I changed my blog theme

Because I wanted to. And even though I really like it, I can’t see my blog title, so I hope you’re still reading.

You’ll find my twitter updates here, too, because you really don’t know enough about me.

What I hate (and a little bit of love)

*When people wake up one day, think “hey, maybe I’ll have another baby” and then POOF! – not only do they knocked up almost simultaneously with having that thought, but they actually STAY knocked up.

*That everyone who knows me knows something is off, but all they want to do is say “you’re really negative lately.” Gee fucking whiz, really?

*These fat rolls that appear when I sit on the couch, motivating me to do nothing more than cover up my belly with a couch pillow so I can’t see or feel them.

*Being so. fucking. broke.

*Knowing that the odds of my daughter actually wanting to move here in only 7 months are dramatically decreasing with every extracurricular she joins, but wanting her to be super involved.

*Curb Your Enthusiasm (which apparently I have no literal trouble doing)

But to be fair…I love…
*That my husband and I got in a ridiculously stupid fight last night but right now he’s rubbing my feet.
*Brand new running shoes like the ones I bought today – even though I canNOT afford them, I need them to avoid another ridiculously stupid fight.
*Planning our stu co trip to Disney World in March.
*Ryan’s 15 minute showers to “get warm”

What I took with me

Last night, John Ondrasik (Five for Fighting) said something that really stuck with me. He was telling a story about how he wrote one of his songs and he said, “There’s probably a song in this room right now, if you just listen.”

I love that word listen. No one (especially me) does it enough. There are uniquely precious stories in the world that never get heard. Even though we wax poetic about “getting everyone’s voice in the room”, people don’t listen.

I’ve decided to start listening. I feel the desire and the need to be writing something of consequence, but I’m stuck. I think I will start over by listening.

I know I promised to be better

and I haven’t. Sorry. We’ve entered the dead time of the year. Kids are sick of school. Teachers are sick of school. We haven’t had a day off – technically – since Labor Day. Thanksgiving feels about a light year away.

So imagine my joy at one just one, but TWO snow days last week. Yep, we were victimized by the first snow of the season. We ended up with close to 20 inches in our backyard and it was gorgeous. Cold, beautiful, pure whiteness. And now in true Colorado fashion, it’s gone. It was in the 60s yesterday. But I digress…

As a bullet point review (and as proof that we really do actually leave the house once in a while):
*I went to see Rob Thomas and reinforced my commitment to the fact that if the man showed up on my doorstep, I would go anywhere with him. My good God Lord…I only get this excited (okay, not quite) for one other man in my life.
*The snow days resulted in the cancellation of two events, so that was a nice break, but now our student council room is overflowing with leftover candy – not good when you realize you are literally (yes, my pants have gotten tighter the past two weeks) getting fatter by the day.
*We went to my mother-in-law’s house on Friday. Nothing to report. We then went to Megan’s first volleyball game on Saturday. Not much to report – they’re not that good, and the volleyball coach in me was SCREAMING, but I said nothing and cheered for my daughter. I won’t be that parent, but apparently her father will be. :::insert annoyed eye roll here::: She doesn’t need weights. She’s 12 – even joking about her body at this point is beyond stupid, you idiot.
*Halloween. Ahhh…it was okay. We had a ton of kids, which was fun. Then we watched videos of infant-sized Ryan. Oh, man. It amazes me to look back and realize that she’s been this way – this funny, spirited, can’t-not-look-at-herself-in-any-reflective-surface – since she was born, even before she was born.

But then in true fashion I realized that I SHOULD be about to have a baby. Frickin’ awesome. I try hard not to go there, but it’s a challenge. I try hard not to care, but it’s torture. I try hard to move past it, but it’s almost impossible. I feel like just one loss would have been doable – I mean, just one is…just one. So I’m trying to focus on the two children I DO have, but even that makes me crazy. Exhibit A: “I already have two kids. I ALREADY HAVE TWO KIDS. So why the HELL can’t I seem to have another one?” Exhibit B: when people on the online community to which I am addicted announce their pregnancies or births, I have to try VERY hard to post something nice. (sorry to those of you who are here – it’s not you, I promise) Exhibit C: pregnant people are everywhere. Seriously. There was even one in the SRO section of Five for Fighting last night. Gah.

