Sundays with Stretchy Pants

Yeah, yeah, I know you all read Pepper Paints and she already blogged about Thursday’s fun. Too bad. Read about it again.

I missed last Thursday’s homeschool park day because I was in Michigan. The potluck was canceled (obviously, what fun would it have been without me?) Or maybe it was because Dawn has a job or something lame like that. Anyway, we’re on for today and I have an extra kid with me so it will be extra fun. My 10-year-old niece is visiting us for a bit and she’s really sweet so she gets along nicely with my kids and my kids’ friends. The pool even gave her a free membership for us so we wouldn’t have to try to sneak her in. Nice of them. Bryan and I were actually planning to just pay an extra 10 bucks to get a pass for a family of 6 instead of 5, but Bryan didn’t know if she had to be immediate family or what so I guess he stammered around saying, “I forgot, our step-daughter will be with us a lot this summer, so I need a pass for 6, blah, blah, blah.” The kid at the desk was like, “Whatever, geezer, have a free pass.” Yay!

I didn’t say anything to Bryan, but it’s funny that his choice of the word “our” really stood out to me when he was relaying the story. Poor little bunny from a two-parent home doesn’t understand that there is no “our” when you’re talking about step-daughters. Unfortunately, I’m quite in-the-know on all matters of step-crap. For the lie to work really well, he should have said my step-daughter. Right? It’s the little things that make a lie believable.

Speaking of step-crap, I’m making a new rule and I think all children of divorce will get behind me on this one: I decree that our parents only get one shot at “blending” families. Got that? My dad is now going through his 2nd divorce, so I will have an ex-step-mother and 2 ex-step-brothers and 1 ex-step-sister to go along with my ex-step-father whom my mom divorced several years ago. I’m not having anymore steps.  My dad’s next wife will be “my dad’s wife” and my children will call her by her first name or Mrs. Clement, but not grandma. Same goes for my mother’s next husband. If they don’t like that, I will go to plan B, which is to refer to the new spouse as “my dad’s current wife” or “my dad’s next ex-wife” or some such other equally degrading term. I think that’s fair.

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Word.

(someecards.com)

My blog went on a bender last week and by the time it recovered, I was busy. I had to play with some IRL friends over and over and over again. And then I had to refinish a coffee table that Kristen thrifted many years ago and very nicely got tired of just in time to give to me. It looks gorgeous and makes the rest of my stuff look crappy. And I learned that saying I like “shabby chic” is a convenient excuse that allows me to get away with not painting well. Wonderful. I tried to take a picture of it, but I’m not good at that and there is no such “shabby chic” defense for picture taking. Wouldn’t it be nice if there were? “No, silly, it’s not that there’s a huge shadow and a glare from the flash, it’s just that I belong to the shabby chic school of photography. I guess you have an un-trained eye in these matters.”

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Kristen and Dawn have introduced me to the wonderful world of thrifting. You would think it would be a no-brainer for me: I’m poor, I should buy used clothes on the cheap. But I don’t like to shop and I absolutely hate to shop in chaos. I <3 T@rget so much when I absolutely have to buy something, not because it has good stuff, but because it is neat and orderly. Order soothes.

I thought the thrift store would be very chaotic, but it was lovely. Everything was sorted by color, which I didn’t think would be a good enough system, but it was. I kept getting butterflies every time I saw something that I liked that was in my size for $1.50.  A dollar and a half! I had to really work at keeping my excited squealing under control. We ended up spending more than 4 hours in a single store. I don’t spend more than 4 hours Christmas shopping without a food break. Actually, if I were ever to shop in regular stores for 4 hours in a row, that would involve 1 lunch break, 1 coffee break, 7 potty breaks, and a cheesecake break. And I would spend 3 times the amount of money and come home with 1/8 of the stuff.

By the time I came up for air and decided to look at my watch, I thought it might be around 2:00ish. It was 5:15. I was in a thrifting-related time warp of some sort, the likes of which I haven’t seen since 1991 when Bryan bet me I couldn’t drink a fifth of Jack Daniels. (The last thing I remember from that night is slamming down the empty bottle, standing up and saying, “Somebody owes me TWO DOLLARS!” And then I woke up and it was 1993).

Anyway, yeah. Thrifting is fun. You should totally do it. But set an alarm or something because the time warp will get you and then you’ll realize that you’re starving and you didn’t get groceries like you planned to and then you’ll decide that you and your thrifting friends and their husbands and children should all go to the Chinese buffet for dinner (since you saved all that money at the thrift store) and then you’ll try to run the next morning with a pile of buffet food in your guts. Not a good idea. But the thrifting was totally worth it.

