Haven't killed any relatives today.

It is rainy and gloomy and dark out today, the kind of weather I normally love because it inspired introspection but seems to just have everyone (especially my sweetie) in a funk.  I am just feeling helpless since my son came home with more math work today that might as well be written in Chinese because I never came close to that level in school. And he is only in 8th grade.  Poor boy is screwed.  It wouldn't be so bad but he is harder on himself than anyone else is and I hate to see him beat himself up over this stuff.  Work is going well but today the supervisors were given the paperwork to fill out basically stating where we want to be in the next year. What our goals are.  Do we want to push to move up in the company or maybe branch out and learn other parts of the company other than what we specialize in.  UUuuugggggg!  I hate this stuff.  There is a part of me that wants to write that I am still looking for a position in the company that requires the LEAST amount of work for the most amount of pay possible. LOL I don't think my manager would see the humor in that like I do.  I know that these things are good to do if anything to keep us from getting complacent in our positions but I really am not in a state of mind to be thinking of my future with this company.  Or my future in any way I guess.  Still feeling post vacation don't give a shit attitude and even feeling a little bulletproof right now.  Hopefully I can bite my tongue till that passes.  The last couple times it has rained it was a sunny clear sky kind of rain and I watched from the window.  Today is one of the moods I want to run outside barefoot and play in it and that's all cool but the amount of lightening is making me rethink that idea and I hate feeling like I have to choice but to behave myself.  Of course there is always a choice but I don't think living or becoming a human lightening rod is that hard of a choice.  This morning was delightful with all the rain since the a/c and heat is kaput in my car.  If you wanna know what a redneck defroster/defogger is it is rolling down your car windows in the rain to keep the windshield from fogging over only to get your passenger side seat soaked.  Rented Silver Linings Playbook from the redbox on the way home which I have been eager to watch.  Not just because of who is in it but mostly because of the subject matter.  What I am afraid of seeing is a whitewashed Hollywood take on a potentially raw subject.  I hope that isn't the case.  It would be nice to see a movie about these kind of issues and feel like someone actually gets it.  I guess I will see shortly. It hasn't cracked any lightening for a while maybe I could pop outside for a moment.

I am the WORST daughter EVER...and my mom still loves me

Well I could blame it on the shellshock of my first day back at work or too much blonde hair color has soaked into my brain but whatever the reason I made the dumbest mistake I have EVER made in my life today so of course let me share my humiliation with the blogosphere... So I am sitting in the breakroom at lunch having finished my soup and salad and since I started lunch a little early was sitting alone a little bored and decided to log onto facebook.  Just as one of my friends joins me at the table I see a post by one of my cousins which I read as she suffered a loss her mother (my mothers sister) passed away last night.  Now my mother and this particular sister don't keep in touch like they should and we know she is in very poor health so this was a surprise but not.  Knowing my mother and sister were at work also they would not have seen this post yet.  So I called my dad.  He tells me he will drive to my mothers work and tell her.  I then text my sister a few minutes later to let her know.  She texts me back a few minutes later calling me an idiot telling me NO it was a friend of her moms that passed away.  Uh-oh.  I then tell her omg I told dad and he went to tell mom.  Well we didn't catch him in time and he had just told her.  So he gets in his car to leave and gets a text from my sister saying our aunt is ok.  So he walks back in the building and says I got good news...wrong person your sister isn't dead.  So after a panic filled text to my mom apologizing and begging her not to be mad at me and a teary car ride home I receive a text about 2 minutes from our house saying she knows it wasn't on purpose and she loves me.  whew!  I am so lucky to have a wonderful mom like I do and in a house where the weak are picked apart and fed to the dogs I have been the butt of endless jokes (mostly from my sis) about killing off relatives.  I am taking my licks like I should I screwed up.  Work itself was good today and I know this is a story that will be shared at family gatherings for some time now.  Even as I wrote this a light bulb blew out as my father was watching one of those Ghost chasers shows and when I joked maybe we have ghosts my sister chimes in maybe it's our aunt.  Have I mentioned how much I love living with my family lately? Didn't think so.

