Some Thoughts

My mood's been heavier the past few days. Does this ever happen to you?

It started as I read "Comfort" by Ann Hood. It was all I could do to make it through this memoir about a mother whose six year old daughter, Grace, died suddenly from a virulent form of strep. There were several moments when I wanted to quit the book entirely; it was just too disturbing and hit a bit too close to home. After all, I have a daughter, Emma Grace, who is seven. In the book, Grace had an older brother, Sam. My Emma also has an older brother, Sam. And the parallels didn't stop there.


When hearing about this kind of tragedy, it is human nature to separate oneself from those experiencing the tragedy by playing out all the ways that it could not be you; could not be your child. In this case, I could not do that. There was no earthly reason for this little girl to die. She did not die from some obscure disease in some far away country. Nor did she die from the neglect of her parents. The fact is, that could be my daughter. Any of our daughters.


And I kept reading...when I would read this book at night, I would have to go lay with Emma for awhile, just to assure myself that she was safe in her bed, and breathing.

And I kept reading. It was compelling. And I knew there would be something to get out of it.

And I kept reading and through my own tears realized that what I could get out of it was seeing my own children through different eyes and relating to them in different ways. I remember one quote of the book that I kept re-reading. I don't still have the book for the exact quote, but the gist of it was that the afternoon of the night that Grace died, her mother was carrying her and smelling her hair. She did not know that would be the last time she ever did that. And it was. And I learned that every chance to listen to, smell, watch, or engage with my kids or my husband or my mom or my dad or my best friend might be it. We all know this to be true, intellectually, but living it moment to moment is an entirely different way of living and of seeing the world.

After reading "Comfort," it wasn't long before Tim Russert died suddenly. His story was so haunting because, again, it could be any of us. If this family-oriented man who had money, success and the best doctors could drop dead, so could I. Or my dad. Or anyone.

This week, I learned that the 13 year old sister of a friend of Sam's had been diagnosed with cancer. One day she was playing in a soccer tournament and had back pain. Within the next week she was hospitalized with a rare form of cancer and had 13 months of chemo ahead of her.

There are a million of these stories going on at any time. I know that. Mostly I exist knowing the reality of suffering and death, but not carrying it around with me like a companion. Like all of us, I move in and out of the denial surrounding death. When I am particularly death and suffering-conscious, I always come back to the same places of comfort and realization:

1. This moment is all there is. Truly. Notice, accept, appreciate.
2. I will be okay if tragedy strikes. I have the strength and the support.
3. Amazing growth comes from suffering.

This week I have an ultra sound on my liver because I have high bilirubin levels. I am sure this is contributing to a feeling of things being out of control. I do better when I accept that life is uncertain and that suffering is an inevitability. The resistance and need to control all aspects of one's life is often what causes so much heartache and stress. It is amazing what happens to you internally when you surrender to the moment and to your current circumstances.

Sorry for the heaviness. I guess a blog reflects the many different moods and places you find yourself in on a daily basis. So this has been today's mood. Tomorrow might be farts.

Ghosts

Look how Photo Booth turned my kids into ghostly creatures. Freaky, to say the least.

Karma

I'm not sure how I feel about karma - does it really come back to bite you in the butt if you do something less than stoic?





Karma bit me in the butt - literally - while we were in Boston. Remember a couple of posts ago when I talked about the perky woman at the pool with the tampon string hanging out? And remember how I said I don't wear tampons? Well, maybe I should start wearing them and risk getting toxic shock again.





Here's the story. So we go to Boston. I get my period the day before. Our first day in Boston is spent touring the city. I wear white shorts. What in God's name was I thinking. We traipse all over the city, come back to my aunt's house, have cocktails, eat some take-out, stay up late talking. It is not until the next day when I going to get more clothes from my suitcase that I spot my white shorts. And they look like this:

No shit. So I fear I walked the city, rode the subway, and hung out with the relatives for a good 12 hours in these shorts. Who knew the pad wasn't holding up? I find myself asking how I could have missed this? It's not as if I'm in tenth grade again (yes, I was a late bloomer) getting it for the first time. It's also not as if I am an extremely heavy bleeder who soaks through pads by the hour. This was preventable, yet there it is. And it must have happened when I was sitting down because it is on the very obvious back of the shorts, not so much in the crotch.

Other than blood soaked shorts, the trip was great.

Our family is heading to Boston tomorrow to visit relatives. I have a prediction that I just might return with some blog material. You never know who you'll meet on the plane or what freaky sites you might see on the streets of a big city. I will NEVER forget visiting Boston several years ago. My brother and I were in Harvard square. I looked across the street just in time to see a bum with a humongous beer belly projectile vomit all over the stairs leading down to the subway.

