Thursday, January 30, 2014

On Being Really, Really Old

Seriously, how cute am in my
old lady readers?
So, I think I mentioned that I am taking this writing class. With girls who are actually a normal college age. And this is what I have learned so far: I am really, really, so very old.

It's a great class, it really is and I'm enjoying it immensely and the professor is brilliant, in a semi-intimidating way. There are also some really good things about going back to take a class when you are not worried about your GPA (more honest writing, only one class's homework, doing the assignments because I want to and because I see their value). It's just that I can't hear any of that over the screaming in my head about how old I am.

"So, who's seen The Sopranos?" Just my hand.

"And I had this Commodore 64. Does everyone know what that is?" Just me nodding my head.

"Well, you know, Harry Potter was the first long book I ever read, when I was about 7 or 8..." Yeah, I read them all in my 20's and 30's.

Also, did you know that Love, Actually is an old movie? It's 11 years old. When did that happen, I ask you?

And then, there's the constant wracking of my brain to try and remember when I understood certain things. How old was I when I figured out that not all break-ups are dramatic? How old was I when I read The Sound and the Fury? How old was I when I all of those things stopped being so serious and all of these things became so serious?

It's good, you know. (That's what I'm telling myself, at least.) It's good to be around younger people and listen to them talk, learn how they see the world. These kids have never lived in the world of the "car phone." They would have no idea how to use a rotary dial. They haven't seen You Can't Do That On Television and their Nick at Nite shows Friends. What is that like? What is it like to not remember life without a computer in your pocket?

I do not know. Because this voice won't shut up.

You know, my mom is 29. She's been 29 for *mumblecough* years. I laugh at that. I am 35. 35! Shout it from the rooftops. 35 is the new black. I don't mind getting old. I like my gray. I can't wait for glasses, and am so very excited that I sometimes have to wear readers. Readers! So cute!

So, I don't even know why this is bothering me so much. Why that voice is so freaking loud. I also don't know when fan fiction became all legit and stuff. Becausen I'm old.

Thursday, January 23, 2014

The Reason Why I Should Never Be Trusted. Ever.

It's too cold to go outside and
take a good picture.
Today, friends and neighbors, is cookie day. The cookies have arrived. And I went to pick them up. Let me tell you about it.

So, yesterday, I risked frostbite to clean out my car. This is a big deal. Typically, my car maintains a medium level of mess through the warmer months and during the winter months, just gets more and more full until the floor is roughly even with the seats. Don't judge me.

Today, I walked outside at the beginning of my lunch break and opened my door. I put my keys in the car and started the engine. To warm it up, you know. It should at this point be noted that I have remote start. I could have done this from my desk and put my keys back in my pocket. But I did not.

Then, I got the car seat out of the back seat and started to walk around the car. Realizing what happens in icy parking lots to doors left open, I closed my driver's side door. I got around the car, opened the passenger door and placed the car seat in the front seat of the car. I then, realized that I had drug the car seat and it's cup holders were filled with snow. I tried to do something about that without getting my hands all cold and wet. I finally gave up and put my purse (containing my spare key) and my paperwork on the car seat.

I closed the door. At some point during my struggle with the snow, the car had decided to lock the doors.

So, my keys were in the car, my spare was in the car, the car was running and I was not in the car.

I called my mommy.

Actually, I called my dad, but he didn't answer, so I called my mommy to find out why he wasn't rescuing me already.

He couldn't. At least not then, so my mom sent my brother. Who came to my rescue with a door jimmy kit (I'm sure that's not what it's called) and rolled down my rear passenger window. I mention that because I stared at him stupidly for a while after he told me because I thought I must be mishearing him and because I wasn't sure what that was supposed to accomplish. Then, I remembered how doors work and ran around the car and unlocked the doors.

The whole adventure took about 45 minutes. My car ran with no one in it for 45 minutes.

The kicker here is that after he had quit grumbling at me and I had run back inside for my sunglasses and then back out to the car, I realized that I had turned my heater all the way off this morning, so the car wasn't even warm.

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Things You Shouldn't Be Worried About