Time to wake up and smell the chai

Yes nine glorious days over time to face reality tomorrow.  I have sneaked into my work a couple of times with the excuse of picking up a couple of things and whenever I glanced in the direction of my department which is in the very front of the store and hard to miss I wanted to cry so I am not looking forward to tomorrow but on the flip side my day should fly by.  I have enjoyed yummy food cooked from scratch, homemade ice cream, do it yourself facials and manicures, time to listen to music and catch up on movies, beautiful walks in the mornings after my favorite thing of my day(driving my amazing son to school).  I love the time we spend in the car listening to music.  He has been a Beatles fan since I got my first ipod when he was 5 and I was able to download all my favorites.  I have my very healthy lunch ready to take to work tomorrow and car full of gas.  I am going to make an effort this week to do more.  More enjoying,more playing, more listening.  Sometimes we get so caught up in what we want to say we forget to hear others around us.  Maybe the fact I have been on here more the last few days letting it all out is accounting for my quietness today.  If thats so then need to remember to do this more often too.  My next vacation comes around the beginning of July and I have already decided that no matter how much I enjoyed this next time we get away for a few days.  I love my family but they are freakin nuts sometimes.  My husband teases me that when I am stressed or frustrated or angry( which is most of the time) I crinkle my forehead and he said I am starting to get lines in between my eyebrows he says it's my Klingon face.  I have spent the week making those lines disappear lets see how quickly they come back after I clock in tomorrow.  One of my friends and my former superviser announced she is leaving her work to be a full time stay at home mom.  Her little ones are about 4 and 1 year old so the decision for her between work and motherhood was easy.  I stayed home with our kids until my youngest started school full time and then I only worked while he was in school.  This was back when my husband was still working 6 days a week and we could afford that.  Do I miss that stay at home time...hell yes.  I was very hands on and we were always doing stuff.  Now he is 13 and doesn't need me there to watch him every second.  I think even if I were to lose the job I have now I am developing my own business I would like to start and that would get more of my attention now.  I am babbling now not because I cannot sleep but because I know it is time to go to sleep.  Uuuuggggg. 

On a rant today

As superstitious as I am I hate to go jinxing things and commenting on how nice of a day today has been before it is even over but it really is a nice family Sunay here.  Hanging out with my two favorite fellas watching comedy shows and listening to good music before the meds set in an zombie man takes over my husband.  Read an op-ed on Nation of Change that bothered me a little and I have to speak my mind a little here.  It was regarding social security/ disability and the number of able minded able bodied people who collect and sit on their butts living off of us "work beasts".  I wholeheartedly agree there are hoards of people taking advantage of this system that should not be on it and do not deny there are scammers out there.  BUT especially in reference to the people who suffer from mental or psychological disorders; how do you judge a moment in someones day or someones life for that matter and say oh they can't be depressed they are at the beach or they went to a concert with friends nothing wrong with them.  I make jokes about my husbands condition sometimes or usual phrases that may seem a little flippant but it is only because I have been living with this man over 16 years now and watching him battle this disease all those years.  Watched him slowly fade and shrink from the charismatic,charming,energetic hands on father to a man who sits in a room daily afraid to leave the house.  He has missed school functions,birthday celebrations, days at the beach or the park or the movies.  Now the occasions I have managed to pull him from the sanctuary of his bed I have either had to beg, threaten, or fight to get him to leave and when we got out to maybe a restarant or a grocery store it was then a battle to have him not behave like Robin Williams on speed or some raging idiot who starts a fight with someone who looked at him the wrong way.  9 times out of ten these little excursions end up nobody being happy an my husband slipping of into a two day medication induced sleep.  I am so sick of hearing about the crooks and moochers and freeloaders who sit on their asses and do nothing while others(and I am one of those others)work their asses off through sickness,aches and pains and all else.  Ask me about the day he texted me from work talking about ending it all and how I finished working my shift before rushing home to him and spent the evening getting him admitted to a psych center only to get home at 3a.m. and go in to work at 5 a.m. and work an eight hour shift.  Not just the physical exhaustion but the psychological turmoil of having to tell total strangers you are afraid of walking in one day and finding your husbands brains on the wall.  I get we are all frustrated with people using the system and taking advantage of our government but how about we learn to look a little closer at who is "faking" and who is legit.  And anyone who thinks the process of applying for these benefits is quick or easy has obviously never been through this with someone.  My favorite aunt suffered a stroke some years ago and was left partially paralyzed an completely blind.  It was about two years later she passed away.  Her first disability check arrived in the mail three days after her funeral.  And her family couldn't even use that money to help with her funeral costs since they had to send it back to the gov.