Another recent travel escapade was when Erika and I visited Las Vegas last month. We decided to get a substantial drink at the Mirage hotel bar before starting our gambling for the evening. While I downed a dirty martini the size of a fish bowl, Erika kept calling over "Jose" the bartender to give her more shots of tequila. We began talking to some hoodlum from L.A., Chris, and his gangster friend, "Six." We finished our drinks and in my martini-haze I gave out Erika's phone number to Chris. At the time, this seemed completely hilarious to me.

You have to understand, Erika and I travel to Vegas one or two times a year together. We are very protective of each other and always stick together. For me to give our her number was a complete change in character for me and a no-no in the friendship department. On our way to the casino I was rolling with laughter telling Erika that I gave out her number. She kept staring at me silently, as if to say "how could you?" I take it back - she wasn't silent. She yelled, "How could you???"

I failed to mention a little detail. In my drunken stupor I had asked Chris, "So, have you ever done a threesome?". I threw this into the conversation not because I wanted to do a threesome with Chris and Erika (Egads! I love Erika, but the combination of doing my best friend and some gangsta doesn't appeal). I like to be provocative especially when I am drunk. I get a thrill from shocking people. So you can only imagine that when I gave Chris Erika's number he thought FOR SURE he was going to get a little menage-a-trois action later that night. So he kept a-callin' and callin'. BTW, Chris had done a threesome before. Big shocker. He called at 11:30 p.m., 1:30 a.m., 3:30 a.m.....

So skipping ahead twelve hours after a long night of losing at playing blackjack - I am sick as a dog. Hanging with the porcelain. I had a raging headache. I reached in my toiletry bag for some Advil. It made me sicker. Later on when I was actually able to walk I saw the Advil wrapper on the table. I had taken Advil PM. Jesus. Just what my early morning hangover needed. And, no, we never saw Chris again.

So let's hope I can return with some material. No threesomes, I promise.

Mustache

I couldn't resist sending this on. It came from my friend, Vanessa. It is so crude. But by now you all should know that I don't shy away from crude.

How the Mustache Was Invented:

I Think I Have a Piece of Thong in My Eye

Did you hear the story about the woman who is suing Victoria's Secret because she was injured by her thong?

I'm not making this up. It was on Fox News.com this a.m.

Apparently, back in 2007 a 52 year old Los Angeles woman was putting on the skimpy underwear and a metallic piece popped off and hit her in the eye. She can sue me, too, for saying this, but she must be retarded. Otherwise, how does a metallic piece get from your ass to your eye, and what made it pop off in the first place? Does she have a particularly tight pair of butt cheeks whose intense pressure on the thong caused the the piece to pop off?

I have some other issues with this story:

-What is a 52 year old doing wearing a thong in the first place?

-What is a 52 year old doing wearing a thong with metallic pieces on it in the first place?

-If you are stupid enough to hit yourself in the eye with something while putting on your thong, why would you want to publicly acknowledge this by suing the company that made the thong?

This brings up another issue for me with thongs. I don't like them. I understand their purpose - to not show pantylines and all that. Personally, I would rather go commando than have a thong up my ass. The one time I tried wearing a thong, it irritated my inner crack so much I had to remove it in the middle of a party.

I also don't like the idea of anything being up any one's ass crack for a long period of time. If I were the inventor of thongs, they would all be disposable. You would buy a pack of 30 to last you a month. Because in my opinion, you can never really get that little g-string thing clean after it has been up there all day.

Another problem I have with the thong is that people wear them when they are on the rag. Did you know they actually make special pads just for thongs? I am not kidding. What is the point? Is it possible to really catch anything in the thumbnail crotch part of a thong? Isn't this just a recipe for disaster? Anyone who wears a pad in their thong almost deserves the drip drip that they might get down their leg.


A few minutes later:

Well, this is interesting. Stayfree, the makers of the thong pad, have discontinued the product. Imagine that. There is a small population of women out there who are outraged. They have contacted Stayfree to complain. Here is one comment made by a devastated pad-thong lover:

"My experience with the thong maxi seemed to be the answer to one of my many monthly gripes. I bought this product because I only wear thong underwear and regular pads didn't fit correctly. The sticky underside would wrap around the thong, sticking to itself, making removal a chore, sometimes a messy chore."

I find myself wondering what her other "monthly gripes" are. Toilet paper not soft enough? Belly button lint gets in the way of her piercing?

