I think I missed that. WHO won the Pennsylvania primary, again?

April 24, 2008 | Category: Best Of

I am underslept and undercoffee'd, so maybe this is juts me.

But, really.

If I hear ONE MORE WORD about the 'meaning' of the Pennsylvania primary, I'm gonna go all Broadcast News.

Just saying.

Smitten

April 22, 2008 | Category: In My Life

I think I miss my cat too much.

Strange thoughts like dust motes crowd my head.

Or, is that just me?

Once upon a time CD and I had this idea, like a dream, that we wanted to raise Bear up North. Under the Northern Lights, like his father had. Skating and skiing and shoveling, like I had.

We loved this idea. We traveled to towns across the continent, looking for the right place to make our pin in the map. We bundled up suitcases and pillows into the van and watched the miles slip under our tires.

For 3 years. But finding the right place takes time.

Unless, of course, you admit you've never found it. Not really.

We found a place that felt sort of nice, and began thinking we should make the move there and quibble perfection later. It was close enough to my family on the East Coast that we could use them as a launching pad.

That was last spring. Coming home to lilacs already waning.

A year ago.

We didn't move, I've noticed. My rooms are the same. The clutter follows me like a friendly children's show monster. It sips daintily from a mug of tea and gives me a wink.

The reasons we stayed and didn't go are over there in the corner. They're real, tangible. They can be drawn and measured and they all make sense.

So here we are, now. Still in this place. Still in this house. Because instead of moving North - instead we find we must move South. Something we dread.

But my body has put its foot down. For my health, we go what feels like the wrong way. Still smitten with the idea of huffing cold air and watching the pink light of afternoon splashing on long snowy stretches of Earth. Smitten, but realistic.

With greater debt, stumbling credit scores, and a goofy puppy with a poodle afro. We wonder about pulling up stakes and going somewhere. Without the enthusiasm of the destination, logistics overwhelm us. We're stuck. We're afraid.

But we have something we didn't have, before. Before I left my career and began us on this spin.

On Sunday, Bear read his first book from cover to cover - all by himself. It was Green Eggs and Ham. He read it out loud, understanding the words and punctuation.

Perhaps this is no big deal. At 7 and a half, it may be considered overdue by some. After a school year of brutal hours spent trying every which way you can imagine, inch by inch, to get him to read.

And then, to listen to his clear voice ringing through the rooms - suddenly utterly confident and sure - well, it was nothing short of a miracle.

He just grabbed the book from a pile and began.

Maybe we'll figure this out. Maybe we won't. Maybe we'll find a way to move. Maybe we'll still be here next year. Maybe I'll go back to work. Maybe CD will homeschool Bear or I will or he'll make so much progress that he mainstreams back into school.

I don't know. My brain is operating on half a cup of coffee. I have 4 deadlines I'm juggling. My son is dawdling about starting his lessons and I think he's decided not to wear clothes today. And I haven't even brushed my teeth yet.

It's just a random Tuesday, juggling corporate and mommy and 10 other things besides.

I used to be smitten with this idea - that someday, we'd get wherever it was we would be going.

I'm not sure if its wisdom or lack of faith that made me let go of all of that. I'd need another cup of coffee to even begin to think about it. I look at a picture of Bear from when he wasn't yet 2 and laugh at the ideas I had then. He's 7 now. He wears a size 4 shoe. He can read.

And maybe his mom is growing up, too.

Goodbye, Maggie Bear

April 18, 2008 | Category: Family, It's a Trip

The other half is gone.

As we skid into the end of a crappy week, punctuated by an earthquake, we had to put down my dear companion Maggie Bear.

She and I had been together for over 20 years.

I miss her already. So damn much.

Burn Down the Mission

April 10, 2008 | Category: In My Life

An amazing offer fell from the sky recently to do some corporate ghostwriting. Just as we were feeling pressed against the wall, teeth bared against the wolves - well, it was like a little, happy miracle.

So I installed a new version of Word, sharpened all my pencils.

And?

Turns out that I suck.

First of all, I have utterly forgotten how to play corporate politics.

I flopped about like a carp in the bottom of the boat. Interviewees gave information grudgingly, passing me about like a frisbee. Every time I'd string together a nugget of information, flares were sent up demanding its inspection for the corporate party line. The teacupped tempests that followed drove me under my desk in confusion.

Oh, I miss THOSE so much! (Only, not.)

Second of all, Blogging KILLS writing.

No, really. My grammar has become so sloppy that a new word needs to be invented for what I'm doing to the English language. The poor editor had to re-write my first attempt to the extent that when I opened it up in Word - it looked like one big long RED LINE.

I figured, after tortuous weeks, that I was fired.

For 3 days, I waited to hear if anything I'd submitted was even remotely usable.