Speaking of which – if you ever get the chance to go to a show at the Soiled Dove Underground in Denver, DO IT. Amazing venue.

Okay, I’m off to enjoy my new Snuggie. Yep. I bought one. It’s green. And now I won’t be cold when I type, so maybe I’ll type more.

Man, I love Wal*Mart

Not only does the Mecca of the Nascar crowd provide us with daily entertainment on the people of Wal Mart blog, things like this happen there (and yes, this is a true story):

On Saturday, my husband and I, after a particularly *interesting* half hour at home while the kids were at Dairy Queen with their favorite older friend , decided to go to the Wal*Mart. Yes, we call it THE Wal*Mart – Ryan started it when she was like two and it just stuck.

Anyhoo…Jesse started in the food section and I remembered I needed deodorant. So I strolled ran over to the health & beauty section while he started his trek through the aisles. I found my Secret (and WHY is deodorant almost FOUR dollars?!) and then found him in the bread aisle. As I walked down to meet him, I walked past a woman who looked like an overweight Sharon Stone with longer permed hair. She was in the middle of a sentence, which was apparently addressed to my husband, when she looked up and saw me. She then said, “OH! You’re married! (to him) I was just about to flirt with your husband! That’s how you know you have a cutie! (to me)”

Okay.

I have to admit that this made me laugh out loud. I mean…really?!?! REALLY? Then I realized that 1) she’d probably been alone a HELL of a lot longer than I have ever been; 2) to be sipping an iced coffee from the instore McDonald’s is just tragic (yep, I’m that guy); 3) no one ever flirts with me anymore *sigh*; and 4) my husband IS a cutie, but I don’t need your wannabe Poison video vixen self to flirt with him to know that.

So back off, women of the world. This slowly-balding, slightly-too-hairy-everywhere-else, beer/burrito/bratwurst-bellied man is MINE.

Remember the hos

When I began my online journey, I started at theknot, where I met some of my dearest friends. They (we) eventually became the FoCoHos (remember where that came from? from my student). The group has grown and shrunk. We’ve seen babies and weddings. We’ve cried tears of joy and grief.

Tonight, we had drinks. And apps. And drinks.

But more importantly, I had fun. I got out of the house. I was with people I don’t work with. And even though talk drifted to miscarriages and doctor horror stories, for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t sad. I saw a pregnant woman and didn’t want to cry. I felt supported (sorry, girls…I talked too much).

So thank you to Brandi for the brilliant plan. And thanks to my Hos (new AND old) for reminding me that there is still life out there, and it’s life worth living.

Sometimes I wonder

I wonder why more people don’t come by and leave comments.

And then I realize that I DON’T POST ENOUGH.

Yeah. Um. Sorry about that.

Here’s something you might not know about me: I am obsessed with song lyrics. Seriously. I love listening to the words of songs. I don’t even listen to a song if I can’t understand (or there aren’t any) lyrics. It is such a “problem” that my ex-husband actually thought that I wanted my life to BE a song. I wondered what was wrong with that. People find connections in literature, in film, in church…why not in a song? So I’ve decided to document the last week or so in song lyrics for you.

To remember my mother, on the 27th anniversary of her death:
And when I feel like I’m lost something tells me you’re here with me
And I can always find my way when you are here

Because sometimes I want to go back and completely change my life choices (and make my ex disappear):
I’ve paid a price, and I’ll keep paying

I’m not ready to make nice, I’m not ready to back down
I’m still mad as hell and I don’t have time to go round and round and round
It’s too late to make it right, I probably wouldn’t if I could
‘Cause I’m mad as hell
Can’t bring myself to do what it is you think I should

I know you said, why can’t you just get over it
It turned my whole world around, and I kind of like it

I made my bed and I sleep like a baby
With no regrets and I don’t mind sayin’
It’s a sad sad story when a mother will teach her
Daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger

Because I miss my daughter:

When destiny calls you, You must be strong
I may not be with you, But you’ve got to hold on
They’ll see in time, I know
We’ll show them together

Because I love my husband:
Every moment, as long as you’re mine
I’ll wake up my body, and make up for lost time

Say there’s no future, for us as a pair
And though I may know, I don’t care

Just for this moment, as long as you’re mine
Come be how you want to, and see how bright we shine

Because I’ve decided to take charge (like I’m supposed to do, because I’m ME, damnit!) and go to counseling:
Years go by will I still be waiting, for somebody else to understand
Years go by if I’m stripped of my beauty, and the orange cloud raining in my head
Years go by will I choke on my tears, till finally there is nothing left…
Hey but I don’t care cause sometimes, I said sometimes
I hear my voice
I hear my voice
I hear my voice

I think people don’t pay enough attention to the words – not on television, not in magazines, not in poetry, and definitely not in song. As poetry, they can be better than Byron. For pure personal connection and motivation, they can be better than Matt Foley.

