Is it nice out yet?

I’m feeling quite restless lately. I guess this is what they call ‘Spring Fever’? We were spoiled with a few nice days of sun and 70 degree weather. On Tuesday, that bitch Mother Nature decided to dump a few inches of snow on us. I threw a sheet over my poor, overly sensitive dwarf lilac. This is the kind of weather that killed half of it the first year I planted it. That’s what Ohio likes to do. It gives you a taste of spring, luring you in, making you think you’ve finally made it. You go outside, work in the yard, cut down your dead perennials you didn’t get cut down in the fall, mix up the soil in your raised beds and start planning this year’s garden and flower beds.

Then, slam. Snow. HA HA. You fell for it again. Stupid Ohioan. When will you learn?

Teh child is proving to be more of a handful. Perhaps it is Mister’s reluctance to let her start spreading her wings and making her own mistakes. Perhaps it is because she is testing the limits. Perhaps it is both. She is, for the most part, a normal teenager. As normal as one can be when coming from divorced parents. Her choice in friends leaves much to be desired, but she continues to score good grades at school, and we have yet to catch her sneaking out of the house at four in the morning, so there isn’t much we can do. Other than know the dishonest friends will end up hurting her feelings, haven’t we all been there? I know I was.

Just last night Mister decided enough was enough, after being called to pick her up at the other side of the lake at the last minute, because she knew she wouldn’t be home by her curfew. (We live near a small lake, there are two small villages on said lake, ours and the one we call “the other side”) This was not the first time. Also it was not the first time we were not informed she was trekking to the other side, instead she just announces she is “going for a walk”.

At her mother’s (I hate calling her that, that makes it seem as if she made an attempt at parenting) she was given free reign. No bedtime, no curfew, no rules. Fend for yourself. Not so at our house. Of course, we also supply her with regular meals, an allowance, lunch money, and some structure. So I guess she gets the good with the bad: the bad being ‘rules’. Anyway, he said that wasn’t going to happen again, if she goes to the other side, she must be back to our side by dark, and she best not call him again at the last second to come retrieve her and her trouble-making friend. She was agreeable, but then the whopper.

“Also, I am tired of hearing you on the phone in the middle of the night. No phone after 11.”

“But DAD. What if I get bored?”

“Read a book. Watch a movie. There is no need for you to be on the phone after 11.”

“Fine, I’ll just text.”

“No, you won’t.”

That, she did not like, and stomped down the hallway and shut her door. At least she didn’t slam it, like I used to do.

I tossed the idea in my head for a few minutes, and thought, well, what is the harm in texting? That does not keep us awake, and if she is tired the next day, that is her problem. So Mister relented on the texting.

I think that makes me good cop.

So now, we shall be monitoring phone records. I hope she follows the rules. Otherwise the phone will reside in our room at night, while charging, and not hers.

I remember when I was her age, there was no phone after 10 on school nights, 11 on weekends. (She is on spring break this week). And if I talked to long? Dad made me get off the phone. There were no 2 hour marathon phone session with a boy because the “minutes were free”. There was “You don’t need to be on the phone for 2 hours. You can see your friend at school and talk to him at lunch.” So I don’t get what the big deal is, aside from the fact that kids these days live in with the expectations of everything being instant, and they just gotta have it now. She should consider herself lucky.

Kids these days.

~anastasia. wishing for the good old days.

Parenting is Hard

The child is obsessed with her concept of rich and poor. She frequently makes statements that when she’s out of school, she’s going to be “rich” and not have to worry about anything. Of course, when asked, she doesn’t have a plan in mind of how she’s going to get rich. She also frequently comments about how we are poor, her mother is poor, and her friends’ parents are all rich.

Mister and I try to gently explain that while her friends’ parents may be “rich”, they could also be in debt up to their ears, but no one would know unless they told. Of course, she insists this is not the case. Her mother does not manage money well, and before the child moved in with us we heard stories of her mother not having money for groceries, gas, etc. Oh, but she always has beer and smokes. Priorities, people! But, because of her mother, I understand the desire for her to not be poor when she’s on her own, and I know she’s definitely tired of hearing her mother say she can’t get or do something because she doesn’t have any money, or she can’t afford it. Personally, I think those are details a child does not need. Simply saying “not this time”, or something along those lines should suffice.