And then, a call. A mixed signal. Nothing cut and dried. "You sucked, but with promise. Here's another assignment. Try again."

Don't wanna, I thought, utterly embarrassed.

It was humiliating how poorly I'd done. Like watching a video of me attempting to ice skate for the first time in 10 years. "And she's up! And look at those arms spin, ladies and gentlemen! I haven't seen windmilling like that since the toddlers took the ice last Saturday! Oh, and here she goes! Clear the space, people...she's...she's...DOWN!"

Suck it up, Elizabeth.

So I took a deep breath and began working, again. With lots of loud replaying of Elton John's Live in Australia CD. And lots of ginger candies for nausea.

Guy on the other side of the world, being interviewed by me one sunny afternoon, said "You HAVE to have some harder questions in that bag of yours?"

Oh, HELL no, I thought. Burned and timid.

And then, at one point, he jokingly repeated the famous Nelson signal: England expects that every man will do his duty.

I laughed, right on cue.

But it reminded me a of different Napoleonic quote. John Jervis, First Lord of the Admiralty, who was so sure of the British Navy that he stood in front of the House of Lords and said "I do not say, my Lords, that the French will not come. I say only they will not come by sea."

Commitment and confidence will win any battle. You just can't walk into an assignment believing that the result will be anything less than a success.

Of course, starting from an emotional humbled puddle on the floor... it wasn't easy to rebuild my enthusiasm.

Eventually I began crawling, walking, and finally really working.

CD watched me tap away at the keyboard one night not long after. He crossed his arms, and smiled down at me. "You found a line to hold?"

I nodded, not pausing. "Maybe I'll still get fired," I told him. "but if I do, I'm gonna leave an Elizabeth-shaped hole in the wall. I'm going to give it everything I got and see what happens. So, I suck. But I used to be a good writer, it's got to be in me somewhere."

"Never give up, never surrender?"

"By Grabthor's hammer," I agreed.

Burn down the mission, indeed.

The Phone Calls You Get

April 07, 2008 | Category: In My Life

Last week, someone I once knew died.

When I was growing up, I thought death was optional. I really did. Didn't you? We were little and grown-ups were big and the pillows were soft and night lights were magical. And we didn't know then that everyone dies. We thought that only happened to goldfish and far-off grandparents, maybe.

My son was was just a year old when my grandmother, who was also my dear friend, died. My husband was separated from me and I didn't have the money to get to her as she lay dying or afterward, to get to her funeral. I spent the day they laid her to rest holding him, tucked beneath my tears.

Each year since, there have been these phone calls. These horrible, horrible phone calls. A cascade and sometimes trickle, but never-ending.

I hate the phone calls I get.

"What are you doing, Mommy?"

"Someone I once knew, died. I am writing cards to his family."

"Oh," he leans against me, his narrow shoulder digging into my arm. He pats my cheek softly. "It's sad, Mommy?"

It is, and I am. I nod.

"I wish no one had to die," he says quietly. "At least for a while."

I agree, and wish I could make night lights magical for him again. And, to be honest, for me.

Missing You

April 03, 2008 | Category: Thy Wedded Life

I don't believe you're less if you're alone.

I don't believe that the world, like Noah's Ark, must be paired off 2 x 2. I don't believe that people must be married, even couples. Although I DO believe in the opportunity for marriage for all couples, if they want it.

That all said, damn howdy what it's like to be in love. To wake up to warm skin and a smile. To have the sun pushing up against the curtains and to hold it away, a sly smile and a murmuring of '5 More Minutes'...

To have my heart flip when I see him. To catch the soft little witticisms he slides into the conversation. The fingertips that push away the hair from my face, the steady expression as he handles the chaos of parenthood, the way he looks up at me as he's tugging on his belt and getting ready to leave for work - as though, for an ounce of persuasion, he'd throw himself back on the bed beside me laughing and earnest and his big eyes twinkling.

I'm not sure I grew up with the adults around me in love.

It was a different time, a different kind of social expectation on couples. But I saw my uncle and aunt adoring and appreciating each other in silences only they shared. I saw my best friend's father's eyes watch his wife whenever she walked into the room. I saw two men glance at each other, teasing about things that happened years ago as though it was just yesterday.

4 years ago or so, we almost lost this. And that makes it all the more precious that it has breathed back into life and stronger than before.

It makes me feel a little guilty - knowing some of the people I care about are struggling so hard to find love and others are in agony mourning it. Like somehow rejoicing is in bad taste, and should be subdued.

And we're broke, I'm sick, the cat is dying, and a thousand other things wrong. The roof is falling apart, the laundry is never done, and a dozen medical bills scream for attention from a basket on my desk.

