But no time to say it.
I found no time for the cat wine.
(Something to come home to)
Though we remained committed to our tequila countdown.
The kitty is all packed.
And at 9:15 AM, we leave this all behind.
Thanks for tolerating this very obsessed countdown.
"See you" next Monday!
Seeing as this day is over.
And tomorrow is Friday.
And doesn't look too horrifying.
And I like starting sentences with "and" because all through junior high, I was told that you can't.
And I don't care.
I don't entirely agree- Thursday sounds to me like a day past Wednesday, and just before Friday, therefore pretty awesome. But, it was cool to find something about "Thursday" on pinterest. Validates the many hours I invest there. Plus he's cranking out a Thursday beer, which does actually apply.
I have learned that directly after "tequila time" is "beer time".
Also, in the interest of my liver and prepping for Mexico.
Since the bathing suits and skirts have been packed for weeks, there are a few lasagnes and chicken pot pies in the freezer, and the passports have been located. Just wouldn't be right to neglect the livers.
Did I mention that tomorrow is Friday? And not really even two days then? Because how ridiculous is it to count Saturday, the day that you're already on holidays, everything is ready (except what isn't) and the only thing to decide is where to take the kids out for dinner.
Thursday. And not really at all three more days to go. This just may warrant popping the cork of my cat wine tomorrow.
At noon.
ohmygosh, what happened? I have sinned by omission- it is now five four days since my last confession, and here I had committed to writing every days since countdown commenced!
For two three days now, we have been wisely climatizing.
Tequila. One ounce per diem.
Not because we want to, but because it is prudent to not shock the system by arriving at Tulum without preparing the liver.
We're just sensible like that.
It's been over six months now that I've been going to the gym. That's right- me. Going to the gym. I'm the kid that got chosen fifth from last for every sport in school, just before the four kids that nobody even liked. I'm the one who only ever went down hill skiing once because I fell so many times trying to learn that the group of friends that I travelled with made me the laughing stock of the weekend. I can still feel the sting of humiliation, the sore and tired muscles, the bruises.
It took about a year of thinking about it almost every day before I decided to give crossfit a try. One of the coaches kept sending me kind and gentle messages about what she thought crossfit might do for me, might help me with, might undo in me. And since I struggle on and off with my body anyway, have given up dieting for life, and I trusted this coach, I thought maybe I should give it a try. I wasn't ready. I wouldn't ever be ready, so I decided to pretend that I needed physiotherapy and that I just needed to show up at the gym twice a week and do whatever exercises I was given. For a year, I told myself. You need physio for a year.
I may be the first fledgling crossfitter to have thrown the F-Bomb on my very first visit.
I mean- skipping rope?? I loved skipping rope as a child. All those awesome little poems and songs we'd sing while we skipped rope on the sidewalk at school recess. I could totally rock that skipping rope.
And then, at 45, my first time at "physio", they said- "Skip". And I couldn't. My arms didn't know how to handle the rope and my feet moved at the wrong times, and the rope got caught on my ankles.
And so because I didn't also want to burst into tears, I said- "DAMMIT! I can't even F-ing SKIP!" Which made the woman beside me laugh so hard she couldn't skip either, and that made me feel a little better.
Well, now I can skip. Around 3 or 4 times later, my body remembered. I'm no longer skipping like an eleven year old, unless they currently wear depends, but still- I can skip. And that feels good. And we never ever skip to MISSISSIPPI, but you take what you can, folks, you take what you can.
My first visit to crossfit, I couldn't do a squat. I don't think I had ever done a squat, or attempted one since I was a toddler. When my "physiotherapist" showed me how to do a squat (stick your butt out, blah, blah, blah) I managed to get down. So far that I fell onto the floor. And couldn't pull myself back up. These days, I have learned how to do the squat- wall squats, kettle ball squats, and the one we refer to as "pole dancing squats". I'm feeling pleased that I don't fall over any more.
When I started crossfit a little over six months ago, I was around about a size twelve, with flabby thighs and a lot of cellulite, a second chin, a weird little belly, and that "second arm wave" that shows up on your fortieth birthday. Not too sure what I weighed since I got Brian to hide the scale from me some time ago.
Six and a half months later, I'm around a size twelve, with flabby thighs and a lot of cellulite, a second chin, a weird little belly. The arm waggle does seem to have settled down.
