Mamarati

Are the Republicans trying to ride on the wave of pride leftover from the Olympics or something? Do they know they aren’t campaigning in China? It’s really weird to me to see all that chanting start up. Ummm, we’re all Americans here. I think no matter what side of the issues you are on, most of us just want what’s best for the country.

I don’t know, I think there are enough things that we disagree on that we don’t need to add a fake thing. It’s strangely alienating.

Now, I said I was going to talk more about politics, because it’s a pretty big part of life in this household. But… this is a conversation so large and complex, I just don’t think I can even begin.

I will try, though. I always think it must be nice for those people who are absolutely 100 percent sure of how they feel or believe about anything. I’m not that way. There are very few issues that are black and white for me. And there is no platform that I am 100 percent behind. I lean lately more toward the Democratic party not so much because of what they are but what they aren’t. And because of who I am right now. And because it’s one of the few two choices out there.

I think it’s really unfair that a candidate has to line up with a party so completely. There are very few say, Republicans that are pro-choice. Or Democrats that are against choice. A few. But it’s like so much hinges on that issue, for example. And if you believe the opposite way of how you’re “supposed” to for your party, it’s like you’re some kind of traitor instead of some kind of person who has come to a different conclusion about a thing. It’s like you’re forced into believing (or at least saying you believe) a certain way.

And I think that’s terrible. And it’s so terribly dishonest. And it makes the media coverage of things like elections or crises a big lie. You see these spokespersons and pundits up there one minute talking about how much they love McCain and think he made a great choice about picking Palin, and they’re all smiles and joy and bubbling with support. Then you go off camera and, Oops, open mic, and the story is completely different. They’re saying the exact opposite and slamming his choice.

And then there’s all this fakery about how we shouldn’t talk about Palin because she’s a woman, we shouldn’t talk about her being a mom. We shouldn’t talk about her kids. We shouldn’t talk about her pregnant teen. We shouldn’t question whether she can do both things. That’s anti-woman. Look how hard we’ve fought for blah blah blah blah.

No. Anyone who says we shouldn’t be discussing these things can just go on and stop talking about them. But for me, I will continue to talk about these things. Because some of these things are things we haven’t been talking about and quite frankly they are just the conversations we need to have. Can we, as women, as mothers, balance it all? Can we do it all? Are we superwomen?

I mean, you can continue to be a martyr if you want and you can say bring on the challenges. Bring on the adversity. Make it hard, as hard as you can. Don’t give me any slack just because I’m a woman or a mother. To that, I say NO. We do need to be protected on the job against discrimination. WHY? Because discrimination against moms happens. We do need privacy and more breaks for pumping milk. WHY? Because not everyone wants to feed their kid formula and because that’s how breastfeeding works. Supply and demand. We do need flexible work hours. It’s not a 9-to-5 world any more and why should it be anyway? It would help more than just moms, it would ease traffic burdens and energy costs, too. We do need flexibility about where to work. Because not every job requires my butt to be sitting in a seat in an office somewhere when I could be doing it (and probably even more efficiently) at home, thus reducing child care costs, etc.

So, with this Palin stuff, I am afraid that some people are going to get this idea that, WOW, here’s this powerful woman and she’s doing it all. How amazing. If she can do it, anyone can do it. She went back to work just days after having a baby. So you can back to work just days after having a baby. She got on the plane when her water had broken, so you can, too. She has five kids and is going to try and be the Vice President, so what’s your problem that you can’t work a few hours or 20 of overtime?

Know what I mean? And I’m sorry, she may have that small-town background, but make no mistake that what she’s doing now and what she’s been doing for the past few years is not at all middle class. I don’t know too many poor folks or even middle class folks that can afford a nanny and a housekeeper. I also know that most families don’t have kids spread out that far apart where the teens can take care of the babies and younger kids. Most of us do not have child care that is so flexible we could leave the house at a moment’s notice without completely disrupting our kids every time. Most of us do not have husbands that stay home with our kids.

Of all the women that I know with kids who also work, very few of them have husbands that do a significant portion of things like taking care of the kids or taking care of stuff around the house like cooking or cleaning. Certainly nothing like half of it even though they may be working as many or more hours than their husbands. There are exceptions to this, of course, but not an overwhelming amount. Not many of their husbands woke up in the night with their babies or do laundry regularly or sweep, mop, dust… and very few cook regularly, plan the meals or shop for the food. If the kids are sick and someone needs to stay home with the kids, most of the time it’s mom. If the kids need to go to the doctor, it’s probably mom that takes them. And this goes beyond just the people I know, too. I mean, my kid has tons of health issues, and when we’re sitting at the allergy shot clinic, it’s 98 percent moms with the kids. Ditto all the other doctor’s appointments. This is how it works in my neighborhood.