  1. Me.
No, really. 

Last week, I wrote about my depression and I have gotten the most amazing responses online and off and I just wanted to make a few things clear that maybe weren't super clear before.
  1. I am being treated. When I talk about depression, know that I am doing the druggy treatment and the talking treatment. I am attacking this thing. It doesn't "cure," though. I have good days and bad days. What the treatments do is reduce the number of bad days and give me the tools to deal with them. One of those tools, for me, will always be writing. That's what I'm doing here. 
  2. It could be worse. When I'm really fighting it, it seems huge and terrible and dragony. But, the truth is that I am one of the lucky ones. I don't have thoughts of suicide. I don't self-harm. I can keep my cool and function on a 100% normal level. In fact, most people who know me would never guess. Ever. Because I am so functionilicious.
  3. I have fuzzy lines. I'm never going to talk about what I take and what dosage here. I'm never going to talk about some of the contributing issues I deal with. Some things are too personal. Some things aren't. I can't begin to describe or explain where those lines are. I just know it when I see it. Like porn. That's not to say that I won't tell you. If you really want to know something, if you want to compare notes or if you want to say, "Me too and hey, do you do this?" just ask. In email. Or Facebook message or some other private way. 
  4. You guys rock. Every blogger says this and if you haven't been there, I don't think you can understand. But I've gone back through all my depression posts, which are some of my most raw and terrible writing, and I haven't received one negative comment. Everyone has been wonderful and supportive and loving and awesome. I appreciate that. I appreciate it more than I can explain. Because it means when I am at my worst, I know that there are people all over who are on my side. Seriously, the rockinest? It is thou.
So, in summary, I'm okay. I'm not normal and I have bad days. I'm going to keep talking about the bad days and hopefully, someday soon, I'll talk about the good days, too. Some days I convince myself of things that aren't true. And some days I work really hard and eventually convince myself of something that is true. But I am okay. I love that you care and I really hope you don't stop that, but please, don't worry. I mean, a meteor could fall out of the sky and destroy me tomorrow, but the likelihood of that is identical to a meteor falling out of the sky and destroying your Aunt Sally. So, if you want to worry, go ahead, but not any more than you worry about Aunt Sally.

Okay?
Okay.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Losing My Loves

Other than my kids and my family and such, there are three great loves in my life. Three things that bring me peace and joy and make me truly want to get up in the morning, rather than just feel like I should.

They are as follows:

  1. Reading
  2. Writing
  3. Creating
For me, these three things make the worst day worth it. They make the sun shine and the birds sing. 

I love to read. I will read almost anything. Someone was teasing Brynna a couple of weeks ago about reading the entire cereal box and I just smiled, because that is so me. When I can pick (which is most of the time, now) I pick Science Fiction, Urban Fantasy, or Horror. I like to leave this world, is what I'm getting at. 

Writing is the most peace I ever feel. I cannot help but feel like I've gone home when I start writing. Whether it's fiction or this here little blog, just creating something, a feeling or an image or an amazing story out of nothing but the squiggles on the keyboard is the grandest form of magic. I feel a great gratitude for language and the ability to put it all together into sentences and paragraphs and stories and dialog and even tweets.

My poison of choice when it comes to creating is crochet. I love crochet. I love how you can start with what is basically a big pile of string and end with something really lovely and lacy and soft. Something you can use or something you can wear. Or maybe just something that you like to look at. I do other things, too, though. I am the queen of the hot glue gun and truly believe that you're not really a crafter  until you've lost your fingerprints.

These are the things that I love. So, why do I sometimes go months without doing them? I'm going to confess something: I haven't written a word of fiction since November ended. Not a single paragraph. Nothing scribbled on the back page of a notebook, waiting for the story it needs to go into. Nothing. 

I didn't read in December. I finished one book and just never started another one. I read blogs and some magazines. I picked something up to get me through a dentist appointment. But that was really it.

And crochet - well, I crocheted almost every day in December. The Year of the Home Made Christmas was survived, but just barely. Since Christmas Day, I've made some fingerless gloves. (They are super cute and someday I'll get someone to help me take pictures and I'll show them to you.) 

Instead of spending my evenings with hook in hand, book in hand or computer in lap, I've spent them curled up in my big red chair, watching TV and trying not to notice that I'm going numb. Again.

Because the numbness, I recognize it now. For years, I'd have periods of numbness, periods of not wanting to do anything, periods of making excuses. And I never knew why. I only knew that all the real feeling in the world went away. Instead of actually feeling, I would have this vague understanding of what I should be feeling and how a person feeling that way would act. 

I cried or I yelled or I smiled or I laughed. But I was not sad or angry or content or happy. I was not anything. 

I took this to show off my
cool new hairdo. But today,
this is how I feel, all light and dark;
shadowy and overexposed.
In these times, I don't lose my reason. That would make it easier. Instead, I wonder what's wrong with me. Am I some sort of low-grade sociopath, incapable of real emotion? Does everyone fake it like this? Why aren't I more upset? Why aren't I actually angry?

Then, a little less than three years ago, a doctor asked me if maybe, I didn't think that I could, possibly, be a little, suffering from depression. 

Since then, I've read and I've read about what it looks like, what it feels like, how it is, how it's treated. I've treated it like every other ailment I've had since Google. I've researched and now I know...

I know that these times, the times when my mind goes numb and I don't really feel, the times when I can't be bothered to read or write or make anything, the times when there is the TV and me and nothing else, the times when I don't want to do the things that I love and I don't really get any joy when I force myself, these are depression. 

I understand that it comes and goes - not the disease, but the bad parts. Some days I'm pretty rough. Some days you'd never know.

I understand that no, everyone does not fake it like this, and no, I am not a sociopath and yes, there is something wrong with me, but that's okay.

But in the meantime, here I am, slowly going numb. I have a book for bookclub I've been looking forward to for months. I've read almost 30 pages in the last three days. I finally came up with the ending for my book, the real ending. It's going to require an almost wholesale re-write, but that's okay, because I know what has to happen now. But I haven't even begun to write it. After I finished those gloves, I thought I would work on the poncho I promised to make myself, but I haven't touched it.

