tactfullyblunt

"Now you stab mommy"

That's what a man told his son. After he himself finished stabbing his wife, the man gave the knife to his son and said that. His son? TWO-YEARS-OLD.

A man takes his daughter on a plane ride. Straight into her grandma's house, killing himself and the daughter. She? EIGHT-YEARS-OLD [Grandma's ok though].

A man has some heartburn with his wife for reasons still unknown, but suspicions are that it's because he thought she was traveling to her job in Puerto Rico too often. What does he do? Dismembers her with their two kids in the house. FOUR- and SIX-YEARS-OLD.

What. The. Fuck. People?

What kind of a world are we living in where stuff like this happens? To KIDS!

It's not like this is the first time things like this have happened, nor is it the first time where I've been left agog with wonder at the human condition. Somehow it just seems that much more shocking if kids are involved, because I've heard variations of these stories involving other adults more times than I care to consider, and while it's not ok, the "wrongness" is dialed down a little.

Does it make it worse that these people did these things to their own children? Is it any better that things much worse than this are happening half a world away between adults who are completely unrelated to the children they are murdering, mutilating and discarding? When I start considering all of the angles, it boggles my mind. I'm feeling a little nauseated, actually.

....

Unrelated, but this morning I was turning into my gym, thinking happy thoughts, looking forward to spring when it occurred to me that I had no idea when the last time I called my mother was. I wondered how she was doing, and made a happy mental note to pick up the phone to call her today. Only a small blip on the radar was the thought that she's probably annoyed with me for not calling sooner. Oh, well, I thought, maybe we can make plans to do something together--I could use some sewing pointers.

And then it hit me that she has been dead over two years now. And then it hit me again that this is the first time I thought about that and didn't feel like I'd been punched in the gut. Of course I wasn't happy about it, but my thinking was actually, "Oh, well then, that explains why I've not spoken to her in a while" and then a mental laugh (and not a malicious one either).

And then? Then I realized that this was a new way for me to think of her--that while she was alive I would never have been happy about calling her. Nor would I have looked forward to making plans to do something with her. For that matter, I don't know if I'd have taken up sewing had she still been alive. Maybe, I don't know. Regardless, the thought of her put a smile on my face, a smile that she isn't alive to take away from me (as she did numerous times in life; sharing in another's happiness? not her strong suit).

I don't cotton to revisionist history, but I'm wondering if this is a sign that I can have a better relationship with her now that she's dead than I'd ever have had while she was alive?

vision. getting. cloudy.

deepbreathsdeepbreaths

A coworker just came into the room to call the ICU and check with her father's nurse on his condition. Due to complications with his cancer (my question is, how can cancer really get any more complicated?), he has contracted pneumonia and is having heart palpitations. She asked the nurse if she was allowed to speak to him and I can only infer that the nurse said he was elsewhere getting tests and would be back later. So coworker just asked the nurse, calmly with no tremors in her voice, if she would let him know that she had called and that she loved him.

Listening to the whole conversation just totally left me watching a movie of my mother from last year in August when she was at Georgetown, wheeling her from the helicopter to the ICU, then up to the Bone Marrow ward, then repeatedly downdowndown for the numerous CAT scan, MRIs and xrays.

At the end of the movie I was left with one thought: I wish I could tell my mom how much I love her.

For some reason in the last 48 hours, I've had two people call in reference to my mother's death, my aunt has checked in on me (I've got to call her back tonight), and several people have talked to me about friends going through parents' dying and death. It seems to come like this for me, several weeks of relative quiet (although I thought of her a LOT in Ireland, and I even let go of a part of her there) and then I get whallopped by external cues.

Despite my relationship with her, I miss her.

the hostage negotiator

This one goes out to my family.

