I guess I’ve just entered that stage of life, or I’ve hit that definitive age where everyone I know seems to be getting married, having babies, buying houses and in all senses of the phrase “growing up.” Now I’ve written about how I fear that I have missed the boat in some senses. Although mentally I grew up before most, merely out of circumstance, I seem to be regressing from, or at least straddling the lines of grown up-ness.
I have no current desire to own a house. I like apartments. Freedom! Being able to pick up and go or to start something new and exciting are things that I value. I could barely commit to a dog! But now that I have a dog, he’s our whole little world. Imagine how crazy our child would be.
Now, as Destiny’s Child serenaded us in the nineties with, “Bills, Bills, Bills,” it still rings true. We still have credit card debt, we need to save for a new car and we need to be able to afford medical insurance (don’t act surprised!), BC, “Before Child.” I desperately want a new T.V. and computer, and we still haven’t had an actual vacation together. Who needs a mortgage and rugrats running around on top of it all?
I have those hormonal times where I’m desperate to reproduce and I need a baby fix, but then I think about how much I look forward to girls night and trips to visit family, and I’m snapped back into reality. It’s some unspoken law that as soon as you get married you are instantly expected to make a family, if you haven’t already begun one. I feel the question looming every time we hang out with in-laws and sisters and such: “When are you going to have a baby?”
Some of the women I admire most are mothers and friends and family alike all tell me there is no true way to “plan” baby time and you’ll never actually be ready. But lately, it’s not the “money” or the “ready.” It’s the sheer fear and lack of mothering self esteem that stops me in my fantastical tracks every time I think I want to board the baby train.
I can’t say I didn’t have a mom around; she was around but she wasn’t exactly much of a mom for most of my life. Granted, the years she was around I wasn’t very in tune with the world, I was under age 10 for most of her mothering years. My mother uses this idea as an excuse to get angry and claim that I’m accusing her of being a terrible mother but the truth is most of my early childhood memories are either pixilated amalgams of pictures and stories, or jumbled physical things associated with the latter. The one thing I remember is my mother telling me that during one of her momentary lapses in parental judgment she kicked me out of the car for kindergarten and said, “I’m so done! I don’t want to be a mother anymore!” I walked into class, promptly and matter-of-factly announced to my teacher, “My mom doesn’t want to be a mom anymore.” My teacher looked back at me with concern and horror, claiming that she’s sure my mother didn’t really mean it, and that I must have misunderstood. Later, my mother received a phone call from the school making sure she’d actually be there to pick me up that afternoon. That story has become legend. I was 5! What would you expect?
Granted, most people don’t have ideal, amazing mothers but I think those of us who get raised by the real nut-jobs or lose a parent during our early stages of life, really have no idea what a mother is supposed to be. There are so many stereotypes with it all. In essence, my dad ended up being way more of a mom. He did my laundry, hemmed my clothes, sewed patches onto wholes, fed me meals with all of the food groups, forced me to drink my water and my milk, and probably made more trips to the store for tampons than my mother ever did. She took me shopping, kept me current with fashion, and helped keep me loud, grouchy and quick on my toes with the insults and jabs that only a real mother can teach you.
My best friend lost her mother when we were in high school and she may be the greatest mother I’ve ever met. She has three little girls who all adore her. She’s kept true to herself in every sense and has raised an amazing family. So against all the stereotypes, I know that her loss hasn’t converted her into a tequila-drinking mom, who watches television all day, ignoring the screaming children, perhaps throwing them a Pringle or Swedish Fish every 20 minutes or so, while simultaneously chain-smoking Marlboro reds, which leaves me hopeful. But then again, what if I become that mother?
Most days I feel I’d shame the word “Mom.” That’s what I’m afraid of. All women strive to never end up like their mothers but I just don’t want to be one of those moms they put on Jerry Springer specials or that end up on Hoarders and Intervention. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable goal.
I was a nanny for most of my life and I love being around kids. Kids are the best friends you’ll ever find and the only little people who will tell you the unyielding truth, love you for what you are, see through any bullshit you may be bearing, and call you ridiculous names all while making you fall in love with them. Two of my best friends in this life are 9 and 17. Kids just keep it real.
I know my husband will be a great father. I have no doubt whatsoever. Even though he makes fun of the fact that I will be completely psychotic when I’m pregnant, and claims I can barely deal with the dog, I know he has faith in me, and in us. For some reason though, at the end of the day, I’m still scared shitless.
I know we made the conscious choice to move across the country from the majority of our family members, but the idea of having a baby makes me feel even farther away. Granted, people would visit, but we’d have no extra support system like most “settled” people do. Then again, we don’t really have parents who can take the kids for days at a time, or who could stay up all night and help us. I’ve got some amazing friends and sisters who could help here and there, but I would end up with just Eben and baby Chriss. Although the thought of just us three is somewhat frightening, it’s really everything I’ve ever wanted anyway, so comforting in the end.
I’m so used to depending on only a small handful of people. It’s almost liberating to think that when it’s time for an addition to the family, it will be our own creation and our own endeavor. It’s a mixed bag, really. I long for having some people physically closer, and I get bummed out and jealous when I see all these friends and family members with their aunts, uncles, cousins, sisters, moms and dads as integral parts of their babies lives, but then again, I’ve never really had that kind of situation as something lasting in my life, so why should I miss something that’s never really been there?
We are lucky enough in this world to have found a grouping of friends and family that truly love being a part of our lives, and I know when the time comes, they’ll step up and make sure I’m not a mommy disaster. But, for now it feels like we’re worlds away from babyhood.
We’ve talked about it, and we talk about it all the time. I feel there’s no rush. Even though “my biological clock is ticking,” there’s always time. I’ve stayed pretty healthy to make sure things are easier when the time comes. I’ve read the literature and statistics. The bottom line is, no matter how afraid I am, or how I feel about my own mom, if I do my best, perhaps I’ll raise a kid who can do the same and surpass all other expectations.
Babies may be on the brain but I’m pretty far away from catching the baby train. Just like everything else in this life, I’ll come into it on my own terms. As crazy as I am and scared as I can be, we tend to get through it all and make it work; we always do. Introducing a ginger baby into the world and raising baby Chriss will just be another chapter in the journey!
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
She Drives Me Crazy
I remember when my dad bought her. I was 16. He described her as having the same features as this new thing called a Prius, but it was more affordable and wasn’t a hybrid car. Of course he made sure she was complete with a CD player and no power windows, in case they could cause you to be trapped inside. She was forest green, which I immediately hated because they had an awesome light teal colored one I thought was way cuter.
She’s the car I learned to drive on. It was in a tiny bank parking lot in our tiny home town which seems like a whole different life ago, lately. She was a 2000 Toyota Echo, which I pronounced “Etch-O,” because I thought I was being cute and quippy. When my parents split up, the Echo accompanied my dad to Oregon. I drove my mom’s Honda or Mazda or whatever. Basic four door sedan thing, easy to drive and fairly ordinary looking. I took my driver’s test much later in a Honda CR-V, but when my dad rescued me from my mother in Florida, “Enid” the Echo as she would later be named, came down from Oregon to scoop me up.
I can’t pretend I was excited to see either one of them, Enid or my dad that is, but they were there, just like they always have been. The Echo towed a trailer with all my furniture in it, 2,500 miles up the mountains to Eugene, Oregon in 5 of the longest and most miserable days ever. Before we even got 4 hours out she took away our air conditioning capabilities because she’d overheat from towing our emotional baggage and the massive trailer. No one could believe we fit an entire bedroom set and all my other crap in just an Echo and a trailer. But we were rock stars.
As soon as we got home to Oregon, my dad and I shared the Echo. Finally he bought a truck to better suit his needs for life in the woods and Enid became my own. I had the newest car of my friends in High School. She was cute. I eventually started adorning her in stickers. If you look at my Echo and then others, you start to see how they actually just look ridiculous without being covered in bumper stickers. I had punk rock bands, offensive political statements about Bush and random other band’s names, plastered all over her. She’s very eclectic.
Her name came to me shortly after meeting some friends that had a band. All of their cars had names, like “The Faded Patch,” and such. During a phase where I was obsessed with the Barenaked Ladies, I heard this song “Enid.” And I thought…”Hmm, Enid the Etch-O. Has quite the ring to it.” And so she has become the greatest car there ever was!
Currently Enid has over 230,000 miles on her. She has been across the country 3 times. She’s been up and down the Oregon Coast, seen Washington, Idaho, and even driven down Lombard Street in San Francisco. She got to ride on a trailer when we moved to Tampa two years ago, because she’s such precious cargo but she’s a BAMF with no doubt.
My father trained me to be meticulous about taking care of her. More than most chicks would ever. So I am: Oil changes regularly, tires, general maintenance and always treating her well. This is a car that has been there for me for a decade. She’s been with me longer than I’ve known my husband!
An ex-boyfriend almost stole her once. It was just her and me on the tearful drive home. She used to help me get my favorite little ones to the park to feed the ducks. Lolly even decorated her in Dora The Explorer stickers, that are still on the rear window. Enid gave me the momentum to get my only speeding tickets. She drove all the people I loved the most around at one time or another. She got my old best friend and his sister’s to their grandparent’s final moments, got countless friends to concerts, and never let any one of us down.
She camped, she was a mountaineer and even hit the gravel roads deep in the Oregon woods to get to my dad’s off the grid cabin. She saved our lives when we spun out on the highway on black ice with barely a scrape or scratch on her. We were going 60miles per hour and easily could have flipped and crashed through the embankment but instead she just bounced and turned, halting us safely.
On our wedding night someone broke Enid’s window and stole some of our stuff before our big move to Florida. She let us patch her up with duct tape and withstood a wicked southern rainstorm until we could get her window fixed. She always takes care of us, and we’ll always take care of her.
Since we’ve been down in Florida, we’ve put a lot of miles on her. We can’t afford a new car any time soon, so we are very attentive to her needs. She’s cost us some bucks over the last two years but she’s getting old so she deserves some TLC. It was on Sunday night recently though, that she was seemingly taking a turn for the worse.
We’d just gotten her oil changed. My husband had recently made the rule that she really needs to run a few minutes after sitting for more than a couple of hours before we just take off, so she gets warmed up before every outing. One rainy morning, she seemed to be choking in some way. I could feel her jerking a bit under me. It wasn’t enough for her to not work, but it was concerning. She quit her jolts a few minutes in and got us to work. Sunday afternoon though, she wasn’t quitting. The entire drive across town, unless I hit 50miles per hour, I could feel her having a tough time.
Sundays are often my Friday so I met my husband at the bar and he fed me candy-flavored shots and a beer. Finally we left and he drove us home. It was when he felt it that he immediately said, “I’m taking her in first thing in the morning.” I was rolling my eyes about it costing money when a pained look crossed his face. He said, “Oh, no…I hope it’s not the transmission, because that’s like 2,000$ and we’d have to buy a new car.”
My buzzed emotional self lost it. I actually felt the tears running down and sobbed. “No! She’s the best car in the world! It’s not her time to go! She’s been with me forever! She’s the only car I’ve ever had!” Because my husband is a great man, he just holds my hand and says, “Honey, I’m sure she’s fine. She’s great but we need to check it out. And she’s an old girl so we’ll just see.”
At this point all I can think about is how offensive that new car smell would be. How could I be in a car with no dog hair, and without stickers? Then I pictured them smashing her in one of those giant machines and I just bit my lip and felt another tear push my mascara into my eyes. I paused a couple times admitting it was ridiculous that I was crying over a car but Enid wasn’t “a car!” SHE WAS MY CAR!
When I had no one, Enid was there to take me away. When everything in my life sucked, she was still there. She was the only piece of Pennsylvania I truly had left that wasn’t a photograph, family member or friend. She followed me everywhere. She drives me crazy in all the best ways! She’s never stranded me or would ever hurt me. As the great Queen song proclaims, “I’m in love with my car!”