To conclude, I am not cruel-hearted. I hope Ms. Patterson, whose thong injured her, was not badly hurt. And I hope that she won't give up on the thong or on Victoria's Secret just because of this one minor incident. Who knows, she might make a nice chunk of change from VS and be able to buy a plethora of new thongs, preferably ones without metallic pieces on them. I am really glad she wasn't wearing a thong with rocks or BBs on it. That could have taken her whole eye out.

Gotcha By the Nuts

My ten year old, Sam, went to a camp all week at our local Humane Society. He hated it. Not that he doesn't like animals, he does, but the camp was mostly girls and he probably would have rather have been out hitting golf balls or finding snakes.

Yesterday, however, was "surgery" day where the campers get to watch an actual animal operation - one that spays or neuters a cat. Lots of the kids were queasy, saying they wouldn't watch the surgery. Even one kid fainted last week. Sam said he would be willing to observe, and I was psyched that maybe this would be the "thing" that suckered him in to liking the camp.

So when I picked him up yesterday, this is how it went:

Me: "So, Sam. Did you get to see the surgery?"

Sam: "Yeah."

Me: "How was it?"

Sam (smirking): "Great! I held a cat's balls."

Me: "What do you mean? Like you held the balls while they did the surgery?"

Sam: "No, I held them after they took them out of the nut sac and removed them from the cat."

Me: "Oh. Did you wear gloves?"

Of course they wore gloves.

While he didn't love the camp, I don't think he'll soon be forgetting the feeling of the cats nuts in his palm.

Bloody Costume!!

In connection with my last post - this is what I'm going to be for Halloween next year:

What Would You Do?

The kids and I went to the pool last evening for a dip. It was hot, Ken was going to be home late - it seemed a swell way to pass the time.

Admittedly, I am one of those moms who typically takes her kids places like the pool and the park, but I prefer to sit on the sidelines reading "People" or a good book rather than playing with the kids. I do get pangs of guilt about this, feeling as if I should be frolicking in the pool playing "Marco/Polo," but then I think back to my childhood and can barely remember a time when my mom or dad played tag with me on the school playground or did a tea party with me underwater. I think I turned out okay, and haven't talked to my therapist lately about their lack of participation in these things. I'm sure it probably scarred me somehow.

To my credit, I do occasionally play "Groundies" with the kids at the playground, mostly because this game is totally fun. And last evening, I did pick my butt off of the lounge chair for a minute to go down the fast slide with Sam. Oh, and I also timed Emma about 150 times to see how long she could hold her breath under water (the record was nine seconds, BTW). So maybe I am really not that lame.

But I digress. My point in saying all that is that between timing Emma and reading a paragraph here and there of my book, I like to people-watch. Longmont, CO has an interesting range of people, particularly at this public pool. There are many tattoos and piercings and enough cellulite to give Richard Simmons a boner. There are also many boob jobs, and nicely toned bodies. Last night, I picked out this one woman to observe. She was about my age, 40s, in good shape, blond and pretty perky. I'm not sure why I was watching her, but I was. I think I liked her bathing suit, and she looked familiar and I was trying to figure out where I knew her from. Or maybe I'm a lesbian trying to get out of the closet.

Time passes and when the kids and I get up to leave, I see Miss Perky leaning over to get something from her bag. Her suit was red, so it wasn't hard to notice a little white thing hanging down between her legs. Then it dawns on me - IT'S HER TAMPON STRING. I had a split second of wondering if I should tell her that her string was obviously hanging out the back, or if that would be too humiliating. But then it's probably even more humiliating to have the string hanging for hours and no one has told you. What would you do? Would you want a stranger to tell you? I, for one, can't wear tampons as I am the one person who actually got Toxic Shock Syndrome back in the 80s. I just swim with a diaper-sized pad and hope no one notices.

I got home and told Ken the story. He thought it was nice that this woman was "swimming with her friend."

Yoga Butt

I've got writer's block and I've just started this blog a couple of weeks ago. I thought I would constantly have material, but what I realize is that while hilarious/interesting things happen all the time, they don't happen to me personally all the time. And they surely don't happen that often if you don't leave the house.

About the most hilarious thing that's happened to me in the past two days as I've been sitting at my computer writing a report for work about two lesbians with tattoos who want to adopt one of the lesbian's younger sisters who is thirteen and a fire-setter (I'm also a social worker, remember?) is that I heard a comedian say:

"Yoga can be defined as one hour of trying not to fart." You'll get this if you've ever done yoga.

