Category: Life in general

Categories
Blogging Business Life in general

On Fire

A fire burns, low and deep, embers glowing red.

It hides behind my eyes, averted, burning holes into those who look too long.

Cool to the touch, an icy facade, the fire is mine alone.

Fire and ice, fire and ice, battle to the death beneath my skin.  Burned raw, sprayed with mace.

Sweet, sweet victory.

Dre.  I am.  Fire and ice, burning bright.  Look.  See.  I am setting her free.

Finally.

*********

The Sweet Life is being retired!  The uber talented Jenn is creating a beautiful space that is much more… me.  Details to come, soon!

Categories
Life in general

Only a Minor Annoyance

Rencently I read somewhere that you should blog about the things that keep you up at night, because, chances are, those things are keeping someone else up at night, too.

I wish I knew where I read that, so that I could credit the genius who said it, and also so that we could all go soak up some more of his or her wisdom.

So, I’m working on a post that’s going to take me awhile to get just right.  It’s something that I wasn’t sure I’d ever write about, but it’s a subject that has kept me up more than a few times in the last few years.  Maybe it keeps you up, too?  Or not.  Either way, I’m working on it.

In the meantime, I’ll tell you about a minor annoyance I’ve been dealing with for the past year. 

My brother-in-law lived with us (well, technically not in the house, but in the guest house, which was bad enough) for about 6 months last year.  We were happy to help him while he and his wife were separated*.

Without going into too much detail about the man’s personal woe’s, let me just say that there were quite a few collections agencies and various legal-type persons trying to get ahold of my brother-in-law.

Which doesn’t really effect me, right?  It’s his business, not mine.

Except.  When he moved out, somehow every. single. one. of the people trying to find him suddenly had our phone number as his, our address as his.  I find it very interesting that he would give out my home number, when there isn’t even a phone line in the guest house.

Every day for 365 days, I have received, at minimum, 10 automated collections calls for my brother-in-law.  My phone rings all damn day, 7 days a week. 

It’s gotten to the point that I don’t answer my home phone.  It’s never for me, so why should I bother?  And since it’s automated, and they begin the call with, “If this is not *insert brother-in-law’s name* please hang up.  It is illegal for you to listen to the following message.”  I can’t even stay on the line to try and get a real person who could take my freaking phone number off of this particular account.

I’m thinking about changing our phone number, because every time the phone rings my blood pressure goes up.  Especially when I’ve just gotten the kids to bed, you know what I mean?  They do tend to prefer calling between 7-9 in the evening, when I need the house to be quiet.

Yes, I’m mildly annoyed.  And I’m considering giving my brother-in-law’s number to every single charity

*It should be noted that when I say “we” I really mean my husband, and I happen to love him.

Categories
Flashback Life in general

Where Did You Get Engaged?? Um…. Sizzler.

Let’s lighten things up around here, shall we? 

Everytime we pass the Sizzler in our hometown, Jeremy points to it and says, “Hey, there’s your favorite place!” and then he laughs for at least twenty minutes.  Ha. Ha. Ha.

The Back Story:

When I was a senior in high school and knew everything there was to know, I had a boyfriend.

He was a few years older than me, but was… how shall I say… inexperienced in the ways of women.  I mean, completely inexperienced.

I found his perceived innocence to be rather endearing.  A guy like that is kind of like a puppy, right?  You get to train him before he develops any bad habits.

We had been dating for about 5 months when he asked me if we could take his mom to dinner for Mother’s Day.  This guy, you know, he was a natty dresser and drove a cool car, had impeccable grammar and spelling, a nice smile, wonderful manners.  But none of that could be attributed to where he came from, capisce?

So I was loathe to take his rather loud mother, who had a knack for making inappropriate comments at the most inopportune times, to a nice restaurant.

I suggested Denny’s.  A place where she’d fit right in.

He said we needed to take her somewhere nicer than Denny’s.  He wanted to take her to my “favorite restaurant”, and all I had to do was name the place.  I had learned my lesson about taking his mom to nice restaurants a few months earlier – it just wasn’t going to happen.