I barely slept that night and as I tossed and turned I just begged the universe for it to not be the transmission or cripplingly expensive. My husband rolled out of bed and took her in. It took an hour just for the diagnostic. I felt like I was waiting for them to say she had car cancer. When he called, he asked what all people ask in those situations: “Good or bad news first?”
“Bad,” I said.
“The cylinders and the spark plugs all have to be replaced and they don’t have the parts. Good news is it’s not the transmission.”
“WHEW!” I thought, as he interjected, “But it’s still going to cost about $500 bucks.”
Ugh! Can’t we catch a break!? But I was quickly calmed at the fact that Enid was going to be okay. They sent my husband home with a newish, bright red Toyota Camry. He looked ridiculous in it. It was huge and so clean and…NEW! It felt weird. I didn’t know how soon we would get the car back and I had a crummy day at work until my co-worker buddies showed up and then one said, “I’ll see if I can see a shiny red car waiting for you.”
“Oh wait,” she said, “He’s got your car! And there’s Brodie!” I was instantly happy to see my car waiting for my with my pug hanging out the window. The family was back together: Eben, Ali, Brodie and Enid the Etch-O. I know I’ll lose it when her time comes, but for now, we have a lot of family events to do together, and even though she can drive us crazy, she can drive us everywhere!
She’s the car I learned to drive on. It was in a tiny bank parking lot in our tiny home town which seems like a whole different life ago, lately. She was a 2000 Toyota Echo, which I pronounced “Etch-O,” because I thought I was being cute and quippy. When my parents split up, the Echo accompanied my dad to Oregon. I drove my mom’s Honda or Mazda or whatever. Basic four door sedan thing, easy to drive and fairly ordinary looking. I took my driver’s test much later in a Honda CR-V, but when my dad rescued me from my mother in Florida, “Enid” the Echo as she would later be named, came down from Oregon to scoop me up.
I can’t pretend I was excited to see either one of them, Enid or my dad that is, but they were there, just like they always have been. The Echo towed a trailer with all my furniture in it, 2,500 miles up the mountains to Eugene, Oregon in 5 of the longest and most miserable days ever. Before we even got 4 hours out she took away our air conditioning capabilities because she’d overheat from towing our emotional baggage and the massive trailer. No one could believe we fit an entire bedroom set and all my other crap in just an Echo and a trailer. But we were rock stars.
As soon as we got home to Oregon, my dad and I shared the Echo. Finally he bought a truck to better suit his needs for life in the woods and Enid became my own. I had the newest car of my friends in High School. She was cute. I eventually started adorning her in stickers. If you look at my Echo and then others, you start to see how they actually just look ridiculous without being covered in bumper stickers. I had punk rock bands, offensive political statements about Bush and random other band’s names, plastered all over her. She’s very eclectic.
Her name came to me shortly after meeting some friends that had a band. All of their cars had names, like “The Faded Patch,” and such. During a phase where I was obsessed with the Barenaked Ladies, I heard this song “Enid.” And I thought…”Hmm, Enid the Etch-O. Has quite the ring to it.” And so she has become the greatest car there ever was!
Currently Enid has over 230,000 miles on her. She has been across the country 3 times. She’s been up and down the Oregon Coast, seen Washington, Idaho, and even driven down Lombard Street in San Francisco. She got to ride on a trailer when we moved to Tampa two years ago, because she’s such precious cargo but she’s a BAMF with no doubt.
My father trained me to be meticulous about taking care of her. More than most chicks would ever. So I am: Oil changes regularly, tires, general maintenance and always treating her well. This is a car that has been there for me for a decade. She’s been with me longer than I’ve known my husband!
An ex-boyfriend almost stole her once. It was just her and me on the tearful drive home. She used to help me get my favorite little ones to the park to feed the ducks. Lolly even decorated her in Dora The Explorer stickers, that are still on the rear window. Enid gave me the momentum to get my only speeding tickets. She drove all the people I loved the most around at one time or another. She got my old best friend and his sister’s to their grandparent’s final moments, got countless friends to concerts, and never let any one of us down.
She camped, she was a mountaineer and even hit the gravel roads deep in the Oregon woods to get to my dad’s off the grid cabin. She saved our lives when we spun out on the highway on black ice with barely a scrape or scratch on her. We were going 60miles per hour and easily could have flipped and crashed through the embankment but instead she just bounced and turned, halting us safely.
On our wedding night someone broke Enid’s window and stole some of our stuff before our big move to Florida. She let us patch her up with duct tape and withstood a wicked southern rainstorm until we could get her window fixed. She always takes care of us, and we’ll always take care of her.
Since we’ve been down in Florida, we’ve put a lot of miles on her. We can’t afford a new car any time soon, so we are very attentive to her needs. She’s cost us some bucks over the last two years but she’s getting old so she deserves some TLC. It was on Sunday night recently though, that she was seemingly taking a turn for the worse.
We’d just gotten her oil changed. My husband had recently made the rule that she really needs to run a few minutes after sitting for more than a couple of hours before we just take off, so she gets warmed up before every outing. One rainy morning, she seemed to be choking in some way. I could feel her jerking a bit under me. It wasn’t enough for her to not work, but it was concerning. She quit her jolts a few minutes in and got us to work. Sunday afternoon though, she wasn’t quitting. The entire drive across town, unless I hit 50miles per hour, I could feel her having a tough time.
Sundays are often my Friday so I met my husband at the bar and he fed me candy-flavored shots and a beer. Finally we left and he drove us home. It was when he felt it that he immediately said, “I’m taking her in first thing in the morning.” I was rolling my eyes about it costing money when a pained look crossed his face. He said, “Oh, no…I hope it’s not the transmission, because that’s like 2,000$ and we’d have to buy a new car.”
My buzzed emotional self lost it. I actually felt the tears running down and sobbed. “No! She’s the best car in the world! It’s not her time to go! She’s been with me forever! She’s the only car I’ve ever had!” Because my husband is a great man, he just holds my hand and says, “Honey, I’m sure she’s fine. She’s great but we need to check it out. And she’s an old girl so we’ll just see.”
At this point all I can think about is how offensive that new car smell would be. How could I be in a car with no dog hair, and without stickers? Then I pictured them smashing her in one of those giant machines and I just bit my lip and felt another tear push my mascara into my eyes. I paused a couple times admitting it was ridiculous that I was crying over a car but Enid wasn’t “a car!” SHE WAS MY CAR!
When I had no one, Enid was there to take me away. When everything in my life sucked, she was still there. She was the only piece of Pennsylvania I truly had left that wasn’t a photograph, family member or friend. She followed me everywhere. She drives me crazy in all the best ways! She’s never stranded me or would ever hurt me. As the great Queen song proclaims, “I’m in love with my car!”
I barely slept that night and as I tossed and turned I just begged the universe for it to not be the transmission or cripplingly expensive. My husband rolled out of bed and took her in. It took an hour just for the diagnostic. I felt like I was waiting for them to say she had car cancer. When he called, he asked what all people ask in those situations: “Good or bad news first?”
“Bad,” I said.
“The cylinders and the spark plugs all have to be replaced and they don’t have the parts. Good news is it’s not the transmission.”
“WHEW!” I thought, as he interjected, “But it’s still going to cost about $500 bucks.”
Ugh! Can’t we catch a break!? But I was quickly calmed at the fact that Enid was going to be okay. They sent my husband home with a newish, bright red Toyota Camry. He looked ridiculous in it. It was huge and so clean and…NEW! It felt weird. I didn’t know how soon we would get the car back and I had a crummy day at work until my co-worker buddies showed up and then one said, “I’ll see if I can see a shiny red car waiting for you.”
“Oh wait,” she said, “He’s got your car! And there’s Brodie!” I was instantly happy to see my car waiting for my with my pug hanging out the window. The family was back together: Eben, Ali, Brodie and Enid the Etch-O. I know I’ll lose it when her time comes, but for now, we have a lot of family events to do together, and even though she can drive us crazy, she can drive us everywhere!
Monday, September 12, 2011
Run, Fat Girl, RUN!
It’s been a rough summer…We started with this awesome vacation to see the family on the West Coast. And vacation, is vacation. There’s no calorie counting and no cares. We hiked, I went to a friend’s step class, we walked a lot but we were there to relax and not care! Drama hit afterward and I was just so exhausted from dealing with it all, working out wasn’t a high priority.
Three years ago before we even got engaged I was pushing maximum density. Between being a food lover, being in love with a chef, and my cocktail enthusiast side, even working out wasn’t really balancing out my intake. A family member joined Weight Watchers and although I’d originally scoffed, she was kicking some major ass, so I fell on that bandwagon. I got back into my workouts. I do love working out. It makes me feel so much better! I got some personal counseling and I made myself lose the weight.
By the time Eben proposed, I was 10lbs down. They say nothing kicks you into gear like an impending wedding. They were so right. I had a gorgeous blonde bombshell of a friend who was also a personal trainer. With Weight Watchers, a strict routine, and the help of Alicia, by the end of it I’d lost 20lbs and fit into a size 4 for the first time since high school. And I didn’t loathe my body much anymore. Success!
For the past two years I’d managed to maintain that figure within about a 5lb range. Ladies, who are we kidding? We can gain 5lbs in a day if the mood is right. Women’s bodies are bitches, just like we end up being because we are trapped into them! I went to spin class a few times a week, hit yoga and body sculpting classes, the elliptical and stair master. I didn’t indulge too hard core and I kept tabs on it all.
In March after a crazy stretch of time where I was working so much that food became a far off dream between naps, and I was lucky if I could grab a granola bar, let alone a fulfilling meal, I’d actually squeezed into the skinny jeans for a week or so but I didn’t feel the need to be skinny really, just healthy.
I come from a long line of petite women who can stay petite but can also balloon up into something of a lumpy pear with compulsive eating habits and alcoholic tendencies. I’ve straddled both the skinny and chunky for most of my life. When I’m active my body shows it, and when I’m inactive, it really shows it.
Before the big vacation this June I cancelled my gym membership because between the puppy, work and everything else, we didn’t need the added expense, and I didn’t have enough time to make it worthwhile. I had a Wii Fit, Wii Active and a decent elliptical at our crummy apartment complex gym to keep me going. I also discovered the dog liked to jog, so I should indulge with him.
I guess six months of “Whatever, I don’t care, I’ll have a gym membership this fall to make up for it,” bit me in my ever expanding ass, after all. When they say it’s easier to put it on than it is to take it off, they aren’t joking! I shouldn’t have justified it when the pants started to get tight. I shouldn’t have spent so much time sucking it in. I should have gotten my ass out of the chair…shoulda, coulda, woulda!
So I made the mistake of getting on the evil square known as the scale, and it may as well have just read “Fat Bitch.” The number amount pretty much said that perfectly! And then the water works started! I, all of the sudden, wished there was some strange way of my being pregnant and the damn baby was making me chunky, but all of the alcohol units wouldn’t have made that possible, so then I stood there getting on and off of the damn scale, sucking it in and willing it to drop down two measly numbers just so I could endure more justifications.
I forced my husband into caring even though he did the obligatory, “You’re beautiful no matter what,” song and dance complete with a “Who cares babe?” and “We’ll do whatever you want to make you feel better about it,” chorus and encore performance. I text my new Bestie feverishly, and she confessed the evil scale had done the same to her! I’d paused thinking there may be some kind of terrible conspiracy and my pants weren’t 6’s and 8’s but really 0’s and 2’s, rebelling against the confines of their size-ist makers, but was shocked back into the reality that I’m just chunky when she told me she’d caved and joined Weight Watchers. We vowed to kick ass together.
