Excitement on the side

How my Monday was like a Primus Song

Posted on June 13, 2011 | 5 comments

I’ve been to hell. I spell it…I spell it DMV
~ Les Claypool

A typical Monday morning for me is a lot more Bangles and a lot less Primus. But I don’t typically go to the DMV first thing Monday morning. Walking out of the house with my lunch, my kid, my dog, a piece of fresh fruit for school, the mail that needs to go out, both doors locked, alarm on, cats fed, do I have my phone… that’s enough for me on an average Monday. But as of this Monday morning I have been married for six weeks. I have had an expired driver’s license with the wrong name for five. It was time to take the bull by the horns.

But why Monday morning? Because I had already given the DMV four shots. The first time I went very early in the morning, just after they opened. I went first to the courthouse for a copy of our marriage certificate and then immediately to the DMV. Nope, I still needed a social security card. No problem. Went to the social security office. An hour and half in to my wait at the social security office the muzak was making me anxious. I elected to drive very carefully and under the speed limit on my expired license until my social security card came in the mail. I filled out the form, put my marriage certificate and my birth certificate (an original copy from when I was a baby, how proud am I for never losing THAT!?) in to an envelope and sent it on its merry way.

A week or so later my documents were returned to me sans social security card. This seems like a strange waste of money but what do I know. And three days later my card arrived. Back to the DMV I go. This time in the middle of the day, the day that Em graduated when I had an hour or so free in the middle of the day. I thought that was an appropriate way to honor the little graduate. “Congrats on your accomplishment, welcome to the real world. You’re going to the DMV.” We went in, we got a number, we sat down. The tricky numbering system of both Letters and Numbers means you never really know how many people are in front of you. But it was shortly after eleven o’clock in the morning. And when I overheard a woman say that she had been there since 8:45 am I elected to call it quits. I would never make it out of there before Em lost her mind.

Trip to the DMV number three . Seven am. They don’t open until eight. I am almost giddy with excitement as I pull in to the parking lot and round the corner to see…. thirty two people already in line. Yes, I counted.

Trip number four , the suspense is mounting can you feel it? 3:00 pm, two hours before they close. Packed to the gills and no longer handing out tickets. Sigh, another weekend as a daredevil without a valid license.

I was not to be defeated. Enter Primus. Trips one through four did not have theme songs. This was clearly my problem. (Special thanks to MQD for reminding me of this stellar tune.) Nor did they have beach chairs. Or refreshments. Or books. I was first in line. It was just almost 6:30 am. For the first twenty minutes I was all alone. It was almost like early morning at the beach, only in a strip mall. The sun on your legs, but you can still feel the chill in the air from the night before. And then I was joined by the second person in line. I mustered every bit of “Please do not talk to me” I have and kept my face in my book. Ten, twenty minutes passed. “I thought I would be first in line,” he said. I only smiled. Success. He went out to his car to get a book. At approximately 7:30 a man asked me if he could get in front of me for $20. “Sure, and in front of all these other people… at $20 a pop, I figure that will run you between four and five hundred bucks.” And another big smile. That conversation didn’t last long either.

Eight am, on the dot, the door opens. I get my ticket A101. “Now serving A101 at desk 1.” This alone was reason to celebrate. My personal DMV employee having come straight from the 1984 Police Academy cast of extras was the icing on the cake.

Some highlights.

“How long have you been married? You’re the happiest damn woman I have ever seen at the DMV. ”

“Do you ever act like a total bitch? My boyfriend he just bought me four new tires and I was hateful to him last night, just hateful… I didn’t sleep at all thinking about it…”

“Only 35 years old, you’re real sexy. I’m not a lesbian, I have had the same boyfriend for 16 years, been with the DMV for 20. In Siler City for 17. But you’re really chesty for being so thin, that’s nice.”

She has me smooth out my pigtails before I take my picture. “Ooh, now that is a nice picture. You have a real nice face, m’aam. A real nice face.”

“You know this is a real stressful job, you have no idea. Now I need to read off of this card and quit cutting up… you practice writing that brand new name for a few minutes.”