When I started writing this blog, I didn't make it public. It was for my thoughts only, and I shared it with a few select (two) people within the family because at the time I thought I was going to be writing about more lofty things--everyone has dreams of being better than they are, and I am no different. And, as far as the lofty part goes, I soon realized that what I had to say wasn't so much lofty as mundane. Some would say that when you write about the mundane well, it becomes elevated in a "God is in the details" kind of way. So far, that hasn't been my experience.

There came a point when I realized that the real reason I started writing was because I needed a place to vent. A lot has happened in my life in the last five years, and too often my way was to swallow it down like some bitter pill, make a few faces, and then move on. When I started writing about how I felt about what was really going on in my life, I was able to either see the humor in it, make peace with it, or decide to take action to change it. I can't begin to tell you how good that has been for me.

I decided to take the blog public when I was getting responses from other women saying they had very similar experiences and they got some support out of what I wrote. I am so happy that I did take it public in the wake of Mom's death because it has helped so many other people which has in turn also helped me grieve her loss in a "productive way".

In the last few weeks, several of you have been moved to share with me either directly or through other family members the hurt you feel about the things I have written directly referencing you. While I have never fabricated anything either about you or the way you interact with the world at large, I can see that holding a blinding mirror like that up to your face would probably be very painful. However, I cannot back down from what I wrote because it is the truth, and I don't take that lightly.

I don't know all of your reasons for feeling hurt and/or betrayed by my bluntness, but I'm going to take a stab at it here just so you can see I'm not all heartless: we've all been through a lot the last year, and as we are beginning to come back out of that, we are turning to one another for more support than we have ever done before. Stumbling across or being directed toward a site that points out the moments you fumbled, stuttered and failed as a human being really isn't what you need right now (or probably ever, for that matter). For hurting you, I am deeply sorry.

Still...if you took the time to read every single entry and not just continually return to read those that pertain to you alone, you will see that the bulk of what I write turns that same critical eye towards myself. I'm not entirely blind to the fact that, in many ways, I'm still trying to grow into the person I'd like to be one day. In short, many days I feel like the world's most colossal fuck-up, a weak-kneed human being, and someone obviously not benefiting from the gifts they have been given. I am no better than you in that respect and I know that.

On the flip side, I have also written things about each of you detailing the depth of my love for you. I know when you are hurt you can't see that, but at some point you should try going back and looking for those entries as well, because they are also my own personal truth. It hurts me that you choose to ignore those things in favor of focusing entirely on the negative, but given both how we were raised and the fact that I never censored my thoughts and feelings when I wrote the way I did/do when we're speaking directly, I can see how you find those entries a bit difficult to believe.

I'm not perfect and I don't pretend to be. I am well aware that each of you thinks I sit on some high throne meting out judgments and decrees on you while holding myself above reproach. I guess that's part of the "mysterious mantle" of being the oldest in a family where there is such a huge age gap between us. The fact is, I have never thought I was better than any of you--what I have thought/hoped/dreamed is just that by virtue of being older that I am "further along", whatever that means.

The real truth of what I think is this, and I hope that at some point you will be able to see it for the extended hand it is meant to be:

Sometimes the struggle of our growth into adulthood gets to me and I have to vent. (If you think I've been hard on you, you should know that I'm brutal with myself.)

None of us are one-dimensional characters--we all have many things going on in our lives that motivate us to do and say the things we do. I don't view you as one-dimensional, so please don't think of me that way either.

I AM NOT PERFECT. I never said I was. I am a fallible human being but I do my best to have compassion for other people and I treat their lives and needs with the same respect I would like to receive. However, disrespect me repeatedly and you need to understand I am not only going to bitch about it--I will expect you to continue treating me poorly, especially if you are treating others in the family poorly as well. Still, if you make a concerted effort to "make things right", I'm your quickest ally--I'm a softie at heart.

I love you all so much that often it hurts. We are all so different that it is entirely possible that we will never be close. I'm not ok with that and I never will be--but that doesn't mean I'm not going to keep breaking my own heart with the dream of that actually coming to fruition.