In a certain kind of lighting, when the moon is crescent shaped, and a woodpecker is pecking past twilight, I can faintly make out some muscle definition on my thighs. The blobs of fat that were falling onto my kneecap have receded, and my flabby butt sits a little higher than it used to. I also have a tiny collection of black workout gear, since learning the wrong way that if you wear stretchy royal blue leggings from WalMart and pee your pants doing a teensey little jog, everyone will know. Turns out that black is a little more forgiving. A little.
I have a new community. A brilliant group of people who know how to laugh at themselves, push themselves, be kind to one another, and just show up. I enjoy watching people who weren't the last chosen at gym class hurling their bodies up onto piles of boxes or wrapping themselves around chin lift bars. There's something marvelous about the human body being able to do that. I also enjoy working out with a particularly sweet, smily-est, most encouraging woman who isn't above saying "feck-it" under her Irish breath when the going gets just a little too hard. It's marvelous to be allowed to laugh.
I'm over half way through my initial plan to give crossfit a year of my life. It's hard to believe that I actually enjoy going to the gym. It's remarkable that challenging my body after a tough day at work feels really good for brain and body. I still tend to feel self-conscious and generally hope no one is looking at me, but the crossfit community in my town has been so kind and gracious that I'm getting kind of getting slightly over that too.
I'm pretty sure I won't turn into an insufferable nag who posts workouts on facebook or goes on and on ad nauseum about crossfit. I'm definitely not going to become competitive. I can't imagine eating paleo, as I'm addicted to carbohydrates and yogurt. I don't even like that caption: "we eat pain for breakfast", because I like toast.
But I like the kitty. And that kind of die-hard weirdo obsessive freak I'm likely to remain.
I have no idea how people can live with chronic illness or pain without throwing in the towel and just becoming miserable bitch grouches.
Brian tells me that I will make an excellent old person, waxing on about my fibroid, my knees, this cough, and - ooooh, my sinuses. I say- I'm there already. My eyes hurt, my belly hurts, my knees hurt and I want my mommy. Until I remember that she's almost 88 and the furthest thing from a whiner in the world. Her cure for spinal stenosis and arthritis is to go for a long walk outdoors in this Siberian-esque winter. She doesn't make a very good old person at all. Humph.
Speaking of chronic pain, I pulled together all my papers for income tax. Except for the inevitable dozen or so that I will have forgotten. My father in law will be messaging me nonstop asking for all the stuff I've forgotten (again), and I will be mortally embarrassed and will blame my husband for not being the bookkeeper type, forcing me to badly impersonate one. I hate tax pain. Numbers baffle me. Give me a psychiatric conundrum any day of the week, I'll deal. But not numbers. They cause me moderate to severe and chronic pain.
And lately there's been lingering parenting pain. I messaged my friend Karla the other night (she's like a 1-800-I suck, please absolve me-line). I told her my sorrows, I whined. "I can't do this parenting thing!" And in all her wisdom she said- "You are actually doing it. They're having a hard time doing the prepubescent/teenage thing. You're doing it".
To which I said- "damn it".
It's painful.
When the kids were little, and impossible, and never slept and cried constantly, some horrible people would say to me- "oh, just you wait until they're teenagers!" I would like to hurt all those people, still, to this day. I have teenagers. They never throw themselves on the floor in Walmart to weep inconsolably. They never shove their hands down their pants during dinner to whine about their panties being wrong. They don't throw fits about the toast being cut into pie shapes instead of squares. They don't poop their drawers while hiding behind the couch.
Teenagers have introduced me to a different kind of pain. It's the kind that makes me question whether I've been doing things right enough since they were toddlers, contentedly eating their own snot. It's a more existential sort of pain. It's the pain of wondering- if my teenager lives in his or her room and only comes out to grunt and root for snacks, is it because I haven't reached them somehow? Will they trust me enough to let me in when they have questions? And when they do let me in, is my response adequate? Will they be well? Physically, emotionally, spiritually well? (Don't try to answer these questions. I won't be easily reassured). The point of mentioning any of these things at all is to dwell morbidly on the topic of pain.
Which might help to explain my recent craving for a piercing or tattoo or sliver....