Peeling myself out of bed to go to work, where the pretty ones would parade around me all day, I managed to look decent and get my fat ass going. I blamed the dog about my weight and he just whined and snuffed at me as if to say, “Bullshit!” When I got to work my gorgeous and athletic co-worker arrived in a kind of funky mood. I knew she LOVED to talk fitness, so I instantly attacked!
Trying desperately to not just blurt out, “Please inject me with whatever it is you take that makes you perfect and makes you like to run and race and everything in between,” I let her use me as a sponge. I forced my Bestie into the conversation and before you knew it, some strange hope had brewed in me, that maybe one day soon I wouldn’t just be another fat girl that the rail-skinny perfect ones make fun of.
I thought my athletic goddess of a co-worker had pretty much finished her pep talk with me about how we’d train together and help each other out when she emerged with a daring idea: “Let’s work up to the Turkey Trott on Thanksgiving in Clearwater! It’s a 10k!” She felt me wince and responded, “They have a 5k too!”
I pictured running that morning with her and my Bestie, and later to come home to an amazing bath amidst the smells of the feast my husband would be preparing, and how after two months of behaving I’d just pig out on my favorite day and I blurted out, “YES! Let’s do it!” Uh oh, there was no turning back now. I’d put it into the universe. It’d set it in motion. Before I knew it, the Bestie was more excited than I and we’d even recruited another co-worker…this was happening!
I told my husband and he was just like, “That’s great, babe!” I was expecting more of a response. I’d imagined more of a, “Wow babe, you are going to kick that race’s ass! You will be able to go so fast and impress everyone! We should buy you a cute outfit. Of course I’ll cook you a feast and be waiting to massage your feet when you get home,” kind of response but, I’d take what I could get.
This is a big deal! The diet’s on! I’m not a big diet girl most of the time but I do know how to scale things back. I do believe that all women should just be perfect, pretty and comfortable while eating buckets of KFC and out-drinking men in Beer and Liquor contests, without even gaining an ounce, but that is SO not the world we live in. I hate how the weight thing will always haunt me. It will follow me around forever like the sound of my mother sighing when the size 4 jeans she just bought me didn’t quite zip, or when I chose to wear fashionable sweat pants instead of quote, unquote “slacks,” for which I might add are inadequately titled because they NEVER provide any “slack!”
I’ve started on a good note so far. I do enjoy eating healthy but who doesn’t love ice cream, cookies and wine? Especially all in the same day! I do have a fat girl mentality for sure, I just hate when she shows up physically, making a muffin top appear out of my pants that used to be “roomy.” My sister once accused me of being bulimic because I lost weight and toned my body, so I replied “No, I like food too much.” She curtly replied, “Which is why you would be bulimic!” How stupid of me!
I wish I could be bulimic, or anorexic, or just smoke a bunch of cigarettes and crack and become one of those cold women who make it all look so easy but can’t even deal with how many calories are in a Tic Tac! No, if I’m wishing, I wish I were like my goddess coworker who runs 10 miles for a warm up and can bike out of the state and back with only 8 ounces of water! Yes, I’m idolizing her, but why not? We all know and sigh at one of these women every time they burst through the door with perfect sunlight providing them a runway! I’m lucky if I don’t fall on a daily basis!
Sometimes I like being curvy. I own it. Also, I’m married so there’s really no one left to impress, but one of the groomsmen told me I shouldn’t be another fat wife and I totally agree. Even though I desperately want to eat an entire container of cheese balls while watching hours of chick flicks, I know I should go for a run and eat celery instead. At least when I weigh less and I’m still curvy, I can be proud.
Of course once I started figuring out how to enroll in the Turkey Trott, all I could envision was a montage from that movie “Run, Fatboy, Run,” and of me hitting the “Runner’s Wall,” or just tripping less than a mile in and ruining the entire effort. But, regardless, I’m going to do it. I’m not much of a runner or a jogger but this is a commitment to an accomplishment I so desperately want to achieve. I have EVERYTHING to lose. The tummy, the ass, the thighs, and the ambivalence that’s literally been weighing me down!
So this fat chick is going to run! I’m going to run like the wind on Thanksgiving! But if you think about it, it’s really just so I can stuff my face afterwards…so if that’s not motivation enough, what is!? I guess you’ll hear about it all afterwards, and if I could even stomach all the food I’m already fantasizing about. Run, fat girl, run!
Three years ago before we even got engaged I was pushing maximum density. Between being a food lover, being in love with a chef, and my cocktail enthusiast side, even working out wasn’t really balancing out my intake. A family member joined Weight Watchers and although I’d originally scoffed, she was kicking some major ass, so I fell on that bandwagon. I got back into my workouts. I do love working out. It makes me feel so much better! I got some personal counseling and I made myself lose the weight.
By the time Eben proposed, I was 10lbs down. They say nothing kicks you into gear like an impending wedding. They were so right. I had a gorgeous blonde bombshell of a friend who was also a personal trainer. With Weight Watchers, a strict routine, and the help of Alicia, by the end of it I’d lost 20lbs and fit into a size 4 for the first time since high school. And I didn’t loathe my body much anymore. Success!
For the past two years I’d managed to maintain that figure within about a 5lb range. Ladies, who are we kidding? We can gain 5lbs in a day if the mood is right. Women’s bodies are bitches, just like we end up being because we are trapped into them! I went to spin class a few times a week, hit yoga and body sculpting classes, the elliptical and stair master. I didn’t indulge too hard core and I kept tabs on it all.
In March after a crazy stretch of time where I was working so much that food became a far off dream between naps, and I was lucky if I could grab a granola bar, let alone a fulfilling meal, I’d actually squeezed into the skinny jeans for a week or so but I didn’t feel the need to be skinny really, just healthy.
I come from a long line of petite women who can stay petite but can also balloon up into something of a lumpy pear with compulsive eating habits and alcoholic tendencies. I’ve straddled both the skinny and chunky for most of my life. When I’m active my body shows it, and when I’m inactive, it really shows it.
Before the big vacation this June I cancelled my gym membership because between the puppy, work and everything else, we didn’t need the added expense, and I didn’t have enough time to make it worthwhile. I had a Wii Fit, Wii Active and a decent elliptical at our crummy apartment complex gym to keep me going. I also discovered the dog liked to jog, so I should indulge with him.
I guess six months of “Whatever, I don’t care, I’ll have a gym membership this fall to make up for it,” bit me in my ever expanding ass, after all. When they say it’s easier to put it on than it is to take it off, they aren’t joking! I shouldn’t have justified it when the pants started to get tight. I shouldn’t have spent so much time sucking it in. I should have gotten my ass out of the chair…shoulda, coulda, woulda!
So I made the mistake of getting on the evil square known as the scale, and it may as well have just read “Fat Bitch.” The number amount pretty much said that perfectly! And then the water works started! I, all of the sudden, wished there was some strange way of my being pregnant and the damn baby was making me chunky, but all of the alcohol units wouldn’t have made that possible, so then I stood there getting on and off of the damn scale, sucking it in and willing it to drop down two measly numbers just so I could endure more justifications.
I forced my husband into caring even though he did the obligatory, “You’re beautiful no matter what,” song and dance complete with a “Who cares babe?” and “We’ll do whatever you want to make you feel better about it,” chorus and encore performance. I text my new Bestie feverishly, and she confessed the evil scale had done the same to her! I’d paused thinking there may be some kind of terrible conspiracy and my pants weren’t 6’s and 8’s but really 0’s and 2’s, rebelling against the confines of their size-ist makers, but was shocked back into the reality that I’m just chunky when she told me she’d caved and joined Weight Watchers. We vowed to kick ass together.
Peeling myself out of bed to go to work, where the pretty ones would parade around me all day, I managed to look decent and get my fat ass going. I blamed the dog about my weight and he just whined and snuffed at me as if to say, “Bullshit!” When I got to work my gorgeous and athletic co-worker arrived in a kind of funky mood. I knew she LOVED to talk fitness, so I instantly attacked!
Trying desperately to not just blurt out, “Please inject me with whatever it is you take that makes you perfect and makes you like to run and race and everything in between,” I let her use me as a sponge. I forced my Bestie into the conversation and before you knew it, some strange hope had brewed in me, that maybe one day soon I wouldn’t just be another fat girl that the rail-skinny perfect ones make fun of.
I thought my athletic goddess of a co-worker had pretty much finished her pep talk with me about how we’d train together and help each other out when she emerged with a daring idea: “Let’s work up to the Turkey Trott on Thanksgiving in Clearwater! It’s a 10k!” She felt me wince and responded, “They have a 5k too!”
I pictured running that morning with her and my Bestie, and later to come home to an amazing bath amidst the smells of the feast my husband would be preparing, and how after two months of behaving I’d just pig out on my favorite day and I blurted out, “YES! Let’s do it!” Uh oh, there was no turning back now. I’d put it into the universe. It’d set it in motion. Before I knew it, the Bestie was more excited than I and we’d even recruited another co-worker…this was happening!
I told my husband and he was just like, “That’s great, babe!” I was expecting more of a response. I’d imagined more of a, “Wow babe, you are going to kick that race’s ass! You will be able to go so fast and impress everyone! We should buy you a cute outfit. Of course I’ll cook you a feast and be waiting to massage your feet when you get home,” kind of response but, I’d take what I could get.
This is a big deal! The diet’s on! I’m not a big diet girl most of the time but I do know how to scale things back. I do believe that all women should just be perfect, pretty and comfortable while eating buckets of KFC and out-drinking men in Beer and Liquor contests, without even gaining an ounce, but that is SO not the world we live in. I hate how the weight thing will always haunt me. It will follow me around forever like the sound of my mother sighing when the size 4 jeans she just bought me didn’t quite zip, or when I chose to wear fashionable sweat pants instead of quote, unquote “slacks,” for which I might add are inadequately titled because they NEVER provide any “slack!”
I’ve started on a good note so far. I do enjoy eating healthy but who doesn’t love ice cream, cookies and wine? Especially all in the same day! I do have a fat girl mentality for sure, I just hate when she shows up physically, making a muffin top appear out of my pants that used to be “roomy.” My sister once accused me of being bulimic because I lost weight and toned my body, so I replied “No, I like food too much.” She curtly replied, “Which is why you would be bulimic!” How stupid of me!
I wish I could be bulimic, or anorexic, or just smoke a bunch of cigarettes and crack and become one of those cold women who make it all look so easy but can’t even deal with how many calories are in a Tic Tac! No, if I’m wishing, I wish I were like my goddess coworker who runs 10 miles for a warm up and can bike out of the state and back with only 8 ounces of water! Yes, I’m idolizing her, but why not? We all know and sigh at one of these women every time they burst through the door with perfect sunlight providing them a runway! I’m lucky if I don’t fall on a daily basis!
Sometimes I like being curvy. I own it. Also, I’m married so there’s really no one left to impress, but one of the groomsmen told me I shouldn’t be another fat wife and I totally agree. Even though I desperately want to eat an entire container of cheese balls while watching hours of chick flicks, I know I should go for a run and eat celery instead. At least when I weigh less and I’m still curvy, I can be proud.
Of course once I started figuring out how to enroll in the Turkey Trott, all I could envision was a montage from that movie “Run, Fatboy, Run,” and of me hitting the “Runner’s Wall,” or just tripping less than a mile in and ruining the entire effort. But, regardless, I’m going to do it. I’m not much of a runner or a jogger but this is a commitment to an accomplishment I so desperately want to achieve. I have EVERYTHING to lose. The tummy, the ass, the thighs, and the ambivalence that’s literally been weighing me down!
So this fat chick is going to run! I’m going to run like the wind on Thanksgiving! But if you think about it, it’s really just so I can stuff my face afterwards…so if that’s not motivation enough, what is!? I guess you’ll hear about it all afterwards, and if I could even stomach all the food I’m already fantasizing about. Run, fat girl, run!