So, the expectation that moms are just so wonderful and they can do anything and they can balance and juggle it all… that’s all sweet and quaint. But it’s not true. There’s a lot of sacrifice in there and a lot of suffering and resentfulness and guilt and we need to keep talking about it so it can get better. Of course motherhood without having an outside job is full of times of sacrifice and suffering and whatnot, I’m just saying that we don’t all have to put on this stoicism and run around like a bunch of friggin’ martyrs when we can talk about it, hash it all out and figure out what can make it better for women and for their kids and families overall. For society overall. I know many of us would like a little more joy and a little less hardship and I think we can get that if we keep this conversation going and not act like it’s taboo or it’s going to collapse everything that women have worked so hard for. Give me a break. We’re still working hard. Palin is not evidence that we’ve arrived, by far. Hillary isn’t either.

So, in short, regarding the working mom thing, I don’t think that anyone should confuse what Palin is doing with what working moms are doing. Palin is making sacrifices that are above and beyond what should be EXPECTED of a working mother. I’m sure she’s doing it because she feels she has a calling that goes beyond what she feels called to do directly for her family. Don’t kid yourself, no matter what you hear in the media… She knows that she’s not giving her family 100 percent. The only way you’d be so clueless is if you were in complete denial. BUT, that’s not to say that she doesn’t feel that what she’s doing is going to provide an even better life for them, for their kids, for their kids and generations on… there’s something to be said about making sacrifices now for huge change for the future.

But for your average working mom, that’s not what’s happening. And the support network that Palin has in place does not one iota resemble what that everyday working mom has to contend with. And the EXPECTATION should not be the same. It doesn’t even compare. And of course I realize that you can work and still be a good mom. But I also know that you can work and be a mom who is doing her best but is still leaving a lot to be desired in the parenting arena, whether you realize it or not. And I realize, too, that sometimes, these are the sacrifices that have to be made because food has to be on the table and a roof has to be over your heads. But I’m also saying that not talking about it and pretending that everything is perfect and fine — that’s not going to bring about any changes.

We have come a long way, but we need to keep going. When I was growing up, for example, and I lived with my dad and step-mom… there were a variety of tough things going on. I had lots of emotional problems, my mom was an alcoholic and I couldn’t live with her any more after the divorce, we had a big family (13 kids) that was just full of drama all the time… I could go on and on. My dad would leave the house before I ever woke up. He would get home many times after I’d gone to bed. My step-mom worked a split shift as a waitress and would be in bed or getting ready for work when I got up to go to school and would sometimes work till late in the evenings and I wouldn’t see her either. They were so tired when I did see them that they hardly had the energy to deal with me. I was the baby of the family so I’m not sure they had the energy left to deal with me anyway. On the weekends, she would still work or they would do housework, yard work or do their own thing. My dad was obsessed with our ginormous yard. It looked like a friggin’ golf course. His battle with moles is the stuff of legend. When I came home from school and let myself in the door (from about 2nd grade on) I was responsible for myself. I could wake up in the morning and roll off the side of my bed between it and the wall and my parents would think I’d gone to school. I could then go play in the woods all day long. Maybe that’s typical for a teen to do once in a while. No, I was doing this from 4th grade on. In 5th grade, I was in the office almost every day getting swats and I never did my homework. I was so clueless in math, so behind in it that when I looked at my assignments it was like trying to read a foreign language.

OK… my parents didn’t even know 99 percent of this stuff. And half the calls they got from the school they just ignored. Were my parents neglectful? Absolutely. But then how much choice did they have then when they had to stay afloat and my dad was an criminal defense attorney and could not cancel people’s court dates and he always had to be somewhere meeting with a client… and my stepmom would lose her job if she took time off to deal with me. This was the reality. Were they good parents? Actually, no. They weren’t. That is also reality. There was no one for me to talk to about my problems. No one told me about my period. No one explained the world to me. No one cared for me. No one noticed if I didn’t take a bath for a month. No one helped me recover from failing grades. No one noticed I had asthma or allergies. No one was happy to see me in the morning or at the end of the day. Hell, half the time I didn’t even see anyone so wouldn’t know if they were happy to see me or not.