I thought she was going to hug me when I left. With my temporary driver’s license in hand. At 8:16 am. The best Monday morning I have had in some time. And the very best trip to the DMV. Hands down.

In eight more years I hope to go back and say hello to her again. In the meantime, this happy gal with the nice jugs and the real nice face will be driving willy-nilly all over the place.

5 Comments

Posted in Nonsense

Tagged DMV, Monday, Primus

I scream, you scream….

Posted on June 10, 2011 | 2 comments

Yesterday was hard. My baby is growing up. But when she burst in to tears because the restaurant we were in “FOR MY SPECIAL DAY” did not have pancakes … I smiled on the inside. And we got up, and we left. And we went to Elmo’s.

Where they have pancakes. And milkshakes.

2 Comments

Posted in Bad Mood, Parenting

Tagged Elmo's, Milkshake's, Pancakes, Parenting

Day 84: Plant a seed…

Posted on June 9, 2011 | 9 comments

Today plant an apple core in a park and come back in 20 years to check on your tree.

Par for the course lately… I accomplished day 84’s challenge, in a round about way. I got up early this morning and took Fish out for a walk. A typical day includes Fisher tagging along to work with me so he was flummoxed when I peeled him out of bed at 7 am. I grabbed an apple on my way out the door.

Ordinarily I listen to a book while I take a walk but this morning I needed a minute to gather my thoughts.

I managed to juggle a dog leash (stuffed in my sports bra! Hey, now! My boobs nourished a child for three and a half years AND they walk my dog! Amazing!!) a cup of coffee and an apple core. I’d planned on planting my apple core somewhere along my walk today. And as I knelt down next to the edge of some trees and dug a little hole with my foot I wondered if I’d be here to come check on “my tree” in twenty years as the book suggested.

And then I started to cry. Because this was only the first seed that would be planted today. My little girl “graduates” from pre-school today. She is excited. She has practiced her song “My Future’s So Bright” complete with shades, of course. (Em is the second bobbing head from the left, in the back row!) She has picked out an outfit. She has expressed her malcontent with continuing to go to pre-school for the remainder of the summer “because it makes no sense, I have GRADUATED!” She is ready.

Again I am left to wonder how it is that I have prepared her for yet another transition and failed to prepare myself at all. With each passing milestone of her childhood I am surprised all over again that it has crept up on me and yet seems to have come all but too slow for her liking.

I see in her a determination that I envy. We have been hard at work on swimming this summer. Our new pool requires the kids swim a length of the pool in order to go down the tube slide. From the day we found out she has been practicing. And rapidly, fearlessly improving. It is not just the former swimming teacher in me that swells with pride. She is convinced daily that “Today I will pass that test!” and is not defeated when she climbs out of the pool to head home for dinner with the knowledge that it might take “one or two more practices.”

I know it is not unusual for a kid to be convinced of their inevitable success. Each child at graduation this morning held up a picture of what they were going to be “when they grew up.” Doctors, teachers, ballerinas, veterinarians, mothers, a samurai, Darth Vader and a Superman. Not one of them said “I’m going to live in my parent’s basement and wait tables until this crappy temp job turns permanent.” Children are hopeful by design. But I can’t help but feel a sense of accomplishment when I see how completely convinced she is of her success and happiness.

Emily has seen more sadness in me than I ever hoped to share with her. But when I see her so certain that it will all work out for her, I know that she has not only noted my sadness and my struggles. She has seen me relentlessly pursue that which will bring a smile to face, even when the journey took much longer than I had hoped. She has seen me grow in to the woman that knows she deserves nothing short of a dream come true.

I thought I would be overwhelmed with how big she seemed today. But instead I just kept looking at her little face. Her nose is the same as when she was born. Her fingers, though longer, still curl around mine just as they did when she was only a few days old. Her skin, even peppered with bug bites and scrapes, still feels brand new.

I may not return to the corner where I planted an apple seed this morning. But I will be here to see the seed that was planted today at graduation grow. I knew someday I’d put my arm around her, pulling her close to me, my eyes intently focused on the camera as if the camera could make that moment last forever. I knew someday she’d pull away, her focus on where she was headed, not where she had been… but I had no idea she would still be so very small.

