Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Tales of a Post-It Ninja

A couple of months ago, war broke out in my office building. There are seven non-profits who are housed in my building and we all share a kitchen, restrooms, foyer and weirdly, a shower.* The battleground of this war was the kitchen, the cause - dishes left out (both dirty and clean) and the weapon of choice: passive aggressive notes about how your actions are making kittens sad. (I am not kidding - that was actual note text.)

Now, understand, I don't want to clean up after people who did not emerge from my womb - it's a thing. But, still. We all get busy. If you rinse your plate and put it in the sink, I truly don't see why someone else (often me) can't come along and unload the dishwasher and throw your stinkin' plate in. We are not talking about really disgusting dishes, here. Everything had been rinsed and left in the sink. Also, everything in most cases is a coffee mug and spoon, but is occasionally a bowl and spoon.

The note writer also seems to believe that clean dishes left on the counter to dry attract bugs. I am at a loss. Some of my dishes in my kitchen belong out and they don't seem to attract bugs. But I digress.

The point is that I find the whole Note War of 2012 to be stupid. I was going to say immature or a waste of time or ridiculous, but frankly, this warrants a stupid. We're all adults, right?

So, in a fit of weirdness, I wrote "You look perfect just the way you are," on a post-it note and put it on the bathroom mirror. A sort of Pants You to all the note writers. And a positive Pants You.

And you know what? Even though I was the note writer, I found myself reading that note every time I washed my hands. I read it and smiled and walked back to my desk at the salt mines just a little happier. And I figured that if it was doing that for me... Also, people must like it a little, because as opposed to the kitchen notes which get ripped down every few days, my note stayed there for a whole month. And then I took it down.

And replaced it. The second note said, "You look amazing, now go BE amazing."

Yesterday, I replaced the note again.
Don't be like the rest of them, darling!
I know I'm not the first person to be a post-it ninja. Here's a Flikr group about it. But, I am actually sort of in love with this. Every time I walk out of the kitchen, it's scowling and every time I walk out of the bathroom, it's smiling, and that - in the humdrum never-ending daily grind of work - is worth it.

What do you think? Also, what else should I say? I have a million quotes, but most of them are too long for a post it.

*Not in the sense of sharing a shower, just in the sense that there is one in our building. Someone used it a couple of years ago when they had no power. Mostly, it's a tornado shelter.

Monday, July 23, 2012

The Best Thing About Being Separated

I thought I would caption this with lyrics from
"All the Single Ladies," a song I know exists because someone told me,
but it turns out that the title is pretty much all of the lyrics.
So, okay, then.
When I was in high school, I was in some sort of weird "Suicide Watch List." I wonder now, if anyone who ever committed suicide in my high school was on their stupid watch list. In any case, I was never once, not once, in danger of offing myself.

I was put on the list because I wrote really dark, morbid and depressing poetry. I also maybe talked about death a lot and read biographies of serial killers for fun. Whatever, I was a joy to be around, people, I swear.

The thing is that as a person that you might have known and had conversations with and such, you would have known that I was not suicidal. But I wrote about it. Because for me, and many others, writing is a little bit of catharsis. You take all your dark feelings, you dump them on paper and then you can move on happily without them. That's always been my feeling at least.

And, so, despite my over-arching message, of "I'm Fine, Already," I feel like I've been sort of a Debbie Downer about the whole divorce process. And yes, at times it sucks. I have my bad nights, my whiny moments, I hear our song on the radio or try to explain my Buffy obsession and I feel incredibly lonely. I also struggle with money, because single incoming it sucks and I worry that things will never even out and feel normal. These things are all normal.

But I write about them, because dumping them on the Internet gets them out of my system. If you know me and talk to me, you probably know that I am Fine is not a mantra, but a true statement about myself.

So, I thought I would tell you all the best part of about my current situation. And I bounced around quite a few lovely ideas.