Twelve days sounds like a really short time. Lately at night I have been dreaming that its time to fly home from our trip and I realize I've never made it out of my hotel room. In my dream, I've spent my whole time on pinterest and sleeping and cleaning the toilet. I never found the swim up bar or the beach and I never went outside.
Maybe that's because it's how I've spent the winter- cleaning the toilet, pinning all the cats, and sleeping.
Twelve more days.
Yes, I missed a day. It was a good day, a very good day. And isn't that a nice change.
Today, it was minus twenty-nine with the windchill. That's a very chilly wind.
And my eyes are still burning, etc, etc.
I went to see my mom today (among other things I haven't got the will to describe).
My mom makes the best sauerkraut borscht. She said it would fix me, and every delicious bite that I ingested did feel like some sort of cure.
However. My eyes still burn and I have a nasty cough and a lot of ringing in my ears.
I never said this stuff would be interesting, only that I would write every day until Mexico, which I have failed so far by two days.
Advice for cures beyond the Advil, Tylenol, Benadryl, neti-pot, vaporizer, hot water with lemon and honey, and neo citron are welcome.
Age of daughter #2 for only a little while longer. In three weeks or so she will be "legal", as they say. This will be a relief to me for several reasons that I'm not at liberty to express since I have decided not to be That Mom. But there's one really important reason that I will be grateful she is 18, and that's the story I'm gonna tell.
I'm a bad mom. So I've raised kids who sleep in or skip classes when it's "life works" and they're going to be taught how to type "CAT" or how to copy and paste on a computer. I'm just not going to fight about stuff like that.
However.
Each and every time Jane or Micah sleep in or miss a class (it's frequent. I'm a bad mom), I get an automated phone call at 6 PM from the school. If I don't pick up, my phone will continue to ring every 10 minutes until I do pick up. Then there is an annoying recorded voice instructing me to call the school or write a letter explaining their absence.
I'm not gonna do that.
I hate when my phone rings.
My kids know how to type "cat" and how to copy and paste.
So don't tell me what to do in your bossy, not-even-real voice.
On April 8, Jane is turning eighteen. She has been instructed to not give the school permission to tell on her any longer, which means the phone will only ring about Micah for the next 2 years, not Jane.
It's a start.
These kids are fixing Cuba. They told me so.
They are armed with plastic hatchet type things (please don't ask why I have hatchet type toys, ok? thanks) And they are yelling: "Fixing Cuba! Fixing Cuba!"
They have that kind of energy because every morning at ten o'clock they eat Cheerios for snack, usually pretending to be vacuum cleaners and sucking them up through their lips, no hands.
If I were to name brand them, it would not be "Dyson".
And here's something from the "Completely Confusing" category.
I live in a town with roughly 14 churches per capita. Some years ago, two of the churches with dwindling populations wisely decided to join forces and practise some sort of opposite of a church split by forming a church join. It seemed cool and even sort of progressive. Then they started to raise funds for a building project. Wtf?
Remember how I used to blog eloquent about the large empty lot behind our yard that turned into a skating rink in winter that we watched people skate on while our idyllic children played video games?
Well. They're paving paradise and are putting up a parking lot.
And putting a huge addition onto one of those dwindling churches. I can only envision some sort of large brotherhood meeting (the sisterhood was baking brownies at the time) where it seemed so energizing and faith-ified to spend a couple of million dollars choosing brick colors.
*sigh*
In seventeen lifetimes, I will never understand building projects.
Factoid Number Five:
This necktie has been tied to the nonexistent railing of my broken deck for at least a year now, maybe longer. I can't remember why. Maybe if I have enough faith, it could turn into a magical necktie and the deck would get fixed. All my other attempts have failed.
Sam's bike is now showing bits of rear wheel, handle bars, and seat. I can't wait until it starts to show rust so I can feel more awesome about leaving it out all winter.
7.
Have I ever mentioned how I feel about the food cooking?
8). Sometimes I get a random comment on a bags4darfur blog post from roughly a zillion years ago:
Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "tREedom": Wow, incredible weblog structure! How lengthy have you been blogging for? you made running a blog look easy. The full glance of your web site is magnificent, as neatly as the content material!
Also visit my page; (bah, virus, bla h)
Posted with Blogsy
Now, I've never been the sharpest tool in the box. But even I'm not dumb enough to fall for this. Let's break this down. "Wow, incredible weblog structure". Well. Gosh, golly thanks. It's called "Get the app for blogsy on the ipad. The "structure" is all there. I just type. Hence the "making the blogging look easy, because it is. All you have to do is write down all your idiotic musings and hit publish. Easy. But thanks.
