Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.
-- Leonard Cohen, Anthem
An extremely thoughtful friend sent this to me yesterday and when I read it I was all: FUCK YEAH! It's the sort of sentiment I wish I could read, see, ingest every single day. I'd be a better person; gentler with myself and less of a goddamned bitch.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Friday, January 30, 2009
Little ole me
Not having a great day.
I think about the moment (moments?) that I went from the young girl who looked in the mirror one day and decided that I would in fact grow up to be pretty *phew* to being the young woman who thought nothing of flinging her head over the edge of the toilet bowl, determined to stay that way.
And now, at 39 My body dysmorphic issues have never really gone away. 3 kids, a bit of therapy, love and admiration from a few hot humans, the stunning devotion of my husband have done their part the mask the issue, to make it sneakier, harder to pin-down, smack around and show it who's boss.
I know enough about the disorder to know it's all about control, my control of my body, my space, my life. My, me, MINE. But like a rather cute therapist from San Francisco once told me: "you're too smart NOT to be crazy". So smart and crazy I sit, horribly uncomfortable in my own skin. It sucks, internets. Truly.
My 8 year old daughter told me last night that a girl in the 4th grade with her is so concerned about her weight that she skips meals!?! At 9 years old. Holy Fuck.
The challenge before me: To not have a starving, puking, self-hating child.
I'm running or walking almost every day now. I'm not complaining in front of the kids about my "Incredible Hulk-ness" and I'm keeping myself off the bathroom floor, for now (It has occurred to me that my disdain for toilet scrubbing and my 4 year old's propensity for getting pee all over the floor may be working to my advantage in this department).
Later.
I think about the moment (moments?) that I went from the young girl who looked in the mirror one day and decided that I would in fact grow up to be pretty *phew* to being the young woman who thought nothing of flinging her head over the edge of the toilet bowl, determined to stay that way.
And now, at 39 My body dysmorphic issues have never really gone away. 3 kids, a bit of therapy, love and admiration from a few hot humans, the stunning devotion of my husband have done their part the mask the issue, to make it sneakier, harder to pin-down, smack around and show it who's boss.
I know enough about the disorder to know it's all about control, my control of my body, my space, my life. My, me, MINE. But like a rather cute therapist from San Francisco once told me: "you're too smart NOT to be crazy". So smart and crazy I sit, horribly uncomfortable in my own skin. It sucks, internets. Truly.
My 8 year old daughter told me last night that a girl in the 4th grade with her is so concerned about her weight that she skips meals!?! At 9 years old. Holy Fuck.
The challenge before me: To not have a starving, puking, self-hating child.
I'm running or walking almost every day now. I'm not complaining in front of the kids about my "Incredible Hulk-ness" and I'm keeping myself off the bathroom floor, for now (It has occurred to me that my disdain for toilet scrubbing and my 4 year old's propensity for getting pee all over the floor may be working to my advantage in this department).
Later.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Cry Baby
Lincoln's tears found him this morning. Damn you, cruel world! Damn you!
Coincidentally (?), he's a few days into flat out BARKING at me. Squealing like a pig all up in my grill many, many times a day.
Told my husband, Lincoln's daddy, the main-man running things, the guy who rocked baby loco to sleep in 10 minutes flat last night, that I remember this time with the other babies; this time that we, the booby-liscious-mommies can at equal intervals, calm our babes with our milk & drive them to the brink of INSANITY with it.
This all means, of course, that he is getting way too big. Too big, too big, too big. Like I said: DAMN YOU!
Coincidentally (?), he's a few days into flat out BARKING at me. Squealing like a pig all up in my grill many, many times a day.
Told my husband, Lincoln's daddy, the main-man running things, the guy who rocked baby loco to sleep in 10 minutes flat last night, that I remember this time with the other babies; this time that we, the booby-liscious-mommies can at equal intervals, calm our babes with our milk & drive them to the brink of INSANITY with it.
This all means, of course, that he is getting way too big. Too big, too big, too big. Like I said: DAMN YOU!
Monday, January 26, 2009
The Wise One Strikes Again
Does anyone really know how you feel?
Is life really good or bad?
Is there only room for good and evil, black and white?
Will we ever find out? Does the truth always have to be told?...
~Ruby, age 8
Is life really good or bad?
Is there only room for good and evil, black and white?
Will we ever find out? Does the truth always have to be told?...
~Ruby, age 8
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Hey Lincoln!
Hi sweet buddy-man. You're sleeping right now; and why not?! It's 10:00AM, why be so *boring* as to sleep at the other 10:00? You're a renegade, baby, and I love you for it.
These past 2 months with you have been an exquisite pleasure. You are lovely, lovely baby. You smiled at 3 weeks, cooed at 4 and laughed at 5; every day, we are reminded of what a gift you are.
Now, I am not naive enough to think it will remain thusly, you being all lovely and all. I've been around the block *with Penelope* and I KNOW that bad moods can happen to good babies. DUDE. I know.