So I said Sizzler.  That was as classy as I was going to go, and I wouldn’t budge.  No way in hell his mom was going to set foot in my favorite places, I liked those restaurants and didn’t want to be embarassed by her. 

I was 17, remember?  And I knew all there was to know.
 
Cut to the Sizzler parking lot.  We pull in, and I notice my good friend’s car.  Puppy says, no, it must just be a car that looks like hers.  Five months in and he hasn’t figured out I have a photographic memory, yet?  That’s her license plate, which means, duh, that’s her car.

He says, hmmmm, I don’t know, we’ll see if she’s inside.  She isn’t, which should have clued me in that something was going on, right?  But it didn’t.  So much for knowing all there is to know.

We were taking his uncouth mom to dinner at Sizzler, and that’s all there was to it.

Except.  During dinner, the server brought over a bowl with a box in it.  In the box was a ring.  Puppy proposed, one knee resting on the filthy floor of our local Sizzler’s.  In front of his mother.

The whole place applauded.  Which was deafening, given the cafeteria-style accoustics in the Sizzler dining rom.

Let’s just say, Puppies?  You don’t necessarily need to marry the first girl who teaches you a few things.

And girls?  Just cause a guy is a Puppy doesn’t mean he’s innocent or incapable of hurting you. 

Even puppies nip.  And pee on the rug in front of your friends. 

And pick up a few bad habits from their mothers.

**I’m guest posting  over at Let’s Talk Babies today!  Head on over!**

Categories
Health and Nutrition Life in general

Change

Put yourself in her shoes.  A moment is all I ask.

You’re a woman.

A mother.  A wife.  A daughter.  A sister.  A friend.  An employee.

You are many things to many people. 

You don’t feel well, but you press on.  Time passes, and your husband encourages you to go to the doctor.

Your employer doesn’t offer health insurance, and you can’t afford to pay for private-pay coverage – not with 5 mouths to feed and bills to pay, not since your husband was laid off when the economy tanked. 

Your family qualifies for medicaid , as long as your income stays low, and so your husband works only part time, keeping you just below the cut-off.  You can’t risk not having health coverage for your kids.

So you try to go to the doctor and you are refused, time and time again, because few doctors will take Medicaid patients and those who do, aren’t accepting new patients.  You call your former doctor, sure he will see you, and learn he has retired.

Your symptoms persist, get worse.

You go to the local clinic and are told you probably have “woman problems”.  Probably.  Have woman problems.  Whatever the hell that means. 

Finally, you find a doctor who will see you, and he tells you, point blank, that he doesn’t like to take Medicaid patients.  As he examines your abdomen, he says yes, he can feel something.  It’s probably ovarian cysts.  Probably.  He gives you a prescription for pain killers and tells you to come back in 6 months if you’re still having problems.

The months pass.  Your symptoms have worsened, and the pain meds only slightly dull the pain.  You can hardly function, barely get through the day, but you’ve used all your sick time and are afraid to be fired if you don’t show up for work.  Your family needs that paycheck. 

You call for an appointment and are told that the soonest the doctor can see you is 3 months from now.  Because you’re on Medicaid, and there are only so many slots available.

You suffer.  Your family suffers with you, because the pain is so severe, so horrendous.  You’ve lost your appetite, overcome with relentless nausea.  Your friends and family comment on how pale you look.

Finally, you get in to see the doctor.  Again, he complains about your Medicaid.  Makes you feel like you’re the scum on the bottom of his shoe.  He looks at your file, listens to your complaints.  Without even examining you, he writes you a new prescription for a different pain medication.  Tells you that if you’re still not well in six months, he’ll discuss a hysterectomy with you.  Because you probably have woman issues.  Probably.

More time passes, and you are in so much pain that you can barely walk.  Getting into the car one day, you feel as though something in your abdomen has burst.  The pain is unbearable, like nothing you have ever felt.  You are rushed to the ER.

The CAT scan reveals two large tumors.  The one on your colon is 5 cm in diameter.  The one on your liver is a whopping 12 cm.  A biopsy concludes that they are malignant.