I be blogging longtime. The full glance should have also indicated that I be bloggy longtime. Magnificent is usually reserved for my 40+ profile, but it probably also applies to my "can't put it down" blogspot whose URL was chosen while potty training my now 11 year old son. You see, I bloggy long long time. I'm so happy you noted how neatly is content material. I launder and fold it regularly.
9) Since writing #8 some hours ago, three more equally brilliant comments have shown up on the very same post.
10) This afternoon, the children were playing a game that required a secret password in order to pass through a made-up blockade. Let's just say that when I was a preschooler, we never used the word "vagina" as a password.
11) Speaking of the vagina.
I went to see the Doc again about my sneezing/coughing/jumping/peeing my pants issue. He is sending me for a strange pee pee test to someone named Dr Hildebrand. No relation. I can only speculate that there may be a trampoline involved.
12) After the Dr, I went to Walmart because the windshield wiper was broken and spring might come before August. Thinking myself clever, I took the broken wiper off so that I could match it up when I got to the wiper section.
Picture me, irritable, standing in front of a wall of wiper blades, not having the first clue what I'm even looking for. So I go over to the tire section and say to the guy - "I'm standing in front of the wipers and I don't have a clue what I'm looking for. Here's my broken wiper- can you help me?"
And he says- "What are you driving?"
I say- "Dodge Caravan, 1990".
Which was true. Like 6 years ago.
It takes me a full two minutes to realize that I'm even more of an idiot than I already knew that I was. So after I confessed that I actually drive a Montana, year of which I can't remember because I'm daft and I don't give a care, he says- that's easy. 24 inch wiper, any one.
For a stupid person, I pride myself on entertaining Walmart employees.
13) When I get back to the MONTANA, its dark and chilly and I have less than no desire to put on the windshield wiper. I simply Do Not Care. Our headlights don't really work either, so who cares about the windshield? I'll just follow the guy ahead of me and hope he's headed towards Niverville.
14) Tomorrow is no school. Which should be okay because Brian still has school, and I don't have ten thousand children coming, and at the end of it I'm gonna say- Brian? Make me the best Gin and Tonic you've ever made in your life. And he will.
15) My dinner was: a coffee from McDonalds that I sent Jane to get me while I perused wiper blades. I gave her my coupon for a free medium because I do their clever little sticker system. The coffee was lukewarm and yucky, plus I accidentally gave her an empty coupon thingie, instead of the full one, which made her look like an idiot, even though I'm the actual idiot. So, I went back to McDonalds, asked for a hot coffee instead, please, no coupon.
16) Main course was a Walmart banana that I ate in the MONTANA while driving home via the braille method.
17) Dessert: Cappucino flavor frozen yogurt. At home, at my table, with my ipad, chatting with you. And my brother via text. And my friend who thought going on a road trip with two preschoolers was a good idea. And my son Sam who must be growing because he's always eating toast with roughly 1.5 inches of nutella on top of it.
Seventeen. Which can only mean that tomorrow is sixteen which is actually sounding pretty much like two weeks since Saturdays and Sundays are like non-days.
You've all been so fun to be ridiculous with, I thank you.
*footnote- I've just spent about 15 minutes trying to remove the "BOLD" from the last half of this blog post. In draft, it is removed. When I republish, it reappears. I'm thinking of driving back to Walmart and asking someone in the electronics department for help. It worked for the wipers. And the coffee.
All the medicines. It's kind of remarkable really. If you're willing to drop half a days wages at the pharmacy and forfeit your liver, you can totally feel better right in the middle of a virus. See that blue/purple one? That little angel put me to sleep last night and left me there with only one teeny tiny wake up spell. Advil is my new boyfriend.
Animal crackers. This is kind of my favorite food. Bland, easy on the guts, and even 2 grams of protein. It's like eating kale chips, but with less prep time.
This daughter's courage. She got bangs cut last night and she looks smokin'!
Number Four). Writing without even trying to be interesting or clever or fascinating. It is good, liberating fun, and I have you faithfuls to thank for reading the nonsense.