I try to be forgiving and understanding when I look back at that time, but it’s not easy, really. I look at the sacrifices and I’m not sure what they were all for. They weren’t for me. I didn’t need that big house or those 8 acres of land. I didn’t need fancy lighting fixtures or a giant pond or a new Ford Mustang or plastic surgery or 50 trees to line the driveway. I needed an inhaler, an antihistamine and some help with my homework. I needed someone’s time.

I realize that my upbringing may not have been the most typical, but I know I’m not alone. And the more Burby parents can argue that they do get to spend time with their kids and that they do meet all their needs. Awesome. And other parents will argue that they may not meet all their needs but that they try their best. WooHoo. And there are other parents who are trapped in an existence that is so bleak, working two or more jobs or working and going to school and barely making ends meet and I don’t know what they will say… And I don’t know what to say to them. But I do know that what I won’t say is, “Hey, shut up. We don’t talk about this issue. You suck it up and deal with it because you’re a woman and this is what you wanted, isn’t it?”

There are so many different levels here and to deny the level another person is on is just nuts. I realize I’m rambling at this point, but hey, like I said… it’s complex. And there is no black and white. And your life is not someone else’s life so you should reserve your meanness and harsh judgment… but you should never stop talking about it or scrutinizing it or rolling it over and over in your mind to try to figure out what it all means. Because there is no one truth to this all. And it’s certainly not anything at all like what you see on either end of the political spectrum. Take down your defenses and look deep down inside and think about what you really want for your life and what you really want for your kids, for your sons and daughters… for their friends and their friend’s mothers. And don’t ever stop talking about it.

I feel like today is the first day of something for me. First day at work. First day at school. First day of something. I finally feel relaxed. My kid started middle school and so far, he hasn’t had sex, joined a gang, failed the metal detector, smoked pot, skipped class, worn his pants so low that his underwear show, flipped off a teacher or otherwise taken part in any offenses that would land him in the office or hot water, been made fun of, shoved into a locker or been the victim of a swirly.

Not that I thought any of those things would happen, but those are my worst, most paranoid fears for 7th grade (or any grade, really. Haha). How do I arrive at all this craziness? Well, if I buy into the bit about kids doing stuff at a younger age than we were back in the day… The rebel years should start any minute.

I’m lucky, perhaps. My kid is a really great kid and we’re pretty open about discussing all this stuff. I didn’t have a lot of sound, solid adults to bounce my concerns off of when I was a kid, so I’ve always wanted to make sure that my own kid wasn’t flailing around in a sea of misunderstanding and confusion. At least not any more than already goes along with being a teen…

7th grade. I can’t believe it. It’s like he’s maturing every single day, too. I see so much difference in him even from just a month ago, and certainly much more than during his last weeks of being in 6th grade, which is still elementary school around here. I look at the kids at pick-up time, though, and I realize that he’s not nearly as mature as many of them. I’ve sheltered him a bit. I’ve kept his exposure to some things minimal. I question doing that some days. Other days not so much.

So far, though, I couldn’t be more pleased. He’s happy about his teachers. He’s interested in his classes. He’s bonded with one of his teachers and wants to stay after school talking to him. He’s so observant and talks to me every day about the things he sees and his take is so interesting. I am thankful for the time we have in the car, where some of our best conversations take place on the drive home after school. He really opens up. He’s not seeming anxious or nervous about anything and said to me yesterday, “I think I’m really gonna like this middle school thing.”

Phew.

So, now that he’s settled… I feel like I’m settled and I can get back to business.

Back to writing and working and being productive. Back to having moments to think. I feel relaxed today. This despite two cups of high-test coffee. It’s a little bit exciting at the same time. I feel like I need to go to Office Depot, though, and get some new school supplies. Nothing says “time to get busy” like a new pen.

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In other news… politics have been incredible lately. I don’t talk about politics too much because of the “work” site. I have my own personal beliefs, of course. Some are strong. Some are pretty liberal. Others are incredibly conservative. I took some quiz one time that identified me as both liberal and libertarian. I have my issues where I’m not going to be swayed and others that I have not fleshed out enough to say where I stand.

I think that a lot of folks are like that, no matter what you may be seeing on TV or reading on blogs or wherever. I think that this race for president is bringing out a lot of issues that people are arguing about, sure, but I also think that a lot of the “conflict” is going on within ourselves. I can only truly speak for myself, but I’m tellin’ ya — I’m thinking about issues and figuring things out for myself that haven’t ever come up before.