I wish this wasn't the legacy we've been left with but it is. I'm doing my damnedest to get past it all. I just can't do it alone.

ED NOTE: To the person who keeps googling to see if their name appears, you should refresh your browser and see that your first name has been removed. Already you're having to alter the search to find yourself, and soon you won't be able to find yourself in that entry at all. Consider that.

wash. rinse. repeat.

The photo to the left is of me; I am the round-headed baby, all fresh-faced and ready to learn about the world. For the most part I have been a quick learner, but I guess everyone takes continuing education courses nowadays, so I shouldn't feel too poorly for last Friday's refresher.

My college roommate can attest to how obsessed I was with my hair the entirety of my freshman year. There probably weren't three days between each time I picked up a pair of scissors to cut it, looking for a visible way to work out my plethora of issues. Ah, if only the world's problems could be cured as easily as cutting off the grey split ends of one's hair!

That's right. I said grey.

The summer before I went to college, I spent a good deal of time in the sun. I also spent a good deal of time fooling with my hair, perming it beyond recognition. What started out as a nice foofy white ball atop my head had become a lank, chlorinated-green poodle in need of a grooming. Pink or blue I'd had done before intentionally, but green was unflattering to my skin tone and that just would not do. So I locked my parents' upstairs bathroom and went to work armed with Clairol Ultresse, Platinum Blonde.

What made the impromptu dye job even more imperative was that I had fallen in love the month before with a gangly cyclist from the local liberal arts college. He had beautiful long hair and the cutest little John Lennon glasses and was just as nervous around me as I was around him. We had previously avoided a first date by hanging out with a mutual friend (and as is often the case, the mutual friend was crushed when we started dating), but tonight we were daringly forging ahead to the movies. So I couldn't go on this momentous date with green hair or I'd be mortified. What's worse, he might be mortified.

Fast forward to 20 minutes before the date, and I am madly washing and rewashing my hair. The Platinum Blonde did half the job--by turning my hair Platinum. Grey to be precise. I'm not talking "flat", "dull" or brown, I'm talking g-r-e-y. I had no idea what to do. I couldn't go ask my mother for help because she'd be upset that I'd done this in the first place. I couldn't call any of my girlfriends because they had already left for school. I didn't have any time. He was going to be here any minute and here I was looking like a granny with a bad hair day.

Eventually I did run down to ask my mother what to do. She followed through, true to form, and told me that I shouldn't have done it in the first place (well, duh!) and that it served me right. (I don't remember her laughing at the situation, which I think will probably be my first response when my daughter comes to me in the same predicament. Yes, I realize she will hate me; she is probably in my ovary hating me for it in advance and shaking her fist at the sky at this very moment. Such is the joy of karma.) She just made some comment about how she couldn't believe she was going to have to send me off to college "looking like this". The Robert Smith hairstyle with blue and pink streaks she didn't comment on. The fact that I had been wearing black clothes for three years made no impression upon her. But the grey hair, THAT got her attention.

As I was standing there talking to her, my date arrived. I remember opening the door and immediately starting to apologize. I think I even told him that it was ok if he didn't want to go out with me. He looked a little stunned and then he said, "No, it's ok, really. We can still go out...if *you* want to..." Long story short, I went on the date.

The grey hair, however, lasted longer than the summer fling did. My hair grows painfully slowly, and it took a good two years before the whole tragic mistake was cut out (thus the perpetual cutting that freshman year).

All of this back story is to set the framework for last Friday's debacle, wherein not having done a thing to my hair since last August, and whilest also feeling rather peaked about my appearance, I decided to once again take matters into my own hands. This time I thought I was being wise by choosing something that was semi-permanent (ie, will wash out) and closer to my natural hair color. Apparently I wasn't that wise, because I was blessed once again with grey hair.