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
ORYGUN - Why we've gone...
We’ve been in Florida for a little over two years. When people here, ask us where we moved from and we answer, “Oregon,” they always reply with, “Why the hell did you move to Florida?” Lately my excuse has been, “Oregon is beautiful, but Eugene is the kind of place where you end up and you stay, and we just weren’t ready to stay anywhere yet.”
S
ometimes it’s hard to find just one reason. Sometimes there really isn’t anything concrete. Every once in awhile my mind starts spinning and we start talking about “The way we were,” to be a complete cliché, and I have to draw myself a mental map of how it all came to be. The idea of moving from Eugene to Florida was originally planted in our minds when we visited my mother in March of 2008, for my birthday. We drove up to Tampa to see Eben’s Aunt Vicki, and my cousins who lived in St. Petersburg.
My cousins had immediately moved to St. Petersburg from Pennsylvania after they had gotten married and the standing joke was that the Tampa Bay/St. Petersburg area was the place you were “supposed” to leave home, and move to after you got married. We then hatched the idea of moving to South Florida to live with my mother, rent free, and help take care of her after some medical issues she suffered during the end of the summer of 2008.
Eben and I had been more or less on our own after age 19, with no choice of living with anyone but roommates. There was no moving “home” for either of us. The idea of living rent free after I graduated, getting Eben into school, and making positive changes was enough to provoke anyone! So, we started actually planning the big escape at the end of the year in 2008. We moved in with a family friend to spend less money and save for the move. We weren’t even engaged at this point but moving across the country together pretty much seals the deal. We were committed!
During the fall of 2008, I’d started some personal and mental rediscovery and measures of improvement. I was feeling really good. It felt like I was working towards something. Graduation was on the horizon and I was trying to make my relationships better. The year of 2008 was pretty much the worst year of my life, or so I considered it to be at that time. We lost my grandma, my mom was sick and had a cancer scare, my boyfriend and I were constantly fighting, I was miserable and taking it out on my friends and loved ones, and life just seemed so shitty. But little did I know what a whirlwind we had waiting in the future.
One cold, January morning in 2009 at 7am, I got a phone call that changed everything. It seems that the very mother with whom I’d had a tumultuous relationship the entirety of my existence, had basically been living a complete lie and tried to take down everyone in her miserable cyclone of destruction. My uncle called to tell me of her indiscretions and problems, and said it was the last straw, she’d no longer be a welcome member of the family. I was left to deal with the remains of whatever was left over.
My mom was alive but up to no good. And now her 23 year old daughter had to fix what she could and say goodbye, again. This news came in the middle of my battle with depression and the constant wrestling match with my mental stability. Things with the boyfriend, Eben, were improving but there was one other person in my life who I’d desperately needed to have a healthy relationship with. We’d abused each other for years: mentally, emotionally, and verbally. He was my best friend. I told him everything and thought we’d always be in each other’s lives, even if it was only to torment each other. It was hard for him to be there for me, but that was okay because he told me he wanted to be there for me.
When all of the bullshit with my mother hit, Eben stepped it up and knew that he just couldn’t understand. My best friend withdrew from it, though. It was too much. I needed him but he couldn’t just do what I needed him to and basically look me, coldly in the eyes, and say, “This is just too much for me. I have my own life to worry about and I can’t help you on this one.” To this day, I wish he’d told me to fuck off, in some way, shape or form.
I’d scraped together my sanity during my last term of college before graduation enough to fly down to Florida, by myself, to clean up the mess my mother had made of her life. All I cared about what putting my deceased grandmother’s things – that my mother had fought with everyone for - and my childhood keepsakes, somewhere safe until we moved to Florida to deal with it. Although my mother’s mistakes had ruined her life, I refused to let her choices hurt any of my plans anymore. She had contributed to the demise of all of my lives great dreams and designs, even helped with the loss of some relationships, and I didn’t want to let it happen ever again. This was the beginning of the end.
I still remember going down there. My mother thought I was there to help her. She wanted me to pay her cell phone bill and help her move out. I told her to give me the title to the car. Her other brother showed up to take away my grandmother’s car, and my mother accused me of being part of some evil plot against her. I remember saying goodbye to her and thinking I may never see her again. I cried the whole plane ride home.
I had to pull myself together. Like always with my mother, I never had a choice but to soldier on. When I came home, all my relationships were put in to perspective. I really valued the people I had left. I harassed my best friend a lot. I was totally guilty of pushing him too hard. But much as he inadvertently got in the way of Eben and my relationship, I got in his way too. It was tough. I should have seen it coming. Definitely an, “If I knew then what I knew now situation…”
One drunken night at a Dropkick Murphy’s show, the stage was set. What better place for two drunk, Irish redheads - myself and Eben - to leave a painstaking mark that has forever defined our Northwestern exit? Terrible things were said on both sides of the table and it ended with the hit heard round the world. Sometimes I wonder if it ever really, could have ended up differently. After 6 years of secrets – the worst part of which, no one will ever really know why and how it all went down, some of the parties involved don’t even know the whole truth, and the ways it all evolved – one bad comment and one flip of the temper changed it all. And we haven’t seen him since.
After that night, we felt Oregon and its residents were helping to give us a violent shove out the door. But with every catastrophe comes an amazing rebound, right? We’d felt like we dug a hole but in that hole we found a whole lot of treasure. Eben and I continued couples counseling and I finished my personal counseling. I’d lost 25lbs by the end of my journey. My mother had exited my life. The people who loved us most rallied around us and showed us that even if we did move 3,000 miles away, they’d be with us, no matter what.
My 24th birthday was around the corner and I was excited. St. Patrick’s Day was first and I knew it would cheer me up! It was that day in 2009, after we’d rearranged our plans to move from West Palm Beach to Tampa, that Eben proposed to me. How could I say no? Plus, we’d already planned the trip, so all we needed to do was figure out the whole wedding thing!
Eben was the only man in my life who accepted me for who and what I was, even with all my flaws and after the evil, hateful moments I’ve had with him, he still wanted to be with me. And I could think of no other person I’d rather be with for the rest of my days on this planet. “All anyone could ever want is a co-pilot, someone to leave this town and help them start a secret…”
We’d literally squeezed the wedding in between everything and got married the day after I graduated, and the day before we started our journey across the country! We had to tell everyone we were actually leaving. Most people were pretty bummed and the wedding was bittersweet, but the people we have kept with us in our hearts, minds, and of course, on Facebook, have confirmed that we made a positive choice.
My sister said that we couldn’t move any further away. We might as well have gone to Tokyo. Our east coast family was ecstatic. In all the years of emotional yo-yoing with my mother, I’d forgotten how amazing your blood relatives can be. I’d tried so hard to push myself into what I thought were these “perfect families” of my friends, that I let my real family slide away. It was nice to be welcomed back to that side of the insanity.
So, in terms of why we actually left? It wasn’t just “the incident.” It was a lot of reasons. Eben’s a born and raised Oregonian. He’d never been anywhere else. It was time for a big change for him. We definitely moved to opposite land, but we love an adventure. Between the mama-drama and the over-dramatic exit of our best friend, we just didn’t feel like Eugene was a home anymore. I’d struggled with the idea of home ever since I was 12, but home became wherever Eben was. I was safe anywhere, if he was by my side.
We love going to visit Oregon. We get to see all our favorite people when we do, but at that time we needed to leave it all behind and just start fresh and new. Eben and I had never really been just “US.” We were always that couple in the middle of the group of friends, that held it all together. We needed to find a place that was our own little oasis. In Tampa we wouldn’t be completely alone. My cousins lived over the bridge and Eben’s Aunt and cousins lived in Tampa as well.
Sometimes you just need to be radical and reckless to change things for the good. It didn’t even occur to us that we could somehow fail. We moved down, got an apartment, got jobs and have been living our lives ever since. Everyone thinks our honeymoon being the move down here, was insane but the standing joke is, we left all the drama and everyone we know, so it’s been a honeymoon ever since!
Sometimes it’s strange that it’s just us, sometimes we look back and wonder if we went back how it could be different. But we were outcasts before the drama. We were restless before we stirred the pot. We weren’t ready to stay and settle down. Every once in awhile when I see the pictures of our friends and family starting their own families and being all happy, my uterus skips a beat, and I want it too. But, then I snuggle up in front of the TV with the dog and we watch a movie in the quiet apartment we’ve turned into a crash-pad for the Chriss’ with a beer in my hand, and I feel okay with what our lives have become.
We are anything but ordinary and conventional. We miss those Oregonians every day, but why we’re gone? That may be a question that could take many more reckless moments, a few more cross-country journeys, and a beer or two for me to answer. You’ll find out when we do, don’t worry.
S
ometimes it’s hard to find just one reason. Sometimes there really isn’t anything concrete. Every once in awhile my mind starts spinning and we start talking about “The way we were,” to be a complete cliché, and I have to draw myself a mental map of how it all came to be. The idea of moving from Eugene to Florida was originally planted in our minds when we visited my mother in March of 2008, for my birthday. We drove up to Tampa to see Eben’s Aunt Vicki, and my cousins who lived in St. Petersburg.
My cousins had immediately moved to St. Petersburg from Pennsylvania after they had gotten married and the standing joke was that the Tampa Bay/St. Petersburg area was the place you were “supposed” to leave home, and move to after you got married. We then hatched the idea of moving to South Florida to live with my mother, rent free, and help take care of her after some medical issues she suffered during the end of the summer of 2008.
Eben and I had been more or less on our own after age 19, with no choice of living with anyone but roommates. There was no moving “home” for either of us. The idea of living rent free after I graduated, getting Eben into school, and making positive changes was enough to provoke anyone! So, we started actually planning the big escape at the end of the year in 2008. We moved in with a family friend to spend less money and save for the move. We weren’t even engaged at this point but moving across the country together pretty much seals the deal. We were committed!
During the fall of 2008, I’d started some personal and mental rediscovery and measures of improvement. I was feeling really good. It felt like I was working towards something. Graduation was on the horizon and I was trying to make my relationships better. The year of 2008 was pretty much the worst year of my life, or so I considered it to be at that time. We lost my grandma, my mom was sick and had a cancer scare, my boyfriend and I were constantly fighting, I was miserable and taking it out on my friends and loved ones, and life just seemed so shitty. But little did I know what a whirlwind we had waiting in the future.
One cold, January morning in 2009 at 7am, I got a phone call that changed everything. It seems that the very mother with whom I’d had a tumultuous relationship the entirety of my existence, had basically been living a complete lie and tried to take down everyone in her miserable cyclone of destruction. My uncle called to tell me of her indiscretions and problems, and said it was the last straw, she’d no longer be a welcome member of the family. I was left to deal with the remains of whatever was left over.
My mom was alive but up to no good. And now her 23 year old daughter had to fix what she could and say goodbye, again. This news came in the middle of my battle with depression and the constant wrestling match with my mental stability. Things with the boyfriend, Eben, were improving but there was one other person in my life who I’d desperately needed to have a healthy relationship with. We’d abused each other for years: mentally, emotionally, and verbally. He was my best friend. I told him everything and thought we’d always be in each other’s lives, even if it was only to torment each other. It was hard for him to be there for me, but that was okay because he told me he wanted to be there for me.
When all of the bullshit with my mother hit, Eben stepped it up and knew that he just couldn’t understand. My best friend withdrew from it, though. It was too much. I needed him but he couldn’t just do what I needed him to and basically look me, coldly in the eyes, and say, “This is just too much for me. I have my own life to worry about and I can’t help you on this one.” To this day, I wish he’d told me to fuck off, in some way, shape or form.