Her father and I are definitely not wealthy, yet we manage to pay our bills on time, and put a little money in savings. We are trying to eliminate our credit card debt and I feel we have a decent plan in place to do so. Without giving her all those details (I don’t think a 14 year old needs all that detail) we mention to her that we need to save up for certain things (she wants another pug dog) and we can’t just go out and buy things on a whim. She, of course, has said we could “just use credit cards”, which I have to counter with an explanation as to why that isn’t a good idea. And that just brings it back full circle, and she’ll say, “Well, when I’m out of school, I’ll be rich so I can buy whatever I want. I won’t have to worry”

Yet, we still have some toys, like our bikes and video games. She definitely doesn’t go without. There is always food and snacks, pop, lunch money and she has her toys, too.  Clean clothes, new shoes.  Her underwear doesn’t have holes. She has books, video games, a cell phone, an iPod (but it’s not the iTouch. Oh, the horror).  A TV in her room, with a DVD player and cable. Yet, somehow it isn’t enough for her.  Quite honestly, compared to the things I had when I was young, I think she’s kind of spoiled, relatively speaking.

How do you get through to a 14 year old about the differences between rich, poor, and all that is in between? It’s not just black and white. And also, how do you encourage her to come up with a plan for being “rich” (I prefer having her come up with a plan for success, not just being “rich”), without coming straight out and saying becoming “rich” doesn’t just happen overnight, that’s a pipe-dream, honey? Which, I have said, in so many words, but I need something to translate to her young language.

I asked her how much money she thought one needed to be “rich”, and she didn’t have any idea. A million? 5 million? A thousand dollars? What?

The other day, Mister went to an eye appointment and decided to try contacts. Well, one contact since his right eye is useless. Anyway, the child informed him that when she needs vision correction of some sort, she’s going to get “cool” contacts, like different colors or cat eyes or something like that. Mister said those are very expensive. Again, her response was that she’ll be rich so she’ll be able to afford them. All he ever says is “I hope you are”. That can’t be helping.

This is just so frustrating. I’m not sure I can bite my tongue next time, and I just might have to drill her. What are you going to do to be rich? How soon after high school do you think you’ll be rich? The day you graduate? After college? When you’re 25? You gonna marry a rich man? Let me know how that one works out. Seriously. I know she’s only 14, but damn, this is annoying.

~anastasia wants to be rich someday, too.

estaremos aquí la semana próxima

Thanks guys.

Thanks to our good (wealthy) friends NY and Leenda, who continue to love us for whatever reason, we will be here next week, for some much needed R&R.  No kids. No cell phones. No email.  Just me and the Mister and their wedding and lots of rum and hopefully some good lovin’.  Uh, not all together.  I mean Mister and me, and NY and Leenda, separate, like as couples, you know.  Oh hell.

~justagirl is tired of secrets.

What? I can’t just pop right back in?

Yeah.  So teh new mom thing kind of took some adjustment.  But it’s all good.  To anyone who still checks in, sorry, and thanks for checking!

That being said…here are some things I have learned, since acquiring an insta-family.

My personal collections, all of the things I ever had a mild interest in and of which I decided to acquire several versions over the past, uh, 31 years, are considered by others to be JUNK. And they don’t really have a home, since we had to downsize and I had to give up all the extra storage space in the old house. Now, I hear, “Mom. When are you going to get rid of the wall of junk? WHAT IS all that stuff?” Hush child. It is my stuff. It’s hiding the mold on the basement walls. And stop listening to your father. He is old and doesn’t know any better.

Nobody covers books with paper bags anymore. OMG. Who are you trying to embarrass? Srsly. Paper bags? People will think you are poor! One must buy book covers. Cloth book covers. But, I suppose, since most people ask for plastic grocery bags now (Polar bear haters!), paper bags aren’t readily available from the hallway closet anymore… At least said book covers are washable.

There is a point in time, when you no longer care if your shoes came from Payless, and your shirt came from Goodwill, and oops, you forgot to put on eyeliner today, did you brush your hair before you left for work? That point does not come when you are 14. That point comes where you are in your 30s, and it is a nice feeling to not be concerned about such things because you remember being concerned about such things at 14 and it sucked. (OMG, you got that from KMART? I am not wearing it. At all. Ever.) Yes you will. And you will be in your 30s, and you will be wondering why in the frick it is such a big deal to a teenager, because, hello, it was only seven dollars. Why pay ten times more for the same thing at the mall. Until you remember you were there once too. And there was a difference. And you will also realize that you are becoming your mother. Except for the whole crazy part. Right?

Also? If a trip is planned, an otherwise always healthy kid shall require a trip to the ER on the morning of planned trip. That? That is Murphy’s Law, folks. And I always obey the law…

Where’s the damn instruction manual?