So when I went to yoga today (okay, I lied, I did leave the house for a short time), I was constantly thinking about this. I don't personally have to hold in gas at yoga, but I am wondering if everyone around me does. My God, I've been going to yoga for years and have not heard anyone fart. How can that be possible with all of the crazy poses you do including "happy baby" (lying on your back, legs spread and bent, holding the pads of your feet as if you're pushing out a baby - try not to crap the floor) or the "wind removing" pose (I am not kidding, this is a real name for a pose. You are lying on your back with one leg pulled to your chest the other extended straight, like you might do in the privacy of your own home when you have a cramp).



So today, my yoga instructor, who is SO freaking funny sometimes, has this non-yoga exercise she has us do that she calls "yoga butt." Basically, from standing, you lean over, put your hands on the floor, raise one leg (bent) in the air and pump your foot up to the ceiling. It's a good workout for the glutes. So today, Carol says "I smell some yoga butt coming on." The girl beside me, who has only been coming to yoga for a month or so says "Sorry, that was me." I wasn't sure if she meant that her butt smelled from doing yoga or if she had farted, but it was priceless.


So watch. Next Tuesday at yoga, I am going to shart or something. After all of my years of holding it in. I guess I deserve that.

Kelly's Got Camel

Argghh!! Ick!! As I was searching under "Camel Toe" I happened upon this. You have to understand - I love, love and idolize Kelly Ripa. I never guessed that she, off all people, would fall prey to the mighty CT.

Camel Toe

Sorry, I couldn't resist. I'm going to buy this, place it just right in tight jeans and head out to the bar. That should make for a good blog story. I'm going for the "Cougar." Click on the picture to get a better view.

Congratulations! It's a Turd!

My favorite cousin, Anna, just had her first baby. The babe turned two months old on June 2nd. Hearing about someone pushing one out takes me back...

I had my first child, Sam, over ten years ago. The way that I shit the delivery table, however, seems like yesterday.

Let me preface this story by saying that I'm one that has always been constipated. At any given time I probably have several days of turd stored in my body. I am not proud of this. The only way I know how backed up I am is when I poop corn. Then I can trace the corn back to a particular meal. When I do go, however, it is swift and voluminous. This is an important foreshadow to the story.

My water broke at 1:00 a.m. We made our was to the hospital and the strong contractions started pretty much immediately. I begged for and got the epidural. Instantaneously I couldn't feel anything from my waist down. I labored for awhile, then the doc stuck his hand inside and proclaimed it was time to push.

In the movies, you push and scream and grunt for ten minutes, tops, and the baby is out. Not in my case. The doctor left the room. I lay there in stirrup position with the nurse between my legs telling me to push with every contraction. Husband Ken was positioned behind my right shoulder, coaching me along. I pushed and pushed and pushed. What I didn't realize was that every time I pushed, I shit the table. It was at about crap #8 that I smelled that distinctive turd smell. I turned to Ken and asked, "Did I shit?" He smirked and nodded his head. It then dawned on me what the nurse had been doing after every push - WIPING MY ASS!!

Suddenly I became very self conscious in front of the nurse and wanted to make some awkward small talk:

Me: Heh..heh. Guess I've been pooping a bit. In your job, you must be used to this after awhile.

Nurse: No, not really.

Me: Oh.

Nurse: (silence, stern look on her face).

The good news is that by the time Sam crowned, I was clean and there was no fecal matter on his head. The other good news is that with baby #2 I was prepared and did an enema or two in advance.

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It's Raining Cats and (noun)!

It's raining. Really hard. These wet days are unusual in Colorado and I love them. One of my favorite sounds is rain on the roof, especially when you're falling asleep.

Sam's baseball camp was cancelled today. Sam and Emma have their friends AJ, Max & Jesse over. The friends were late getting here because AJ, the oldest, locked his mom and Max in the chicken coop for 20 minutes. I bet they smelled good after 1,200 seconds with the chickens. Another friend told me that last week her seven year old daughter got locked in a public restroom at a park for 45 minutes. They had to call the city to get her out.

It's kind of like being stuck in an elevator. I'm sure there is this moment of panic when you think you might never get out, and you will expire in there. Either that or crap yourself. Dang! No one knows you are gone and you will starve and dehydrate and die a slow death.

I can't recall being stuck somewhere before. I have been stuck outside, though. One time I was locked out of my house sick for eight hours when we lived in Greece. I was 13. Both of my parents were at work. We had no neighbors who spoke English and that was before cell phones. I was in my PJs. I had to keep warm (yes, Greek winters can be surprisingly cold) with the wash hanging on the line (yes, we didn't have a drier). You can imagine my dad's response when he got home from work and I was huddled by the front door covered with his Izod shirt and boxer shorts.