I’d scraped together my sanity during my last term of college before graduation enough to fly down to Florida, by myself, to clean up the mess my mother had made of her life. All I cared about what putting my deceased grandmother’s things – that my mother had fought with everyone for - and my childhood keepsakes, somewhere safe until we moved to Florida to deal with it. Although my mother’s mistakes had ruined her life, I refused to let her choices hurt any of my plans anymore. She had contributed to the demise of all of my lives great dreams and designs, even helped with the loss of some relationships, and I didn’t want to let it happen ever again. This was the beginning of the end.
I still remember going down there. My mother thought I was there to help her. She wanted me to pay her cell phone bill and help her move out. I told her to give me the title to the car. Her other brother showed up to take away my grandmother’s car, and my mother accused me of being part of some evil plot against her. I remember saying goodbye to her and thinking I may never see her again. I cried the whole plane ride home.
I had to pull myself together. Like always with my mother, I never had a choice but to soldier on. When I came home, all my relationships were put in to perspective. I really valued the people I had left. I harassed my best friend a lot. I was totally guilty of pushing him too hard. But much as he inadvertently got in the way of Eben and my relationship, I got in his way too. It was tough. I should have seen it coming. Definitely an, “If I knew then what I knew now situation…”
One drunken night at a Dropkick Murphy’s show, the stage was set. What better place for two drunk, Irish redheads - myself and Eben - to leave a painstaking mark that has forever defined our Northwestern exit? Terrible things were said on both sides of the table and it ended with the hit heard round the world. Sometimes I wonder if it ever really, could have ended up differently. After 6 years of secrets – the worst part of which, no one will ever really know why and how it all went down, some of the parties involved don’t even know the whole truth, and the ways it all evolved – one bad comment and one flip of the temper changed it all. And we haven’t seen him since.
After that night, we felt Oregon and its residents were helping to give us a violent shove out the door. But with every catastrophe comes an amazing rebound, right? We’d felt like we dug a hole but in that hole we found a whole lot of treasure. Eben and I continued couples counseling and I finished my personal counseling. I’d lost 25lbs by the end of my journey. My mother had exited my life. The people who loved us most rallied around us and showed us that even if we did move 3,000 miles away, they’d be with us, no matter what.
My 24th birthday was around the corner and I was excited. St. Patrick’s Day was first and I knew it would cheer me up! It was that day in 2009, after we’d rearranged our plans to move from West Palm Beach to Tampa, that Eben proposed to me. How could I say no? Plus, we’d already planned the trip, so all we needed to do was figure out the whole wedding thing!
Eben was the only man in my life who accepted me for who and what I was, even with all my flaws and after the evil, hateful moments I’ve had with him, he still wanted to be with me. And I could think of no other person I’d rather be with for the rest of my days on this planet. “All anyone could ever want is a co-pilot, someone to leave this town and help them start a secret…”
We’d literally squeezed the wedding in between everything and got married the day after I graduated, and the day before we started our journey across the country! We had to tell everyone we were actually leaving. Most people were pretty bummed and the wedding was bittersweet, but the people we have kept with us in our hearts, minds, and of course, on Facebook, have confirmed that we made a positive choice.
My sister said that we couldn’t move any further away. We might as well have gone to Tokyo. Our east coast family was ecstatic. In all the years of emotional yo-yoing with my mother, I’d forgotten how amazing your blood relatives can be. I’d tried so hard to push myself into what I thought were these “perfect families” of my friends, that I let my real family slide away. It was nice to be welcomed back to that side of the insanity.
So, in terms of why we actually left? It wasn’t just “the incident.” It was a lot of reasons. Eben’s a born and raised Oregonian. He’d never been anywhere else. It was time for a big change for him. We definitely moved to opposite land, but we love an adventure. Between the mama-drama and the over-dramatic exit of our best friend, we just didn’t feel like Eugene was a home anymore. I’d struggled with the idea of home ever since I was 12, but home became wherever Eben was. I was safe anywhere, if he was by my side.
We love going to visit Oregon. We get to see all our favorite people when we do, but at that time we needed to leave it all behind and just start fresh and new. Eben and I had never really been just “US.” We were always that couple in the middle of the group of friends, that held it all together. We needed to find a place that was our own little oasis. In Tampa we wouldn’t be completely alone. My cousins lived over the bridge and Eben’s Aunt and cousins lived in Tampa as well.
Sometimes you just need to be radical and reckless to change things for the good. It didn’t even occur to us that we could somehow fail. We moved down, got an apartment, got jobs and have been living our lives ever since. Everyone thinks our honeymoon being the move down here, was insane but the standing joke is, we left all the drama and everyone we know, so it’s been a honeymoon ever since!
Sometimes it’s strange that it’s just us, sometimes we look back and wonder if we went back how it could be different. But we were outcasts before the drama. We were restless before we stirred the pot. We weren’t ready to stay and settle down. Every once in awhile when I see the pictures of our friends and family starting their own families and being all happy, my uterus skips a beat, and I want it too. But, then I snuggle up in front of the TV with the dog and we watch a movie in the quiet apartment we’ve turned into a crash-pad for the Chriss’ with a beer in my hand, and I feel okay with what our lives have become.
We are anything but ordinary and conventional. We miss those Oregonians every day, but why we’re gone? That may be a question that could take many more reckless moments, a few more cross-country journeys, and a beer or two for me to answer. You’ll find out when we do, don’t worry.
Thursday, July 14, 2011
My So-Called Strife
I'd recently had a conversation with a friend about going into my blog archive to find an older post, and he opened up quite the collection. He mentioned there was two years of blogging and I thought,"Wow, has it been that long?" Apparently. I told him that that was way too much baggage...I mean bloggage to sort through. It's been quite the journey thus far and, recently, I've certainly attracted more than a few critics.
In May I upset a reader so much that, out of respect, I had to remove the blog...for now! I'd also found myself receiving a wide array of reactions. Most people find me to be generally amusing and even some may say I'm whitty and well-spoken. You're not a true creator unless you warrant the negative attention too, however.
Most of my blogs are personal diatribes about my life conquests, failures and success. Some allow you to see how crazy I am in actuality, and some dare to reveal my vulnerability. My readers who know me best, come to find me more endearing, and those who don't are often stunned by my verbal prowess and less-than-lady-like attitudes.
Some days I feel like I'm so crafty and mysterious but others, I'm pretty blatant and ruthless with my views. I like to think I offer a simple love-hate relationship with my writing and that goes the same with my personality. When growing up in a world where appearance is everything, living up to a desperate need to look civilized and put-together becomes part of the routine quite easily.
I do give off a specific persona of being ordinary, but we all have our secrets, our intrigues, and our insanities hidden behind the exterior; it's what keeps us interesting!
I've found out recently that, rather than offend by what was said, I really offend but what's done. People like to think I'm a certain way, they see me as a polite, amiable litte thing, who's pretty complacent overall. It's a decent act to keep people at bay. From day to day, I am relatively ordinary, but as I get comfortable you'll see the sassy, sarcastic, and loud version that is Alison, and she comes out to take names and kick ass. I feel like the people who meet that Alison should be flattered; you've passed the test. Others shouldn't be offended that she doesn't come out to play, rather, be appreciative that I'm attempting to respect you enough to keep her under wraps. When she comes out, she will offend you, but that's just her.
Wait, I think I just spoke of myself in the third person. How "Me, Myself and Irene" of me! I realize not everyone wants to read my bitching, or listen to it. I realize, for some, it's too much information, but the thing is, if I can get someone to relate and feel better by unleashing and posting these rants, my work is done! What more can a writer ask for?
Some readers may think, "What the hell does this chick have to complain about?" We are all lucky and unfortunate in our own special ways. But remember, as I've made very clear in past posts, what makes my shit more important that everyone else's, is that it's MINE. Really I'm just inviting my readers to bask in and enjoy my complaining and join in. After all, misery loves company.
I have come to a more recent realization, however, that upsetting people with my words is a powerful thing. Some may see me as two-faced, sitting here, hiding behind my shitty, Dell laptop and being pissed off at the world. I get it. I've had to own my anger and that's been quite the battle. I am an angry woman and every once in awhile it rears it's ugly head in some risky situations. I've seriously wrestled with not letting it overtake me. As someone raised by an extremely hateful person, becoming like her is my greatest fear. As annoying as people are, it's a lonely life without people around, even the ones we choose to dislike.
There's nothing in this blog, or any, I wouldn't reveal to someone in person. There's no cryptic or underlying messages that aren't eventually put in plain sight in my pieces. Anyone can whine and moan about life, but I'd like to think that making it fun, poetic, and verbally interesting is a gift I possess. I may be tooting my own horn but, people do read my stuff, even if afterwards they find it to have been a kind of waste of their time!
Mostly I'm just sorting through the crazy workings of my own mind in my free time, with this blog as the victim. Or I'm trying to keep my friends updated on my life, reassuring them I'm still just as off-the-wall as ever. I've tried to be aloof, puzzling and provoke some serious thought into secret messages with my creations before, and usually it's an inevitable fail.
I'm such a musical fiend that one time, I made a genuine "mix cd" for an old friend, complete with songs that meant something real and deep, and I forced him to listen to it in an attempt tho have him to decode the secret message: "You're upsetting me beyond belief, and tearing me apart." At one point he just commented on how random the collection was and then asked if we could listen to something else because, I was well aware he didn't really like all my music. I'd even just put on one specific song from time to time, trying to scream the message out to him, and he'd be oblivious. The problem was, he just didn't care, he didn't want to know even if I was legitimately upset. So now, when you read an Alison Chriss blog, you don't have to read between the lines...just read the actual piece.
People, especially women, really need to find the hidden meanings behind words and actions. It's like a psychological thing. We waste years definining moments, sentences, situations and memories. They have classes in college called "Women's Studies," for Pete's sake! It's all about the context and perception with us; it's exhausting! We are mysterious gender for sure.
We are even worse with each other. If you tell a girl buddy that her boyfriend is "just okay," she may dump him over it. If you tell a girl a dress makes her boobs look big, she'll freak out because that means her boobs are usually seen as small. The drama is ridiculous.
I spent years playing and losing the game. Now I try to play straight, no bluffing. Every once in awhile I run into an angry, bad sportsman and we get into it, but I'd like to think I'm not a completely terrible human. A friend I travelled with in London, once told me that I'm actually pretty easy to read. I carry the weight of the world and it shows. He didn't mean this in a bad way. It was funny, actually, because here I am waltzing around, acting as though I'm such a wiley and wonderfully strange being, only to find that a guy who's a relatively new friend, can tell most of what I'm thinking just by paying attention. There goes my feminine mystique!
Sometimes my lack of subtle-ness gets me into trouble, but it can also help keep me out of the strife that keeps me blogging. If you've become a victim of the tales of the life I call my own, it's not a purposeful occurence. Although I'm easily labelled as a "bitch," my intent is never to hurt or piss off anyone. If I really wanted revenge, I could do it. That's the angry, bitch side of me. If I'm going to attack you, it won't be some shady blog post. I'll say it to your face if I'm seriously upset with you. I'm not saying I've never talked about someone behind their back and never engaged in the ever-prevalent "shit-talking" session but I'll tell it to you straight if there's a true problem.
I'm still a big kid, overall. Becoming an adult blows! Who wants to do that? But I'd like to cast myself as someone grown up enough to at least play the good part. I'm not going to hide from people, situations and things just because I may upset someone. When you're around people, you're bound to clash and turn heads. It's a part of life. Our divine drama and ability to overdramatize is what actually seperates us from the animals...maybe I should stop writing and just start throwing feces.
I've weathered enough storms to keep a raincoat and umbrella handy. Does that say enough? What exactly would qualify me to be acceptable? Or what qualifies as unacceptable, I guess? There are some life questions to answer...