  • Sleeping single in a double bed - hells yes.
  • Only being able to blame myself for the fruit flies - whatevs, fruit flies are totally the new black.
  • Never pulling dirty socks out from between the sofa cushions - and I mean ever.
  • Always having control over the remote - hehe.
  • Being able to stay up as late as I want, go to bed as early as I want or turn on the TV in the middle of the night when I can't sleep - Alumaloy, here I come.
  • Getting - and remaining - semi-caught up with laundry
And, I'm not kidding here, those things all rock. But the best thing - the truly amazingly wonderful thing - is the peace.

Louis CK says that "happy marriages don't end in divorce," and when you think about it, that makes so much sense that it hurts. I can't speak for everyone involved, so understand that I am only speaking for myself here, but I was NOT happy. 

Marriage is a constant give and take, push and pull, an eternal compromise, and if it is healthy then everyone gives and takes basically the same amount. I can honestly say that in the beginning, we did that. In the end... we didn't. 

We fought and we made each other miserable. There was never peace, there was only the eggshelly space in between the arguments. There were hurts suffered in silence and there were hurts suffered out loud. That was the up and down of our relationship at the end. At least, that's how my view of it looked.

And I can truly tell you that I am a happier person now, and I hope that he is too. I hope that he has a list like mine up there and can point to some of the things that drove him crazy about me and say, "Thank goodness, never again." 

And that's fine. If I had to read his list, it might hurt my feelings a little (mostly because I still believe myself to be a joy) but not for very long. The fact is that we didn't work. And now we don't have to. And while some days that makes me sad, some days the Dolphins make me sad. I am okay. I am totally and completely fine. And not in a because I have to be way, because the new landscape of my life is totally better than the old one.

Friday, July 20, 2012

Five Things on Friday - Miss You Edition

It has been a long week without my kids while they are off playing with their dad. I'm glad that they got to go, but I can't wait to pick them up. Here in no particular order are:

Five Things I Miss About My Kids When They Are Gone

1. The noise - Even in the dead of night, the house is just more alive with sound when they are in it. I've been sleeping with the TV on to make a little more noise and it's helped but it's just not quite  right. I hate to admit it, but I've even missed the screaming a little.

2. The little hands - Maren does this thing where she reaches up and pats my face and it is so sweet and angelic. And Brynna is constantly making art, even if it's just the way she arranges her toys on the floor. Those four little hands are the busiest there are and I couldn't miss them more. Even if they are sometimes sticky and getting into things.

3. The hugs/snuggles - Brynna once overheard me telling Maren that she is a world champion hugger. And she is, that kid puts her whole self into every hug, wrapping her arms all the way around and laying her head down on your shoulder. If possible, she'll even hug with her legs. I can't help it, she is just the best. But then I reminded Brynna about all the times I've told her she is the world's best snuggler. And she is. Both of us with a book, blanket on the couch and she curls up and just sits, at peace with everything. Nothing like it. Even if it sometimes means more humans in my bed than I wish.

4. The sarcasm - Brynna is almost 8 (be still my heart) and so she is really starting to master sarcasm, which is hilarious, so long as it's not directed at me. Maren has the distinct advantage of growing up in a house with Brynna and me, so she's catching on early. Even factoring in the occasional back-talk, I wouldn't trade it for anything.

5. The constant reminder of their greatness - Ask Brynna to tell you about herself and she'll start with "I'm a fabulous artist." And she is. Ask Maren how smart she is and she'll whisper sweetly, "So smart." And even if you don't ask either of them anything, just being around them will remind you how amazing they truly are.

I can't pick my midgets up and get back to our regularly scheduled life. What do you miss about your smalls when they are away, even if only for a little while?

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Making It! - Raking in the Jewels

A few years ago, I asked for a jewelry chest for Christmas. I don't have that many jewels, but there is something magical about a jewelry chest. I had always wanted one and now I had one. I began sorting all my jewelry (mostly junk with a few nice items peppered in for spice) into the four drawers down the front and cozying my rings into the little velvet rolls in the top compartment. What I had left when I was done with a huge pile of necklaces and I realized a very important part of the jewelry chest.

