Keep busy

I feel so good, in fact I haven't felt this good in a long long time. On my last check up for the hysterectomy I told my surgeon, " I don't know what you did or took out or fixed but whatever it was, THANK YOU!!" He said to his assistant in the room, "I'm picking up on some good vibes on this one." I think that's Dr speak for he could tell it was a success!!

I feel terrific, lots of energy. None of the nasty moods and depressions they told me might happen at sudden onset Menopause from the surgery, nope. I'm feeling amazing!!!

I'm loving the vegetarian diet too. I'm eating a bit more cheeses than I'd like, so have to cut back. Its just a matter of eating out really, the only vegetarian foods accessible when I eat out it seems is cheese laden pastas. Or saucy cheesy pastas. With cheese. Or cheesy casadillas stuffed with cheese. Oh they are all yummy and filling but they don't just fill up my stomach, they fill up my butt and thighs too and make me queasy with their too much cheesy. So I have to go back more to the soups and the steamed veggies I like to make and stay out of the restaurants.

I've been so busy. Painting commissioned paintings, getting a calendar ready and out there of my paintings and doing some charity work. Taking my son places and visiting and organizing and just being busy at work and home. Its all been fantastic and great. The busier I am the better.

Time goes faster, I feel better, my son is with me and is helping so it feels like old times. Happier times.

The weather has been glorious and that helps too.

I do however feel the mid life crisis feeling. That feeling of oh my gosh what is all this for feeling. A friend was talking about how they might pack up and move to this small cabin of a house not too far from here but definitely in the boonies and I kept thinking of how I'd love the peace from that. Just peace and quiet. If I owned a bazillion dollars I would do that. Well no that's not true. If I owned a bazillion bucks I'd buy a Barnes and Nobles and a Michael's store and I'd live in the book store and go visit my other one every day. I'd invite you and we'd do crafts all day and then go to my home at night and have coffee and pastries and read books all night!

THAT would be my dream.

Back to School Nite

This is my son's school's back to school nite. The night you shuffle from room to room with a few hundred other parents and listen to the teacher's class rules for 12 minutes and then shuffle to another teacher's room. I go every year and tonight will be the final "Back to School Nite" for me.

It is funny that it is also the night you scope out other parents and see how they have fared for the year. Have they gained weight, changed their hair, gotten skinnier, lost more hair, gotten a paunchy stomache. Its human nature to measure ourselves against the current society we are in.

I of course will be sporting store bought hair and less eyelashes and eyebrows. I will have to find a great lipstick color to contrast.

I will be reflective tonight. Thinking about all the past "Back to School nites" and thinking about my son going off to college and how the whole dynamic of the family will shift. I hope I wont feel useless and put aside. I take all these "mommy jobs" pretty serious.

Thank goodness for technology and Skype and texting and cell phones. I dont know how our parents did it when we flew the nest. No contact. Just pay phones.

I wont miss "Back to School Nite" and all its scoping out of parents and teachers and snickering and "looks" but I will miss the feeling of purpose and connectivity I feel when I go scope out the "other home" of my son for so many hours a day.

*sigh*

TWO Year Update Follows

Last night my husband shaved my head. Bald.
I'm now a velcro-head. Not shiney like the sexy-heads. Nope....I'm some halfwit velcro-head.

I have breast cancer. There I said it. I had surgery, now chemo and soon radiation AND chemo. For a year.

I had 12 straggly hairs left and I couldnt take it any more. Couldnt take the mangy sickly cat look. It fell out gradually. In clumps. sick. So last night I went to bed, husband still watching the news on the couch. Laid down and then got back up and came down and begged him to cut it.

It was probably the kindest thing he's ever done for me. He kindly and carefully and tenderly cut the hair closer and closer and closer. I have all stages of the pictures. I first looked unevenly mangier, then I looked like the movie depicted 'dykes' on tv. All butch with some mohawk looking style and then I looked like a baby with new hair and then finally a squinched up old man. With my glasses I look like a chimpmunk cheeked old man. I looked actually pretty with the mohawk and my son made the comment that if I were lesbian I wouldve scored me some chics with that look. Then he told his Dad he should be jealous. That started us laughing and the whole experience turned into a fun, freeing, and liberating event instead of the freakish event it really was. I mean c'mon my husband was shaving my head bald at midnight. How much more weird could it get?

I thought my forehead would be stately and tall. Nope. Its a short forehead and I look like the white version of Gary Coleman. That really disappointed me. I imagined my head so different. And its not smooth, it has ridges. I looked up Phrenology sites yesterday so I could learn about myself through the ridges and bumps but it has been debunked for years. bah!