Grey. Like Carol Kane's in The Princess Bride. Yes, I laughed when I saw it, even though I was sent into a similar panic as the last time. I could hear Bill's voice in my head pleading with me not to change my hair color again (he was kind about the color I had for the wedding, but it was easily the most brassy blonde I've ever been, and I think he had fears that I was considering another such fiasco). I could hear my mother's voice telling me that I shouldn't have done this in the first place. I also heard a voice telling me that perhaps if I styled it it wouldn't look so bad. It seemed like a good idea, so I tried it.

After a curling iron revealed that my hair was indeed still grey (big surprise), I assessed the situation to determine whom to call in as a reinforcement. I opted for Shelly, who has had the most brilliant shades of red, burgundy, pink and orange hair the whole time I've known her, because I figured if anyone would understand my plight so clearly it would be her. The choice was a good one because, while she laughed hysterically, she told me stories about other womens' hair trauma (one of which involved trying to hide a half bleached head with a sock stuffed into the side of a baseball cap) and soundly advised me to wash it a few times with dishwashing soap and if that didn't work to call Clairol (again, I should've learned my lesson about Clairol the last time).

Five washes later and I was on the phone with the Clairol 800 number. A pleasantly effeminate man answered the phone and, after asking me a series of questions about how this travesty could have occurred, politely said he needed to put me on hold, Honey. I said sure and had my hopes further buoyed when the hold music was Oleta Adams singing "Get Here If You Can" (hey, if you're going to have a hair emergency, your best friend is the gayest man you can find, and it helps if he's got Oleta, Patty or Aretha on hold, and I don't think that's unPC, thank you very much). However, in this case, Sweetie, he was unable to advise me about what to do, on account of the fact that, Child, you could do a lot more damage to your hair if you use another off-the-shelf Clairol product. In short, Girl, his advice was to seek a professional's help, because that grey part would have to be cut out.

So I called the professional who said she couldn't cut my hair until May 6 and was told that no, indeed, she can't fit me in for an emergency color consultation until she sees me to cut my hair. And even then we'll probably be looking at an appointment round about the beginning of June.

sigh

So I got off the phone and washed my hair some more. I even put vinegar on it because a link said that was how to get hair dye out of shag carpet, and after so many washes with dishwashing soap, my hair definitely felt like shag carpet. I think it helped a little, because the roots of my hair now look normal, but the ends of my hair are still holding onto the base color enough that they look grey. My outside source, Shelly, said it wasn't so much grey now and that when she saw it she "just thought it was more toned down than usual".

Somehow that sounds like there's an insult hidden in there, but I'm still laughing about it.

ask and ye shall receive, dangblastit

I want to be clear: what follows is merely a way of relating information and *not* whining on any front. I take my fortune where I may, and I am glad for it.

Yesterday I was concerned I'd not have the stones to be creative three days next week. So I got a phone call from another source asking me for my creativity, bringing it up to five days of creativity. Five! Five days of creativity! HA-Ha-ha!

Yesterday I was upset that I'd only read three books of nine. So I read another. Four! Four books read! HA-Ha-ha!

Yesterday I whined about not having assembled my OCD plastic-sleeved organizational binders for the house, gardening, and graphic design ideas. So I cut up some magazines I've had since last year and updated the existing house folder and made two new ones for the others. Two...I'm over this, so you can fill in the blanks for yourself, Count.

As I was getting the cleanest edge possible with my ruler and xacto blade (*cough*OCD*cough*), I flashed back to August 2004. I was lying on my stomach on the cold lineoleum floor of a darkened room on Georgetown University Hospital's Bone Marrow Ward. The IV machines clanked away and Mom slept in the largest pair of old lady wraparound sunglasses I could find. She'd complained they were hurting her face, so I'd spent the last half hour fashioning padding for the nosebridge and sides out of old bandaids I had in my purse. That seemed to help, for the time being anyway, and she was peaceful.