For years, I've kept my necklaces in the drawers and untangled them once or twice a year, when the situation got unbelievably desperate. And there were a few drawbacks to the situation:

  1. The perma-knots that I know have in two or three necklaces with wispy chains;
  2. The out-of-sight-out-of-mind quality of having to dig through two inches of sterling silver to find anything that matches; and 
  3. The rush in the mornings trying to un-knot something to wear.
But really, I didn't think too much about it until this Christmas. Brynna got a jewelry box from Santa. A nice one, one that will hold all her jewels (and also her camera because she thinks that's where it goes). And it has necklace hooks. Just a few little pendants hang on those precious eight hooks and I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt that I couldn't live like this any longer.

I had, at some point pinned this and I decided that I had to have it. I immediately started begging people for broken rakes. Not that I couldn't just buy one, but you know, it seemed a pity. Finally, my dear, sweet brother broke a rake and handed the head over to me.

One picture hanger later and Voila!

I hung the rake right over the jewelry box (and unfortunately, my light switch) and untangled and hung my necklaces. It's been a couple of months since I got this brilliance mounted and it has solved every last problem listed above, mostly by keeping the tangles out and making everything perfectly visible. Also, I think it's super-cute. 

Now, to get those ugly tan walls painted...

*Also, I realize this wasn't Making It! so much as Hanging It! It's okay, I still love it.

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Ya'll Should Revoke My License

Listen, I know. I know. Really, I know. I've been gone. Perhaps you didn't notice. Just stroke my ego here and pretend you did.

I don't know why, but this time around, I didn't just disappear from my blog. I disappeared from Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and even the wide, wide world of blogging comments. Sometimes, I just fall off the planet.

This morning, I went to read The Six Year Itch, and she said this,
"Blogging is an epic marathon where you publish into the abyss hoping that in all of that darkness a few people show up with a flashlight and shine that light on your words, your story, and find a little bit of themselves in you. And together you can find the sun."
And, hell to the yes. That, in a nutshell is how I have felt for the past couple of weeks. Like I'm just screaming into the abyss.

Have you ever been in a room, maybe at a party, and you are talking, but no one appears to be listening to you and you just want to stop and shout, "Hello! Does my voice not make noise?!?" Or driving down the Interstate and people start cutting you off right and left and you wonder if you accidentally switched your car into stealth mode?

That is how the whole internet has felt to me lately. Like my voice just stopped making noise. I wonder, genuinely if anyone has been hearing me. (I don't mean to be all self-pity, woe is me, but I talk to myself all the time, I'm not sure we need a written record of it.)

Reading Liz this morning reminded me that we all feel like this sometimes. But it reminded me of something else, too. I truly appreciate everyone else who screams into the abyss. I love reading little pieces of your life. Whether it's in blog form or 140 characters. I am listening.

So, I'm going to take it on faith that you're listening too. I am putting an end to my silence. I'm not sure that it matters, but one more voice can make the difference. One more voice can change the world. I don't know if it will, but I don't know that it won't, either.

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

It's A Million, Ya'll

I try not to talk about the weather round here. The thing is that weather is, sort of by it's definition, regional, so when I'm burning up in the middle of summer, some of ya'll are watching the snow fly. (At least that's what my webstats say, although my comments don't seem to agree.) So, I try to keep that to myself aside from the occasional five things or hate-filled diatribe.

Today is the latter.

I am frickin' miserable, y'all. It is easily a million and twelve degrees. We've already had more days topping 100 than I need in a year, and in case you don't know, July just started. Here in K-Y, we've got two more months of solid summer, one month of nearly summer and about 2 weeks of fall-but-it-might-top-90-anyway. I'm not sure I can take another 8 weeks of this misery.

It's always in this weather that I start thinking about the joys of living elsewhere. My smarter-than-me phone will give me the weather in multiple cities on my home page. I currently am living vicariously in London, Christchurch and Juneau. Because it's not a million degrees.

And tomorrow, oh glorious Independence Day, I get to go sit out in the heat for five hours. Because I am rather fond of my kids and have a hard time denying them the big boomy things in the sky.

Pity me.

Because that's what I'll be doing tomorrow.

To all my 'Merican friends, Happy Fourth! Try to keep breathing and drink lots of fluids.
To my otherwise affiliated friends, spend a day in comfortable temperatures and think of us idiots in the heat.