Two years ago I had a 15 year old, now he's 17. Typical teen. Bricks in his butt, cant make decisions, wants much freedom like he's a 22 year old, rolling his eyeballs while he talks to us is like breathing. He's a good boy. He is just going through all those typical stages a 17 year old does. Wants to be with his friends all the time and when he's home he cant move. I remember well that stage. I would NOT go through it again for anything. Its the age of the major cross roads and decisions. He will be a senior. He will have a great year in school and make this passage unto adulthood very well, I am sure. I try hard not to make the C-Word the all encompassing issue around here but it has kind of taken over our life so I try to talk about it with him but let him have lots of time to have fun so he doesnt remember this year as the ruined year of his life.

*sigh*

I dont know exactly why its been two years since I've updated. Perhaps the frenetic pace of life is one, It got out of control. I was so stressed and so busy and so GOING GOING GOING that I didnt even have the time sometimes to go to the bathroom. Cancer has a way of stopping life. Cant work, cant do much sometimes but sit on the couch or sit in the bathroom sick. I have 7 good days a month. The rest is spent in quazi nausea, flu-like symptoms or just lay down wanna die bone and muscle achiness. On the good 7 days I RUN LIKE THE WIND catching up to all that I've let slack but oh it feels good when I feel good!!

I painted another mural. Last month on my good week. It came out gloriously well. Its of a hawaiian dreamy window. I just have to get some trim and trim it in like a real window. It felt delish to get paint under the nails again!! Smiles every day while I created.

Well there ya have it.
I'd write more but the chemo has thrown me into early menopause and I find my velcro head is dripping in hot-flash manna....gotta go mop it off!

Do it again Mama! Do it again!

There is nothing more joyous about having children than when you set their eyes alight with wonder. Like when they are infants and you play peek a boo and they giggle and laugh to see you disappear and then appear. Just that simple act of play.
Then when they are one and you show them how to blow into a straw instead of sucking and you make bubbles overflow and chocolate milk bubbles go all over the table.
When children shout "Do it again Mama! Do it again! all kinds of pride and love and zeal for the simple joys of life bubble up inside our hearts and then we want to show them more and more and more.

When a child becomes a middle schooler they become jaded and the world only revolves around themselves and their raging prepubescent hormones and middle school is a war zone of obnoxious cliques and social stereotypical tiers of a tweenie kingdom. Nothing lights up their eyes unless they get something they covet to make themselves feel "cool" even if only in their head.

Then they become teens and they no longer want to do ANYthing associate with kiddie fun.

Unless you bust them doing something they really miss doing like taking the couch pillows and race down the stairs like they are tobaggans.
Or when you see their gleeful face as they scoop up sand at the beach to make the "little cousins" happy by making them a sand castle.

So this past Sunday I had the most joyous little dejavu moment with my son when Saturday grocery shopping had him begging for storebought pastries. You know the kind. They look so pretty with their glazed icing and their jelly filled centers. When you eat them tho they somehow taste of their cardboard home? I said that I thought they were a waste and did he really want to pay $4.99 for cardboard sugar. He really really did. I said "But I know how to make REAL cinnamon rolls, why should you eat these?" and he said "YOU DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO???" and I said "Yes , have I never made you any?" and then I realized; Oh my God, I havent made so many food things that bring joy to families that my Mom used to make us. Life is such a hurly burly rush and all about nonfat and sugar free and eat healthy that I make salad and veggie and protein meals and no FUN food! No sugar laden gooey treats. Like . Like. Like popcorn balls.
My mom always made popcorn balls!!! Or Rice cripy treats or any of that stuff.

So I got the ingrediants that very day and Sunday woke up and made cinnamon rolls.

He watched that pan of rolls rising like a hawk, kept lifting the towel to peek. Giggled when I slapped his hand from trying to get a finger of cinnamon butter. It was GLEEFUL!

His eyes lit up when I turned over the pan and showed off the bottom that was now the top of brown sugar/butter topping and he ate 4 right in one sitting. FOUR!