And the truth is, while I don’t usually talk about politics online because I work here and I don’t necessarily want my personal politics to be used for or against me in any way… and I want to be as unbiased as a person can be who is offering what mostly consists of advice rather than pure journalism… I have a lot to say about politics. I’ve been involved in this process. I’ve had relatives run for office and I have been to rallies, watch parties and the like. I’ve campaigned for candidates. I’ve dragged my sick, flu-ridden self to the polls to vote. I ran a friggin’ caucus here in Texas and boy was that a rush. I’m excited by the Democratic process. I like thinking about all this. I think that things are in a state of change right now and it’s really interesting to me to consider things I haven’t before. To be confronted by issues that I’ve never had the opportunity to consider and weigh.

Sometimes I hear my son say something and I think that he’s getting it from me. Sometimes it sounds extreme coming out of his mouth and that reflects on me. It gives me a chance to think about the context of how he heard me discuss that issue and how it came across to him. It gives me a chance to play Devil’s advocate and give him the other side of it. It gives me a chance to say I may not be right about everything and even that there may not be a perfect right or wrong way to think or feel about an issue.

More on this… because I am going to write about it. And this is my space, so I’m going to use it because I’m tired of remaining silent on these issues that are so important to me just because it’s such a charged arena. It’s so much more complex than that, and I have so much to say that some days I’m about to burst. And, too, I have so much more to work out for myself, and this has always been the place where I’ve done that. Do you remember what you told yourself, woman? That all this self-censorship was like cutting out and discarding a part of your brain? Yeah, I’m tired of that.

So, I did something recently that I’m feeling rather strange about. I quit school, basically.

I’m this close to the end and I threw up my hands and said, “I can’t do this any more.”

There are a number of reasons why I did it. It’s actually been something I’ve been thinking about doing since I fell off the roof. I mean, what better time to take care of myself than then? But instead, I did not do that. I took it a little bit slower, but basically kept plowing through. And then all these things started happening with Jacob and the surgeries and the changes in his diet and on and on happened… things I did not forsee. And so, for the last year or so, I think I have been slowly losing my mind.

I mean, there have been actual moments where I have questioned my sanity. Where I felt like I was close to a nervous breakdown or something. I just felt pulled so tight all the time and the only logical next step was to snap. And all the while I was doing that thing… that superwoman thing where you tell yourself that you’ve got your shit together and you can do anything you put your mind to and all that other bullshit that really just means you can be all things to all people but you won’t be worth a damn to yourself.

So, no. I cannot be all things to all people. I cannot handle all this stuff on my plate. I cannot do it all. For now, I have got to focus on my family, my work, my relationships and myself. I wrote to my adviser and let her know I was losing my mind dealing with everything and talked a bit about the stuff going on with Jacob (more on that later, it’s all getting weird with doctors and such) and she was cool and agreed that I need to focus on family stuff. School will be there whenever I’m ready to go back.

The other thing is work. I feel like… Due to the flexible nature of my job, I feel like there have been times when I have given it my all and really thrown myself into it. And I enjoy those times more than anything. But then when things come up like they have lately, I feel like my work suffers greatly. It’s the thing that can bend the most, so I let it absorb the shock of any trauma or stress in my life. I’m lucky to have such a job. But I really miss working. School was not allowing me much room for that. And it’s like, for years I’ve been trying to finish school and something always happens that cuts into it. But still, I keep chasing down this thing that I want to be. This future occupation or career or whatever. And suddenly, I’m like, “Why?” Why do I keep chasing down something else when what I really love to do is what I’m already doing? If I’d just DO IT already. Like, if I would just go on and really give myself to it…

I had the fortune to go to an event recently that was for other folks who do the same thing I do… actually two events. One was specifically for folks that work at About.com and the other was for mommy bloggers. And I talked to other folks who felt the same way I did. Folks who may also have other jobs and maybe right now they are asking themselves if they are ready to take the plunge and do it full time. Leave the day job behind and just do THIS. I talked to some people who had already taken the plunge and they talked about how scary it was to finally realize that they were writers and that they didn’t have paychecks that were written in stone but that if they dedicated themselves to it, they would make it just fine and maybe even be more than just fine. I talked to moms who were contemplating never going back to corporate America in favor of staying home with their kids and blogging their lives and interests. There are sacrifices to be made, for sure… trade-offs. But I think they might be worth it.