Tonight, I am going to a writing class. I'm taking it the whole spring semester and I am really nervous and really excited and really amazed that I have this opportunity. Today, I am writing this missive. I am pouring it out and hoping, praying and pleading that it will come back. That the switch will flip and I'll be able to write again. That I won't waste this opportunity. That what I need is a kick to get me going again.

Because I hate being numb. I hate wondering why everyone feels more than I do. I hate looking at the things that used to make me happy and not feeling much of anything.  

I hate these days. 

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Be Careful Who You Wish For

I got a dog. I've wanted a dog since approximately two weeks after my last dog died.

Let me share a brief history of me and dogs:

I grew up on a farm. We had dogs. I loved them. I went to college. I got a house. I got Davey.

Davey was an eleven year old Irish Setter and was the smartest, prettiest, bestest dog in the history of dogs. He was so good it made your heart hurt. I had him for five years and at 16, he died. I was 9.9 months pregnant with Brynna. Seriously, he died the week before she was born.

I sat in the floor of the vet's office and sobbed until they threw me out. Nicely. Because they were wonderful people, but they really needed that exam room. They offered to drive me home.

Then I didn't have a dog. But I didn't miss having a dog. I missed Davey and no one ever could replace him.

Then came Marley-Bones. Marley was a mutt and a sweetheart. She was smart and sweet and loved Brynna (who was about 2 when we got her). I never really bonded with Marley the way I bonded with Davey. Davey was, above and beyond all else, my dog. Marley was Brynna's dog.

Marley died about four years ago. We think she was poisoned. She's buried in the back yard and Brynna still leaves her presents on her grave.

I missed having a dog.

The thing is that Davey was an old dog and old dogs have a lot of issues. And Marley was just a issue-filled dog. Every time we turned around, there was something the matter with her. And there's all this responsibility and money and trouble that comes along with that. And, you know, we're not home a lot and it doesn't seem fair to a dog.

So we went without. And then I got divorced and I kinda thought how much I would like to have a dog around. Because sometimes I'm there all alone and there are creepy noises. And sometimes I would like something to bark at the big bads.

But you know, I held strong. And didn't get a dog.

So, when a dog fell in my lap, I squeed and acted like it was a hard decision and Fire came to live with us.


Fire is an eight year old English Setter. So, my affinity for elderly sporting dogs continues. And she is sweet as sugar. A couple of weeks ago, I was home sick all day on a Sunday and as I lay in bed, wishing for death, she curled up next to me and occasionally sniffed my hair. She never left my side.

When we come home, she jumps up and down and looks like we've made her day just by existing. She plays with the girls and lets them grab her collar to get her to go to their rooms and she is pretty tolerant when they get a little rough. She loves the cats. The cats hate her. Hilarity ensues.

But this dog has the worst doggy habits.

The worst, by far, is the trash thing. She loves trash. And every day, when I come home, I find the trash all over the kitchen floor. It doesn't matter what's in the trash. She is going to knock it over and drag it all over the floor.

Also, you really shouldn't leave anything on the counter.

This is what I came home to yesterday:


That's my almost full box of Cheerios sprinkled liberally into my shoes. Shoes full of cereal. That's what I got. Shoes full of cereal.

I may have cried.

I definitely was not thrilled to be cleaning it up when I was having my "pain day." I was not happy with the whole situation. Then, she scared my cat who had spent the two coldest days of the year outside because I couldn't get him to come home where the dog was. I was so mad.

I thought about all the things I'd like to do to that stupid dog. I thought about all the other places that dumb animal could go and live.

Then, finally, I collapsed on the couch and she climbed up next to me and laid her head in my lap. And, despite myself I was smitten again. I'm just going to have to get a new trash can that will fit in a cabinet, that's all. Because stupid dog has gotta stay.

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Living with my Stupid, Human Body

I am in pain. Lots of pain. I don't know why. Not exactly at least.

I've been to the doctor. I've taken pills. Nothing really helps. I just have to live through it.

It'll go away soon and then it will be a while, weeks, before it comes back.

I'm doing something about it. And hopefully, soon, it will be all better and I'll never have this pain again.

Hopefully.

In the meantime, there's not much more demoralizing than having pain that I can't do anything about.

I don't cry when I'm in pain. I mean, sometimes, I'm crying so hard that I don't look where I'm going and I walk into a doorway and then I'm both in pain and crying. And sometimes, I am in so much pain that I can't do something that I think I really should be doing and then I cry in frustration.

But, I don't cry because I'm in pain. I cuss. And I yell. And I whine. I whine a lot. I get down and I get angry. I get lots of angry.

I have a kind of high pain threshold. Not as high as Brynna's, but higher than some people.

So, when I am actually feeling my pain, I get really cranky. I'm not used to this. Little cuts and scrapes don't bother me. I don't know where half my bruises came from. And now, suddenly, why does my body hate me? That's as far as my mind will function.

As you can tell by the scattered (haha) way this post is written, my mind isn't functioning particularly well.

So, you know, I'd like to talk coherently about something. I really would, but not today. Today is my Pain Day and you should be pleased that I wrote anything at all.

So there.