to me as I was sitting on the couch, still in my pajamas, the two boys we then had running amok in the apartment we lived in and making a mess, dishes piled in the sink, clothes overflowing the hamper, and put his hands out for mine. I took them thinking I was going to get some comfort, my mother dying was the worst thing that had happened to me up to that point, to this day, remains, the worst thing. But instead of holding my hands, lifting me from the couch, hugging me, he used that leverage to pull me up, somewhat roughly, and told me to get over it, it had been long enough. No comfort. No understanding. No tenderness. Just an order - and one the 8 years of marriage up to that point had taught me I needed to pay attention to or have hell to pay later. So I pushed aside anything I felt and moved forward because I had to. End of mourning.
As I sit here unmotivated today, 17 years after that day, and countless days, months, years after other incidents that were similar, I know I can blame in part the pharmaceuticals but maybe more so, the emotional release of finally, after three years, letting go of the thing, whatever that thing was, that made me get off the couch that day and do, instead of asking, insisting, and demanding for the support and comfort I so desperately needed.
It occured to me the last few days that if I use this blog, as I've used others for various reasons in the past, and was always successful at working things out in that forum, that I may be able to get past some of the roadblocks that are in my way now. Like my lack of motivation.
We'll see. | |
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10 Comments | |
| profiled as a band mom |
Oct 28, 2007 12:07 am
580 Views | I got back about 20 minutes ago from WAY out yonder IL from the the last high school band competition of the season. This place was farther out than most we've gone to this year - and for whatever reason the band director chose all these places in IL where God left His shoes to drag the kids to...go figure!
We drove 150 miles on the Interstate, then navigated all these twists and turns on C.R.s to get to the high school - total enrollment, 102, and that's from two communities.
I live close to Chicago, we have streets with names, and addresses that are numbers, not longitude and latitude. And even though I live in such a populated place, I still manage to get lost. I'm directionally challenged...but only when it comes to getting home. I can get anyplace just fine, but I have an issue with reversing the directions.
I had a co-pilot for this trip, my friend Chris whose oldest son is in the drumline with mine. We were in her husband's car because I need new brakes on my van. I was driving because I always drive, whether we take my car or not. She doesn't enjoy highway driving, and going this far away, there was no way she would do it.
So we got there fine, manuevered the twists, one lane roads, streets that changed names every few miles, and found the high school. The band played wonderfully - percussion won two major awards (yeah drums!!) - and we were given easier directions for going home from a local. Life was good!
As we were following these new directions home we came across a familiar intersection. Knowing this would take us back to the Interstate because we came out that way, we decided to turn down it. This is farm country, no street lights, and we just didn't want to keep going down a dark road without being positive we would get where we were going - local directions or not. So we took what we thought was a sure thing.
Except we made a wrong turn someplace and realized this when we hit a town. We hadn't hit a real town from when we got off the Interstate until we were at the high school. It was all farms. So we knew something wasn't right.
Chris got out her map of Illinois - not the mapquest directions we had been using, I turned on the dome light so she could read it and there in my rear view mirror is a set of flashing red and blue lights from a police cruiser.
I couldn't imagine what I did - maybe he didn't like the dome light on? So I pulled over and the cop walks up and says I was clocked on radar doing 46. Did I know it was a 30 mph zone?
I innocently told him "no" and explained we were lost - where we had just come from, and where we were trying to go. He looked at my ID, me, Chris, then says he's going to do me a favor, NOT write me a citation AND give me directions back to the Interstate, but wanted to run my information before he let me go.
He comes back about 10 minutes later and says all is fine except my insurance card is for a Chrylser Town & Country - my van, not Chris's husband's car. So she gives him her insurance card and he reads off the information to that nifty shoulder walkie talkie the cops wear.
While he's waiting for them to run the insurance information he gives us directions back to the Intersate. Then his shoulder beeps, he answers, and starts asking Chris all these questions about her and the car. Turns out the VIN came up as stolen from Canada.
Her husband works in Indiana - we live in Illinois on the IN/IL border - the car has never been to any other states than that.
So she has to give him her license and he says he's sure it's a misunderstanding because we don't fit the profile of car thieves. He believed we were what we said, two band moms from up north who got lost on the C.R.s.
A few minutes later he explained how the computer matches up to 8 similar numbers on a VIN and that the last 4 numbers of her husband's car matched those of a stolen trailer from Canada.
He gave us back our IDs, wished us luck getting home, and got back in his car.
It added 45 minutes to our trip home, but getting pulled over turned out to be a good thing because it put us back on the right track. Plus fitting the profile of a band mom didn't turn out too bad either. I may have to wear that hooded sweatshirt with the high school logo on it more often, be windblown and wind burned, and never take off the orange wristband that marked me as paid to get in. Not the most glamorous look, but it helped save me an out of town ticket. | |
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13 Comments | |
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