9 Comments

Posted in Family, Parenting, This Book Will Change Your Life

Tagged Graduation, Kindergarten, Parenting, This Book Will Change Your Life

“Fear can hold you prisoner. Hope can set you free.”

Posted on May 31, 2011 | 11 comments

The library in my parent’s bedroom was full of books, most of them hardbacks. Sometimes they were exactly what I was expecting. In the summer of 1984 I fell for Nancy Drew and I was never disappointed. Book after book, I enjoyed them all. Several years after that Agatha Christie was more my speed. I loved Christie’s Hercule Poirot (but I admit years later I love Albert Finney’s Poirot from the 70’s film Murder on the Orient Express even more.)

Year after year I found more books that I’d not yet read. I’d stand in front of the big built-in book case until something caught my eye. Sometimes the books I pulled down were not at all what I had expected or hoped they’d be.

I read The Reincarnation of Peter Proud and spent way too much thinking about reincarnation for an average ten year old.

I pulled Helter Skelter down thinking it would be about The Beatles and was none too interested in the Manson murders.

I was titillated upon finding Lady Chatterley’s Lover but soon discovered that the late night viewing of Bo Derek’s Bolero I was able to catch on “the blue channel” of “Super TV” at an often unsupervised friend’s house put it to shame. (I recognize that this is a heinously long run-on sentence but I am so pleased with my recollection of SuperTV and the memory that the dirty movies were in blue in the guide. I mean how many times could you watch The Golden Seal and On Golden Pond before you wondered what the “Blue channel” was all about? I think it is only too sad that I might be the only person on the planet that remembers this weird pre-cable TV movie box, but I do so fondly.)

I first met Andy Dufresne the summer after seventh grade. I tore through Christine that summer and then promptly read everything in the house that Stephen King had written. My heart ached for Carrie and then silently cheered for her. I remember remarkably little of any of The Bachman Books (aside from thinking I was far more clever than my fellow 12 year olds for reading them at all, since we had the copies that did not actually say “Written by Stephen King” on them.) I started and stopped both It and The Tommyknockers several times that summer. And then I stumbled across Different Seasons.

I was as charmed by King’s Gordie in The Body as I had been by Wil Wheaton’s in Stand By Me. But it was Andy from Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption that stuck with me the longest. Years later when the movie came out I was moved all over again. I suppose an alternate title to this post could be “Things I Learned from Andy Dufresne.” My pal Andy also suggested that I ought to “Get busy living, or get busy dying.” He’s a smart cookie, that Andy.

Lately I have had little drive to sit down to write. And it’s not because I don’t have lots of Big Thoughts. Or Big Plans. I’m just busy. Busy living, I guess. And hoping.

MQD and I have been married now for one month. And in the last month I have allowed myself to eat great big scoops of Hope. And I’ve not dined on even a morsel of Fear. There is plenty to be Hopeful for, and certainly plenty to Fear. But for now I am trying to be mindful of Andy’s words. Often when I am asked for advice by a friend it comes back to the same thing, over and over. I always say “You just get this one life.”

I think that is what Andy meant when he said you’ve “got to get busy living, or get busy dying.” And not until I started thinking about it today did I see the parallels between hope/freedom/living and fear/prison/dying. I’d never thought of my countless “what if’s” and of my worries as a prison. But it’s true.

If I had to answer the “what is different since you got married?” question today, it would be the same as my answer to “What is different since you turned 35?” (Eerie, right, if I had not celebrated my 35th birthday on the last day of our honeymoon.)

I am not afraid.

There’s not much that Vic Chesnutt didn’t figure out in his short life. I have, to quote Jeremy, bought a pass to shake my ass at a zillion Widespread Panic shows. And at at least a third of them they played Let’s Get Down to Business. But I think I finally get it, Vic.

Let’s Get Down To Business shall we?
It’s time we stop playing stop playing games …
Let’s Get Down To Business shall we….
And tackle this what shackles us all of this pressing business. ~Vic Chesnutt

It’s fear that shackles most of us. And I am unafraid. I don’t know if it is getting married. Or turning 35. Or the big heaping bowls of Hope I’ve been eating. But I am not gonna ask too many questions.