Hey ya’ll.

So, I’m gonna be a full time mom now.  Save every other weekend.

She’s 13 and brilliant.  And she calls me mom.

Damn.

How do you do this?

Its The Fair!

It is! Because it’s August! So it’s The Fair! This makes my brother and me very happy. We loves The Fair.

Gosh. It’s been a while. Mr. is back to work, sporting three lovely scars on his big chest. I say they give him character. And he can scare people with them. He feels good, except for said scars, they give him some sort of strange pulling sensation. I assume because they are still healing. This skin is very tight there.

Now summer is almost over. We can ride again. (Well, I always could, but didn’t because I felt guilty. Good little wifey.) So we are. Here and there. We went camping and we’re going again. Trying to fit a whole summer into what’s left of it. Good thing we’re broke from medicial bills and we can’t go on vacation because I don’t know when we’d find the time.

*sigh*

But, I shan’t complain, as I am thankful for what I’ve got. Or something like that, right?

Work has cracked down in internet usage, which I suppose is completely necessary for some reason. We get 20 minutes a day to look at stuff that isn’t work related. I’m the one that has to control it and present all the reports to my boss. Because of this, I haven’t read the blogs in my list for weeks. I am so behind. But I’ve got a bit of time this weekend, maybe I’ll get caught up.

Members of my husband’s ex-wife’s family are coming over today. This should be great fun. It’s her brothers kids actually, coming to go on Mr’s dad’s boat with us and Mr.’s daughter. You have to watch what you say and do around kids like that. They report back to “the other side” with every little detail. When did life become so damn complicated. Who’s in charge here? They should be fired.

That’s it in a nutshell. I’m still so damn exciting I can hardly control myself.

Right.

Quickie

Surgery went well.  He should be home soon.

Thanks to all who emailed or commented.

The summer of suck.

Hey.  Guess what is not fun?  Finding out your husband, at 42, needs to have a valve replacement.  In his heart. They will STOP his heart and take it out of him and remove the bad valve and put in good cow parts and then put it back in. Cow valve or pig.  Cow or pig.  Beef or bacon.  Whatever.

On Monday.

That’s a great thing to try to wrap your head around.

:(

Our favorite bar has closed its doors forever. I feel like I have graduated from high school all over again, and soon will lose touch with all of my friends. Of course, we are older and more mature now, so we will be responsible and keep in touch, instead of just assuming we will run into each other at our very own local version of Cheers. We even had a mailman.

We had a lot to drink on Saturday night, so as not to be saddened by the reason we were all there at the same time for the same reason.

This is it folks. It’s over, Johnny. See you on the flip side.

We don’t have a starting place for riding, now. It used to be all “Hey, j. Wanna go riding Saturday? Meet here at noon.” No more.

We don’t have somewhere to go on Sunday after the kids leave and holy hell we need a drink and some adult socializing. Nupe.

We don’t have a place to go to unwind after a shitty day at work. (And let me tell you, I’ve had my share of those in the last few weeks. You missed my breakdown. I was actually escorted OUT of my office. Good times.)

No longer will I get a phone call or a text instructing me to meet for a drink.

No longer will I stop in (just for one!) and run into at least 10 people that I know and end up staying a little too long. (Hello? Mr. Taxi Cab driver? Um, yeah…)

Yesterday, my friend called to see what we were doing. He was going riding. Where to? He wasn’t sure.

Ohio State plays tonight. We are we all going to watch the game? We don’t know.

This weekend we doing have anything to do. Where are we going to go? Beats me.

We’ll have to figure something out. I met way too many good people there to just lose all of them.

😦

Fat Fat Piggy Fat

What better way to continue my winter blues than to suddenly and unwittingly become painfully aware of the fact that my body has turned thirty and is leaving my attitude behind.  I still think like I’m 17, but I sure don’t look like it.  Gray hairs show up when I don’t get my hair colored frequently enough.  I have dark circles under my eyes even when I get enough sleep. I have lines (LINES!) on my forehead.  Where did those come from?  Most of my jeans don’t fit right, if they fit at all.   I am two pounds away from where I was in that picture that Mr. saw; the one at my brother’s house that made him say, “Whoa!  That was you?  You were porky.”  Which was somewhat funny (OK, not that funny) but now it’s really not funny, because, well, I don’t want to be porky, and I am.  Plus, it was after my brother said, “Hey, come look at how fat j was.”