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Dawn tagged everybody with this meme about 3 things we do well as mothers, and then she verbally assaulted me at the park yesterday and threatened my life if I didn’t do it. (Not really, she just asked me to do it and so I am. Because she’s the boss of me. But you can totally see her verbally assaulting me, right?)

1. I take an interest in what they find interesting even if I find it horrendous. You know, so we can talk about it and I can be excited about it with them. I think they like that.

2. I cuddle with them endlessly.

3. I’m teaching them that their feelings matter and that they don’t have to go along with something just to avoid hurting a friend’s feelings.

Number 3 has been more uncomfortable for me than anything I’ve ever done as a parent. And that includes saying the word vulva. This seems to come naturally to Maya so far, but for the rest of us, it is hard to say no to people we like. It is hard for me to allow my kids to say no to playdates or birthday parties, but if they don’t want to go, I’m not making them go, despite my extreme discomfort. It literally goes against my make-up as a precious pleaser to do this (right now, my Ohio friends are saying, “What? You’re the biggest bitch I know!” and I’ll take that as a compliment, thankyouverymuch.) In the past, Lena and Liberty have asked, “What if so-and-so gets mad at me because I don’t want to go to his birthday party?” And, while my instinct is to say, “You’re right! We don’t want people to get mad at us. What will we do if somebody gets mad at us? I guess we better just ignore your feelings for the sake of somebody else’s feelings. Get in the car,” I have choked down that sentiment, broke out in a cold sweat and said, “Well, darlings, it’s like this: Your feelings matter. If your friend gets mad at you just because you’re not comfortable going to his birthday party, that is your friend’s issue, not yours. You aren’t in charge of other people’s feelings. Chances are, your friend will come to understand and respect your feelings. If he doesn’t, then he’s not a true friend.” And then I passed out from the effort of conveying this most basic truth of humanity. Our own feelings matter? WTF?

This trip is hard. Dawn is right when she says other parents make all the difference in the world. We need other parents who can be open and honest about the struggles in their parenting, the struggles in their marriage, the struggles in their lives. And you know what? We need to be able to talkabout the good things without setting off a competition. If it comes up in conversation that I cuddled with Lena while she talked about her Pokemon DS game for ten minutes, it makes me uncomfortable when another mom comes back with, “Well, I cuddled with my precious for even longer while she was talking about something even more boring to me.” It makes me feel like I made her insecure with my very small good thing and I didn’t mean to do that. And then it makes me feel like I’m in a competition that I didn’t know I was in. I usually get a free t-shirt whenever I sign up for a competition. I don’t have one, so I didn’t sign up. Stop it.

This is not a new idea, but we really, really do just need to be able to share and not be judged or fixed or competed with. It’s amazing how many of the posts for this meme start off with something to the effect of, “I’m supposed to say what I do right as a mother, but there are so many things I do wrong,” even though the instructions clearly say we’re not supposed to say that. We can’t help it. We’ve been burned too many times by the mommy olympics and we’re afraid that if we say we’re doing three whole things right, 800 other mommies are going to feel insecure and point out exactly what we’re doing wrong, or what they’re doing better. Stop it. We don’t need that shit. Let’s celebrate ourselves because, no matter what we do, our kids are going to be pissed at us. Let’s just be there for each other when it happens.

Oh, I’m tagging Mechelle, TooTightPonytailGirl, Sharon, Alissa, and Kristen. Five chicks who are ever so hard on themselves and deserve to talk about what they do right because there is a lot. A whole effin’ lot.

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I haven’t been this sick in a very long time. I can’t remember the last time I had a fever, but it must have been in the 80s because, darn it, this fever has set off such a hankering for peach Hi-C. A hankering that is destined to go unsatisfied. Unless somebody out there has a bomb shelter set up with all kinds of Hi-C and Spam and whatnot. That would be awesome.

My mom didn’t usually buy Hi-C or anything fun like that when I was growing up, but when I was sick, she would buy me a giant can of my favorite peach drink. That, and a can of Planters cheese balls. Or cheese curls, depending on which texture I was after. I can still remember the smell of those cheese balls when I peeled the foil back. Yum.

I’ve been dreaming about peach Hi-C in a can, opened on 2 sides (to avoid the glugging when it’s poured) with that little thing that used to put triangular holes in the many varied tin cans that held our liquids in the 70s and 80s, and popsicles for my sore, sore throat. I called Bryan at work this morning at about 7:00 and tried to communicate to him with my nearly non-existent voice that I would need him to bring me some popsicles on his way home or else he shouldn’t bother coming home. Only I couldn’t really talk that much, so I didn’t get to threaten him and be all dramatic. So I just used my scary voice to say, “Redrum” over and over and he got the hint. Then I staggered back to bed and dreamed that he couldn’t find any popsicles anywhere because they stopped making them when they stopped making peach Hi-C. After waking up from that nightmare about 23 times, he finally came home with my precious yum yums.