We’d been married for one week, on this day, the morning of my thirty-fifth birthday. But it was May 10th I stopped being afraid.

11 Comments

Posted in Family

Tagged Andy Dufresne, Fear, Hope, Reading, Stephen King, SuperTV

Day 83: International Helloooo

Posted on May 31, 2011 | 1 comment

Today call someone on the other side of the world and explain how strange it is for them to be asleep when you’re awake.

It is somewhat fitting that I’d be returning to the daily challenges (head hung low, feeling like a failure, as I have been away for far too long) to say simply that I fail at this challenge. The only person I can call in an opposite time zone is my brother and sister-in-law and I can’t think of a good reason for waking them up in the middle of the night. Although to be fair, I do owe my brother a phone call. So, perhaps I should give him a ring next time I wake up at 3:30 am and say hello, 9:30 pm his time, might not be a bad time to catch up, right?

1 Comment

Posted in This Book Will Change Your Life

Brain Movies

Posted on May 17, 2011 | 2 comments

Every morning I ask Emily how she slept the night before. Usually she responds “Great!” Very occasionally she looks sleepier than normal and I ask her if she had a decent night’s sleep. She’ll scratch her head, mussing her hair and giving me a window in to the teenager she will one day become and say “I couldn’t fall asleep…” or “I woke up in the middle of the night…”

Em doesn’t suffer in silence. Usually I am well aware of her late night wakefulness. I paid my dues with the kid that co-slept almost full time until she was three and appeared in my bed in the wee hours of the morning almost nightly until she was four. The first time she told me she’d awakened I was surprised. She hadn’t come to climb in my bed, her room was as we’d left it the night before so I tentatively asked her what she did all night. “I watched brain movies.”

At first I thought she meant dreams. But the more we talked about it she explained that when she can’t sleep she looks at “brain movies, about my day, or about things that have never even happened….”

The other evening I was sitting on the couch with MQD and I got myself all choked up (shocking, I know.) “We’ve been married for almost two weeks, and I remember less and less of the day, of the actual event every day.” There are moments in your life that you think you’ll hold on to forever. And then the days pass by and slowly the memory fades. I may not remember the details of the day, but I will never forget how I felt.

I couldn’t sleep last night. Woke up around three o’clock in the morning and was awake for the better part of the rest of the night. I tried watching brain movies. I have a lot of excellent footage from the last few weeks to choose from. Kind of wishing I could kick back and watch some brain movies right now….

When I can’t sleep Fish doesn’t sleep, either. He keeps me company. Follows me from room to room. Wondering, I am sure, what exactly we are doing awake and whether it would be appropriate to take my entire spot in the bed.

He is definitely watching brain movies right now…

2 Comments

Posted in Family, Parenting

Tagged Brain Movies, Dreams, insomnia, Wedding

Happy, I found you….

Posted on May 16, 2011 | 3 comments

I haven’t been this happy in years. ~ Emily June

7:30 in the morning, Monday, May 9th, 2011

I don’t know what she meant by that… in years? She’s only 5. But I have been 35 for almost two weeks, married now for almost three weeks, and neither have I. A proper update is coming… but for now… just know that I am so very, very happy.

We had a delightful band at our reception, the Gravy Boys. They have an amazing tune, Happy. It is my hope it will be an anthem of sorts for the rest of the year.

Can’t remember life before you
And all my memories lead to you
What’ll happen if I ever lose you
Just don’t matter, ‘cause I end with you
‘Cause only you can make me

Happy, so happy
Happy, I found you

3 Comments

Posted in Family

Tagged Emily, Gravy Boys, Happy, Wedding

Day 82: Meditation

Posted on April 25, 2011 | 4 comments

Day 82: Sit in the lotus position for 30 minutes.
Sure. Just as soon as I have thirty minutes. I actually did take thirty extra minutes after Bikram the other night to sit. And just be. It’s easier to carve out thirty minutes of time when you have already earmarked ninety.