There was one tiny sliver of a floor to ceiling window in this room, and the shade was always drawn. Any light that could've potentially come in was blocked by the building almost immediately next to it, but we kept the shade closed out of deference to Mom. Pretty much the only way I could survive being in total darkness for 8-24 hours at a time was to lie on the floor next to that window, prop out the shade about an inch or so, and read by the smallest amount of light possible. When it got dark, I used a flashlight. I think that's why I read so many gardening magazines; I needed to feel connected in however remote a way to living, growing things.

Periodically Mom would slur out, "What are you doing down there?" When I told her I was reading a magazine, her response was always based upon her comfort at the moment. Sometimes I was being too noisy, sometimes she was just checking to make sure I was still there, sometimes she'd have me turn on the Olympics and still others she'd say something particularly nasty and unwarranted. I can't tell you how often I had to remind myself of her situation and the fact that ultimately she really needed me. I choked back some bitter tears in the face of that. I remember thinking that it couldn't possibly get much worse. Ah, the naivete of youth.

So here I am in 2005, having seen it get much worse than last August, and I'm still pouring through all of that detritus selfishly trying to figure out what I am supposed to do with it. Bill has been gently prodding me to start writing a book (a book!) about the experience of taking care of Mom. Sometimes I think it's a great idea and others I'm reminded of how many other people have written about taking care of a dying parent and I lose my gumption. I'm just not sure how many people would want entre into the purely gallows humor I have. Even I find it frightening, some of the things that go through my mind as the shit comes down. The question I keep asking myself is would I read my book?

I really don't know. I've had a hard enough time living it, I don't know if I could read a book about it. Well, unless it made sense of it all. That I would read five bajillion times.

people are strange

Last night I made my dad dinner and he not only ate it, he had seconds. I am a good cook but Dad is notorious for not eating anything his offspring make beyond baked goods, and that is often questionable. The joy he took in eating the meal was a great gift to me and I don't know that he knows that. How do you let someone know, "Thank you for deigning to eat and actually like the food I prepared for you"?

Thank you cards were done but as I passed off the pile to Dad for stamps, I was handed a pile of about 25 sympathy cards that have come in the last week. In this pile was a card from my high school boyfriend's mother. This would be the boyfriend who punched a hole in the closet door immediately inside my parents' front door as we were breaking up. It would also be the boyfriend who popped me in the lip and did whatever he could for the next four months to make my life a living hell. Her note was beautiful and heartfelt and I'm wondering how I'm going to respond to her with the hesitance I'm feeling.

I'm wondering about this mostly because after I broke up with Bruiser I realized everything I was losing. I'm not so much talking about the loss of him as much as of her. She was everything I needed in a mom at the time: available to her kids, supportive of every little thing they were into, and struggling successfully against some depression of her own. So about seven months after the break-up I wrote her a note asking her if it would be possible for us to, you know, maybe stay in touch. She responded by writing me back and asking me to go out to get a bite to eat with her. I remember it being a little awkward for the both of us, and that we never did it again. I don't think that either of us was up for the challenge at the time.

It's strange to be remembering that time now. I don't see this thank you note as a way of reuniting as the perfect mother and daughter because that train left the station a very long time ago. I don't know even that I have thoughts that it might lead to a wonderful friendship now that we're both adults (because that would just be, well, strange, not to mention like a sitcom). I guess that maybe I'm just looking at it for what it is: a nice sentiment from a woman who kept a piece of me in her heart all these years just like I did of her.

uncle

went to the mall to finish the family's demanding santa list.

saw the ex for the first time in five years.

on a day when I look like ass, he looks great.

hid in the old lady section.

got sweaty pits.

immediately called home for support and got a reality check.

sisters fighting over who is bossing whom more about mother's care.

apparent moral of story: it's wrong for me to feel like I got punched in the gut by the ex-sighting when there are more important things to be upset by.

steaming, warm-from-the-oven cookies

My job for the last week has been to take all the cookies people offer me. Given that my previous propensity was to be a closet whiner, it was a bit awkward at first, but once I made the choice to take them, the universe provided me with some really great cookies:

God bless Shelly. For the last few weeks she's been working double-time as my Esteem Assistant, but last week she went even further beyond by sending me long supportive emails and links to articles by other creatives about their blockages. I'm constantly surprised that this wonderful person wants to be my friend. What's even better is that she is my friend.