Brain Soup

Tonight I seem to be having brain soup issues.  To explain, I call dreams brain soup.  When you dream you obviously cannot control what goes on in your head and I think that excluding the usual themes, being chased, being nake in public, falling , flying, etc. everything else in your dreams is just random bits of things in your head that you have come across recently.  Maybe your 4th grade teacher is in a dream, probably because you saw something that made you think of him or her and it was just a brief flash but you brain pulled up that info and used them as a character.  Okay it isn't science but it's my personal theory and dealing with my hubby and the sometimes disturbing dreams he has and how shaken he is by them I find myself telling him this more and more that no matter how bad the dream was it was just brain soup and it doesn't mean anything.  For whatever reason tonight I am having waking brain soup where just random stuff is flying in and out of my head like it's a beehive.  Cannot focus on any of it though.  Maybe I have had a little too much zen time and relaxation...is that possible.  Need to shake things up a little.  NNaaahhhh what the heck am I thinking.  Some good strong coffee to straighten out my brain and some artistic expression is just what the doctor ordered here.  Well strong coffee for sure.  Damn brain soup.

One More Day

So the vacation Gods have smiled down on me this week when I logged on to my work site to double check I work tomorrow morning because I have not looked at the schedule all week I saw that my manager decided to give me the entire weekend off though I only asked for Saturday.  I normally work every Sunday no matter what and was in shock to see this and although there is a little teeny tiny voice inside me saying call work and see if they want me tomorrow( and they will) there is the much louder voice screaming SHUT UP BITCH!  I don't want to anger that voice anymore so I will be enjoying an extra day.  My dear sweetie is in a downswing right now with his moods and I am struggling to be supportive while still pushing him a little to lighten up.  I know depression is not something you just decide to get over but every now and then he needs a kick in the ass to get him out of a self induced hole.  Now he is facing the idea of his aunt and uncle (like parents to him) giving up their house that he spent most of his childhood in and where we have always stayed when we go to visit.  It is a fact of life.  We lose people and things and places get paved over and if you are in a John Cusack movie they get turned into a minimart. (Grosse Pointe Blank is on my top ten list of movies) We move on.  He says I am cold and unfeeling but really one of us has to be the one to face our kid with a smile on their face and say good morning every day and it isn't him.  So who knows what the rest of the day holds for us and I like not knowing.  There are days I am so overwhelmed by the beauty around me I end up bursting into tears.  Yeah I know it's weird I'm the normal one in this relationship.  Doesn't anyone else just see a sky so freakin amazing it gets to you. 

Thumb of Death

Every spring I am filled with the uncontrollable desire to grow something.  It  has been that way since I was a little girl planting my snapdragon seeds in a small planter outside of our little duplex growing up.  By June I am reminded of why in all these years of planting things I have never actually GROWN anything.  This year I continued the tradition with three packs of "living herbs".  I do love to cook and am always buying fresh herbs so I was delighted to see that Target sells the fresh herbs in their produce section but they still have their roots and can be replanted.  Oh Yes all the work done for me all I have to do is repot in another container.  Oh and keep them from dying! Thats pretty important too.  So I pick the three I use most often, basil,rosemary, and cilantro.  I was most happy about the cilantro since I put it in most of the things I cook.  Haahaha.  So my basil is actually doing allright.  I wont say it looks perfect but I am using it as much as I can, made pizza and caprese salad, among other things.  The rosemary is half...ok three quarters dead but I still am working on the one branch of it left that is somewhat green. Then there is the cilantro.  I know it looks like just a pot of dirt since all of the cilantro dried up and fell off within two days of bringing it home but I know somewhere deep down there are roots in that soil and they will come back to life.  Everyone else in the house believes otherwise.  In this house you are either the butt of someones jokes or you are making them.  There is no room for thin skinned in this family.  Needless to say my black thumb of death is a great source of amusement to my family and everyday when I water my cilantro(is it really a plant or just roots) whatever I hear the snickers and comments.  What is it about the sunshine and fresh air and 70 degree temperatures that causes this delusion in me to flare up.  Just wondering I guess.  I am not admitting defeat yet.  After spending 5 dollars on pots,13 dollars on plant food for herbs, 8 dollars on soil, and 15 dollars on herbs I will get my 40 plus dollars worth of basil and maybe rosemary chicken for dinner tonight.  Oh i love spring.

