Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Pity

Here is what I haven't said; this is what I can't say;


The loss of her broke me. It shattered me into a thousand wee pieces and left them scattered about. There are days I do not cry, but there is not time I do not remember that she would be this big or this old. Sometimes I wake and have forgotten her absence and then I remember again and am shattered again. But mostly, I don't forget and that is both better and worse.


Sometimes, I am able to believe myself when I wish another mother a happy pregnancy. Sometimes, I'm able to be happy for them. It's easier, of course, when they're happy for themselves. But still, inside, I hate them. Just a little. For having what I don't. And then I hate myself. I don't wish them ill. But the jealousy burns; a tiny, bright flame in my gut tears me up and I hate them.


I am selfish in my grief. Forgetting that he, too, lost her. Curling up on the sofa or raging, tears streaming down my face in the grocery line as he strokes my hair, taking all the sadness in the world and making it mine alone. Your dog died? You lost your job? Your husband left? I don't care. My baby is gone. But of course I do care and then I hate myself, too. I hate that I count her absence in months now, instead of hours or days. I hate that I will one day count it in years. I hate that I have to count it at all.

I hate that the Universe gives baby after baby to mothers who hit them, or drown them, or sell them, or forget to hug them. To mothers that leave them in dumpsters or with some man they met; some man with shifty eyes, alone in the bathtub, or in a hot car. I hate that I walk through the aisles of the store and hear them crying as their mother ignores them and talks on her cell phone about how she's gonna get her hair did. I hate that someone, somewhere, some mythical force, thinks that they are better mothers than me. They must be, right? They have their babies and I do not. Their body kept their baby safe despite them and mine did not.

I hate that I am now the woman who Hasn't Move On. I used to pity that woman. Now I pity myself.

Monday, November 28, 2011

For Starters

Me: Okay, but how the hell did a vampire get someone pregnant? He's dead. His stuff would be all dried up.

Shush: Seriously? That's the plot hole you're fixating on?

Me: Until they reveal Kristin Stewart is really a zombie, yes.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Cosmo Lies

The secret to a happy marriage isn't finding the perfect man, it's finding a man who you don't want to stab in the ear with an ice pick even though he throws his dirty clothes ON THE FLOOR IN FRONT OF THE HAMPER.



(actual crime scene photograph)


(not pictured: the folded basket of clean laundry I did two weeks ago but haven't put away yet because I hate that part and I don't want to do it and you can't make me so there.)

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Unlike what happens in Vegas, which ends up on the internet.

Bum: Excuse me beautiful lady, do you have any change?

Me: Nope, sorry.

Bum: That's okay, we can still get married.

Me: I've already got a husband.

Bum: Damn, girl. That's okay. We don't have to tell him. What happens downtown can stay downtown!

Monday, August 1, 2011

Willow

ceramic vases stand sentinel
cloying scent of lilies heavy, sweet
petals dropping like tears
loved me, loved you
loved her
forming drifts around
carefully typed words
inadequately embossed on stiff little cards
until the transient well wishes
can be borne no longer
and the detritus is cleared away
the cheerful reminders of death
stowed neatly beneath the sink
counters cleared of
thinking of you
ten tiny fingers, ten perfect toes
suspended in black and white
replaced by a grocery list
as normal begins to smooth broken edges
of life held together by grief
until from a distance
it looks whole again; fractured but solid
save for the space
that fits the shape of her exactly

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Everyone Else is Doing it!

People are stupid. Seriously.

My parking garage has a single driveway that feeds two gates. EVERY SINGLE FUCKING DAY there is a line of chumps waiting to get in the garage. Why? Because like lemmings they all feel the need to line up at the same gate. Failing, apparently to realize that if there are two gates, two cars can slide in at once! The novelty!

Sometimes, for fun, I sit at the gate and pretend like I don't know how to make my card work, just to see if they'll wait patiently behind me rather than break rank and move to the other gate.

Because I'm an asshole.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

A Ranting We Shall Go

Why the hell are some people such big whiny babies? NOT ME. I wasn't talking about me, though if you'd been at my house the last few days you'd be all "well you SHOULD be, Whiny McWhiner" and then I'd cry. Because that's how whiners deal with shit. They whine some more.

One of the things I do is make the kitchen duty list. Everyone gets a turn. Today Chief Whiner was all "Where's YOUR name on the list" so I pointed it out and he's all "why is it only on there once, mine is on there twice?" Listen, ManBitch, my name is only on there once because I do kitchen duty every fucking day. Any time someone else has a meeting, is off, forgets or just doesn't bother I do the kitchen. Sure, it can be argued it's part of my job to keep an eye on the kitchen, but KEEPING AN EYE ON IT and standing in as your mother because you never learned to put a cup in the dishwasher are NOT the same thing. Don't believe me? I DON'T CARE, I make the fucking list and if you whine any more I'm putting your name on it every other week. Don't like that? SUCK IT.