“There are a few treatment options,” the oncologist says, “but so many more if we’d caught it sooner.”

If only someone had taken you seriously when you first sought medical attention.

There is nothing left to do, but hope, and weep, and wonder what could have been. 

If only.

She has a name, a face, a history.  Likes, dislikes, passions.

Her name is Rachel.

She has a wonderful smile, an infectious laugh.

She works hard, pays her taxes. 

Maybe you support healthcare reform.  Possibly, you oppose it.  Perhaps you don’t know what to think.

Is this what Rachel deserves, America?  Is this the kind of healthcare that anyone should have to live with?  To die with?

This much I know is true:

Rachel is not the only one.  Politicians can spout off statistics all day long, but who are the people behind them?  What are their names?  What are their stories?  

Put yourself in any of their shoes, only for a moment.  And then dare to tell me that nothing needs to change.

Categories
Kids Life in general

Boundaries

Recently, my mom took Alison to the library – two book worms, engrossed in words – one of their favorite activities.

They came home earlier than expected, and my mom said it was either that, or barf on the library floor.

It seems there was a girl child, somewhere between Blythe’s age (3) and Alison’s (6) who was sent to the children’s section of the library for some “alone time” while her guardian – whoever that may have been, for that person never made an appearance in the hour they were there – attended to other things in the adult section of the library.

Don’t even get me started on that, by the way.  A 4 or 5 year old child, left to her own devices in the children’s section of the library, for an hour or more?  It’s something I cannot fathom.

Anyway, the child in question did not know how to read.  She saw my mom and Alison reading books, and asked my mom, obviously a Grandma but no less a stranger, to read her a Sponge Bob book. 

My mom looked around for her guardian, and saw no one.  Since Alison is beyond needing to be read to, and the child looked at her with pleading eyes, she agreed.

The little girl proceeded to crawl up into a hesitant stranger’s lap for story time.

At first, my mom didn’t mind.  But as they read, the child’s fingers wandered to her nostrils.  The further the girl’s finger went into her nose, the more uncomfortable my mom got.  She has never been one to tolerate nose picking.  But what do you say to a child you don’t even know about the hazards of boogar picking?

The child pointed to Sponge Bob with the nose-picking finger, and my  mom suppressed a gag.  She was touching books, the same books her grandchildren read, with a boogar-laced finger.

Since my mom couldn’t gag and read aloud at the same time, the child grew impatient, and began to rub her snotty finger on my mom’s leg, begging her to continue reading.

Thankfully, it was a fairly short book, and my mom got through it without actually vomiting on the child or the library carpet.  The little girl announced her need to pee, and ran off to the bathroom – again with no guardian in sight.

My mom looked at Alison, engrossed in a book. 

“Pssst” she whispered. 

Alison looked at her.

“We need to get out of here right now.”

“But I’m not done with my book,” Alison replied.

My mom looked at the clock.  She had three to five minutes, at best, to get the hell out of there before the nose-picker came back.

“We need to go now, Alison, and I’ll explain why in the car.”

Alison looked at her half-read book, unaware of my mom’s mounting panic.  “Can I just finish this one?”

My mom shook her head.  “I’ll take you to Burger King and get you a Kid’s Meal if you’ll walk away right this minute.”

Alison knew a good deal when she saw it.  They hightailed it out of there.

And in the car, my mom explained why they needed to leave while the child was in the bathroom. 

My mom, you see, was torn between a child that clearly needed some adult attention, and her own phobia of Other People’s Boogars.  Blythe’s boogars, Alison’s snot – those she can handle.  But some stranger kid’s nose pickings?  There is no way. 

She knew if they were still there when the little girl got back, she’d end up covered in them, because she simply cannot say, “no” to a sad little girl who wants to be read to.

And if she did, she knew that she’d continue to gag.  She saw no other choice but to run away.

When they got home, my mom immediately removed her boogary pants and put on clean ones. To my surprise, she didn’t burn them.  Because when I was a kid?  That’s exactly what she would have done.