And I’m feeling so many things right now… Anxiety. Fear. Excitement.

But mostly I’m feeling this amazing sense of relief. Like this huge burden has been lifted and the pressure is gone. I feel refreshed. I’m sleeping better. I’m thinking more clearly. I don’t feel like I’m running around in a fog. I don’t feel like a time bomb about to go off. I feel like I can finally relax for a moment and maybe even enjoy a few parts of my life. Even though there are still stressful things going on and there’s still that element of chaos, I feel like I can handle it now.

Well, something has gone wrong in the date keeping area of my brain. And it’s been going wrong since I gave up the use of my DayRunner. Actually, when I was using my Mac exclusively, I had iCal and there’s this thing about a Mac… it’s much like opening a book. When you open it, everything is visible and working in just seconds, so it’s like having a paper calendar. That worked for me.

On Windows, not so much. Back in the 90s, I tried to get used to using the Outlook calendar and others. But when you want a quick reminder of what’s on your To Do list and your computer is asleep, it’s a much bigger fiasco. There’s more chugging and churning and time passes so slowly. Like a watched pot that never boils, so were those systems on Windows trying to awake from sleep and open programs without giving a blue screen of death.

So, I ditched any Windows-based calendars and stuck to the devil I knew, which was my DayRunner, classic edition, one page per day.

When I got my iBook a few years ago, iCal took the place of my DayRunner quite nicely.

Then I fell off the roof and had to get the Windows Vista so I could do accurate speech recognition / handwriting recognition. Since I was functioning at a bare minimum anyway during the months and months of recovery, a calendar really didn’t do much for me. I wasn’t making any appointments, going to any meetings, driving. I had to depend on everyone else around me for my scheduling needs.

Now that things are back to normalish and I’m needing to be more productive (I’m back in school full time and working as full time as possible, doing the normal mom things) I’m finding that I can’t seem to get my ducks in a row. My system has been all jacked up and all my habits broken (both good and bad) by the time I spent on bedrest.

In writing all this out, I’m wondering why I feel the need to justify or rationalize my decision to buy a DayRunner refill. Do I feel guilty because I like paper? Do I feel like it’s an oddity since I’m such a computer nerd and yet I crave hard copies of parts of my life? I’m not sure, but I just know that this is not the year for me to be unproductive. This is the year I get it all done.

On top of that, after some hemming and hawing and much complaining about the way Vista behaves and after counting in my head all the hours that are wasted on extra clicks, clicks, clicks, clicks… After realizing that my system is loaded with more RAM than Vista can even handle and has way fast processors and still it is just so slow and clunky… After thinking about all the ways Vista is not intuitive and after way too many times thinking in my head, “If I were on my Mac, I would just do x, y or z and this whole thing would be overwith, but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO here I am still waiting on Vista,” or, “Why did Vista just do that? I did not tell it to do that. I did not tell it to reorganize my desktop icons or save that file there.” I decided to just break down and buy a MacBook.

So, I look forward to joining the ranks of the productive again. Some time around the 14th, I will be there. Until then, I will continue to curse, throw my hands in the air, bang my head on the keyboard and sigh exasperatedly at this piece of crap machine.

In other news, I did not take many pictures at Camp Baby. I was too busy talking and well, I was just tired the whole time I was there. I did manage to snap this shot, confirming that I am the master of Wii Bowling and that Heather is a looooooser. Actually, I’m not that great at bowling on the Wii. Jacob is way better and beats me all the time. Somehow on this night, however, I managed to get like 5 or 6 strikes in a row. Odd.

Also, the lasagna of last night… I really love the food saver machine. I really am contemplating doing more bulk cooking. This will probably be doubleplusgood when the new computer gets here since nightly cooking tends to break into my most productive work hours. I’m on a roll between 4 and 6 — in that hyperfocused zone, you know?

So far… lots of fun.

The best part, however, has been meeting my co-worker, Heather.

More about that later. I don’t drink wine and I had some tonight. It’s making my head hurt. I want to take a bath desperately.

Well, tomorrow is the Johnson and Johnson Camp Baby gig, so I’m off again.

I’m tired. I have so much to do… I really just want to be home. I’m such a home body.

I’m kind of glad that I’m getting in early (though not glad that I’m leaving early) because it will give me a chance to sit down and finish some of the things I need to get done…

I don’t miss travel at all. I really don’t.