This morning I knew I had to go to the chiropractor, remind Mike to get keys cut, sign up Emily for kindergarten after school care and then go to work. But when I looked at my phone on the way in to the chiropractor’s office and my gmail calendar was not showing up, I flipped. I tend to schedule things, put it on the calendar and I don’t have to feel the stress of both completing a task and remembering it. But this week I actually have things on there like “find suitcases.” “Charge camera battery.” Not in lists… but on my calendar. At certain times. I am starting to feel the Bridal Mania and I have been choosing to sedate it with a steady diet of Budweiser and scheduling. Both seem to set me at ease. So, not being able to see my calendar this morning had me panicked. I can’t exactly kick back beers at work, so I need my calendar. If nothing pops up and tells me to do something, I’m cool. I’m not forgetting things.

To that end I decided I needed another thirty minutes of sitting. I rarely take a “lunch break.” But I have promised myself I’d get in the office early and stay a bit late if need be this week, so taking thirty minutes for me seemed necessary. And it is 80-something out today. And not raining.

It wasn’t on my calendar. But I sat on the floor for thirty minutes and did my damnedest NOT to think about anything.

And then I took a quick walk outside. Spring has sprung. I hear Springtime is a nice time to get married. And turn 35. And make babies. I am feeling pretty confident in my ability to get two of the three accomplished in the next couple of weeks. For now, the third task is not on my calendar. Fingers crossed that it won’t ever need to be.

4 Comments

Posted in Exercise, This Book Will Change Your Life

Tagged Birthdays, Lotus, Spring, Wedding

It just might be a lunatic you’re looking for…

Posted on April 14, 2011 | 11 comments

No matter how sure I am, no matter that I know in my heart of hearts that I am doing the “right thing” there is something about having a “wedding” that is making me antsy. It’s funny, I never felt like this when I got married before. Although if you’d asked me to be honest, even then, if I thought we’d make it until the end of time I would have had to ask you what “make it” looks like to you.

I am so absolutely ready to marry MQD. We have grown so much together in the last two years. Not only closer, but individually. And I can see us continuing to challenge each other for years to come. It is the making a decision that touches not just my life, maybe, that is making it scarier. You don’t typically choose a parent for your child. And I have been so lucky. To find a boy that makes me crazy and a man that makes me sane all wrapped up in one human being.

So what is it that has me staring at the ceiling at night instead of sleeping? Equal parts “Do I remember where I put my strapless bra?” and “Will anyone notice that my shoes are not exactly the same color as my crinoline?” and “How long do we try to get pregnant before I freak the fuck out?” I suppose. But if I dig deep and am honest there isn’t any part of me that wonders if MQD is the “right person” for me. But I do find it unsettling that there is no litmus test.

I never imagined I’d get married again. And I never imagined I’d spend my days adding up numbers and arranging invoices and expenses and facts. But what appeals to me about my job is exactly what is making me antsy about getting married. I don’t love construction. Or math. But I love it when all the numbers add up. They are right. There is no need to argue them. They are correct. Period. I love being right.

In about two weeks I will gather my friends and family and say “Hey guys! Check out this Life Plan. I pick him. He is “right.” And I am “right” for him.” But I can’t export a marriage in to Excel and double-check it. There will be no tape from the adding machine stapled to our marriage license with my initials on it.

I have been thinking on this for a few days. Wondering when I stopped being fearless. Is it being a parent? being older? having been hurt in the past? Have I just developed a tendency to over think things in the last decade?

And then I ran across this. And I stopped worrying about right or wrong.

Loving the wrong person

Let our scars fall in love.
–Galway Kinnell

We’re all seeking that special person who is right for us. But if you’ve been through enough relationships, you begin to suspect there’s no right person, just different flavors of wrong. Why is this? Because you yourself are wrong in some way, and you seek out partners who are wrong in some complementary way. But it takes a lot of living to grow fully into your own wrongness. And it isn’t until you finally run up against your deepest demons, your unsolvable problems–the ones that make you truly who you are–that we’re ready to find a lifelong mate. Only then do you finally know what you’re looking for. You’re looking for the wrong person. But not just any wrong person: the right wrong person–someone you lovingly gaze upon and think, “This is the problem I want to have.”

I will find that special person who is wrong for me in just the right way.

~ Andrew Boyd

Can’t get much more wrong than this, can you? Love you, MQD. Thanks for putting up with me the last few weeks.