Even if this rambling incites some other reactionary measure causing my mind to spin further, I'll still going to keep on keeping on. I'd felt as though my ability to abuse this blog and create verbal masterpieces was taken away once before, and I won't allow myself to feel that badly ever again. I am who I am, I do what I do, and even when the clusterfuck hits, I will prevail.
I'm an artistic creature by nature and that's something you just can't un-do. It may be a flaw, it may be a quality found less than attractive, but it's me. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I fuck up but I won't wallow in regret. I own my mistakes and my fucked-up-ness. I own the fact I can be an angry, prickly, bitch. I'm not afriad to offend.
Perhaps it's a defense mechanism coming out to claim it's hostages, but I've let a lot of people into my circle of unrelenting truth, only to have them betray my confidence and be forced to kick their asses out of it! I do live and learn so, I'm able to weed out the good and bad better than past situations as each day passes. You have to work to get me to let you in. Perhaps if you break down the wall you'd join the ranks of the friends I amuse the hell out of, instead of those pissed off who add me to their "Shit list." Oh, come on, we all have one!
In the end, my so-called "strife," may be nothing but another day in the life and times of Alison. I may be over-dramatic and whiny but I don't feel like I'm pretending to be otherwise. If after two years of blogging, countless memories made, amazing days and horrific ones, someone is still reading my random musings, I consider myself to be doing okay. Even if this all ends up being nothing but a mental release for a live journal, it's a better way to spend my time than watching hours of Netflix Instant Queue!
Perhaps I'm just one entry away from insanity, but then again maybe one of my readers looked at this, laughed, and continued the day with a smile...I guess we'll see!
In May I upset a reader so much that, out of respect, I had to remove the blog...for now! I'd also found myself receiving a wide array of reactions. Most people find me to be generally amusing and even some may say I'm whitty and well-spoken. You're not a true creator unless you warrant the negative attention too, however.
Most of my blogs are personal diatribes about my life conquests, failures and success. Some allow you to see how crazy I am in actuality, and some dare to reveal my vulnerability. My readers who know me best, come to find me more endearing, and those who don't are often stunned by my verbal prowess and less-than-lady-like attitudes.
Some days I feel like I'm so crafty and mysterious but others, I'm pretty blatant and ruthless with my views. I like to think I offer a simple love-hate relationship with my writing and that goes the same with my personality. When growing up in a world where appearance is everything, living up to a desperate need to look civilized and put-together becomes part of the routine quite easily.
I do give off a specific persona of being ordinary, but we all have our secrets, our intrigues, and our insanities hidden behind the exterior; it's what keeps us interesting!
I've found out recently that, rather than offend by what was said, I really offend but what's done. People like to think I'm a certain way, they see me as a polite, amiable litte thing, who's pretty complacent overall. It's a decent act to keep people at bay. From day to day, I am relatively ordinary, but as I get comfortable you'll see the sassy, sarcastic, and loud version that is Alison, and she comes out to take names and kick ass. I feel like the people who meet that Alison should be flattered; you've passed the test. Others shouldn't be offended that she doesn't come out to play, rather, be appreciative that I'm attempting to respect you enough to keep her under wraps. When she comes out, she will offend you, but that's just her.
Wait, I think I just spoke of myself in the third person. How "Me, Myself and Irene" of me! I realize not everyone wants to read my bitching, or listen to it. I realize, for some, it's too much information, but the thing is, if I can get someone to relate and feel better by unleashing and posting these rants, my work is done! What more can a writer ask for?
Some readers may think, "What the hell does this chick have to complain about?" We are all lucky and unfortunate in our own special ways. But remember, as I've made very clear in past posts, what makes my shit more important that everyone else's, is that it's MINE. Really I'm just inviting my readers to bask in and enjoy my complaining and join in. After all, misery loves company.
I have come to a more recent realization, however, that upsetting people with my words is a powerful thing. Some may see me as two-faced, sitting here, hiding behind my shitty, Dell laptop and being pissed off at the world. I get it. I've had to own my anger and that's been quite the battle. I am an angry woman and every once in awhile it rears it's ugly head in some risky situations. I've seriously wrestled with not letting it overtake me. As someone raised by an extremely hateful person, becoming like her is my greatest fear. As annoying as people are, it's a lonely life without people around, even the ones we choose to dislike.
There's nothing in this blog, or any, I wouldn't reveal to someone in person. There's no cryptic or underlying messages that aren't eventually put in plain sight in my pieces. Anyone can whine and moan about life, but I'd like to think that making it fun, poetic, and verbally interesting is a gift I possess. I may be tooting my own horn but, people do read my stuff, even if afterwards they find it to have been a kind of waste of their time!
Mostly I'm just sorting through the crazy workings of my own mind in my free time, with this blog as the victim. Or I'm trying to keep my friends updated on my life, reassuring them I'm still just as off-the-wall as ever. I've tried to be aloof, puzzling and provoke some serious thought into secret messages with my creations before, and usually it's an inevitable fail.
I'm such a musical fiend that one time, I made a genuine "mix cd" for an old friend, complete with songs that meant something real and deep, and I forced him to listen to it in an attempt tho have him to decode the secret message: "You're upsetting me beyond belief, and tearing me apart." At one point he just commented on how random the collection was and then asked if we could listen to something else because, I was well aware he didn't really like all my music. I'd even just put on one specific song from time to time, trying to scream the message out to him, and he'd be oblivious. The problem was, he just didn't care, he didn't want to know even if I was legitimately upset. So now, when you read an Alison Chriss blog, you don't have to read between the lines...just read the actual piece.
People, especially women, really need to find the hidden meanings behind words and actions. It's like a psychological thing. We waste years definining moments, sentences, situations and memories. They have classes in college called "Women's Studies," for Pete's sake! It's all about the context and perception with us; it's exhausting! We are mysterious gender for sure.
We are even worse with each other. If you tell a girl buddy that her boyfriend is "just okay," she may dump him over it. If you tell a girl a dress makes her boobs look big, she'll freak out because that means her boobs are usually seen as small. The drama is ridiculous.
I spent years playing and losing the game. Now I try to play straight, no bluffing. Every once in awhile I run into an angry, bad sportsman and we get into it, but I'd like to think I'm not a completely terrible human. A friend I travelled with in London, once told me that I'm actually pretty easy to read. I carry the weight of the world and it shows. He didn't mean this in a bad way. It was funny, actually, because here I am waltzing around, acting as though I'm such a wiley and wonderfully strange being, only to find that a guy who's a relatively new friend, can tell most of what I'm thinking just by paying attention. There goes my feminine mystique!
Sometimes my lack of subtle-ness gets me into trouble, but it can also help keep me out of the strife that keeps me blogging. If you've become a victim of the tales of the life I call my own, it's not a purposeful occurence. Although I'm easily labelled as a "bitch," my intent is never to hurt or piss off anyone. If I really wanted revenge, I could do it. That's the angry, bitch side of me. If I'm going to attack you, it won't be some shady blog post. I'll say it to your face if I'm seriously upset with you. I'm not saying I've never talked about someone behind their back and never engaged in the ever-prevalent "shit-talking" session but I'll tell it to you straight if there's a true problem.
I'm still a big kid, overall. Becoming an adult blows! Who wants to do that? But I'd like to cast myself as someone grown up enough to at least play the good part. I'm not going to hide from people, situations and things just because I may upset someone. When you're around people, you're bound to clash and turn heads. It's a part of life. Our divine drama and ability to overdramatize is what actually seperates us from the animals...maybe I should stop writing and just start throwing feces.
I've weathered enough storms to keep a raincoat and umbrella handy. Does that say enough? What exactly would qualify me to be acceptable? Or what qualifies as unacceptable, I guess? There are some life questions to answer...
Even if this rambling incites some other reactionary measure causing my mind to spin further, I'll still going to keep on keeping on. I'd felt as though my ability to abuse this blog and create verbal masterpieces was taken away once before, and I won't allow myself to feel that badly ever again. I am who I am, I do what I do, and even when the clusterfuck hits, I will prevail.
I'm an artistic creature by nature and that's something you just can't un-do. It may be a flaw, it may be a quality found less than attractive, but it's me. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I fuck up but I won't wallow in regret. I own my mistakes and my fucked-up-ness. I own the fact I can be an angry, prickly, bitch. I'm not afriad to offend.
Perhaps it's a defense mechanism coming out to claim it's hostages, but I've let a lot of people into my circle of unrelenting truth, only to have them betray my confidence and be forced to kick their asses out of it! I do live and learn so, I'm able to weed out the good and bad better than past situations as each day passes. You have to work to get me to let you in. Perhaps if you break down the wall you'd join the ranks of the friends I amuse the hell out of, instead of those pissed off who add me to their "Shit list." Oh, come on, we all have one!
In the end, my so-called "strife," may be nothing but another day in the life and times of Alison. I may be over-dramatic and whiny but I don't feel like I'm pretending to be otherwise. If after two years of blogging, countless memories made, amazing days and horrific ones, someone is still reading my random musings, I consider myself to be doing okay. Even if this all ends up being nothing but a mental release for a live journal, it's a better way to spend my time than watching hours of Netflix Instant Queue!
Perhaps I'm just one entry away from insanity, but then again maybe one of my readers looked at this, laughed, and continued the day with a smile...I guess we'll see!
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Clusterfucked...
I guess I'll just jump in and say that my husband and I are not the average, American married couple, and I'm anything but an average girl. We don't have an obscene amout of credit card debt- a little under $5,000-ish -we don't own fancy things, we share one car, we still have a tube TV, and my father branded into me the idea of living simply. My husband encourages me to live even simplier...so not a word.
I don't buy new clothes and shoes all the time, and when I do, they are purchased at Target, TJMaxx and Ross. We don't go to fancy restaurants, buy expensive drinks and such. We are pretty chill for the most part. Where does all our money go? Plane tickets, a splurge on concerts, or we turn to the credit cards for the, "Oh, shit" fund.
We rarely ask for help although who doesn't love monetary presents? But June kicked some Chriss' asses and man, today was the day of relief, worry and a damn good cry.
I'm pretty obsessive about budgeting and in turn, I've made Eben the same way. We rarely "overspend." But when it came to vacation this year, we just accepted our defeat. It cost us over $1,000 to fly home to Oregon. Eight hundred round trip for us and $250 to take the the dog with us, which we rationalized because he was little, we could take him as carry on and it was "cheaper than boarding him!" So, the tickets, the bags, the Brodie and everything was put on the credit card.
In the midst of this we are also in an amazing transitional phase where the old will be out and in will come the brand new, so balancing the two became quite the act! So Eben had just been awarded vacation pay, which we knew we'd have to pay rent. We also knew this fall, his pay would change again so we'd figured, we can deal with this later, we can wait! Fun now, pay later!
One glorious day an American Express application came with my name on it and I thought....oooh, now I'm a grown up. So we discussed it and I said, "It might be nice to have this as part of the 'Oh, shit' fund and then on the trip we just don't have to care as much." So I applied and got accepted. I kept my fingers crossed that I would get it in time for vacation so we'd have it for the incidentals and it showed up two days before our flight!
So off we went for the grand Oregon adventure. I swiped that AMEX like nobody's business! Not to mention it saved us in the long run anyway. Half of the crackpot plans we did have in place before we left got changed three days before, anyway so the card just helped us cover the bases no one else could.
We didn't over-spend too much on vacation. It helped us have a lot of fun and do the things we didn't think we could otherwise. I didn't even want to know how much, still don't! When we came home we thought we'd go back to work and be hardworking Americans who slowly pay down their luxuries. But does any story end that way? Of course not.