Oh, speaking of work stuff… I blogged something caffeine related at work and got a Starbuck’s ad. So, I went to check it out, since I think that’s the first time I’ve seen one of those on my site. I know we’ve got new marketing people in place who are doing cool stuff, so maybe that’s why… Anyway — best idea ever: My Starbucks Idea. I hope they really do follow through on a lot of those ideas. Better than sitting around in a corporate meeting room talking about new ideas that may or may not have anything to do with what your customers would really appreciate. I voted for a bunch of ideas I liked (free coffee on your birthday, reusable sleeves, frequent flier cards, FREE WI-FI, etc.)

Did I mention free wi-fi? Did I mention I’d rather go to the Coffee Beanery because they have free wi-fi?

Or at least when I was still allowed coffee… I don’t think tea is as good out as it is at home.

Oh yeah, I forgot to talk about Teecini… yeah, not for me. I just can’t get with it. For now it’s me and Earl Greyer or my PG Tips…

It cannot possibly be almost 7pm.

Austin was a good time. Makes me wish I’d made it to guide events past. It was really amazing meeting the folks I work with. We’re all sort of isolated not working in an office together…

Clothingwise, I’m glad I decided to just say screw it and wear jeans. Haha. Everyone else did, too, for the most part. One of the editors did have on one of those cute, tie-in-the-front shirts though, but it was very casual and I felt comfortable. I have a real deficiency in the area of personal fashion. I’m a bit like Gilda Radner who said:

“I base most of my fashion taste on what doesn’t itch.”

Boyfriend actually had to Google once about the apparent (to everyone else in the world but me) faux pas of wearing black and brown together. See, to me, those two colors look great together. It’s very soothing to me, in fact. Much better than say, black and white. That makes me think you’re a Mormon doing your door-to-door mission work or that you’re going to refresh my tea and ask me if I “saved any room for dessert.” Yet, there’s a whole store devoted to that color combo.

Whatever.

Gilda said something else, too:

“While we have the gift of life, it seems to me the only tragedy is to allow part of us to die — whether it is our spirit, our creativity or our glorious uniqueness.”

Black and brown. That is my gloriously unique gift to the world.

Maybe not, but screw it. It’s just how I am and I’m not going to let it die just because I’m being forced to leave the house and play with my peers.

More later, time for school.

for no good reason. It’s not like I was doing anything productive, because I had a headache from hell from no caffeine. (Although I did sneak a few sips of a Mexican Coke in with dinner… but that’s really just a drop in the bucket of caffeine I generally consume in a day…)

So, I don’t know if that Teeccino stuff does actually offer a natural “lift” or not. I don’t know what it was.

I’m going to Coldwater Creek today, which is not a creek but rather a clothing store. I found a blog post someone had made about it that indicates I will probably like their clothing:

“I know the niche market is 40 yr old female English professors who drive subarus, but who is to say that that won’t be me one day?!“

I’m almost 40. I was going to be an English professor till I changed my mind and now I’m going to be a Librarian. (ooooh, big change there!) And I am a writer… and I used to drive a Subaru. I miss it dreadfully, seat heaters and all…

Anyway, Jacob’s Ness (stepmom) was wearing this cute pink top the other night when I went to hang with Jacob and Jessen… had this tie in the front. Really cute. And then when I went to pick Jacob up yesterday, his math / social studies teacher had on a yellow shirt that was similar and also cute, same tie thing in the front… and I thought, “Where are they getting these cute shirts? I need one!” And then I actually said that exact thing out loud to his teacher and she said she got it at Coldwater Creek and that earlier in the day when Ness had dropped him off at school she said something about the shirt, too. Funny.

Anyway, the deal is, I got rid of all my dress clothes. Remember the purge? So, yeah, they were too small anyway and I haven’t worked in an office (except for my brief time at Citi) for over 12 years. I only kept nice clothes around when I worked at iVillage for those NYC trips and conferences and stuff. Working remotely has its benefits: sweatpants and hoodies.

So, now I’m going to an Austin conference for About.com… finally I can go and so far no one has gotten sick or died to change my plans. It’s casual and all, but my idea of casual is pretty casual and plus I’m getting a new guide photo. Yay. I think my hair has recovered enough from the busted arm-related chopping that I’ll be happy with the shot. And then I’m going to Johnson & Johnson’s Camp Baby in NYC (which has blown up into some nastiness, btw) and I have no idea what the atmosphere there is going to be. Business casual, I’d imagine. So, the point is — I have no clothes for this stuff. I only have my mom clothes. The rest is with the Goodwill.