11 Comments

Posted in Family, Parenting, Wedding Planning

Tagged Andrew Boyd, cold feet, Wedding

Letting go and holding on…

Posted on April 6, 2011 | 10 comments

I have an unlikely friend. The Universe works in mysterious ways. When my phone rang a couple of weeks ago and it was the young lady my ex-husband was living with soon after we separated you’d probably not have guessed that I’d have answered. Or that she’d have been calling to ask for advice. Or that I’d have poured a glass of wine and sat down on my back porch, giggling like I was talking to a dear girlfriend. Or that I’d have been so very thrilled to hear the anticipation in her voice as she was preparing to catch up with an old boyfriend.

Then again you’d be just as surprised to know that a few years ago, when I was preparing our divorce papers it was Hillary I called. To make sure it was a good time to send them. That she’d be around if he needed someone to talk to. Because I hated the idea of him hurting and not talking to anyone about it.

Sometimes the world brings you the people you need in your life. And sometimes you seek them out, asking advice from the friends that you know will tell you want to hear. I knew Hillary would tell me to do what I needed to do, not take any bullshit, rip the band-aid off. And when she called the other evening, I suspect she knew that I’d tell her to dive in, head first, heart and arms wide open, because what have you got to lose? If there was ever a time to ask a woman if she thinks it is a good idea to be open to the possibility of Love I’d guess that the month before she gets married is a pretty damn good time. I think my exact words to her that night were “What did you think I’d say? Are you fucking kidding, I love Love!”

So it was with a heavy heart that I read her email last week. She told me that it was a no-go with the old flame. I replied that she just has to keep putting herself out there. And in what I declare a moment of genius told her that “our hearts are like earthworms. We have endless regenerative powers.” Hillary is a tough cookie. And when I didn’t hear from her I assumed that she was toughing it out. Her earthworm heart mending itself in time to be torn in two for perhaps the gazillionth time, but all in all, no worse for the wear. And then yesterday she posted this….

Dear Kelly Ann,
You never mentioned that once you try and finally let go….what happens when they try to force themselves back into your life? What if my guard is weak just like my heart? Why all these fucking games? Why all the constant tugs on my heart strings?
Sincerely, Hillary from cantstopthebeattt

And I am at a loss. I am a Dreamer. A Believer in Love. But I am not one to suggest to my friends that they keep putting themselves in the line of fire, earthworm hearts or not. So I am not sure how to respond. And when I am not sure of what I think I am prone to question what the asker thinks I am going to say… Did she ask me hoping that I’d tell her to stay true to her heart, to try one more time, to never give up, because after all wasn’t it me that was “in Love with Love” just last week? Or did she ask me because she heard the tearful struggles. She saw me crying in the parking lot of the Waffle House where Jer and I would swap Em for the weekend. She knew from our talks so long ago that I did leave once, but I never stopped loving. So maybe she was looking for me to be the Kenny Rogers of relationship advice and tell her to “know when to walk away, know when to run.”

As is usually the case once I talk myself all the way through both possibilities I can see that neither is really right.

I can’t tell you how to walk away. And I can’t tell you how to hold on and keep trying, in spite of the hurt. Because I don’t think we every really make that choice. Hillo, we don’t choose to fall in love. And we can’t, unfortunately, choose to let it go, either. I don’t think we ever really walk away, or put up a fence around our hearts, not when you love with your whole heart. So, then when is it over? It’s over one day when you wake up and you realize that you’re not crying. That you fell out of love as wordlessly, as effortlessly and quietly as you fell in.

So, keep treading water if you don’t want to dive in headfirst, little girl. But I’m afraid you can’t just get out of the pool. I don’t think girls like us have that as an option.

*A few years ago you put a bunch of pictures of your past in a mirror. A mirror that had been mine and had hung in my house, with pictures of my past in it for over a decade. When I moved out I didn’t take it with me. And it ended up in your hands. I hope you still have it. And I hope you keep looking in it. For a little while longer, anyway. And then I hope one day you don’t need it anymore. I hope you get all the answers you need from your past. And I hope you know how grateful I am for your unlikely friendship.