Number five). Rest time when the minions allow me to shit shut my eyes for a bit. Like today. And yesterday. They don't mean to be nice to me and give me that break, but still I'm terribly grateful. It gives me what I need to thrive for the rest of the day; not merely survive.
Number Six). Daughter #1 got two new jobs! She will be wrapping burritos at Burrito Del Rio until May when she'll leave us for a few months to go work at a fly-in fishing lodge. I'm proud of her.
**footnote**
(You may well be under the impression that Brian and I, in our flawless marriage devoid of any struggle have birthed four mythical rainbow-farting unicorn (thank you Janice for that vivid image) children who cause us no grief, worry, or embarrassments.
Yeah, no.
It behooves me to explain that I've grown the tiniest vein of discretion in my years of blogging, and don't actually talk about marriage or children here except in pretty and lovely ways. Just in case they meet rich potential partners who google their names and come to this blog and learn of their most stupid, ugly, humiliating moments. Oh, what glorious release it would be to truly pen on and on about raising 3 teens and a boy, but alas- can't be done.)
And if Brian meets a rich, potential partner who googles his name and reads only glowing things? Well then. Hmmmmm.
Number seven). Earlier this afternoon, I thought- "self! You could mention your notable self control with box 'o' wine since you moved it out of your range of vision and don't try out the spigot feature nearly as often now that it's hidden downstairs!"
But as of now, 5:32, I've just tested the spigot on the now bladder 'o' wine (takes up less space when you ditch the box). The spigot is in good working order! This is indeed, good news.
Number Eight). I wouldn't ordinarily be happy about the sun vanishing for 2 days and a cold wind blowing, but I am grateful for the cessation of Micah's ceiling fountain.
Number Nine). Perfect glorious husband just sent a text indicating he has purchased the fluorescent bulbs we need. This means I may be able to function in lighting as early as this evening. Unless, of course, he needs some time to dwell on the replacement procedure.
Number Ten). The geranium that I've not yet killed has bloomed.
Number Eleven). The thrift shop is open this evening. I shall go, hoping to find a Brita pitcher for fifty cents, and will leave with 4 books, a skirt, and a single roller skate or something equally baffling. It's an addiction and I don't want the cure.
Number twelve). My work day is now over. The only signs are a few random sippy cups, a box full of blocks, animal cracker crumbs, and a Mr Potato Head. So, basically it's 17 days to Mexico, because the rest of today is chill. What with my perfect children and all.
Number Thirteen).
That might be all I've got. The cold and flu medication has worn off, and I'm waiting until the midnight hour of NINE to take the sleepy one. Another family communique has plunged me back into elderly parent sadness, regret, guilt, and inadequacy. I'm busy feeling sad and anxious and berating myself for not going home more often. And it's true. I could and I should and I must but I didn't this evening (tired), won't tomorrow evening (appointment) or Friday evening (people. Invited here.). And when the weekend is here, it will still be a struggle. I suck.
Bitch
And moan.
I'm not of the variety to finish this post properly just because I started it out as 18 gleeful bits. You got twelve of the glee variety and roughly 6 of the anxious, moaning type.
18. In 18 days, I will begin to stew about my parents from somewhere that I truly cannot visit them from.
I'm sorry for the suckish end to this otherwise happy day.
Serious progress shown on our snow marker.
We actually got outdoors.
Sam's beautiful freckles came out to play.
In other news, there's water running into Micah's bedroom through his ceiling. Ice jam on the roof.
And I'm in bed, wrapped in denial, a quilt, flannel jammies, fuzzy socks and a wool sweater breathing in steam from my vaporizer and drinking neo citron.
I'm a woman, but it seems I've caught a pretty bad man cold. I'm married to a man who doesn't whine and snivel and beg me to call his mom when he's under the weather. He's all stoic and no nonsense and just minds his own business. Whereas, I wouldn't mind whining just a bit and demanding to know- will I sleep tonight? How long will this last? And Why Me?!
But it is day 20. That's actually ever so slightly less than three weeks until nacho and Cervesa day.
Well, days.
Days of nachos and cervesas.
It's a terrible shame that Sam's bike has been left out all winter.
Put it on my "you suck" list.
Then note how high the snow is, and let's weep together.
After a cleansing cry, we can gather round Sam's first snowman of the Spring, hold hands, and sing Kum Ba Ya.