But for now, you are my delicious milkman, my sweet, sweet guy who loves his mama, is calmed by his papa and who sublimely tolerates diaper changes by his sisters. We're a bunch of lucky, stoned-out of our minds mother-fuckers because of you, Lincoln. Thank you, baby. We needed you.
These past 2 months with you have been an exquisite pleasure. You are lovely, lovely baby. You smiled at 3 weeks, cooed at 4 and laughed at 5; every day, we are reminded of what a gift you are.
Now, I am not naive enough to think it will remain thusly, you being all lovely and all. I've been around the block *with Penelope* and I KNOW that bad moods can happen to good babies. DUDE. I know.
But for now, you are my delicious milkman, my sweet, sweet guy who loves his mama, is calmed by his papa and who sublimely tolerates diaper changes by his sisters. We're a bunch of lucky, stoned-out of our minds mother-fuckers because of you, Lincoln. Thank you, baby. We needed you.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
@!#*&!%!$!!!!
Health insurance, health insurance providers (ha!), unions can all kiss my chilly, white ass.
Not that anyone comments, but if you care to comment, do any of you three fearless readers of mine have a POSITIVE anecdote for me? I need hope. Or millions and millions and millions of dollars so I won't care so much any more about getting reimbursed.
Nothing can make me feel so helpless, so at a loss than when I'm dealing with this business. It is crazy making at its most maniacal. And if I were still the hitting-my-head-on-the-wall type, I'd have one helluva cracked skull and if I weren't a wild-animal-starving nursing mother, I'd be contemplating picking up that eating disorder again. Not kidding.
Not that anyone comments, but if you care to comment, do any of you three fearless readers of mine have a POSITIVE anecdote for me? I need hope. Or millions and millions and millions of dollars so I won't care so much any more about getting reimbursed.
Nothing can make me feel so helpless, so at a loss than when I'm dealing with this business. It is crazy making at its most maniacal. And if I were still the hitting-my-head-on-the-wall type, I'd have one helluva cracked skull and if I weren't a wild-animal-starving nursing mother, I'd be contemplating picking up that eating disorder again. Not kidding.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
A departure
So. I've been privately working out more and more what my thoughts are on the election and looming inauguration. I am still thrilled and still a squeamish with said thrilled-ness that we get to get Barack Obama. Holy shit. Barack Obama.
I think a lot about what sort of nasty things will come to a head and what kinds of wonderful forces will repel them. I feel bit the kid in a candy store that I get to live in such a monumentally important point in history.
Back to the nasty things, though. Again, I believe this to be the crux of my own mixed up feelings on whether or not I get to be proud of our next president.
While I really don't think I think that just because I happen to be a white person living in America, that I am equally responsible for the reprehensible things my anscestors did during slavery, I also don't think that just because I happen to be white that I shouldn't get grouped into the herd with fucking yahoos who still perpetuate hate RIGHT NOW. The latter is much trickier for me to peel off.
Here's an email I got from a friend the other day:
"We got through the pediatrician (Phoebe) and the dentist(both kids) with only mild trauma, so I took the kids to the Perkins restaurant in Middletown for lunch to celebrate.
I was thinking, snobbishly, how everyone in the restaurant looked troglodytic, then chastising myself for making assumptions about people based on how they looked. I said something to the kids about how calm they'd been at the dentist's like, "Who's better than you? No one!"
And Phoebe laughed and said, "Well, sometimes some people are better--like Obama!" I felt suddenly self-conscious and worried,
then thought I was being paranoid to think that anyone at the restaurant would have a problem with a 5 year-old being excited about Obama. Well. Here are some snatches of the conversation I overheard at the next table:
"I didn't love him, but McCain..."
"Of the four of them, Sarah Palin was the only one qualified...experience...Alaska..."
[OK, so far it's just the usual Fox News talking points, nothing
revolutionary.]
"And he's not even American!"
[Um...what?]
"Now they're gonna think this evens everything
up..."
"Now one of them is President..."
"The day after the inauguration we're going to be
picking cotton."
[Big laughs over this. Sweet Jesus.]
"Someone's gonna whack him."
"Somebody SHOULD whack him."
[Then some discussion about what method
"somebody" should use. The consensus
is reached that explosives would be best, like "at
that federal building
down there." Holy fuck. I am in a nightmare. The rest
of the conversation
was just as lovely.]
When I went to pay and the manager asked how everything
was, I tried to make a joke about how it was fine except for the racists at the next table and burst out crying, just to add a little embarrassment to the agony.
Why am I always surprised by how awful some people are? And
why do I expect stupid people to be embarrassed by their idiocy and not broadcast it publicly?
I feel really scared about how many people in this country
think EXACTLY the way those guys do. Millions of people. And I don't mean scared for Obama.
That kind of talk--about fearing for his safety--is just a
distraction from the big fucking void at the center of this country where a soul should be. I mean scared for me, my kids, and the future of this country. I'm scared by how empowered these people have become, having been pandered to by the anything-for-a-vote end of the Republican party for so long.