My heart is STILL swelled up with the joy of that Sunday morning wonderous time. His eyes were saying "Do it again Mama! Do it again!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And that afternoon in infectious joy he called me to come learn how to play Rock Band. Oh my Oh my I LOVE ROCK BAND. I sing like a horror chic and my character is a bad ass and I am having so much fun with our band touring and singing. I can drum and sing but am a miserable embarrassment on guitar.
But my heart is so full and I am enjoying every single moment with my son as he trudges the line between being a cool teen and letting some family fun capture his heart.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ok I need some advice: he wants to go back "out" with the girlfriend we dont approve of. Talking and texting like a fiend. We have cojoled, explained, pleaded, and now last night his dad blew up. He asked to go to the movie with "friends" and we said "what friends" and he shrugged "you know, just some friends" and then we demanded WHO? and he named the girl and HER friends. His dad blew up and was saying "why do you insist to hang around this bad girl yadda yadda yadda" and the conversation grew long and HIS CELL PHONE RANG and we all looked at the clock and it was midnight and it was this particular girl.
WHAT GOOD GIRL CALLS A BOY AT MIDNIGHT???
That is 13 yrs old?
So his Dad went ballistic and said he could NEVER go to the movies if she was any where NEAR the theatre and on and on.
Now: I KNOW that is not the right tactic: Demanding no contact since she is aggressive and will sneak, she has before.
But HOW how how do we make him see she is BAD news?
ugh!!! ANy suggestions from your past experience?????

Fathers Holiday

I actually like holidays especially the ones that people in a grumbly mood call "Hallmark Holidays". I love Fathers day, Best Friends Day, Grandparents day, Secretary's day and all the other ones. All 'new' holidays. I love giving better than recieving. I'm not so good at recieving. I never get what I hope for, well thats not true. A couple of times I have been completely brought to my knees by my husbands gift but it happened basically twice in the past 20 years.

I dont get much really for Mothers Day. I have gotten breakfast of toast and eggs in bed before, that was cute, yeah, but really? c'mon, I totally had to go grocery shopping the day before for the stuff and set the alarms in my sons and our room and the pretend to sleep through all that noise and clatter.....bah humbug!
I prefer handmade gifts or gifts I have in my mind that you ask me what I want and then you get them. In my family this doesnt work but I keep hoping that the hint bombs I drop might result in a real actual gift in my hand instead of my mind. Or perhaps the pictures CUT OUT AND MAGNETED TO THE REFRIDGERATOR DOOR might prompt the actual item. I've even left torn out pictures or printed out pictures from the computer in the bathroom to give hints, none have worked. Can you tell me how to get these hints accross? Are you a better reciever than I am? I guess I am not grateful for the gifts I get enough. Perhaps thats it.

One year for Mothers Day I got forgotten and then when I couldnt hold it in any longer and I was in complete tears and slamming stuff and bitchy as heck, my husband declared that he and our son had to run to the nearby gas station for cigs. 'Yeah right my ass' I thought. I was so hate filled and hurt. "who wants your stupid gift now" I kept thinking the whole 2 hours it took to go on their secret "cigarette getting" mission.
They came home all smiles and said "We brought you a suprise Mommy!!!" then my heart melted and I was forgiving and smiley again.
It was items in a Wallmart bag. Back when they were blue with yellow smileys on them. Not wrapped. Oh and groceries? There were two grocery store bags too?!
They made me sit down and hold out my arms and they put a box in my hand, It was freezing cold!!! I opened my eyes to ...................
ICE CREAM! I got a box of ice cream! ..............oh wait, there were more things. Chocolate syrup. Strawberry powder with a bunny on the box. Milk. and from Walmart???? My lovely gift?
A blender.
I looked up in disbelief. My husband says all sugary; "Oh I couldnt think what to get and I was walking around Walmart and our son said 'Lets get a milkshake and walk around, I'm thirsty' and then DUH! I thought to myself LETS GET MOMMY STUFF TO MAKE MILKSHAKES FOR EVERYBODY!"

Ok so you so know how that gift giving episode ended dont you?
heh.
Not a good day.

I am the sort that months before our anniversary or a hallmark holiday I start planning and thinking and I've made so many amazing and suprise gifts and my husband is totally blown away and brought to tears...........I have done it for years and now I'm afraid I'm resentful. When is it gonna be my turn to get a nice thoughtful gift? It obviously isnt in him to think ahead so maybe my heart should just give up the resentment. *sigh*

Regardless.... This year I thought of a great Father's Day present. My son bought him a gift he will love and then I went and bought a huge frame that had a mat inside of 18 various sized framed holes for pictures. We found in our albums and boxes of pictures and copied and put back 18 pictures and cut them for the frame. Pictures only of Dad and son from birth to now. It came out AMAZINGLY cool and my son was so into making it for his Dad.

I wonder what he will say...............Maybe in his heart he will wish for a milkshake and be done with all the emotional gifts?
heh.