The other problem with buying a few outfits to wear is that one event is in Austin (where 80+ degree weather has already started) and the other is in NYC (where there have been temps below freezing this last week). Ugh. In fact, I just looked at the weather and it might snow in NYC next week. Joy. So, I guess I will get whatever works down here and take a couple of sweaters with me to the deal up North.

Meanwhile, there’s a big redesign going down and I need to get my ducks in a row for that and if you think I’m caught up with school you’ve lost your mind. Great timing on going out of town. I couldn’t be spread thinner if a steam roller went over me. 50 times. The sad bonus to all this… my kid is in Guatemala. What irony that I’m a bit grateful that my kid is out of town so that I can deal with all this kid-related stuff. I’m also super happy he gets to take this trip because he’s going to see so much interesting stuff and have such a great time. But I have to tell you, when I dropped him off over at his Dad’s house and said Goodbye, I was saying, “HELLO!” to a long, uninterrupted stream of work and school.

Whatever, I’m so over mom guilt. I wish I could take new moms and fast forward their lives about 10 years so they can see that all the stuff they fret about and all that time they spend worrying that they are doing everything wrong is a waste. Guilt is crap. Just slow down and enjoy those years. I know it’s cliche, but it’s true: They grow up so fast.

Besides, there’s so much other guilt in the world to immerse yourself in… Like the guilt of taking one orange mommy cat and her kitten to the vet, finding that they both are sick with FLV (that’s why she was doing that weird little cough and why the kittens were dying) and then having to have them both euthanized. It’s a long story that I have partially drafted, but it’s really so painful I can’t finish. It’s been two weeks now and every night I still think about the sweetness of mama orange thing and just cry. Last night was particularly bad because my neck was hurting so I went for the heating pad… and I had used that pad to keep the kitten warm in the nesting box. So, I just sat there and bawled like a giant baby, thinking about her.

I can’t talk about it any more. I’m going to go get these clothes and then hurry back here so I can read, read and then… read some more.

lots of stuff going on as usual. I can barely find the time to think. I’m so friggin’ tired. Basically, though:

• flus and colds at both houses
• MRSA at the ex’s house so J was with me without a break for weeks
• hurt my thumb and couldn’t type for a few days
• stomach ailment requiring multiple poo samples from J
• five or six days ? out of school in the last few weeks for J
• stray orange cat gave birth to three kittens either premature or just way too small and two didn’t make it
• the one that made it cries all night and has a hard time finding a nipple and she doesn’t want to take care of it

I am exhausted and behind in school, behind with where I want to be workwise, haven’t been in the mood for any good lovin’ and I’m just generally worn out and grumpy. Having the kittens and worrying about them making it has been stressful. One of them could just not find the nipple at all and had such a weak suck. I think it must have gotten a chill since the mom cat kept leaving them at first. I was worried that she had another one in there.

She literally gave birth to one on the couch sitting between me and my boyfriend and if I hadn’t looked down and seen it I wouldn’t have even known. That was Thursday night. She didn’t have the other two until Sunday!! The whole time inbetween she was acting crazy and was glued to my side, meowing over and over and over. I felt so bad for her although she didn’t seem to be in pain. She was just doing that “talking” meow or that meow they do when you’re getting canned food ready. I’d say something to her and she’d just meow back again and keep meowing at me.

There are not enough hours in the day for all this stuff sometimes.

I will write more later (famous last words) but right now I’ve got to get the rest of my reading done and post some stuff for a group project. My saving grace is that J’s stepmom isn’t working in an office this week and she’s offered to pick him up every day from school this week, so I’m going to blow it out and get caught up. Yay! I’d feel bad about not seeing him except he’s been over here so much with the MRSA stuff being over there, so I know he misses being over there and misses his sister, especially. No guilt. That’s my new mantra. Or credo. Or mission statement. Whatever.

No guilt. I’m tired of guilt for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Nothing I do is that friggin’ bad.

I need a change in strategy here for parenting.

I really do.

It’s not that things are bad right now… They really aren’t. Jacob is doing well in school and we’re fine…

But it’s me.

And he is starting to cross into this… independent place. I can see it. It’s funny, though. On the one hand he does things that remind me of a 2-year-old, and the next he’s showing maturity more his age or beyond. He’s still got some of the little kid in him, but it’s vanishing quickly.

So, I need to allow this transition to take place and I need to be the calm one around here.

I know this because I did it before and it worked. I had some happy days in there.