So sad that I’ll be missing the Chair is Art show at Gallery 202 tonight. Bryan will be there with the girls because Liberty worked on a couple of chairs with her art class. Some of our friends also have chairs in the show. It will be fun and I hate to miss the fun. Boo.

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It’s art day and it’s nice out. I suppose t’s possible that there is a cloud over the beautiful coffee shop, but I’m choosing to believe that Oprah heard my prayers and has forgiven me. Feels good.

We’re very excited around here to be having some more awesome company for the next 3 days (Mechelle, her kids, and one of my nieces–yay!) We’ll be wandering around doing the fun things that we can do in Columbus, so I won’t be around here checking my blog stats obssessively. Much. I don’t know how the 8 of you who check my blog regularly will get through the week, but I’m sure you could read a book or maybe interact with other humans to pass the time. I know those things don’t sound like viable alternatives, but I read on the internet that that’s how some people choose to spend their days. For real. Ok, bye.

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Kristen over at Pepper Paints is having a contest and since you know you don’t play with your kids enough, this contest is a great way to make it appear as though you do! Win-win, even if you don’t win.  It’s simple enough-you have a week to let your kids snap some pictures and link to them in Kristen’s comments.  People will vote on them, and maybe you’ll win some prizes.  Or maybe you won’t and you’ll start a flame war instead.  Again, win-win! Happy snapping!

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It’s raining today, what a surprise. I knew it would be raining because it’s homeschool art class day and homeschool art class day is when my friends and I drop our kids off and walk to the most beautiful coffee shop in the world. And on every single homeschool art class day, the weather has treated us like shit. It’s either raining or freezing cold, even if it was sunny and 50 degrees the day before. I think that the universe thinks that if we get to spend an hour and a half chatting in a beautiful coffee shop and have nice weather for our little walk, our heads might just explode with glee. I guess that could happen. The more likely theory is that this kind of thing happens because I once hung up on Oprah and she’s been punishing me in these little ways ever since.

To be fair, I didn’t know Oprah was going to be Queen of the Universe back when I hung up on her and I really think she should take that into consideration. It was the ’80s and I’m not even sure her ratings were better than Donahue’s at that time. She was having a show about bad neighbors and I had a really bad neighbor. When I was 8, he shot my first pet, Pooty the cat, and then pointed a gun at my mom when my parents confronted him. (No, we didn’t live in a trailer park. Why do you ask?) Anyway, this was back in the call-in days. I figured I had a story to tell, so I called and called and called. Every time somebody told their bad neighbor story, I was all, “My story is worse than that you big baby!” while I frantically dialed through my tears. I finally got through during the last commercial break. I don’t remember how the person answered the phone, but I know I said, “My neighbor is so bad, he shot my cat because she walked on his car and then when my dad and mom went over there, he pointed the gun at my mom! And we don’t even live in a trailer park!” The person on the phone said, “Ok,” and then I heard a click. I thought that meant I should hang up. I was little. They came back from commercial and I was bouncing up and down on the couch waiting for Oprah to say something like, “We just had the most precious little girl call in and tell us the worst story we’ve heard yet today. This story puts all of our panel guests’ stories to shame. Oh, the tragedy this little child has faced. I don’t know how she finds the strength to go on.” But she didn’t say anything like that. She said, “Ok, we have a caller. Go ahead, Caller. Caller? Caller, are you there? Jesus H. Christ, Caller? WTF?” And then she turned to her producer and said, “Don’t tell me that little bitch hung up on me.” At least, that’s the way I remember it. And can I tell you how a little piece of me died that day? I watched Oprah get all tense because I hung up on her. I felt an odd mix of elation and dread. I could’ve been on OPRAH! Oh no, I hung up on OPRAH! And then my parents got divorced. I don’t think it’s a coincidence.

So, I want to say I’m sorry to Oprah. I also want to say I’m sorry to my homeschool mom friends. I shouldn’t have kept this part of my past from you. I don’t want you to be hurt by any more of Oprah’s cosmic retaliation powers. I mean, I’m not sorry enough that I’m going to skip the coffee shop just so you guys can have a nice walk there, but still. At least now you know the truth.

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Bryan screwed the front license plate on our cars. Did you hear me? Do you know what that means? He paid $2.50 for the proper screws and he screwed our Ohio license plates onto the front of my mini van and his falling-apart-type beater thing. We’ve been living in Ohio for 3 years now. We came from Michigan, land of the single, back-end only license plate. Apparently, there is no point in having one on the front and one on the back when there isn’t any money in the state budget for highway patrol.