Back to the rain. The kids become very inventive when they're bored. Emma just asked if we could build a zip line. Yes, sure! Anything for you. Let me get out my polyethylene rope and pulleys and I'll get right on it!

The boys, on the other hand, have been doing Mad Libs. Remember those? They used to be one of my favorites. Only almost-4th and 5th graders could come up with this one:

A Quiz to Take Before Leaving Home

1. Have you filled your car with pee?
2. Do you have the reservations for your room at the fart?
3. Did you remember to pack all of your toilet articles, such as your balls brush and your butthole paste and your soggy lotion?
4. Did you remember to turn off the wet fart and the nut sac in the house?

I'm sure someday I will appreciate how innocent these days are. I'm fearing the adolescent days of dealing with peer pressure, drug/alcohol issues, sex stuff. It is certainly easier to listen to talk of buttholes and the giggling that follows than to tackle the really big stuff that will inevitably come later on. Everyday I try to teach my kids about making good decisions, and the consequences that occur when they don't. Most of the time I am not sure if I'm making much of an impression. I guess time will tell...

(Did you know "butthole" is not in the spell check?)

Sex with Santa

We had "the talk" with Sam a few weeks ago. You know - the birds and the bees and all that.

This is how it started - during dinner Sam said, "there is a rumor going around the 4th grade that one girl wants to have sex with another."

I threw up a little in my mouth. What exactly was disturbing about this? Sex? Fourth grade? Girl on girl? All of it, maybe?


I asked if he knew what "sex" was. Fortunately, Emma wasn't feeling well on this night, so she was in the other room on the couch.


Sam said he knew what sex was because he and his friend, Suzie, found a miniature toy that was supposed to be Santa having sex with someone. He said they found it a few months ago on the golf course and that Suzie was so grossed-out she kicked it and broke it into little pieces. Apparently, this Santa could mimic the "in and out" motion, as Sam put it.

I had no clue what "toy" he was talking about, and can't say I've ever seen or heard of something like this. I didn't think that Santa was having sex and if he was, it would be with Mrs. Clause, but according to Sam, it was someone else. This is very upsetting. I never knew Santa cheated. Could it have been one of the elves? Maybe it was one of the Hoos from the Grinch?

Anyway - so because we didn't want Sam's only information about sex to involve Santa and the golf course, we gave him the entire scoop. He took it well, didn't act too shocked, but told us he didn't want to think about his mom and dad doing this. I don't blame him. I don't want to think about my mom and dad doing it either.

A couple years ago I had purchased the book "Where Did I Come From" for this exact occasion. This is the book I had when I was a kid. After "the talk," I pulled out the book so Sam and I could read it together. We busted a gut. Here are a couple of the pictures (yes, I'm sure I'm
breaking some copyright law here but it's too good to pass up).

It really is a great book when you're ready to have that conversation. Granted, I had to choke a bit when reading, "The man wants to get as close to the woman as he can, because he's feeling very loving to her. And to get really close the best thing he can do is lie on top of her and put his penis inside her, into her vagina." Yikes.

Beware! SATC Spoiler!

A few girls and I got dressed up, met for drinks and went to see the "Sex and the City" movie on Friday - the night it premiered. Aside from seeing Miranda's bush and witnessing Charlotte shit her pants, there was for me, one extraordinary part of the film.

Carrie had been heartbroken by Mr. Big who didn't show up for their wedding. She and the girls go to Mexico where Carrie and Big were supposed to have celebrated their honeymoon. Carrie is beyond depressed. She stays in bed with the blinds drawn. She looks awful and we, the audience, just want her to resume being the Carrie we know and love. Finally, Samantha comes in to check on her and tells her she needs to eat. This for me was the most touching part of the movie. Samantha begins to spoon-feed her yogurt. Kind of like a mom would spoon feed a baby.

No matter how you feel about these girls, this movie, you have to be touched by how Samantha takes care of her friend. We can all recall a time when we were so sad, so down and out, that we could hardly function. We hope that at this time we were lucky to have someone who compassionately, wholeheartedly and unconditionally took care of us. For women, there is nothing like having your best friend come in and put a cold wash cloth on your head and hold your hand to make you feel loved. Our very basic self just wants to be taken care of sometimes.

How was the movie? Pretty predictable. I, however, still like watching the female bonding in action cause I know how strong this can be for us.