Yours in promising-to-write-more, the lyric queen

My First Place

I’m currently nursing a small addiction to HGTV and I can’t get enough of the shows Property Virgins, My First Place and House Hunters. There’s just something about watching people look for their first home, making those big decisions…and then I get annoyed! Who are these 20-somethings that can afford a $300K house right out the gate?

My first place? A TRAILER. To be fair, it was a brand new trailer, and where we lived, that was the best thing to do. But it had WHEELS.

My second place? It cost $90,000. That’s a $600 mortgage, if you’re counting.

This place? Is actually pretty affordable for these parts.

I know that my first mistake was becoming a teacher. My second mistake was marrying another teacher – twice. The thing about teaching is that not only does it pay SHIT, there’s a limit to how much you can make. No bonuses. No pay increases after you max out the salary schedule.

Ah! You’re going to pull the “you have summers off” card, aren’t you? You might want to put that back…every single teacher I know does these things during the summer: takes classes, reads for their classroom, goes into their classroom, plans, looks for new material for their curriculum…are you getting my point? There are no summers off. And unlike people in the “real” world, I don’t get to leave my job at my place of work. I bring home grading about three nights a week and on the weekends – in fact, sometimes I have to *force* myself to stop working at home, I go to school on Saturdays about twice a month to plan and work. Over Christmas holidays, I answer emails from students and parents. I spend my spring break WITH my students.

There are intangibles, of course – I feel good about what I do. I know I impact the lives of kids. I am thanked almost daily by parents. And that’s all well and good – I’m not trying to belittle that, because heaven knows it’s about all we get.

I just wish someone could explain to me why someone who pushes paper all day gets to live in a 3000 square foot house and drive a car with less than 140,000 miles on it. Why they don’t get to the 25th of the month and hope the kids don’t get too hungry. Yes, I live a good life. I’m relatively healthy and I’m educated. My children are beautiful and intelligent and my husband is wonderfully supportive of me. This isn’t a “keep up with the Joneses” complaint, and I know I haven’t made the best financial choices in my life. I’ve come a long way and I’m proud of that, but. My kids deserve vacations. My family deserves a cushion. My basement deserves to be finished.

I just want to know why, because I happen to only be good at this one thing, that will never happen.

And we’re clear

As of 2:00 pm today, the biggest event of the year is over. Homecoming and all of its glory has passed into the annals of history. The assembly was gorgeous and the dance was packed. Movie night and the bonfire were well attended. We had to kick kids out of every event. I think we did a good job. And after a three hour clean up, today it’s over. I’d be lying if I said I was sad. I put in about an extra 40 hours this week – and of course I didn’t do it alone, but hey! I’m old! The kids have energy and youth on their side.

So I’ve decided to take Tuesday off. I wanted tomorrow, but since I’m starting new units in all my classes, there was just no way to make it work. So I’ll take Tuesday – and probably Wednesday – for some well-deserved rest. Then Friday, Jess and I are off to Breckenridge – I got a “come listen to our time share spiel and stay free for two nights” deal, and I’m taking it. Ryan is staying with Grandma, and hopefully we can get some restful time together.

That’s it. The next thing on my calendar is two full weeks away, and I’m looking forward to being home for a while.

Lucky 13?

13. That’s what my number is this week, down from over 200. In a week. But I still have to go back next week and again and possibly again until it’s zero. If I were to pee on a stick right now, I’d get a big fat negative, but I’m still “pregnant.” Stupid.

As an added bonus, the doctor has said to wait so many cycles that it will be February before we can try again. February. When this all started. Awesome. We didn’t have to wait that long after the molar. Still stupid.

Don’t they know I’m old and can’t afford to wait?