So we’ve been driving around with our front license plate tucked on our dashboard for 3 years. Last year, Bryan was issued a $40 ticket for this very infraction, yet he still couldn’t bring himself to permanently attach the license plates. This type of to-do list inaction is so against his character as a man that even he, King Literal, Head of the Knights of the Anti-Allegorical Order, could see the symbolism. As Bo Schembechler, rest His soul (yes, that’s a capital “H”) would say, he’s a Michigan Man. He loves that when he looks at his veins, they’re running blue. And he tries to never actually bleed because, well, the blood is scarlet. Nothing makes him more annoyed than Buckeye fever. That’s hard when you live in Columbus. Attaching the license plates? That’s some permanent stuff.

This move was supposed to be temporary. It was a way to get out of the shit-hole AT&T customer service job that he had been in for 6 years. A voluntary transfer to a better department in a city that we were bred to hate. My dad said, “Columbus? I raised you better than that! Divorce him!” Not really, but close. Indeed, I never would’ve agreed to a permanent move. We lived in our hometown of Chesaning, near both of our families in a house that we transformed from a run-down hovel into a gorgeous historic home fit for Chesaning’s now-defunct Parade of Homes. Move? MOVE? “I never would’ve married somebody who was going to move me away from my family,” said I, Queen Co-Dependent, Head Lady in Charge of Seeking Approval from Extended Family At All Costs. Ouch.

Then we moved. I was ready to look at this as temporary to get him out of that job, and just do what I could to get by for a couple of years and then move back home. But Columbus, she’s a seductress. She found many, many ways to my heart. Usually food is the only way to my heart, and she definitely has that covered, but let’s just take homeschooling as another for instance.

Homeschooling is a huge part of our lives and in Chesaning, we were a very lonely minority. I had no idea how lonely until we moved here. Homeschooling Community, you had me at hello. The Homeschool Gym, Homeschool classes that are offered at art galleries, science museums, recreation centers, the zoo, the metro parks, and anywhere you want them. Seriously, you just call places and say, “we want a homeschool class/tour,” and they fall all over themselves to make it happen. The roller skating rink? Some homeschooler called up and said, “We be homeschoolers and we desire to trade cash for services. But the cash shall be of an amount that is less than what they who are not homeschoolers pay.” And the roller rink (and the ice skating rink, btw) said, “Let it be written. Let it be so.” Support for homeschooling instead of blank stares and defensiveness? I. Had. No. Idea.

Oh, and there are fun people here, too. We like you guys.

**Oh my, you should feel how my blood pressure went up and my pulse quickened and my brain screamed, “Don’t talk about how much you love your Ohio friends! The people in Michigan are going to think you don’t like them anymore! What if they call you and yell at you for making new friends? Omigod, you are going to be abandoned!”**

That reminds me, one more thing we love about Columbus is the many options for psychotherapy.

It’s ok. It’s really ok. It’s hard to come out, but we’re doing it…

We love Columbus: The people, the stuff to do, the stuff to eat, the therapists. Not the buckeyes. We’ll never love the buckeyes. But we have 2 license plates on our vehicles now and, dammit, it feels good.

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I took the girls rollerskating yesterday with the homeschool group and I was surprised to find that the roller rink did not play “Pac-Man Fever” or “Freeze Frame.” I know, right? Back in my day, those songs were the go-to skating songs. I must have been a little young because I remember being disgusted whenever “Open Arms” would start to play. Disgusting! All the teenagers holding hands or skating with their hands in each other’s back pockets (”Here, let me move my comb to my other back pocket so you can put your hand in that one.”) Disgusting!

The roller rink I went to back then was about 30 minutes away from where I grew up and it seems like every weekend I went skating with my friend Melinda and her family. It couldn’t have been every weekend, though, because that would’ve made for an awesome childhood and it would have totally compensated for all of the benign neglect and outright abandonment that has contributed to my issues that some people say I have today. It was probably only a few times, but those are some of the best memories I have. Sometimes Melinda’s brother Jeremy even chose his best friend Bryan to go with him, but not often. (Not good with the wheely sports, that one.) That’s ok, though, because I had yet to realize what a catch Bryan would be and I was there to skate with MELINDA! (Ok, I might have had a little crush on Jeremy back then, but that had more to do with proximity than anything else. I see that now.)

I might be projecting a little bit, but I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who had fun yesterday. Lena, Liberty and Maya got right out there and kept at it, fall after fall, big ol’ grins on their faces. At one point, Lena said to me, “Do you feel young, Mama?” Nothing gets past that girl. I answered her with, “Who you callin’ ‘Mama’?” And then I skated away and pretended I didn’t know her. Next time I’m bringing a comb for my back pocket. And maybe some pom pons for my skates.

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