Eben went back to work for two days before the Clusterfuck cloud rained down on us. On a regular Monday afternoon while watching some comedy special on the Netflix queue and eating a homemade salad things went a bit crazy. I was in my undershirt and underwear getting ready for work when I sat down to eat for a moment and it all took a turn for the scary.
Eben was sitting there staring and looking strange. I joked, "You look disgruntled babe, do you not want to watch this?" All of the sudden his head nodded down low and he went ghost white! He put his salad down and his eyes opened wide and glossy, his body tensed up and he started shaking and having tremors. Every few minutes he would breathe in short, exhaulted breaths, hyperventilating. He couldn't talk. He looked at me like he could hear me but couldn't make out the words. Something was wrong. I panicked.
I fumbled with my phone to call work and say I couldn't come in. I couldn't dial, I could barely think. I called three people in hysterics, probably scaring the shit out of all of them and needed to get Eben some help! Clusterfucked: do we have insurance? NOPE! We're healthy twenty-somethings and it's not in the budget. Off to the walk-in Urgent Care we go!
I shakily get him into the car. He's only half aware of what just happened. I'm crying and swearing. I threw on some crappy, terry-cloth, way-too-short, shorts and a t-shirt and grabbed my flip flops. The poor dog just looked bewildered. We walked into the clinic and I told them he may have had an allergic reaction. They took him back immediately with about 5 other people in there that had been waiting before him just looking annoyed, and I started to fill out paperwork.
The asked me to come back immediately. His eyes were glossy, his memory foggy and when he stuck out his tongue it drooped to the left. They said, "You need to get him to the emergency room right now, it's neurological, and preferably get him there by ambulance." The hospital was across the street. The walk-in clinic didn't even let me finish filling stuff out. They didn't make us pay. I got him to the ER and they took one look at him: "Do you need a doctor?"
Clusterfucked: He was so trembly and trying to piece it together, and the circus began. They asked us what happened in admissions, he gave a full medical history and lack of insurance information. The stress hits me. We move to the emergency room. Who to call, who not to call, what to do? Luckily it was his day off, but it was safe to say he wouldn't be in tomorrow. Thank goodness I had two days off in a row!
The dog! We had to get someone to care for the dog. This is what was racing through my mind. I hate hospitals! Then the waiting game. We had to listen to the amazing bronchitis woman in the next area over, the wheezy lady, Senorita Spanish in pain screaming, "Hay dios mio!," and the gal beside us with a broken bone arguing with everyone. And we just waited for each nurse, doctor, and assistant to come in and let us perform the who-what-when-how ritual. It was 4pm and I was exhausted.
I finally called for back up. The only person who I knew wasn't going to be inconvenienced was my friend from work, whom coincidentally also loved our dog. She came a running. She was amazing and then came the question: "How's Eben?," followed by, "And how are you?" Me, I couldn't even think about me. Me wasn't important...everything else was.
Clusterfucked: They have to test him for everything from epilepsy to stroke. It was likely to be a seizure...then it WAS a seizure. They were keeping him overnight. A ray of hope that Eben saw as a sign because she shared the name of his Grandmother Chriss, came in to give us all the financial help papers. We could deal with all this later. Those bills wouldn't show up any time soon right? I could feel the stress in my ears and toes. This was bad.
Brodie goes with Auntie Em and I come home to pick up the house a bit. It's a scary place without him. Thank goodness for good friends and family checking on us. I'm already calculating the bills in my head and it hurts. I'm ready to put some family members on my speed dial but I'm not ready to fully surrender yet. It's only the first night.
Anti-seizure medicine is on. He's on a liquid diet. MRI at 4am. Neurological tests at 11am day two of the hospital. No food yet. Dinner and no test results. They've taken his blood four times. The IV in his arm is killing him, time to move it. New IV on the hand. The second night I cave and go home with the dog. Our friends visited him in the hospital.
If it weren't for the dog spooning me, I may not have slept. Plus I knew they finally fed Eben. MRI comes back fine, blood work is fine. No word on the neurological results on day three. Ultrasound for the blown out IV. Now he may have cellultitis. The saintly woman comes back to say we qualify for help. We wait. He has a clot in a superficial vein; very painful. We also find out he has sleep apnea and an extremely immense sinus infection. The results are in: small grade seizure, a combination of stress, sinus infection, travelling, and pressure changes gave him a neurological meltdown. No epilepsy. We're hoping for a one time freak accident!
They let us go home. Eben's still shaky and tired but all he wants is to see the dog. We drop off his presciptions at Wal-Mart. Clusterfucked: It's going to be almost 200$! Hello AMEX! We have almost no food. Hello AMEX at Applebees! We're stewing...should we ask for help or wait and see? We waited a lot. Things weren't working. Paychecks were small because of vacation, things were happening late. Bills were wiping us clean and I was desperate for interaction outside of my home. I'd never been so happy to be back at work.
Eben was exhausted and in pain. At home he puttered around the house. He cleaned, cooked, watched TV, played with and walked the dog. He was definitely taken down a few notches but he was stressed about going back to work. He didn't want anyone to fuss about him. It had been an emotionally tumultuous week and I'd had to talk myself into not crying wolf, but finally caved in to asking for help.
Clusterfucked...it was just too much. I started writing these cryptic, angry Facebook statuses and couldn't cry but needed to. Besides Eben, I only had one ally. She told me it was okay to ask for help. It was okay to ask for a lot of help. Eben's Dad was on a military kind of social security budget, my dad just got out of the hospital himself. Eben's mom was great for immediate help but what about next month? We needed to call the wonderful OZ of our family. I was going to shoot high and ask for a lot. Why not? Even if he said no, I'd still taken a leap. I didn't expect the moon but I can hope!
He knew when I called. He's that kind of guy. He asked what he could do to help. I gave him the first offer. It threw him! "What do you need that kind of money for?" To break even I thought! To wipe the slate clean! I immediately became upset and embarrased. I'd gone too far. It was too familiar for him. Like the days when my mom would hit him up for ridiculous amounts. I just estimated the total of those bills and got antsy. Now I felt bad.
I'd asked for a loan. I wanted to pay it back in installments but he said he'd give us a smaller gift instead. Now I just hoped Obama would pay for our entire hospital stay out of his pocket, if I filled out the right paperwork and wrote him a nice note. I found myself searching for one of those posters with the kitty that says, "Hang in there," just to give me some self assurance.
I text my cousin and bore my soul! I told him I shot high and hit rock bottom and felt so terrible for doing that. He told me that's what family is there for, and asking for help is okay, he does it all the time. I felt a bit better.
Clusterfucked: Eben and I feel like failures. We've paid our dues and we don't expect much. That's exactly why I shot so high. We never expected to be given that much -if any- but damn it, if we could just have it to solve our problems and only owe our family we'd do it. I didn't want this to come up at family dinners. I didn't want them to feel like we were broke, lesser beings. But then I started wondering, which let me to start talking to people and I realized, everyone does it!
I think our entire universe is in some kind of debt. Some people don't even care! I bet my entire family has thousands, upon thousands of dollars worth of credit card debt and then some. But we all hide it so well. If we have money to go out, or at least to appear to do so, we're fine. It's all about keeping up appearances. Any sign of weakness is unacceptable!
I'm still stewing a bit, with worry and stress to boot, but we got some help. We really got all we needed. Then I thought about how awesome my bargaining skills were. If I'd shot too low, we may be worse off - haha, kidding - but instead I negotiated myself a payment of rent for August in case it all really went to shit!
I wish we could get past this. I wish Clusterfucked was just a really bad ass word we'd say in jest, instead of the epitome of our situation but it is what it is. Twenty years from now when we get these kinds of phone calls from our neices, nephews, and kids of our own we'll remember that they helped us. So when they ask us for $10,000 to help, because by that time it'll be the equivalent of what $5,000 pays for today, we'll say, "Instead of loaning you that much, I'll just give you $3,000 as a gift and we'll call it even. Take care of yourself and things will get better."
We have to believe that things happen for a reason and this was all a sign. We have to remember that many people have it far worse than we do and that the Clusterfuck is an artful thing, a learning experience really! At the end of the day, we are surrounded by some seriously amazing people and we can still laugh. That's all there is!
I don't buy new clothes and shoes all the time, and when I do, they are purchased at Target, TJMaxx and Ross. We don't go to fancy restaurants, buy expensive drinks and such. We are pretty chill for the most part. Where does all our money go? Plane tickets, a splurge on concerts, or we turn to the credit cards for the, "Oh, shit" fund.
We rarely ask for help although who doesn't love monetary presents? But June kicked some Chriss' asses and man, today was the day of relief, worry and a damn good cry.
I'm pretty obsessive about budgeting and in turn, I've made Eben the same way. We rarely "overspend." But when it came to vacation this year, we just accepted our defeat. It cost us over $1,000 to fly home to Oregon. Eight hundred round trip for us and $250 to take the the dog with us, which we rationalized because he was little, we could take him as carry on and it was "cheaper than boarding him!" So, the tickets, the bags, the Brodie and everything was put on the credit card.
In the midst of this we are also in an amazing transitional phase where the old will be out and in will come the brand new, so balancing the two became quite the act! So Eben had just been awarded vacation pay, which we knew we'd have to pay rent. We also knew this fall, his pay would change again so we'd figured, we can deal with this later, we can wait! Fun now, pay later!
One glorious day an American Express application came with my name on it and I thought....oooh, now I'm a grown up. So we discussed it and I said, "It might be nice to have this as part of the 'Oh, shit' fund and then on the trip we just don't have to care as much." So I applied and got accepted. I kept my fingers crossed that I would get it in time for vacation so we'd have it for the incidentals and it showed up two days before our flight!
So off we went for the grand Oregon adventure. I swiped that AMEX like nobody's business! Not to mention it saved us in the long run anyway. Half of the crackpot plans we did have in place before we left got changed three days before, anyway so the card just helped us cover the bases no one else could.
We didn't over-spend too much on vacation. It helped us have a lot of fun and do the things we didn't think we could otherwise. I didn't even want to know how much, still don't! When we came home we thought we'd go back to work and be hardworking Americans who slowly pay down their luxuries. But does any story end that way? Of course not.
Eben went back to work for two days before the Clusterfuck cloud rained down on us. On a regular Monday afternoon while watching some comedy special on the Netflix queue and eating a homemade salad things went a bit crazy. I was in my undershirt and underwear getting ready for work when I sat down to eat for a moment and it all took a turn for the scary.
Eben was sitting there staring and looking strange. I joked, "You look disgruntled babe, do you not want to watch this?" All of the sudden his head nodded down low and he went ghost white! He put his salad down and his eyes opened wide and glossy, his body tensed up and he started shaking and having tremors. Every few minutes he would breathe in short, exhaulted breaths, hyperventilating. He couldn't talk. He looked at me like he could hear me but couldn't make out the words. Something was wrong. I panicked.
I fumbled with my phone to call work and say I couldn't come in. I couldn't dial, I could barely think. I called three people in hysterics, probably scaring the shit out of all of them and needed to get Eben some help! Clusterfucked: do we have insurance? NOPE! We're healthy twenty-somethings and it's not in the budget. Off to the walk-in Urgent Care we go!
I shakily get him into the car. He's only half aware of what just happened. I'm crying and swearing. I threw on some crappy, terry-cloth, way-too-short, shorts and a t-shirt and grabbed my flip flops. The poor dog just looked bewildered. We walked into the clinic and I told them he may have had an allergic reaction. They took him back immediately with about 5 other people in there that had been waiting before him just looking annoyed, and I started to fill out paperwork.
The asked me to come back immediately. His eyes were glossy, his memory foggy and when he stuck out his tongue it drooped to the left. They said, "You need to get him to the emergency room right now, it's neurological, and preferably get him there by ambulance." The hospital was across the street. The walk-in clinic didn't even let me finish filling stuff out. They didn't make us pay. I got him to the ER and they took one look at him: "Do you need a doctor?"