Sunday, Todd and Heather stopped by unannounced. This was great because I've been feeling guilty for not making good on the dinner invitation I made in July to repay them for hosting a post-honeymoon party for us. Guilt and introspection don't go well together, and I was fairly convinced that by backing out of helping them remove bamboo last weekend, however well-intentioned (ie, I've been sick and Heather's trying to get pregnant), I put the last nail in the potential friendship coffin. So their surprise visit, despite making me totally aware of how nasty-dirty our house is, was what I needed to tell myself that Dawgone it--people like me!!

A major project I've been working long hours on was chosen by the external client. Chosen out of five options. While this client notoriously mucks up the designs provided (for that matter, so does this ad agency), for now I'm rubbing my nose in the effervescent smell of success. I desperately needed this, for so many reasons. ::::Hot off the presses: the latest development is that the client wants to do something totally different with this piece than they've done with any pieces like it in the past: THEY'RE ACTUALLY BUILDING A SPECIAL KIOSK TO HOUSE IT. I rawk.::::

Today the Creative Director (with whom I'm having an illicit affair) told me I looked cute. "You look cute today," he said in a sing-song voice. Lesson: When a man uses his sing-song voice to tell you something like that, you know he's telling the truth.

I've come up with an art project for myself that involves doing things I've got no experience doing. This could go poorly and I could wind up with a 5'x4' piece of mod-fabriced crap, but I'm keeping an open mind that I can get it to come together well.

strange kind of love, strange kind of feeling

I went off my blog. Kind of like going off my feed, but not.

Truth is, campers, I've been out of sorts for a while now. Could be post-traumatic stress, could be my annual spiral into early SAD, could be the fact that I've been feeling strangely beyond control of everything in my life since, oh, say, February, with a secondary ramp-up in August when Mom got so sick. Could be any of those things, but I'm going to put it down to what someone I trust implicitly told me last week: maybe I'm going through a growth spurt.

I thought my growth spurts were long since over. At least one this major anyhow. But sometimes that same feeling I got in puberty has a way of coming up and hitting me in the back of the head and saying, "Remember me? I'm here to make you break out. In sweats. In zits. In tears."

On that front, last Saturday, I cried. Not just the average tearing up that I've experienced for the last year or so, but a full on, body racking, sobbing, mascara-smudging-on-Bill's-shirt-kind-of-crying. I don't know where it came from exactly, but there it was. In fact, I think it was the first time I've cried like that in front of him (which, given the fact I've not done that in so long wasn't surprising). It was freeing, and I'm thankful for whatever it was that made it happen, even if it did only last for about three minutes.

So while that puberty feeling sucks, it's also obviously here to make me break out of myself, which is apparently where I'm at right now. So this week has been interesting for me, because despite the fact that it's been raining pretty much every day for two weeks straight, I can feel the slightest sliver of light on my face. I remember THAT feeling from puberty as well.

Bittersweet.

mr. bill had to open his big mouth

*sigh*

Bill's shift Saturday evening was probably the high point of mom's upswing. I spent Sunday night and Monday (24 hours straight, baby) with her as she rode the fever train, plummeted in her mental health state, and slept the majority of the day away.

She's just way, way down.

I am too.

It's also time to start really dealing with the fact that my career is going nowhere fast. And that fastness is coming to a head here in about two weeks when my summer contract is up. I'd dedicated the month of August to getting myself marketed and having back-up work, but taking care of my mother has really taken away all that time.

I'm whupped.