Seriously, the next person that whines "it's not fair" at me is getting punched in the throat.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Hey! I have a blog!



I know, right? The line to smack me forms to the left. Please be orderly and have your ticket ready.



So, I really don't even know where to start.



I got married. But most of you know that. Here we are looking all disgustingly in love and shit.




Just kidding. That's us with our attendants, Vodka and Jameson's. They've been such good friends to us over the years, it was important that they got to be part of the wedding.


I got a new job. It's pretty much like winning the job lottery. No, it IS winning the job lottery. The pay is great, the view is great, the work is great, the people are really great. If I didn't have to wear a grown-up costume to work everyday it would be the Best. Job. Ever. hands down. That's pretty much all I can tell you about it though because sometimes you see us on the news and there are Rules.


Um...what else? We went to Seattle in June for M's 16th birthday. Right? What the hell? She's working at summer camp now, which means that the next six months everything she tells me will begin with 'at camp'. I write her letters from the cat. One cat is a little tetched and the other is kind of a bitch and doesn't write letters so much as send a list of demands. No boring 'love mom' letters from this house. I mean really, she's gone for six weeks. And all I do is go to work. So it's not like they'd be a wealth of funny stories or anything...unless I ride the rail in.


Seriously. Do any of you commute on public transportation? Is there a law that states the minimum number of crazy people per train?


I was waiting for the train and a homeless person was digging through the trash. Not a big deal, there are frequently people collecting things to recycle. Not this guy. OH NOT EVEN A LITTLE. This charmer grabs the WHOLE FUCKING BAG and brings it on the train with him. A bag of trash. Trash that has sat in the 100+ sunshine cooking that old nasty chicken to an extra special level of stank.


The next day a different guy, not visibly homeless, took the time to sit down next to each passenger on the train one by one and assure us each "everything was going to be okay". Some people got addressed as "brother" or "sister". I'm not sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I just said "thanks" and was glad he moved on.


Riding the train makes people very short tempered. Not just me I mean. I'm always short tempered. It's part of my charm. Yes it is. Shut up.


You're the reason Mama doesn't blog anymore! And why can't have nice things!


Friday, January 28, 2011

Friend this.

This place has gone from a complain about everything (but in a humorous way! With mirth!) to a "work through the issue around divorce because my therapist is too far away and I work too many hours to go anyway and also I'm off all my medications oh and PS I'm having wicked body issues and aside from THAT Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?" bit of Internet that I mostly forget exists. I know. I suck. I blame the hippies and their damn patchouli oil that stink up our office.

See? Hippies. (side note: these particular hippies, while colorful were actually not at all smelly)


As usual I'm fully off my train of thought here. Surprise, surprise. I guess not EVERYTHING changes.

Okay. The point. Facebook in all it's amusing sadism, thinks I need to be "friends" with my ex-husbands new girlfriend. I'm sure she's lovely. In fact, I bet she's perfectly nice and I probably WOULD like her, but hello? Awkward much? Yes. Today they recommended we "reconnect" for the ten thousandth time and I noticed that her profile picture is one of her and J together, posed all couple-y in front of a landmark.

In all the time we were married, in all our road trips snaps, in all the family vacation photo's there are maybe two or three pictures of J and me together. Okay, maybe four. He refused. Flat out, absolutely NO FUCKING WAY refused to ever be photographed on any of these trips. Not alone, not with M, not with me and really, really never all together in front of some commemorative scenery.

Thirteen years of snapshots of scenery and not a single damn human in any of them. I quit asking. Quit wanting to be able to show people those photo's that no one except your Gram ever wants to see anyway (and here we are in front of a shrub! and this is us with a highway guard rail!) because I got tired of hearing "no" over and over. Instead M and I would do long arms of ourselves or she'd pose and I'd shoot. It's like he was standing outside our lives the entire time. When I sorted through the (oh dear god, the number!) photographs from before we went digital do you know how many I found of us as a family? A dozen. Or less. He simply wasn't interested in standing beside me to mark some little event that years later you look back on fondly.

And yet, two months in, there he is with his new love. Standing in front of a scenery marker, arm around her. Saying "look! we went somewhere and it was fun and we enjoy each other's company!".

Why wasn't I worth that same? Why wasn't the fact that I wanted it enough? What did I finally manage to say with my leaving that I couldn't say with my begging?

Don't misinterpret. I'm not jealous or...whatever else is not jealous but implies that I have a problem with them going places and enjoying it enough to want to remember it. I'm so very much happier where I am. But I don't understand. I can't wrap my head around why I had to dismantle our lives to finally get him to acquiesce to the tiny things that would have maybe been the Dutch Boy's finger.

I can't help but think that I really wasn't enough. That I am not enough. It's a fucked up smack to the face to finally begin to feel worthy of the happiness you've scratched out to then be confronted with the evidence that you've finally won a battle you're not fighting anymore. Or maybe lost it. I'm not even sure anymore.