Forty wha!!??

At least once a day I have a discussion with a customer at work, always women in their fifties and above, usually women who are regular customers in my store and who I have helped find items before.  This time of year the conversation becomes more frequent as the weather gets warmer and the sleeves on ladies clothes get shorter and shorter.  What is it about women that they will wear sweaters with Christmas trees crocheted on them or t shirts calling them sexy grandma but they will not under any circumstances buy a shirt or dress they like because it has short sleeves or no sleeves.  Really? I don't get it.  Now I am a plus size girl and working on that but I have noticed at work I have gotten used to showing my arms more and I am more comfortable with it now than I was at 18 when I was a size 8 and worked out daily.  But there is nothing wrong with these ladies arms except they are getting a little jiggle in them.  I know it's a silly thing but I find it weird that at 41(not till June but I add the extra year on a little early to adjust to it) I am more comfortable in my skin than I ever was.  There are a lot of things about getting older my mother never shared and one day I will thoroughly thank her for that but I now get those "little old ladies" I see out sometimes well into their 70's and 80's acting like kids...why...because we are all still kids at heart.  I still want to activate all of the singing dancing toys when I go down the toy aisle in a store, I am still tempted to grab the microphone at the register of the grocery store and call out "Cleanup in aisle 42".  I still initiate an icecube  fight every now and then.  We never really grow up at all do we.  Some of us get hardened by life and I understand that but I believe there are some of us lucky enough that we will always be peter pan inside.  How I wish more people felt that way.  When is the last time you saw an adult sitting outside on a spring day or evening blowing bubbles. Or catching fireflies. Or drawing on the sidewalk with chalk.  Maybe I have a little spring fever here but I know this is a good thing. 

Best Vacation EVER!!!

I am on the best vacation I have ever had and looking at that statement I realize it is kinda sad , what does that say about past vacations?) but also not sad cause I am loving this.  No trips, no travel, no packing, no plans. Just eight days of doing whatever I want to do.  And what I want to do is learn a few things, do some soul searching, give some quality time to my family, and enjoy an appreciate every second of it all.  Not so easy living in someone elses house but it is possible.  My father likes to keep the television on cnn all day and that does really throw a wrench in things.  Try blocking out 24 hour coverage of the Boston bombings.  I am all for reporting the news but I definitely see a change in our media today that EVERY aspect of an incident is pulled apart and analyzed and dissected over and over and you hope that not everybody is sitting in front of a tv glue to this not moving forward in any way.  I grew up feeling in my heart I was a democrat.  We were working class and in the early 80's the republicans were the epitamy of evil greed.  They were big business pulling the strings while my parents both worked through illness and aches and pains just to make ends meet.  When I became old enough to vote right before Clinton's first run for president I was so excited to stand in line for two hours with my mother who was also voting for her first time ever.  When I look back at how black and white I saw things it is almost embarrassing.  I no longer consider myself a democrat or connect with any particular political party.  I view all politicians now with the same clear lenses wondering what kind of wolf is hiding under the sheep suit.  The recent betrayal by so many who promised to make changes to our gun laws in the wake of a tragedy only to cower to the NRA when it was time for action confirmed what I have so recently learned.  The media is no better.  The bombing in Boston was truely horrific and tragic and deserves to be reported.  The stories of bravery in those moments and the people who stepped up to help others we need to hear those things.  Why do we give not as much but MORE attention to the alleged fiends who committed the act.  Why do we need to know every minute detail of their lives.  I don't care where they went to school, what they studied, what kind of a child they were.  You dishonor the real heroes in this when you continue to focus on these young men.  Then there is the loss of life in Texas and how that seems to have been given almost no coverage why, no way to sensationalize that story with no villan.  It all is just a reflection of our society today.