Clusterfucked: He was so trembly and trying to piece it together, and the circus began. They asked us what happened in admissions, he gave a full medical history and lack of insurance information. The stress hits me. We move to the emergency room. Who to call, who not to call, what to do? Luckily it was his day off, but it was safe to say he wouldn't be in tomorrow. Thank goodness I had two days off in a row!
The dog! We had to get someone to care for the dog. This is what was racing through my mind. I hate hospitals! Then the waiting game. We had to listen to the amazing bronchitis woman in the next area over, the wheezy lady, Senorita Spanish in pain screaming, "Hay dios mio!," and the gal beside us with a broken bone arguing with everyone. And we just waited for each nurse, doctor, and assistant to come in and let us perform the who-what-when-how ritual. It was 4pm and I was exhausted.
I finally called for back up. The only person who I knew wasn't going to be inconvenienced was my friend from work, whom coincidentally also loved our dog. She came a running. She was amazing and then came the question: "How's Eben?," followed by, "And how are you?" Me, I couldn't even think about me. Me wasn't important...everything else was.
Clusterfucked: They have to test him for everything from epilepsy to stroke. It was likely to be a seizure...then it WAS a seizure. They were keeping him overnight. A ray of hope that Eben saw as a sign because she shared the name of his Grandmother Chriss, came in to give us all the financial help papers. We could deal with all this later. Those bills wouldn't show up any time soon right? I could feel the stress in my ears and toes. This was bad.
Brodie goes with Auntie Em and I come home to pick up the house a bit. It's a scary place without him. Thank goodness for good friends and family checking on us. I'm already calculating the bills in my head and it hurts. I'm ready to put some family members on my speed dial but I'm not ready to fully surrender yet. It's only the first night.
Anti-seizure medicine is on. He's on a liquid diet. MRI at 4am. Neurological tests at 11am day two of the hospital. No food yet. Dinner and no test results. They've taken his blood four times. The IV in his arm is killing him, time to move it. New IV on the hand. The second night I cave and go home with the dog. Our friends visited him in the hospital.
If it weren't for the dog spooning me, I may not have slept. Plus I knew they finally fed Eben. MRI comes back fine, blood work is fine. No word on the neurological results on day three. Ultrasound for the blown out IV. Now he may have cellultitis. The saintly woman comes back to say we qualify for help. We wait. He has a clot in a superficial vein; very painful. We also find out he has sleep apnea and an extremely immense sinus infection. The results are in: small grade seizure, a combination of stress, sinus infection, travelling, and pressure changes gave him a neurological meltdown. No epilepsy. We're hoping for a one time freak accident!
They let us go home. Eben's still shaky and tired but all he wants is to see the dog. We drop off his presciptions at Wal-Mart. Clusterfucked: It's going to be almost 200$! Hello AMEX! We have almost no food. Hello AMEX at Applebees! We're stewing...should we ask for help or wait and see? We waited a lot. Things weren't working. Paychecks were small because of vacation, things were happening late. Bills were wiping us clean and I was desperate for interaction outside of my home. I'd never been so happy to be back at work.
Eben was exhausted and in pain. At home he puttered around the house. He cleaned, cooked, watched TV, played with and walked the dog. He was definitely taken down a few notches but he was stressed about going back to work. He didn't want anyone to fuss about him. It had been an emotionally tumultuous week and I'd had to talk myself into not crying wolf, but finally caved in to asking for help.
Clusterfucked...it was just too much. I started writing these cryptic, angry Facebook statuses and couldn't cry but needed to. Besides Eben, I only had one ally. She told me it was okay to ask for help. It was okay to ask for a lot of help. Eben's Dad was on a military kind of social security budget, my dad just got out of the hospital himself. Eben's mom was great for immediate help but what about next month? We needed to call the wonderful OZ of our family. I was going to shoot high and ask for a lot. Why not? Even if he said no, I'd still taken a leap. I didn't expect the moon but I can hope!
He knew when I called. He's that kind of guy. He asked what he could do to help. I gave him the first offer. It threw him! "What do you need that kind of money for?" To break even I thought! To wipe the slate clean! I immediately became upset and embarrased. I'd gone too far. It was too familiar for him. Like the days when my mom would hit him up for ridiculous amounts. I just estimated the total of those bills and got antsy. Now I felt bad.
I'd asked for a loan. I wanted to pay it back in installments but he said he'd give us a smaller gift instead. Now I just hoped Obama would pay for our entire hospital stay out of his pocket, if I filled out the right paperwork and wrote him a nice note. I found myself searching for one of those posters with the kitty that says, "Hang in there," just to give me some self assurance.
I text my cousin and bore my soul! I told him I shot high and hit rock bottom and felt so terrible for doing that. He told me that's what family is there for, and asking for help is okay, he does it all the time. I felt a bit better.
Clusterfucked: Eben and I feel like failures. We've paid our dues and we don't expect much. That's exactly why I shot so high. We never expected to be given that much -if any- but damn it, if we could just have it to solve our problems and only owe our family we'd do it. I didn't want this to come up at family dinners. I didn't want them to feel like we were broke, lesser beings. But then I started wondering, which let me to start talking to people and I realized, everyone does it!
I think our entire universe is in some kind of debt. Some people don't even care! I bet my entire family has thousands, upon thousands of dollars worth of credit card debt and then some. But we all hide it so well. If we have money to go out, or at least to appear to do so, we're fine. It's all about keeping up appearances. Any sign of weakness is unacceptable!
I'm still stewing a bit, with worry and stress to boot, but we got some help. We really got all we needed. Then I thought about how awesome my bargaining skills were. If I'd shot too low, we may be worse off - haha, kidding - but instead I negotiated myself a payment of rent for August in case it all really went to shit!
I wish we could get past this. I wish Clusterfucked was just a really bad ass word we'd say in jest, instead of the epitome of our situation but it is what it is. Twenty years from now when we get these kinds of phone calls from our neices, nephews, and kids of our own we'll remember that they helped us. So when they ask us for $10,000 to help, because by that time it'll be the equivalent of what $5,000 pays for today, we'll say, "Instead of loaning you that much, I'll just give you $3,000 as a gift and we'll call it even. Take care of yourself and things will get better."
We have to believe that things happen for a reason and this was all a sign. We have to remember that many people have it far worse than we do and that the Clusterfuck is an artful thing, a learning experience really! At the end of the day, we are surrounded by some seriously amazing people and we can still laugh. That's all there is!
Friday, May 27, 2011
Songs of Love
So my man Eben and I have quite the relationship! Below are the songs that, together, comprise the love we share and will always share! Laugh and enjoy!
So we didn't have an instant connection but we'd both had those high school heartaches. Even though I had the hots for his roommates, we still asked the same question out of life: "Where Do Broken Hearts Go?"
Then I started dating his roomate, Josh, while Eben worshipped me from afar and I knew that he wished that he had "Josh's Girl." After the big, bad break-up with the roommate I was a little hesitant, but he wooed me and convinced me, "Love lifts us up where we belong."
We had to break the friendship zone because he'd been "My Best Friend," for so long! So we started dating and at first we hid it from people, but eventually everyone could tell that we were in love. It just kind of happened. We didn't know what to expect but all of the sudden we were "Accidentally in Love," and it was a happy accident.
Then of course, we have to have some drama, because that's what life is all about. The best songs to sum this up would have to be a kind of montage of...me having "issues," some "Trust" stuff, and not being able to just be "us." We pulled it together but when hard times hit months and months later we tried to be apart and date other people, which was weird. But at the same time we always kind of ended up back together in one way or another.
Eben hated the guy I was dating, I know he thought, "Is she really going out with him?" Although, I didn't want anyone else getting their hands on him either. He was mine!
So eventually we gave up and gave in and got it back together for real.
On our second Valentine's Day we found our official song, "I Will Follow You Into The Dark." We were inseparable and we even ended up moving in together. That was quite the adjustment but like everything else in this life, we made it work.
I got the opportunity to study abroad. It was tough for me, but it was an opportunity I had to take. I had to suck it up even though I wanted to cry! I knew he hated that I was "So Far Away."
When I came back it was like I'd never been away. We talked all the time when I was gone and picked up right where we left off. We saw the Silver Lining in it all. It wasn't all happyness, champagne and roses though. We still had a lot of drama all around us and I was a mess after being gone. I missed my friends so much.
Things kept on swinging, and life kept on happening. Through it all, we stuck together. When my grandma died, he was there for me. I was the The Luckiest. I still am! When my mom was sick, he was supportive and patient. When life, kicked my ass, he was always there to help me back up. He's definitely a Well-respected man. It became pretty clear, despite any bad times, the fights and the drama that My Life Would Suck Without him.
We lost some great people in the midst of putting ourselves back together, but we all had the Time of Our Life and as sad as it is to say it was Good Riddance. So on St. Patrick's Day in 2009, after nearly 5 years of being together through it all, Eben asked and I said yes! I knew that He and I would be amazing together forever.
We still have times where we drive each other crazy but overall, I think we love each other Faithfully, we keep the Lovin, Touchin and Squeezing, live life Anyway we Want It, and won't Stop Believing in each other and the love we have!
So we didn't have an instant connection but we'd both had those high school heartaches. Even though I had the hots for his roommates, we still asked the same question out of life: "Where Do Broken Hearts Go?"
Then I started dating his roomate, Josh, while Eben worshipped me from afar and I knew that he wished that he had "Josh's Girl." After the big, bad break-up with the roommate I was a little hesitant, but he wooed me and convinced me, "Love lifts us up where we belong."
We had to break the friendship zone because he'd been "My Best Friend," for so long! So we started dating and at first we hid it from people, but eventually everyone could tell that we were in love. It just kind of happened. We didn't know what to expect but all of the sudden we were "Accidentally in Love," and it was a happy accident.
Then of course, we have to have some drama, because that's what life is all about. The best songs to sum this up would have to be a kind of montage of...me having "issues," some "Trust" stuff, and not being able to just be "us." We pulled it together but when hard times hit months and months later we tried to be apart and date other people, which was weird. But at the same time we always kind of ended up back together in one way or another.
Eben hated the guy I was dating, I know he thought, "Is she really going out with him?" Although, I didn't want anyone else getting their hands on him either. He was mine!
So eventually we gave up and gave in and got it back together for real.
On our second Valentine's Day we found our official song, "I Will Follow You Into The Dark." We were inseparable and we even ended up moving in together. That was quite the adjustment but like everything else in this life, we made it work.
I got the opportunity to study abroad. It was tough for me, but it was an opportunity I had to take. I had to suck it up even though I wanted to cry! I knew he hated that I was "So Far Away."
When I came back it was like I'd never been away. We talked all the time when I was gone and picked up right where we left off. We saw the Silver Lining in it all. It wasn't all happyness, champagne and roses though. We still had a lot of drama all around us and I was a mess after being gone. I missed my friends so much.
Things kept on swinging, and life kept on happening. Through it all, we stuck together. When my grandma died, he was there for me. I was the The Luckiest. I still am! When my mom was sick, he was supportive and patient. When life, kicked my ass, he was always there to help me back up. He's definitely a Well-respected man. It became pretty clear, despite any bad times, the fights and the drama that My Life Would Suck Without him.
We lost some great people in the midst of putting ourselves back together, but we all had the Time of Our Life and as sad as it is to say it was Good Riddance. So on St. Patrick's Day in 2009, after nearly 5 years of being together through it all, Eben asked and I said yes! I knew that He and I would be amazing together forever.
We still have times where we drive each other crazy but overall, I think we love each other Faithfully, we keep the Lovin, Touchin and Squeezing, live life Anyway we Want It, and won't Stop Believing in each other and the love we have!
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