But I can't help it. Our lives in the past years since I quit my job have blossomed. We hum, and hold hands, and flirt. Bear giggles and launches himself towards us with a happy laugh. The dog woofs to join in, and the days stuff full of everything and a thousand details besides.

And in the quiet of the morning, he presses the snooze button on the alarm and rolls over to face me. "5 More Minutes," I beg, my fingertips trying to cover my morning breath.

"Yes," he whispers, kissing my forehead. "Yes."

And later, I catch the woman in the mirror and feel so surprised. She is in the early autumn days of her life. Hard to see clearly, just another blurred face in the crowd.

But inside, my heart is young and wild and fluttering. Pounding out a simple rhythm, in love. And be humbled with the gratitude it brings.

Lord, I Suck At This

April 01, 2008 | Category: Thy Wedded Life

One of the problems I have with writing is that I am terrified of stepping on toes. And what I am about to say just might, so let me say 'hey, sorry' right up front.

Well, not sorry.

I am a firm believer that people generally do the best they can in the moment. Good Lord, I hope so. Because when I take my big feet and just insult the ever-loving crap out of someone, all I can pray is that they know I mean well and no harm and hey, I extend them the same benefit of the doubt - right?

But since this blog started in 2004 - despite trying at first to be all anonymous and stuff - some of my real life relationships have really gone downhill. People far and near who I have watched flake. It drove me into a deeper and deeper silence until, well, anyway.

Is it fair to love someone who uses the relationship as fodder for their creativity? As we broke up, my ex wrote a beautiful song dripping with irony and farewell... about me.

"A sentimental fool, to be sure..." he sings somewhere, over his guitar. And it I bite my lip and have no response.

So I say I mean nothing by it, but on the other hand...this is the story of my life. So it includes the people in my life. And I guess somewhere along the line, I have to stop apologizing for that and let it be what it is.

Anyway.

Two months ago we let our bookkeeper go. As $10 makes a difference on a weekly basis of where I can buy our food that week and for how much - the truth was that she (although a very reasonably prices and practically a member of the family) had become a luxury we couldn't afford. It was time for me to step up and take the reigns, as part of being the at-home half of this partnership.

But this is a huge mountain for me to climb. Not because I am dumb with numbers. Hey, I can actually publish a weekly financial breakdown of a multimillion project and how it is doing against budget with graphs and charts and a solid summary of spend.

But because between me and my own finances, I have a lifelong block. An emotional thundercloud that squeezes my heart and makes my hands shake. And my husband is worse.

I was brought up in a world compulsively obsessed with money.

And still is.

I can remember the discussion about how much things cost, and who got what bargain, and who was denigrated amongst whatever social circle for being perceived as living above their means. Inside my home, it was a vicious refrain that seeped into every day, every experience, as they constantly challenged each other for control of the money and the power they gave it over our lives.

What's funny is that I was never taught how to handle a checkbook or what a dollar bought. I was shielded from how much the house cost, what income bracket we were in, even mundane things like what the electric bill looked like or what was reasonable to spend at the grocery store.

But not shielded from the impact. Late at night, they would argue. A staccato, endless trill echoing upstairs.

A long, cold war that framed my growing up. And from which I escaped in body, but never heart.

I went to see a counselor about it in my late 20's. My ex had been the money guy and with him gone I was drowning. She helped me by having me simplify to the point that I didn't even have a checking account.

But I am older, wiser, and with an infinitely more complex life.

We live frugal, reasonable choices - but we pay way too much in what I consider "stupid fees". Late fines and such because I hate paying the bills. Hate it when there IS enough money. Hate it fanatically when money is tight and I need to make choices.

My husband, whose father raised him hand-to-mouth and one step away from ruin, struggles with me. While we had our bookkeeper, we were all right. It was not an issue between us. Never so much as an argument.

Now?

Oh, Lord. I suck.

I called him this morning. "You spent $16 on the debit card," I sigh, reading the daily balance sheet.

"What do you mean, 'YOU'?" he snaps.

"Well, you're the only one WITH a debit card, so I must mean.... YOU," I point out. "My card is still unactivated, stuck to it's introductory letter. Plus look, a charge just came in for $40 for the iPass transponder. Dang, I hadn't budgeted that for this week."

"I told you about that," he reminds me.

And I wanted to scream. There is an entire garbage bag full of mail I need to sort. A spreadsheet I need to fill out. And I am hunting for excuses not to do it. Simple, basic math. Simple priority decisions.

And this revulsion creeping up the back of my throat.

I have been fighting this battle all my adult life - which is now more years than my childhood so why do those lessons still haunt me?

I look around me and think that everyone else has got this handled. But when it comes to opening that electric bill, I am still the child in the grown-up's body, learning to deal. As I hang up the phone and think, time to make coffee - I'll do the rest later.