I'm scared that so many people believe this line of thinking goes hand-in-hand with loving God and country. I'm scared that Phoebe's going to say something positive about Obama at school next year and get punched in the face for being a n-lover. I am just sick over it.
Going back into my bubble now."
My friend isn't white, she isn't black, but she isn't white. Like me. Like the fucks who wrecked her lunch.
For months and months I carried around a terrible fear that Obama was going to be assassinated; a sick, palpable fear, now I trust his protection more and more and that agony has been replaced by something not so sinister a thought process and I'm grateful for that because what happened in that nasty little restaurant in upstate NY is what I need to focus on, not how I can protect the life of my president and his family. Because I may be a bad-ass, but let's be serious.
I grew up with my grandmother and other family members talking about n-----s and "those people". I went to an integrated school in Boston in the 70's and I witnessed some maniacal hatred. I never want my kids to be a part of anything like that or like what happened at Perkins. And that's what I think Barack Obama is going to bring; he's going to bring the wonderful forces that will wipe away another layer of shit-spewing ignorance.
I am hopeful that Barack Obama, my black president, will make white people into better people.
I think a lot about what sort of nasty things will come to a head and what kinds of wonderful forces will repel them. I feel bit the kid in a candy store that I get to live in such a monumentally important point in history.
Back to the nasty things, though. Again, I believe this to be the crux of my own mixed up feelings on whether or not I get to be proud of our next president.
While I really don't think I think that just because I happen to be a white person living in America, that I am equally responsible for the reprehensible things my anscestors did during slavery, I also don't think that just because I happen to be white that I shouldn't get grouped into the herd with fucking yahoos who still perpetuate hate RIGHT NOW. The latter is much trickier for me to peel off.
Here's an email I got from a friend the other day:
"We got through the pediatrician (Phoebe) and the dentist(both kids) with only mild trauma, so I took the kids to the Perkins restaurant in Middletown for lunch to celebrate.
I was thinking, snobbishly, how everyone in the restaurant looked troglodytic, then chastising myself for making assumptions about people based on how they looked. I said something to the kids about how calm they'd been at the dentist's like, "Who's better than you? No one!"
And Phoebe laughed and said, "Well, sometimes some people are better--like Obama!" I felt suddenly self-conscious and worried,
then thought I was being paranoid to think that anyone at the restaurant would have a problem with a 5 year-old being excited about Obama. Well. Here are some snatches of the conversation I overheard at the next table:
"I didn't love him, but McCain..."
"Of the four of them, Sarah Palin was the only one qualified...experience...Alaska..."
[OK, so far it's just the usual Fox News talking points, nothing
revolutionary.]
"And he's not even American!"
[Um...what?]
"Now they're gonna think this evens everything
up..."
"Now one of them is President..."
"The day after the inauguration we're going to be
picking cotton."
[Big laughs over this. Sweet Jesus.]
"Someone's gonna whack him."
"Somebody SHOULD whack him."
[Then some discussion about what method
"somebody" should use. The consensus
is reached that explosives would be best, like "at
that federal building
down there." Holy fuck. I am in a nightmare. The rest
of the conversation
was just as lovely.]
When I went to pay and the manager asked how everything
was, I tried to make a joke about how it was fine except for the racists at the next table and burst out crying, just to add a little embarrassment to the agony.
Why am I always surprised by how awful some people are? And
why do I expect stupid people to be embarrassed by their idiocy and not broadcast it publicly?
I feel really scared about how many people in this country
think EXACTLY the way those guys do. Millions of people. And I don't mean scared for Obama.
That kind of talk--about fearing for his safety--is just a
distraction from the big fucking void at the center of this country where a soul should be. I mean scared for me, my kids, and the future of this country. I'm scared by how empowered these people have become, having been pandered to by the anything-for-a-vote end of the Republican party for so long.
I'm scared that so many people believe this line of thinking goes hand-in-hand with loving God and country. I'm scared that Phoebe's going to say something positive about Obama at school next year and get punched in the face for being a n-lover. I am just sick over it.
Going back into my bubble now."
My friend isn't white, she isn't black, but she isn't white. Like me. Like the fucks who wrecked her lunch.
For months and months I carried around a terrible fear that Obama was going to be assassinated; a sick, palpable fear, now I trust his protection more and more and that agony has been replaced by something not so sinister a thought process and I'm grateful for that because what happened in that nasty little restaurant in upstate NY is what I need to focus on, not how I can protect the life of my president and his family. Because I may be a bad-ass, but let's be serious.
I grew up with my grandmother and other family members talking about n-----s and "those people". I went to an integrated school in Boston in the 70's and I witnessed some maniacal hatred. I never want my kids to be a part of anything like that or like what happened at Perkins. And that's what I think Barack Obama is going to bring; he's going to bring the wonderful forces that will wipe away another layer of shit-spewing ignorance.
I am hopeful that Barack Obama, my black president, will make white people into better people.
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