Keyword being I.

ME.

I did it before because I’d read this book and I got all fired up. It was ScreamFree Parenting.

Truly one of the best books I’ve ever read with very sound logic and it’s like every page is a lightbulb moment for me.

Then there’s bridging the gap between practice and theory. I didn’t do so well putting it into practice. I mean, I did. For a while. But then I stopped.

So I’ve got to start again.

Because I need to focus on me and Jacob needs to focus on Jacob. I’m about to be very busy with school and work. And I want to be able to focus on those things because they are important to the future of this family. To ME.

So, I’m reading it again.

And I’m starting again.

New Year.

New habits. Old habits going away. Fresh start. All that stuff… good things.

Very good things…

Today, I got a lot of stuff done. A lot of stuff that I have been meaning to do forever. And of course, because I did all that, I decided that I should start a new project, that is bigger than anything I have done before.

Because I’m about to start school (have I mentioned the 17 hours? I’m sure I have at least 17hundred times, no?) and I will just have all the time in the world for new work projects.

What am I thinking?

It’s just such a good idea.

In other news, the boyfriend and I just went and bought a new bed. The old bed sucks so bad, it’s like this antique size that you have to have special made and of course that costs more than a house. So, the bed-buying thing was freaking me out… I mean, it’s not like buying an mp3 player or something where you can go online and find out what a bajillion people think is the best one and there isn’t an army of bed nerds on here doing a point-by-point review of every mattress that has ever existed…

There’s not that. Just a bunch of crap about how many coils you should get and to avoid lots of toxic materials and whatnot.

It was worse than buying a bathing suit.

Until we went to the little ole family mattress joint up the road… and then things got really easy. These guys have been in business for a long time. They didn’t give us any crap or put any pressure on us… just told us which beds sell well and then told us to go lay on them all.

So we ended up getting this Simmon’s BeautyRest bit with a pillow top… it’s soft because of that, but then underneath it feels all firm, like it’s not going to give way too much and be saggy in spots or anything like that.

All in all we spent like $600 bucks (half of which was a Christmas present from boyfriend’s dad) and it’s the same mattress that Sears and all those corporate type stores are selling for twice as much (or more).

I feel fine.

Well, actually I don’t feel fine yet, because the mattress isn’t going to be here until Thursday… but I feel good about the decision at least and it was a lot less painful than I thought it was going to be. I was bracing myself for a full-on nervous breakdown.

We went to Taco Bueno and had celebratory tacos.

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Then David and Brandon came over and had drinks and played Scrabble and the Wii.

And of course because I was tipsy I wanted to have that fun, uninhibited kind of lovin’ with boyfriend later… you know, the kind of lovin’ that comes when vodka makes me forget what all my flabby parts look like hangin’ in the breeze…

Good stuff.

More in a bit, need to get Jacob into bed. He came home sick from school today and he’s so stuffed up. Not so stuffed up that he can’t play Grand Turismo, however. But definitely enough to miss school.

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I find it really hard to type when my hands are so cold. I’m going to have to get gloves and cut the fingers off or something.

Why am I always so damn cold?

I am trying out Qumana. It’s not a drug or herbal supplement to help raise your metabolism so that your body generates more heat. No.

It is an offline blogging doohickey. It doesn’t work with the new version of blogger, however, so I will have to wait to use it here. They’ve got to figure out the bug and get a new version up or something like that. I’ll wait.

It works with my wordpress blogs at work, though, so I kinda like it. I can just save a bunch of crap that I haven’t fleshed out completely and come back to it later instead of letting it hand in my mail folder, which is kind of like a dead letter box at the post office. I might as well rename my “do something” folder “do nothing.”

I procrastinate.

I think that school will help this. I’m taking 17 hours this semester, and it seems like the more shit I have to do, the more shit I actually get done in all areas of my life, no matter how frazzled I may seem.

I’m looking forward to it.

We went out of town to visit my boyfriend’s family and were away from home for like 20 days or something. I didn’t work much of those 20 days. I am about to feel it in my paycheck.

I know Will must have some gloves around here that I can alter.

I’m going to go look for those and then I will be back…

I hate for my chair to get jealous with all the Jerker attention:

And I love it. It does all kinds of stuff. Tilts back and forward and goes up and down and has soft armrests that are adjustable and it is just so damn comfy and much better for my back.

Has some insanely long warranty, too.

Go Staples.

So, we went to Ikea, and now I have the ne