I can deal with the gray (color) and the dark circles (makeup) and the lines (firming lotion).  But the porkiness? (is that a word?)  I’m too lazy to get rid of that. I just want it to go away, and give back my flat, firm belly

I think about all of the hangups I have had, and some that I still have, regarding my weight and body.  And really, it’s not very fair, because, I’ve never been all that bad. I sure have always been self concious about it, though.  I’ve never been grossly overweight.  I used to be quite skinny actually.  So, I got teased for that.  I never grew boobs, which you would think I would have accepted by now, but I don’t. And I still get teased for that. It’s all good natured fun, I know, but it still stings.  My legs are a little thicker than I think is acceptable, this happened about the age of sixteen. I dealt with that, even though I hated the fact that I had cellulite as a teenager.  And now?  Now I have cellulite on my belly.  This cannot be happening.  I need to do some sort of cardio, right?  To burn off the fat?  Because the crunches and squats and all of that other pilates crap just isn’t working.  Except for my arms and shoulders.  That part of me is actually kind of nice.

My mom started my hangups, I think.  She was always talking about her small frame (only two pounds heavier in the winter! Woo!) in a way that made me feel that I was supposed to end up the same size as her, and if I didn’t, well, that would just be WRONG. Nevermind that I am built nothing like her. (I’m only about an inch taller, but my legs are WAY longer than hers. I have a shorter torso.) So I held at that weight.  The same weight as dear old complex-causing mom. I held that weight for a LONG time.  I held it until my first marriage, actually.  Then I guess I gained the weight because I really didn’t care what I looked like or what he thought of me.  But you know what?  I still wasn’t that big.  I wasn’t “fat”.  I never even made it out of a size seven for Christ’s sake.  But my family had a field day with this. They still do, when they look at old pictures of when I was “fat”.

I lost the weight when I got divorced.  I was back down to my mother’s target weight for me.  “Oh, you look so good!” she would exclaim.  Meanwhile, the people at work would say, “Oh, honey, you need to eat, you’re getting so skinny!”  Which was it, I wondered to myself.  I can’t possibly be both.

I held that weight for a bit longer, which, unfortunately, was during time I met the Mr. Guess who has a new “expectation” of what my weight should be?  Nevermind that during that time I was living on Slim Fast and ice cream and amaretto sours.  Very nourishing.  Needless to say, I have gained the weight back.  And I feel fat.  And I feel like such an asshole when I think that way, because, really, if I look in the mirror, WITH CLOTHES ON, I look pretty OK.  If I see myself in shorts, or a bikini, or, God forbid, naked?  Oh, look out, the complex rears it’s ugly head, and my self esteem goes right out the fucking window.  All I see are my flaws.  My belly, but butt, my thighs, my frickin’ knees?  They all look fat to me.  Then I notice the gray hair.  Then I see the dark circles, and the lines, and my skin is dry, and my teeth aren’t straight, and …

Do you see how that is just one big snowball effect?  It’s a good thing I like food, or I would probably be anorexic. I feel for the girls who have that condition.  I understand how it can happen – all the skinny models and photoshopped cover girls with huge fake boobs (they photoshop the scars too!) making all of us look bad?  Those women on magazine covers are what men think women should look like.  Because their stupid penises don’t have  the mental capacity to say, “That woman does not look like that in real life.  That is not normal. My girlfried/wife/that-lady-over-there IS real and she is hot. I wish to have sex with someone like her.” So girls who are taught that fat is bad end up worrying. They end up worrying too much.  I’ve considered the starving, actually.  But, fortunately I know the weight would just come back once I started eating again, and I also know that it is bad for you.  So I don’t.

I asked Mr. this morning if I was fat.  He said no.  I didn’t believe him. That is wrong.  I told him to not lie. He stood his ground. I suppose that is the right answer for him to give.  Imagine if he would have said, “Well, um, now that you mention it, I have notices that you have gained a little bit of weight.”  I think we can all say that he would be receiving the silent treatment for at least a day.

Even though all I hear, every time I put on a pair of jeans, is that one time someone said “Anything bigger than a size six is too big!”

Fortunately for me, my family has mostly layed off of me, only because my SIL is the new target of their fat dissatisfaction.  (“That baby weight ISN’T going away! MUAHAHAHAHA!”) My mother really seems to get some sort of joy out of it.  It’s kind of sick.  It actually pisses me off.  But mother knows best, right?

That’s why her thirty year old daughter still feels like a young awkward girl going through puberty and only wants to have sex with the lights off.

Thanks for that.